OneDrive for Business now available for MAC

Yes all you Office 365 and Mac fan boys and girls, Microsoft has just announced that SkyDrive for Business sync client for MAC is available on iOS! You can read all the good news here and how you can procure it:

http://blogs.office.com/2015/01/28/onedrive-business-comes-mac-ios-devices/

There is also an Office Mechanics video that shows you all the features.

Demonstrates how OneDrive for Business is really a great cross platform tool for sharing and syncing files.

Connect SharePoint to MS Access

You can consider SharePoint as an extension of the Office applications you have on your desktop. One of these that provides a huge amount of power but gets used infrequently is Microsoft Access.

Many don’t appreciate that you can easily connect a SharePoint list to Microsoft Access on the desktop. Doing so allows you to use SharePoint as the data repository and Access as the analytical front end, allowing to create complex structures and queries as well as producing mind blowing reports and data analysis quickly and easily.

This tutorial will show you the basic steps of connecting SharePoint to your desktop version of Access. You see how that when you do it establishes an bi-directional link that means data is updated no matter where it is changed.

This is only the beginning of what is possible when you combine Access and SharePoint, however it is a very good place to start. Watch out for more content on this topic very soon.

Enabling your Office 365 Azure AD

Many don’t realise that Office 365 identity is built on top of Azure Active Directory. This means that every Office 365 tenant is using Azure Active Directory. What many also don’t realise is that you can easily access the Azure Active Directory by simply enabling it from your Office 365 Admin console. Here’s how you do this.

Login to Office 365 as a global administrator. Navigate to the Office 365 Admin, in my case by selecting the Admin icon from the app launcher.

In the lower left of this window, under the Admin section, you should find the Azure AD link as shown above. Select this.

You’ll now be taken to a screen like that shown above where you sign up to Azure.

You’ll need to enter your details (email, phone, etc). You’ll also need to specific a mobile phone which a verification code can be sent to.

Once all the details are entered and you have complete the verification via mobile phone select the Sign up button.

You’ll notice here that you don’t need to put in any credit card details like you do when you sign up for a free trial. This is because you are getting the free Azure Active Directory Edition only.

You see your request begin to process.

After a short while you should see a screen like that shown above. You can see that what you have signed up for is Access to Azure Active Directory.

It will take a few minutes to complete the provisioning and you can press the Refresh link to get an update on the status.

When processing is complete you’ll see the above screen. Select the Portal link in the top right of the window to proceed.

You’ll most likely be prompted to work your way through an introductory tutorial.

You should then see the Azure management portal as shown above.

You won’t however see all the standard Azure options on left, you’ll only see what is shown above. The main one of interest is Active Directory so select that.

You should now see your Active Directory listed. There should only be one, so select the name to drill into its properties.

You’ll be taken to the Dashboard. However, here select Users from across the top.

You should now see a list of your Office 365 users.

Now you can administer and work with tenant users from Azure or Office 365 (as well as PowerShell in both environments). There is also a whole more configuring that is available for your users from this Azure portal but I’ll cover that in upcoming posts.

So you have now enabled the Free Azure Active Directory Edition that comes as part of every Office 365 subscription. To read more about the different Azure Active Directory Editions see:

https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/azure/dn532272.aspx

but I can tell you, there is still lots that can be done for free and I’ll cover that in upcoming posts.

Advanced List editing in SharePoint Online

Getting large amounts of data quickly into SharePoint lists can be cumbersome unless you use the Quick Edit mode of SharePoint. This tutorial will show you how to place a list into Quick Edit mode and then make changes just like you do using a spreadsheet by navigating the cells.

The tutorial will also show you how to copy and paste from an appropriately formatted spreadsheet in Excel on your desktop directly into a SharePoint list.

Using Quick Edit mode is the best way to work quickly with SharePoint lists and this tutorial will get you started.

Simple controls in SharePoint Online missing

Out of the box a SharePoint Online Document Library displays what is known as simple controls just below the Document Library name as highlighted above. These button are typically new, upload, sync, edit, manage and share.

However, you may see a situation where they are no longer displayed as shown above.

If you want them back, here’s what you need to do.

The reason they are no displaying is because the current view of the document library is not based on the default view style.

You’ll need the rights to change the Document Library, but if you can select the Library tab at the top of the page to reveal the Ribbon Menu.

On the Ribbon Menu locate the Manage Views section, on the left hand side. Then select Modify View as shown above.

Scroll down to the bottom of the page that is displayed and open the Style option.

As you can see above, the current style is set to Shaded.

Change this to Default and Save the changes.

You should once again see the simple controls as shown above. Unfortunately, you may also lose some of the functionality that you desired with the previous style. At this point in time you can have one or the other option but not both.

Introduction to Views in SharePoint Online

Views are a way in SharePoint that you can display information in a different layout. You can have as many views as you want for most items in SharePoint, making it a very flexible way to focus on what is important and avoid distraction.

This tutorial video will show you how to create new views as well as make them the default. You’ll see how to configure views to display different fields and automatically sort, filter and group information.

Views are available in most elements in SharePoint, from Document Libraries to Lists to Calendars and more. They are a key way to ensure that people focus on the right information.