Solved

[AngelaHetrick1]

It looks like the Tags are going away in January. Is this correct?

[leward · Accepted solution]

Hi @AngelaHetrick1 .  I'm pretty sure the feature will remain available indefinitely. I think the following two things are happening.

1. Currently there are two separate places where the feature needs to be enabled--The main accountSettings ta  and Settings > Feature Options.  Apparently, the setting on the Fearure options is going away in the next release to get rid if the redundance.  It's not clear to me why some settings wind up on the main Settings tab and others on the Feature Options.  Personally, I'd like to see them all in one place.  And I would strong prefer that the differentiation tags feature be a course-level feature, so instructors would be able to opt in or out.
   
   
2. I think the issue you are referring to is this:
   
   The Differentiation Tags feature user group will close for participation on January 18, 2026. After this date, current members can continue to view information in the group in a read-only format. 
   
   The January date refers only to this user group, not the feature itself...thank goodness.

[leward · Accepted solution]

Hi @AngelaHetrick1 .  I'm pretty sure the feature will remain available indefinitely. I think the following two things are happening.

1. Currently there are two separate places where the feature needs to be enabled--The main accountSettings ta  and Settings > Feature Options.  Apparently, the setting on the Fearure options is going away in the next release to get rid if the redundance.  It's not clear to me why some settings wind up on the main Settings tab and others on the Feature Options.  Personally, I'd like to see them all in one place.  And I would strong prefer that the differentiation tags feature be a course-level feature, so instructors would be able to opt in or out.
   
   
2. I think the issue you are referring to is this:
   
   The Differentiation Tags feature user group will close for participation on January 18, 2026. After this date, current members can continue to view information in the group in a read-only format. 
   
   The January date refers only to this user group, not the feature itself...thank goodness.

[AngelaHetrick1 · Accepted solution]

Thank you for the clarification. My school is new to Canvas this year and we started using them. However, we are now having a great deal of issues with them not working and getting error messages. 

[james_whalley]

@AngelaHetrick1 What kinds of issues are you running into?

[james_whalley]

@SamGarza1 Why is this feature option going away? We are not ready for this feature to be enabled by default for everyone. By taking away the option to enable at the course level, we must now set this up in a subaccount and then manage which courses get added there. This is more work in order for us to do a soft launch of this product and I don't know why you would want to remove the ability for users to enable this for individual courses. Please rethink this decision.

[mreyes]

I want clarification as well, since the Summary in the October 18 release notes states, "The Differentiation Tags feature option is removed for all users. "

[teryn_odom]

Hi folks - Differentiation Tags are now under my purview as @SamGarza has moved to the Outcomes team. As mentioned above, Differentiation Tags are not going anywhere. We hope to only make them better! Only the feature flag/feature option was removed as part of October release. There is now a setting to enable/disable within account settings. Since DTs are now generally available, there isn't a need for the user group, so it's closing/moving to read only. Feature options are generally short-term for things pre-GA and Settings are long-term. But, you make a great point that it's difficult to manage and ideally would be one area. 

[james_whalley]

@teryn_odom I am fine seeing things move from Feature Options to Settings. What I would like is for this to remain something that can be enabled at the course level. Even the language in the interface implies there will be this course-level granularity, as the account-level setting reads, "Lock this setting for sub-accounts and courses".

[teryn_odom]

Thanks @james_whalley ; I've made note of this to discuss with engineering and have added to backlog for discussion and prioritization.