Migrate from Conceptboard to Microsoft Project

Each Conceptboard Board maps to a separate Microsoft Project plan (.mpp file or Project Online project). Because Conceptboard has no API, we run guided export sessions to produce a PDF and PNG of each board, which the customer subject-matter expert reviews to confirm the board's purpose and content. We create the MS Project plan with the board name as the project name, board creation date as the project start date, and board description as the project summary notes. Board visual layout does not carry forward; the MS Project plan is a structured schedule reconstructed from the board's content.

Conceptboard Projects are containers grouping Boards. If a Conceptboard Project contains multiple boards representing phases of a single initiative, we consolidate those boards into one MS Project plan with summary tasks per board. If boards within a Conceptboard Project represent independent initiatives, we create separate MS Project plans linked by a SharePoint hub site or Project Online Project Professional site. Starter tier limits active projects to 5, so we scope the full project list (including archived) during discovery to avoid missing content.

Conceptboard Sections subdivide a board visually. We treat each section as a summary task in MS Project, with its title as the task name and any sub-items within the section as subtasks. Section order is preserved by setting task outline numbers sequentially. Sections with no sub-items become placeholder summary tasks with a note indicating they were originally board sections.

Conceptboard's built-in task feature (checklist items, task cards, or milestones on a board) maps directly to MS Project tasks. We extract task titles, assignees (mapped to MS Project resources by email), due dates (mapped to task Start and Finish dates), and completion status (mapped to % Complete). Task descriptions from Conceptboard become MS Project task notes. Custom task fields in Conceptboard map to custom fields in MS Project.

Conceptboard milestones (if used on boards with the task feature) map to MS Project milestones (task with zero duration and Milestone = Yes). We preserve milestone names and target dates exactly. Milestone dependencies are reconstructed from the board's section order or any explicitly drawn connectors if visible in the exported content.

Conceptboard licensed users map to MS Project resources. We separate licensed users (per-seat) from guest accounts (free, unregistered) and create only licensed users as resources in MS Project. Guest collaborators without Conceptboard accounts do not get resource records. Resource booking kind defaults to Work. Customers using Project Online with enterprise resource management map Conceptboard users to the enterprise resource pool by email match.

Files attached to a Conceptboard board are downloaded individually and re-attached to the corresponding MS Project plan. Project Online attachments store in the associated SharePoint document library; Project Desktop attachments store in the project folder. We preserve original filenames and attempt to attach to the relevant task if the attachment context is identifiable from the board export. Attachments without clear task context are added as project-level documents.

Conceptboard templates (personal and team-shared) are migrated as standard boards in MS Project. We note which boards were templates versus production boards so the customer can extract a project template from the exported board structure. MS Project does not have a native template library for Project Online plans, but SharePoint document libraries can store .mpt template files for Project Desktop users.

Conceptboard comments on board elements are captured in the PDF export as text but are not available as structured data. We record the comment count per board as a quality indicator and include comment content in the board-level PDF that becomes the project documentation. If individual task comments are identifiable from the board layout, we add them as task notes in MS Project. Comment authors map to task notes with a [Comment by Name] prefix.

Board history (Advanced+ tier) records version snapshots of a board over time. This is an audit artifact with no Microsoft Project equivalent. MS Project stores task history as a basic change log but not version snapshots of the entire plan. We document whether boards had active history tracking and flag this as a governance feature the customer will lose. The customer may export board history as PDF before migration if historical versions are required for record-keeping.

Approval workflows (Corporate & Government tier) are process state artifacts. Microsoft Project does not have a native board-level approval workflow; approvals are handled via SharePoint Power Automate workflows or external tools. We flag whether any boards had active approval workflows at migration time and deliver a written recommendation for rebuilding approvals as Power Automate flows or as SharePoint approval steps attached to the project site.