Microsoft® Office Groove®

Collaborative Solutions
January 2007

http://www.microsoft.com/groove/ 1
 Table of Contents

Abstract ................................................................................................................ 3

Introducing the New World of Work ...................................................................... 3

Microsoft’s Collaborative Solutions ...................................................................... 4

Collaborate through Integration ............................................................................ 4

Empower Effective Teams ................................................................................... 5

Create a Groove Workspace ...................................................................... 7

Add a SharePoint Files Tool ................................................................................9
Set a Synchronization Schedule .......................................................................11
Share a Workspace ............................................................................................12

Synchronize Work “On the fly” ........................................................................... 14

Create Flexible Project Teams ..........................................................................15

Protect Company Assets .................................................................................... 17

Archive Work ...................................................................................................... 19

Summary ............................................................................................................ 22

http://www.microsoft.com/groove/ 2
Abstract
With the release of Microsoft® Office Groove 2007, Microsoft brings a powerful new tool into
its collaboration suite.

Office Groove 2007 adds new flexibility to the collaborative solutions already realized by
users of Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services. This paper discusses the out-of-the-box
capabilities available to users of Microsoft Office Groove 2007 in conjunction with
Microsoft® Office SharePoint® Server 2007 and Microsoft® Windows SharePoint® Services.
The power of these solutions is presented in the context of common business scenarios that
require simple and secure collaboration from behind and across corporate servers and
firewalls.

Introducing the New World of Work

The work environment is not what it was ten or even five years ago. With more powerful
software and computing systems, wireless connectivity, and a proliferation of mobile devices
from laptop computers to Smartphones, the definition of a workplace or team now cuts
across locations, organizations, and cultures. An office is no longer simply a room or a
building. It can be any place information workers create, share, and store information, and
wherever they collaborate with employees, partners, customers, and others on projects and
business processes.

In this new world of work, project teams need to form quickly and share information easily.
Because teams often are composed of individuals from multiple offices and companies as
well as mobile workers, teams often are forced to rely on a patchwork of tools to share
information and work together. These tools may include e-mail, phone, voice mail, file
shares, and Web sites.

Email is frequently used for document sharing and information exchange because shared
drives and other server-based file-sharing tools are rarely accessible by colleagues in other
offices or by partners and customers on different corporate networks. As a result, file
versioning issues increase, e-mail account sizes grow, and security breaches are common.

While each of these tools has strengths for particular work activities, together they fail to
provide a persistent, contextual work environment that is accessible to all team members—
anywhere, anytime, on any network. In addition, many of these tools were only designed to
support internal company work. Infrastructure costs and security risks increase when they
are used for work that crosses organizational boundaries.

Microsoft Office Groove 2007 provides an environment for team members to complete
projects more effectively by working in contextual, collaborative, workspaces. And it
provides enterprises with a flexible forum where they can gather information from disparate
sources, create virtual teams, and foster dynamic collaboration among team members who
are separated by geography, time zones, and corporate firewalls.

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Microsoft’s Collaborative Solutions
Microsoft Office Groove 2007 can be used in conjunction with the latest SharePoint portal
product, Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007, to satisfy the needs of many in the
organization; from information workers and mobile sales representatives to project
managers and executives. Moreover, the benefits of SharePoint integration can be realized
right out of the box by using Groove’s flexible SharePoint Files Tool.

Collaborate through Integration

The SharePoint Files Tool, new with Microsoft Office Groove 2007, allows information
workers to access resources stored in SharePoint document libraries while collaborating on a
project in the Groove workspace.

Overvview

 The SharePoint files tool can be added to any standard Groove workspace, and
regular synchronization between the tool and the associated SharePoint site ensures
that the team always has access to up-to-date information.

 Users don’t need to worry about uploading or downloading files—updates are

automatically synchronized between the Groove workspaces of all team members
and with the files in SharePoint.

 Because files in a Groove workspace are stored securely on the user’s hard drive,
users can continue to work offline and changes will securely synchronize with the
workspace members as soon as they reconnect.

 A PC with an Internet connection is all that is needed to stay in touch with other
workspace members, allowing highly mobile employees to work together on projects
wherever they go.

 The integration between Groove and Sharepoint allows users who do not have
Groove installed on their PCs to view the latest version of a work-in-progress simply
by navigating to the SharePoint library.

 Regular synchronization also allows Groove workspace members who cannot access
the SharePoint site to see the files in the SharePoint library, simplifying the process
of extending a project across corporate boundaries.

 The integration between Groove and SharePoint can be used to limit access to
sensitive material and confidential info. Company trade secrets can be kept separate
and safe.

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Empower Effective Teams
This paper presents an example of how a team can work together and share information on
a project that involves

 An internal sales team connected to the corporate LAN

 Remote employees not connected to the corporate LAN, working in different time
zones
 External contractors and vendors who need access to information without
compromising corporate security

The players:

Contoso Ltd. Is a medium-sized manufacturer of specialty shoes. Employees include

 Mark, sales representative for Contoso Ltd.

 Rosa, the Contoso sales manager.
 Bob, a senior footwear designer temporarily based at Contoso’s factory in Italy.
 Bill, a Contoso project manager.
 Jane , a Contoso product manager.

The set-up

Northwind Traders is a popular outdoor recreation retailer who is accepting bids for the design and
manufacture of a new line of hiking boots. Contoso has worked with Northwind Traders in the past and
wants to win the opportunity work on the hiking boot project.

By collaborating, Contoso can win the bid….

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Create a new SharePoint document library
Mark, a sales representative for Contoso, Ltd, sees a great
opportunity. He knows that Contoso has worked with
Northwind Traders before so there’s information about the
company and the proposal-writing process already stored in
a SharePoint site on Contoso’s corporate server.
Mark navigates to the Northwind Traders SharePoint site on
Contoso’s server to do some research before meeting with
Northwind’ Trader’s representatives. He finds the documents
he needs to prepare a Northwind Trader’s request for
proposal (RFP) for the new hiking boot line.
At the conclusion of a successful meeting with Northwind
Traders, Mark is ready to start working on an RFP. He
creates a new library in the Northwind Traders SharePoint
site on the Contoso server.
Mark selects the request for proposal (RFP), his meeting
notes, and the schedule for drafting a proposal to Northwind
Traders for the project.
Create a new SharePoint document library
and upload content
1. Click Create from the Site Action drop-down
tab in the upper right-hand corner of the All
Site Content page.
2. Click Document Library, enter a name and
description for the new library, and click
Create.
3. Click Upload and select Upload Multiple
Documents.
4. Browse to the location of the files to be
uploaded.
5. Select the files to upload.
SharePoint uploads them to the new library.

Next, Mark needs to retrieve a copy of Contoso’s proposal template. He knows this template is stored in
the templates library in Contoso’s SharePoint site. Mark navigates to Contoso’s SharePoint home page to
get started.

As Mark begins to work on the proposal, he sees that the new hiking boots must meet a very specific set
of criteria, and he soon finds that he needs help.

Rosa, the Contoso sales manager, suggests that Mark get in touch with
Bob, a senior footwear designer who is based temporarily at Contoso’s
factory in Italy.

Mark wants Bob to take a look at the RFP and he also wants to show
Bob what he has done so far on the proposal, but Bob can’t access the
SharePoint sites on Contoso’s server from his remote location in Italy.

Mark quickly sees that he can use Groove to work with Bob on the proposal, and to give Bob
secure access to the documents on the Contoso site.

He wants to run this idea by Bob but Italy is nine hours ahead of Mark’s local time. He sets
up a call very early the next morning to bring Bob up to speed.

After the phone conversation, Mark is ready to create a new workspace and use the
SharePoint Files tool to point to the new proposal library he’s created for Northwind Traders
on the Contoso SharePoint site.

It takes Mark no time at all to create a new workspace, add the Groove SharePoint Files tool
and point to the new library where he’s working on the proposal.

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Create a Groove Workspace

Mark starts with a Standard Workspace that he can easily modify Create a new Groove workspace
for his project.
1. At the top of the Groove
A Standard Workspace allows members of the workspace to launchbar, click New Workspace.
2. Type a name for the new
 Share documents workspace.
 Participant in discussions 3. Choose the type of workspace to
 Send messages create:
 Use additional tools (like the SharePoint files tool) to File Sharing
enhance collaboration Standard
Template
4. Click OK.

Groove opens the workspace in a

workspace window.

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Add a SharePoint Files Tool
Having created the standard workspace in Groove, Mark is ready to Add SharePoint Files tool to a
enhance it with the SharePoint Files tool. This tool allows teams to Groove workspace
work together to produce and modify documents in SharePoint
libraries through automatic integration in Groove. 1. Choose New – Tool –
SharePoint Files from the File
menu.
2. Click Setup on the Welcome
screen.
3. Type the URL for the SharePoint
site containing the library or folder
to synchronize or select it from a
list of network places.
Groove populates the dialog box
with the libraries and sub-sites on
the SharePoint site.
4. Select the library or folder you
want to synchronize and click
Open.

Groove displays the contents of the

library in the SharePoint Files tool.

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Set a Synchronization Schedule
Mark wants to be sure that the files are updated and synchronized. Groove provides a synchronization
schedule that he can set and modify as a manual or automatic process..

Set File Synchronization

1. Click the calendar icon in the

synchronization bar.
2. Choose Manually to synchronize
files manually.
3. Choose Automatically and specify
a schedule in the Every: field and
time unit drop-down list.
4. Click OK.

Groove synchronizes the files

according to the schedule that you
specify.

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Share a Workspace
After setting up his Groove workspace, Mark invites Bob to the workspace so Bob can view messages
from Mark and can access the documents Mark has added to the SharePoint site through Groove.

Mark invites Bob to the workspace and types a detailed message,

Share a workspace
reviewing the issues and concerns he expressed to Bob over the
phone. He clicks Send Message to send the invitation.
1. Under Invite to Workspace, type
the email address of a person to
Within minutes, and just before he leaves his office in Italy (it’s the
invite to the workspace and click
end of the work day for Bob), Bob receives an e-mail inviting him to
Go.
join the workspace. Bob clicks Accept and Mark receives notification
2. Type a message to the invitee
of the acceptance and confirms it.
and click Send Message.
Now Bob is able to view Mark’s message as well as the documents
Groove sends an email message to
in the proposal library on the SharePoint site (see Figure 1).
the invitee to accept.
The next day, back in the office, Bob looks over the RFP and the Accept an invitation
proposal document. Using the Track Changes feature in Microsoft
Office Word, Bob adjusts the proposal document to address Mark’s  Choose Accept to accept an
concerns and saves it back to Groove as a new version. invitation to a workspace.
Later, at the start of Mark’s day in the US, he logs on and sees the Accepting an invitation gives the
change notification beside the proposal document in the Groove invitees full access to the workspace
workspace. He reviews Bob’s changes, accepts them, and uses the with all its features, tools, and
Groove discussion feature to thank Bob for his help. functions.
In the afternoon, Mark realizes that part of the cost estimate will have
to be adjusted to accommodate Bob’s changes. Mark sends Bob a
Groove message asking for his input.

Bob opens the cost estimate document in the proposal library. After calculating an adjustment, Bob
inserts it into the document and saves it. Groove updates the document in the workspace and Mark, who
is working late at home, sees the change notification and sends Bob an acknowledgement.

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 Figure 1

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Synchronize Work “On the fly”
The next morning, Rosa, the sales manager, holds a meeting of the sales team. She wants to discuss
current sales prospects and proposals so that she can do some resource planning. Mark is enthusiastic
about the Northwind Traders opportunity, and Rosa asks to
take a look at Mark’s proposal. Synchronize Now]

Rosa wants to contribute to the proposal, but doesn’t 1. Choose Edit.

necessarily want to join the project. She’ll need access to
the proposal on the Northwind Traders SharePoint site but 2. Click Synchronize Now…
time will tell if she’ll need access to the Groove workspace
that Mark and Bob share. It’s easy to invite her later, if Groove synchronizes the files
needed. For now, Mark directs her to the proposal on the immediately.
Northwind Traders SharePoint site.

That afternoon, Rosa navigates to the proposal library on the Northwind Traders site where she opens
and reads the latest version. Rosa was involved in the creation of a hiking boot proposal for a European
retailer last year and wants to compare it with the work Mark has done on Northwind Traders. She notes
some similarities with the European proposal and she inserts language copied from that proposal, which
she feels is a little clearer, into the Northwind Traders proposal. She sends Mark an e-mail asking him to
take a look at her changes.

Mark receives Rosa’s e-mail, but he has to catch a plane and doesn’t have time to review it. Before
packing up his laptop and leaving the office, Mark opens the Groove workspace and uses Synchronize
Now to synch up his Groove workspace with the SharePoint document that Rosa made changes to. He’s
synchronized her changes with his workspace version so he can review her changes while he’s on the
plane and disconnected from the corporate network.

While on the plane, Mark is able to view Rosa’s changes from within the Groove workspace. He agrees
that Rosa’s wording is an improvement and, after making some additional edits, he sends Bob a Groove
message asking him to take a look at the linked proposal and accept the changes if he has no objections.

That night in his hotel room, Mark’s Groove workspaces are automatically updated when he connects to
the Internet. Bob instantly receives the updates, and after reviewing the proposal, he accepts the
changes.

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 Figure 2

When Mark returns from his trip, any changes made while he was away synchronize again with the
SharePoint site. Over the next few days, Mark and Bob put the finishing touches on the proposal. The
scheduled synchronizations also keep the SharePoint site updated so that Rosa can track their progress
as well (see Figure 2).

Create Flexible Project Teams

Northwind Traders likes Mark’s proposal and negotiates an agreement with Contoso for the design and
manufacture of the hiking boot line.

Now it’s time to move from the proposal stage to kick off the project, Mark creates a separate SharePoint
site for the Northwind Traders hiking boot project. He uploads the final project specs, budget, and
schedule from his hard drive into the document library on the new site.

Mark wants Bob to be part of the project team because of his familiarity with the proposal but Bob is still
in Italy, so they will continue to collaborate in Groove but using a new workspace.

Mark creates a new Groove workspace and adds a SharePoint Files tool to synchronize with the library in
the hiking boot project site. Mark also adds a files tool that points to the library in the Northwind Traders
proposal site so that all project members will have access to the final proposal document.

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 Figure 3

Now that the workspace has been set up, Mark invites other members of his team to join. In addition to
Bob, Mark sends a Groove invitation to Bill, a Contoso project manager.

After accepting the invitation, Bill, in turn, invites Jane, a Contoso product manager into the workspace.

It’s easy to add new members and you can match existing configuration of teams in the work place or
bring together people on a more ad hoc basis.

Mark schedules a conference call with all workspace members to discuss the project and he uses Groove
to viewing and update documents during the meeting.

 Mark, Bill, and Jane meet in the conference room and Bob joins the call from Italy.
 Mark projects the schedule document from the workspace onto the screen in the conference
room.
 From his office in Italy, Bob goes to the project workspace and opens the project schedule.

Groove allows him to view the same document that Mark is projecting on the screen in the conference
room.

When Mark makes adjustments to the schedule, he is prompted to save them back to Groove and they
become accessible to Bob only moments later (see Figure 3).

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Protect Company Assets
The Northwind Traders project is off to a good start. And the team is growing.

Jane, whose job is to ensure that the boots have the right look for the target market, wants to bring in
John, an outside design consultant she has worked with in the past. She wonders, how can she best give
John the information that he needs to work on the project without compromising design secrets that are
stored on the Contoso SharePoint site?

When Bill approves Jane’s request, she asks if he can help her think of a way to invite John into the
hiking boot project workspace without exposing the privileged information that should not be shared
outside of Contoso. Together, Bill and Jane realize that Groove offers a way to resolve this issue.

Jane can create a design folder in the library on the hiking boot project site and copy the documents
relating strictly to design into it. She can next create a new Groove workspace for design planning and
add a SharePoint Files Tool pointed at the design folder on the SharePoint site.

Because the design planning workspace will be synchronized only with the design folder on the
SharePoint site, and John will only be a member of the design planning workspace, he will not have
access to any of the more sensitive materials in the hiking boot project site library.

Satisfied with the plan, Bill gives Jane the go-ahead.

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 Figure 4

Jane sets up the folder, creates the workspace and sends John an invitation to join the workspace as a
participant. After he accepts, John is able to view and manipulate only the files synchronized between the
Groove design planning site and the design folder on the Northwind Traders SharePoint site.

As John’s design evolves, he updates the files in the workspace. Groove synchronizes the design
changes to Jane’s computer, which in turn synchronizes with the folder in the hiking boot project
SharePoint site.

 All members of the project team workspace are able to see John’s work, because the Groove
project workspace is synchronized with the library in the SharePoint site that contains the design
folder (see Figure 4).
 When Bob spots a potential conflict between one of John’s design elements and the ergonomic
requirements of the new boots, he sends a Groove message to Jane with a link to the
requirements spec;
 Jane is able to give immediate feedback to John.
 John adjusts his design so that it conforms to Bob’s specifications, and Bob sees the change
soon after John saves them back to Groove.

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Archive Work
Once the boot design is approved, Bob (still offsite in Italy) is assigned to head the team for the creation
of a hiking boot prototype. A prototype of a hiking boot includes a physical boot and all of the documents
and design specifications that are used to created it.

Bob recruits three shoe technicians to help him; Donna, who is located in Italy, Carl and Earl who both
work out of Contoso’s U.S. headquarters.

Bob uses Groove to allow the four of them to collaborate efficiently. He creates a workspace that he
labels “Northwind Boot Prototype” in Groove and invites Donna, Carl, and Earl into the workspace.

This workspace contains documents initially created by Bob and is independent of the Northwind Traders
hiking boot project SharePoint site on the Contoso server. (See Figure 5)

Figure 5

Soon after work on the prototype hiking boot begins, Bob invites Jane into the workspace to keep her up
to date on their progress.

In accordance with Contoso best practices, Jane sees that the documents relating to and describing the
hiking boot prototype also need to be archived on the hiking boot project SharePoint site, both to allow

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access for other members of the team while the project is
ongoing, and to create a record once the project concludes. Point Groove SharePoint Files tool
to a SharePoint library
Jane does the following:
1. Right-click the SharePoint files tab
 Creates a folder in the Northwind Traders hiking boot in the lower-right corner of the
project site on SharePoint for the prototype Groove workspace.
documents 2. Choose Open in New Window.
3. Select and drag documents to the
 Adds a SharePoint Files tool to the Groove
tool window.
workspace that holds the prototype documents
4. Click Synchronize Now to
 Points the SharePoint Files tool in Groove to the new
publish documents to the folder on
folder she created for prototype documents in
the SharePoint site.
SharePoint
 Groove synchronizes the files
immediately.
Jane opens the prototype workspace root folder, then right-
clicks the SharePoint files tab at the bottom of the workspace and selects Open in New Window. In the
workspace window, she selects all the documents related to the prototype and drags them into the tool
window. When she clicks Synchronize Now, the files are published to the SharePoint hiking boot project
site on in the new folder she created for the prototype files. see Figure 6).

As the prototype phase continues, Jane synchronizes the documents back to SharePoint manually
whenever she sees a change notification.

After the hiking boot prototype is delivered to Deleting a Groove Workspace

Northwind Traders, Bob confirms that Jane has
synchronized the final versions of the files with
the SharePoint site before deleting the prototype
workspace.
Under File, Delete Workspace, he selects For
All Members. The workspace is deleted from
the hard drives of all five computers, but the files
it contained remain part of the permanent project
record archived on the SharePoint Northwind
Traders site.
1. Choose Delete Workspace from the File
menu.
2. Select one of the following:
From This Computer
(Groove account on this computer)
From All My Computers
(All computers with your Groove account)
For All Members
(All workspace members’ computers)
Groove deletes the workspace in accordance with
your selection.

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 Figure 6

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Summary
Microsoft Office Groove 2007 is an important addition to the Microsoft collaboration tools, providing rich
out-of-the-box functionality that includes:

 Simple user interface for creating and maintaining workspaces. Groove workspaces can be
created from the desktops of information workers as easily as they create new documents in
Microsoft Office Word, making it easier to use than more complex systems.

 Ability to collaborate securely both behind and across firewalls. End-to-end, always-on
encryption allows for the sharing of information without the exposure inherent in the sending of
files as e-mail or IM attachments or copying them to CDs and storage devices.

 Support for Microsoft Office. Both Groove and SharePoint are designed to work in conjunction
with the Microsoft Office Suite, reducing training time in organizations where the use of these
applications is already well-established.

 SharePoint files tool for easy access to SharePoint libraries and folders. A member of a
Groove workspace with access to a SharePoint site can synchronize with an entire library or a
single folder on the site simply by typing the appropriate URL into the SharePoint Files Tool.

 Choice of manual or scheduled synchronization with SharePoint files. Any member of a

Groove workspace can synchronize with SharePoint manually by clicking a button. Alternatively,
a workspace member can set up a regular schedule for synchronization.

 Ability to archive workspace files to the SharePoint server. Files in a Groove workspace
created independently of SharePoint can be archived on the SharePoint server by adding a
SharePoint Files Tool pointed at the appropriate site, dragging the files from the workspace into
the tool, and synchronizing the tool with the SharePoint site.

Microsoft partners and customers who need to create secure virtual workspaces without extensive IT
support will be well served by the addition of Microsoft Office Groove 2007 and Microsoft Windows
SharePoint Services 2007 to their business environments. Simple and secure collaboration begins right
out of the box.

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