Documents and Records Management
Walk into any enterprise organization and ask someone in a department to describe his or her document storage and processing operations, and the person will likely give you a story about how management of documents and data is far from ideal.
In the time that I have been working with SharePoint and various clients looking to implement an information management system in SharePoint, the situation has been typical—documents and files scattered on a shared drive or file share, no categorization, multiple copies of the same document floating around in e-mails. Even the more organized groups have issues with multiple document and information silos.
Documents Management Systems and Records Management Systems are about the “management” of documents and data at an enterprise level. This chapter focuses on documents and records management features in SharePoint.
Before diving into the topics of document management and records management, I should mention that both of these fall under the umbrella of Enterprise Content Management (ECM) in SharePoint.
What Is a Documents Management System?
Even though the name implies management of documents in an organization, document management is really about empowering users who create and collaborate around documents to do so with more structure and control. Consider asking users of your organization the following questions:
The preceding questions are a small subset of those that I send new clients who are looking to move from a file-share document silo to a Documents Management System. A Documents Management System aims to provide a secure, central location for storage of all documents in an organization. Typical features of a Documents Management System include the following capabilities:
Any good Documents Management System provides features/functionality to address some or all of the questions raised previously. The next section introduces the features of SharePoint 2013 document management.
Document Management in SharePoint 2013
At the core platform, SharePoint provides document libraries for storage of documents. This feature addresses an immediate need to prevent e-mailing of multiple copies of a document under construction. Instead, users can e-mail a link to the most recent document in a SharePoint site. This is collaboration in basic form.
SharePoint offers many more features in the document management suite. The best way to get started exploring these features is to create a new site collection with the Document Center features installed, as in the following steps:
Note You may install/activate all the features available in the Document Center in another site template, but for the purpose of this chapter, it is easier to create a Document Center site collection. The Document Center site template is an easy way to create a new site collection with all the document management features included. Some document management features default to document libraries, so users may make use of these features in any site that uses document libraries.
Figure 11-1. Document Management Site
The home page of the SharePoint 2013 Document Center consists of various content Web Parts, some content query Web Parts, to display recent documents, and the Find by Document ID Web Part. You may arrange these Web Parts differently by editing the page, and you may place these Web Parts on any other page in the site collection that includes Web Part zones.
Overview of Documents Management System Features
With the Document Center, created in the previous section, you are now ready to explore the document management features in SharePoint. The first place I would like you to look is in the Site Collection Features page:
Table 11-1 describes the Documents Management System capabilities in SharePoint 2013 at a high level, and I will discuss each capability in greater depth in the following sections in this chapter. Some of the capabilities listed are not specific to Documents Management System but part of the core functionality and list behavior in SharePoint.
Note The capabilities/functions listed in Table 11-1 may belong to specific SharePoint site or site collection features or be part of the core platform.
Table 11-1. Documents Management Features in SharePoint 2013
Capability/Function | Description |
---|---|
Document Libraries | Available in the core, document libraries derive from a basic list and allow users to upload, edit, and manage documents (files) to a library. Document libraries provide all the niceties of lists—workflow, versioning, custom content types, and so on. |
Document Content Types | All document libraries contain the document content type, by default. This content type inherits the item content type and includes the site column to contain the file name of the document. |
Document Sets | Document sets provide a special content type and function that allows users to encapsulate multiple document files in a single document library item. Document sets apply nicely to those documents that constitute multiple parts, such as proposal documents, where users need to work on the component parts as documents in their own right. Document sets allow users to assign document components their own content type. |
Document IDs and Barcodes | The Document ID Service assigns newly uploaded documents a unique ID (included in the document URL on the site). If a document moves location within the site collection then SharePoint keeps track of the location and the Document ID still allows users to access the document. This feature allows users to e-mail links to documents without worrying about the links breaking because another user moved a document or changed the document library structure. This feature gives users of the Documents Management System peace of mind in uniquely identifying a document link. |
Workflows | SharePoint Server includes a number of out-of-the-box workflows, which users may apply to lists, libraries, and sites. Notable is the Approval workflow, which routes tasks to users for document approval, either serially or in parallel. Other workflows, including Collect Signatures, Collect Feedback, and Disposition Approval, execute on document library items. |
Document Versions | Document libraries and lists maintain versions and change (when enabled) so users may roll back to prior versions of a list item in time. SharePoint supports Major Version numbers, in which each major version constitutes publication of the list item for non-approver users, and Major/Minor Versions, in which a minor version denotes draft version, and users need to publish the item as a major version to make the changes available to non-approvers. In addition to versioning, SharePoint lists and libraries also support check in/out, so any one user may ensure another does not change a document while he or she has it checked out for edit. |
Document Workspaces | Document workspaces provide user collaboration for a document. At any time, a user with collaboration rights to a document, and site creation rights, may elect to create a new document workspace site, which contains lists and libraries to collaborate on the document. For example, a proposal document may require a team of people to complete, who meet regularly and keep detailed notes and managed tasks for their work on the document. |
Drop off Libraries | Rather than leaving users the arduous task of deciding or knowing where to upload/save documents to a library in a site collection hierarchy, a drop off library provides a single upload point for all documents. Based on metadata and document content, administrators of the drop off libraries may then apply rules to uploaded documents to move them to correct locations automatically. |
Search within Documents | SharePoint indexes the content of typical Microsoft Office documents (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Access, Visio, and so on). SharePoint 2013 can access other non-MS document types as long as an IFILTER exists. New in SharePoint 2013 is the ability to search within PDF documents out-of-the-box. When users search for documents by keyword, SharePoint will use the data found in documents, as well as the metadata applied to each document list item, to provide search results. |
Document Conversion Service | The Document Conversion Service is a SharePoint Managed Service Application, which handles the load balancing and conversion of documents converted from one format to another. |
Document Library Settings Page
The typical approach to navigating to the Document Library Settings page is to click the Library tab on the ribbon and then click the Library Settings button in the settings section. However, you may also access the same library settings as follows. Throughout this chapter, when I reference navigating to the Library Settings page, I assume that you will either follow the steps below or click the Library Settings icon on the ribbon within the Library tab.
Figure 11-2. Site Contents
Document Content Types and Document Sets
In Chapter 9, I discussed content types at length. I showed you how to create new custom content types and how to use them in lists and libraries. If you are new to content types, I recommend taking a quick look back at this chapter to familiarize yourself with creation of content types.
Document Content Types
Why are content types important in a Documents Management System? Any good Documents Management System must allow users to distinguish one document type from another, without expecting users to open documents. Metadata, and thus content types, provide the baseline functionality to allow content owners to categorize their content with properties—the fields of content types.
The action of creating a content type and applying a content type to a document constitutes basic categorization—without even adding fields/properties to the aforementioned content type. For example, in my project management system I may need documents for Project Plans, Statement of Work, Client Presentation, Invoice, and so on. Creating custom content types, which derive from the stock document content type, and then adding these content types to a document library allows users to upload Office documents of the designated aforementioned types.
Note A good practice is to remove the stock Document and Item content types from the document library, which forces users to choose a content type that classifies the document.
The following lists some best practices to consider when creating new content types for documents in your Documents Management System:
Once a user adds a document to a document library in SharePoint, and then applies metadata via content type, subsequent editing of the document from SharePoint integrates the field/properties in Microsoft Office applications (I cover this in Chapter 14). Say I create a content type for a Statement of Work (SOW) document, including properties for client, contract type, and cost estimate, and then upload an SOW document to a library and then classify the document as an SOW. When I open the same document from SharePoint, I can see and edit the properties directly from the Office application. The following series of steps demonstrates this example:
Note It is usually a good idea to put all custom content types in a separate group from the stock content types.
Figure 11-3. Create a new document with content type
Figure 11-4. Microsoft Word with Document Information Panel
How did SharePoint know how to open a Word document? Navigate back to the Statement of Work content type in the Content Types Gallery to see.
SharePoint displays a page like Figure 11-5. The Document Template section governs the document template to use when creating a new list item of this content type. Figure 11-5 shows the template as the default template.dotx; thus, SharePoint defaults to opening Microsoft Word.
Figure 11-5. Advanced Settings page for our custom content type
Note Document Information Panel requires at least Office 2007, 2010, or 2013.
Perhaps you have a document on disk and want to upload it to a SharePoint document library. How does SharePoint know which content type to assign? It asks you.
Figure 11-6. Select document content type after upload
Using the Save As feature in an Office application and then specifying the location as a SharePoint document library renders a similar dialog to choose the content type (Figure 11-7).
Figure 11-7. Choose Content Type from Microsoft Word
Note SharePoint will assume the library default content type and field values when uploading multiple documents.
Saving a Document to SharePoint from Office
Office 2007, 2010, and 2013 applications allow you to save directly to a SharePoint location from within the application. The following steps demonstrate how to save an open Word 2013 document to an existing document library in SharePoint 2013:
Note The easiest way to get the URL of a document library is to navigate to the library page in your browser and then strip off the /Forms/AllItems.aspx part from the URL. For example, http://server/site/DocumentLibName/ .
SharePoint allows users to add links in a document library to another document in a different document library. SharePoint achieves this with a simple content type that contains a URL field and an ASPX page that allows a user to enter the name and URL of the linked document.
A document set consists of several documents in a single list item of a document library. The purpose of document sets is to group related documents and manage the set as a single item, just like a regular document list item.
A good example of the use of a document sets is for a proposal document. Typically, in business, a proposal is a large document and requires contributions from many authors to complete. One way to accomplish the creation of the proposal is to have authors write independent documents for the various sections and then combine these documents into a finished proposal document at the end. I have seen this approach in action on earlier versions of SharePoint (pre-2010), and the authors maintained the document pieces in a folder of a larger project document library. Document sets now allow users to continue to work on document pieces but manage them together in a document set of a document library. Since a document set is a special content type, each document set has its own metadata, in addition to the metadata specified by the content types of the documents contained inside the document set.
The following steps demonstrate how document sets operate using Document Center and default document library:
Note If you do not see the Document Set menu item, follow the steps at the bottom of this section for adding document sets to existing document libraries.
Figure 11-8. Document Set page
The Document Set page provides a similar interface to that of a regular document library. Click the Manage tab on the ribbon (Document Set). The ribbon shows various options for the document set (Figure 11-9), such as
Figure 11-9. Manage tab for a document set
Adding Document Sets to an Existing Document Library
You are not required to use the Document Center site template to use document sets. Document sets exist as a feature at the site collection level, and as a content type, which you must add to your document library as follows:
Like many of the topics in SharePoint, workflow is the subject of whole books. A workflow is a process, either automated by computer or manual with human intervention. Workflow may consist of both human and automated elements, but the premise is the same—a workflow management system keeps track of the steps in a process (the activities) and alerts different actors in the process of tasks to complete an activity/step in the process chain. Microsoft workflows come in two flavors: sequential, meaning that each step succeeds the next; and state machine, in which the workflow system tracks overall state at any time and transition from state to state via activities.
SharePoint uses Microsoft Workflow Foundation (WF) to provide business process on documents, web pages, forms, and list items. SharePoint allows attachment of workflow to sites, lists, libraries, and content types. Since workflow in SharePoint uses WF, developers may create custom workflows to automate the process of documents and list items, or process data in a site. SharePoint Designer allows developers to create sequential workflows, with drag-and-drop ease, and Visual Studio provides for creating more elaborate coded workflow. Even though SharePoint allows for the adoption of custom workflow, the platform provides out-of-the-box workflow for use of document approval, signature collection, disposition approval, and so on. Table 11-2 describes the out-of-the-box workflows available.
Table 11-2. SharePoint 2013 Workflows
Workflow Name | Description | Available in SharePoint Foundation |
---|---|---|
Three-State | Tracks the business state of a document through three defined phases | Yes |
Publishing Approval | Sends a document for approval, typically before publishing | No |
Disposition | Handles document expiration and disposition | No |
Note SharePoint 2010 included the Collect Feedback, Collect Signatures, and Approval workflows. These workflows are still available by activating the site collection workflows feature.
In the days of SharePoint 2007, users could only apply workflow activation to lists. Since SharePoint 2010, users are able to apply workflows to sites and content types. Because content types provide portability of metadata in a site collection, applying workflow to content types now means that users can provide business process with reusable workflows. If a content type exists for a proposal document in an organization site collection, the organization can attach the workflow process whenever someone creates a new proposal document—anywhere in the site collection, not just in a particular list instance.
Adding a Workflow to a Library or List
Take the following steps to add a workflow to a library or list:
Figure 11-10. Add a workflow to a list
Adding a Workflow to a Library or List Content Type
Take the following steps to add a workflow to a library or list content type:
Adding a Workflow to a Site Content Type
Adding a workflow to a site content type is a similar process to that of adding to a list content type, only you access the content type via the Content Type Gallery instead of the list.
Take the following steps to add a workflow to a site content type:
Editing and Developing Custom Workflow
With a whole workflow platform and plenty of ideas to automate business process, it is natural that users will want to create their own custom workflows. Creation of custom workflow falls under development and is out of the scope of this administration book. However, I do wish to mention some of the new enhancements that SharePoint brings to workflow in the platform.
Any good Documents Management System allows users to reference documents from the system, without concern about other users changing the location of such documents in the Documents Management System. The blog sphere addressed this very topic with permalinks—links that do not directly link to blog articles but provide virtual links, which the blog engine translates into the physical link. SharePoint 2007 pretty much ignored the issue of document link tracking, but fortunately, SharePoint 2010 and now SharePoint 2013 provide this functionality. I shall describe the various methods for document tracking in the following sections.
SharePoint incorporates a Document ID Service feature for keeping track of the location of documents and providing users with virtual URLs for documents with unique ID. The platform does not enable the Document ID Service feature by default, although the Document Center template does enable it. To confirm the existence of Document ID tracking, follow these steps:
Figure 11-11. Document ID Settings for the site collection
Figure 11-12. View properties of a document
Note The document ID link does not reference any particular document library, just a common redirection page, and the document ID.
Barcodes have become an accepted method for providing unique identification to objects. Next time you visit the grocery store, peek at the back of every packaged product and you will find a barcode. A barcode consists of a unique pattern of lines, of varying thickness, that combine to provide a unique stamp for the object.
Note Although SharePoint 2013 still supports barcodes, there is talk that Microsoft may depreciate this feature in later versions of SharePoint and Office: http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepoint-help/discontinued-features-and-modified-functionality-in-microsoft-sharepoint-2013-preview-HA102892827.aspx#_Toc330374495.
SharePoint includes functionality for adding unique barcodes to documents, so users may track documents when printed or part of a manual processing workflow. The following steps detail how to enable barcodes at the site collection level and then for a particular document library:
Figure 11-13. Barcodes added to a document library
Document Conversion
SharePoint includes a Document Conversion Service for converting documents of one type to another, such as Word document to PDF. Document conversion is important in any Documents Management System because it allows users to upload documents of a type and allow other users to read and edit these documents in another type, typically a common type that most users can access. Office 2010 and upward uses an XML format for document data, and the Document Conversion Service converts documents of these types to viewable web pages for those users who do not have Microsoft Office 2010 or 2013 installed on their desktop.
The Document Conversion Service consists of two parts: a Load Balancer Service and a Launcher Service. SharePoint requires both services configured and running to enable the Documents Conversion Service. The following steps detail how to configure document conversion in your SharePoint farm.
Note You must start the Load Balancer Service before the Launcher Service for document conversion to work. The Launcher Service stops if the Load Balancer Service is not started or is stopped.
Figure 11-14. Services on Server, showing the Document Conversion Services
The next set of steps demonstrates how to enable document conversion in a web application.
Figure 11-15. Configure Document Conversions
With the conversion services started, and the web application configured for document conversion, navigate to any document library in a site/site collection hosted by the web application. Upload a Word DOCX document, and then follow these steps to convert the document:
Figure 11-16. Convert Document menu item
Figure 11-17. Create Page from Document
If you are not seeing the menu option to convert a document, ensure the following:
SharePoint has always been great at providing space for users to collaborate. At the core of the platform, Foundation offers basic and team sites, which include task lists, calendars, document libraries, and so on for users of the space to share and collaborate on a topic of interest.
SharePoint 2007 and 2010 included document workspace site templates for users to collaborate on a specific document. Microsoft depreciated the document workspace in SharePoint 2013, and users should now utilize team sites for document collaboration.
Note Microsoft depreciated document workspaces in SharePoint 2013—use SharePoint 2013 team sites to collaborate on document life cycle. You can re-enable them by editing the WEBTEMP.XML file in the templates folder on the hive.
Records Management in SharePoint 2013
A record is an object in a Records Management System that adheres to set of policy rules. A Records Management System is a system responsible for storing many records and asserting information policy. Information policies are rules, adopted by an organization, to impose restriction on the use of content and the life cycle of content in the organization. Just like document management, the industry provides a number of sophisticated Records Management Systems. Microsoft has included records management in with SharePoint.
SharePoint includes the Records Center site template, which includes functionality for centralized collection and management of records, adhering to policy. One of the many jobs of the Records Center is to manage the long-term archive of documents—converting them to records. The Records Center is just another site template with a set of features pre-activated, but owners of other site collections can also enable records management features. Since version 2010, SharePoint allows in-place records management, meaning that any site owner may convert documents of a document library to records, with assigned policy.
Table 11-3 lists some of the features included in the Records Center, which I shall discuss further in this section.
Table 11-3. Features Included in the Records Center
Feature | Description |
---|---|
Document ID | See the earlier section of this chapter about document management, which discusses the Document ID feature. |
Content Organizer | Routes documents and records in the Records Center based on defined policy. |
Drop Off Libraries | Let the user drop documents in the drop off library and have the Content Organizer route dropped documents, based on policy. |
Records Retention | Determines when documents and records expire and how SharePoint handles deposition. |
Hold and e-Discovery | Provides auditing and tracking of external actions that might interrupt normal document life cycle (for example, because of litigation). |
To start, the following steps demonstrate how to create a new instance of a Records Center. I created a managed path (see Chapter 2) to host my Records Center in my default web application.
Figure 11-18. Records Center in SharePoint 2013
The Records Center home page includes a handful of helpful Web Parts to assist you with management of records in the Records Center. Remember, a record is an object (typically a document) in Records Management System with policy applied. The SharePoint Records Center deals primarily in list item and document records. Click the Submit a Record button and SharePoint will prompt you for a file to upload (Figure 11-19) and convert to a record. SharePoint leverages the Content Organizer to route the file to a correct location, based on policy rules. I shall discuss the Content Organizer in the next section.
Figure 11-19. Submit a document as a record
Setting Up the Content Organizer
The Content Organizer feature is responsible for routing documents to other areas in SharePoint. In the next section, I take a closer look at the Content Organizer in the context of the Records Center, which you created in the previous section. First, look at the Content Organizer settings in the Records Center site settings, as follows:
Figure 11-20. The Settings page for the Content Organizer
The Content Organizer Settings page provides the following settings:
Note Content Organizer settings and rules apply to sites and subsites. Each discrete subsite may have Content Organizer rules different from another subsite.
Ordinarily, when configuring Content Organizer rules in a Records Center, you would likely want documents routed to a document or record library. For the purpose of demonstration, I am going to show you how to specify the Documents Center site collection as a destination location. Once configured, users can submit a record (document) and have the document routed to the Document Center.
Figure 11-21. New Send To location for my Documents Center
Note The URL http://server/sites/dms/_vti_bin/officialfile.asmx is specific to the structure of the target site.
Assuming you followed the steps in the earlier section, you now have a new Records Center site collection. The following steps detail setting up the Records Center to accept documents as records.
Figure 11-22. Records Center Management
Note The Records Center has a default record library and drop off library.
This procedure is a lot to digest, so allow me to recap.
Assuming all is well, you can now click the Submit a Record button, on the home page of the Records Center, specify a document, and see the document route to the Document Center.
Hold and e-Discovery
Any organization that maintains a large enough collection of documents, and defines policy that warrants the use of Records Management, may need to locate documents and put policy on hold. One common example in US business is that of litigation—when a court wants to review an organization’s documents, the organization may want to isolate documents from typical routing and retention polices. This is where the Hold and e-Discovery feature of SharePoint comes in handy.
SharePoint 2013 includes a new site template for e-Discovery, called the e-Discovery Center. The e-Discovery Center allows management of discovery cases and holds placed on content, such that an organization may analyze and collaborate around the content for a given case. Each new e-Discovery subsite represents a case and consists of a document library to store documents relating to the case, lists of queries and exports for the case, and various sources of content (Exchange mailboxes, SharePoint sites, and file shares).
Follow these steps to create a new e-Discovery site collection for an already provisioned web application or managed path.
Figure 11-23. e-Discovery Center
The home page of the e-Discovery Center provides helpful information to set up security and permissions for your legal team, working on discovery cases. A good practice is to create a new group for all members of your legal team (in Active Directory) and then grant rights to this group to review content in SharePoint sites, file shares, and Exchange mailboxes (specific steps outside the scope of this chapter).
Creating a Case
Imagine that the legal team has taken on a big case to audit all content across the organization. I will now demonstrate the functionality of the e-Discovery Center, using a fictitious case. Exchange and file share discovery is outside the scope of this book, so I shall concentrate on discovery of SharePoint sites. Start by creating a new case.
Figure 11-24. Create a new e-Discovery subsite for a case
Figure 11-25. Home page of an e-Discovery case subsite
Note The look and feel of the e-Discovery Center and case subsites is subject to change once SharePoint 2013 releases to market.
Now that you have a new case collaboration site, the next task is to start collecting content to review, which is where Discovery Sets come in.
Figure 11-26. Add and manage Discovery Set sources
Note Discovery of SharePoint content requires the content to be indexed by search and permissions to view the content. I cover search in Chapter 15.
Note Enabling in-place hold means the content stays in the source location until someone modifies or deletes it, in which case the held content moves to a secured location.
Figure 11-27. Summary of the discovered content
Figure 11-28. In-place holds summary
In my example, I have created discovery of two SharePoint site collections and applied holds to them. I enabled in-place hold so that any changes to content do not affect the original discovered content. If I were to change content in either of the site collections, defined in Discovery Sets, SharePoint would move the original content to a secured location in the site collection. Now that there is some held content, I shall demonstrate how to query this content, which is typically the role of the legal team, as part of their content reviewing tasks.
In the previous section, you created a new Discovery Case, defined a Discovery Set within the case, and successfully held SharePoint sources (defined within the Discovery Set). As part of their job, the legal team must present reports of discovered content and export the content for review. The following steps demonstrate how to accomplish these tasks:
Figure 11-29. Create a new query of held content
Figure 11-30. Export held content
Figure 11-31. Download results and reports for held content
When the legal team has completed their work, it is time to close the case. Case closure releases any holds on content and marks the case subsite as closed. The following steps allow you to close the case:
Records retention and deposition is the process of managing the life cycle of a document, from inception to depreciation. Records retention is vitally important in some organizations that deal with sensitive information, which they must ensure is current and that older versions are depreciated over a finite time.
The good news is that SharePoint provides records retention and deposition functionality at the very core of its records management features. SharePoint considers every list item or document a record, once it has undergone adoption of policy—policy that defines retention and deposition. In this section, my aim is to show you the core functionality inherent in SharePoint for records management.
In an earlier section, we created a Records Center site collection. For the purpose of this section, I shall continue use of this Records Center in my demonstration steps. To begin, I will review records retention for SharePoint sites, which is new in SharePoint 2013.
Sites Records Retention
New in SharePoint 2013 is records retention for site. SharePoint 2010 supported records retention at the list/library and content type level. Now, site owners may apply similar policies to the life cycle of their sites within SharePoint. I shall demonstrate this functionality with a new subsite within the Records Center, which you can create now by following these steps.
With your new subsite created, you can now define a retention policy, which you configure at the site collection level. You may define multiple different retention policies for different sites, but they all reside at the site collection level.
Figure 11-32. New Site Policy
Table 11-4. Site Deletion Policies
Policy | Description |
---|---|
Do not close or delete site automatically | Default option—the policy ensures that a site is never deleted automatically and only site owners and administrators may delete the site manually. |
Delete site automatically | Provide a time after site created or closed that SharePoint deletes a site, define times when site owners receive notifications and how many times they may postpone deletion. |
Close and delete sites automatically | Provide a time when SharePoint should close a site, and when SharePoint should delete a site, define times when site owners receive notifications and how many times they may postpone deletion. |
Run a workflow automatically to manage site closure | Run a workflow at a time after site creation and optionally repeat the workflow until the site closes. Provide a time after closure that SharePoint deletes the site, and define times when site owners receive notifications and how many times they may postpone deletion. |
Note You may optionally make a site collection read-only when closed via site policy, by checking the check box on the Site Policy creation page.
Figure 11-33. Apply site policy to a site
Note Users may continue to access closed sites in read-only mode.
Content types provide good portability in a site collection. A site content type defines an entity—list item or document—in a site collection to which the content type belongs. Applying retention policy to a content type instructs SharePoint to apply the policy to all list items or documents that use the content type. In the same way that content types provide abstraction of metadata (site columns), they also provide abstraction and portability of policy. This is because the policy is not restricted to one specific list item, document, or containing list.
In this section, I shall demonstrate the steps involved in creating a new retention policy and applying it to a document content type. As previously, start by using the Records Center.
Figure 11-34. Add retention policy to a content type
I am sure that you have already gathered that content type retention policies apply to records and non-records. Non-records are essentially list items or documents that a user has not converted to a record. Why allow different retention policies for non-records and records? Content owners may wish to treat non-records differently from records. For example, a content owner may decide that records undergo more stringent retention policy than that of non-records, and content owners define documents as records when they require special consideration. In my example, I shall define different retention policies for records and non-records, as follows:
Figure 11-35. Add a retention stage for a system content type
Figure 11-36. Add a retention stage for non-system content type
Note You may only set a custom retention formula from custom code.
I think a quick recap is in order. . . You created a new content type, derived from a document and applied retention policy to the content type as a non-record and also applied retention policy to the content type as a record. Now, let us see the policy in action. Follow the next steps to add the content type to an existing document library and to see the different retention policies when a document converts to a record.
Figure 11-37. Compliance details for a document
List retention policies follow closely those of content type retention policies. Because list retention policies bind to a specific list instance, they are not portable, like content type policies. However, list policies can override content type policies, which you may desire in cases where the overarching policy defined by a site collection is not what you intend for a given list.
The following steps detail how to apply retention policies to items within a list. I will not provide too many steps, as many of the steps are similar to those taken when creating content type retention policies.
SharePoint includes the ability to define documents as records in regular document libraries. Prior to SharePoint 2010, you had to move documents to a Records Center with a records library to use records retention and policies (different from those defined for documents). SharePoint now allows for “in-place records management” for document libraries and lists, with configuration starting at the site collection level.
Figure 11-38. Records Declarations Settings
SharePoint provides basic auditing for events in a list or document library. Similar to the way you configured barcodes in a document library, a list owner may configure auditing at the content type level, as follows:
Summary
In this chapter, I described the various features for document management within SharePoint. I demonstrated how some of these features allow your users to organize their document content better—often the lifeblood of any organization that processes information.
Among the interesting areas of records management I covered were information management policy, the Records Center, holds and e-Discovery, and auditing. Records management is all about maintaining the life cycle of documents and data in SharePoint in adherence with organization or business policies.
New to SharePoint 2013 is the e-Discovery Center site template and features for better management of holds and discovery, allowing legal teams to place holds on content for review. Also new to SharePoint 2013 are site retention policies, which you spent some time exploring.
In Chapter 12, I shall introduce business intelligence features within SharePoint 2013—stay tuned.
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