Ok, so I have been working with several clients who are ‘interested’ in Office 365, particularly from a SharePoint perspective. During demonstrations of the platform with them, and through my own use I’ve come across several issues. So I’ve of course raised tickets with MS support and submitted discussion threads to cover, and the helpdesk are very fast to respond. However, some of the issues I am mentioning in this blog I would consider serious; and most relate to the SharePoint public facing site collection.

I’ve decided to list them here as I come across them. Please note, there have been some indicated third party fixes for some of these, however, I have not put them in unless anyone can confirm they work 100% of the time!

• Content and Structure. This is a vital component allowing the movement of repository content. There is a fault with this component, and it will not work. From my understanding there appears to be no planned fix date. This is worrying because without this feature it will be difficult for users to restructure site content? Even a workaround is going to be perceived as unacceptable (if they already use SharePoint).
• SharePoint Blog site and the Anonymous Authentication. If you have a public facing SharePoint site with a SharePoint blog sub-site anonymous users will not be able to read your blogs and instead are asked to authenticate. This means that in order to read a blog on a public SharePoint site you must sign into Microsoft online first?
• Visibility of a Public facing SharePoint site using IPhone and Win7 and I think Android. If you attempt to access a public facing SharePoint site using your mobile you will not be able to view it on the mobile’s browser and instead diverts to the Microsoft online login. Surely a key aspect to the success of companies public facing SharePoint site is the ability to access it from a mobile device?
• Can’t reallocate a second site collection as default
• No navigation from SharePoint site collection back to other Office 365 services
• My profile photo wont display on site collection person details
• Once site collection is set up, site collection admin rights appear to vanish
• Can’t disable a user account in Office 365, only change password or delete
• In Lync, pinning a person to recent contacts appears to have bugs by way of presence
• How on earth do you federate Lync with other Office 365 companies?

If you have anymore, please feel free to comment on them. Please note I am not representing Microsoft here, but, at least I can use this as an avenue to pass likewise issues directly to them concerning SharePoint Office365…. More blogs to follow!

06/09/11: Updated: SharePoint Blog Site and the Anonymous Authentication – update from MS Support -> Design “Change Request has been submitted to the Operations Team for this issue and we have added your Service Request information to it. Anonymous blog access has been a known global issue and Operations will be working for a Community Solution in the future. Unfortunately, there is no estimated time of arrival for a solution.”