Five reasons to try the new Modern experience in SharePoint

Microsoft continues to evolve the SharePoint Online experience. Since the announcement that communication sites would begin to roll out to Office 365 customers, we’ve been implementing “Modern Sites” and I wanted to share my experiences editing and publishing content in this new-look environment.

Modern Pages

The biggest adjustment for users is the page editing experience. Gone are the rigid boundaries of Page Content and Web Part zones. Page editing is a far more “blog-like” experience, with the ability to structure the page in a fluid and on-the-fly manner.

Page headers support the addition of images to add colour and life throughout the site, particularly when working with new web parts such as Quick Links and Hero.

Web Parts

Web parts are added to pages in a far more contextual fashion compared to the classic page editing experience. Sections can be added, or changed section-by-section (create pages with a mix of one column, two or three columns with variations on column widths) and sections and web parts can be moved or inserted before, between or after existing content on the page.

While the number of Modern web parts currently available is fairly limited, the new SharePoint Framework (SPFx) means that over the next few months and years, I expect the range of available web parts to explode, providing greater out of the box functionality and less need for business users to wish they could write custom code.

No more Ribbon

Another major change in the user experience is the move away from presenting controls in a Ribbon. You’ll still see the Ribbon when you dig down into parts of SharePoint where the classic interface is employed, but for Modern pages, document libraries and list views, the Ribbon is no more. 

Details and Filters

List and library settings can be found in the Site Actions cog, and new details and filter panes provide access to item metadata and list and library filtering functionality. These new panes are a great way to interact with Libraries and quickly add metadata to items.

Events and News

Really two great reasons; News and Events have both been re-imagined. The News web part allows news to be added to any site throughout the tenant. Articles added via the News web parts will roll up on the SharePoint Home Page (App Launcher > SharePoint tile), meaning no matter where news is published, you can stay informed via the Home page roll up. 

Events now have an “add to my calendar” feature, which is something I’ve had a lot of people ask about; how can I add events that are in the company calendar to my personal Outlook calendar. SharePoint facilitates this now, out of the box. This is not an automatic sync, but rather you get the option to select items that you wish to add to your own calendar.

The new Events filters in the "See all events" view provide a useful way to view and search for upcoming events that have been added. Behind this scenes, you’ll recognise the standard SharePoint calendar app, but the new Modern interface makes for a far more usable experience.

Have you started using Communication Sites? What are your thoughts on the new Modern experience? Share your views in the comments below.

If you would like more information or help implementing your collaboration strategy on Office 365, email me at melissa.khim@zetta1.com.