< | For everything SharePoint and Office 365 from the community for the community!
You may have noticed a little change here . First off I wanted to say a huge thank you to for providing FREE hosting for this web site running on a SharePoint Server 2010 Farm for the last few years. The community has benefited tremendously from the wealth of information shared by the community headed up by myself (Jeremy Thake ), Mark Miller
and Natasha Felshman . I would also like to thank all of our sponsors over the years that have helped to pay for expenses to keep the site running and the editorial effort running, without the sponsors this site wouldn’t be what it is today.
I have spent quite a bit of my own personal time writing up a migration script to get the content out of SharePoint Server 2010 Publishing Site lists and libraries into WordPress. I’ve used all the tricks in the book to get ALL of the content over including all the comments, images, authors and categories.
As you are probably aware, I have moved to Seattle to take a role as a Senior Product Marketing Manager role in the Office 365 Developer team. I wrote
on this back in March when I joined. I would encourage you to go see what our team has been up to at . I would just like to say a personal thank you to everyone involved in the community, I wouldn’t have been able to achieve my dream of working for Microsoft without all your support and help over the years!
Mark has also been busy forming a new community around the Nexus product.
You can check out what Mark has been doing over at the . No doubt that community will benefit immensely from his passion for building strong collaboration across the globe like he did
Rather than let the content disappear off the Internet when the SharePoint Server’s were switched off, I thought it was important to keep things going and accessible. I’ve already had quite a few questions over the last few months around the future of the site.
The site has over 160,000 page views a month purely through search driven referrals. There has been no content updates on the site since November 2013, but if there are people who want to contribute to this site I am more than happy to open the doors again.
The web site is currently hosted on my personal Azure tenant. I am not looking to make this a commercial site and will only source sponsorship to keep the lights on. Truthfully, I have no idea what it’ll cost to run WordPress on Azure Web Sites and Azure SQL with the audience it has.
If people are interested in contributing, I will be looking for some volunteers to act as editors for content in the End User, Developer and IT Pro spaces respectively. I am also looking for someone with some Photoshop skills to skin this site from the default theme with a nice top banner.
So, feel free to chime in below in the comments and lets see what we can rustle up!
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Editor’s Note: Contributor Ben Henderson is Client Services Manager for . Follow him
When you look at the numbers, the challenges of BYOD in SharePoint reach far and wide. 17,000 organizations now run SharePoint as their enterprise CMS and 125 million SharePoint licenses have been sold to date, according to file-sharing company Accellion. Gartner reports 70% of organizations allow users’ personal devices to access network systems and enterprise applications, and an astounding 78% of white-collar employees in the US use their own laptops, smartphones and tablets for work purposes (Cisco Systems).
You do the math. Thousands of IT departments are dealing with the daily challenges of actively monitoring and managing a myriad of mobile devices, yet delivering SharePoint content in a way that is easy and useful so that employees don’t look to less secure alternative solutions.
So what’s the problem? Two words – data breaches. In March 2011, 40 million employee records were stolen from RSA S the year before that Gawker Media experienced compromised email addresses and passwords of about 1.3 million commenters on popular blogs Lifehacker, Gizmodo and Jezebel, plus the theft of the source code for Gawker’s custom-built content management system. Although not on the same scale, corporate data breaches are common. According to research firm, Ponemon, about 85% of all US companies have experienced one or more data breaches.
SharePoint Needs Careful Management
SharePoint is capable of handling more than 200 file types out of the box. Imagine the data it can unleash. Without appropriate and consistent policies around access controls and security measures, such as restricted remote access, critical information can be left to twist in the wind.
Administrative mishaps, incorrectly configured services, and broad access rights all create security vulnerabilities. In the wrong hands, consumer-grade devices open an easy way through these vulnerable holes to enterprise data stored on the device and sometimes into the entire enterprise network.
As experts in SharePoint collaboration, we’ve learned first-hand where our customers face the biggest BYOD challenges in SharePoint, and they broadly divide into two categories: security and ease of use. The two go hand-in-hand to satisfy the needs of the organization as a whole and the individual users. Let’s start with security.
1. I’ve Lost my Phone
The number 1 security concern with BYOD connecting to enterprise networks is loss or theft of those devices. Foreground Security, a consulting firm, reports that 47% of employees have no passcode for their mobile phones. Malicious individuals will have access to any enterprise data stored on the device and possibly even to data stored on enterprise servers.
IT departments need to put in place, and enforce, strong password policies for every mobile device. Further, you should also consider creating password access to apps or browser access points into SharePoint, auto-wiping content after a series of unsuccessful tries, and setting up the ability to remotely wipe content from the device.
2. Authentication
On the topic of remotely wiping content, controlling access to SharePoint content on mobile devices is key. To protect sensitive corporate information, enterprises need to implement more fine grained security mechanisms and access control policies within the centralized or cloud-based SharePoint systems. IT departments need to pay attention to authorization policies that know who is accessing information and what type of data they are accessing, as well as what time of day, from what location and over what type of connection.
To achieve this, there needs to be proper site governance of both the content and structure of the SharePoint site. Note that this goes both ways, so that content that is created and changed on mobile devices need to follow the same set of authorization policies as those on the SharePoint site.
The good news is that SharePoint, Microsoft Outlook and Windows file server provide integration with identity providers like Active Directory Federation Services to enforce fine grained policies on what types of information users are permitted to view and access, even to the point of the specific device the user is connecting with.
Also note, for compliance with some of the more rigorous standards like HIPAA and SOX, enterprises need to go beyond access controls and encryption. To comply with these rigorous standards they need to implement logging and auditing to provide a trail of where the content is and has been.
3. Containerization
At the recent Gartner Security and Risk Management Summit, analyst Eric Maiwald commented: “BYOD means my phone, my tablet, my pictures, my music – it’s all about the user.” We could add to that: my confidential documents, my customer lists, my company financials, my bids and my patent information, and we have the full picture.
Separating corporate and personal data can be a thorny problem. One solution is containerization and this topic deserves an article all on its own. For the purpose of this article, we’re just making a note of its advantage. There are many choices for technologies for separating out and managing corporate email, applications and data. Just beware in making your choice, though, you’ll often need to use the vendor’s API and SDK to link customized apps to the container.
4. Jailbroken Devices
It’s no joke when a jail-broken iOS device appears on your corporate network. These devices pose a serious security risk. Worst case scenario is that malware can be introduced to your network through the use of unauthorized apps, and many jailbroken iOS devices also install a secure shell server that remote attackers can exploit.
Many MDM solutions are able to detect jail-broken devices, but don’t rely on your container solution to do this on its own. According to Gartner analyst Eric Maiwald: “If you have a rooted device, a container will not protect you.” You’ll need a multi-layered approach to jail-breaking, starting with educating employees about the risks and implications of jail-breaking their devices.
5. Malicious Apps or Hackers
What if a malicious app or person tries to access corporate documents? It has to be about the security settings you ensure all employees set on their device. For iOS devices, for example, encrypting vital information and user’s SharePoint credentials with hardware encryption and then storing them in the device’s Keychain will protect sensitive data. You’ll also want to pay attention to rogue apps that use the iPad’s screen capture capabilities, detect any modifications made to the .plist files on the iPad and if content is backed up on iTunes.
6. Preventing Information from Being Shared Externally
Employees often need to share documents with customers and partners, and this does create security issues for IT departments. The biggest issue is when employees send a document as an attachment to an email. Once that happens you lose the thread of who is sharing the document with whom, and there is no knowing who the customer then may share it with.
One solution is to offer the option to email documents as links in SharePoint. This adds extra security as the recipient must have the required SharePoint credentials to access the link and you can set authorization policies around the retrieval of said document.
7. User Interface
On the flip side of enterprise-wide security, we have ease of use for the individual. It goes without saying that if users cannot access SharePoint on their mobile devices or if they cannot access SharePoint content the way they would like to with an easy to use interface, they will look to alternate solutions for collaborating with colleagues and customers.
Out of the box, SharePoint 2013 has paid attention to the mobile experience with four browser-based experiences and the HTML-5-based contemporary view option, as well as the ability to design your own view based on your organization’s usability requirements. Your ability to choose the experiences, though, depends on a number of factors, including the devices you have and the type of site you are trying to enable.
There are also a number of third party solutions that cater to a wide range of devices to ensure employees adopt SharePoint for their mobile experience. Just note, that the user experience is tantamount to the success of your deployment and it starts with the user interface.
8. Working with Documents Offline
Field workers, sales professionals, external auditors are just some examples of employees who spend a large portion of their working days away from the office. To work efficiently, they will need offline access to email content stored in SharePoint. You’ll need a solution that allows users to selectively cache their SharePoint content to give them instant access to remain productive on the road or in the field.
There you have it. My hit list of measures you need to consider for successfully deploying a BYOD strategy in SharePoint.
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Editor’s note: Contributor Erik Abderhalden is a consultant with . Follow him
They say there’s only two seasons in Chicago: construction and winter. Thankfully most of the major highway and tolls are construction free now (sans I-90 west of 290), and winter is a while away. Or is it? Chicago weather is downright bizarre. How do you keep tabs on what it’s like outside? 15 minute weather web part to the rescue!
What I love about the 15 minute weather web part is how easy it is to style. Unlike other weather web parts, you can really get into this one and style it however you want. In my
this would just be another ol’ web part sitting pretty in a zone. What if I’m too cool for zones? OK Fonzie, chill. We can create the weather web part as a snippet and place it anywhere we want and style it however we want. Since we’re too cool for zones, we can even embedded in – wait for it – the master page.
Thanks to the HTML snippet generator in SharePoint 2013 you can place it anywhere you want in the master page. Here’s how. Make sure Publishing is enabled on your site first.
Download jQuery Tools
and zWeatherFeed
and place them in your site. Download
– especially if your master page isn’t already using it.
Follow the configuration steps in my
(stop after the first code block)
Save the code as a text file
Upload the text file to your Style Library and publish it
Follow steps 1-5 .
In the Design tab select Media and Content & Content Editor
In the content link property, enter the URL of where the text file from step 4 was uploaded
Expand the Appearance section and set Chrome Type to None
Click the Update button right of the web part properties
Click Copy to Clipboard. Don’t worry that the preview is empty.
Open up your master page in SharePoint Designer
Make sure you open up the HTML version of your master page and not the .master
Look for SharePoint: AspMenu ID=&TopNavigationMenu&. A line or two after it there should be a / asp: ContentPlaceHolder& and a / SharePoint: AjaxDelta& . Create a div with the class &weather&.
Paste the content copied from the snippet generator inside that div. It should look something like this:
Save the master page and check out your site
OK – so it looks a little wonky. Let me help you with some CSS. Throw this in a CEWP or reference it via an external stylesheet in your master page. This won’t be perfect because the position of the classes depends on other elements in your master page, but this should whet your appetite.
.Weather {
font-family: A
margin:15px 8px 0 0;
.weatherFeed {
width: 100
.weatherFeed A {
color: #4b4a53;
.weatherFeed A:hover {
color: #4b4a53;
text-decoration: none
.weatherItem {
background:none !
.weatherCity {
color: #4b4a53;
font-size:14
margin-bottom:2
.weatherTemp,
.weatherDesc,
.weatherWind,
.weatherLink {
.weatherRange {
color: #4b4a53;
font-size:11
.verticalweather {
.Weather .items {
.Weather .items DIV.weatherItem {
height: 42
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.Weather { font-family: Arial; float:right; margin:15px 8px 0 0;}&.weatherFeed { width: 100px;}&.weatherFeed A { color: #4b4a53;}&.weatherFeed A:hover { color: #4b4a53;
text-decoration: none}&.weatherItem { background:none !important;}&.weatherCity { color: #4b4a53; font-size:14px; margin-bottom:2px;}&.weatherTemp, .weatherDesc, .weatherWind, .weatherLink { display:none;}&.weatherRange { color: #4b4a53; font-size:11px;}&.verticalweather { height:42px; position:relative; overflow:hidden; width:100px;}&.Weather .items { margin:0; position:absolute;}&.Weather .items DIV.weatherItem { height: 42px;}
When done, your web part should look like this. If you have multiple locations in your text file, the web part will rotate through them as well.
I wanted to share one caveat. If you’re using design manager to package up your publishing assets to move between environments or create a boilerplate site template, leaving the 15 minute weather web part, or any other web part embedded in the master page, is a bad idea. Strange things happen when you import the package. I’ll save you the headache now instead of later.
Finally I need to share some credit where credit is due. This post wouldn’t be possible without the help of my awesome coworker Liz Sdregas.
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Editor’s note: Contributor Ellen van Aken is an experienced intranet adoption manager. Follow her
This is yet another example of streamlining a process where incomplete information was given via various channels.
What was the problem?
One of our global brands was struggling with their packaging process. Being in the fast-moving consumer goods business, there were always many new products being introduced and many promotions going on at any given time. Very often (such as: “now 20% extra!”) this meant that a new packaging had to be designed and printed.
For reasons of cost-efficiency and standardization, all packaging from one brand had to be centrally purchased. The purchasing manager was receiving incomplete information through various channels. Next to that, the requests were often received too late to allow the supplier the necessary lead time. Consolidating all information and ordering exactly the right amount of the right product at the right time was therefore not an easy task. I assume you will recognize this.
What is the solution?
You take one Team Site, as per my usual recipe.
We have turned an Excel form (which was used occasionally) into a Team Site custom list.
We made use of mandatory fields to force people to add information they often forget, such as the budget number, or whether the seconday packaging needs to be changed temporarily as well.
A calculated field is used to determine the deadline for artwork. So, if you want your new packaging to be ready on October 1, you MUST deliver your packaging designs before August 1. This was one of the more frequent problems. With the new process, delivering late is no longer allowed.
A workflow allows the purchasing manager to check if all details have been entered correctly. All approved requests are visible to all members.
The packaging supplier has read-access to the Team Site. The official ordering is done in the supplier’s system.
What are the benefits?
Although marketeers did not really like the limitation of their freedom, (especially where artwork deadlines were concerned), the new process has had many benefits for the total organization:
The process has saved time for the purchasing manager because she now receives complete and correct information.
All artwork is now being delivered on time, reducing last-minute stress for all. This is more a result of the implementation of the process, rather than the Team Site itself, of course.
The purchasing manager can now combine different requests and get better conditions.
The supplier knows beforehand what he can expect.
All requests are creating a large database. Marketeers in different locations can see what their colleagues are doing or have done, so they can share experiences with a certain action, or combine a promotion and therefore save costs.
Once again, this is not rocket science, it does not even use sophisticated new code, it is just regular SharePoint with a bit of thinking.
This screenshot shows the data entry screen.
New Request Data Entry
Below you see the Homepage with all approved requests on the left, for everyone to see and share. On the right, a web part with only My Requests waiting for confirmation. (In the real situation, this would be all My Requests, but since I have created all requests, I had to use another filter to show a difference.
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Editor’s note: Contributor Erik Abderhalden is a consultant with . Follow him
When people ask me what’s the weather is like outside, I think of Good Morning Vietnam when Robin Williams asks his fictional weather reporter Roosevelt E. roosevelt what the weather’s like. Roosevelt snaps back, &You got a window? Open it.&
When it comes to intranet sites, one of the more frequent requests is the ability to display weather. Not everyone in corporate America has the ability to open a window, nay even sit by a window. Thus a weather widget, or in the case of SharePoint a web part, is utilized to showcase the current temperature and give workers something to look forward to when they leave work or plan their weekend.
If you Google &SharePoint weather web part& you get a slew of solutions and they all have different functionality. What if instead of downloading a web part you could use a content editor web part and some JavaScript, CSS and accomplish the same functionality for free? It’s easy to set up and takes about 15 minutes from start to finish.
In this solution, I’ll be utilizing Zazar’s
JavaScript and some CSS. zWeatherFeed utilizes Yahoo weather and is easily customizable to meet your requirements.
First, download the zWeatherFeed JavaScript . If you’re like me and reside in the United States, we don’t use Celsius like the rest of the world, so we need to change the script to use Farenheit instead of Celsius. In your favorite script editing program, open up the script you just downloaded. Do a search for &unit& and replace the value of &c& to &f&. The location varies if you downloaded the .min.js or .js file. Here’s what you need to look for:
zweather.min.js unit:&c& zweather.js var defaults = { unit: ‘f’,
Great. Upload the JS to a safe place on your SharePoint site.
Now create a new text file. In the text file we’re going to place our code to call the JavaScript, and set up the HTML formatting for the weather.
The code is as follows. Be sure to update line 3 to reflect the JavaScript’s actual location.
&script src=&/ajax/libs/jquery/1.7.1/jquery.min.js& type=&text/javascript&&&/script&
&script src=&http://cdn.jquerytools.org/1.1.2/full/jquery.tools.min.js& type=&text/javascript&&&/script&
&script src=&http://yoursharepointsite/jquery.zweatherfeed.js& type=&text/javascript&&&/script&
&script type=&text/javascript&&
$(document).ready(function () {
$('#weather').weatherfeed(['90210', '75201', '37201', '33101'], {}, function (e) {
$(&div.scrollable&).scrollable({
vertical: true,
}).circular().navigator().autoscroll({
interval: 3000
&div class=&scrollable verticalweather&&
&div id=&weather& class=&items& &&/div&
&div class=&navi& &&/div&
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<script src="http:///ajax/libs/jquery/1.7.1/jquery.min.js& type=&text/javascript&&&/script&<script src="http://cdn.jquerytools.org/1.1.2/full/jquery.tools.min.js& type=&text/javascript&&&/script&<script src="http://yoursharepointsite/jquery.zweatherfeed.js& type=&text/javascript&&&/script&&<script type="text/javascript">&&&&$(document).ready(function () {&&&&&&&&$('#weather').weatherfeed(['90210', '75201', '37201', '33101'], {}, function (e) {&&&&&&&&&&&&$("div.scrollable").scrollable({&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&vertical: true,&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&size: 1&&&&&&&&&&&&}).circular().navigator().autoscroll({&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&interval: 3000&&&&&&&&&&&&});&&&&&&&&});&&&&});&</script>&<body><div class="scrollable verticalweather">&&&&<div id="weather" class="items" ></div></div>&&<div class="navi" ></div>
In line 7 of the code are all the zip codes the web part will diplay the weather for. You can use up to 10 zip codes so update the code to be reflect all the zip codes you wish to display. When done, upload the file to your site.
Now you’ll need some styling. First things first, download
and add it to your SharePoint site. This will be used to toggle between the different weather forecasts and displays at the bottom of the web part.
We’re not doing anything fancy here other than
so the web part’s background will reflect if it’s presently day or night in the currently location. You can add the stylesheet to the page via your prefered MO: another CEWP, in the same text file as the JS, an external stylesheet etc.,
However you place the stylesheet, be sure to update line 53 to reference the image you downloaded in the previous step. If you don’t include the reference, no worries, but you won’t have the nice navigation in the web part because that’s what truly defines this web part as snazzy opposed to all those non-snazzy weather web parts.
&style type=&text/css&&
.weatherFeed {
MARGIN: 2em 3 WIDTH: 280 FONT-FAMILY: Arial, Helvetica, sans- COLOR: # FONT-SIZE: 100%
.weatherFeed A {
COLOR: #888
.weatherFeed A:hover {
COLOR: # TEXT-DECORATION: none
.weatherItem {
TEXT-ALIGN: PADDING-BOTTOM: 0.8 PADDING-LEFT: 0.8 PADDING-RIGHT: 0.8 PADDING-TOP: 0.8em
.weatherCity {
TEXT-TRANSFORM: COLOR: #000
.weatherTemp {
COLOR: # FONT-SIZE: 4 FONT-WEIGHT: bold
.weatherDesc {
FONT-WEIGHT: bold
.weatherCity {
FONT-WEIGHT: bold
.weatherDesc {
MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0.4 COLOR: #eee
.weatherRange {
COLOR: # FONT-SIZE: 0.8em
.weatherWind {
COLOR: # FONT-SIZE: 0.8em
.weatherLink {
TEXT-ALIGN: MARGIN-TOP: 6 FONT-SIZE: 0.8em
.verticalweather {
BORDER-BOTTOM: #555 4 POSITION: BORDER-LEFT: #555 4 WIDTH: 280 BACKGROUND: url('bg.jpg') rgb(34,34,34) repeat-x; HEIGHT: 140 OVERFLOW: BORDER-TOP: #555 4 BORDER-RIGHT: #555 4px solid
POSITION: MARGIN: 0 HEIGHT: 20000em
.items DIV.weatherItem {
HEIGHT: 140px
WIDTH: 288 HEIGHT: 20px
background:url('/style library/weatherwebpart/navigator.png') 0 0 no-repeat
MARGIN: 3 WIDTH: 8 DISPLAY: FLOAT: HEIGHT: 8 FONT-SIZE: 1px
.navi A:hover {
BACKGROUND-POSITION: 0px -8px
.navi A.active {
BACKGROUND-POSITION: 0px -16px
BACKGROUND-COLOR: #b0b0f0
COLOR: #555
BACKGROUND-COLOR: #2a2a33; COLOR: #eaeaf0
.night A:hover {
COLOR: #fff
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<style type="text/css">.weatherFeed { MARGIN: 2em 3em; WIDTH: 280px; FONT-FAMILY: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; COLOR: # FONT-SIZE: 100%}.weatherFeed A { COLOR: #888}.weatherFeed A:hover { COLOR: # TEXT-DECORATION: none}.weatherItem { TEXT-ALIGN: right; PADDING-BOTTOM: 0.8em; PADDING-LEFT: 0.8em; PADDING-RIGHT: 0.8em; PADDING-TOP: 0.8em}.weatherCity { TEXT-TRANSFORM: uppercase; COLOR: #000}.weatherTemp { COLOR: # FONT-SIZE: 4 FONT-WEIGHT: bold}.weatherDesc { FONT-WEIGHT: bold}.weatherCity { FONT-WEIGHT: bold}.weatherDesc { MARGIN-BOTTOM: 0.4em; COLOR: #eee}.weatherRange { COLOR: # FONT-SIZE: 0.8em}.weatherWind { COLOR: # FONT-SIZE: 0.8em}.weatherLink { TEXT-ALIGN: left; MARGIN-TOP: 6px; FONT-SIZE: 0.8em}.verticalweather { BORDER-BOTTOM: #555 4 POSITION: BORDER-LEFT: #555 4 WIDTH: 280 BACKGROUND: url('bg.jpg') rgb(34,34,34) repeat-x; HEIGHT: 140 OVERFLOW: BORDER-TOP: #555 4 BORDER-RIGHT: #555 4px solid}.items { POSITION: absolute; MARGIN: 0px; HEIGHT: 20000em}.items DIV.weatherItem { HEIGHT: 140px}.navi { WIDTH: 288px; HEIGHT: 20px}.navi A {&&&&background:url('/style library/weatherwebpart/navigator.png') 0 0 no-repeat MARGIN: 3px; WIDTH: 8px; DISPLAY: block; FLOAT: left; HEIGHT: 8px; FONT-SIZE: 1px}.navi A:hover { BACKGROUND-POSITION: 0px -8px}.navi A.active { BACKGROUND-POSITION: 0px -16px}.day { BACKGROUND-COLOR: #b0b0f0}.day A { COLOR: #555}.night { BACKGROUND-COLOR: #2a2a33; COLOR: #eaeaf0}.night A:hover { COLOR: #fff}</style>
Be sure to upload the CSS to your site. Now that the fun stuff is done, it’s just configuring the page. Add a content editor web part to the page and reference the JavaScript in the web part’s content link property. Repeat if applicable for the CSS. And voila! You’re now the proud owner of a snazzy looking weather web part!
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Editor’s note: Contributor Ellen van Aken is an experienced intranet adoption manager. Follow her
This example may be interesting for Communication employees in multinational organizations.
What was the problem?
As in many international companies, the company language is English. Most people can read that, but general survey feedback showed that employees would really appreciate to read important business news in their own language.
So the Communications team decided that those messages would be translated into 14 different languages. Hiring an external translation agency was easy, but how to handle all those primary, draft and final documents (some of which were unintelligible for the Comms team) without getting confused?
What is the solution?
We set up an external Team Site with 2 libraries:
One library for the primary document, in English. The agency set an Alert (Added Documents, Immediately) so they know when they have to start translating.
One library for the translations. The agency uploads the translations to this library, using a special naming convention, adding the language as metadata, so we can group the documents by language.Designated local employees then check the translations, making sure that the texts fit country and company culture. These employees have set an Alert (Added Items, Daily) so they know when they have to correct a document. They can make changes online. When a translation is OK, a box is “final” is checked.(Since the Alert can not distinguish beteen languages, we suggest a Daily e-mail to avoid getting too many irrelevant emails)
Communications has also set an Alert to the Translations library, to monitor progress. (All Changes, Daily)
All documents with”the “final” checkbox are made visible to employees in special views by language.
(for advanced users: in a separate Team Site we have created one Web Part Page per language, and “project” the documents, filtered by language, on that page using Corasworks)
What are the benefits?
This setup is not ideal, since the information is still hidden in documents and there are no Alerts per language. A truely online process with targeted news in the correct translation on people’s Homepage would be better, but that is not available at this moment. Still, this setup does help to streamline the process:
All documents are in one place.
Notification emails that “you have work to do” are being sent automatically.
Documents are properly tagged with metadata.
No confusion with loads of documents in individual emails.
The data can be used for KPI’s, such as turnaround time, learning curve of the translation agency, and projected costs.
Another example of how some thinking and experience with SharePoint can solve those all-too-common business problems!
This is the Source library, containing the original English document:
Source Library, containing the original English documents.
And this is the Target Library, where the translations can be uploaded.
Library for the translated documents
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Editor’s note: Contributor Ellen van Aken is an experienced intranet adoption manager. Follow her
Maria was one of our most dedicated administrators of the Employee Directory. She was working in one of our larger locations, and she was very motivated to keep her part of the Directory up-to-date. If you saw an employee profile from her location, you could trust it would be 100% accurate. Being that dedicated also took her a lot of time. So she asked me if there was a solution to her chasing everyone for the correct information.
What was the problem?
The Employee Directory was not (yet) connected to another system, so it had to be updated manually.
Maria’s location included many manufacturing and marketing employees, who changed jobs frequently. She received information about changes from various channels: e-mail, documents (via e-mail or snail mail). chat, fax, telephone and visits to her desk. Hardly anyone provided the full set of details needed, so she always had to ask people for the additional information.
What is the solution?
We set up a simple SharePoint custom list for her, in local language. We used pre-filled Choice or Lookup columns where possible, to make it easy for the requester and guarantee consistent information. We made two views: “In Progress” (default), and “Completed”.
Maria set an Alert (Added Items, Daily Summary) so every morning she knew the changes she had to make.
When she had made the required change for one person, she would tick the box “completed” in the request and the item would move to the “Completed” view. This way she always knew which requests were still waiting for her, and she also had an archive of finished requests.
What are the benefits?
Maria saved time, because the information she received was complete. There was no longer any need to chase someone for missing information.
The business was happy, because the changes were processed faster, making the Directory more accurate and trustworthy. (Of course they grumbled a little when they were confronted with a new process, but Maria sold the benefits very well – and simply refused to process any request via another channel)
Many employees were now working in SharePoint lists, and this sparked ideas for other applications.
This was a very generic process which could be replicated to other locations easily. So even though this project did not generate many financial benefits, the project had a high
because it was a very reproducible solution.
Another inefficient process was streamlined with little effort!
Please find below some re-created screenshots.
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Editor’s note: Contributor Chris Clark is the Marketing Manager for . Follow him
SharePoint Online, a component of Microsoft’s Office 365 suite, provides subscribing organisations with public-facing website functionality. This type of SharePoint public-facing website lacks the full feature set of SharePoint, but is perfectly adequate for websites with basic functionality (not necessarily small or low-traffic sites).
We were recently approached to deliver 2 such websites for a client (N.B. as an educational organisation they were eligible for the A2 Office 365 Plan, meaning their SharePoint Online website licensing and hosting was completely free)
Both of the SharePoint Online websites can be viewed here:
In this blog post we will give a brief overview of the two websites, exploring:
SharePoint Online Website Author Requirements (content management and analytics)
SharePoint Online Website Visitor Requirements (user experience and accessibility)
SharePoint Online Website Features Leveraged (blog site, list apps and library apps)
SharePoint Online Website Author Requirements
A public-facing website can have all the design and functionality in the world thrown at it, but if the content is not relevant or up-to-date then it is unlikely to have a lasting effect. For that reason, the key requirements from a website author’s perspective were easy content management and the ability to analyse site performance.
Content Management
As the organisation’s marketing team have no internal IT support, it was crucial that the content of both sites could be managed by non-technical authors. The content on the websites, which needs regular updating, includes:
Rich text, including videos embedded from YouTube and other sources
Links to other pages and external sites
Documents (particularly Word and PDF)
SharePoint Online websites allow videos to be surfaced directly from YouTube using the ‘Embed’ tool
In addition to creating and editing pages independently of IT, the website authors also need to be able to optimise the site for search engines (SEO) without having to edit code.
SharePoint Online websites allow SEO properties to be changed through a modal in the ribbon
Finally, website authors need to track the performance of the websites using Google Analytics. As the code snippet for Google Analytics (the code that allows authors to track websites) can change without notice, website authors also require a way to update this without going into HTML.
The SharePoint Online ‘Web Analytics App’ (freely available) allows authors to change Google Analytics snippets without touching code
SharePoint Online Website Visitor Requirements
User Experience
Website visitors need a simple, modern look and feel that helped them easily find the content they needed, whilst conveying the organisation’s existing brand guidelines.
SharePoint Online themes provide the whole website a consistent look and feel whilst custom CSS can be used to enhance specific page elements
Accessibility
As well as looking good, it is also important that the websites meet accessibility standards (specifically being AA compliant). Whilst underlying elements of Office 365 may compromise accessibility, additional code is able to meet the rigorous standards.
SharePoint Online Website Features Leveraged
As I mentioned in the introduction, the SharePoint Online public-facing website lacks the full feature set of SharePoint. Nethertheless, it provides more than enough functionality for many website projects. Here we will look at three areas of functio the blog site, list apps and library apps.
The SharePoint Online blog site enables content authors to publish rich text blogs from either the browser or Word. Once published, blogs are automatically categorised and made available to website visitors. The latest blogs are surfaced on the homepage and visitors can choose to follow via RSS, comment with a Facebook account and share content via email.
Publishing a new blog through a rich text editor, as viewed by a website author
A new blog post, as viewed by a website visitor
List Apps enable content to be stored, as the name suggests, in lists, and then surfaced on various website pages via ‘app parts’. Adding new content to lists is done through simple forms, meaning that pages with these ‘app parts’ can be updated without the use of code.
Adding a new FAQ through a form, as viewed by a website author
A list of FAQs, surfaced through an ‘app part’, as viewed by a website visitor
Library Apps
Similarly to list apps, library apps allow content in document format to be stored in libraries and then surfaced on pages via ‘app parts’, once again avoiding the need for editing in HTML.
Adding a document by dragging-and-dropping into a library, as viewed by a website author
A list of downloadable documents, as viewed by a website visitor
Conclusion
As you can see, despite the functional limitations of SharePoint Online public-facing websites, they can be more than capable of delivering an impressive authoring and visiting experience. In particular, they can:
Streamline content management, reducing dependency on IT
Be easily optimised for search engine performance
Integrate industry standard analytics
and finally, provide an engaging (and accessible) user experience to website visitors
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Editor’s note: Contributor Ellen van Aken is an experienced intranet adoption manager. Follow her
One of the teams spends their days making telephone calls to customers, asking them about a brochure or telling them about a new product or a special offer. This team has many calls to make each day, the more the better!
All phone numbers were in an Excel file, which was shared in a Team Site. Every Call Agent looked through the Excel file for the numbers assigned to them, and after the call edited the line item with the outcome of the call, as well as changes in information that they had learned during the call. (E.g. new contact person, change in telephone number).
What was the problem?
Opening the file and finding their assigned phone numbers took a long time.
Editing the item and saving the information caused waiting time (if the file was checked out by another call agent) or overwriting issues, (if a call agent forgot to check out)
All customers were in the file, whether they had been called or not
Management was always asking “how things were going” because they were curious and nobody had an overview of progress or results. This meant Call Agents had to spend time on ad-hoc reporting, which took time away from their calling time
What is the solution?
We opened up the Excel file by importing the data into a pre-configured Issue list in a Team Site. We created different views, such as:
New calls to be made, as well as call-back appointments, grouped by Call Agent
Completed calls, grouped by Result Code for a quick overview with sums (e.g. Appointment, Not interested, Business Discontinued, Offer)
Export view to export the data back into an Excel file for detailed analysis
By removing the finished calls to a different view, every call agent can see quickly which and how many calls he or she needs to make, without making mistakes.
We also added some real-time Excel graphs for management, so they can see progress and outcome of any promotional action in real-time. These graphs can also be used to evaluate the Call Agents’ performance and to share tips for a succesful approach between Call Agents.
What are the benefits?
Call Agents know exactly which customers to call or follow- editing a line item is much faster than editing a file so they can do their work more quickly
Call Agents make less mistakes in calling a customer twice or overwriting someone else’s edits
Management has a real-time overview of progress and outcomes, and they can see that without bothering the Call Agents
It is now possible to see progress as you go along, enabling the Marketing Manager to make adjustments during the promotion
It is clear which Call Agent is most succesful, which enables exchange of good practices between Call Agents
All in all, this simple Issue list has enabled the Call agents to make TWICE as many calls a day as before!
So, small wonder that other departments have embraced this solution as well – by now there are 3 teams calling in this way.
Another succesful cure for Document Addiction!
Please find a screenshot below, this shows the real-time Result Codes (e.g. Call, Written Proposal Requested, Meeting Requested, Already Bought T Not Interested etc.) on the horziontal axis. Vertical is the count of this result code. The graph is slightly distorted because screenshot was made early in the Action, when there were still many calls (3344) to be made.
Below is a screenshot of the results by Call Agent. On the horizontal axis the names of the individual Call Agents, on the vertical axis their stack of different result codes. This enables management to monitor both their productivity (# calls made) and their effectiveness (# of calls that have a favourable result). Please note that Call Agents do not all work fulltime.
