Forum Discussion
Modern - all or nothing?
RobOK, you are correct that the default search in a Communication site is only within the site. You can then switch to everything. The Hub site that will come next year will solve this issue. From a Hub site you the search default will be through all connected sites.
The Hub site will also solve part of your Navigation issue. It will provide a shared top navigation for all connected sites. Default position of the current navigation of a modern teamsite will stay on the left.
Structural navigation will not be available though. The key word here is: performance. So you will have to manually create your Navigational nodes.
Search from a modern site is Microsoft Graph-driven. That simply is very different from classic SharePoint search. If you have highly structured content with lots of content types and heavily used meta deta, than Modern Search will not be very helpful.
Admittedly having not read any of the responses here, one observation I'd like to make is that check in/out is a baaaaaaaaaad practice in SharePoint Online/2016 IMHO.
Unless you have an absolute need (the only qualifying ones I can allow in my head are legal or compliance requirements, which is very uncommon), drop the check in/out step in all your [non-automated] business processes. It may have been nice in the past, and it may help keep configuration control a bit more in check, but its value really isn't there when SharePoint offers so many other features that make up for check in/out's disadvantages. The biggest issue is the fact that check in/out is a mutually exclusive concept to co-authoring, which is now the norm.
I'd be curious to know what exactly your org's check in/out requirement is and whether it's worth reconsidering for the sake of making sure there are as few bumps in the road as possible. This would also relieve the major complaint you have with the modern UI. (Not all, of course, but that's the one you called out.)
I've published an article detailing why I despise check in/out if you're curious to understand in more detail where I'm coming from. http://icsh.pt/SPCheckOut
Great note, thanks. I think at this point it is just a cultural norm that admittedly has a learning curve when people start.
Some related points (that I don't think will strongly make our case):
- a perception that a "checked out" document is being worked on, or at least you can see that someone is working on it
- versions - I'm not sure how versions work without Check In
- We use Check In comments extensively for statusing
Co-authoring is not something we use currently but maybe in the future.
EDIT: also, for some of our highly formatted documents, we have had document corruption with DOCX files vs. DOC. So for certain documents we use DOC only which I think cannot be Co-Authored.
Also, is co-authoring available in Word, Excel, and Powerpoint client software, or just the Web versions fo the programs?
I will look at your article too, appreciate your thoughts.
Rob.
Co-authoring works both in the clients and in the Online versions of Word, PowerPoint and Excel.
The great thing is that as soon as you open a document you can see who else is looking at or working in the document. Read this article to see how: https://support.office.com/en-us/article/Collaborate-on-Word-documents-with-real-time-co-authoring-7dd3040c-3f30-4fdd-bab0-8586492a1f1d.
Regarding versioning: by default all SharePoint Online libraries keep 500 major versions of all documents. In the library settings you can change this setting to also include minor version. In that case you have to publish a document to make it a major version. When you do that you get a window were you can leave comments about the version.
About the issues you have had with highly formatted documents: I wonder how long ago those issues have been. DOCX is around for over 10 years already. I would recommend to modernize your formatted documents in this case. You are right that co-authoring does not work in .doc files.
Rebekka Aalbers-de Jong wrote:
The great thing is that as soon as you open a document you can see who else is looking at or working in the document.
When you do that you get a window were you can leave comments about the version.
About the issues you have had with highly formatted documents: I wonder how long ago those issues have been. DOCX is around for over 10 years already. I would recommend to modernize your formatted documents in this case. You are right that co-authoring does not work in .doc files.
Good points... Re; Doc vs DocX, sometimes these are emotional points not necessarily fact based! It only takes one or two examples to prove and DocX (or really Word 2016) does have bugs and file corruption. It is hard to prove it is related or not related to the file format.
We'll see....i'll start encouraging co-authoring and see if a change is coming!
Hi Rebekka Aalbers-de Jong - Doesn't co-authoring in the rich client require that the authors have the latest or at least 2016 versions of Office? What happens when there is a mix of Office Online and rich clients co-authoring? I haven't tested this very recently, but it wasn't too long ago where I had problems in OneNote when one person was editing in OneNote Online and I was editing in the rich client. Testing this is onerous in our environment. For example...
- Everyone co-author using the same version of MS Word.
- Test if there a difference in co-authoring between MSI Versions and Click to Run versions of 2016.
- See if co-authoring works with rich clients and Online versions.
- Add in Mac versions of Office.
- What happens in the co-authoring session when a user opens the document in the mobile version of Word?
It's gotten to the point that now when I recommend that an internal client use some bit of functionality (e.g. co-authoring) I feel the need to test or validate that it works as I expect it to work.
If you say that it all works now, I will be very pleased, and I would probably still do some lightweight verification.
Thanks - Greg
- You have to have at least the 2013 version, but 2016 is better. MSI or Click to Run should not make a difference as long as it is Office Pro Plus. For Mac it is the same: use Office Pro Plus.
In the context of Office 365 it only makes sense to use Pro Plus. You should have something in place so that you users get frequent updates. I think the default mode in Office 365 is that your users get quarterly updates a little bit behind global release to consumers. You should also look at what SharePoint sync clients you use, if you use them at all. The old clients gave more issues. The new Windows 10 client with files-on-demand is the best.
I would not suggest that there will never be any issue with co-authoring, but it has come a long way and works fine in my experience.
