Set up SharePoint Online integration
Updated over a week ago

Link your Xakia matters directly to folders in SharePoint Online.

Once your SharePoint Online integration has been set up, corresponding folders will automatically be generated in SharePoint Online for all new matters created in Xakia. Any updates made to a matter in Xakia will automatically be pushed to this SharePoint Online folder.

This article explores:


Setting up SharePoint

Follow the steps below to set up your SharePoint:

  • Click on 'Admin' in the top navigation bar

  • Select 'Integrations' from the left -hand menu

  • Select 'Document Management'

  • From the 'Provider' dropdown, select 'SharePoint Online'

To complete the integration, the following steps are required:

General Settings

Root Site Collection URL

This is the URL of the root site collection of your SharePoint Online tenant. It will be in the form of "https://<your-tenant-name>.sharepoint.com/".

Confidential Group Name

This is the name of the Group in SharePoint Online that will be granted access to any folders that correspond to confidential matters in Xakia. This field is optional, and a name can be provided if desired. For more information on how confidential matters work visit this Knowledge Base Article.

Note: If multiple site collections are used, a group with this name is assumed to exist in each site collection that is used by the Xakia SharePoint Online integration.

Folder Name Format

This is the folder naming convention which will be used when creating and updating folders in SharePoint Online. See the 'Folder Naming Convention' section below for more details.

Note: There is no feature available to automatically sync users from Xakia with 'All Matters including Confidential' access in Xakia to confidential groups in SharePoint Online. It is expected that administrators will to maintain the group membership accordingly.

Folder Naming Conventions

The name used for folders in SharePoint Online can be selected based on one of the following conventions:

  • Matter Name

  • Division Name - Matter Name

  • Subcategory Name - Matter Name

  • Matter Name - Subcategory Name

  • Matter Name - Division Name

  • Matter Name - Subdivision Name

  • Matter Name - Category Name

  • Matter Name - Division Name - Category Name

  • Matter Name - Subcategory Name - Matter Number

  • Matter Number - Matter Name

  • Category Name - Matter Name - Matter Number

  • Matter Number

  • Matter Name - Matter Number

  • Division Name - Matter Name - Matter Number

  • Group Name - Matter Name - Matter Number

  • Subdivision Name - Matter Name

Allow filing from Outlook

If you have the SharePoint Online integration set up and the Outlook Add-in then you can transfer email metadata to SharePoint Online. To learn how to set up email filing visit this Knowledge Base Article.

Authentication

The Authentication tab of the SharePoint Online configuration page in Xakia allows you to authenticate to SharePoint Online using Microsoft Entra ID. Authenticating Xakia to your SharePoint Online tenant is a once-off process where your Entra ID Global Administrator grants access to the Xakia Application. The Entra ID Global Administrator will then need to authorize each Site Collection in SharePoint Online that Xakia needs to access. Note that Xakia does not require access to all Site Collections in the tenant - you authorize only the Site Collections that you require.

Setting up the authentication to SharePoint Online will require a user with Global Administrator privileges in your tenant.

To set up:

  • Select 'Azure Active Directory' from the 'Authentication Mode' drop-down box

  • Click the 'Get the App' button

  • You will be prompted to sign in with a Microsoft account - sign in with a Global Administrator user

  • You will then be prompted to grant consent to our App, which will access your SharePoint Online resources

  • Once the flow is completed you will be taken back to Xakia.

Your Entra ID Global Administrator now needs to authorize each Site Collection to the Xakia App. This can be accomplished using the below PowerShell script. Substitute the value of $siteUrl variable with the URL of the Site Collection in your SharePoint Online tenant that you want Xakia to access. The script will need to be run once for each Site Collection that you want to authorize.

Note that this PowerShell sample requires PowerShell 7 with the PnP.PowerShell module installed.

Note: there is also an option to authenticate to SharePoint Online using SPO Add-Ins. Microsoft has announced plans to deprecate SPO Add-Ins. SPO Add-Ins exists as an authentication method in Xakia as a legacy option only. We strongly recommend using Microsoft Entra ID for authentication to SharePoint Online.

Field Mapping

Fields from a matter can be copied into custom site columns on a folder in SharePoint Online, allowing you to search for Xakia matter metadata in SharePoint Online.

The following fields can be mapped to custom site columns:

  • Matter Name

  • Matter Number

  • Matter Description

  • Matter Manager

  • Division Name

  • Sub-Division Name

  • Category name

  • Sub-Category name

  • Group Name

  • Matter Hyperlink

  • Matter Status

  • Internal Contact

  • Confidential

Note: To search the metadata for attachments we recommend using the title 'Has Attachments' for the column. Please avoid using the column name "Attachments" in your field mappings. SharePoint treats the column named "Attachments" as read-only. If you try to specify a mapping to a column named "Attachments" this will result in none of the metadata being mapped.

Note: The Xakia SharePoint Online integration currently requires the same field mapping configuration on all Document Libraries in use. It is not possible to configure a different field mapping configuration for each Document Library.

Folder Placement

The Folder Placement rules can be configured in the 'Folder Placement' tab of the SharePoint Online configuration page in Xakia. Folder Placement rules are evaluated from top to bottom and if no rules are matched, then the destination specified in the 'Otherwise' clause is used.

How to create Folder Placement Rule

Under the 'Folder Placement' tab click 'Add New Folder Placement Rule'

  • Select a component from the dropdown menu

  • Select either 'Equals' or 'Does not equal'

  • Select the relevant component input

  • Enter the SharePoint Online URL for the desired location

Note: When specifying the destination for a folder, this is done with two separate fields. The first is the URL to the site or subsite, and the second is the path to the Document Library or folder.

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For example, if the tenant was xakiatech.com, and there was a site called Sales, and it had a subsite called Leads, and this subsite contained a document library called Contracts, and the intention was to have the integration create folders in the Contracts document library, then the destination would be configured like so:

The folder placement rules are only evaluated when a matter is first linked to SharePoint Online - i.e., when the matter is first created. If any of the matter fields change, the folder is not moved to a different location.

Note: The Xakia SharePoint Online integration will overwrite any changes made to a folder made by end users. Therefore, we encourage users to use Xakia as the source of truth for matter names, metadata, and permissions, and treat SharePoint Online as a read-only store for matter metadata.

Note: The Xakia SharePoint Online integration does not support renaming or restructuring of sites, document libraries or folders in SharePoint Online. Xakia refers to a linked folder by its path in SharePoint Online - therefore, if any element of the path changes in SharePoint Online, Xakia cannot locate the folder and will be unable to update it.

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