Searching the Community

Search first. There's a good chance that someone has already asked a question, started a discussion, or written a wiki article on the topic you have in mind.

Select "Search the Community" in the search area, and type in your question, keyword, or topic.

Click the search button , and then look through the results for your solution.

Absolutely. There are a number of ways to narrow your search:

• At the top of the screen, click Categories, and then select a product or technology to search in that category.

  

• Use the drop-down menu on the Search button to refine your search by product or category.

  

• Go to any content list page, and select a version and or topic in the dropdowns, and then click Apply. You can also select a content type: questions, discussions, or wikis). You'll be searching with those filters. If you don't find what you need, you can remove the filters in the search results window to widen your search.

  

If you find the same question you wanted to ask in the forum, but it hasn't been answered yet, click the Me Too button. That way you'll be notified via email when your question has been answered.

Note: You can click Me Too even if the question is answered, to get updates on that thread. You have to be signed in to click Me Too.

Posts that contain the correct answer to the question will be marked "answer" by the original poster or a moderator.

You can also look for posts with a high number of "helpful" votes, even if they haven't been marked as answers yet. These may appear with the designation "Most Helpful Reply."

Asking a Question or Starting a Discussion

If you've searched the community and you can't find a question or topic that is the same or similar to yours, it's time to post your own.

1. Select Post to the Community in the Search area, or click Create on the search results page.

   

2. Type in your question.
3. Click the search button. A short list of related content is listed followed by a box to "Create a new question or start a discussion."
4. The "Title" field automatically displays the question or topic you typed in. You can rephrase the question if you want to.

   

5. Type in any details about your question or discussion topic that you think would be useful. Include details like what you are trying to do, what you have already tried, and your computer type if you are asking a question.

   

6. From the Category dropdown list, select the product or technology you're using. This may generate other dropdowns. For example, if you picked the Office category, you may see an Office Version dropdown and an Office Topic dropdown. Use these to make your post as specific as you can.

   

7. Select the Post as question or Post as discussion radio button as appropriate.

   

8. Select "Notify me when someone replies to this post", in order to get an email notification when others respond to your question or discussion.

   

9. Click Submit. Your question or discussion has been posted.

   

Note: You have to be signed in to post.

Question posts are used to get an answer or solution to a specific question or issue.

Discussion posts are used to share opinions, discuss tips and tricks, and chat about Microsoft technologies.

Both types of posts have the same formatting and similar options. The most noticeable exception is that no answer-marking is needed or available on discussion posts.

1. Go to your post.
2. Click the Edit option and make your changes.

   

3. Click Submit when you are done.

   

Yes, if no one has replied to it.

1. Go to your post and click the Edit button. The "Edit" screen opens.

   

2. Click the Delete button.

   

If other users have replied to your post, you can't delete the post unless the other users delete all of their replies first.

No. Posting the same question or discussion multiple times creates distraction. Just wait--someone will reply, and you'll be notified when it happens.

Yes. Just click the Subscribe to Updates option on any post. If you didn't provide an email address at sign-in, you'll have the opportunity to provide one when you click Subscribe to Updates.

If you clicked Me Too, Subscribe to Updates, or checked the Notify me when someone responds to this post box, a Stop emails option will appear at the bottom of the post. Just click the Stop emails option.

If you posted the original question, you can mark the question as answered yourself. Just click the Mark as Answer button.

If you didn't post the original question, you can still mark the post as "helpful."

You can go to the response and click Unmark as Answer.

No one can mark their own post as an answer. Only the person who posted the original question (if it someone else) or a moderator can mark as post as Answered.

You can follow the discussion and let others know it’s worthwhile by clicking Me too on the Recommend button.

If you like a specific reply in a discussion, click Like.

Participating in Wiki Articles

Yes, wiki articles accept comments so that you can share your thoughts on the article.

1. Click Comment on this article.

   

2. Type your comments.
3. Click Submit.

You can suggest edits to wiki articles. Your suggestion may be as small as a simple grammar fix or as broad as a set of steps that you think would add value to the article. Community members whose suggestions are approved earn points toward community badges.

1. Click Suggest Edits to this article.

   

2. Type your suggestion.
3. Click Submit.

Yes. Just click Subscribe to Updates. If you didn't provide an email address at sign-in, you'll have the opportunity to provide one when you click Subscribe to Updates.

You can follow the discussion and let others know it’s worthwhile by clicking Me too on the Found this helpful button.

You can also recommend a specific comment by clicking Like.

Note: You have to be signed in to participate.

Contributing to the Community

1. Click the Reply option.

   

2. Type in your reply.

   

3. Click the Submit button.

   

Note: You need to be signed in to post a reply.

When you click this link, your reply will be posted with the content of that post at the top of your reply window.

1. Go to your response, click the Edit option and make your changes.

   

2. Click Submit when you are done.

   

1. Go to your response and click the Edit option. The "Edit" window opens.

   

2. Click the Delete button. The "Are you sure you want to delete your post?" window opens.

   

3. Click OK.

   

Yes. Please read our Code of Conduct for using the community.

If someone has posted content that is abusive, offensive, threatening, or otherwise violates the Microsoft Community Code of Conduct, you can report it.

1. Click any Report Abuse link.

   

2. A pop-up menu opens. Select the type of abuse you're reporting.
3. Briefly describe the abuse you saw.

   

4. Click Submit.

   

A Microsoft representative will review your report and decide how to proceed.

Yes. Advanced user options can help you find and review threads more efficiently.

• Use the advanced search filters to find threads that are waiting for an answer. In Question and Answer threads, you can select one or more advanced filters to help locate questions that contain no replies, have Me Too votes, or contain no replies marked as helpful. In Question and Answer threads and Discussion threads, you can look for threads that were posted within a defined timeframe. Advanced search filters appear in addition to other forum filters.

  

• Advanced search filters must be activated through your user profile.
  1. Open your profile by clicking your screen name anywhere it appears in the community.
  2. Click Edit Profile.
  3. Under Advanced user options, select Show advanced search filters.
  4. Click Update.

     

• Use thread preview to read posts without leaving the thread list. To open thread preview, click the chevron to the left of the thread name. The full question, up to two answers, and up to five recent replies appear, along with the option to reply or open the full version of the thread. Click the chevron again to close the preview.

  

• Thread preview must be activated through your user profile.
  1. Open your profile by clicking your screen name anywhere it appears in the community.
  2. Click Edit Profile.
  3. Under Thread Preview, select Show thread preview in thread list to the inline preview and select the number of replies to display.
  4. Click Update.

     

Only a Microsoft moderator can start a private message. If you receive a private message, it means that the moderator needs to address your question or issue in private or requires information that may be more personal (such as an email address or account details). Only you and Microsoft moderators can see the contents of the private message - other community members cannot see it.

1. To open a private message, open the thread and click You have a private reply to this message. Click here to read it on our secure private messages section.

   

2. If the moderator has asked for a response to the private message, click Reply in the private messages box.

   

3. Type your response and click Submit.

   

Your Profile

Click your screen name anywhere it appears in the community (for example, in one of your posts or questions, or at the top of any page) to go to your profile.

• Your username
• Your picture (if you decide to upload one)
• Your title, if you have one (for example, Community Moderator)
• Your stats
• A text blurb (if you decide to write one for your profile)
• Your accomplishments and badges
• Any weekly awards you may have won
• Your access to advanced user options
• If you've contributed to the community, you'll see a tab for each of your Questions and Answers, Discussions, and Wikis.

  

• Use the Category dropdown list to filter your posts by the product or technology they were posted in.

  

• Use the sort options to put your posts in a desired order.

  

Questions and Answers

• Helpful Votes: Sort posts by the most "helpful" votes
• Me Too Votes: Sort posts by the most "me too" votes
• Replies: Sort posts by the highest number of replies to a thread
• Latest: Sort posts by most recently posted
• Views: Sort posts by the number of times a thread has been viewed

Discussions

• Recommended: Sort posts by the most "recommended" votes
• Likes: Sort posts by the most "like" votes
• Replies: Sort posts by the highest number of replies to a thread
• Latest: Sort posts by the most recently posted
• Views: Sort posts by the number of times a thread has been viewed

Wikis

• Helpful: Sort wiki articles by the most "helpful" votes
• Likes: Sort wiki articles by the most "like" votes
• Comments: Sort wiki articles by the highest number of comments
• Latest: Sort wiki articles by the most recently posted
• Views: Sort wiki articles by the number of times the article has been viewed

Click the Edit Profile button on your profile page.

From here you can:

• Change your profile picture
• Change your display name
• Write or edit your bio
• Add a link to your profile
• Add a signature that will be displayed with your posts
• Update your email address
• Choose to get email notifications or not
• Select advanced user options

When you've finished editing your profile, click Update.

No. You can use a picture that you own (for example, a picture of your cat or dog) or a picture in the public domain, like license-free clip-art or photographs.

Please read our Code of Conduct to make sure your profile picture is appropriate.

See Building your reputation, below.

Click another user's screen name to see his or her profile.

Private messages come only from Microsoft representatives. Click the link to read it.

Building your reputation

MCC: Content Creator badge

Each time one of your question and answer posts is marked as helpful or as an answer, you get a vote toward your Content Creator badge. When you have a high enough percentage of posts marked as "helpful" or "answers," you'll get your badge.

Benefits of being a Content Creator:

• Your profile will be featured in the Top Contributors rotator
• You'll be awarded space for 5 additional links in your profile
• A Content Creator badge is added to your profile

This is an ongoing, dynamic process. Note that this badge can be lost if enough of your posts are not voted as helpful or marked as answers.

MCC: Content Curator badge

When you vote a question and answer post or a wiki article as helpful or you recommend a discussion post, you have started on the path to a Content Curator badge. If enough of the posts and articles (in any combination) that you have voted for end up as answers or as the most helpful or recommended post and articles in that category, you'll get your badge.

Benefits of being a Content Curator:

• Unlimited votes per day (ordinary users get up to five votes per day)
• Your profile will be featured in the Top Contributors rotator
• You'll be awarded space for 5 additional links in your profile
• A Content Curator badge is added to your profile

This is an ongoing, dynamic process. Note that this badge can be lost if not enough of your helpful and recommended votes are voted to the top of their category or marked as answers.

The Guardian badge

Every time you report legitimate abuse in the community, you get a vote toward your Guardian badge. When you have reported enough actual cases of abuse and accurately pointed out the type of abuse, you'll get your badge. Reporting content that is not actual abuse will not get you votes.

Benefits of being a Guardian:

• A Guardian badge will be added to your profile
• Content the Guardian reports as abusive is automatically hidden until moderated.

This is an ongoing, dynamic process. Note that this badge can be lost if you don't accurately report enough actual cases of abuse.

The First Answer badge

The first time one of your question and answer posts is marked as an answer, a First Answer badge will appear in your profile. This badge cannot be lost.

The Quickest Answer badge

This badge is awarded to the person who posts to a question and answer thread in the shortest amount time after a user asks a question and which is marked as an Answer either by the person who asked the question or by a moderator in the past week.

The Helpful Post of the Week badge

This badge is awarded to the person whose question and answer post gets the most "Helpful" votes in a given week (minimum 5 votes). Every week this badge will be awarded to a poster in each category. This badge cannot be lost.

The Most Important Answer of the Week badge

This badge is awarded to the person whose question and answer post gets the most "Me Too" votes in a given week, and is subsequently marked as an answer. Every week this badge will be awarded to a poster in each category. This badge cannot be lost.

The Most Answers for the Week badge

This badge is awarded to the person who creates the greatest number of question and answer posts marked as answers in a given week. This badge cannot be lost.

The Most Recommended Discussion badge

This badge is awarded to the person whose discussion thread gets the most “Recommended” votes in a given week. Every week this badge will be awarded in each category. This badge cannot be lost.

The Wiki Contributor badge

This badge is awarded to community members who have suggested the most wiki article updates that are accepted and result in updated wiki articles. Every week this badge will be awarded in each category. This badge cannot be lost.

The Conversationalist badge

Conversationalists are community members who have consistently started and participated in discussion threads. Many of the discussion threads they’ve started are highly recommended by other members of the community.

The Wiki Master badge

Wiki Masters are Wiki Authors who have published numerous articles, many of which the community has identified as especially helpful.

Who's Who in the Community

These are volunteers who are here to help the community. Community Moderators answer questions, and work to keep the community healthy and fun. Community moderators are members of the community, not Microsoft employees. People who make extraordinary contributions to the community may be asked to be Community Moderators.

Support Engineers are experts who are engaged by Microsoft to answer your questions.

Forum Moderators are experts engaged by Microsoft to mark the best answers, manage abuse, and maintain community health.

Wiki Authors are community members who have demonstrated outstanding written and technical skills. Wiki Authors have the ability to create and manage their own wiki articles in Microsoft Community.

These are Microsoft employees in charge of a particular category. Forum Owners are ultimately responsible for the health of the category.

MVPs

Most Valuable Professionals are independent experts who are offered a close connection with people at Microsoft. They can often answer your most challenging questions. Find out more about the MVP program.

Microsoft Employees

Microsoft employees participating in the community have a badge that says Microsoft. These community members may work in the community, or they may be general employees who choose to participate

Microsoft Community Code of Conduct

This Code of Conduct applies to all users of the Microsoft Community.

The Microsoft Community is designed for individuals 13 years of age or older.

As a participant of these forums you agree that you will uphold this Code of Conduct, and are responsible for all activities and content you post/upload.

In addition to upholding this Code of Conduct, you are responsible for adhering to all applicable local and national laws.

This is your community. Help us to keep it safe, friendly, fun and helpful.

• Be polite and respectful in your posts, and in your replies to other people.
• Keep conversation threads on track and constructive. It's okay to disagree with another user's post, but don't take the thread off track to do so. Always address your comments to the person who asked the initial question, not the other posters.
• Cite the source of anything you post or upload, if it isn't your own original content. Be honest about your sources.
• Keep it clean. No profanity, obscenity, insulting or bigoted comments please.
• Search to see if a question you'd like answered has already been posted by somebody else. Posting the same question repeatedly and starting multiple threads on the same subject can be confusing.
• Report any kind of abuse you find in the community. You will find "Report abuse" links in every post and in every profile.

• Divert or change a thread for your own purposes; just start a new thread with the subject you want to discuss.
• Post questions that are the same or similar to questions you have already posted. When someone has an answer to your question, that person will respond to you.
• Threaten, stalk, insult, victimize or intimidate anyone (or group of people) for any reason; including on the basis of age, gender, disability, ethnicity, sexual orientation, race or religion.
• Incite other users to threaten, stalk, insult, victimize, or intimidate another person or group of people.
• Harass, insult, tease, or correct other users about the grammar used in their posts. Good or bad grammar isn't the point-the community is about getting questions answered and technical discussions.
• Post content depicting nudity of any sort, including full or partial photographic human nudity, or nudity in cartoons, fantasy art or manga.
• Post chain letters.
• Link to websites that require payment to access information.
• Post links to external sites that violate this Code of Conduct.

• Posting content that is intended to harm or exploit minors in any way, including collecting the personally identifiable information (PII) of any minor (anyone under18 years old), including, but not limited to: name, email address, home address, phone number, or the name of the minor's school.
• Invading anyone's privacy by attempting to harvest, collect, store, or publish private or personally identifiable information, such as passwords, account information, credit card numbers, addresses, or other contact information without that person's knowledge and willing consent.
• Posting content or links to content that is illegal or violates any applicable local or national laws.
• Posting or spreading viruses, worms, malware, or other software intended to harm another user's computer.
• Impersonating a Microsoft employee, agent, manager, host, administrator, moderator, another user, MVP, or any other person through any means.
• Pirating Microsoft software or products, or offering pirated software or products for sale, including posting product keys.
• Specifically violating Microsoft licensing or terms, such as posting content or links that will install a 3rd party kernel, or evade security measures built into the software.
• Promoting or otherwise facilitating the purchase and sale of ammunition or firearms.
• Posting 'spam,' 'pyramid schemes,' 'affiliate marketing,' or unsolicited commercial advertisements of any kind, including advertising for money making schemes, discount cards, credit counseling, online surveys or online contests.
• Attempting to manipulate the forums, or other community features, including ranking and reputation systems, by violating any of the provisions of this Code of Conduct, colluding with others onvoting, or using multiple profiles.
• Offering to make international money transfers for amounts exceeding the asking price of an item, with intent to request a refund of any portion of the payment.
• Using any form of automated device or computer program that enables the submission of postings without the express written consent of Microsoft Corporation.

• Be very cautious about accepting direct help from another user. If that user suggest she use Remote Assistance to help you, be aware that he will have access to your computer, and that your computer could be hacked.
• If you volunteer to help another user through Remote Access, be very careful not to harm their computer in any way, or to access information that is not openly made available to you. Abuse of Remote Access will not be tolerated, and will result in your being banned from the community.
• Please be careful with your personal information. If you post your email address in a post, it may be used for any purpose by the general public, as this is a public community.
• Don't post information that could be used by others to steal your identity, like your street address, your phone number, your social security number, or your credit card number.

Microsoft reserves the right, at its sole discretion, and without any obligation to do so, to review and remove user-created services and content at will and without notice, and delete content and accounts. Microsoft reserves the right, at its sole discretion, to permanently ban participants or terminate access to the community.

• We encourage you to not share information that others could use to harm you. We encourage parents to be aware of and help exercise control over content posted by and activities of their children to keep them safe online.
• Microsoft is not responsible for the content of any user-created posting, listing or message. The decision to view content or engage with others is yours. We advise you to use your judgment.
• You are responsible for protecting your computer against interference, spyware or viruses that may be encountered. We recommend you install a virus protection program on your computer and keep it up to date.
• You may use the Report Abuse link to report violations of this Code of Conduct.
• Microsoft reserves the right to amend or change the Code of Conduct or any service at any time without notice. We encourage you to periodically review these guidelines to ensure you are in compliance.
• Some information you provide or upload to the service may be stored outside of the country in which you reside.
• All activity on the service is also governed by the Microsoft Terms of Use and the Microsoft Privacy Policy .
• You acknowledge that you are a volunteer participant in the Microsoft Community and that you may discontinue your participation at any time. Nothing related to your participation will be construed as creating an employer-employee relationship, a partnership, joint venture, association, or agency relationship, or as a limitation upon Microsoft's right to terminate your access as foreseen above, or upon Microsoft's discretion, to terminate your access as provided herein. You assume all risk for your use.
• You understand that posting content or submitting material is voluntary, and you are under no obligation whatsoever to provide any submissions or contributions. You are solely responsible for your dealings with any third party that relates to your use of the community, or any information or materials you obtain from a third party.
• No Compensation. Microsoft shall not be obligated to provide, and you have no expectation of receiving, any compensation in any form for your voluntary participation in the community, or for your submissions or contributions.