Questions everyone asks

It became your department's SharePoint document library — same folders, same files. In File Explorer, look under Carolina Meadows in the left-hand pane. On the web, open your department's SharePoint site and click Documents. The Accessing Your Files page has the full map.

It became your OneDrive. In File Explorer it's the entry labeled OneDrive – Carolina Meadows with the cloud icon. On the web, sign in at office.com and choose OneDrive from the app launcher (the nine-dot grid).

Search beats browsing. On the web, open your department's site and type a few words into the search box at the top — it searches file names and the text inside documents. In File Explorer, click into the library and use the search box at the top right. Still missing? It may sit in a different library or in someone's OneDrive — ask a teammate who used it last, or contact the IT Help Desk; nothing was deleted in the migration.

No. That's one of the biggest improvements. Any computer with a web browser will do: sign in at office.com with your work account. The File Explorer setup only exists on your configured work computer, but the web works everywhere.

Yes. Opening, saving, renaming, dragging, copying — it all works the way it always has, from the same left-hand pane. The one difference is the small status icons beside files, explained on the File Explorer page. That said, do give the web interface a try: it's the preferred way forward and it can do things File Explorer can't, like search inside documents and restore old versions.

Clicking a file on the SharePoint web page opens the quick browser version by default. To use the full desktop program instead, select the file, then choose Open → Open in app. Files opened from File Explorer always use the desktop apps. Both edit the same copy, so use whichever you prefer.

Almost certainly not. Deleted files go to the site's Recycle bin (left-hand menu on the SharePoint site) and stay restorable for 93 days. Open the recycle bin, tick the file, and click Restore — it returns to exactly where it was. Files deleted from OneDrive work the same way via OneDrive's own recycle bin. Past 93 days, contact the IT Help Desk right away.

Yes — this is version history's moment. Right-click the file (in File Explorer or on the web), choose Version history, and you'll see every saved version with dates and names. Open the one you want and restore it. Microsoft's step-by-step guide walks through it.

Nobody. Open it at the same time and you'll both edit live, each seeing the other's changes and cursor. It works in the browser and in the desktop apps. If you ever see a “locked for editing” message, the file was likely opened from an old local copy — make sure everyone opens it from the library.

Send a link instead of an attachment: select the file, click Share (on the web or from the right-click menu in File Explorer), choose who the link should work for, and send. Your colleague opens the one true copy — no duplicates flying around by email. Microsoft's sharing guide covers the details.

Files you've recently opened are usually already on your computer and keep working; changes sync when the connection returns. For anything you must have in an outage or on the road, right-click it in File Explorer and choose Always keep on this device. Online-only files (the blue cloud icon) do need a connection to open.

That's a sync hiccup. Click the blue cloud icon near the clock in the bottom-right of your screen — it will tell you what's wrong (often it just needs you to sign in again). If the cloud icon is grayed out or missing, or the problem persists more than a few minutes, contact the IT Help Desk. Don't keep editing an unsynced file for hours — sort the sync first so nothing diverges.

Two common causes: the library isn't synced to your computer (IT can add it in a minute), or you don't have permission to that library yet. Either way, the IT Help Desk can fix it quickly — tell them which department's files you need. Meanwhile, check the web interface: if you can see it there, it's just a sync setup issue; if not, it's permissions.

Microsoft updates the SharePoint interface from time to time, so a button occasionally moves or gets renamed. The concepts on this site stay true even when the pixels shift. If a difference trips you up, let the IT Help Desk know — we keep these pages current.