EPIC: User Group Improvements

[arnaumonty]

This is an EPIC for UserGroups Improvements

Summary

The UserGroups in Decidim it needs several improvements to enhance their behaviour and the participation experience of collective actors in the platform.

EPIC motivation

Any UserGroup has to be a group of users of Decidim. Today is limited to one user. The UserGroups should be administrated by more than one user, and should have a public profile with the identification of the UserGroup is different than a User. The UserGroups can be represented by any organization or collective who wants to interact in the platform as the collective, and this is why we should provide some improvements to UserGroups.

User story

I want to manage my UserGroups, the members of each one, I want to know who is a User or a User Group. I want to follow a UserGroup. I want to request access to be part of UserGroup. I would like to see the page of the UserGroup with differences with User page.

Main related issues

• Create UserGroups: Impossible to create an UserGroup from an already registered User #1579

Technical and product decisions that need to be made

• The UserGroup can interact with Decidim as any other User (Endorse, Comment, Follow, Share) but it can't give support to the proposals.
• Any registered user can create a User Group
• The user who creates the UserGroup should be the admin of the group
• Any admin of the UserGroup can do the following actions:
  • Invite new users to be part of the UserGroup
  • Manage users:
    • Create admins of the User Group
  • Participate as a User Group in Decidim
  • Request verification
  • Edit Group settings (bio, profile, url,..)
• Any UserGroup needs their own profile page identifying that is a UserGroup and not a regular User

Tasks included in the MVP

Features

The UserGroups needs to offer the following actions to Users:

• Create a UserGroup from "My account" section in the subsection of the UserGroups
• Request access to be part of a member of a UserGroup
• Be a member of more than one UserGroups
• Any User can Follow a UserGroup
• The UserGroup can follow Users and UserGroups -->(1st Iteration)
• List all members

The creator of a UserGroup should be the admin of the UserGroup and the admin role needs to offer the following actions:

• Invite Users to the UserGroup
• Accept members
• Give admin permissions to members of UserGroup
• Manage the information on the public profile page of the UserGroup
• Request verification of the UserGroup --> (1st iteration)

Others:

• List all user groups a user is member of.

Pages

• Public Profile UserGroup Page: Needs Design. It should look like the User Profile with an identification that is a UserGroup.
• The management page of "My UserGroups" with a list of the UserGroups in which I am.
• The Administration page to manage the settings of the public page profile and to do the actions detailed above.

[mrcasals]

@arnaumonty can you put the tag for the correct development team, please? 😄

[oriolgual]

@arnaumonty we would need design pages for all the management part, invitations and and profile page.

[arnaumonty]

@furilo we will need designs for this.

Cc @oriolgual

[furilo]

OK, here are the screens I think we need to cover all these.

UserGroup page

• As a user profile, but with a main action (on the sidebar) "Join UserGroup" (btw, how should we call them publicly? UserGroup or just Group?
• If an admin is visiting a UserGroup she manages, she will be shown: Invite users, Manage users, and Request Verification (we would need the copy for the tooltip)

Group users - admin

The page for a UserGroup admin to manage admins of that group; really, just to remove existing admins

My groups

For an end user to manage their belonging to groups, should we add a Groups tab in their profile?

---

Another doubt: should we have a "Members" tab on a groups page to show which users are members of the group?

[furilo]

ping @decidim/product

[carolromero]

Wow @furilo, this is really nice 😍 And we've wanted this for so long!

My feedback:

As a user profile, but with a main action (on the sidebar) "Join UserGroup" (btw, how should we call them publicly? UserGroup or just Group?

I think Group it's more understable.

The page for a UserGroup admin to manage admins of that group; really, just to remove existing admins

And how does an admin accept new members and grant admin permissions to other users? Wouldn't it be through this page?

For an end user to manage their belonging to groups, should we add a Groups tab in their profile?

Good point. Definitely.

Another doubt: should we have a "Members" tab on a groups page to show which users are members of the group?

I'd say yes, but I don't really have a strong opinion on this. Maybe just the admins for transparency reasons? cc/ @decidim/product

[furilo]

And how does an admin accept new members and grant admin permissions to other users? Wouldn't it be through this page?

So just to confirm - we can have normal users belonging to the group (which should be accepted anyway) and then we have admins - right? If yes, I think I would have two pages, one for managing Admins and another for managing Members:

Admin admins

Admin members

I'd say yes, but I don't really have a strong opinion on this. Maybe just the admins for transparency reasons? cc/ @decidim/product

So we would have an extra tab in a Group, which would be "Admins" - right?

[oriolgual]

As a member of a user group (not an admin), can I do anything (commenting, following, etc)?

[arnaumonty]

As a member of a user group (not an admin), can I do anything (commenting, following, etc)?

@oriolgual No, just the admins can do things as a user group (create proposals, endorse, follow,...)

[furilo]

@decidim/lot-core do you need HTML for all screens, or just for the admin one?

[oriolgual]

Just admin screens @furilo

[furilo]

@Crashillo you can proceed to create the HTML for "UserGroup-Admin members"

[Crashillo]

Ok, then here you are the layout #4119

[mrcasals]

@decidim/product I have some doubts here, but I can start working right away meanwhile they are solved:

• can a given user mention a User Group in a comment?
• can an admin remove admin rights from another user in the same group?
• can an admin remove a user from a user group? I see this in the design, but not in the specification of the issue.

[carolromero]

@mrcasals:

can a given user mention a User Group in a comment?

Yes

can an admin remove admin rights from another user in the same group?

Yes, does it make sense for the first user to create a usergroup to be the admin of admins (aka capo dei capi 😜 )?

can an admin remove a user from a user group? I see this in the design, but not in the specification of the issue.

Yes

[mrcasals]

Yes, does it make sense for the first user to create a usergroup to be the admin of admins (aka capo dei capi 😜 )?

@carolromero so you mean no one can remove the admin rights from the creator? This could be done, I guess.

[arnaumonty]

@carolromero so you mean no one can remove the admin rights from the creator? This could be done, I guess.

This can be problematic, but probably is less problematic than the other option. Let's try with this.

[mrcasals]

@decidim/product if a user group can be mentioned in a comment, who receives the notification? Everyone in the group? Only the admins?

[mrcasals]

More doubts and comments, @decidim/product. Sorry for the bunch of posts, but these doubts keep appearing as I work on the issue.

• The issue description does not show it, but the layouts show a description for a user group. We don't have this, so we'd need to add it, but there's no layout for this kind of profile editing. The same applies to the user group avatar and website.
• Do badges apply to a user group? There's the "Badges" tab in the layout, but it does not appear in the description
• Can a user group have conversations? Same as badges, it does not appear in the definition but the layouts have it.
• We're currently not generating any notification when a user group performs an action. This means quite an amount of work to add it, so the "follow a user group" feature will take time (just to keep it in mind)
• Is there a way to publicly list all the users from a UserGroup and their role?
• If a UserGroup can follow other users and usergroups, it will receive notifications. Who can read & clear this list? Only the admins?

[mrcasals]

After today's work, only one part is left: "Invite users to user group". There's no design for this, and no more explanation, so I'll assume that only admins of the group can invite other users. I'll do this because if a member (non-admin) invites another user, then we need a process so that an admin can review that invitation. Since this is weird, and implies a lot of back-and-forths, I'll assume only admins can invite.

[arnaumonty]

@mrcasals Yes, just admins can do this. El lun., 22 oct. 2018 a las 16:31, Marc Riera (<notifications@github.com>) escribió:

…

After today's work, only one part is left: "Invite users to user group". There's no design for this, and no more explanation, so I'll assume that only admins of the group can invite other users. I'll do this because if a member (non-admin) invites another user, then we need a process so that an admin can review that invitation. Since this is weird, and implies a lot of back-and-forths, I'll assume only admins can invite. — You are receiving this because you were mentioned. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#3893 (comment)>, or mute the thread <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/ADrV81N197pyYgnPyirjUKzPRTzjzeNDks5undbegaJpZM4VaMU0> .

[mrcasals]

With #4347 I've finished all the tasks in the MVP. @decidim/product I think we can close this issue and create another one for the 1st iteration 😄

[carolromero]

Hi @mrcasals we need to make some changes to the "Create group" form:

[mrcasals]

@carolromero while developing #4256 I made phone numbers and document numbers required, on purpose. Those fields were required on the previous version of the form, so I kept the behaviour.

Should I make those fields optional?

[carolromero]

@mrcasals with the new functioning of Groups (the way to manage them from the front-end etc), we will now have verified and unverified groups.

[mrcasals]

@carolromero done, check #4458! 😄

[carolromero]

Hi @mrcasals I'm late to the PR but I miss the link in the header text, which should point to the /Help section. It is important to explain what Groups are, what can be done with them and how they can be verified (this Document Number will vary in each organization and must be explained).

[mrcasals]

@carolromero I skipped the link because we don't have any default help page about user groups as of now, AFAIK, so I thought we'd add it whenever we add default help pages. This is what I see when I visit the "Help" link in the topbar:

The "FAQ" page has nothing inside as of now 😕

[carolromero]

Oh ok @mrcasals, no problem then, let's wait until de Contextual Help is finished :)

[oriolgual]

Pinging @josepjaume here, @carolromero what's missing from contextual help?

[carolromero]

@oriolgual AFAIK we still have the MVP pending. Let's comment in #3973

[josepjaume]

@carolromero do we have content for the help pages?

[stale]

This issue has been automatically marked as stale because it has not had recent activity. It will be closed if no further activity occurs. Thank you for your contributions. @carolromero & @xabier feel free to chime in.