Comparing and Restoring Article Revisions

As Knowledge Base articles change over time, you may need to refer back to the different saved versions at some point. Each time changes are published to an article, the knowledge base creates a separate, historic version called a revision. Opening a revision allows you to see what was revised, who made the changes, compare two revisions, and restore a previous revision if necessary.

In this article, we'll cover:

• Viewing Revisions
• Comparing Revisions
• Restoring a Revision

Viewing Revisions

1. In the Client Portal, open the Knowledge Base, and navigate to the desired article.
2. Click the Edit Article button.
3. Click the Revisions tab.
4. A table will display each saved revision of your article, with the newest version at the top. Click the Revision name to open it and see the article content as it appeared at the time of saving. 

Comparing Revisions

You can easily compare the differences between two saved versions of the article.

A couple of things to note about comparing revisions:

• A revision can only be compared to older revisions. For example, if there are five revisions of an article, you cannot open revision three and compare it with revision four. Instead, you must open revision four and then compare it to revision three.
• Some formatting, such as tables, cannot be compared, but text within formatted areas will still be compared when possible. 

Compare Revisions from the Revisions List

From the revision list, the selected revision will automatically compare to the current revision. (This is why the Compare button doesn't appear for the current revision.)

1. In the Client Portal, open the Knowledge Base, and navigate to the desired article.
2. Click the Edit Article button.
3. Click the Revisions tab.
4. Click the Compare button for the revision.
5. The revision preview will show the selected revision and 'current' revision compared inline.

Compare Revisions from the Revisions Preview Page

From the revision preview, you can select any previous revision to compare to.

1. In the Client Portal, open the Knowledge Base, and navigate to the desired article.
2. Click the Edit Article button.
3. Click the Revisions tab.
4. On the revision preview page, click the Compare Revisions button.
5. In the popup, select the previous revision you want to compare against. You can only select older revisions.
6. Click Compare. 

Reviewing Revision Differences

The comparison page will display the content of the two revisions inline. Text and images will be highlighted; the colors indicate the following:

• Green with an underline indicates newly added content
• Red with a strikethrough indicates removed content
• Blue indicates formatting changes or modified content

Some formatting, such as table styles, cannot be compared. 

Restoring a Revision

If, after reviewing the differences in an older revision, you decide that the older content is better, you can restore the old revision. This will replace the currently live content in the knowledge base. The replaced revision will still be available in the revision history.

To restore an older revision:

1. In the Client Portal, open the Knowledge Base, and navigate to the desired article.
2. Click the Edit Article button.
3. Click the Revisions tab.
4. Click the Restore to this Revision button.
   
5. Confirm OK in the modal.
6. The revision table will display the restored version of the article as a new revision at the top of the list. To see the newly published revision, click the article title in the breadcrumb.