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Forum Structure Changes Coming Soon!

Scott_iTalent Profile Picture Scott_iTalent Community Manager

 

Please pardon our dust!

 

In our never-ending quest to improve the community and help the Dynamics 365 Community members get answers faster, we are consolidating the number of forums on the site.  There are over 30 different forums on the site today. This can be a challenge to find the right place to post your question or locate a topic to participate in. By reducing that number, we hope to bring our experts and our help-seekers closer together!

We are also doing some much needed forum cleanup. The pace of technology moves quickly, and posts from our launch in 2007 are no longer as relevant as they once were. So, we are archiving older posts to help people find more timely, relevant discussions to participate in.

Update: Older posts in the Previous Versions section (Microsoft Dynamics AX, CRM, GP, NAV, RMS, SL) will be retained for reference, but the forums will be set to read-only.

 

What is happening?

We are reducing the number of forums on the site from over 30 to less than 10. In addition, we are archiving posts in the forums that are over 5 years old. Topics for Blogs and User Groups will also be changed to match this new top level structure.

 

Home page

 

 

 

Blog topics

 

 

 

User Group topics

 

 

 

Does this mean my posts are going away?

  • If your posts are older than October 1st, 2019, and they are not in one of the Previous Versions forums, they will be archived and you will no longer be able to access them on the site.
  • Older posts in the Previous Versions forums (Microsoft Dynamics AX, CRM, GP, NAV, RMS, SL) will be retained for reference, but the forums will be set to read-only.
  • Newer posts from the affected forums will be migrated to the new forum structure and will remain accessible via bookmarks, browsing, and search.

 

Will I lose points I earned for posts that are archived?

No, your points will not be affected.

 

What about my subscriptions?

Subscriptions to specific threads, comments, and other content like blogs will not change.

However, if you have subscribed to a forum that is being removed, you will need to subscribe to the new forum that replaces it to continue receiving notifications.

 

Which forums will be affected?

Here is the list of the new, consolidated forums and the affected forums that will move to each:

 

 

When is this happening?

We will begin archiving older posts this week to make ready for the forum structure changes and post migration.

The forum structure changes will be deployed on 11/8.

 

We’re excited to bring a cleaner, more active experience to the Community and our members!

If you have any questions, please let us know.

 

 

Comments

  • Scott_iTalent Profile Picture Scott_iTalent Community Manager
    Posted at
    Forum Structure Changes Coming Soon!
    Description
    Hello all – I have updated the announcement to reflect that older posts in the Previous Versions section (Microsoft Dynamics AX, CRM, GP, NAV, RMS, SL) will be retained for reference, but the forums will be set to read-only.
     
    Thank you for all your feedback!
  • Scott_iTalent Profile Picture Scott_iTalent Community Manager
    Posted at
    Forum Structure Changes Coming Soon!

    Thank you Lisa at AonC.com,JGarcia123, andMartin Dráb!

    Based on your feedback, and feedback we've heard elsewhere, we've decided to restore the archived Microsoft GP posts and make them read-only. We're re-evaluating the other legacy product content as well. I will be updating the announcement with revised details.

    We appreciate your help in making (and keeping) the forums a valuable resource for all our community members!

     

    And thank you for the feedback on the structure, Martin!

    We had discussions about bringing Finance and Supply Chain together into a single forum, but based on the current activity it seemed like that might be too much consolidation.

    We'll be keeping a close eye on where people are posting and how the topics are used following the migration. We expect there will be some adjustments to be made as we learn how community members use the new structure.

    Thank you all!

     

  • Lisa at AonC.com Profile Picture Lisa at AonC.com 3,070
    Posted at
    Forum Structure Changes Coming Soon!
    We really need those archived posts.  Can't they remain in a read-only database?  We just went through re-working links following the last change and updating all the broken links related to GP enhancements.  Now I see links I provided clients earlier this month are broken and no longer in search results. 

    If Microsoft really wants GP customers to move to other Microsoft products, making their life more difficult while they are continuing to stay current on GP maintenance plans, removing the critical support documents and cutting support while raising rates isn't a good look.
     
  • JGarcia123 Profile Picture JGarcia123 1,534
    Posted at
    Forum Structure Changes Coming Soon!
    Thank you Scott for clarifying.  Just one other suggestion you may want to retain data further back for the legacy systems, GP, SL, AX, etc...  Because those systems have not changed much in recent years resolutions to common support items and questions are often found in much older posts.  
  • Martin Dráb Profile Picture Martin Dráb 229,173 Most Valuable Professional
    Posted at
    Forum Structure Changes Coming Soon!
    I've been a big proponent of such a simplification. Regarding F&O forums, reducing them to just two (plus the general one, which users tend to use for everything) is an improvement. But most questions about F&O can't be clearly categorized as "Finance only" or "Supply chain only", because all platform stuff is shared, many business processes are tightly connected and many things are about neither area.
    Also, the Finance forum stops being an F&O forum, because it now includes completely unrelated products such as Dynamics GP. It sounds confusing to me.
    I think that F&O users will keep struggling with finding the right forum (and moderators will either spend extra time trying to fix it, or they'll give up).
    My idea about testing the structure is asking questions like: "I want to ask how to post a packing slip through X++ in F&O. Which forum should I use? Does the site give me this information"?
    Notice that the forum structure doesn't mention F&O at all, but it's what many users are looking for.
     
    I understand the reasons for archiving older posts, but my feelings are mixed. It may reduce confusion by removing discussions about old features etc., but it's also a loss of useful information. For example, most of X++ and the platform F&O libraries are the same as twenty years ago and old discussions about them are still relevant and useful.
    It sounds to me like a workaround for insufficient options for filtering (e.g. that I could select the versions of the product I'm interested in or the period when the question was asked).
  • Scott_iTalent Profile Picture Scott_iTalent Community Manager
    Posted at
    Forum Structure Changes Coming Soon!
    ThanksJGarcia123, good point.
     
    We're keeping all posts after 10/1/2019, including GP, SL, and AX products. All three of those products' posts are moving to the new Finance | Project Operations, Human Resources, AX, GP, SL forum.
     
    In addition we are adding a category corresponding to the old forum name to each post, so folks can filter by those products/forums in the future. Hopefully that will help folks find what they need!
     
     
  • JGarcia123 Profile Picture JGarcia123 1,534
    Posted at
    Forum Structure Changes Coming Soon!
    You may want to consider keeping the history for the GP, SL, and AX products as this is one of the few forums that retains that content at least until the conclusion of the lifecycles.  SL extended support through 2028 and the GP through 2029.
     
    JG
  • Scott_iTalent Profile Picture Scott_iTalent Community Manager
    Posted at
    Forum Structure Changes Coming Soon!
    Interesting ideaVaHiX! We'll keep an eye on those topics. Thanks!
  • VaHiX Profile Picture VaHiX 2,249
    Posted at
    Forum Structure Changes Coming Soon!
    Thank you for your continuous improvement.
    I recommend creating a separate section for training and MS Learn content. Many people have questions or suggestions about these topics, and it would be more effective to address them in a dedicated forum rather than scattering them across different discussions.