# Use the Discourse REST API to subscribe users to categories to replace mailing lists

**URL:** <https://talk.openmrs.org/t/use-the-discourse-rest-api-to-subscribe-users-to-categories-to-replace-mailing-lists/1612>\
**Category:** ID Dashboard\
**Tags:** community, openmrs-id, discourse\
**Created:** [April 4, 2015, 7:53am UTC](https://talk.openmrs.org/t/use-the-discourse-rest-api-to-subscribe-users-to-categories-to-replace-mailing-lists/1612 "2015-04-04T07:53:43Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 6\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![r0bby](https://talk.openmrs.org/user_avatar/talk.openmrs.org/r0bby/32/6479_2.png) [@r0bby](https://talk.openmrs.org/u/r0bby)\
**Post date:** [April 4, 2015, 7:53am UTC](https://talk.openmrs.org/t/use-the-discourse-rest-api-to-subscribe-users-to-categories-to-replace-mailing-lists/1612/1 "2015-04-04T07:53:43Z")

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It just dawned on me that we can still have the mailing list functionality in the ID dashboard, but instead of subscribing them to a mailing list, it subscribes them to the category in discourse.

Opinions? I’d like to scope this under Google Summer of Code if possible. If not done under GSoC, then I will do it myself.

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**Author:** ![michael](https://talk.openmrs.org/user_avatar/talk.openmrs.org/michael/32/15070_2.png) [@michael](https://talk.openmrs.org/u/michael)\
**Post date:** [April 4, 2015, 12:25pm UTC](https://talk.openmrs.org/t/use-the-discourse-rest-api-to-subscribe-users-to-categories-to-replace-mailing-lists/1612/2 "2015-04-04T12:25:52Z")

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Watching in Discourse is way more powerful than categories, so I think we want to encourage people to do this on the site itself where it’s fully integrated. Also IMHO their API is rather fragile and undocumented. @sunbiz may have more to say.

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**Author:** ![plypy](https://talk.openmrs.org/user_avatar/talk.openmrs.org/plypy/32/505_2.png) [@plypy](https://talk.openmrs.org/u/plypy)\
**Post date:** [April 4, 2015, 1:43pm UTC](https://talk.openmrs.org/t/use-the-discourse-rest-api-to-subscribe-users-to-categories-to-replace-mailing-lists/1612/3 "2015-04-04T13:43:42Z")

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I agree with @michael. In my opinion, the Dashboard should be compact enough, which means that we should focus on managing IDs, but not trying to take everything in control.

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**Author:** ![michael](https://talk.openmrs.org/user_avatar/talk.openmrs.org/michael/32/15070_2.png) [@michael](https://talk.openmrs.org/u/michael)\
**Post date:** [April 4, 2015, 4:12pm UTC](https://talk.openmrs.org/t/use-the-discourse-rest-api-to-subscribe-users-to-categories-to-replace-mailing-lists/1612/4 "2015-04-04T16:12:36Z")

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To be clear, the only reason we ran Groups through Dashboard was because we didn’t want to force a user dependency on **a third party login account** (i.e. Google Account).

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**Author:** ![r0bby](https://talk.openmrs.org/user_avatar/talk.openmrs.org/r0bby/32/6479_2.png) [@r0bby](https://talk.openmrs.org/u/r0bby)\
**Post date:** [April 4, 2015, 4:41pm UTC](https://talk.openmrs.org/t/use-the-discourse-rest-api-to-subscribe-users-to-categories-to-replace-mailing-lists/1612/5 "2015-04-04T16:41:13Z")

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Just an idea – consider it dead.

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**Author:** ![michael](https://talk.openmrs.org/user_avatar/talk.openmrs.org/michael/32/15070_2.png) [@michael](https://talk.openmrs.org/u/michael)\
**Post date:** [April 4, 2015, 11:01pm UTC](https://talk.openmrs.org/t/use-the-discourse-rest-api-to-subscribe-users-to-categories-to-replace-mailing-lists/1612/6 "2015-04-04T23:01:40Z")

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Closed on April 4, 2015, 11:01pm UTC