I am in the process of updating an adjunct training course that I have used and maintained for several years. When running the Canvas Link Validator, all of my existing Canvas training resources—including official Canvas guides, documentation links, and embedded training materials—are now being flagged as broken. As a result, the entire course appears to need rebuilding, despite these resources having worked reliably in previous terms. I am trying to understand: * Has Canvas made recent changes to documentation URLs, training resources, or link structures? * Were any global updates implemented mid–academic year that could impact long-standing courses? * Is there a known issue with the Link Validator producing false positives for Canvas-hosted resources? * Are others experiencing similar issues, and if so, what solutions or workarounds have you found? Any insight into what may have changed—or guidance on best practices to fix this issue—would be greatly appreciated. Thank you in advance for your help.

Canvas Link Validator Flagging Long-Standing Training Resources as Broken — Mid-Year Changes?

I am in the process of updating an adjunct training course that I have used and maintained for several years. When running the Canvas Link Validator, all of my existing Canvas training resources—including official Canvas guides, documentation links, and embedded training materials—are now being flagged as broken.

As a result, the entire course appears to need rebuilding, despite these resources having worked reliably in previous terms.

I am trying to understand:

Has Canvas made recent changes to documentation URLs, training resources, or link structures?
Were any global updates implemented mid–academic year that could impact long-standing courses?
Is there a known issue with the Link Validator producing false positives for Canvas-hosted resources?
Are others experiencing similar issues, and if so, what solutions or workarounds have you found?

Any insight into what may have changed—or guidance on best practices to fix this issue—would be greatly appreciated. Thank you in advance for your help.

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HeatherSaigo

Hi @awalenski ! I'm not an expert, but I believe Canvas recently moved some videos from the old guides to a new platform. I remember seeing warnings on Canvas video guides that they would be deprecated this month. I wonder if that is causing some of the trouble?

Chris_Hofer

Hi @awalenski …

@HeatherSaigo is correct that the Canvas Community website recently switched platforms (this happened Wednesday or Thursday of last week, I believe). The old Canvas Community website was locked down for a few weeks while the transition happened, and as Heather mentioned, there were banners across the top of the Canvas Community website letting people know about the upcoming changes. Since the Community is now on a new platform, links did change. But, they should also redirect to the current site. So, if you have links that pointed to the previous Community site, those should re-direct to this current site. It's also my understanding that if you still had links to things from the Community two versions ago, those will not re-direct.

Also, some of the tutorial videos that you might have been using (such as overview videos to Pages, Discussions, Assignments, etc.) are going to be retired by the end of the year. Instead, you'll find shorter embedded videos in many of the written Guides near the top of those pages.

I hope this extra bit of information will be of some help to you.

awalenski

Yes, I understood the videos and have implemented those updates; however, all of my links to the former training guides are now broken. I understood that the videos would be deleted, but I was not aware that the links to the training guides would also be removed. At this time, those links do not redirect to the new website information, which is creating a significant issue.

Chris

Hi @awalenski,

The Your Community, Refreshed - Instructure Community blog post from a few weeks ago does outline the guide redirect situation pretty well.

Generally, guide links that have a path of /doc/DOC-#### are from 2 community platforms ago (5+ years, I think) and will no longer redirect. My guess is that most of your links are in that format and will need to be updated as stated there. There are a few links from the previous community platform that may not be redirecting properly still as well due to multiple redirects or content moving to new places in this new community space.

At this point, since you seem to have a lot of things not redirecting at all, I'd probably recommend going through all of your documentation and updating the URLs to their current versions through searching the community or Googling for the latest link. That will be the most future-proof action, since redirects are hardly ever permanent.

I know this is not welcome news if you didn't see the blog post last month, but I hope the info helps.

-Chris

awalenski

Hi Chris,
Thank you for the explanation. I do have a follow-up question for clarification. I downloaded Canvas – Passport to Canvas from Commons today (Shared by: Training Services, updated September 11, 2025) with the intent of using it as a current training resource. When I ran the link validator on that course, it returned 28 broken links as well.
Has this course been updated by Instructure to reflect the recent community changes, or are those links also pending revision? I want to be sure I’m not missing something before rebuilding our local training materials around it.
Thanks again for your help.

-Ann

dbrace

Hi @awalenski,

I believe you are referring to https://lor.instructure.com/resources/bc0e43d31fbd4eccbfbefbd6217de6ef.

I could be wrong but (and I am basing this on what appears in the "Version notes") this resource has not been updated since the Community switched platforms.

-Doug

dbrace

Hi @awalenski,

I reached out to my CSM at Instructure. The training team is aware that the Commons course that you referenced has not been updated and they are working on it. They do not have an ETA for when it will be ready.

-Doug

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