Sharing OneNote without Sharepoint

[RSlaton]

I would like to share a notebook with some family members in order to
collaborate notes. We aren't networked so I can't put it on a network drive.
Everybody needs to be able to edit the notebook so just emailing them the
onenote file isn't feasible either. And I can't afford to buy a server
computer with sharepoint and all that. I have played around with trying to
share it with SkyDrive and Live Workspaces but it doesn't seem to work that
way. Is there some sort of hosting site that will work with OneNote that I
don't know about? Or are there places that will sell you a little space on a
sharepoint server?

 

[Michael]

There are places you can get Sharepoint Server space from. I do not think
the Skydrive or Live Workspaves will work.

 

[hey_tommy]

You can use Office Live Small Business to get this functionality for free -
and I am currently using that solution myself and can confirm it works
excellent.

Go to http://smallbusiness.officelive.com/ and create an account (using your
existing Windows Live ID account - or you can set up a new Window Live ID if
you like).

Once there, go to the Business Applications section (which is basically the
SharePoint portion of your Office Live account) - you'll find it under the
'More' menu option in the top navigation bar.

The first time you click there, you'll be asked to wait while the Business
Applications feature is activated (a few minutes - basically, it's creating a
new SharePoint workspace).

You can then use the default 'Documents' document library in the default
Document Manager application - or alternatively, add a new application and/or
a new document library.

With the basic, free service, you can have up to 5 different users including
yourself. Each user login is based on an email address, but if that email
address doesn't already have a Live ID associated with it, that user will be
required to create one (and keep in mind you can create a Live ID for ANY
email address - not just the Microsoft ones ending in hotmail.com or
live.com). Also, your Business Applications area (ie, the SharePoint portion
of your Office Live Small Business account) allows you up to 50 MB of
storage.

You can upgrade either the storage or the number of users (or both) for a
*very* reasonable price - you'll see links to it in the associated areas - or
conversely, you can go to Add/Manage Services option in the top navbar's
'More' submenu.

To create a shared notebook in your document library of choice, make note of
its URL when you've navigated to it via clicking its tab in your business
application - and strip away the 'Forms/AllItems.aspx' at the end.

In OneNote, select to create a new notebook, choose a name and a template
(or use the blank template) and click Next. Then select 'Multiple people will
use this notebook' and 'On a server' radio buttons - and next once again. And
finally, enter the URL you've noted (once again, with 'Forms/AllItems.aspx'
stripped from its end) - make note of the full path URL being show right
below the URL text field - it's basically that same URL you pasted, with your
notebook's chosen name as the subdirectory - and this is what you'll give out
to other users (and what will appear in the email that's automatically
created for you to send out to your partners if you leave the checkbox below
checked when you hit 'Create').


Hope this helps. Let me know if you have any further questions,

Tom

 

[RSlaton]

It seems so close to working but right after it asks if I want to create the
folder it errors and says OneNote was unable to create the folder. I guess
there is some sort of permission problem somewhere, but it's getting real
late, I'll have to look at it more tomorrow. Thank you so much though for
pointing this out, it seems very useful for a number of ideas I have. I think
tomorrow I'm going to see if I can get Windows to map a drive to the
documents folder, maybe that will make the permissions a bit more straight
forward. Any ideas?

 

[hey_tommy]

Yes, I think I might have one idea that might be causing this.

First of all, I'm going to assume that this is NOT a permissions issue,
since you are the creator of the Office Live account, so you automatically
get Owner permissions on everything. But if you are having this issue with
one of the accounts you added in the Users & Permissions section of Account
Management, then it's possible they don't have the permissions to create new
folders (they need to at least have the Editor permission for that Business
Application).

Did you create a brand new Windows Live ID for this? And do you normally use
a Windows Live ID on your machine for things like Live Messenger or Windows
Live Mail? Also, are you a Vista user?

If that's the case, your machine caches the credentials and would try to use
these cached credentials to log into Office Live Workspace when using the
WebDAV mini-redirector (or the full legacy WebDAV client) - which is what
gets used in things like Open dialog boxes or Windows Explorer.

If you indeed created a new Live ID account, the cached Live ID account
isn't authorized to access the workspace (unless, of course, you added it as
one of those 5 accounts that are allowed to use the workspace - which is one
way to remedy this - but then you waste an account).

I was having somewhat similar issue, so I had to clear the cached
credentials - which could fix the problem entirely, but it might interfere
with other things that utilize the Live ID / Passport credentials on your
machine.

So first thing you should do (if this applies to you - that is, if you did
indeed create a new Live ID for your Office Live Small Business account) is
clear the cached credentials.

Open your Advanced User Accounts Control Panel - easiest way of doing this
is by typing "control userpasswords2" in the Run or Start Menu search box and
hitting Enter. You might get a UAC prompt in Vista, so accept if necessary.
Once it loads, click the Advanced tab and click Manage Passwords button.

Once the Stored User Names and Passwords dialog box opens, scroll down and
delete all the entries *starting* with Passport or WindowsLive and hit close.
You can also back things up just in case with the Back Up button before
making the deletions.

Once you've cleared the credentials, restart your machine and attempt to
create the shared notebook from OneNote once again. This time, you should be
prompted for a user name and password - enter your Live ID credentials, check
"Save Password" and you should be good to go.

Now, as I said, this may screw things up - I'm not sure whether and/or how
this interfaces with Windows Live Sign-in Assistant (a pretty useful
component that gets installed with Windows Live Messenger - which allows you
to store credentials for multiple Live accounts).

Anyhoo, if it works OK in the beginning, but then messes up later on, then
you know it's related to Windows Live ID credential caching. If this solution
doesn't fix it, then it's probably something else - so please get back and
let us know either way.

Now, if it DOES work at first and gets messed up - which means it has to do
with multiple Live ID credentials being used in your user account, and the
wrong cached credential being supplied to Office Live - then there are TWO
possible solutions.

The first one would be to either create an Office Live Small Business
account that is associated with your main Live ID that you use for Hotmail,
Messenger, etc.

The second one would be to simply add your main Live ID account that you use
for other Live services as one of those 5 users authorized to access your
Office Live workspace (and give it the appropriate permissions in Office
Live).


Hopefully that wasn't too much info... was trying to cover all
possibilities, lol.

Good luck, and let me know where you stand.


Tom

 

[hey_tommy]

Sorry, I should have really read my response before posting - 2
clarifications, as I think it might be confusing in some places.

1. When I'm talking about 'main Live ID account', I'm talking about the
account that you use for your Hotmail, Live Messenger, Live Mail, etc - which
is different from the Live ID account you created (or another Live ID account
you associated) when setting up Office Live Small Business. This means that
if the Live ID you used to create the Office Live account IS the usual Live
ID account you use on the machine, this solution scenario probably doesn't
apply (although clearing the cached Passport / Live credentials will do no
harm at all - so you may as well try give it a try).

2. When I said "this may screw things up" - what I really meant was that it
may affect which Live ID the Live Sign-In Assistant uses for various services
- but there is no "screwing up" of any kind - and actually, on my machine
(Vista Ultimate SP2 x86), this did NOT affect the login on any of the Windows
Live Essentials programs (Messenger, Live Mail, etc) - that is, continued
working as before. So that was really a bad choice in phrasing on my part -
sorry for the possible confusion.

 

[RSlaton]

It's no problem, I got the idea. I was in IT for many years till I made a
recent career change. But anyway...

I used the same Live ID that I use for everything else. I tried removing
them anyway and restarting but it still says that it can't create a new
notebook at the location. I tried removing the last "documents" folder from
the address and making a new application and pre-adding the folder that
OneNote would use and I still get the message every time. The strange thing
to me is that it still gives the "The location doesn't exist, would you like
to create it" box when I pre-added the OneNote folder for it; but it might be
giving that message for the file inside that folder that it creates.

Wait, I just had a thought while I was typing that. I turned off my norton
firewall and autoprotect temporarily and tried it and bingo it opened. I'll
have to play with that some and fine out what I can add to the firewall list
or whatever to let it through before I get everybody else to do it.

Thanks again so much for your help in this. It's even better of a solution
than I wanted. We can add all kinds of documents and such on here too to
share.