SProbot enables you to create both and SharePoint and Teams templates. This guide explains how snapshots enable SharePoint workspace templates to work by capturing the detailed configuration of a SharePoint team site to be re-used at a future point in time.
But first...
What is a SharePoint team site template?
A SharePoint site template is a combination of structure, settings and certain portions of content that enables SharePoint workspaces to be repeatedly created in a standardized way. Templates enable workspaces to be created by administrators, or by end-users themselves through pipeline requests.
This guide is about SharePoint templates, read more about Teams templates here.
What is a snapshot?
A snapshot is a detailed definition of the structure and configuration of a SharePoint team site. Snapshots also include some of the content which may be contained in a team site, such as pages. SProbot stores snapshots in the form of JSON payloads.
Snapshots of a source site can be taken at different points in time. A snapshot taken 5 minutes ago will be different to a snapshot taken right now if changes were made to the site between then and now. It is this characteristic which enables you to update the configuration of your template by making changes to the source site as and when you need to, and then taking a new snapshot.
The latest snapshot is always the active one for the template, meaning workspaces built using the template will always be based on the active snapshot.
What is included in snapshots?
SharePoint team site snapshots include:
- Libraries
- Folders
- Pages
- Navigation
- Permissions (SharePoint groups, AD groups, Microsoft 365 groups) at site and library level
On pages, snapshots only include the following content and web parts:
- The Title area including the page title and header image
- Text web parts and their contents
- Document libraries added to the page
- Button web parts
- The Site activity web part
What is excluded from snapshots?
At the moment, SProbot snapshots do not include:
- Library and list content
- Custom list columns
- Content types
- Site columns
- Web parts on Pages not listed under "What is included"
- Permissions at folder and item level (best practice recommendations are to not apply permissions further down than library level)
Head over to create a SharePoint template to get started with using snapshots to build sites.
More guides
This guide shows you how to use the pipeline rules in SProbot to require multiple owners to be specified when a workspace is created.
This guide shows you how to use the pipeline rules feature in SProbot to apply different storage quotas to different types of workspaces.
Use the categorisation functionality in SProbot to classify workspaces according to region, business unit, area, or any other tag relevant in your organisation.
