Using Microsoft Office Coauthoring Basics

Box for Microsoft Office coauthoring enables autosaving edits and real-time collaboration for Office files stored in Box. You can simultaneously edit and collaborate on Microsoft Excel, Word, and PowerPoint files on the Office desktop applications in real-time, with all changes automatically saved to your Box account.

Collaborating with Office files

With your team members, follow these steps:

1. Go to your Files from either the Box web app or from your desktop files folder.
2. Open the desired Office file (.docx, .xlsx, .pptx).
   • From the web app, click "Open" on the top right side:

3. Start editing.
   • From here, you’ll see everyone working on the document. 
4. Close the file when done with editing.
   • The file stays open until the file is successfully saved.

You can also open a new document to live edit.

Desktop Box folder (Windows File Explorer):

1. Double-click the file you want to edit
2. Begin editing
3. Share with your team members to live edit.

Sharing from the Office desktop application

When you click on the Share button within the Office desktop application, you can open the Box share page from the web browser. If you are signed in to Box web, then clicking this option opens the document preview page with the share modal open. You can get a shared link, update permissions or add collaborators right from within the share modal.

View File Version History

You can view the file version history in Box from the Office desktop application. When you click “view version history” in the Office desktop application you can preview the document with the share modal open. 

In the Office Desktop Application:

Single/Multiple user sessions: When you are solely working in the document, the "AutoSave" option is turned on in the Office app. You can also click on the arrow next to the filename in the Office Ribbon and see the location the file is saved.

Multiple user sessions: When you and your team are in an Office document in Box, your team can also see avatars of other collaborators who are in the document at the same time. Clicking on the avatar and selecting the "Go To Location" option shows you where a collaborator is within the document. You can also hover over your team member's cursor to identify one another in the document.

In Box Drive and Box Web

With coauthoring enabled and at least one user having the file open in a coauthoring session, you see the coauthoring overlay icon for Box Drive. All collaborators also see the new overlay icon, indicating that, if they have the correct set up, they can coauthor the file with other collaborators.

Note: If a collaborator is not set up for coauthoring, the file opens in read-only mode if the file is being coauthored by others.

Supported File Types

Coauthoring supports the following file types:

Technical Details

Data Transfer

For coauthoring of Office files in Box, data for files being edited may be sent to Microsoft's Office Collaboration Service to enable coauthoring. This is similar to Box's existing integration with Office Online, where data must flow between Box and Microsoft to enable this collaborative experience.

Files enabled for coauthoring

You may choose to enroll only a subset of your team members to coauthoring. When enabling the feature in the Box Admin console, you have the option to choose select individuals whom you want to enroll.

Note:
If you have enabled coauthoring for your entire enterprise, then all files owned by your enterprise are enabled for coauthoring. This is the preferred setting.

Any document that an enrolled team member owns is accessible for coauthoring by that and any other enrolled member. However, any document owned by a non-enrolled member is not accessible for coauthoring.

For example:

• If User A is enrolled in coauthoring, then they can coauthor all Office files in Box.
• If User B is not enrolled in coauthoring, then they cannot coauthor any files they own nor can other users that open User B's files. However, if User B's organization enables Box for Office Online within the Box Admin Console, then User B can coauthor their files.

File Locks

Coauthoring sessions apply a coauthoring lock held by all participants in the session.  This lock allows participants to edit the file.  While the coauthoring lock is in place, Box rejects changes to the file from people who are outside the Office coauthoring session.

Locking coauthorable files results in Office opening the file in read-only mode.  If a non-Office lock is present on a file, Office does not start a coauthoring session on the file.

Version creation

All your edits are saved to Box, with a new version created when one of the following conditions happen:

• Five minutes has passed from the last created version
• A collaborator downloads the file within 5 minutes of the last version
• A collaborator completes a coauthoring session (closes the document)

Supported environments

• Box Production/Sandbox environment
• Box Verified Enterprise

Compliance levels supported

• FedRamp Moderate

Protected View

Once Box is added as an online storage location, when opening files from Box (web app, Box Drive or Box web), you can see the protected view notification in the Office app.

See the following document Protected view for documents on CSPP Plus hosts on how to suppress the above notification from being displayed to your team members

Note: When following steps from Global authorization (GPO) on suppressing the protected view notification, use api.box.com as the domain to enable.

Determining Coauthoring Enablement

Use one of four established methods whether you have coauthoring enabled:

Method 1

1. Login to your box.com account
2. Click on your avatar on the top right, then select App Center.
3. Below your avatar, click My Apps.
4. In the My Apps section, see whether the Box for Microsoft Office (Desktop) app is enabled.

After you add Box as an online storage location in the Microsoft Office apps, the application above is added to the your My Apps page. To disable desktop coauthoring, you can remove the above app.

Method 2

In the box.com app, if you have enabled coauthoring, you'll have the option to open the file with “Microsoft Word/PowerPoint/Excel Desktop”. (Microsoft Excel pictured below)

If you're not enabled for coauthoring, you'll see the option to open the file with “Microsoft Excel”.  Using this option will open the file on the desktop Microsoft Excel application using Box Tools.

Method 3

Within the Office menu, go to the Open tab and see whether Box is added under Other locations. If the app is added, the user's sign-in username is displayed.

Method 4

1. As administrator, sign into the Box Admin Console.
2. Navigate to Apps → Box for Microsoft Office and see whether the user is enabled.

Known Limitations

• Microsoft licenses compatibility: Perpetual licenses of Office (Office 2016, 2019 etc.) do not support co-authoring for Box files.
• Download stats are not captured when you open the file in coauthoring mode on Office desktop/online applications. Check back frequently for when this is updated.
• When a folder has the  hide collaborators option in Box checked, then files in those folders cannot be co-authored.
• After enabling co-authoring, you cannot change Microsoft MIP sensitivity labels in documents.
• When adding Box as a Place on MacOS, Device Trust does not support WKWebView used by Microsoft Office. 
• The use of @mentions while commenting in Microsoft is not available.

Support

For additional help or support related questions, visit the following support pages:

Troubleshooting for Microsoft Office Coauthoring

Support for Box for Microsoft Office Coauthoring – Box Support