Upcoming SharePoint mobile beta testing - winding down

Microsoft

Hi everyone… first, thanks so much for participating in the external beta!  Your feedback has been great, and we really appreciate your insight and dedication to helping us make this a great update.

 

With that, we will be starting to rollout the updated production version to the app stores this week.  It will be a gradual rollout, so it won’t be available to everyone at once.  We are anticipating the rollout to take a few weeks.

 

In the meantime, you can continue using the beta versions, or you can get back on the production train.  To get back to production…

 

  • For iOS: Remove the TestFlight version and reinstall the version from the App Store.  When the new update is available, you’ll get it as you have before through the App Store.
  • For Android:  You’ll need to exit the Alpha via the following link: https://play.google.com/apps/testing/com.microsoft.sharepoint.  And then uninstall the Alpha version of the app.  You can then go to the PlayStore to get the production version.  Note that it may take a few hours to get you off of Alpha back to production.

 

Again, in both cases above you may not see the updated version of the app in the stores for a bit, as the rollout continues.

 

Thanks again for your help, and keep the feedback coming!  We are always interested to hear what you think about the product and how we can make it better.

 

Nate and the SharePoint mobile team

 

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

 

Hi all… we are now ready for beta testing.  iOS and Android are ready!  You should be receiving an email from Apple/Testflight soon that will walk you through the steps for getting the iOS beta.  For Android, if you installed the placeholder alpha build, you should get an update later today or tomorrow.  If you haven’t installed it yet, you can get it from the instructions below.  In both cases, it’s SharePoint online only for now.

 

With that, welcome to the new Find tab and the updated SharePoint app look and feel.  Both of these changes reflect our desire to make the app as effective and valuable to you as possible. 

 

This includes a few things.  First, continuing to update the experiences you know and expect, per feedback.  Second, ensuring that we are aligned in the key areas with the web as it continues to improve and innovate.  Finally, looking at ways that we make the app great from a mobile scenario perspective.  That is, what are the key improvements we can make that are unique to mobile and/or demonstrate the power of SharePoint, but from a mobile point of view.  The changes you’ll see in the beta reflect all three of the above factors, but focus mainly on the third. 

 

What you can expect:

  • A new layout that aligns to two key areas.  First, getting to and finding the content that’s important to you.  This is the Find tab.  It brings all of the content you care about into one easily scrollable view.  You’ll see…
    • Improved search.  Better results, better suggestions.
    • Your sites, the people you work with, and your organization featured links
    • Your recent files
    • Popular queries in your organization
    • Quick access.  Initially, this section shows you the last three items (people, pages, news, lists, files) you’ve accessed in the app. 
    • And check out the menus for sites!  You can quickly get to the site content you care about from the menu, saving you a few steps.
  • The second area is your news.  No major changes here, but you’ll see an improved layout.

 

Your feedback is very appreciated, so definitely play around with the app and let us know what you think!  And this is just the continuation of our journey.  There is so much more to come beyond this release!

 

Thanks

Nate and the SharePoint mobile team

 

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

 

Hi all…

 

I’m Nate Clinton, and I’m a program manager on the SharePoint mobile engineering team. As you may have seen at the recent SharePoint conference, big things are happening in the mobile space!  We are updating the user interface to better reflect our core “user jobs”:  1) Finding content and getting answers, 2) being the place to get notified about what’s important in your SharePoint world, and 3) being the place to consume your news content.  This is a journey, but we are nearing a point at which we’ll be ready to release the first update.

 

To ensure we deliver the right experience for you all, we’d love to get your feedback on the beta version.  We are targeting late June to start the beta program.  If you are interested in being an early previewer of the updated SharePoint mobile app, check out the steps below.

 

A few logistical notes:

  • The beta is primarily for SharePoint Online users at this time.  Some of these features may be coming to on-premises, but that timeline is still tbd.
  • When the first beta build is ready, you’ll be notified through the below described platform mechanisms.
  • We’ll use this community to post updates, progress reports, etc.  So be sure to check back!
  • We are still building features and fixing issues.  So things may be a bit rocky here and there :smiling_face_with_smiling_eyes:

 

Android beta testing

  • Note that, until we release the beta build, you’ll continue to get the current production build via the alpha program.  We’ll let you know when the first beta build is ready!

 

iOS beta testing

  • To test on iOS, you’ll need to use the TestFlight app.  To get started, send your email address to natec@microsoft.com.  This email address will be used by Apple to send you the invite.  From there, you can install the TestFlight app, and then our app.  The TestFlight app will let you know when there are updates.

 

If you are already a beta tester (from previous iOS testing), you should be good to go! 

 

Thanks for your help with this!  We are very excited about the changes, and we’re eager to hear your feedback.

The SharePoint mobile team

 

56 Replies
Works good,
A question,
Im a part of a big EDU tenant so the results in the popular search area is so irrelevant for me as i see them now
Would it be possible through a setting to maybe hide it?

We are looking at providing an option in the future for admins to configure what shows / doesn't show in the Find tab.  Details still TBD... but it's on our roadmap.

 

Thanks!

Hmmm.  Ok, let me chat with a few folks to see if we have other options for you.

 

Thanks!

Under ‘People you work with’ I would prefer to see my organisational reports separate from other co-workers. An example is how Delve and Microsoft Teams displays these. This would allow me to cut through a very busy list in this app view. This is simply another view but surfaced here would help. Thanks.
Is the number of sites under Frequent Sites fixed? For example, I can see four sites when there is capacity to show six sites. Is this value set by the Graph within certain parameters? In addition, the ellipsis?displays differently according to the site. Is this conditioned by site type (team, comms or hub site) or by permissions? Finally, on first run, highlighting the ellipsis would help discovery. There are plenty of examples of these useful callouts across SharePoint. Hope this helps as feedback. Enjoying the new app!

Hi Denis... just to confirm, you are using the game Google account for the Alpha track that you use in the Google Play store to download apps?  Also, you have uninstalled the app before trying to re-download?

Thanks John! Great feedback... I've added it to our list.

@Nate Clinton Unbelievable I did not notice that! I do have a personal and a work account on the device.
Thanks for the hint, it solved my problem and I have 3.0.0 now!
For your trouble, I'll try to provide feedback for the app soon!

Great to hear!

@Nate Clintonas promised, here is my feedback:

 

There are a lot of nice improvements that I like in this alpha build.

However I think the most interesting feedback is on the things I don’t like or are missing:smiling_face_with_smiling_eyes:

(don’t get me wrong, this build is really good)

 

News

  • In saved news, it would be intuitive to swipe saved news “away”.  Comparable to swiping an e-mail in outlook mobile for archiving or planning
  • Would be nice if some news items could be higher in the list than others.
    For instance important news from management.
    This might be implemented with the announced “Organisational news”?
  • There are no filter possibilities. Filter on date might be interesting. However the most interesting would be to filter on category, but that’s also a feature related to the organisational news I guess?

Search

  • Fast Access is filled dynamically, but wouldn’t it be better if the user had more control over the items?
  • You still have to use wildcards like * to get correct search results.
    If I search for the word “orange” I don’t get results that would be found with “oranges”. You have to use “orange*” to find those files.
    For end-users this is not intuitive. End-users don’t like wildcards or don’t even know they exist.
  • Followed sites seem to be a bit hidden, you have to click “more sites” first. I do understand there might not be room for a more prominent spot.
  • I get hits on Microsoft team wiki pages when searching, but I cannot open them in the app. (maybe the teams app should open then?) (the irony is that it’s also put into fast access but ofcourse there you get the same error, its basically a deadlink in the fast access.)
  • Switching to the OneDrive app is still very confusing. When selecting details on a file, I expected to get a modalpopup with the URL of the file, just like the details modalpopup for sites. Instead I get thrown into the onedrive app. And there I can’t even see where the file is actually situated.
    If i press back, I'm still in onedrive app and not in the SharePoint app anymore.
  • It would be fantastic if files were indicated with a label with the teamsite they are on, just like news has the name of the origin site in blue above the newsitem.
    sometimes the location of the file is VERY important and not just the name of the file.
  • Is it need to show the IM adres for every person? In my organisation this is always 100% the same als the e-mail adres that is shown.
  • Under the ellipsis in the site list, you can go directly to documents, activity, news, lists etc. for that site. That’s awesome. However it would be nice if the ellipsis would provide the same functionality if you use the textsearch. If a search result is indeed a site, ellipsis should reflect this and offer the same possibilities.

Me

  • Don’t really know why I need my own photo, name or e-mail adres on top. I know how I look like, what my email is and what my name is ;) Takes space where other stuff could be.
  • I don’t understand why some files are in my recent tab. There are files there that I surely didn’t not open in the last hour, but yet are in the list. Some other people might have opened these files, but I didn’t. So I don’t really want those in “recent” on a tab that is called "Me".
    I expect to see only files I actually worked on or viewed.

 

Bug?

  • On the “Details” modalpup of any item the button to close is labelled “Verwijderen”
    (Dutch for “delete”). This should be “Sluiten” (Dutch for “close”)
  • It’s still impossible to display the Microsoft Stream webpart on SharePoint pages
  • Powerapps customizations to a list are not shown in the SharePoint mobile app. The default is shown. This undermines all the customizations made? (like validations etc)

 

 

If any of my feedback isn’t clear, please ask and I’ll try to clarify!

Thanks for the opportunity to test this version.

 

Great feedback, thanks! I've documented it and if we have questions as we go through it I'll let you know.

Thanks again!
Nate
SharePoint And OneDrive integration

The ondedrive connection is confusing and irritating sometimes

As i understand a built in way to access the SharePoint files isn’t in a near time if ever. But
Today I just wanted information of a files location so I went to Information on that file and got thrown in to OneDrive.
Can you somehow insted of just throwing you to the OneDrive app,
Maybe show a pop window with information relevant to that file, ex: about where the file in question is stored and so on
And there maybe a link to open it in the OneDrive app? Or some other clever way but just don’t throw me to OneDrive app

Sometimes you just don’t want to hop back and forth between apps just to file information
Thanks for the feedback Jonas. The good news is that we are working with the OneDrive team to build access to libraries/files into the SharePoint app. We will add more functionality over time, but we are excited about it... so stay tuned!
Is there a redeem code? I haven't received an email but I did install TestFlight

The emails often go into the junk folder.  Any luck there?  

Hi,

 

Will any aspects of the organizational news targeting features (currently slated for September release) and push notification subscription be available as part of this beta? Would be great to see the ability to have more granular control over which notifications I get as a user (other than "Interesting news" and "Comments").

 

Thanks!

Hi Mark... the beta didn't include organizational news or more granular control over notifications.  You'll see more on us on both fronts over the next few months though!

 

Thanks!