Office 2003 integration with SharePoint Part 2 - Document Workspace

A Document Workspace site is a SharePoint site created for document sharing. A Document Workspace site provides Windows SharePoint Services features for a document, including document version tracking, document check-in and check-out, and inline discussions. It also organizes team information and provides shared features such as lists and alerts. When you open your copy of a document that is stored in a Document Workspace site, you can get updates of the document with the click of a button, so you no longer need to manage document revisions manually.

Office 2003 provides multiple integration points for creation of document workspace right within office applications, making it very easy for team members to collaborate their work on their shared documents.  To create a document workspace in Office 2003, you can do either one of the following:

I. Send a shared attachment:

1. In Microsoft Office Outlook 2003, start a new e-mail message.
2. In the To box, type the e-mail addresses of those whom you want to be members of the Document Workspace site.
   Note: Recipients on the To and Cc lines are automatically given permission to contribute to the site. Recipients on the Bcc line are not granted automatic access to the site and need to request permission.
3. In the Subject box, type a subject for your message.
4. On the Insert menu, click File.
5. Click the document you want to insert, and then click Insert.
6. If the Attachment Options task pane is not visible, click Attachment Options.
7. In the Attachment Options task pane, click Shared attachments, and in the Create Document Workspace at box, click or type the Web address (URL) of a Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services Web site where the Document Workspace site will be located.
   Note:  The Document Workspace will be created as a sub site of the Windows SharePoint Services site, so you must have permission to create Document Workspaces at this Web site.

    Note:  If you want to add more members after you send the shared attachment, open the document, and on the Members tab  of the Shared Workspace task pane, click Add new members.  

II. Use the Create button in the Shared Workspace task pane

    Note:  You can use the Shared Workspace task pane to create a Document Workspace in Microsoft Office Word 2003, Microsoft Office Excel 2003, Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2003, and Microsoft Office Visio 2003 only.

1. Open the document in Word, Excel, PowerPoint, or Visio.
2. On the Tools menu, click Shared Workspace.
3. In the Shared Workspace task pane, click or type the Web address(URL) of a Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services Web site where the Document Workspace will be located.
   Note:  The Document Workspace will be created as a sub site of the Windows SharePoint Services site, so you must have permission to create Document Workspaces at this Web site.
4. Click Create.
5. On the Members tab of the Shared Workspace task pane, click Add new members.
6. Type user names or e-mail addresses for the members you want to invite to the Document Workspace, separated by semicolons.
7. If you want members to have permissions other than those of the Contributor site group, select a different site group.
8. Send an e-mail invitation if you want.

Also, for a document that is already published in a SharePoint document library, you can still easily create a document workspace right from your browser.

1. In a Web browser, go to the document library where the document is stored.
2. Point to the name of the document, click the Edit arrow that appears, and then click Create Document Workspace.

Tip: After you have worked on the document in the Document Workspace, you can update the original copy by clicking Publish to Source Location on the document library page in the Document Workspace.

Office 2003 integration with SharePoint Part 1 - Meeting Workspace

Although organizations do have ways for setting up meetings and handling tasks that emerge as a result of the meeting, the process may be inefficient.  SharePoint provides a way to bring the meeting objectives, agenda items, associated documents, tasks, and attendees all together in one centralized area.  This workspace can be created, or linked to, from the same screen used to create the meeting in Outlook 2003.

The ability to create a SharePoint meeting workspace, or linked to an existing workspace directly from Outlook 2003 when the meeting is created makes it easy to get into the habit of linking SharePoint meeting workspaces to meetings.  Attendees will automatically be added to the workspace, and objectives and agenda items can be entered.  Documents associated with the meeting can also be put on the site, or links created for accessing them.  When the meeting notices are sent, there is a link in the e-mail that takes to attendee directly to the meeting workspace.

For example, a team of engineers that will soon be starting a project for a client can be used to illustrate organizational use of the SharePoint meeting workspace.  Before going out to the client site, there is a project kickoff meeting to go over the project background, ensure that everyone understands the project goals and objectives, discuss project tasks and milestones, review project deliverables, and discuss any other issues that the team has regarding the project.  The project manager creates a meeting request in Outlook 2003 and also creates a SharePoint meeting workspace.  Therefore, a link to the project workspaces is contained within the email meeting invitation.  The project manager enters agenda items in the workspace; sets up events for major project milestones; provides a discussion area; and sets up links to the proposal, statement of work, and project plan.  Because there is a link to the meeting workspace in the meeting invitation, the team members can go directly to the site to review the necessary documents and task as soon as they get the invitation.

Here are steps for creating a Meeting Workspace on a SharePoint enabled Intranet for your Outlook meeting:

First create a meeting, add meeting attendees as usual, then the “Meeting Workspace” button becomes enabled.

Now you can click on the “Meeting Workspace” button to start creating your meeting workspace. First thing to do, configure your settings for Meeting Workspace by clicking “Change Settings”

Then click on the “Select a location” drop down, and choose “Other” to specific a “Workspace Server”. In my test case, it is http://office/meetings

Next, you will make your selection for "template language" and "template type", and click "OK" to complete the creation of your "Meeting Workspace".

As you can see below, once a "Meeting Workspace" is created, a link to this "Meeting Workspace" is embedded for you to access it on the Intranet.

Shown below is the view of a single occurrence meeting on the Intranet. 

And here is a view of a recurring meeting's meeting workspace.