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- EmilyPerina
Community Manager
That’s a wrap! Thank you for joining our Microsoft Syntex AMA today! We appreciate all the great questions and hope you learned something new! I'll be locking this event to new questions, but our experts will still be able to respond to any unanswered questions. Stay tuned for more Microsoft Syntex news!
For any other questions about Syntex, head to the Microsoft Syntex Community Discussion Space.
- Chris McNulty
Microsoft
Thanks everyone!
- When classifying documents, is there a way to tell if a classification attempt has been made but none of the models (deployed to the library) succeeded in classifying some of the docs? Something like setting the classification attempt time/date and a content type of 'Unknown' would be good. Thanks.
- JamesEcclesGreat feedback. We're looking something along these lines to give you better indications of where Syntex has processed a document. Look out for a change in this direction coming soon.
- Can you explain a bit more about the differences in functionality for Freeform documents (using AI Builder) and Unstructured Documents (using doc understanding models)? I know the training is different, freeform doesn't do classification, and a few other things. One question I have is whether both can do the "deskew" of PDF or scanned images before processing. Freeform seems to handle rotated documents but unstructured documents have trouble with OCR text extraction positioning if the image is rotated
- JamesEcclesThis article gives a good overview of the different model types - https://learn.microsoft.com/en-gb/microsoft-365/contentunderstanding/difference-between-document-understanding-and-form-processing-model Both Unstructured and Freeform models can be used to tackle similar use cases. Limitations on file format and language may push you in one direction or other. But assuming both are possibilities for your use case, then I would start with Freeform. It has a lower bar for effort during training. If that doesn't get at the right data, then shift to Unstructured which has more of a teaching element and more need for human training. Both model types use the same OCR engine, so should be broadly the same for skewed docs. One thing to note though is that Freeform does factor in layout to the model, where Unstructured has to restructure into linear text.
- I can't wait to use MS Syntex to allow users to sign documents electronically. I'm after a demo that shows how we can use Syntex to do esignatures. Please feel free to share links or resources
- Chris McNultySyntex eSignature is coming next year! You can see it in throughout our launch videos, including here: https://youtu.be/omTtOyNsinQ?t=85
Can you share more details around Syntex archiving? (1) expected pricing / licensing required (2) how does it impact search & audit log (3) does archiving impact SharePoint APIs? e.g. will the files still visible via the SharePoint API? (4) when a document is archived, is metadata still accessible but not the file content? To see the content need to recall the file back into SharePoint?
- Chris McNultySyntex archival storage will be available to most M365 commercial plans at a cost significantly lower than today's M365 "hot" storage. It will work in place, preserving metadata and searchability, but viewing or editing content with require "rehydration", and API access will be limited as a result. Syntex Archive is designed to help you keep you content in place inside the M365 trust boundary while managing your costs for less-used content at scale.
- IanStoryHi Hadwin! I'll do my best to answer these, but as you'll see, some we can't comment on (particularly #1) - LOL! 1 - I can't comment on this beyond we intend at this time for it to be based on the amount of data archived and restored from the archive, aligned in a "pay as you go" type of model. This could change before we make the product generally available as discussions are ongoing. In terms of the actual price, I can tell you that we intend to make it significantly less expensive than the "hot" storage you can add today to your tenant, with the trade off being fewer features when archived, in exchange for the significantly lower price point for archive storage. 2 - The intent is that you can still search and archiving will show up in the audit logs. 3 - Probably need more detail on what type of impact you're asking about, but when things are archived, there is a reduced set of functionality (no co-authoring for instance) and so depending on the API, yes, there may be some impacts. 4 - Yes, that's the plan, and you'd need to restore back to SharePoint from the archive for the content, correct.
- EmilyPerina
Welcome to the Microsoft Syntex Ask Microsoft Anything (AMA)! This live hour gives you the opportunity to ask questions directly to the Microsoft team. Please post any questions in a separate, new comment thread on this event. Thanks!
- Oh so this is running as a text based chat event, not a Teams meeting?
- EmilyPerinaHi Brian, yes this is a text based event where questions are answered live on this page. If you have any questions, please add them in new separate comments.
- IanStoryHi everyone, Ian Story here, I lead the product team for Microsoft Syntex and I'm excited to answer as many questions as we can today!
- JamesEcclesHi everyone, I'm James Eccles, Customer Experience Program Manager on the Syntex team. Looking forward to answering these GREAT questions
- What are the benefits of using Microsoft Syntex in a business related structure?
- wbaerHi Babedi, can you expand on the question? Is there a particular use case scenario that you have in mind, such as an industry example, etc.?
- Question: For content composition with Syntex, are there APIs that can be called to initiate a composition using a template and if not do we have an ETA for those?
- JamesEcclesWe currently have a Power Automate action in the SharePoint connector for automated content assembly. It's called "Generate documents using Syntex (preview). We're working on having APIs give the same experience programmatically, likely to be released next year.
- Question: If I have content composition, is there a way to have the finished document land in a different folder or document library than the template? I can see using content routing, but that feature is not yet available
- Hi Mario, I trigger the content creation via a 'For a selected item' Power Auto trigger then a 'Generate document using SharePoint Syntex (preview)' action, it still places the composed doc in the template folder but I use downstream actions to move the file and convert to PDF. * I'm assuming 'content composition' is the same as 'content assembly'.
- This is the action I was referring to. I know I can use a downstream action after the document has generated. Was wondering about the addition of the redirect target location so that the doc wasn't generated (even briefly) in the source location. There is a concern about permissions and directing to the target with permissions intact. Thanks for the fast reply. I'll continue to use this approach for now.
I have a few questions for this event specifically on Syntex Content Assembly (Outbound Document Generation) and if below is on Roadmap/existing.
Q1: Typically, a Template management team is different to the Team that may be generating the final document. For example, the Legal team may manage the Employment Contract Template but its HR that will generate the final named Employee Contract based on a template. Given Syntex operates on Modern Templates how can we create a security model on that Doc Lib that allows Legal team to add/update modern templates, but they have no visibility to the generated documents due to sensitive content (HR access only)?
Q2: In many countries' documents have a legal requirement to have 2 languages displayed side by side in a document like a contract. How can we parse the same template twice in the Power Automate Generate Document with Syntex action, once filling in one language fields and then the other. Or conditional steps to complete this process.
Q3: Question asked below as well, is there an API that allows systems to retrieve modern templates along with placeholder fields for use by that calling system? many systems will have specific doc generating processes, but organizations would want to manage templates and finalized documents in one place (SPO & Syntex) but not use the doc generation workflow of Syntex due to propriety workflow that generates the content?
Q4: Any impact to licensing or high-volume API calls for a scenario where let's say an example financial institution uses Syntex to generate thousands of documents (by its triggering systems) for its global millions of members and surfaces these documents to external facing secure members website to browse, search & view these documents by its members?
- It is very interesting questions. And that's reason to conduct events! Questions 3, I have commented on that, there is API and due to advance of AI, I think it could be possible for Cloud based.... so, all these workful of Syntex within security policy must be placed not separately. And you will hear a lot more from the presenters the experts on the fields.
- IanStoryHi Mo and tutlammctechisoftware! Thank you for the great questions, I've sent to our content assembly folks to chime in, but I'll share a couple of thoughts here too: Q1 - great feature ask, we are looking at ways to create libraries of templates (and images and clauses and so forth for use with templates) and we'll consider this! Q2 - likewise, great feature ask, we'll have to look at adding this to the Power Automate capabilities. We are absolutely adding conditional capabilities to generate various clauses, but not sure it'd be exactly what you need here. I guess you could just define the template with both languages and then reuse the values...I suspect our content assembly folks will have some ideas for you on this one! Q3 - we are planning to add APIs, beyond Power Automate (which surely is not an API, I get that!), in the upcoming ~6 months or so, stay tuned! Q4 - to be direct, our *current intention* here is that an end user license of Syntex allows the user to manually create documents using content assembly, any bulk generation capabilities, at this point in time, will be in a pay as you go/consumption model.
