Introduction to SharePoint - Part 3

If the notion of browsing to the Office 365 for Education portal, logging in, and navigating to a document before you even get started is just too much trouble, well – your right. It is too much trouble.  If using SharePoint to manage documents is not at least as convenient as using your local hard drive, then getting your users to embrace it will be a challenge.

Sure, when they really need to access a document that someone else created, they will go through the trouble. After all SharePoint is better than sneaker net;  but  without easy access to documents, both coming and going, they will likely not venture outside the My Documents folder.

So how do we make the wonderful world of collaboration possible? There are three ways that come to mind immediately. Let’s take a look at them from a more practical point of view.  I’ll even suggest a bonus method at the end of this article.

1. Through an app from your favorite app store
2. Using one of the Office Professional Plus programs
3. Using the SharePoint Synchronization tool

Applications from the App Store:

 

If the first thing that comes to mind when I say app, is the App Store, then there is a good chance you are using an iOS device (iPad, iPhone, etc.). There are a huge number of apps that have a SharePoint component.  This is also called a WebDav connection.

 

Check in the settings of your favorite app to see if there is not a SharePoint or WebDav connector. If so then you have the capability to connect to SharePoint. Now what you may or may not be able do once connected is a function of that specific app and outside the scope of this article.

 

In summary, most apps are designed for mobile devices to improve the function of a product or service offering as compared to simply browsing to the respective website. This is especially true of iOs (Apple) devices which do not always display content designed for Windows endpoints. For Windows phones the content is generally more accessible by browsing directly, vs. through an app, thus there is less of a need for apps in the first place.

 

Office Professional Plus Program:

 

A much more elegant and practical tool for managing documents is to do so directly from within one of the core Office Professional Plus programs. The most common of these is Microsoft Word, but the interaction is similar in other programs. The exception is OneNote which does the synchronization automatically (see my article about OneNote).

 

From within Microsoft Word for example, you simply create a file, complete with all of the complexity you can muster, then instead of selecting “S” for Save, or “S” for Save As, you instead select Save and Send and choose the SharePoint option. Although this will take just a few seconds longer, including a login screen for the first time you are using this program in the current session. You will be prompted to save your document directly into the SharePoint Cloud.

 

Opening a document is also straightforward, but instead of browsing to a folder, you browse to a SharePoint Workspace.

 

A word about sessions and session state is in order. One of my personal frustrations is the limitations on sessions in the Office 365 environment. You can actually map a drive letter to a SharePoint document library and save documents directly to a lettered drive, but only during the time a session is alive. Office 365 sessions expire after a couple of hours of inactivity. And the mapping will cease to work, unless you recreate it.

 

 SharePoint Workspace Synchronization Tool

 

One of the most efficient tools to manage your document library on SharePoint is with the SharePoint Workspace Synchronization tool. This utility works in the background and automatically synchronizes documents in a specified folder on your computer with a specified folder in SharePoint. This is an incredible tool, but use it with caution!

 

The caution is advised in two ways. First, be cautious that you don’t try to synchronize a folder that has multiple GB’s of documents, otherwise you will spend a lot of computing resources constantly keeping two large data sets in synch. Second, be cautious about synchronizing a folder accessed by more than a few users.

 

The presumption of a synchronization tool is to keep two locations in synch. Adding huge amounts of data or additional storage locations into the mix can be problematic.

 

Bonus

 

I could have mentioned this in last week’s article, but there is also a very powerful drag and drop capacity within SharePoint by using your browser. And this is where you will need to use Internet Explorer, and a later version at that. You can open your SharePoint site collection in an Internet Explorer browser window by ftp and then select the option to open the folder in Windows Explorer (not the same as Internet Explorer) and navigate the folders directly on your desktop. This would enable you to open two folders side by side on your desktop and drag and drop multiple files between your SharePoint site collection and your desktop.

 

Summary

 

If you have not yet gotten beyond browsing to the Office 365 for Education Portal, then signing in, and choosing the Team Site option, you are not using SharePoint efficiently. While this may in fact be more efficient than your previous experience of sharing files, it is SharePoint kindergarten. We want you to earn a graduate degree in SharePoint and become the model of efficiency.

 

Next week we will discuss using SharePoint as your public facing website and why it may be an excellent option for you. 

Implementing SharePoint - Part 2

The best place to start when attempting to understand SharePoint is your favorite internet browser. And we could easily get sidetracked into a discussion about browsers, but I’ll pass on that. SharePoint plays well with all Internet Browsers, but as you may have already guessed, it works optimally with Internet Explorer…. no surprise there!

So let’s browse right on over to the Office 365 for Education Portal. And if you don’t remember or write down anything else in this series of articles, remember this: https://portal.microsoftonline.com. This is the portal or gateway into all of the services offered in the Office 365 for Education solution. Once you log into the portal, you will have access to all of the services. And if you are an administrator, this is where you will also manage services for your organization.

Upon logging into the portal, you will see a link at the top for Team Site. This is your default SharePoint site. Once you are comfortable with accessing your SharePoint site, you can browse directly to it, rather than from within the Office 365 for Education Portal.

During signup or trial, your domain name will be assigned a default domain name similar to myschool.onmicrosoft.com. You will want to add your own domain name to the service as soon a possible, otherwise the URLs in this article might be confusing. Ultimately, the URL you you use to access SharePoint you will be something like myschool.sharepoint.com and that will also be the shortcut I referred to earlier.

Note: The “myschool” part of the domain name represents a third level name that belongs to your organization, names are available on a first come first served basis, and once accepted by the Office 365 for Education system, is registered with Microsoft as belonging to your Office 365 for Education subscription.

So now that we have got through all of the preliminaries of getting access to your Team Site, lets focus on what you can do there.

Your first experience with SharePoint may be similar to my first experience with a Personal Computer back in 1982. I anxiously hooked it up, powered it on, and was presented with a black screen and a blinking cursor. Hmmm, reality is such a harsh companion. SharePoint is not really like that, but the analogy is fair.

If you are expecting a default SharePoint site to be automatically customized to your organizational structure, filing system, internal process and work flows, you will be disappointed. In fact, the first takeaway from this article is that SharePoint requires you to become an information architect. You really need to think about your organization, how you manage documents and information, then begin the process of configuring SharePoint accordingly.

And since this is a team effort, it is essential that you engage your team. Doing so will accomplish two things. First it will improve your design and configuration experience, but perhaps as important it will engage your users so they will take ownership of SharePoint project and participate. Adoption among team members is always a challenge when rolling out SharePoint in your organization.

Admittedly it is unfair to be tasked with designing an information system for your organization when you do not know the capabilities of the information system at hand (SharePoint); hence my attempts at education in this series of articles. But as counterintuitive as it may seem, I would suggest that you start not with SharePoint, but with your own organization.

Take inventory of the types of documents you create, share, and file. Consider how you schedule events, meetings, and appointments. Evaluate how you create, update, and share lists and directories. And look closely at important relationships between organizations and groups and the projects they manage. Only after you have done this homework assignment, will you be capable of bringing your ideas and SharePoint’s efficiency into your organization.

Of course you will need to understand the basic capabilities of SharePoint in order to complete your design project, so let’s summarize the major SharePoint features and see if the workflows and processes you’ve dreamed up are possible.

Here are my top 10 favorite capabilities of SharePoint as it would apply to a charter school. Think about these ideas as you consider your SharePoint design project. SharePoint is:

A cloud based centralized filing system for all of your school documents

SharePoint is like a hard drive on the internet or a cloud based network share that gives access to authorized users and denies access to those unauthorized.  It stores documents of all types and formats, including forms, manuals, letters, reports, lesson plans, policy manuals, tests, assessments, lunch menus, etc. If you create, modify, or store information on a PC, it generally can exist in SharePoint.

A centralized store of lists, directories, and databases

Consider all of the lists you have in a busy school, everything from addresses, to school supplies, to vendors.  SharePoint can serve as the single repository of these lists and other data sets, that is both search and filter enabled. Consolidating all of your lists, directories, and databases, to the extend possible will greatly improve the efficiency of referencing information for all of your staff.

A centralized calendar of events for the school

Do you have challenges managing your calendar? SharePoint can serve as the one authorized and consistently updated calendar for all school activities. This calendar can be managed by one or several individuals and can provide automatic notifications for changes or pending approvals. This calendar can also be published to your public facing website eliminating the never ending process of updating the schools calendar on the website.

A discussion board, forum, or online meeting place

Amazing things happen when creativity and collaboration collide. SharePoint can serve as an internal meeting place where questions and documents can be posted and then discussed, without formal meeting times. The byproduct of this dialogue is a very useful knowledge base.

A Wiki

An intersting phenomena called Wikipdia, exists on the same platform as SharePoint. A SharePoint wiki can be a free flowing digital asset where all team members can contribute ideas, thoughts, insights or resources and links to resources.

A school wide issue resolution & tracking system

Technology and facilities management can be greatly improved when all interested parties have the latest information on issues and problems. SharePoint can serve as an issue tracking system that is continuously updated and available to all users. It can be created with complex work rules, time stamps, escalations, and automated communications or be as simple as a system a tod do list, with a status indication and user identification.

An image library

An important legal requirement for using photos at school includes protecting the identity of students and others. SharePoint is an excellent centralized storage facility for all approved imagery for use in school publications, communication, and presentations.

A video library

Yes, there is You Tube and other video sharing sites, but carte blanche access to these resources can put you at odds with CIPA requirements.  SharePoint can serve as a centralized storage facility for instructional videos. This can include both actual videos or links to approved videos for use in the classroom or for administrative purposes. And you can keep these organized by groups or simply lump them all together and allow the built in search features of SharePoint to provide you the access needed.

A social media system

Many schools prohibit the use of Facebook at school, which may be wise; but in doing so they limit students ability to learn important behavioral skills in the social arena. SharePoint, in the default Office 365 for Education configuration, provides a robust social media system that is restricted to the school, yet enjoys many Facebook like features. And the entire system can be managed by school administrators.

A Learning Management System

Some of the worlds most well know universities run on SharePoint LMS, a learning management system built on SharePoint. While this may not be appropriate for your school, SharePoint is a great way to share lesson plans with precise groups of students, discussion forums for each teacher/grade, resource listings, links, and social connections within classes.

All of these features listed above can be configured for your organization with SharePoint. And all of these systems would be present to you when you login as an authorized user at myschool.sharepoint.com or at the Office 365 for Education portal.

Next week we will discuss ways in which the management of SharePoint documents can be improved.

Is your data in Synch or in the sink (as in down the drain)?

When it works, it’s a marvelous thing. When it doesn’t it is painful.

That was my observation this week after losing several hours of creative work that originated on my iPad and was supposed to be synched to the cloud. Somewhere between my iPad and the cumulus digitus, my files got zapped. Perhaps it was a cruel joke Apple was playing on me for daring to use a Microsoft (One Note) application on an Apple device, the iPad.

The cause was more likely the result of not following my own advice. Attempting to create content on a consumer endpoint (iPad) rather than a robust workstation did not turn out well.  Although the same thing can happen on a workstation, automatic backups make recovery possible. Not so in my case.

Do you face challenges sharing your files between end different end points and end users? It can be challenging, but once you master the process, it is very useful. Here are a few things you might want to think about.

•  Decide how you will create original documents
• Settle on a file format that is platform independent
• Use infrastructure that is device neutral
• Synchronize your programs automatically (or semi-automatically)

Let’s consider a scenario to demonstrate how this works:

 

Suppose you have documents that you need to diagram, outline, or notate, then share. This is common in the classroom where a teacher creates a lesson plan document, marks it up during a lecture, then posts the document online for students to review.

 

This is not so simple to do on your laptop or desktop (PC or Mac) alone. However, with an iPad or tablet and the right application, it’s a cinch. The problem is that much of the resources, in the form of documents, photo stock, spreadsheets, etc. exist on your laptop/desktop during the creative process; where typing text, inserting tables, or adding photos is a snap. Yet presenting that document during a lecture often means using another medium, such as an overhead or smartboard, where it is not easy to capture the doodles, drawings, diagrams, or annotations on the original document.

 

So the challenge is moving your creative work through its various stages; from your PC, to your iPad or tablet, while retaining the ability to access it on both, plus a web browser for sharing.

 

If you are simply copying an existing document, this is pretty straightforward. But that may not provide you the personalized original document you need. And it really doesn’t matter, because it is the same process described below, with a few steps taken out.

 

So let’s apply the four principles above to our scenario and see how this works:

 

Decide how you will create original documents

 

I start with Microsoft One Note as my creative solution on the desktop. It is a very clever program included in Office Professional and now part of Office 365 Web Apps. Within One note, you can clip articles, snip website pages, insert photos and notate with text on the location of my choice on the page. You can also create tables on the fly if you need to do spreadsheet-like calculations. And while you are at it, embed your video, audio, or other links.

 

One Note is truly an amazing program for organizing stuff in an electronic document on a PC or Mac. You may have another favorite or a program more oriented to the subject matter you teach. But I have not found an equivalent for doing this creative work on the iPad. While great at displaying content, the iPad is very limited with respect to creating original content.

 

Settle on a file format that is platform independent

 

Next I save my document in Adobe’s Portable Document Format. A .pdf is so common now that many don’t realize it originated as the output of Adobe Acrobat, a very powerful program used to manage documents with advanced features to transport, distribute, secure, sign, certify and otherwise manage digital documents.

 

Most of the advanced features in a .pdf are not necessary in the classroom, but the ability to create .pdf’s (as opposed to just reading them) has always been a bit challenging, due to licensing issues with Adobe – the creators of the .pdf standard. You can find an unlimited number of free readers on the internet, but you almost always have to pay (in one way or another) for software to create a .pdf.

 

The benefit of using a .pdf is the ability to view it on virtually any platform and device. Desktop, laptop, PC, Mac, Linux, iPad, iPhone, Android, Kindle, etc. you name a digital device and it reads a .pdf. And all kinds of websites, ftp sites, sharing services, etc., also accommodate .pdf’s.

And backing up one step, the reason I use One Note is that along with its versatility, it (like all Microsoft Office Programs) contains a “Save As” option that includes an option to save the document in a .pdf file format.

 

Use infrastructure that is device neutral

 

Once you have successfully created your document and placed it into a .pdf format, you’ll need to decide where to store it. The variety of choices in this step are mind boggling due to the sheer number of options presented in various apps available for endpoint devices, so be careful. Storing the documents is only one aspect of this process. The capacity to share, download, tag and find, and manage lifecycle or archiving are also important considerations.

 

I am not writing this article oblivious to Drop Box and Evernote, I use both. And you may know of others, there are some very clever apps and programs out there, but my platform of choice is SharePoint. The reason is simple. It is an enterprise level program with deep integration into my organization as a whole and provides a number of other important benefits aside from our discussion here.

 

SharePoint’s adoption is evident in most programs designed to synchronize your data. Just look in the setup menu and you will almost always have an option to save to a SharePoint (or WebDAV) site.

Bottom line is that SharePoint is very compatible with the other steps outlined here. And for users that are not inclined to try every new gadget program out there or are a bit technically challenged, SharePoint is very easy to use. It looks just like another folder on My Computer and saving to it is very much like saving a document to the My Documents folder.

 

Synchronize your programs automatically (or semi-automatically)

 

The final step in this document creation and display journey may very well take you back to your iPad which is synched to the cloud through one of the many clever .pdf programs. Otherwise use your desktop or laptop or tablet or smart phone or kindle, or… you get the picture. Synch your data and share it with others in your world.

 

If you choose the iPad, you’ll need a good .pdf program. Take your pick, there are dozen’s. I Like PDF Expert (by Readdle)  where I can doodle, highlight, draw circles, boxes and arrows and do all sorts of hands on notation of the document while I am lecturing from it. And with the right app, I can connect my iPad to an overhead projector or share it on a smart board for all to enjoy.

 

When my presentation is done, my document is automatically synched to the SharePoint cloud and available to the groups and individuals with whom you have shared it. And if you make changes to the document, they are available on all the endpoints.

 

Summary

 

What happened to me turned out to be failing to follow my own advice, although in fairness it wasn’t really advice if I had not yet advised it as such.  No matter, the lessons I learned have helped me to more effective. I hope you will find the ideas useful.

 

Decide upon the program you will use to create your specific content and ensure that it will allow you to "Save As" or export to .pdf. Use a .pdf document as the medium of transporting and sharing. Manage the .pdf on Sharepoint, and take advantage of any automatic synchronization of the documents.

 

Don’t feel like a dummy if you can’t figure out how to make this work on the first go around. There are a number of steps involved. But if you routinely create, share, modify, and archive documents in the process of instruction. These ideas should work for you.

 

Let us know if you other useful ideas.