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Have Microsoft considered merging ALL of the forums?
Have Microsoft considered merging ALL of the forums?
- Hi to any Microsoft staff,
I'm usually in the VISUAL BASIC forums but I recently discovered a load more forum areas, namely;
http://social.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/categories
Plus all of the ones in this.>>
http://www.microsoft.com/communities/forums/default.mspx
which includes these popular ones.>>
Most Popular
• MSDN Forums • TechNet Forums • Microsoft Answers Forums
Have Microsoft ever considered putting the entire lot
into one FORUMS HOME area under their appropriate categories?
If so is this an ongoing thing?
Regards,
John
I'm currently looking for work in Vb.Net software development. :-)
All Replies
There are about 2000 forums, they are all scattered across about 5 main sites, some of them listed above. We need to rework our home pages to make it easier for people to find the forums, that is for sure. This is something we have been thinking about but just haven't gotten to yet. The visual basic forums contextualize the user into the visual basic dev center, the forums home link in the My Links right hand column is one easy way to bump back out to the big main MSDN list. But I do realize this isn't very discoverable. Anyway, thanks for asking the question, the short answer is that I agree we need to do more for discoverability.
Community Forums Program Manager- Hi Brent,
Will there ever be a time when all the forums are in just one forums home area though?
That is my main question, is this idea also the intent of the top staff at Microsoft?
Regards,
John
I'm currently looking for work in Vb.Net software development. :-) - Why don't you work from the given information backwards: how would you organize 2000 forums into a coherent structure with an easily browsed homepage, optimized for visitors that never posted to a forum before? You'll have to work with the restriction that this can't be organized by the users themselves though. Post your ideas.
Hans Passant. - Hi Hans Passant,
Using an Asp.Net server you could make the main categories from all of the ones in this.>>
http://www.microsoft.com/communities/forums/default.mspx
and have a tabbed all in one FORUMS HOME with TAB titles something like;
POPULAR DEVELOPER HOME & EDUCATIONAL ENTERTAINMENT BUSINESS DESIGN & USER SERVERS MOBILE INTERNATIONAL
That would be just 9 tabs on one MAIN ALL-IN-ONE forums home page on a sub-domain like.>>
public.forums.microsoft.com
Each of the tabs could show a sub-set of TABS or if they were buttons a sub-set of links. :-)
What I am also getting at is with one domain such as
public.forums.microsoft.com
it would not be difficult to put each forum area in its own folder such as.>>
public.forums.microsoft.com/msdn/default.aspx
Here is a picture to give some idea of the above showing the first 7 of the suggested 9 TABS or buttons.>>
I just know it can be done, and if I were in charge or a close understudy to Steve Ballmer
I would definitely rearrange the forums.
:-) ;-)
Obviously, it is less of a priority compared to the next version of WINDOWS, OFFICE or
VISUAL STUDIO or any other "flagship" product that Microsoft produce.
:-)
I wish someone at Microsoft would suggest to only use sub-domains or
to only use folders for url links too. ;-) :-)
e.g.
windows.microsoft.com
office.microsoft.com
visualstudio.microsoft.com
OR
microsoft.com/windows
microsoft.com/office
microsoft.com/visualstudio
and not have a mixture. Can someone suggest it to Steve Ballmer ??
Regards,
John
I'm currently looking for work in Vb.Net software development. :-)- Proposed As Answer byBrian Borg Friday, September 18, 2009 4:12 AM
- Hi to Brian Borg,
Thanks for proposing the above answer for my forum suggestion. :-) ;-)
I guess I can take that as a vote for my suggestion, I guess. ;-) :-)
Regards,
John
I'm currently looking for work in Vb.Net software development. :-)
