The technology platform behind the GeoNet community will be changing in the fall of 2020. Thischange will bring a new community user experience, features, and design to GeoNet, The EsriCommunity. This Document details the changes coming to Spaces, Places, and Groups. The audiences
for this document are current space admin/owners and group owners and future Place Managers/Groups Owners.

Terminology Updates
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Spaces  Places (the term spaces will be retired, instead just the term place will be used)
Groups  Groups (the concept and term for groups will remain the same)
Follow  Subscribe (the action to follow a place or group will be replaced with the term
Subscribe)
Content Type  Interaction Styles/Boards (Question, Blog, Documents, Events, Ideas)
Questions, discussions  Question Post (there will not be different interaction styles for each,
only question boards)
Correct Answer  Accepted Solution
Likes Kudos
Idea Votes  Idea Kudos
Helpful  won’t exist
Rate  won’t exist
Tag  Tag
Categories (applied to places/groups)  Labels (applied at board level)

Places & Groups
Places and Groups are created by the Community team.
Any community member can request a new place or group through the new community place/grouprequest process.
Places and Groups consist of Interaction Style Boards (Board options: Question, Blog, Document, Videos,Event, Ideas).
Places –Primary use cases are for Esri products, industries, services or programs, or Esri sponsoredinitiatives. Places will have at least two associated Place Managers for monitoring and oversight.
Groups – Primary use cases are to bring smaller groups of people together to collaborate on a specificgoal, special interest or specific topic. Groups can be setup as open, closed or hidden. Groups will have aspecified Group Owner(s) assigned. Groups require membership, specifically closed and hidden aremember only.

Group Types:•••

Open: Visible, open to anyone in the Community.
Closed: Publicly searchable but requires a request or an invitation to join and view boards andposts.
Hidden: Invisible to the public and accessible by invite only.

Labels – are pre-defined and are applied at the Board level, they are useful for searching, filtering andsubscribing at a more granular level.
Place and Group Structure is mostly flat. Groups will primarily be organized under: User Groups and allplaces will be organized under one of the Top-Level Communities:• Products• Industries• Developers• Worldwide• Services• Learning• ArcGIS Topics• Events

What’s changing & not migrating:••••Place layout will be standardized & consistent throughout the community (no option to change
page components/ design)
Overview page designs, images, html info will not migrate
Projects do not exist in new platform and will not migrate, content will be pulled into parent
place
Followers will not migrate; community members will need to setup new subscriptions (follow)
for places

What are the Benefits?
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Similar UI/UX across all places will make it easier for users to find what they are looking for on
any page
Searchability at a place or even board level
Use of pre-defined labels allow for deeper filtering and subscriptions
Less overhead for place managers, allowing more focus on the content
Better analytic reports for a place will be available by request to the Community team
ArcGIS Ideas will be decentralized – an ideas board will be created within the Place for all thecurrent ArcGIS Ideas categories and current ideas will migrate accordingly to that Place’s Ideas
board
Each place and board landing page will display activity feeds, leaderboards, search options, postoptions, subscribe options

Place Managers (previously known as space admin or owner)
Place Manager role will be different in the new platform, with a stronger emphasis on the content andless on the place overhead (layout/design).
Staff and/or distributors can be assigned a Place Manager role (permission based). As a Place Manager,
you will have oversight of a specific place (area/category). Your role is to monitor the place and boards
within it, including; assist with discussion as needed, mark accepted solutions where needed, assist withengagement. You will be assigned a place manager permission role that will allow you to float topics(bring to the top), mark topics as read-only, feature articles, move posts. Also, by default all staff &Distributors will have access to blog, create documents, post questions and videos, create events acrossall places. Place Managers are not expected to be the primary responder to questions, we recommend
allowing 48 hours for peer to peer replies before Esri jumps into the conversation, unless of course Esriis the only one who could answer the question.

Group Owners
Current group owners and members will migrate to the new platform.
Group owners will have access which enables them to edit group hub details, manage membership
requests and invitations, and assign and change group roles for members.
Member management is performed in the Members Page. An Owner or Administrator can see a list ofcurrent members, edit a member's role, remove members from the group, view pending invitations, andaccept and deny requests to join.
New group type distinctions:
Current GeoNet
PublicPrivate (listed)
Private (Unlisted)

New GeoNet
Open
ClosedHidden

All groups are aggregated on a The User Groups Page, which provides quick access to the group
discussion styles and recent activity. On this page you can filter by open, closed or hidden groups. Youwill see hidden groups you are member of, and closed groups you will have the option to request to join
but you will not see content unless you are member.
Each group has its own configurable set of interaction styles (questions, blog, documents, and ideaexchange) to organize content and communication.
Other important group capabilities include fully functional search within the group and groupsubscriptions.
For more on Group Management, see GeoNet Group Management (link coming soon).