[German]Occasionally Microsoft cleans up its web site and deletes older support articles. In recent weeks, a number of KB articles have fallen victim to this cleaning action.
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I came across a tweet by Woody Leonhard, who put agaoin the topic on the table this weekend.
Microsoft is deleting (not archiving) older Internet Explorer documentation. https://t.co/MVYPXffzYc
— Woody Leonhard (@AskWoody) November 10, 2019
Woody Leonhard refers his article to Internet Explorer (Version 8 and 9) and writes that old support articles will be deleted.I notice, however, that this affects much more content at Microsoft than just Internet Explorer.
Background: My blogs uses a plug-in that checks all links cyclically for validity. Invalid links are displayed to users as crossed out in the text. I get a list of broken links and redirect them to archive copies of the Wayback machine if possible. During the last months I have been getting 'bursts' with many broken links to Microsoft – that is: Microsoft has deleted the downloads for patches or hotfixes, but also KB articles.
For some deleted content this makes sense, for example hotfixes or updates contained in the update rollups or cumulative updates. The problem I see: Deleting KB articles is of course stupid for people looking for the old content. But Microsoft doesn't seem to dispute it.
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