 Microsoft Teams

This article is the starting point for anyone working with files in Microsoft Teams at Bowdoin, and it points to the knowledge base article that covers each task. It contains no procedures of its own, and every article it names is listed in the Related Articles section.

An overview of what Microsoft Teams does at Bowdoin, who can use it, and its key collaboration features. Includes a curated set of Microsoft training articles and videos that walk through getting started, chatting, sharing files, meetings, channels, and more. Applies to all Bowdoin students, faculty, and staff.

A step-by-step guide for departments moving shared files from the Microwave department drive (J:) to Microsoft Teams, in partnership with the Service Desk. Covers requesting help, designing a Team structure, reviewing and grouping files by destination, and completing the transition.

Explains how OneDrive, Microsoft Teams, and SharePoint fit together, where a file actually lives depending on whether you put it in OneDrive, a Teams chat, or a Teams channel, and how to decide where your own work belongs. Points to the step-by-step articles for moving files and for reaching them from File Explorer or Finder.

An explanation of how Microsoft Teams organizes work into channels, how permissions work across teams and channels, and where files are stored in the linked SharePoint site. Covers standard, private, and shared channels, owner and member roles, the folder structure behind Teams, managing channel settings, and best practices. Applies to Bowdoin students, faculty, and staff.

One table collecting the limits that apply to files in Microsoft Teams, SharePoint, and OneDrive at Bowdoin: file size, path length, item counts, sharing link and guest expiration, and how long deleted files are kept. Also covers how to structure Teams and channels, how to name files so they do not fail to sync, how to connect Teams files to your computer, and what happens when a Team goes inactive or someone leaves the College. Applies to Bowdoin students, faculty, and staff.

How to sync a Microsoft Teams channel folder or a folder shared with you so it appears in File Explorer or Finder, what a live two-way sync connection means for shared files, how to choose which folders come across, and how to stop syncing and reclaim the space.

This article gives a department a structure to start from when moving shared files off the Microwave (J:) drive into a Microsoft Team. It includes two worked examples, the naming and nesting rules that keep the result usable, and guidance on what belongs in OneDrive instead.

Step-by-step instructions for creating a new team in Microsoft Teams for department or project collaboration and file storage. Covers opening Teams, choosing a template and privacy setting, naming the team, adding members and assigning roles, setting up channels, and customizing the team. Applies to Bowdoin students, faculty, and staff.

This article explains why desktop shortcuts, recent file lists, spreadsheet links, browser bookmarks, and email signatures stop working after a department's files move from the Microwave (J:) drive into Microsoft Teams. It describes how to repoint each kind of link at its new location and why repairing links as they fail beats auditing every file at once.

How to move files into a Microsoft Teams channel safely, whether they are coming from OneDrive, from Microwave, or from your own computer. Explains which method keeps a file's version history, why to copy and verify before deleting the originals, and what to check before moving a folder. Applies to Bowdoin students, faculty, and staff.

Instructions for scanning to a network folder from a PaperCut-enabled multi-function device (MFD) on campus. Note: scanning to a network folder is a legacy feature being deprecated in favor of scanning to OneDrive, email, or Teams/SharePoint. Network scan folders must be requested through IT and are not created automatically.

Troubleshooting steps for when the Microsoft Teams desktop app on a Mac cannot use the camera, microphone, or screen sharing. Covers checking and granting camera, microphone, and screen recording permissions in System Settings, triggering the permission pop-up, fully quitting and reopening Teams, adding Teams to the permission lists manually, and resetting the permissions. Applies to anyone using the Teams desktop app on a Mac.

This article explains which kinds of files stop working, or lose data, when they are placed in a Microsoft Teams channel. It lists the file types a department should leave out of a migration from the Microwave (J:) drive and names where each type belongs instead.

How to add a Teams channel folder or a shared folder to your OneDrive so it appears in File Explorer or Finder on every computer you sign in to, how to make its files available offline, and how to remove the shortcut again. Removing a shortcut never deletes files. Applies to Bowdoin students, faculty, and staff.

Whether to add a shortcut or sync when you want Microsoft Teams channel files and shared folders to appear in File Explorer or Finder. Compares the two options, explains which one follows you between computers and which is tied to a single machine, and covers switching from one to the other.

This article explains how to search for a file in Microsoft Teams, SharePoint, and OneDrive, and what each search box actually covers. It also lists the common reasons a file that exists does not appear in your search results, and what to do next when no search turns the file up.

This article explains where a department's shared files live after they move from the Microwave department drive (J:) to Microsoft Teams. It covers how to open those files, how to reach them from File Explorer or Finder, and what changes compared with working on the J: drive.

Explains how to find a direct link to a folder or subfolder inside a Microsoft Teams channel by opening it in SharePoint and copying the browser address. These links are useful for automation, integrations, sharing, or troubleshooting. Applies to Bowdoin faculty, staff, and students using Microsoft Teams on the desktop or web.

This article explains how to open Word, Excel, and PowerPoint files stored in Microsoft Teams using the installed desktop apps instead of Teams or a browser. It covers setting the desktop app as the default, opening a single file in the desktop app, and what to check when a file opens as read-only or when Office is not signed in with a Bowdoin account.

This article explains how to keep Microsoft Teams, SharePoint, and OneDrive files available on a computer when there is no internet connection. It covers marking files and folders to keep on a device, freeing that disk space again afterward, and what happens to edits made offline once the computer reconnects.

This article explains that a file attached to a Microsoft Teams chat is stored in the sender's own OneDrive and shared only with the people in that conversation, while a file posted in a channel is stored in the team's SharePoint library and is available to everyone with access to the channel. It covers how to tell the two apart, where meeting recordings are saved, and how to move a chat file into a channel.

This article explains why giving one person access to a single folder inside a standard channel usually causes more problems than it solves, and describes four better ways to reach the same result. It also covers what to record when a custom folder permission genuinely is required.

This article explains how an owner of a Microsoft Team at Bowdoin can choose between sending an external sharing link, using a shared channel, and adding a guest to the Team. It describes what a guest can see once added, the 180-day expiry on external access, and how to remove a guest when the work ends.

This article explains how a Team owner checks everyone who can reach the files in a Microsoft Team, including members, guests, people added directly in SharePoint, and anyone holding a sharing link. It also describes a short review a Team owner can repeat each quarter.

This article explains how to give another person access to a file or folder stored in Microsoft Teams, SharePoint, or OneDrive with a Bowdoin account. It covers the link types available, the difference between edit access and view access, and when adding a person to the Team is a better choice than sending a link.

Instructions for adding an approved app, such as OneNote or Planner, to a Microsoft Teams channel, and for requesting approval when an app is restricted. Explains what happens after a request is submitted and how to get help. Applies to Bowdoin students, faculty, and staff.

This article explains how a Team owner adds channels to a Microsoft Team that is already in use, moves files between channels without losing version history, and removes channels the department no longer needs. It also explains which channel changes cannot be undone.

Explains how a Team owner can make a folder in a Team read-only so members can view files but cannot edit, upload, or delete them. Because a Team's files are stored in a connected SharePoint site, the permission change is made in SharePoint. Applies to Bowdoin faculty and staff who own a Team.

Instructions for controlling Microsoft Teams notifications, including general preferences such as sounds and previews, chat and channel notification settings, muting a specific chat, managing notifications for a channel, and reducing noise from less active channels. Applies to Bowdoin students, faculty, and staff using Teams on Windows, macOS, or the web.

Instructions for team and channel owners on adding, removing, and changing the roles of members in Microsoft Teams. Covers managing members of a team, a private channel, and a shared channel, explains owner, member, and guest roles, and lists reasons membership may not be editable. Applies to Bowdoin team and channel owners.

This article explains what changes and what stays the same when a Microsoft Team or one of its channels is renamed. It covers why the SharePoint web address keeps the old name, what other people notice afterward, and the order a Team owner should work in.

Explains how a Team owner can limit file sharing in a Team so that only owners can create sharing links or invite others to files and folders. Because Teams files are stored in a connected SharePoint site, the change is made in the site's sharing settings. Applies to Bowdoin faculty and staff who own a Team, especially for confidential or restricted groups.

This article explains how to give a Microsoft Teams channel its own email address, so that messages, scans, and automated reports arrive where the team already works instead of in one person's mailbox. It covers getting the address, limiting who may send to it, removing it, and when a different approach fits better.

This article gathers everything a Bowdoin Microsoft Team owner is responsible for into one page. It covers the controls only owners have, why every Team needs at least two owners, membership and guest reviews, expiration notices, deletion risk, restricted data, and a recurring checklist, with each procedure named in the Related Articles section.

Instructions for archiving a Microsoft Team so its conversations and files become read-only, restoring an archived Team, and making specific SharePoint folders read-only when a whole Team cannot be archived. Also explains what happens to files in an archived Team and the Microsoft 365 Team expiration policy. Applies to Bowdoin Team owners and members.

This article explains what deleting a Microsoft Team removes, including the Team's SharePoint site and every channel's files. It also explains the 30 day window for recovering a deleted Team and why archiving is usually the better choice for a Team whose work is finished.

This article explains what happens to a Bowdoin colleague's files after that person leaves the College. It describes which files stay available, which files disappear with the departed account, how a department requests recovery of files held in a departed colleague's OneDrive, and how to keep the same loss from happening again.

This article explains what happens to a Microsoft Team when its only owner leaves Bowdoin, how to check whether a Team still has an active owner, and how to get ownership restored. It also lists the handover a departing Team owner should complete.

This article explains the email Microsoft sends to Team owners before an inactive Microsoft Team expires. It covers what the warning means, what counts as activity, how an owner renews a Team in one step, what is deleted if nobody acts, and what to do with a Team the department has finished using.

This article explains how version history works for files stored in Microsoft Teams, SharePoint, and OneDrive, where to find it, and how to put an earlier version of a file back. It also explains why restoring an older version does not erase newer ones.

This article explains why a Word, Excel, or PowerPoint file stored in Microsoft Teams, SharePoint, or OneDrive is sometimes locked, even though two people can normally edit the same file at the same time. It describes how to tell who is holding a file open, what checking a file out does, and how to keep working while a lock clears.

Explains the different ways to start or schedule a Microsoft Teams meeting, including an ad-hoc video, voice, or screen-sharing session from a chat, and scheduled meetings created in the Outlook desktop app, Outlook on the web, or the Microsoft Teams calendar. Applies to Bowdoin faculty, staff, and students using Microsoft Teams.

Explains how the owner of a video recorded in Microsoft Teams can download that video from Microsoft Stream to share it on another platform or keep a personal archive. Covers signing in to Microsoft 365, opening the Stream app, and downloading a video. Applies to Bowdoin faculty, staff, and students who own recorded Teams content.

Instructions for recording a class session in Microsoft Teams from an instructor computer that has a PTZ (pan-tilt-zoom) camera connected. Covers connecting the camera, starting and stopping the recording, and finding the saved recording. Applies to Bowdoin faculty and instructors using classroom computers.

This article explains how to schedule a webinar with a registration page in Microsoft Teams, customize the registration form, host the live event, and review attendance afterward. It is intended for Bowdoin faculty and staff who need to run larger, registration-based online events rather than standard meetings.

Explains why a Teams meeting organizer might want to limit participant privileges and how to use Meeting options to choose who can present. Applies to Bowdoin faculty, staff, and students who organize Microsoft Teams meetings.

Explains how to install the Microsoft Teams desktop app on a Bowdoin-issued computer, using Self Service on macOS or verifying the automatic installation on Windows. Teams is delivered to Bowdoin-issued computers automatically or through managed software tools. Installing Teams on a personal computer is covered in a separate article.

Explains how to download and install the Microsoft Teams desktop app on a personal or home computer running macOS or Windows 11. Applies to Bowdoin faculty, staff, and students installing Teams on a computer that is not Bowdoin-issued.

Explains how to clear the Microsoft Teams cache on Windows and macOS to resolve common problems such as freezing, sign-in errors, or content that fails to load. Covers quitting Teams, deleting the contents of the Teams cache folders, and restarting. Applies to anyone using the Teams desktop app on a Bowdoin computer.