"Archiving" this forum

[karthur1]

I just noticed someone has made the decision to "archive" post older than 10 years.  Who thinks that is a good idea?

I think I understand why this is being done, but this is being DELETED not archived.  Why not move the post to a new "read-only" forum, but please don't delete that information.  There is tons of information that will be lost.

What about newer posts that link back to post of the 10yr mark.  All we will get is an error when we click on the link?

This is a horrible idea.

Link to the original post: https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/community-announcements/community-content-archiving-announcement-and-...

[Curtis_Waguespack]

---

@pcrawley wrote:

2 - This is misrepresentation. “Archive” is defined as “A place where historical records are kept”.  You are deleting - not archiving. 

---

@pcrawley ,I agree with all you typed.

on point 2, my understanding is that AD has taken steps to save and recreate some posts that meet some mystery criteria and will make those available, somehow, somewhere, in someway... at some point in the future.

I don't know if that makes you feel better or worse. Personally, there has been such poor communication and decision making around this, that I am braced for disappointment. 

I tried to get some clarity around all of this right from the start 2 weeks ago, in 3 different places, but had no luck.

Edit: it looks like that meeting isn't going to happen.

I did just receive a email invite about setting up a meeting so I can try to get some answers that I can hopefully share with other users.

There are some other scant details around the policy that have been shared behind an NDA, I don't know if I can share those publicly, but I'll ask about that as well.

I'll ask about your point 3. Let me know if you have other questions and I'll see if I can get some answers. ( don't hold your breath though).

[pcrawley]

Thank you @Curtis_Waguespack   Ironically, it is many of your posts I am most upset about losing!

From @Tiana_Y original post - it says:

Q: What if there is a helpful post or thread I would like to keep?
A: Unfortunately, we cannot keep the content.  We encourage you to create a new thread about the same topic. It will help maintain the conversation while also resurfacing it on our boards to continue the conversation.

If you would like to keep older content for yourself, you can save it locally to your own machine via screenshots or save it as a PDF file.

I read that as that's 65 words to simply say "deleted".  Braced for disappointment.

Looking forward to reading whatever you're allowed to share.

[Curtis_Waguespack]

---

@pcrawley wrote:

Looking forward to reading whatever you're allowed to share.

---

It looks like the meeting I mentioned isn't going to happen, due to holiday schedules, etc.

[MKE_Howard]

Hello, I don’t want to insult or disrespect anyone, but archiving (deleting) old posts is completely unnecessary and honestly, quite stupid. I usually agree with Autodesk on most things, but in this case, they’re deleting so much valuable information, and I just don’t understand why. "To stay relevant to our users and customers" – I’m sorry, but what? So many times, older posts have helped me and many resolve bugs, learning, ect. 

When people ask why they are doing this, we receive an explanation that doesn’t make sense, and then they block the comments : 

"The team has thoroughly reviewed the data and established criteria for content that is still helpful to our customers." No, you didn’t. You know why? Because when almost all of the customers told you that this was a bad idea, and that you’re going to delete really useful posts, your response was simply: We don’t care. Users and I reapeat, USERS ONLY should have decided what are the criterias because USERS know whats usefull or not.   

You can't tell someone that you going to delete posts then right after tell them "create a new thread about the same topic" Wtf! Come on, you’re a billion-dollar company! Don’t tell your customers you can’t keep posts on a forum. This is golden information! At least give us the real reason or if you dont have one, lie better. Thanks

[pball]

I just hit my first dead end on a google search and it feels bad. I'm sad Autodesk is actively ruining the biggest place to find help for their software.

[andrewdroth]

This is just maddening.

Especially for the Ilogic and VBA code. I'm just trying to find little snippets. Stuff I've used in the past. Dead end after dead end.

It's all the fundamental stuff too. People figured out how to automate this stuff over 10 years ago, and there doesn't need to be new posts because that code still works!

You look for a google result with a new date instead and that links to the same dead one...

@Discussion_AdminHelp me understand.

Shout-out to the visionaries that put their code on github. Seems to me more of these discussions need to move to other sites that value stewardship.

[WillL84]

Anyone else notice that the announcement post is no longer pinned?

[nbonnett-murphy]

This is really gonna help them increase the forum engagement metrics. It'll look like the forum is helping more users, when in reality it will just be enraging them.

[nbonnett-murphy]

Oh god, I didn't even think of iLogic. This is a mess.

[Rory_M]

Absolute madness. I posted in the community forum about this too:

https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/community-announcements/we-re-testing-a-new-forums-experience-feedbac...

The cuts to the iLogic forums are a real loss, I'm not the most skilled programmer and some of the basic things I've been helped by are in posts from long ago that I think are still relevant. Obviously someone at Autodesk knows better and decided to skimp on server space by deleting a massive chunk of what was one of the best knowledgebases on the internet.

I was going to add more but I'm thinking "if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all".

[Curtis_Waguespack]

---

@Rory_M wrote:

... decided to skimp on server space 

---

I don't think this has to to with server space. The stated reason was more about legal documentation retention policy, but in hearing the community redesign team speak it seems pretty clear that they had motives for this as well.

The cuts to the iLogic forums are a real loss

---

I was told that the community team didn't think about the code examples when considering this decision "because none of us are programmers"  😓

---

@Rory_M wrote:

I was going to add more but I'm thinking "if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all".

---

ehhh, the people involved have made a clear effort to not listen to anything their customers/users have said about this anyway.

---

[pcrawley]

Thanks for the updates.  Do we know for sure if the old posts have been deleted - or are they archived?

(They used "archiving" in the original post subject line and later said "...we cannot keep the content." - which means "deleted".)

If they've been deleted, then...  It is so hard to follow this fine example:

@Rory_M wrote:

I was going to add more but I'm thinking "if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all".

---

I know the forum moderators weren't consulted, so you wonder how "policy" is made at Autodesk.  If there were no programmers, no forum moderators, and therefore likely no "users" on the "community team", you have to ask how their opinion could possibly form corporate policy.  It is a worrying demonstration where corporate Autodesk has gone.

[nige106]

It is rather frustrating and disappointing. Seems to lack any common sense for the community. I've recently been coming up against the issue when trying to research modelling techniques. I hadn't realised it was intentional. The Autodesk forum search results were always my first to go to.

[Ray_Feiler]

I think that all of the forums collective knowledge has been assimilated into A.I. Therefor can be "Archived".

[hosford]

There is an open source project FreeCad that could use funding, it isnt driven by a overly large too strung out company that isnt there for its users.

The future could be software that is supported by users.

[ChrisMitchell01]

All,

Without getting into all of the background details about this, rest assured that actions are being taken to try to address this. Please refer to this Community Announcement for further information.

As mentioned there, the possibility to unarchive certain highly viewed/requested topics &/or solutions, (with an initial focus on API topics containing code/script), is currently under investigation.

Hope this helps,

Thanks,

Chris

(chris.mitchell@autodesk.com)

[Curtis_Waguespack]

@ChrisMitchell01  I was just coming to this thread to post that link.

Thank you for taking interest in this and for posting this link here for the members of the community who expressed concerns and asked questions about this issue.

The bit about "with an initial focus on API topics containing code/script" is great news and something I and many others have asked about over and over and this is the first (public) acknowledgement of the question about that type of content I have seen offered to the users concerned about it.

I've just spent the last 10 minutes tracking down and posting the same community announcement link to several threads I knew about where community members expressed concern about this issue ... I'm sure there are many I don't know about though... but I was so pleasantly surprised to see someone from AD beat me to this one. Thanks again Chris!

@CGBenner and @Tarek_K see Chris Mitchell's post for an example of effective communication, shared directly to the members of the community that have been expressing concerns about this topic. This is what listening and caring looks like. 

This is the type of communication and leadership expected from community managers vs. what we've seen lately which is to post a link to the community announcement page (that most users don't know exist or don't ever check) and then just walk away and assume that the information will somehow find its way to the users that are seeking it. 

[kerry_w_brown]

I realise this is 'Inventor Forum' and the following link in to the '.NET Forum' , but some people may take small comfort knowing your dismay is shared.

I don't think a preface or summary of the thread is required. 

https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/net/regarding-community-content-archiving/td-p/13198106

Stay well,

[James_Willo · Accepted solution]

Hi, please see this update:

They will no longer go ahead with removing the idea station posts and future forum posts.

Some archived posts will also be brought back but I am unsure on the process being used to do this. 

https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/community-announcements/update-on-archiving-idea-boards-and-forums/td...

[CGBenner]

---

@James_Willo wrote:

Some archived posts will also be brought back but I am unsure on the process being used to do this. 

---

To clarify; whether or not any previously archived posts will be brought back is still in the feasibility stage.  Stay tuned to the post on the Community Announcements forum for further updates.