Secure online editing for Microsoft Office 365

New feature in Objective Connect Enterprise Edition

It’s always an exciting day in the office when new features are delivered to Objective Connect, combining the collaborative effort and creativity of our entire team! Launched on Wednesday 18th of February, participants in an Objective Connect Workspace can now edit an Office document online and even co-author with multiple people without ever having to download a local copy.

A workspace owner can also allow participants to edit a document online and block download - a reassuring feature when you trust the person you are collaborating with, but not the machine they are using.




Get started with Objective Connect Online Edit today

An organisation has the option of when they wish to enable Online Edit. While an Office 365 license is not essential to enable the feature, anyone wishing to edit online (internal or external to the business) must have an Office 365 account.

Online Edit is enabled per Workgroup. From within Workgroup Administration, your Connect administrator needs to click Workgroup Options and then select 'Allow document edit in Office Online'. You're now ready to roll.

New workspace ability

When inviting a new participant to a Workspace, there will be the new Ability 'Edit Online'. This Ability can be applied to Participants in new workspaces and even your workspaces you have open today.

Once a participant has the Ability applied, they can select 'Online Edit' for Word, Excel and PowerPoint documents; a new browser tab will open. The participant can now start editing. Once the user exits the edit session, a new version is recorded in Connect. If ConnectLink is in place this version is then synchronised to Micro Focus Content Manager or Objective ECM.

Co-author with participants

Participants who have the 'Online Edit' ability applied can now co-author documents with people in the workspace. Whether they are across the office or on the other side of the world, multiple people can update a document in real-time.

As each person moves into edit mode, the action is captured in the workspace record. The last contributor to exit the online edit session will be attributed to the latest version in Connect.

Create new documents in the cloud

The integration with Office 365 gives participants the capability to create new Word, Excel and PowerPoint documents directly in the cloud. Click the Action Button, select Create > Online Office Document.

Security-first approach

We understand that government grade security and good collaboration governance is vital for public sector and regulated industries. We have added some additional features to ensure information security when working on sensitive information with external partners.

  • Edit without download: You can apply the 'Online Edit' Ability and not the 'Download' Ability. This will give you peace of mind that copies of your confidential information is never out of your control and saved to a local hard drive. To support this feature, a participant cannot open the Office document on the desktop app
  • Block sharing outside of Connect: When editing a document, the participant is blocked from further sharing via Office 365. If the document needs to be shared, this must be done from Connect
  • Print removed: The print function has also been removed. If you want to enable printing for a participant, it means that you are happy for the document to be out of the secure workspaces of Connect. If this is the case, apply the 'Download' Ability so the participant can print from a local copy.


Announcing Secure Online Edit to Connect Community

We have advised our Connect Administrators about this exciting new feature, providing them a 'head start' on their team. On the 2nd of March we will also be advertising the feature on the log in page of Connect.

Upgrade from Objective Connect Standard to Enterprise Edition today

If you are currently on a Standard Subscription and would like to upgrade to an Enterprise Edition of Connect, reach out to your Connect Customer Success Manager. We will have you up and running in minutes.

Get started with Objective Connect secure online editing. Download the guide.