Here are the steps to share either a file or a folder from your OneDrive account with another person, be it a Royal Roads employee or an external user with a Microsoft account, or the general public.

Granting access (Sharing content)

IMPORTANT: always use caution when granting access to others to content in your OneDrive account.

1. Open a browser and navigate to your OneDrive account: https://royalroadsca-my.sharepoint.com
   
   

2. Once there, click on “My files” (left-side menu). This will show you the contents of your OneDrive account in a folder structure, similar to what you see with Windows Explorer in your personal computer.

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3. If you want to share a file, navigate to the folder where the file exists.
   If you want to share a folder, navigate to the parent folder where that folder exists.
   If the folder you want to share exists in the root folder of OneDrive, stay where you are.
   
   

4. Hover your mouse over the name of the file or folder you want to share. This will cause a few icons to appear beside it. Click on the “Share” icon:

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5. That will open a dialog box where you will enter the email address of the people with whom you are sharing this file or folder:
   IMPORTANT: as you can see from the highlighted area below, it is here that you define what level of access you are granting to the people with whom this content is being shared. Be sure to provide the appropriate level of access.

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6. Click on Send. The resource has been shared.
   IMPORTANT: You probably noticed the “Copy link” option beside the “Send” button. You should avoid using it. If someone looses access to the resource (folder or file), revoke and re-grant their access instead. This will ensure that only the people you want accessing your files and folders will have access to them. The indiscrimate use of the link from “Copy link” may grant access to people you didn’t intend to share your content with.

What happens next?

That depends on with whom you shared your resources:

RRU Community

If you shared the file or folder with someone that has a “@royalroads.ca” account, they will see your content if they click the “Shared” button from the left-side menu (see that option in the screenshot above, just below “My files”).

Microsoft customer

If you are sharing this resource with someone outside Royal Roads that has a Microsoft account, they should not have any issues logging into their account and, using the link they received when the resource was shared, be able to see it.

NOTE: they would not see anything outside the resources you shared with them (sibling folders, parent folders, other files in the same folder, etc)

General Public

For the general public, accessing shared files has a few extra steps.

Each time they click on the link that they received in the original email (the one sent to them when you shared the resource), they will be prompted to enter their email address (to confirm that the person who’s trying to access is the person to whom the access was given). If the email is corrected, they will be prompted to enter a “confirmation code”. This “confirmation code” is sent, at that time, to that same email address. Once they enter the “confirmation code”, they will see the same content, i.e., the folder or file you shared with them.

What if they lose the link?

If the person with whom you shared the resource tells you that they lost the URL (for example, deleted the email or didn’t bookmark the URL), it is advisable that you revoke their access and re-grant it following the steps above (see how to revoke access below).

Revoking access (Stop sharing your content)

To revoke someone’s access to the resource (folder or file):

1. Open a browser and navigate to your OneDrive account: https://royalroadsca-my.sharepoint.com
   
   

2. Once there, click on “My files” (left-side menu). This will show you the contents of your OneDrive account as a folder structure, similar to what you see with Windows Explorer in your personal computer.

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3. If you want to revoke the access to a file, navigate to the folder where the file exists.
   If you want to revoke the access to a folder, navigate to the parent folder where that folder exists.
   If the folder to which access you want to revoke exists in the root folder of OneDrive, stay where you are.
   
   

4. Hover your mouse over the name of the file or folder you want to share. That will cause a few icons to appear beside it. Click on the ellipsis icon and, from the drop-down menu, select “Manage Access”:

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5. That will open a dialog box that shows everybody with whom you shared that access. Click on the name of the person you want the access revoked:

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6. That will open a new dialog box, specific about that person.
   NOTE that it will be different depending on this person being from Royal Roads or from other organizations.
   Click on the area that shows the access you are trying to revoke:
   If from Royal Roads:

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   If NOT from Royal Roads:

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7. This will open it for editing. Click on the down arrow and, from the options that will show, select “Remove direct access”:
   If from Royal Roads:

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   If NOT from Royal Roads:

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8. This will trigger a confirmation pop-up. Just confirm it:

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9. That person will disappear from the list of people with access to your resource. Please note the small icon at the top of that same dialog box. It allows you to re-grant access from here, without the need to close this dialog box and use the “Share” icon again:

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