Introducing the New Discussion Creation Experience
A new create and edit experience for Discussion topics is coming soon to Falcon Online. Here is an preview of this update so that you can review, prepare, and raise any questions you may have. This update will be opt-in so after the next update on 27 April, you will see this screen when you first create or edit a topic in the discussion tool.
Once you make a selection the panel will minimize to an arrow that you can use to access the panel to move between the classic and new experience.
Consistent layout
The redesigned create and edit screen for Discussion topics has the same layout as in Assignments and Quizzes, making it familiar and easy to learn.
The primary panel on the left contains common, frequently used fields that are always displayed. These fields are most relevant to learners and are core to topic creation.
The right-hand panel organizes additional, more advanced options such as start and end dates, and release conditions. These options follow the same logical groupings as found in Assignments and Quizzes.
While the right-hand groupings are collapsed, the summary text provides details about which settings are active so you can see which settings are applied at a glance.
Notable changes
Beyond the restructuring of the topic creation page for consistency, the new experience also includes updates and wording changes to a few settings that you may be familiar with. These changes are designed to simplify workflows and to align more closely with our Daylight patterns. Let’s review these changes.
Automatically create a new forum with same name and visibility as a new topic
To streamline getting started with the Discussions tool, new topics will create a new forum of the same name and same visibility. This eliminates the requirement of creating a forum prior to creating a topic when first building out the discussions area in Brightspace. For example, a new topic titled, “Introduction” which is marked as visible to learners, will automatically associate and generate a new, visible forum titled, “Introduction”. Once saved, topics and forums behave as they do today and become independently managed. For greater flexibility with this behavior, users can leverage the Change Forum workflow to edit the name of the newly created forum or associate the current topic with an existing forum.
Checkboxes now radio buttons for Allow anonymous posts and Users must start a thread
Previously, the settings of Allow anonymous posts and Users must start a thread were independent checkboxes that could only have one selection at a time. These capabilities persist in the new creation experience but now appear as a set of radio buttons.
- A new radio option of Default participation has been added and is equivalent to neither Allow anonymous posts nor Users must start a thread being selected in classic.
- The radio option of Allow learners to hide their name from other learners has updated wording and is equivalent to Allow anonymous posts being selected in classic.
- The radio option of Learners must start a thread before they can view or reply to other threads has updated wording and is equivalent to Users must start a thread before they can read and reply to other threads being selected in classic.
An illustrated diagram below shows these settings and how they appear today in classic and how they will appear going forward in the new experience.
Topic type selector replaced by Manage Restrictions workflow
The radio buttons for selecting a topic type have been replaced by an updated Manage Restrictions workflow in the new experience. Like today, all new topics in the new experience start as an “open topic”. To change an open topic to either a group or section restricted topic or to a restricted topic with separate threads, open the Availability Dates & Conditions accordion and launch into the Manage Restrictions workflow to add a restriction.
Restricting topic and separate threads
To restrict a topic so that learners can only view threads from their group or section, choose the radio option Restrict topic and separate threads in the new Manage Restrictions workflow.
Restricting topic using groups and section restrictions
To restrict a topic so that only selected groups and sections of users can view a topic and all threads, choose the radio option of Restrict topic in the new Manage Restrictions workflow.
Full functionality
With this first release of the new discussion creation experience, there are no known functional gaps when compared to classic discussion topic creation.
What's next
As previously mention you can move between the classic and new experience. However, with the July 2023 update, the new experience will become the default and only view.
Bill Harrison
Director, IT - Training and Instructional Resources
bill.harrison@daytonastate.edu | 386.506.4306