Advanced Lesson 1: Version Control

Do you know how version control can help you and your colleagues?  It’s rarely a good idea to have multiple copies of the same document circulating among multiple users. This tutorial will explore how Workspace makes version control easy and manageable.

Version control (also known as versioning) allows you to keep track of the changes made to a document in an organized manner.  A basic method of maintaining version control is the use of file-naming conventions:
The first draft of a report would be saved as report_version_1
The draft with corrections would be saved as report_version 2
The revised report would be saved as report_final
What problems do you see with this method?
Large, complex projects with many authors need version control, but even single document authored by one person can benefit.  Good version control forces you and your colleagues to read and edit only the most recent version – no worrying about working on the version from last week.  No searching through your inbox and wondering if the version you’ve found if the most recent version.  Version control in Workspace helps makes the process easy and transparent.

When you upload a document to Workspace, you are prompted to enable versioning.  When you choose Enable Versioning, the document you uploaded becomes version 1.0.  When you or someone else adds a version – either via direct version upload or using Edit-in-Place – version 1.0 is saved but the newest version is most easily accessible.  Showing only the most recent version means that everyone will read and edit the most up-to-date version of the document.

Another benefit of versioning is that you can see which user added a new version.  Users can comment on each version and if you need to disregard all of the changes made, you can easily remove versions or revert to a previous version. 

Workspace makes version control easy with the Edit-in-Place tool.  Use this tool instead of downloading, changing, then re-uploading documents.  The Edit-in-Place tool also locks the document while you are editing it, preventing others from making changes at the same time.

To use the Edit-in-Place tool, you must use Internet Explorer.  This tool is not available in other browsers.  You will also need to correctly configure your browser.  Please see the guide for correctly configuring your browser in the frequently asked questions area of Workspace Help.

To use Edit-in-Place for a document, simply click on the pencil icon.  A dialogue box will appear, asking for your permission to run an Active-X control.  Click Yes or OK.  Then the document will open in Microsoft Word.  From here you can edit the document as you normally would.  Each time you save the document, a new version will be added to Workspace.

If you do not use the Edit-in-Place tool, you can still maintain version control.  To upload a new version, simple click the version icon.  The process for adding a new version is similar to the process for adding a document.  Complete the form, adding notes if desired.  Click OK when finished. 

You can view previous versions by navigating to a document’s information page and clicking the Version History checkbox.

Now you understand how Workspace can help with version control.  Navigate back to workspace and configure Internet Explorer for use with Edit-in-Place.  When you’re finished try using the tool on a test document, and then view the next tutorial about linking items.