How to integrate a form in a sharepoint upload process:

[Matthias_Hunscher]

We are currently building a sharepoint (we use Sharepoint Online) for the exchange of internal documents. So that the users can search in the Sharepoint as specifically as possible, those who upload the documents should fill out a form in which they add important information to the document (properties). This form should appear at the beginning of the upload process and the actual upload should only take place after completing the form. Then we want to use approval workflows that get triggered only after all mandatory metadata (properties) of an uploaded document have been assigned. Does anyone have any experience of how such a form can be created and inserted into the upload process?

[#2]

@Matthias_Hunscher

Short answer: yes, but it is a lot of work.

Long answer
We have been through the process to develop a form (browser-based) where users need to select a content type and set metadata values prior to uploading. See here.

It can be very useful to ensure uploaded documents have correct metadata. For example, customer name, GPS location for a bunch of photo's, security classification, ..

You will need to create an App to provide this functionality. Supporting all different column types is challenging. For instance, having single line of text or yes/no is relatively simple. If you also need to support managed metadata, person or group fields, Enterprise keywords, ... then things become much more challenging. You will also need to make sure required columns are filled out, field lengths are not exceeded, cater for default values, ...

and last and not least: error handling.

The form is of course independent from the approval flows.

Paul