Discussion Forum Doc

Introduction

To make discussion within a context and every logged in user can be participated.

Architecture Diagram

Hierarchy of discussions

The below diagram explains the category & topics created for a Course & Batch. The same can be used for any other types like Group, Quiz, etc.

Category → It is like a container( can hold Sub-containers, Topics)

Topic → This will be always added to the container(Category, Sub-Category). This is a discussion topic/thread created within the category. Users can participate in the topic/discussion.

Post → This will be always added to the Topic. This is the user response/reply given for the discussion topic/thread. The user is participating in the topic by posting.

Tech Stack

Angular	8 or above
Nodejs	14 or above
Nodebb	v1.18.6
Redis	6.2.5

Note: Install above things in your system.

Nodebb

NodeBB is an open source project which can be forked on GitHub (Link). It have plugin support. We can create new plugins for our requirement and link to nodebb.

How to setup nodebb in local environment

Note: Before staring nodebb setup in local. check redis is up and running. If not start redis first and do the setup.

Step:1

Clone the nodebb repo

git clone -b v1.18.x https://github.com/NodeBB/NodeBB.git nodebb

Step:2

Navigate to nodebb folder and do setup of nodebb using below command

./nodebb setup

While running the setup, nodebb will ask below question for initial setup.

>> URL used to access this NodeBB (http://localhost:4567) : Press Enter 
>> Please enter a NodeBB secret (44abfc50-3d6a-4e6c-a258-9f551f9faa5a) : Press Enter 
>> Would you like to submit anonymous plugin usage to nbbpm? (yes) : Press Enter 
>> Which database to use (mongo) : redis

Now configuring redis database:
>> Host IP or address of your Redis instance (127.0.0.1) : Press Enter 
>> Host port of your Redis instance (6379) : Press Enter 
>> Password of your Redis database : Press Enter 
>> Which database to use (0..n) (0) : 3 (redis db number)

Admin User details
>> Administrator username : admin 
>> Administrator email address : admin@test.com
>> Password : Your password
>> Confirm Password : Your password

Step:3

Now start the nodebb, Using below command.

Step:4

Build the nodebb using the below command.

Step:5

Open the browser with fallowing link http://localhost:4567

Use full commands

Mandatory Plugins

We have built our own plugins based on our need. We need to enable those plugins.

nodebb-plugin-create-forum	Contains all custom api	https://github.com/Sunbird-Ed/nodebb-plugin-sunbird-api.git
nodebb-plugin-sunbird-oidc	User login api	https://github.com/Sunbird-Ed/nodebb-plugin-sunbird-oidc.git

Activating Plugins

In this plugins, We added our own apis. Like User login, Enable discussion, read discussion context, disable discussion, user read based on sunbird id …. etc.

To activate plugin. Use below command.

a. Using repo as a npm module.

b. Using from local

clone the repo https://github.com/Sunbird-Ed/nodebb-plugin-sunbird-api.git`
Execute command npm install
Execute command npm link
Go to nodebb terminal and execute command npm link nodebb-plugin-create-forum
Execute command ./nodebb activate nodebb-plugin-create-forum
And execute command ./nodebb build

Note: When you enable or disable any plugin, You have to rebuild and restart your nodebb. Then only the changes will reflects.

Do the same thing for other plugin.

Write api plugin

This in an important plugin, By using this we can do all write operation in nodebb. Like create category/topic/post, updating topic/post, delete topic/post…..etc.

Install nodebb-plugin-write-api

Login to nodebb as a admin user.
Go to admin pannel.
Go to EXTEND => PLUGINS => FIND PLUGINS
Search for nodebb-plugin-write-api
Click on Install
Rebuild and restart nodebb.
Reload the admin panel.
Go to EXTEND => PLUGINS => INSTALLED
Search for nodebb-plugin-write-api
Click on Activate
Rebuild and restart nodebb.

What is Master token

To perform any write operations in nodebb we need write api plugin. And this plugin provides apis to do those write operations but If you want to use this apis we have to pass a master token (in request headers as Authorization token) and nodebb user id(add _uid as query param or with in request body ).

How to create master

Login to nodebb as a admin user.
Go to admin pannel.
Go to PLUGINS => WRITE API
Left side panel you can see MASTER TOKENS Section.
Click on CREATE TOKEN

Refer this link also: Nodebb Plugins

Discussion Middleware Setup

Step:1

Clone the discussion middleware repo from https://github.com/Sunbird-Ed/discussions-middleware.git

Step:2

Execute npm install command.

Step:3

add the environment variable in environmentHelper.js file.

Step:4

Run the discussion middleware using the command npm run start. Discussion-middleware will run on port 3002.

Discussion-UI setup along with demo application.

Step:1

Clone the discussion-ui repo from https://github.com/Sunbird-Ed/discussions-UI.git.

Step:2

Execute npm install command.

Step:3

Change the host in urlconfig.json file. Add below url.

Step:4

Build the discussion-ui library using npm run build-lib. This will generate a dist file along with assets. For every change in discussion-ui library you have to run build command.

Step:5

Run the demo application using the command npm run demo. This is a simple angular application which is used to test df-library in local.

Nodebb api documentation

We can see all discussion forum api here : Discussion forum apis.

Discussion forum integration with any application

Discussion forum is library and can be attached to any application. Before integrating we have to verify following things

Application should maintain cache.
Discussion forum uid have to be stored in cache.
Uid need to attach for all discussion forum apis as a query param link ?_uid=${discussionForum_uid}.

Add discussion for a context

We can attach discussion forum for any context like Groups/Courses/Batchs/Textbooks…etc.

Before attaching discussion forum we have to create one parent category and for context have one parent category. So that we can have all group context under one parent similarly for course, textbook.

You can see below image. Discussion forum for Groups is a parent category and all group related discussion forums are under that category.

Schema

SbType	SbIdentifier	cid	Data

SbType	SbIdentifier	cid	Data
course	do_11317805943810457614592	5	{JSON}
batch	01316730820300800028	6	{JSON}
group	123475d2-c299-45f6-992e-a22d081431bd	7	{JSON}

For example, We are adding discussion forum for group, For that we have to use below api.

Request

URL: https://staging.sunbirded.org/discussion/forum/v3/create

Payload:

Response

In the above response we have newCid that is the category id which is created for the group context that we pass in the request. So whet ever the discussions happened in the group are present in the discussion forum category.