过去，团队(team collaboration)在文档上的协作既耗时又乏味。一个人会写一个草稿，把草稿交给其他人进行修改，重新阅读修改并决定是否接受，将文档交给其他人进行编辑，等等。如今，(Nowadays)共享文档就像编写它们一样容易，许多人可以轻松地处理同一个文档。Microsoft Office的程序套件专为团队合作而设计，但起初并不是每个人都会觉得它是本能的。在这里，像Team Collaboration，Using Microsoft Office for More Effective Teamwork这样的书可能是真正的瑰宝。这本书是否兑现了书名的承诺？作为Office 的老用户(Office user)，我很想知道。让我们看看我发现了什么。
本书专为企业设计
从一开始就很清楚，这本书是为在商业环境(business environment)中工作的人特别是企业而设计的。它也适用于已经熟悉最新版本的Office（自从引入功能区以来）并且不需要基础教程的人。假设读者拥有Office 2013，这就是插图所显示的内容。
这本书首先讨论了团队合作中涉及的概念（团队动力、以身作则的领导力等等），不幸的是，这本书就像教科书一样枯燥，从来没有一个词可以用一打。作者似乎想确保每一个明显的点都包含在沉闷的细节中。我不认为我会独自一人阅读一段又一段，并希望(paragraph and wishing)他已经开始阅读。
办公室协作
实际讨论与Office协作的第一章详细描述了SharePoint的使用。使用SharePoint需要订阅Office 365 Small Business Premium或更高级别。SharePoint 部分(SharePoint section)的大部分内容是为管理SharePoint网站的人设计的，作者同意非管理员用户可能会发现这些信息很有趣，但他们无法用它做很多事情。毫无疑问，SharePoint是一项功能完善的服务，如果企业已经拥有Office 365 Small Business Premium订阅，SharePoint是内置的。关于如何完全配置SharePoint以满足团队的特定需求的描述是详尽的，并且很好地说明了。
然而，订阅的成本可能会让许多企业望而却步。专注于管理SharePoint 网站(SharePoint site)会浪费大量空间。进入SharePoint的企业几乎肯定会拥有自己训练有素的管理员和自己的政策。下一部分描述了通过Outlook进行的团队合作，但同样，一开始的重点是将Outlook链接到公司SharePoint 网站(SharePoint site)。一旦这本书开始通过OneNote描述协作，它对普通用户来说就变得更有价值了。
本书介绍了如何将Outlook链接到OneNote，以及如何确保团队日程、消息和日历同步到共享笔记本。日历功能(calendar feature)对于跟踪各种项目并确保没有日程安排冲突特别有用。
有一个部分描述了与Lync的(Lync)团队协作(team collaboration)，但这仅适用于企业使用Lync Server并已获得授权供其员工使用的人员。
同步与协作
“跟踪讨论和想法”("Keeping track of discussions and ideas")一章汇集了OneNote 和 Lync的(OneNote and Lync)团队使用(team use)说明。重点是OneNote，它解释了如何通过Outlook和其他Office 应用程序(Office apps)共享文档，以及如何创建共享文件夹和列表。这就是《团队协作，使用 Microsoft Office 实现更有效的团队合作》(Team Collaboration, Using Microsoft Office for More Effective Teamwork)最终对大多数人有用的地方——这本书已经读到一半了。除了最常见的协作任务外，本节还包括对模板、参考、通过电子邮件共享页面和使用备份的描述。有一个简短的提及，人们不一定必须拥有Outlook接收共享项目。
有章节专门介绍如何与Word、Excel 和 PowerPoint(Excel and PowerPoint)进行协作。这本书暗示这种协作只能在Office 2010或更高版本上完成，这并不完全正确。较新的版本允许多人同时处理同一个文件。但是，如果不需要同时使用，我发现Office 2007（我使用的）也可以。作者假设这些共享文档将通过SharePoint or SkyDrive/OneDrive提供。SharePoint上可用的工具比OneDrive中的工具更加广泛和通用。追踪(Tracking)Word中的更改已经存在很长时间了。许多以前在文档上进行过合作的人都知道它是如何完成的。尽管如此，书中的描述对新手还是有用的，对更有经验的合作者也是一个很好的提醒。Excel中的注释和PowerPoint的共享使用也是如此。
最后，SkyDrive/OneDrive
最后一章解释了如何在SkyDrive（现在名为OneDrive）上进行协作。由于这是对很多人来说最实用的方法，我认为它应该首先被推荐。在7 Tutorials中，编辑人员通过OneDrive 和 Google Drive(OneDrive and Google Drive)进行协作，因此我们知道与OneDrive的联系是多么有价值。本书讨论了Office Web Apps（现在称为Office Online）并说明了这些应用程序的功能和限制。这本书的版权为 2012，在Office Online更名和更新之前。
判决
Team Collaboration, Using Microsoft Office for More Effective Teamwork专为需要设置Sharepoint的业务用户和 IT 管理员而设计。对于无法访问公司SharePoint 或 Lync 服务器(SharePoint or Lync servers)以及不管理SharePoint网站的人来说，其中的大部分内容将是无关紧要的。文风(writing style)枯燥、罗嗦、枯燥，材料本身有些过时。即使是目标受众(target audience)中的人也可能对此并不满意。这本书不是为普通读者设计的，它的语气也不会邀请人们阅读它。还有其他更好的书籍来解释文档共享和协作(sharing and collaboration)，它具有提供更好、更详细的一般Office参考的额外优势。(Office)无需在SharePoint上花费太多时间，这并不是真正的协作，而是管理Microsoft的企业协作平台(collaboration platform)。在购买之前，我们建议您查看其目录和免费示例章节(sample chapter)，并仔细检查它是否真正分享了您需要学习的内容。否则，最好远离这本书。
Book Review - Team Collaboration, Using Microsoft Office for More Effective Teamwork
It used to be that team collabоrаtion on documents was time-consuming and tedious. One person would write а drаft, give the draft to someone else to make changes, re-read the changes and dеcide whether to accept them, hаnd the document to someone else to edit, and so on. Nowadays sharіng documеnts iѕ evеry bit as easy as writing them, and many people can easily work on thе same document. Microsoft Office's suite of programs is designed for tеamwork, but not еveryone will find it instinctive at first. This is whеre a book like Team Collaboration, Using Microsoft Office for More Effective Teamwork could be a real gem. Does this book live up to the title's promise? As a long-time Office user, I was interested to find out. Let's see what I discovered.
This Book is Designed for Business
It's clear from the start that this book is designed for people working in a business environment and especially enterprises. It's also for people who are already familiar with recent editions of Office (since the introduction of the ribbon) and who don't need a tutorial on the basics. It's assumed that the reader has Office 2013 and that is what the illustrations show.
The book begins with a discussion of the concepts involved in teamwork (team dynamics, leadership by example, and so forth) that is unfortunately about as dry as a textbook, never using one word where a dozen will do. The author seems to want to be sure that every single obvious point is covered in dreary detail. I don't think I will be alone in reading paragraph after paragraph and wishing he'd get on with it already.
Collaboration in Office
The first chapter that actually talks about collaboration with Office describes using SharePoint in detail. Using SharePoint requires a subscription to Office 365 Small Business Premium or a higher level. Much of the SharePoint section is designed for people who administer SharePoint sites, and the author agrees that non-administrator users might find the information interesting but they won't be able to do much with it. There is no doubt that SharePoint is a wonderfully full-featured service, and if a business already has an Office 365 Small Business Premium subscription, SharePoint is built right in. The description of how to fully configure SharePoint to suit the team's particular needs is thorough and well illustrated.
However, the cost of the subscription may well be prohibitive for a lot of businesses. And the focus on administering SharePoint sites wastes a lot of space. A business that has gotten into SharePoint will almost certainly have its own trained administrators and its own policies. The next section describes teamwork through Outlook, but again, the focus, in the beginning, is on linking Outlook to a company SharePoint site. Once the book starts describing collaboration through OneNote, it becomes more valuable for the average user.
The book describes how to link Outlook to OneNote and how to make sure that team schedules, messages, and calendars are synced to shared notebooks. The calendar feature should be especially useful to keep track of various projects and ensure there are no scheduling conflicts.
There is a section describing team collaboration with Lync, but this would be of interest only to people whose businesses use Lync Server and have licensed it for use by their employees.
Sync and collaboration
The chapter called "Keeping track of discussions and ideas" brings together instructions for team use of OneNote and Lync. The focus is on OneNote, and it explains how to share documents via Outlook and other Office apps, and how to create shared folders and lists. This is where Team Collaboration, Using Microsoft Office for More Effective Teamwork finally gets down to being useful for most people—halfway through the book. Besides the most common collaborative tasks, this section also includes a description of templates, references, sharing pages via email, and using backups. There's a brief mention that people don't necessarily have to have Outlook to receive shared items.
There are chapters devoted to working collaboratively with Word, Excel and PowerPoint. The book implies that this kind of collaboration can only be done with Office 2010 or newer versions, which isn't quite true. The newer versions allow multiple people to work on the same file at the same time. But if that simultaneous use isn't necessary, I have found that Office 2007 (which is what I use) will do just as well. The author assumes that these shared documents will be made available via SharePoint or SkyDrive/OneDrive. The tools available on SharePoint are much more extensive and versatile than those in OneDrive. Tracking changes has been available in Word for a very long time. Many people who have collaborated on documents before will know how it's done. Still, the description in the book will be useful for newcomers and a good reminder for more experienced collaborators. The same goes for annotations in Excel and shared use of PowerPoint.
Finally, SkyDrive/OneDrive
The final chapter explains how collaboration can be done on SkyDrive (now named OneDrive). Since this is the most practical method for so many people, I think it should have been featured first. Here at 7 Tutorials the editorial staff collaborates via OneDrive and Google Drive, so we know how valuable connections with OneDrive can be. The book discusses the Office Web Apps (now called Office Online) and notes the apps' features and limitations. This book was copyright 2012, before Office Online was renamed and updated.
Verdict
Team Collaboration, Using Microsoft Office for More Effective Teamwork is designed for business users and IT administrators that need to set up Sharepoint. Much of it will be irrelevant for people who don't have access to corporate SharePoint or Lync servers and who don't administer SharePoint sites. The writing style is dry, wordy and dull, and the material itself is a bit out of date. Even people who are in the target audience might not be that pleased with it. This book just isn't designed for the average reader and its tone doesn't invite people to read it. There are other, better books that explain document sharing and collaboration, which have the added advantage of serving as much better, much more detailed references to Office in general. There's no need to spend so much time on SharePoint, which isn't really about collaborating but about administering Microsoft's collaboration platform for businesses. Before you buy it, we recommend that you take a look at its table of contents and its free sample chapter and double check if it truly shares what you need to learn. Otherwise, it is best to stay away from this book.
