- In this section of the course,
I'm gonna talk about some of the things
that you could be doing right now
that will provide immediate benefits
to you and highlight the value
of using collaborative technologies
and tools.
Let's start with one of my personal pet peeves,
e-mails with attachments.
How many of you have been stuck
in e-mail jail where you couldn't send
or receive anymore messages because you went
over the size limit for your account?
And how many times was that because somebody sent you a huge
file as an attachment?
I won't even get into the subject
of file and image size optimization.
But if you're like me, this has happened
to you more than once.
So what's the alternative?
Well, almost every modern file sharing tool has the ability
to send a link to a file rather than the file itself.
The file is stored in a central repository either online
or on premise, and the link allows people
to access the file where it lives rather than
on their computer.
This has two major advantages.
Number one, obviously, e-mail messages will be a lot smaller
meaning less time in e-mail jail.
And number two is a little less obvious.
Do you realize that every time you attach a document
to an e-mail you're essentially creating another copy
of it?
When you share links to files instead
of the files themselves, you direct everyone
back to the actual file itself.
This gives you much better version control.
You're basically restricting things
to one single version of the truth.
You also have the ability to grant
or restrict permissions for the document.
Do you want people to read, edit,
have full control, including the ability
to delete?
These are all possibilities open
to you.
Often, like in SharePoint, you even have the ability
to block people from downloading the document.
Very nice if you need something
to stay confidential.
Let me show you this in action.
Here's a SharePoint document library.
I'm gonna share this document here,
so I click to select the document.
And I click share in the menu bar.
This dialog pops up, prompting me
to enter the e-mail address or addresses
of whom I want to share it with.
Now notice this.
It currently says that anyone with the link can view,
share, or edit.
If I click that, I get a few more options.
Now I can choose to restrict this
to just people who already have access
as granted through SharePoint or
to anyone who has the link.
I can allow or disallow editing,
and this is nice.
If I'm sending it to someone who doesn't normally have
access, I could even set an expiration date.
After this, they'll no longer be able
to get to the file.
Controls like these are pretty typical
in file sharing tools.
So look, I'm not saying that it's never appropriate
to attach a file.
Just last week, I had to send a couple
of forms to someone that I don't share
with on a regular basis so attaching them was a simpler
option.
Also, in this case, version control wasn't an issue.
But you should absolutely be thinking
about what that file is, how it's going
to be used, and how the content needs
to be protected before you attach a document
at work.