My last post was on the new Windows Live Workspaces if I am not mistaken… since then a lot has happened including the final releases of the new Office 2010 suite. As you all know this includes both a new SharePoint version as a new client to work with that serverplatform. Microsoft has pushed the integration into the right direction this time…. One of my favorite features (besides the CQWP, but that was already available in 2007) are the new co-authoring features in the Office 2010 family.
For now co-authoring is enabled/available for:
- Word
- Excel
- OneNote
More info from Microsoft on this topic can be found at:
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff718249.aspx (Co authoring overview in SharePoint 2010)
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/microsoft_office_word/archive/2009/09/09/co-authoring-in-word-2010.aspx (Co-authoring ie simultaneous editing) in Word 2010
Recently I had the proper use case to actually use this feature for its proper duty! Together with a few colleagues I was responsible for answering a large RfP under ‘some’ time pressure….. Everyone in college or in business who has had to work together on a document knows the caveats….. how to keep up with versions, how to merge the different additions, how to share the latest version….
Have you ended up with a merged document containing changes from more than 2 authors? Was it fun judging all those changes in that rainbow of colors? Bet it was…..
I’ll leave the general description of the co-authoring feature to the Microsoft dev team and instead will focus on the practical use of this nice feature. Some prerequisites:
- SharePoint 2010
- Word 2010 client
(this applies to the Word co-authoring of course… Excel is a bit different and I’ll hope to get to that later when I have to make a joint business-case 
. Also, checkin/checkout should be disabled.
So, where do we start? Well, in a SP workspace with a document in it….
And how? U could click on the document name, and then in the view choose edit in word (co-authoring in web app version not supported I believe…. Note to self: test that too…) or just call function menu and choose edit in word.
Ok, so then you are busy with multiple people in a document… the catch is that you might be editing the same document,but not the same section ! Word locks the area in which an editor is working for other users until the editor saves the changes to the server, thus releasing the sections and sharing the updated results with the other authors.
But, it is possible to comment in the section someone else is editing… not the same I agree, but perhaps usefull. However, the other user would have to save (and u too) to synch the changes and make them visible. Until then Andy wont see the comment…
Its easy to see where the other user(s) are editing. A bracket appears indicating the locked section. Commenting as said is still possible, editing isnt (see notification in bottom left corner) My section locking bracket appears differently, as seen below:
If you have a small document, or you have a writer going through it like a berserker touching every paragraph you might get something like this:
All sections locked until Andy saves the document, synching the changes and releasing them to me, the other author…
From the backstage view it is possible to see who is editing the document, and send them a message. A quick image:
An overview of users (and the ability to send them an IM via integrated OCS) is also available at the bottom of the screen…
When both users try to save at the same time the second one is blocked…. Wait a few seconds and try again… Oh yeah, the indicator on save button indicates available updates…
Thats all for now folks ! Enjoy your co-authoring and remember to save often ! No sectionsquatters !!!
Ciao,
Martijn
ps: Thnx to www.twitter.com/@awdhaan for testing this feature together with me….
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