Update about the future of the Unity Forums & Unity Discussions

[illashiza]

@IllTemperedTunas

Cool beans. Really excited for this new energy from you guys, here’s hoping thing continue to go in a positive direction. This new website is in a word “clunky” hope that improves over time. I do kinda miss the simplicity and ease of use of the old forums.

Excited about the new energy! Hoping the website improves over time; missing the simplicity of the old forums.

[vertxxyz]

@IllTemperedTunas

What are the rules of posting? These are important guidelines we need to know.

https://discussions.unity.com/faq
You can reach the code of conduct via the drop-down near your inbox on the left. I’m pretty sure it’s linked a couple of other places too.

Yes, I’m also a moderator (hence the shield).

@IllTemperedTunas

What slurs did I post and to whom did I levy them?

You haven’t levied them at anyone. Just avoid using non-standard terms for disabilities and you won’t run into ableist slurs in the future. E.g. don’t turn a name for a disability into a verb.

---

I agree with your general sentiment that the forums are stale, but I don’t think it’s at all correct to level that at cancel culture. Personally I think strong voices have taken over the space and a lack of moderation has basically let them own it.

Most of the conversations had regarding Unity end up being very heated instead of objective, bringing a lot of old or pre-existing issues to every discussion as if it helps. But it doesn’t help to complain about how render pipelines were implemented every time something new is announced, for example.

I also think threads end up filled with so much inane content that they’re often a waste of time to participate in. I don’t want to be notified that someone’s posted a one-line affirmation of another post, or a meme, or whatever. I want to hear from Unity’s developers, and I want to see them receive interesting questions and feedback, which seems similar to the sentiment around the forum posts you linked.

Hopefully the newer community conduct helps keep conversation more on-topic and meaningful so the rest of the community that isn’t posting due to the above problems can begin participating again.

Also noteworthy: we can’t judge Discussions yet, because it’s currently a very quick implementation that has been iterated on behind the scenes, and its community is 95% a holdover from an old (and failing) platform, Unity Answers. When the forums are migrated and the new platform is live then hopefully it’ll also revitalise the space.

[IllTemperedTunas]

I appreciate this much more clear feedback on the post. I’m still bummed it was removed, to my knowledge I had edited out the offensive language long before any moderation, but whatever, seems to just be getting everyone offended anyhow. It’s a little unnerving to know you guys are skimming through original drafts looking for little bits of offensive content to call us out on.

Anyway, here’s to better posts in the future. I’ll try not to use such inflammatory language in my posts from the get go.

[LeonhardP]

Hi everyone,

Thank you for your feedback and questions about the Forum migration to Unity Discussions. We consolidated frequently asked questions below.

Q: Currently Unity Discussions looks like a Q&A site mainly. As Unity Forums is migrated into Unity Discussions, will Unity Discussions have more categories and functionalities that are served in Unity Forums at this moment?

A: Correct. As part of the Forum migration, the Unity Discussions Platform has been redesigned to offer much more than a Q&A site. It will encompass and support a broader range of use cases and topic types such as Questions, Bugs, Feedback, Collaborations, and Showcases that are currently available on Unity Forums.

---

Q: What will happen to categories?

A: We are retaining the general structure of the Unity Forums but in a more streamlined form with fewer exclusive spaces. Instead, we will rely more on tags to segment and filter conversations. To recreate the experience of separate rooms despite having fewer categories, we will support dedicated filters that encompass related tags.

For example, we currently have five distinct forums for user-created content discussions. Post-migration, there will be a single “Showcase” category where the community can discuss their Made with Unity projects, non-commercial tools, and art assets, or commercial ones (Asset Store). The segmentation currently provided by separate sub-forums will be maintained by a dedicated group of showcase tags, which users will choose from during topic creation.

As another example, Unity Engine-related discussions that were split between more than 100 sub-forums in the Unity Community Discussion and the Beta & Experimental Features areas will be consolidated into a collective Unity Engine category with tags to preserve their current structure. Instead of having four different categories for physics-related discussions (2D, ECS-Physics, Physics, Experimental Physics), there will be a physics tag group users can choose from to specify what area of physics their topic is about. And for folks who are generally interested in seeing all physics discussions, we will have a filter that will show all topics with at least one of the physics tags.

---

Q: How will topics about very specific subjects be handled on Unity Discussions? What measures are in place to ensure these posts aren’t lost?

A: The new Unity Discussions, once the Forums are migrated, is designed to improve search and discoverability of specific questions or topics, without them being lost between different sub-forums.

It will allow tags to be attached to each thread to identify topic types, products, related subject matters, etc. Advanced search will enable users to find desired threads using these tags.

We’ve also enhanced the composer to guide users via dropdown menus to create new topics in the correct place from the start. Additionally, the “Getting Started” category allows beginners to start conversations even if they are unsure which area it relates to.

---

Q: How does the Forum migration affect the SEO or Google ranking?

A: Once the migration is completed, we will enable redirects to preserve SEO value. Also, the new Discussions supports additional SEO features like the schema support for the questions, using the QAPage schema and the Sitemap.XML (an index of all pages, with publish date, and frequency to recheck). We anticipate this will lead to better search results and more accurate listings.

---

Q: Will “watched threads/watch list” be migrated?

A: All topics you have replied to will be tracked by default. We are also exploring the feasibility of bringing over other types of watched threads.

---

Q: Will you add an “Official” tag similar to the forum?

A: Yes, the “Official” tags will be there and colored in a similar way to Unity Forums.

You will also be able to see all official topics in one list and set up notifications specifically for new official topics.

---

Q: What will happen to the job forums?

A: We are migrating the job boards into a combined “Collaboration & Jobs” category. The distinction between commercial/non-commercial job offering/searching topic types will be maintained via tags.

---

Q: What will happen to threads without replies?

A: We are migrating threads without replies if they have at least one like. This has been clarified in the original announcement.

---

Q: What attachments don’t have filenames? Images that are pasted from the clipboard?

A: There are about 26 attachments without filenames, leftovers from a previous migration.

---

Q: The width of topics on Unity Discussion is too narrow compared to the Unity forums. Are you planning to change that?

A: Yes, we are making adjustments to the overall topic width in the redesign of Unity Discussions.

Your Unity Community Team

[andrew-lukasik]

Taking advantage of the fact that this big revitalization event is underway - can you guys also fix these old posts that got left behind after last migration?

Here are 3 google queries to easily find these broken posts:

@andrew-lukasik

If anyone want’s to know if this issue is resolved - run these google queries:

• site:https://discussions.unity.com/ “* }*” - Google Search
• site:https://discussions.unity.com/ “ ” - Google Search
• site:https://discussions.unity.com/ “_ _” - Google Search

3 x 0 search hits means it’s mostly resolved already.

LLMs are pretty good at fixing these, apparently. For example, here is one of these posts, it’s in pretty bad state rn:

Show post

@Statement

Clean your code, so it is easier to follow.

for( var hit in colliders )
{
    if( hit.rigidbody )
    {
        hit.rigidbody.AddExplosionForce( explosionPower, transform.position,
                                         explosionRadius );
    }
}

What is the “for()” doing?

It loops through every collider in colliders. The variable hit is for every loop assigned to the next collider. It is the same as:

for( var i = 0; i < colliders.Length; ++i )
{
    var hit = colliders*; // This is your "var hit in colliders"*
 *if( hit.rigidbody )*
 *{*
 *hit.rigidbody.AddExplosionForce( explosionPower, transform.position,*
 *explosionRadius );*
 *}*
*}*
*```*
*<blockquote>*
 *<p>Is it like a "if()"?</p>*
*</blockquote>*
*<p>No, but it does have a scope (the { and }) so it looks very much like an if. The for will repeat the code inside the scope for every item in your collection.</p>*
*<blockquote>*
 *<p>What is asked in the if statement "if(hit.rigidbody)"</p>*
*</blockquote>*
*<p>It checks if the collider has a rigid body. It is the same as calling "if(hit.rigidbody != null)".</p>*
*<blockquote>*
 *<p>Is "hit" a list of things that have collided with something?</p>*
*</blockquote>*
*<p>No, hit is one of the objects that you have in your collider colle

And here, the same post as repaired by claude.ai:

Show post

One additional comment I gave it was to remove all the unnecessary “*” and “**” that it still left there after first try.

@Statement

Clean your code, so it is easier to follow.

for( var hit in colliders )
{
    if( hit.rigidbody )
    {
        hit.rigidbody.AddExplosionForce( explosionPower, transform.position,
                                         explosionRadius );
    }
}

What is the "for()" doing?

It loops through every collider in colliders. The variable hit is for every loop assigned to the next collider. It is the same as:

for( var i = 0; i < colliders.Length; ++i )
{
    var hit = colliders[i]; // This is your "var hit in colliders"
    if( hit.rigidbody )
    {
        hit.rigidbody.AddExplosionForce( explosionPower, transform.position,
                                         explosionRadius );
    }
}

Is it like a "if()"?

No, but it does have a scope (the { and }) so it looks very much like an if. The for will repeat the code inside the scope for every item in your collection.

What is asked in the if statement "if(hit.rigidbody)"

It checks if the collider has a rigid body. It is the same as calling "if(hit.rigidbody != null)".

Is "hit" a list of things that have collided with something?

No, hit is one of the objects that you have in your collider collection. Since it is in a loop, hit changes each time the loop is run so it will repeat for every object in your collider collection. Just think that "hit" is going to be "all" your colliders, one at a time in the loop.

Is that why the code says "hit.rigidbody.AddExplosionForce()" to add a explosion force to rigidbodys that have been hit?

Yes, it applies an explosion force to every rigid body that was attached to a collider in the collision test.

---

I think you could do some simple tests to boost your confidence in what the code is doing. Try this:

function Start()
{
    // Create a collection of strings
    var collection = new String[3];
    // Put some data in it
    collection[0] = "Hello";
    collection[1] = "For";
    collection[2] = "Loop";
    print ("Test 1");
    // Test the for with enumeration
    for (var each in collection)
    {
        print ("each = " + each);
    }
    print ("Test 2");
    // Test the for with explicit control,
    // backwards for fun!
    for (var i = collection.Length - 1; i >= 0; --i)
    {
        var each = collection[i];
        print ("i = " + i);
        print ("each = " + each);
    }
}

The output for the first test:

 Test 1 each = Hello each = For each = Loop 

and the second test:

 Test 2 i = 2 each = Loop i = 1 each = For i = 0 each = Hello 

Sorry for bothering you with this but many of these posts represent a lot of work, knowledge and history of Unity community in general.

[LeonhardP]

Hi @andrew-lukasik, thanks for the flag. Unfortunately, it’s out of scope for the upcoming migration but we will look into possible solutions once that has been completed.

[IllTemperedTunas]

Very welcome improvements, lots of little things we could nitpick but I’m sure they’ll get sorted in time.

Sorry to keep posting, this thread already feels a little awkward and desolate, but that’s why I feel compelled to clear the air and make this final appeal.

It’s worrisome to know you guys feel that it’s been a lack of moderation that has solely caused the decline of this community. While I agree that curtailing agitative behaviors among the worst offenders would help create less noise and a positive environment, it’s also true if you banned the existing user base no one would post at all. Instead of thinking of these users as toxic posters of no value that need to be eliminated, maybe we can think of those whose content we dislike as once great, positive forces in this community who can be coaxed back with great interactions. One could also say that the decline set in because of a lack of positive interactions from the Unity side.

I know it’s annoying to hear one of these “toxic users” harp on this subject. Not trying to be smarmy, I share this sentiment. I think all of us users who post on Unity can’t stand the majority of the other users, but we’re too damned stubborn to leave. And stubborn developers are some of the best.

This is of supreme importance: We only get one chance to use this fresh slate. Unity users will come to this place one time to see if things have improved and then make a judgment call. We’re all focusing on features and nuts and bolts, but one factor that isn’t touched on enough, the absolute most deciding factor of a forum is is it worth posting in? Will you feel under threat by moderation? Is fun not allowed?

Maybe I’m being petty airing these grievances here in the open, I don’t think so, I think this needs to be said, and I truly want this place to be better, be popular, and the engine I have devoted over a decade to to have a vibrant future. Let’s all try to be a bit more professional, but let’s also not act so militantly about it or this place is going to die really quickly. No one wants to feel like they’re stepping on egg shells too much.

If someone playfully uses a word they didn’t know they weren’t allowed to use, airing that person out publicly from the position of representing Unity is going to cause bad blood right out of the gate.

I understand from a certain perspective that things would be better if this forum were just all dry technical talk with no color commentary whatsoever, but that would be a defeat. If you look back at the Unity forums when it was at its best, it was never like that, they were inviting, they were full of optimism and memes and good times. THAT is the sign of a healthy community.

Hoping we can all come together and get on the same page and end this sense of hostility on all sides. I know it’s hard, many of us users feel the same way about you guys. Some of it warranted, some of it is not. People make mistakes, and sometimes, quite often these days, we misunderstand and assume the worst of people and in this viscous cycle we bring out the worst in one another.

We’re all dealing with this prejudice, whether it be against the big bad gaming corporation or it be unwashed masses of forum users who don’t know how to be professional and say their terrible things.

Maybe you guys can send out an internal memo. If mods don’t know beyond the shadow of a doubt if a thread is in bad faith, you should not chastise them or take too strong of moderator action. For the first infraction state the rules kindly. If there’s some doucher (is that ok to say? I’m only partly trying to be snarky, I have no idea which derogatory terms are kosher or not) who can’t behave in an acceptable manner, by all means crank up the flames, tell them they need to get their act together with a final warning then give them the boot.

This is a very delicate time for Unity and its community, and we only get this clean slate of this new forum one time. This first impression is hugely important, and while no one is saying you shouldn’t eventually take hard action against repeat offenders, if right out of the gate you’re demeaning and moderating posters with questionable reasonings, this community is going to remain a ghost town.

If you go to the Questions and Answers section of this forum, it’s already so boring and lifeless. Who would want to spend their day wanting to answer mundane, and project specific questions all day by posters who aren’t giving enough information to allow people to answer 90% of questions. Engagement, color commentary, memes, these are the glue that keep our attention stuck in the forum, to the Unity community and fosters brand loyalty.

Anyway, I know this comes off as preachy, a ramble, whatever. I want this place to be better in a myriad of ways and I hope we can all step it up, spend more effort into quality posts regarding the engine, and try to leave a lot of our baggage at the door moving forward.

Heavy moderation will only create an even worse clustersomething than has become of the public image of Unity. If 1/4 of the Unity workforce made a great, quality post every 3 days in these forums, or even just a small amount of engagement, that would go WAY further than trying to force what you guys believe to be positive behavior. To be frank, Unity deserves some lambasting.

We’re all hoping things get better in the future, let’s all try to have a little faith in one another.

I realize this post is skirting the line, that was the intention. Trying to get you guys in shape for the migration!

Quick Edit: It’s not my intention to be a constant thorn or nuisance, but this is an important discussion and this is important feedback that I hope can make this experience better for all of us: users and mods. I understand the sort of posts and topics we all want to avoid, and I alluded to them in my first post and that’s a mistake on me. I’ve given myself a warning for that, no more of that sh- stuff.

I agree that as a community we should get past these divisive topics as it’s not constructive for this community of diverse developers. But we don’t have to throw away the baby with the bathwater.

OK! No more long drawn out diatribes from me in this thread. Apologies for the long post, I get carried away sometimes.

[Brach_Unity]

I will add this to the roadmap as something we can investigate for fixing.

[andrew-lukasik]

I happened to read a twitter/x post about somewhat adjacent issue by none else than Unity’s former employee, few weeks ago. Person was readably very unhappy about his blog posts disappearing from the web. It stuck with me for longer than I expected.

Unity → Godot funnel:

My understanding is that many older users here would express similar sentiment toward their own forum & answers posts; people take this somewhat personally. Most of these are silly little threads going nowhere - yes - but these are also recordings of long hour investigations and still relevant blog-like posts among them, where people really cared to take their time to write down and share what they knew.
Now - when they log-in again and see their posts in disrepair - they could start felling not taken seriously here, like all this was waste of their time.

[LeonhardP]

Hi everyone,

As mentioned in the original announcement, to complete the migration to Unity Discussions, the Unity Forums will be set to read-only mode on July 12. Following this, Unity Discussions will go to read-only on July 15 until it goes live again with the new design and the migrated forum contents on July 18.

From July 18 onwards, Unity Discussions will become the central official Unity community site.

Important Dates:
July 12 Unity Forums read-only
July 15 Unity Discussions read-only
July 18 Unity Forums go live on Unity Discussions

We appreciate your understanding and support as we work to improve our community sites. Thank you for being a part of our community, and we look forward to continuing to serve you in the future.

Your Unity Community Team

[justaddice831]

You can change to classic white BG with black text using the “sun” icon in the top left . Consider tweeking monitor settings otherwise

[nasos_333]

Nice :), so simple

That is great they have this option, was one of the major issues for me

Now need mostly to put the user name little to right and decrease the gaps of text to tab edges to be way bettter

[PanthenEye]

Nothing my monitor settings can do and I’m already using the “eye” icon’s dark mode. I have an eye condition that blurs/glares pure white text on dark background. But Dark Reader chrome addon solved my issue by adding a smidge of grey to text. I need dark mode, just not one where they blast my eyes with white text.

[ina]

hmm so it seems forums is already down - are they being migrated here?

can’t seem to find this forum post here

[

In-game Code Editor using Textmesh Pro

](https://forum.unity.com/threads/in-game-code-editor-using-textmesh-pro.1268561/)

[Waterstudios11]

Can’t be, I managed to open several old forums topics, including the one you posted just now. I must wonder why you had trouble opening it…

[Shinyclef]

There was a period when the forums were inaccessible before they went read-only.

[RaventurnPatrick]

There is no info whatsoever why the forum has been marked read-only other than this cryptic info?

Poor unity users…

[RaventurnPatrick]

A new info appeared just now

[IllTemperedTunas]

It’ll be interesting to see how these forums go now that it’s the only place to post. Here’s hoping there isn’t too much salt, this place and it’s features are really starting to grow on me. Just needs content now and the revamp will be very welcome.