Shared library / folders in O365

[ridleyrumpus]

We are trying to move our files into the cloud but file sharing in O365 seems difficult.

 

We can use teams but if we want to share resources with several classes we don't want to be upkeeping multiple teams esp when they'll all change next year anyway. We also want to keep it as simple as possible for the students and non tech teachers.

 

I have looked at creating a SharePoint site say "student resources" then creat subsites from this for each subject, and then share the document libraries as "cloud storage" in teams.

 

Is this a good way to do it, or are we thinking about this all wrong?

[Steve21]

That's the route we're planning to go down. Make one department/store team (note we plan to do english/maths etc, not one shared one for file limits to syncing), and then add it to the class teams via the tab option, so updating the one department will update every class.

 

Only maintenance would be adding it to the Teams for each new year but after that should be golden to just ignore it

 

Steve

[ridleyrumpus]

We were not going to use the TAB option but the "Add Cloud Storage" option, that way the students view does not get really messy if they need to add more than a few to the tabs, there's not much real estate up there.

 

We are trying to get our heads around the permissions settings, one of the reasons for using SubSites so that the teachers/students are not able to see/edit every other subjects resource area!

 

(It would be much easier if they had shared drives like google drive does.)

[Steve21]

Cloud storage is for 3rd party items (dropbox etc) (and for individual users I think?)

 

Regarding the permissions, it'd be the same whether it's individual sharepoints or a shared one really. You remove the owners/viewers, and set up new groups, like Maths_Staff, Maths_Student etc and apply that to the folders to inherit downwards

 

Steve

[ridleyrumpus]

You can add a Sharepoint Library as a cloud storage option, you do not need to use dropbox etc. That way you could add many different Sharepoint libraries that all appear in the "file" section of teams as folders, personally I think that that is a better solution that using the TAB option.

 

When you create a SubSite you can say whether you want it to inherit permissions.

[Planehazza]

If you have the budget I would STRONGLY recommend you look at third parties like Cloud Design Box. Managing Teams manually would be a nightmare in a highschool and with CDB it syncs with SIMS, meaning Class Teams with a SharePoint site and automatic permissions are created for every class and subject. Very cool stuff.

 

Also if you are moving to cloud, try and move from Office 2016/19 to Office 365 so that the on prem office environment is up to speed with 365 app changes. It also brings in the auto save features so that opening cloud files on desktop apps save and you don't have staff downloading and saving multiple copies of files.

 

And coming from experience, getting teaching staff to move from legacy T drive to cloud files is not an easy task. Plan for lots of training needed as they can be... stubborn with change.

 

Make sure you go through your SharePoint/Teams admin centres and set policies for chat permissions, sharing permissions, or I guarantee you the next question from SLT will be "how do I block... for safeguarding".

 

Avoid logon scripts that map OneDrive as a network drive. They work, but IME, you're better using OneDrive for Business desktop app and then using GPOs to control how much can be synced (looks at local SSD space, Files on Demand, automatic clean up). If you tell staff to access their OneDrive just from the web, you'll have people downloading copies of copies to their H drives in no time. TRUST ME.

 

 

https://www.clouddesignbox.co.uk/

 

I'm no pro, but we've almost completed what you're about to start.

Edited November 23, 2021 by Planehazza

[supportman]

We created sharepoint sites for each department.

 

We use onedrive for individuals files.

 

We only allow students to use the web to access the files.

 

Don't use Teams or individual classes as its too much work to keep a hold of, just do it by department.

[Planehazza]

Don't use Teams or individual classes as its too much work to keep a hold of, just do it by department.

 

The rewards are so worth the effort for setting assignments etc. if you can have the Teams created automatically based on MIS data. That's where CloudDesignBox (I linked to them above) come in. About £10k for the first year including build and top tier support, but so worth it.

[supportman]

The rewards are so worth the effort for setting assignments etc. if you can have the Teams created automatically based on MIS data. That's where CloudDesignBox (I linked to them above) come in. About £10k for the first year including build and top tier support, but so worth it.

 

Oh yes we already do that with Salamandersoft and teams for our entire timetable. But I would not recomend basing a file system around it.

 

Setting assingments, chat, calendar or remote lessons works great.

 

For file storage we have complete departments on dedicated sharepoint sites.

[Boredguy]

We create class teams at the start of the year, and they are synchronised daily by a report exported from SIMS and a PowerShell script I made (you don't need 3rd party apps if you have a reasonable grasp of PowerShell)

 

Some departments have also used the dedicated Sharepoint sites we've setup so who year resources/schemes of work etc are on there, and the Teams storage is uses purely for that class for additional work, homework, remote teaching etc.

 

While our users do have OneDrive configured for their own storage, we've not setup any additional librarys in OneDrive on Demand as it's not really needed. If students are "following" the subject Sharepoint, it's available via the Office application File dialog (same as Onedrive). Getting users used to not using File Explorer to access resources, but rather from within the application or web site takes a bit of time though.

[Planehazza]

Oh yes we already do that with Salamandersoft and teams for our entire timetable. But I would not recomend basing a file system around it.

 

Setting assingments, chat, calendar or remote lessons works great.

 

For file storage we have complete departments on dedicated sharepoint sites.

 

CDB uses SalamanderSoft (free). We create department teams too, but the beauty of using CDB's portal is that it handles permissions automatically. We're going to SalamanderSoft soon too and are about done with our build doc. Staff are super excited for their SIMS timetables to be in their calendars automatically, let alone it handling user creation for us. Win win.

[Planehazza]

We create class teams at the start of the year, and they are synchronised daily by a report exported from SIMS and a PowerShell script I made (you don't need 3rd party apps if you have a reasonable grasp of PowerShell)

 

Some departments have also used the dedicated Sharepoint sites we've setup so who year resources/schemes of work etc are on there, and the Teams storage is uses purely for that class for additional work, homework, remote teaching etc.

 

While our users do have OneDrive configured for their own storage, we've not setup any additional librarys in OneDrive on Demand as it's not really needed. If students are "following" the subject Sharepoint, it's available via the Office application File dialog (same as Onedrive). Getting users used to not using File Explorer to access resources, but rather from within the application or web site takes a bit of time though.

 

I'm only good with Powershell for basic commands, largely stuff that can't be done via a UI, but I'm by no means a scripter or intermediate let alone pro user. We don't even remotely have the time need to get good with it and build something like that myself, but I am highly impressed and jealous that you have

[E_G_R2]

At my last school the intranet page was a sharepoint Hub site with document libraries for each subject. Permissions cascaded downward from the hub linked to AD groups. No need for lots of individual sites be they sharepoint of team. Pupils soon got adept at using this outside of school as well.

[Guest ZFarnworth]

At my last school the intranet page was a sharepoint Hub site with document libraries for each subject. Permissions cascaded downward from the hub linked to AD groups. No need for lots of individual sites be they sharepoint of team. Pupils soon got adept at using this outside of school as well.

 

Have you used the azure ad connect tool to sync your school up and used the groups in ad for permissions?