Microsoft 365: The Next Generation of OneDrive

Microsoft announced its third generation of cloud storage OneDrive. With over a staggering 2 billion files added daily by trillions of consumers and businesses, the OneDrive web app is being overhauled to meet the demands of end-users whilst aligning with the Microsoft streamlined look and feel in all its products. Adapting to the dynamically changing landscape, OneDrive is more than cloud storage as it is the centre of Microsoft 365’s file experiences, powering collaboration through file sharing spanning across SharePoint document libraries, Outlook in the form of attachments in meeting invites, Teams as documents that can be accessed and exchanged, and throughout Microsoft 365’s suite of apps.

OneDrive is the central hub where users can easily find their files, dashboards, design boards, and loops that they need access to, no matter where the file lives and no matter where the user is accessing it from.

Sleek and user-intuitive, the new OneDrive web app provides effortless file management with ease of finding files, whether newly created or those shared with others.

OneDrive Home and Effortless File Management

Image: Microsoft Community Hub

Navigation from OneDrive Home for Web is simple, and intuitive, and provides a streamlined process for accessing files, including shared files, while contributing to and supporting improved communication, organization, and collaboration.

OneDrive Home: from your OneDrive Home Web page, you can easily navigate and retrieve newly created files or those that are shared with others, plus easily open and see your most recently accessed files.

For You: located at the top of the OneDrive Home Web page, recommendations powered by AI are surfaced at the right time for you, ensuring that what you need is at your fingertips.

Add New: from OneDrive Home, users can create new files or folders and will be able to upload existing files and folders from their machine.

Shared View: one can easily lose track of which files have been shared with whom. In Shared View, all files that have been shared with you will appear here. It does not matter who shared the file or how it was shared. Shared View is the repository for all the files that you are collaborating on.

Favourites: Important files can be marked as a Favourite, which allows users to access the file from their Favourites list from Microsoft 365, SharePoint, OneDrive, Teams, File Explorer, and many other apps.

People View: how many of us cannot remember the name of a file, but we can remember who sent or shared a file with us? In People View, files are organized by the people you work with, providing a different context by finding files visually.

Meetings View: in this view, past and future meetings along with recordings and shared files are easily accessible regardless of whether they were shared in the meeting invite or the chat.

Shortcuts: no matter where the original location is, simply collect files for projects by creating a Shortcut to them in OneDrive. Shortcuts provide users with quick access to files that are shared with them and to files residing in shared Teams locations.

Colorful Folders: everyone organizes in their own way, and with Colorful Folders, users can assign colors to their folders to keep them organized or to highlight important folders.

Simplified Sharing: Copying links and sharing files requires fewer clicks and is extremely user-friendly.

More Goodies Coming Soon to OneDrive Web App

Open in App: from inside OneDrive, users will be able to open Word, Excel, PowerPoint, PDF, and CAD files in their respective desktop app, which in turn, will automatically sync in OneDrive. Expected release in December 2024.

OneDrive in Outlook: with the new Outlook for Windows and Outlook on the web, a new button for the OneDrive app will be added to the left navigation pane, making it simple and quick to add a copied sharing link in an email or to find a shared file, all without leaving Outlook. Expected release in December, 2023.

OneDrive in Teams: the Files app in Teams will be updated to the OneDrive Teams app which will allow users to access their files across SharePoint and OneDrive from Teams. OneDrive Teams app will leverage the new updates made to OneDrive and SharePoint library experiences, including new views, feature enhancements, and improved performance in OneDrive. Expected release in December 2023.

Files On-Demand for Web: files and folders are available offline and can easily be accessed on a device by selecting them to be always available locally, directly from OneDrive for Web. Once selected, users will have access to these files offline. Expected release date early 2024.

Offline Mode: Files that are available for offline access can be opened and worked on in the browser, even if the user is offline. Once the user’s Internet connection is restored, all revisions that were performed in the browser will automatically sync back to OneDrive. Expected release date early 2024.

Add New: without leaving OneDrive, users can create a new file or folder. New files can be launched with a blank template or users can choose a rich template for a fast start. Expected release date Summer 2024.

Media View: this new view will, in one place, organize your media, including photos, videos, media, and images. Expected release date Summer 2024.

Copilot in OneDrive

Microsoft 365 is once again changing the datascape by utilizing AI to transform how users leverage, extract, and utilize the value from their files.

Copilot in OneDrive: without opening the file, and no matter where it lives (OneDrive, Teams, or SharePoint), users can ask open-ended questions related to an individual file or obtain a summary of the content with Copilot in OneDrive. The expected release date is December 2023 for all customers who have a Microsoft 365 Copilot license.

Microsoft 365 Chat: ask a question, and it will comb through your entire Microsoft 365 data universe, including data in SharePoint and OneDrive, and then it will connect the dots across all your content. Finally, it will gather and deliver the information you asked for.

Future of Copilot in OneDrive: an exciting future with Copilot in OneDrive is on the horizon as we steam towards supporting users with gathering, managing, and transferring knowledge with fewer clicks, greater intuitiveness, and streamlined speed.

Advanced Security and Governance

Advanced Security and Governance Admins have been empowered to tighten access to content, protect content from over-exposure, govern sharing, and assist in the migration of content in a safe manner during mergers and acquisitions with the new tool SharePoint Advanced Management (SAM). Unless otherwise noted, the capabilities below are currently available.

Granular Conditional Access Policies: multi-factor authentication can be added to specific users who require access to confidential files. By doing so, this fine-tuning will help ensure that the user will not accidentally access or leak sensitive information.

Restricted Access Control: admins can block users from accessing shared files in specific OneDrive accounts by limiting OneDrive access to members of a specific security group. This restricted access control policy ensures that only users in a specified security group will have access.

Moving OneDrive Accounts Across Tenants: companies grow, whether by mergers, acquisitions or organically. With cross-tenant OneDrive migration, admins can move OneDrive accounts across all tenants. The beauty of cross-tenant OneDrive migration is that all existing shared links will continue to work with the redirect feature.

Block Download Policy: SharePoint admins and global admins for Microsoft 365 can block the downloading of files and Teams meeting recordings from OneDrive or SharePoint sites. Users will have browse access only and will not be able to print, download, or sync files. Note that this feature can be set for individual sites but not at the organization level.

Collaboration Insights: Sharing patterns and user-centric collaboration can be identified across the organization, allowing admins to drill down on accidental sharing which is the main driver behind data leakage. (Available in private preview only)

Data Export for OneDrive Sync Client Admin Reports: as part of Microsoft Graph Data, data-driven admins will have reports on health, errors, volume, and more for SharePoint. Once available in Azure, admins will be able to visualize, analyze, and report on this data through Azure Synapse and Power BI.

With these tools, admins will be empowered to protect their organization’s content from intentional and unintentional exposure.

Consumer Photos: Improved Search

Search for People: with your permission, OneDrive can search and find images based on the names of the people in your photo collection, but only after you name the people in the images. This search feature searches and browses photos based on the people in them.

Search Your Photos Using Natural Language: going beyond object recognition, this search will allow users to search with specific parameters such as people, objects, settings, and specific places. Images that surfaced will include the specific details that the user included in the natural language search.

Beginning October 2023, these AI search features will be available in limited preview for consumers on OneDrive for Web and OneDrive mobile app. A public preview is expected in early 2024.

The next generation OneDrive for the web is super exciting as it brings many new features that are designed around user accessibility and streamlined, quick, and easy access across many Microsoft 365 apps. OneDrive is no longer a cloud storage app. Instead, it is evolving to be the central hub for data access across the Microsoft 365 platforms for online and offline users.

Microsoft Ignite October 2022 Part 1: Security and Compliance Across SharePoint, OneDrive, and Teams

Around the world, we hear how corporations fall prey to cyber predators. Cybersecurity has never been more important than now with the hybrid conditions for work. The challenge has been to ensure the cybersecurity of data and content for staff who work remotely on their systems and Wi-Fi network in conjunction with staff who work on-site. With so many possibilities of threat entries, cybersecurity has reached Zero Trust as the standard and norm. Microsoft is committed to enabling its customers to diligently, smoothly, and easily as possible manage content, people, and context across SharePoint, OneDrive, and Teams.

Microsoft announced at Ignite today, six new security and management capabilities including:

  1. Advanced access policies for secure collaboration
  2. Security controls to safeguard content
  3. Comprehensive compliance
  4. Migration enhancement
  5. Advanced sites lifecycle management
  6. Organization lifecycle management

In this article, we will review Advanced Access Policies for Secure Collaboration and we will review the remaining in the next article, Part 2: Security and Compliance Across SharePoint, OneDrive, and Teams.

Advanced Access Policies for Secure Collaboration

Advanced access policies for secure collaboration are currently available as either private preview, general availability, or premium feature and span across SharePoint sites, OneDrive, and Teams.

Restricted Access Control (RAC) Policy for SharePoint Sites: Private Preview

Unauthorized access to content can occur when content is overshared by users. Users commonly share content with good intent, but they are unknowingly and mistakenly, sharing with a broad audience, resulting in unauthorized access to content by the broader audience. Oversharing has always been an issue, but with hybrid work environments, this has bubbled to the surface with an expansion of oversharing and unauthorized access to content.

With the RAC Policy for SharePoint Sites, administrators can now restrict access to SharePoint Sites, instantly restricting access to content to a confined set of users, regardless of how widespread the content has been shared or where inheritance was broken at the content level.

This advanced policy, RAC Policy v1 (Private Preview), allows administrators to restrict Microsoft 365 Groups-connected sites to having the same membership as the parent Microsoft 365 Group, even if the site or content was shared outside of that group membership. Microsoft announced that this policy will be extended to all SharePoint Site templates by configuring the RAC policy with a security group.

Restricted Access Control (RAC) Policy for OneDrive in Your Organization: General Availability

Announced at Ignite this week, the Restricted Access Control Policy for OneDrive is generally available. Similar to oversharing of SharePoint sites with external users, OneDrive content is also overshared.

By creating security groups in Azure Active Directory that contains all the organization’s employees and then configuring the Limit OneDrive Access to those groups in the SharePoint Admin centre, only those groups granted access will now have access. By restricting access to all OneDrives in your organization to a determined set of users such as only employees, your organization’s content is secure from being accessed by externals who should not have access in the first place.

Conditional Access Policies for SharePoint Sites, OneDrives, and Teams: General Availability

There is flexibility with the Conditional Access Policies for SharePoint Sites, OneDrives, and Teams by allowing admins to determine whether the content is classified as business strategic or general training content. Both types of content will require different levels of security whereby classified business strategic content is accessible only when certain conditions are met, and general training content should be easily accessible. The conditional access requirements should match the security posture of these sites.

This can be achieved by utilizing SharePoint Online PowerShell to set the appropriate access policy for a site. This will dictate the conditions that are required to access the specified site. For example, a site containing business strategic information can have the condition of multi-factor authentication (MFA) to be met in order for a user to access this site. Additionally, these policies can be associated with sensitivity labels, if deployed, by labeling the teams or sites appropriately. The key benefit of this policy is that it allows the admin to have users go through additional credentialing only when they are accessing critical sites or teams that contain business strategic content.

Access policies are just one of the methods that are being applied for cybersecurity by Microsoft. As Microsoft moves closer to Zero Trust, increasing security controls, safeguards, malicious malware protection, and lifecycle management are all integral parts of this advancement. In our next installment, Part 2: Security and Compliance Across SharePoint, OneDrive, and Teams, we will examine these closer in detail.

SPTechCon San Francisco

I am excited to announce that I am returning to speak at SPTechCon San Francisco on the week of February 17, 2020. SPTechCon is THE training, problem solving, and networking event for those who are working with SharePoint, OneDrive, and Office 365. This includes the varied uses and approaches to managing SharePoint; On-Premises (2013 thru 2019), Hybrid Variations, and SharePoint Online.

I will be delivering 2 sessions and a half-day workshop:

  1. Session # 1: SharePoint Classic to Modern Migration
    Abstract: Many organizations have used SharePoint classic with their on-premise version, or when they originally moved to Office 365. Many of us resist the change and do not intend to embrace the new SharePoint modern as quick as we want, with the fear of loss of functionalities in the modern UI. This session will cover the following topics to embrace the new SharePoint modern UI and what you need to do to get yourself ready for it:
    1. Differences between Classic and Modern
    2. Steps to moving into modern
    3. Developing in modern using SPFx
    4. Customizing your list with column and view formatting.
  2. Session # 2: Build an Intranet with modern SharePoint
    Abstract: Learn how to build a world class Modern Intranet by leveraging Office 365. Intranet should no longer be a single portal with multiple site, but it should span across multiple features and capabilities to deliver the platform you are looking for. Explore how to use Microsoft Teams, Modern SharePoint Team Sites and Communication sites, as well as Hub sites to create this unique modern site that can be glued all together to provide the future of the intranets.
  3. Workshop: OneDrive Deployment from Start to Finish
    Abstract: n this half-day workshop we will walk you through the key areas you need to know to help you deploy OneDrive to your organization and to enable collaboration within your team. We will cover key topics like how to best plan, deploy, upgrade, manage and secure OneDrive, how to use. The session will focus on:
    1. Why OneDrive
    2. Deploying your OneDrive Sync Client
    3. Automation
    4. Security
    5. Collaboration with SharePoint and Teams

This is a conference not to be missed! you can use my code MikeM20 to save $200 on your registration.

SPTechCon San Francisco 2020 Banner
SPTechCon San Francisco Banner

SharePoint Conference 2019 (SPC2019): Announcements Part 2

There are so many great announcements at the SharePoint Conference 2019 (SPC2019)! The vision of Microsoft encompasses three pillars in building an intelligent workplace: teamwork and business process, employee engagement and communications, and search and content intelligence. By connecting these three pillars, with SharePoint underpinning as the connecting foundation, employees within your organization and those external that are teamed with them, become powerful through content management and collaboration across Microsoft 365 and Office 365.

Collaboration starts with individuals and through fostering inclusion and engagement, teams are built. Through engagement, collaboration becomes successful. Microsoft Teams provides the space for your teams, while engagement through learning, teaching, and sharing is provided through Yammer. Combining core applications like Microsoft Teams, SharePoint, Yammer, Microsoft Search, OneDrive, Stream, and AI, you now have a powerful tool that provides your employees and teams the ability to collaborate in several mediums, on the go, on any device, and across platforms and applications.

Organizational attributes in sites, such as project, department, division, or region, are organized and connected through SharePoint hub sites. The unified navigation experience is provided with hubs. Sites can be created for a specific function and these sites can be added to the hub. All sites in the hub can roll up content to the top. If you click down to a different site, all the branding and design is automatically applied. Just like adding, sites can be moved from one hub to another.

Keeping your data secure is one of the forefront priorities with Microsoft, and with Classification Labels, this process is now more streamlined and simplified. There are two types of Classification Labels: Retention Labels for applying retention policies on all data; and, Sensitivity Labels for applying consistent security and access policies to all data. This includes content marking, group privacy, controlling level of access on unmanaged devices and restricting access to specific users in your organization. Additionally, anonymous sharing of sensitive files can be blocked through the creation of a DLP policy. And, an audit can be run with your DLP policy for accessed denied requests.

Not only are documents secured, but site access by an external user can be set through a tenant wide limit that defines how long an external user can access content on a shared site. Once the limit is met, the external user will automatically lose access. Requests for an extension can be granted by the Admin in the Admin Centre under User Expiration. Likewise, the Admin can terminate the access immediately.

Managing the Classic experience and the Modern experience is now made easier as the full features in the Admin Centre in the Classic experience is now in the Modern experience. Sites can now be managed with just one-click with bulk actions.

The ability to change the URL of a site is one of the coolest and handiest features (in my opinion). This can be accomplished by going into the Admin Centre, then choosing “Change site address”. Next, type in the new URL in the popup. At the same time, the opportunity to change the name of the site is offered. Once you accept, links will be updated plus a check is made to ensure all links are valid. Old links pointing to an old site are handled with Automatic Redirect. With this running automatically, the user is redirected to the new site, eliminating the need for you to copy content from the old site to the new site.

Collaboration, in real-time with multiple users, is the goal, and with Fluid Framework, this is now possible. Fluid Framework provides the platform for the collaboration of multiple co-authors to work on the same document and at the same time while edits and additions appear almost instantaneously for real-time collaboration.

Microsoft Search combines the power of AI and Microsoft Graph to produce search results not only from files, conversations, and insights but can find people, tasks, or even take you to the spot where you left off in a document. Microsoft Search connects your users with relevant content and people across several platforms and applications, including SharePoint, OneDrive, Yammer, Microsoft Teams, Office, Outlook, Windows, and Bing. One powerful search engine across all Microsoft applications. One feel, and best of all, it brings your design, your branding, your company voice across all MS products.

These are just a few of the applications, and with so many applications, the Admin Centre has been redesigned. The newly redesigned Admin Centre allows the configuration of Microsoft Search settings across all apps and services. Using a third-party? No worries – with search connectors, third party and line-of-business application information will be connected and searchable.

The power of Microsoft Search in SharePoint is prominently featured in the header, like it is in all Microsoft apps and services, on the SharePoint Home Site. It is available when you are, wherever you are. Catching up on announcements and news or continuing where you left off in a shared document or finding sites that are relevant to you without endlessly scrolling through feeds or bookmarks, is made effortless with Microsoft Search in SharePoint.

One key feature is zero intent queries. Simply click on the new search box, and contextually relevant information pops up! What’s contextually relevant? Documents that you recently used, recent suggestions, and people (skills, projects, and interests are all searchable) are ranked based on insights from documents, sites, and people you work with. Matches with rich previews, from over 270 different file types, will display as a live site preview on the search results page, visually making it easy to identify the content you want. For people, a people card will appear that lists their basic information, who they report to, projects they are members of, and teams that they belong to. To help you decide on what content you want to open, and to highlight company endorsed content, Administrator curated answers with markers will appear in the appropriate space on your home page.

A key feature of Microsoft Search in SharePoint is the Megamenu. With the megamenu, not only content on your Home Site is accessible, but content across the entire estate is now at your fingertips.

Interestingly, traditional search engines are based off an inverted structure. However, Microsoft Search leverages machine learning to build optimal models that are refined based on the click thru rate, search results, and the use of documents by users in organizations. Microsoft Search is now the consistent search engine across all platforms and applications. The uniqueness of Microsoft Search is that it is an open source repository where teams across an organization build it cooperatively through collaboration and with AI, creating a repository that is the most relevant to the users.

With one click on the top left Apps Launch button, you can quickly navigate between apps like OneDrive, SharePoint, Outlook, Yammer, and more while corporate branding and navigation flow through. Being natively mobile, all content and conversations are available on the go. An excellent feature is the News Digest Summary which summarizes what you need to know, and with one click, it takes you to the specific article. On the go or no time currently to read it? Simply save it for viewing and reading later.

Even with all these new, enhanced and exciting features, there is more to come! Based on community feedback, Microsoft continues to listen carefully and develop SharePoint, Office 365, Microsoft 365 and its applications to provide the best tools to its customers. Announced for the future will be the capability to unlock text in images that are stored as PDFs, find conversations in Teams and Yammer across all applications, having these listed in a dedicated vertical search area, search videos in Stream, OneDrive, and SharePoint in a dedicated vertical search area, utilize custom connectors with adaptive cards for the search results page (you can customize how it looks and take action from that card), and develop your apps with endpoint for MS Search in MS Graph API (currently available in private preview).

These are just a few of the upcoming enhancements, but Microsoft has and will be delivering many new features to SharePoint, Office 365, Microsoft 365, OneDrive, Yammer, Stream, Outlook, and many more of their applications. Combining their powerful individual capabilities together, and coupling it with AI, these applications provide your employees with the tools to use to support, engage, and redefine how collaboration between them is performed.

SharePoint Conference 2019 (SPC2019): Announcements

At the SharePoint Conference (SPC2019) held in Las Vegas this spring, many new announcements were shared that will impact SharePoint, OneDrive, Microsoft Teams, Yammer, PowerApps, Microsoft Flow and several other applications within Office 365 and Microsoft 365.  

The internet connects the world while an intranet connects the people and content in the workplace. But, an intranet does more than just connect people and content. A properly organized intranet will cause collaboration between people, whether in teams or in siloes, through the sharing of knowledge, the harnessing of this collective knowledge to create solutions and the provisioning of a platform for communication. SharePoint has been the powerhouse behind intranets for more than a decade and can be found in every industry and geography. As a leader, SharePoint continues to set the bar higher and higher, meeting the needs and goals of organizations and its people with intelligent solutions.

SharePoint Home Sites

A SharePoint communication site, but amped up, SharePoint Home Sites is the landing page for your organization and the new home view on the SharePoint mobile app. SharePoint Home Sites, with personalized content, information, and navigation, not only engages through conversation but also through video that is powered by Yammer and Microsoft Stream. It neatly organizes and curates the organization’s news, with official news being marked visually and is available for all users with access to the home site. Relevant content and news are shared based on the role of the person as well as their role while Microsoft Search serves as the main connector of content within the organization.

A key focus with all of SharePoint’s enhancements is the time-to-value for customers. With the improved navigation and activity insights across sites, and coupling these features with views of your documents to get back to work quickly, work processes are greatly streamlined, underscoring the valuable time-to-value gained.

As we all experience, we may come across content that we would like to read, but at that moment, cannot. With SharePoint Home Sites, news and content can be flagged for review at a later time. This feature, enhanced saved for later view, will be an extremely useful and well-used feature.

SharePoint Home Sites are easily deployed – within minutes – straight out of the box with no coding! Customizations to reflect company branding and design are easily done through web parts, navigation, and site design – all straight out of the box.

Being the leader as the powerful platform for delivering applications on the intranet, many SharePoint partners are onboard with integrating their intranet offerings closely to the SharePoint intelligent intranet. Additionally, solutions built with SharePoint Framework by your developers or by SharePoint partners can be embedded.

Yammer and Microsoft Stream

Both Yammer and Microsoft Stream are featured out of the box for SharePoint Home Sites. With Yammer and Microsoft Stream, engaging employees in communication and learning has never been easier.

Yammer provides the platform for employees to engage in open conversations that can drive cultural transformations and cause organizational alignment.  Every employee across an organization is empowered to express their opinions, ideas, and feedback and now, with the new Question and Answer feature, you or a group admin can mark the best answer, making this knowledge easy to find, share, and reuse. Taking it one step further, a group can feature bot-like, intelligent answers to questions that are frequently asked.

There are some major changes for customers using Yammer groups connected to Office 365 groups. For these groups, e-Discovery for Yammer will be available for them. Recognizing the unique data residency requirements for European customers, in-geo data storage for Yammer in the EU is now available for new Yammer networks in the EU. Yammer messages and files attached to these will be stored at-rest in Microsoft EU datacentres.

Video is becoming more popular, and is quite often the first choice, for learning, engaging, and communicating. Microsoft 365’s video capability is powered by Microsoft Stream, a powerful engine that provides users the ability to securely record, upload, and share videos from the iOS or Android mobile apps. By incorporating Microsoft Forms into Microsoft Stream, polls, surveys or quizzes can easily be inserted into the videos.  

A natural extension of video is 3D and virtual reality. SharePoint Spaces has been in development since 2018, and at Ignite 2019, expect to see what SharePoint Spaces is in its early stages.

OneDrive

OneDrive is the Office 365 files application that stores all your individual and shared files across platforms, across browsers, and across devices and is accessible on mobile or on desktop. With so many files stored, accessing has become more streamlined and simple with Microsoft Search in OneDrive as the powering search engine. Personalized recommendations are provided with the new AI-powered experiences. Activity, file insights, and lifecycle signals such as DLP policies are shown on OneDrive’s enhanced file hover cards. Another great feature is the save for later which allows you to flag a file that you can return to later to read.

With the OneDrive web application, you can now work with metadata columns, custom views, sync files to your PC or Mac, and preview more than 320 file types, including 360-degree images and AutoCAD .DWG files. This can all be done with the new, full-fidelity files experience for shared libraries. And, with the comments on non-Office files, comments and be added to any of the 320+ file types, including PDFs, CAD drawings, and images.

Sharing policies set by your organization can now be done directly from OneDrive, making it that much easier to collaborate through file sharing with internal and external collaborators with the create a shared library with a streamlined experience backed by an Office 365 group. With this, you can specify the people you want to share with. Files can also be shared in Teams, which is the hub for teamwork, with the new file sharing control in Teams chat. This allows you to either upload a copy of the file or share a link, and the access provided by the link is configurable. The new sharing control to Outlook will also be implemented.

A new request files capability is being introduced which allows you to select a folder and invite people to add files. Everyone can upload folders to the file, but the only files they see will be theirs. With each file added, you will receive a notification. With request files, you are able to collect files from multiple individuals while preventing individuals from seeing other peoples’ files.  

These are few of the highlights announced and shared at this year’s SharePoint Conference. All are very exciting and will help your organization’s employees collaborate with greater efficiency and productivity while encouraging learning through enhanced media platforms.

SharePoint Fest DC 2019

Chicago Fest Chicago is April 29th to May 3rd, 2019, a full week packed with workshops, breakout sessions, Ask the Experts panel, and podcasts. This is one of my favorite conferences, and I am honored this year to present one workshop and 3 sessions:

  1. Workshop – 4/29/2019: OneDrive Deployment from Start to finish. This video gives you a quick overview of the workshop.
  2. Session 1 – 5/1/2019: The Evolution of SharePoint ECM to Content Services
  3. Session 2 – 5/2/2019: Increase your collaboration with Azure Automation
  4. Session 3 – 5/3/2019: Build an intranet with modern SharePoint

There is a great lineup of speakers, so make sure you check out the agenda and register for this awesome conference.

You can use Maadarani100 code and get a $100 discount.

SP Fest DC

SharePoint 2019 New Features

The new features in SharePoint 2019 are based on three themes. These themes involve the users’ experience that is developed through SharePoint Online, content engagement across all platforms, and powerful scaling security and compliance capabilities.

What is new for SharePoint 2019? SharePoint 2019 will have many new and added features that enhance the “modern experience”, making it flexible, mobile, compelling and easier to use, especially for on-prem users. These new features include:

  1. SharePoint Home Page: The home page will provide users with the ability to easily find and access SharePoint sites within the organization. Additional information will include the news from the sites that they are following as well as from suggested sites. If the administrator has given the user permission, the user will have the ability to create new communication sites from the home page. There are three out-of-the-box templates available:

      Topic which consists of four default web parts (Hero, News, Documents, and Events);
      Showcase leverages the default Hero and Image Gallery web parts to visually highlight products, events, and people; and
      Blank which provides a clean canvas so that you can customize with your own modern web parts;

  2. Modern Lists and Libraries: Bringing List and Libraries in parallel with SharePoint Online, the modern experience is now the default for team sites, though Classic is still supported. Users will be able to copy and move files using the command bar as well as add files as links, filter and sort easily, pin documents, and apply column formatting including adding columns and rows to SharePoint Lists with JSON markup.

    By combining the powers of SharePoint 2019 and OneDrive, Libraries has a modern sharing experience with an updated and intuitive UI. Previous syncing and integration issues are now solved so that tasks, like creating new folders, saving documents, and uploading files in SharePoint and/or OneDrive, can be done at any time and from anywhere;
  3. New Team, Site Pages: As the communication site, users and teams can share messages, news, broadcasts and they can also display stories. With the new Hero web part, five items with text, image, and links can be displayed, drawing attention to the most important content;
  4. New Pages: Comprised of web parts, new pages are fully customizable to the needs of the user. Users will have the ability to add Word, Excel and PowerPoint documents, images, feeds like Yammer, site activities, and embed videos;
  5. Modern Search Experience: Using intuitive logic, the modern search experience will suggest relevant content before the user enters a keystroke. The results update as the user types in the criteria. The search results page shows an overall of search results and is grouped by type;
  6. Lists: The modern lists simplify how users and teams create, curate, and interact with the information. Individuals and teams will be able to share, access, and collaborate around structured data. Additionally, information from other systems can be leveraged into SharePoint to support business processes.

True to its purpose, SharePoint continues to support collaboration between teams and individuals in their organizations. As SharePoint updates to 2019, there will be some features in 2016 and 2013 that will be deprecated and these six features will be:

  1. Aggregated Newsfeed: The tile in the app launcher and the option to implement the newsfeed capability will be removed. The existing aggregate newsfeed will become read-only. The suggested solution is to use communication sites and Microsoft Teams;
  2. Custom Help: The existing engine in SharePoint will be removed in the future. For the Microsoft legacy on-prem SharePoint help engine, it will be updated and will synchronize with O365;
  3. SharePoint Designer 2013: SharePoint Designer 2013 will continue to function with SharePoint Server 2019 until 2026 where support will officially end. Alternatives include PowerApps and Microsoft Flow and both are available via the on-prem data gateway;
  4. Multi-Tenancy: Inline with migrating services to the cloud, multi-tenancy capabilities are building dependencies on cloud technologies, and for on-premises environments, these capabilities are not available. Due to costs and complexities of providing on-prem alternatives, multi-tenancy will no longer be available;
  5. Visio Services: Rendering based on Silverlight will no longer be supported effective October 12, 2021. Switching to PowerBI is the recommended solution; and 6. Code-based Sandbox Solutions: These customization packages deployed at the site collection level have already been removed from SharePoint 2013 and SharePoint Online. They will be removed from SharePoint 2019. SharePoint add-ins are the suggested alternatives.

Summarizing the added new features and the deprecation of others, is a handy cheat sheet below:

Credits: ShareGate.com

The Modern Experience is not only here to stay, but it is being integrated into SharePoint 2019. If an older version of SharePoint on-prem is being used, it is highly recommended that the upgrade to SharePoint 2019 be implemented. With nearly all the modern functionalities available, it will bring on-prem up to par with SharePoint online. With SharePoint 2019, user experience and collaboration become modernized with greater ease of access and use for individuals and teams. 

New OneDrive for Business capabilities announced SPCNA


You asked. You voted. You shall receive.

Microsoft has offered to listen to your feedback through a public, user driven forum aptly named OneDrive UserVoice (https://onedrive.uservoice.com/forums/262982-onedrive/filters/top). If you have a suggestion or have a request for an improvement or feature, this is the place to suggest it. In addition to requesting, you also have the capability to vote on other suggestions that have been submitted. As a collective voice, OneDrive UserVoice became the collaborative, driving force for the new capabilities that were announced at the SharePoint Conference in North America for OneDrive for Business.

Scan and Photos Experiences on Mobile

Scan Experience: a dedicated icon in the tab bar allows easier access to the built-in scan functionality. Annotating, adding multiple pages, and changing the destination folder or file name can now be done in the capture experience.

Camera Upload: photos and videos captured on your local camera roll in iOs and Android platforms are now automatically uploaded.

Sharing and Collaboration Security

Password Protected Links: Sharing a file or folder with your collaborators will have an additional level of security with the ability to not only set a password, but the recipient will also require a password. This will prevent accidental sharing of information if your recipient forwards or shares the link. Password protected links are unnecessary if secure external sharing is applied.     

Block Download: View-only links allow you to share Office documents in the cloud but with block download, users are prevented from downloading files for the purpose of keeping and storing them offline.

Deployment and Onboarding

Known Folder Move: Administrators will have the capability to seamlessly move folders such as Documents, Pictures, and Desktop, from their PC to OneDrive. This is supported during initial account configuration and for post-deployment migration.

Team Site Automount: Administrators can automatically connect and synchronize specific SharePoint Team Sites as part of the process of deployment or upgrading to OneDrive.

Sharing Controls

External Sharing Reports: Site administers will be able to see all the files that are being shared on their site, including files that are being shared through secure external sharing and anonymous links with this report. By setting filters, the data can be further refined for capture and can be exported to Excel or Power BI. This data report can then be used to analyze end user patterns, including sharing usage. These reports can also be imported into third-party management software as well as security software.  

Customization of Sharing Emails: For outbound and emails that are being shared with recipients, Administrators will have the ability to brand these emails with their company logo; however, Azure Active Directory Premium P2 is a requirement for this functionality.

Transfer Ownership for Deleted Users: A user’s ownership of their OneDrive files is currently transferred to their manager when they leave the organization. Soon, Administrators will have the ability to transfer the ownership to any individual in the organization.  

 

When does this all roll out?

These are truly exciting features that have been announced! The various stages of the updates and rollout dates can be found on the Office 365 Roadmap (https://products.office.com/en-US/business/office-365-roadmap?filters=#) and I suggest that you check here often as release dates have not yet been announced.     

Versioning Update for SharePoint Online and OneDrive


The Importance of Version Control

Version control, or versioning, allows a file or item to be restored to an older state that is chosen from the version list. With versioning enabled, items and files in the SharePoint list or library are protected from unwanted, miscalculated and inadvertent errors. 

Applications of Versioning

Track Version History: version history discloses information about when an item or file was changed, by whom, what was changed, and any comments that were made when files are checked into libraries

Restore Previous Version: file or items that are corrupt can be restored from a previous version. A previous version can also be restored if mistakes are made in the file or item, or if the previous version is more akin to what is wanted. The restored version becomes the current version

View Previous Version: Before reverting to a previous version, there is the capability to compare two versions within a Microsoft Office document, such as Word or Excel, to determine the differences between the two documents without overwriting the current version.    

What is New with Versioning

Versioning is becoming more crucial as software and technology advances, as exemplified by the evolution of AutoSave and Restore Your OneDrive. Leveraging versions allows greater confidence for users and administrators alike while delivering better user experience.

In line with development, Microsoft recently announced they will be enabling versioning on all Document Libraries in team sites in SharePoint Online and OneDrive for Business with a default of retaining a minimum of 100 major versions. If your library is set to retain 100 or more major revisions, then this update will not affect you. However, existing libraries that are set to retain less than 100 major versions will be updated to meet the minimum criteria of 100 events.

Roll out will begin in June for first release customers while remaining tenants worldwide will receive the update in July. The rollout is expected to be completed by the end of July.

Who is Impacted

As mentioned, all team sites for OneDrive for Business and SharePoint Online will be affected. Will you be impacted if your team sites are not connected to an Office 365 group? The answer is “yes”, the rollout will update to the 100 minimum major revisions if you are not set to be 100 or above.

What if we are On-Prem for SharePoint? Will this affect us? The answer is “no”, this will have no impact on your SharePoint document libraries.   

What Else Changes

Once the update is rolled out to your tenant, site owners and administrators will not be able to set a versioning limit of less than 100. In addition to this, they will not be able to disable document library versioning as it will now be standard practice to have it enabled.

What About Storage Space?

Prior to the redevelopment of the flat collection sites with Office 365, versioning of document libraries required large storage sites. This, in turn, created issues for the allocation of storage for site collections. The result of limited storage was the stringent, low versioning limit. With the new approach of flat collection sites, storage is less of a concern than it was in the past; however, with audits, the speed of change in technology, and the increase in collaboration between teams and individual members, errors and corrupt files can be incurred, which places a priority on the ability to restore and recover these files and items. Hence, the rollout of the new higher, minimum versioning limit of 100.