Request: Automatically make Subscribers into Authorized Users for private forums

[mattengland]

I would like Nabble 2 to automatically make Subscribers into Authorized Users for private forums.

As I understand it, this would allow me to subscribe people to my forums via the convenient 'Add Subscribers' form and allow said subscribers to also read/post on via the forum web interface (assuming they register their said email address...?) without my (as a forum owner) having to manually do this via the 'Authorized Users' section of the 'Who Can View / Post?' (which is quite cumbersome).

Thoughts?

Thanks for any help,
-Matt

[Will <Nabble>]

Thanks for the suggestion, but I'm not sure if this feature makes sense.

One reason is that when you add a subscriber, he may or may not become a Nabble user. He could just subscribe and never register, thus accessing your forum content entirely from email. So, to us, when you add a subscriber, we don't have a user id associated with that subscriber, so we can't add a subscriber as as he is a user.

Does this make sense?

But on the other hand, I do see your point. If the subscriber becomes a registered user, and he wants to go to the forum to see stuff, he should automatically be able to enter that forum. Is that what you want?

[mattengland]

Will <Nabble> wrote:
>But on the other hand, I do see your point. If the subscriber becomes a
>registered user, and he wants to go to the forum to see stuff, he should
>automatically be able to enter that forum. Is that what you want?

Yep. :)

>One reason is that when you add a subscriber, he may or may not become a
>Nabble user. He could just subscribe and never register, thus accessing
>your forum content entirely from email. So, to us, when you add a
>subscriber, we don't have a user id associated with that subscriber,
>so we can't add a subscriber as as he is a user.
>Does this make sense?

Yep.  My thoughts regarding alternatives:

* Add a checkbox to the 'Add Subscribers' form that provides an option
to auto-enable said subscribers to also become registered users.

However, this starts down the path of cluttering your intereface and
beginning to confuse your users/admins as well as still enabling "modes"
for various subscribers/users (some are email-only, some are not) which
may not be a great design paradigm--alas, maybe only my opinion. Since
Nabble (or at least N2) does such a good job in this arena, it may be
best to follow the good user-interaction conventions y'all present keep
options minimal.  And as such I would advise...

* Consider that it doesn't hurt anything (presumably) to enable
subscribers to be registered users (once they actually register-confirm)
even if they never visit the forum.

This might keep things more simple; fewer users/subscribers with
"different" modes/settings.  Possibly cleaner UI. etc.

Thoughts?

[Will <Nabble>]

Thanks for your thoughts. I'm really glad that you understand the Nabblers' obsession with keeping things simple. Let me forward this to the team and we will think of a solution. But this is not a very high priority because it's mainly an infrequent convenience issue.

[mattengland]

Will <Nabble> wrote

Let me forward this to the team and we will think of a solution. But this is not a very high priority because it's mainly an infrequent convenience issue.

Ok.  fyi, here's where it gets annoying for me:

I susbcribe hundreds of email addresses to a private Nabble forum (which effectively makes it an email list).  In order to get every subscriber web-forum access, I have to, one by one, manually add each email address to the  'Authorized Users' list.  An extremely cumbersome endeavor for hundreds of email addresses, because the  'Authorized Users' form only allows you to add one account/email at a time--unlike the 'Add Subscribers' form which provides a text block to add a list of email addresses all at once.

Here's a potential comprimise: could the 'Authorized Users' form allow a "list" input of accounts/email addresses like the 'Add Subscribers' form does?  This would tremendously alleviate the heartache of manual entry of hundreds of email lists (I'd enter the list twice--once for email subscribers, once for forum subscribers).  Otherwise, I don't think I can feasibly manage my larger email lists via Nabble; it would just take too long and would be too error prone to enter by hand.