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Document owner | |
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Designer | |
Tech lead | |
Technical writers | |
QA | |
OKR | Continue to add high priority business improvements for enterprise customers. |
Request (CR) | |
Request (other) | |
Design Spec | Design Spec - Group Mentions & Invites |
Technical Spec | Tech Spec - Group Mentions & Invites(LDAP) |
Test Plan |
Objective
Group objects (whether native or AD/LDAP) are valuable as referenced objects in communication. Groups of people, whether departments, roles, owners, etc. can be needed in a discussion or channel for collaboration purposes. This feature aims to provide that value by enabling group mentions /invites on a per group basis (opt-in).
Background
Groups exists via AD/LDAP sync and native, self-defined MM groups are being considered as a standalone feature. Referencing these groups for purposes of at-mentions and invites of users is demanded and expected by MM users and administrators.
There is currently a plugin that was built to accomplish several of the user scenarios: https://github.com/mattermost/mattermost-plugin-autolink
Success metrics
Goal | Metric |
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Build a useful feature that enables messaging and inviting alerting/notifying groups of users with a single command |
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User Scenarios
Members (not guests) of any channel can @mention groups of users (e.g. @infosec or @finance)
Members (not guests) can /invite any of those same groupsMembers want to mention users in a specific channel that are also in a specific group
Admins can choose which groups are available to be referenced
Members can manage notifications for groups mentions (TBD)
Admins can restrict disabling of notifications (TBD)be mentioned
Channel Member - I’d like to see any group mentions in the “@ - Recent Mentions“ search filter in the top bar
Assumptions
Phases & Milestones
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Areas Touched
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System Console UI (Channel Group Configuration page and permissions)
Chat-facing UI
LDAP Groups
Desktop/Mobile Apps
Requirements
Requirement | User Story | Importance | Direct Design Link | Jira Issue | |||||||||||||
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| 1 | new permission to group mention - off for guests | 2 | add group section to autocomplete and add slugs | 3 | if 2 groups of same name, with group mentions enabled we notify everyone in both groups | 4 | 5autosuggest | As a user, I want to be able to distinguish between a user and a group in autosuggest dialogue, so that I can more easily reference the users I intend to |
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| 2 | Allow members to @mention groups by their group name (slug is auto-generated) | As a user, I want the ability to @mention entire groups and push a notification to that group, so that I can better collaborate with groups of people |
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| 63 | Add group names slugs to autocomplete suggestions on invite and mention screens | As a user, I want automated suggestions for groups as a type, so that I can more easily find the group I am looking to reference |
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| 74 | Ability for admins to turn on/off @mentions for specified groups (off by default) | As an admin, I want the ability to opt-in to toggle the above setting on and off for each group, so that I can selectively choose which groups can mentioned |
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| 85 | If within a team or channel is group constrained, only autosuggest groups who are available in that team or channel, auto-complete only shows groups that are available in that team or channel | As a user, I want to be sure that the groups I am mentioning are available in the team and channel I am posting in, so that I do not mention groups that cannot view my post |
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| 6 | If the team and channel are not group constrained, all groups with the toggle enabled are mentionable |
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| 97 | confirmation modal before sending to x number of 5 or more users (add to setting for @mentioning groups) - same threshold as @here and @all | As a user, I want to be alerted before I alert a large number of users, so that I can reassess the impact of my action |
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| 8 | system message notifying user that some users were not members of the channel with option to invite | As a user, I want to be made aware if members of the group I am mentioning are not members of the channel (and won’t be alerted from my mention), so that I can choose to invite them. |
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| 9 | Ability to rename group slug | As an admin, I want the ability to rename the group slug, so that I can maximize group mentions usability for my users |
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| 10 | Convert group config to draft / save style (like permissions scheme) | In order to rename slugs we need draft state |
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| 11 | Duplicate detection for groups when slug is created | As an admin, I want to be sure there are no conflicts of group slugs when I am enabling or renaming group slugs, so that I can be sure my users can easily mention the intended group |
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| 13 | Highlighting
| As a user, I want to easily identify which group mentions triggered notifications for others, so that I can accurately assess who likely saw or will soon see a message. As a user, I want to easily identify which group mentions were directed to me (and triggered notifications for me) so that I can quickly find content others want me to focus on. |
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Open Questions
Question | Answer | Date Answered |
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Does it make sense to allow this include role @mentions or invites? Such as @system admin or @moderator, etc? | This is out of scope for MVP | |
How do we prevent disruptive invitations to a channel when attempting to mention users? | This will not be answered in MVP. We need to determine if this is a real problem through user feedback. | |
If I’m inviting a group name, and I can’t see the individuals / who’s in it - is this useful / would I use it? |
Risks
disruptive invitations to a channel when attempting to mention users
security issue if we reveal users in specific groups
group invites may be limited by the current invite architecture having a max limit of invites sent at once (not batched on the backend)
group invites will have challenges with the current invite modal UX possibly feeling overwhelming in two ways, first will having a huge quantity of chips in the input field feel ok? second, will having a large number of invites listed in the confirmation screen feel ok?
Out of Scope / Deferred
secret Secret groups - groups that can be mentioned only and if no one from the group is in the channel, nothing happens (potentially with preview before joining)
Ability for users to ignore group mentions at per channel level
remove add/invite people to channel modal
show group mentions in Recent mentions
Dup detection of group slugs
Specific Permission to allow mentioning Groups
Ability for users to mute or turn off notifications from group mentions
Ability for admins to restrict disabling of notifications for specific groupsAllow members to /invite groups by their group name
System Admin ability to explicitly make a group available for invites - should only approach if comes in a request
System Admin ability to configure number of notifications that would trigger a warning dialogue prior to posting a group mention
Ability to invite groups to the team using the “invite people” flow ** For this item please note the third and fourth item under “Risks”
Channel Admin ability to granularly control which members can use group mentions (as part of Channel Moderation)
Show group member count in the group mention autocomplete
Ability to invite a group using the /invite command (or something similar)
Accurate count of how many people will be notified in how many different timezones when sending group notification
Quick invite option for channel member who mentions a group with no members currently on the team
This will allow display of group mentions in “Recent Mentions” area
Updated design for group configuration - group profiles needs improvement
Updated icons for groups
Make group mentions linkable (click a link and see a profile card? Maybe see who’s in the group?
Group filter for bulk enabling mentions (As an admin, I want to enable group mentions in bulk, so that I don’t have to tediously enable each group one by one)