With the growth in cloud storage the way that people access that information also changes. Much access, especially for cloud services, is now undertaken away from a traditional desktop and in many cases on mobile devices. With that in mind Microsoft is again updating its mobile OneDrive apps.
You can read the specifics about what is happening in this blog post:
https://blog.onedrive.com/onedrive-gets-smarter-on-your-phone/
One of the enhancements on the Android platform is the ability to access your OneDrive consumer and OneDrive for Office 365 directly from the same app on Android devices. when combined with Office on Android this will make it extremely easy to work with files no matter where you are. Microsoft is crafting the app to ensure that information is easily separated between personal and business. They are also improving access by utilising pin code access.
The rapidly improving features of mobile apps are really beginning to shine light on the power of the cloud as they give people access to their information where ever they are, optimized for the screen they are using. If you are not yet using the OneDrive app for your mobile device download and give it a go. I’m pretty sure you won’t look back. If you already have the app key an eye out for the latest round of updates as they look like some major improvements.

One of the biggest challenges around SharePoint is end user adoption. I have written about this many times including:

The classic SharePoint migration mistake

SharePoint Online migration – Pilers and Filers

SharePoint Online migration–Start up is key

End user adoption in the SMB space is more of a challenge but I get REALLY frustrated when I see resellers ‘implement’ SharePoint Online by simply copying user files to a single Document Library and then running away screaming that there is no opportunity with cloud services. SIGH.

One of the best sites you can point people to when it comes to learning about SharePoint is:

www.discoversharepoint.com

But I’ll bet you didn’t know that you can embed this content directly into a customers SharePoint Team Site. Here’s how.

Navigate to a SharePoint Online Team Site.

Select Site Contents from the Quick Launch menu on the left.

Select add an app

Select SharePoint Store at the bottom of the Quick Launch Menu.

If you get this warning select a language in the top right.

You should now see the store with apps inside as shown above.

Go to the search box in the top right and enter discover and select the magnifying glass to search.

Hopefully the first result should be Discover SharePoint BETA. Select this.

This will take you to a screen with more details about the app.

Select ADD IT on the right.

Select Trust It.

(You may need to use a Microsoft account to complete the purchase if this is the first time you have purchased from the store. These accounts are free. I have a previous post that cover creating such an account this if you need to.)

You should now see the Discover SharePoint BETA app listed in the Site Contents. Select this.

It will take a moment or two to set up.

You should then see the app displayed on the page as shown above.

If you select the Cog in the top right of the page you will see a menu as shown above.

The Settings option will allow you to determine whether analytics is sent to Microsoft to help improve the product. Note that it is enabled by default.

If you select Admin Panel you will be taken to a screen where you can select what content is displayed by the app. Maybe you just want to start simple with a limited amount of information so as to not overload your users, you can de-select what isn’t required initially and then return and add it later when ready.

When complete select the Save Changes at the bottom of the page.

You’ll then need to select Exit Admin Panel in the top right of the page.

This will return you to the app. To to return to your Team Site select Back to Site in the top left hand corner of the window.

On the Team Site you should now find the Discover SharePoint BETA item listed in Quick Launch Menu allowing anyone to access the app directly.

From here the Discover SharePoint BETA is just like any app in SharePoint, you can remove it at anytime if you want.

Don’t forget that the content in this app is being updated regularly so continue to visit it to see what’s new.

So hopefully, there is a nice simply way for you to add some information and training about SharePoint Online to help end user adoption directly into a Team Site.

In a recent post I covered off how to create an additional location for files in OneDrive for Business to overcome some of the current syncing limitations. There is another way that you can store additional files (and other items) in your OneDrive for Business.

Because OneDrive for Business is effectively a SharePoint Site Collection you can create any number of ‘subsites’ under the primary OneDrive for Business site. The default primary OneDrive for Business site basically only allows you to add document libraries as I showed in the previous post. However, by creating a ‘standard’ SharePoint subsite under the default you get all the flexibility that a normal SharePoint site has.

To create a subsite under your primary OneDrive for Business site follow these steps:

Firstly, navigate to your OneDrive for Business site.

In the top right select the COG and then Site contents from the menu that is displayed.

You should now see all the standard apps in your OneDrive for Business site. As the previous post highlighted, you can add an app here if you want.

If you however scroll down to the bottom of this page you will find a heading Subsites and a link new subsite. Select this.

You’ll now be taken to the familiar SharePoint dialog that allows you to create a subsite. You give the new subsite a name and URL suffix.

You then select which template you wish the subsite to be based on. Normally you select Team Site so all the features will be available to you.

You generally leave the other settings as default and press the Create button.

After a few moments you should see your subsite displayed.

You can now go into the Site Contents for this new subsite and add something like a Picture Library which you couldn’t do in the primary OneDrive for Business site.

Unfortunately, the only way that you can sync items in a OneDrive for Business subsite is to select sync manually as mentioned  in the previous post. They will also not automatically appear in any mobile clients.

Thus, another way to divide up the space you have available in your OneDrive for Business apart from adding apps at the top level, is to create subsites off the primary site (just like any Team Site) and place you information there. Unfortunately, if you need to sync these items to your desktop you’ll have to do that manually and they also won’t appear in mobile clients.

With OneDrive for Business now having 1TB of space available, more and more people are looking to take advantage of it and reduce the amount of files they have stored locally. However, simply dumping everything from a server into OneDrive for Business is not generally good idea.

The major reason is that OneDrive for Business is a “special” SharePoint site that by default contains a single document library called Documents as you can see above. Now, a single document library has a number of limitations that you will find when you start pumping lots of data in there.

The first is the 5,000 view item limit. You can read about it here:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2759051

You can certainly have more than 5,000 items in library but above that limit you need to use views to limit the display to less than 5,000.

The second is that there is s 20,000 sync item limit. You can read about that here:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2933738

Thus, you can sync up to 20,000 items from your OneDrive for Business and up to 5,000 from other SharePoint document libraries.

Now it used to be that you could sync up to a maximum of 20,000 files per site collection with a limit of 5,000 per individual document library. I can’t find any mention of those specifics so I am going to assume that you can keep syncing as many additional document libraries you want provided they are below the 5,000 item limit.

Thus, I am going to assume you can sync:

20,000 items in OneDrive for Business

+ 5,000 items from Document library 1

+ 5,000 items from Document library 2

+ 5,000 items from Document library 3

and so on without a limit on the number of document libraries you can sync.

Another issue once you start getting a lot of files is that the OneDrive for Business desktop sync application does not allow you to select which files you wish to sync. Thus, you have no option but to sync the entire document library.

So how do you handle the situation when you exceed the 20,000 items in OneDrive for Business but still want to sync to your desktop? Here’ s an option that may work.

What you may not appreciate is that you can add additional document libraries to OneDrive for Business.

To do that access your OneDrive for Business and select the COG in the upper right corner. From the menu that appears select Add an app.

One of the apps you will see here is Document Library which you should select.

Some interesting points to note here is that there are only a limited set of apps that you can add, not like on a normal SharePoint Team Site. Secondly, you can however add apps from the SharePoint Online store!

Give your document library a name (here photos) and press the Create button.

You’ll now see that library has been added to the OneDrive for Business site. Select it to view its contents.

You should see the document library as normal as you can see. However, note that the library appears under the Newsfeed menu item on the top NOT the OneDrive item.

If you select OneDrive from the menu you are returned to the initial page and unfortunately there is no link on this page to the document library you just created. If you back to the Newsfeed page you will find it.

If you return to your newly created document library you can upload files to it as you normally can. You can also sync those files to your desktop using the sync client BUT is the limit of that 5,000 because it is an additional document library or is it 20,000 because this library is part of OneDrive for Business? I think it best to assume 5,000.

Unfortunately, from what I can see this newly create document library will not automatically appear on mobile devices using the OneDrive for Business mobile app. The only library that appears is the default Documents one.

Now if I sync this newly created document library to my desktop you’ll see that it doesn’t appear under OneDrive for Business it appears synced under the SharePoint document library area as shown above.

Therefore, although creating additional document libraries in OneDrive for Business can help you overcome what appears to be a 20,000 file limit and allow you to overcome the need to sync everything from a single document library, as you can see it still has limitations.

Here’s something I just learnt that I think is really, really helpful.

Click on a Microsoft Office document somewhere in SharePoint Online (Team Site or OneDrive for Business). It will then open that document in a browser using Office Online. If you then elect to edit that document in a browser you’ll see the familiar ribbon as shown above.

See that box at the top of the ribbon that says ‘Tell me what to do’?

If I type ‘create table’, as you can see that menu option immediately becomes available, allowing me to select and create a table.

If I instead type in the box ‘create grid’, Office Online works out that I probably mean table and again shows me the appropriate menu command right there so I can create my table.

This is very powerful as it allows people to find what they are after much quicker and reduces the needs for lots and lots of menus and buttons.

Use it, love it.