Distracting "Need Help?" thingy

I can’t be the only one who finds the “Need Help” thingy utterly, utterly annoying.

It doesn’t load directly but animates in from the side just when you have started to visually parse the page, it is unclear what it is for (I am already on the forum where I can search for help) and the intense color makes it stand out a lot. It doesn’t follow the flow of the page but sticks in from the side in a seemingly random way, and even covers other content on the page, like the button to get rid of similar posts when creating a new post. When clicking it, I can’t fully focus on its content as it is displayed in a small font size in a box at the edge of the screen, on top of other content, and not as its own document using the whole window.

The worst things is how it is animated. I can’t write when this utterly distracting spam thingy is moving in the corner of my eye at random points. I’ve already used my adblocker to rid my own computer of this UX abomination, but now when I’m on my work computer I’m facing it again.

Can we please just not have it? If its content is useful a pinned post can be used, or there could be a troubleshoot “guide” article in the help center or something.

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Though, as seems to happen all too often, it is no doubt a “feature” that Discourse decided to drop on us unannounced, without asking us whether we want it, and without telling the moderators how to get rid of it if people complain.

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I don’t think AnswerDash is a discourse feature, but they must have some sort of integration into sites like this forum and with the Drupal-based SketchUp Help site.

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I haven’t had to use the need help thingy, but I just gave it a try. It claims to have 384 answers, so I tried a fairly specific one, that you can relate to.

Here’s what came up:

The first entry explains that it’s a known issue, and that you need to contact SketchUp support. That should help encourage someone already on that page that they are in the right place.

There is also a suggest question option. I don’t know how many of the questions are made up by the SketchUp team, and how many come from people suggesting a question.

I can say I’ve had no use for this AnswerDash feature, but thought that it may help someone (newbs.) So I’ve been ignoring it. I have a very wide monitor so it never gets in the way.

I’d agree with a member preference to switch it off. (Perhaps can be suppressed with a Chrome extension?)