Introducing SmartFilters for Modern Document Libraries
Published Dec 09 2016 12:52 AM 22.7K Views
Microsoft

Earlier this year, when we rolled out modern SharePoint document libraries, our goals went beyond just enhanced user experience. Creating modern content management is essential to empower new business value built on SharePoint.  That’s why we’re pleased to announce the availability of SmartFilters for SharePoint modern document libraries, now rolling out to First Release, as announced this morning at SharePoint Fest Chicago.

 

SmartFilters provide dynamic search capabilities based on the rich metadata available inside a document library.

 

 

SmartFilter.PNG

SmartFilters can be opened by clicking on the “funnel” icon on the right side of the library command bar.  By default, SmartFilters provide a graphically rich way to filter a view of a library by modified date, modified by, and document type.  Additional metadata columns in the view can be selected and also filtered using the SmartFilter.  Finally, SmartFilters can be saved as a custom view for any library.

 

For more information, please visit our support article.  Thanks, and we look forward to your continued feedback.

 

14 Comments
Steel Contributor

And speaking of metadata, what are the plans to help get documents tagged with metadata in an easier fashion with the new experience? Having the right hand info bar in order for users to add the metadata after upload is not a good option. Now we have the smart filters option in the UI as well. Many people liked the option previously where on uploading a doc, a user had to complete metadata options and then save.  Good metadata is what helps the filters work properly in the first place. Looks a bit like the cart before the horse.

Copper Contributor

Agreed. @Andrew Gilleran raises a good point here. The new experience has introduced several "clunky" pieces of functionality...

 

Would it be possible to have the old profile dialog back when uploading but make it work for multiple uploads, with a tick box at the bottom saying "apply tags to all files"?

 

The market place has been resistant to metadata because of the network-share hangover. At it's core there in an reliance on saving to a "location" - a sub folder many levels deep.

 

While metedata is/was the perfect solution, adoption rates suffered as the entrenched dependancy on folders is a decades old habit that is hard to kick.

 

With the advent of teams/groups and this new experience Microsoft has given up fighting the uphill metadata battle and almost reverted to an environment free of metadata. While it's still there in the background Microsoft have all but obscured it with this clunky, google-drive information right hand pannel.

 

 

Navigation is another equally big can of worms with governance ramifications that go beyond the initail or even sencond thoughts one might have.

Bronze Contributor

What about SmartFilters availability? We don't have it yet in our first release tenant.

Bronze Contributor

Hi @Chris McNulty

 

Any update on the rollout? We're still not seeing it.

 

thanks

Brass Contributor

Hello,

 

Are SmartFilters compatible with Lookup columns where Allow multipe values is enabled?

Because the feature is already available for our tenant but the Lookup column does not show up in the SmartFilters pane.

 

I really need a feedback on this: I have a demo of the modern libraries early next week.

 

Thank you,

Bronze Contributor

I'm seeing SmartFilters as well, must have been last week or so.

Brass Contributor

Is there any way how to easily filter by Title contains "word" with these SmartFilters?

Bronze Contributor

@Roger Schmidt shouldn't the top left search box fulfill this requirement? 

SmartFilters wouldn't know your required search phrase. Additionally you might create a saved custom view that contains a preinput search phrase.

Brass Contributor

@Ivan Unger Thanks for your quick response. Not exactly. It is really about filtering documents in library. E.g. for quickly editing metadata across found documents.

The search box filters on any field value or content of documents, and you could open them but it does not filter the view.

Save custom views would not be an option for quick filtering, there must be a more elegant way of doing this...

Brass Contributor

I am really missing a column filter with such functionality. Currently you can use "filter by", but this shows all values found in corresponding column. Think about if you have hundreds of docs/items.

Bronze Contributor

I think I understand what you're looking for, basically the same "search text box per column" as exists in Excel.

Steel Contributor

Using the smart filter vs the filter in the colum gives you different results (see screenshots)

These columns are set to multiple choice and as you can see the smart filter merges the choise into a string and you cannot filter by these at all, while the simple coloum filter gives expected results.

Is this by design?

Steel Contributor

Using the smart filter vs the filter in the coloumn gives you different results (see screenshots)

These columns are set to multiple choice and as you can see the smart filter merges the choice into a string and you cannot filter by these at all, while the simple coloumn filter gives expected results.

Is this by design?

 

Smart filterSmart filterColumn filterColumn filter

Brass Contributor
It would be great for Microsoft to add a tree view metadata UI to SmartFilters, as many are calling for here: https://sharepoint.uservoice.com/forums/329214-sites-and-collaboration/suggestions/19270162-bring-ba...
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