Google
Suite

To maintain maximum security and privacy regarding the information managed by everyone, you need to know who you are sharing collaborative documents with and what permits they have.

You have two options when sharing a document:

1. In the Drive documents view, click the right-hand button on the mouse and then click on the sub-menu: Obtain link for sharing.

   Important: Enable the button to view the link, copy it (Crtl+C), and close it again. You can now send the link to the person you want. When the other person accesses it, you need to confirm the permit to be able to view, publish or comment that as owners of the document, you want to assign it. This is the safest way of controlling who can access your documents and minimizing the risk of information leaks.

2. Another way is, in the document itself, click on the top right-hand Share button.

   Here, you can enter the people, or preferably groups if this is the case, with whom you want to share the document. You can also assign permission for viewing, posting or commenting.

Under no circumstances should you share the link to the document directly without disabling it again or should you share any document with the entire uoc.edu domain, as this would put information privacy at serious risk.

Other recommendations:

• Create groups of people who work with a set of documents that you need to share, as it is much easier to manage permits from a group than person to person.
• Whenever possible, do not share @gmail.com, @hotmail.com or other personal addresses. Always use corporate addresses.
• When you decide to share a document, you need to define what type of permits it will have, as edit is the default setting. Always grant the minimum necessary level of sharing. In other words, do not grant edit permits to users who only need to view.
• Carefully assess the need to share a folder in edit mode and always decide who needs access to your documents. Public sharing of documents is not a recommended practice and it will mean that your documents will be seen (and even altered) by people who are not involved in your work.
• Remember that permits are inherited. If you generate new documents in folders that you are sharing, they will have the same permits as the shared documents.

• Do not use UOC Drive to store personal documents. Remember that this is a corporate Google Apps account and that all the data stored on it may be audited.
• Highlight the most important and most used files or according to the criteria you consider suitable: it will help you access them through Starred.
• You don’t need to download documents sent via email and then save them on the Drive. You can save them directly in your chosen My Drive location.
• Try not to use Google Drive offline for files that are altered by lots of different users or very frequently.
• Use advanced search to find the files. That will help you find the file you are looking for.
• When you comment on a document, get used to mentioning the person who will have to review it and add a note in the document by putting a + in front of their name. For example, +usuari@uoc.edu. The user will then receive a notification email with the comment they are mentioned in. The system will suggest that you add them to My contacts.
• Be careful when you alter a document simultaneously. If you’re working in the native Google format, you need to know that it allows all the users who have edit permission for the file to work simultaneously. Spreadsheets are a case in point, because while one cell is being edited, it is disabled for other collaborators until it has been released.
• We do not recommend automatic conversion. You should convert your files from Microsoft to Google format manually to ensure that it is done correctly. If you allow Drive to convert them without intervening yourself, you will risk the converted document not having the desired result.
• Always try and work with groups of editors, the specific group for the project. And grant comment or view permits only for this area and specific people.

• If you are the owner of the folder, we recommend that you prevent guests from being able to alter its structure.
• A folder structure with lots of layers may make it difficult to control files and makes the Drive structure too complicated in terms of controlling permits and sharing.
• The files that you share with us must be situated in different locations in our structure and not in Shared with me. Do not use Shared with me as a repository.
• Always give your elements a name. The name Untitled Document is assigned by default, but it is important to change this and help with the organization and subsequent search for the document.
• Do not give it the same name as your documents or folders. Even though Drive might allow it, this may lead to confusion when searching for or sharing elements.
• To maintain the history of changes to documents not in Google format, we recommend you use the Manage versions options by clicking the right-hand button on the file in Drive.
• When you delete a document, depending on whether it is a file that you have shared or one that has been shared with you, assess whether other people will need the document. Remember that it may affect the people with whom you are sharing it. If the file was not yours, neither the owner nor the other guests will be affected.
• Documents that you do not need to share and that are part of your work must be kept in the Professional private folder.

Each calendar and event can have different share permits. Therefore, even though a calendar can be viewed by all UOC personnel, the user can create private events. The default setting is that events will have the same visibility as the calendar in which they have been created.

• Users must always share their main calendar whenever possible, in other words, it must be fully visible so that others have access to the user’s meetings and events. Sharing the main calendar with their work department makes the diary more efficient to use. The project calendar must be shared with the work department by default and with everyone involved in the work that one decides.
• If you create an event that is personal or that is not of interest to others, you must classify it as private when you create it. This way, it will not be accessible to anyone.
• Try not to include sensitive information in the description of the event.

When configuring the event, you should take the following into account:

• The description must include the reason for the meeting and the objectives, but it must not include personal or sensitive information.
• If the meeting is to be held in a physical space, you must add the location of the event.
• You have the option of adding a document, spreadsheet or presentation to the event if you feel it’s necessary. This is useful especially if you want to add minutes of previous meetings, presentations or important documentation to help follow the meeting. Remember that guests must have permission to access this documentation.
• As far as possible, try and avoid adding local files.
• If you are thinking of calling a meeting via video conference (Hangouts), you need to be sure that you create the call using the Create button and not directly from the calendar, as this is the recommended way of ensuring that the hangout space for the meeting is independent and secure.

For invitations to other users, remember the following:

• Only invite people to the event who are really interested in it. If you want to inform someone about the event (but not for them to attend), you should add them as an optional guest and click the icon next to their name.
• If the people who have been invited have shared their calendar with the user, you should consult their availability when you create the event by clicking on the View availability tab.
• You also have the option where Google Calendar finds a suitable timeslot for all the guests. To do this, when you create an event, click on Finding a time below the guest list.
• Remember that you can invite people who are not on Google Apps, providing that they use a calendar system like Outlook.
• Every time the user makes changes to an event to which they have associated guests, Google Calendar will ask them if they want to send an update to the list. Remember that too many notifications about an event may irritate some people.

In terms of notifications, remember the following:

• It is important to specify the notifications that the user wants to receive before the event takes place. So, the best suggestion is that the system sends an email a short time before the event. Depending on the type of event, you need to change when the advance notification is sent out.

• Having Conversation history activity means that you can consult any professional conversations that have been held. Also, the most relevant conversations can be saved if necessary.
• Try not to block any users, because if you do you will not be able to send or receive messages from them, nor will you know if they are participating in a group conversation. Finally, you cannot make video calls to this person either.

• You should respect other people’s time and plan meetings by consulting the calendars.
• Also bear in mind that the number of video conference participants is limited to fifteen. When planning you should follow the agenda, which will help optimize everyone’s time and give an overview of who should be called to the meeting.
• When scheduling a video call or video conference, you should think of giving it a name that will identify the subject quickly.