EBAX for SharePoint

Overview

Installs a new "SharePoint" tab in Excel
Easy to navigate ribbon allows you select Sites, Lists, and Views to Update.

Update SharePoint Lists and Document Libraries from Excel
EBAX is as simple as select your site,list, view. Press the "Populate" button. Make changes. Then press "Update Data". If there are any errors, the Status column will allow you to correct the issue and then just "Update Data" again.

Column Validation as you type in Excel
The column has a range set (between 1 and 10). EBAX will turn the row red telling you the data is not valid. EBAX supports most SharePoint column types and validations.

Maintain Managed MetaData columns
Managed MetaData columns (Available in SharePoint 2010) can easily be modified with EBAX. EBAX for SharePoint will maintain security structures in place and even allow users to create new terms.

Compatible with External Lists
External Lists and External Content type columns (Available in SharePoint 2010) allow users to manipulate line of business applications (SQL, Access, etc) through SharePoint lists. With EBAX for SharePoint, users can also use the familiar layout of Excel to manipulate and update external list information.

Offline Capable
With EBAX for SharePoint, taking your lists with you is as easy as ever. Just populate the data to download from SharePoint, and save the workbook. Make your changes in Excel while offline and once you are online again click update data to put your changes into SharePoint.

Cross Listing
Cross listing is the act of displaying 2 related lists at the same time. Think of accounts and contacts: You can have many contacts for one account. In SharePoint there is most likely a lookup field in the contact list that tells what account the contact belongs to.

Cross listing with EBAX allows users to see, add, and edit multiple lists at the same time. With cross listing, displaying “1 to Many” and “Many to 1” relationships is intuitive. You can view your account list with all of the contacts, or the contact list with all of the account information. Both lists are fully editable (something not available out of the box in SharePoint 2010)!

No Server Side Installation
EBAX is a pure Excel add-on. There is no server side component to install or configure! Once it is installed on the desktop, you are ready to begin working with your SharePoint data from within Excel.


Richtext Supported
EBAX supports Richtext (HTML) columns. To enable richtext editing, just double click on the cell and our richtext editor will open.

Works with SharePoint Online
EBAX works with SharePoint Online and other SharePoint hosting vendors. For more information about SharePoint Online - visit SharePoint Online

Reporting
The wonderful thing about EBAX is that you get all of the power of Excel with your SharePoint lists. Use EBAX to populate the data set and then use Excel to create charts and pivot tables. If you see something is incorrect in your dataset, make the change and click update data (rather than having to go to SharePoint, make the change, export the data and create the chart again). Your changes are made instantly in Excel and SharePoint. If you need to refresh your data set, just click populate data to download a fresh set of data. Your charts and pivot tables will adjust automatically!



Increases SharePoint User Adoption
We all have employees who love to work in Excel and don’t want to learn or try anything new. EBAX is perfect because it keeps the user in Excel and your data in SharePoint.

• IT uses EBAX for importing and data correction
• Sales use EBAX for maintaining pipelines.
• Marketing uses EBAX for setting up demonstration data
• Executives use EBAX for reporting

Based on SharePoint views
EBAX uses SharePoint views to populate the data into Excel. This makes EBAX practically a zero configuration tool!

Video

Cross List

Cross listing is viewing two lists at the same time that are related in some way. You probably are using related lists now by using the lookup field in SharePoint. The lookup field populates with values from another list. With EBAX you will not only be able to view and edit that lookup field, but you will also be able to view and edit any field from that related list. With EBAX Cross Listing you will even see how many records are linked to the lookup record with one to many and many to one groupings.

There are 3 methods of cross listing that EBAX supports:

1) Lookups – Described above, lookup fields populate with values from another list. Lookups can be used in many different scenarios. From contacts linked to accounts, to addresses displaying Countries (instead of typing in a country, the country can be a list that gets selected in a drop down)
2) Mult-select lookups – Multi-select lookups are the exact same as lookups except that allow many values instead of only
3) User Defined – EBAX is not limited to using the linking tools located in SharePoint. With user defined cross lists, you can create a cross list based on any two similar fields.

EBAX supports viewing cross lists from both sides. Need to display you contacts and then display the account address with them? Done. Need to display you account names and then all of the contacts that are associated to that account? Done. With EBAX all of these things are a few clicks away.

A Cross List Story:

Bob the salesman is working on his sales opportunities. The Opportunity list has a lookup field to accounts. Bob just closed a deal, so he needs to update the Opportunity status for AAA publishing. While on the call with AAA publishing, Bob’s contact mentions a new project that could be implemented. Because of this Bob adds a new opportunity for the same client AAA publishing. After that, a new opportunity arrives through email for a new account. Bob creates both the Account and Opportunity record in the same row and using EBAX updates all of his data at the same time.

Figure 1 Bob's opportunity data entry screen in SharePoint

 

Figure 2 Bob's opportunity data entry screen with EBAX (with client information in a cross list).

Figure 3 Bob closes one opportunity and creates another (row 6 and 10)

Figure 4 The New opportunity and account are created at the same time (Row 11).

Figure 5 Bob clicks "Update Data" and all of the records are created / modified at once.

Bob can also see view his opportunities by looking at them from the account side using an associated cross list.

Figure 6 Viewing Bob's opportunities through his Accounts

Bob could create another opportunity this way just by inserting a row

Figure 7 A new opportunity is created by inserting a row. EBAX is intelligent enough to know what account the opportunity is related to and links them when “Update Data” is clicked.

 

Bob can also create reports using EBAX with cross listing. All he needs to do is set the “Fill for Reports” option in the cross list configuration and then he can create a pivot table to display all of his opportunities by state.

Figure 8 Setting the Fill for Reports option turns off grouping and creates a dataset suited for reporting.

Figure 9 Bob's dataset without fill for reports

Figure 10 Bob's data set with Fill for reports

Figure 11 Bob creates a pivot table report using his cross listed data

Managed Metadata

Managed Metadata is the most exciting feature of SharePoint 2010!

With Managed Metadata columns, administrators can set their metadata across site collections for a more efficient taxonomy. For end users, the Managed Metadata column will help with categorizing documents, tasks, and other lists by allowing multiple terms to a single record, allowing terms to be added to the term list, and auto complete / synonyms for terms.

The only problem is that you can’t edit the managed metadata columns inside of the datasheet view. They are kept as read only. That’s where EBAX for SharePoint comes to the rescue! With EBAX for SharePoint maintaining your MetaData has never been easier! Utilizing a drop down or our Managed Term screen your users will be able to update and maintain all of the metadata at once with the power and ease of Excel.

External Lists

External lists are one of the many exciting new features of SharePoint 2010.

With External Lists line of business applications (like Access or SQL databases) can be manipulated using SharePoint lists! Now instead of multiple applications you can use SharePoint and combine them all.



The only problem is that with external lists, you can’t export to Excel and you definitely can’t synchronize with Excel. That’s where EBAX can save the day! With EBAX for SharePoint users will be able to work with their external lists just like any other list in SharePoint.

 

Designer

EBAX Designer for SharePoint is a tool for SharePoint administrators to implement an enterprise EBAX configuration and EBAX external List support. With EBAX designer for SharePoint global EBAX configuration files can be created for Cross lists, Pick Lists, and External List Associations.

Cross Lists: Users in EBAX can create Cross Lists (for more information regarding cross lists Click Here),with the designer, administrators can create cross lists for all of their users that show automatically.

Pick Lists: Picture this: Your external list has a status column that is a reference field to your status column. The external list just holds integer values (1,2,3) while the status table holds the meaning behind those values (1=Open, 2=Pending, 3=Closed). With External lists, this value will just be a text field. To create a rich experience for your user, administrators will need to create an association record which will just make the field look like a lookup and not a selection box. With EBAX Designer for SharePoint, any text field (not just External List text fields) can be converted into pick lists. To the EBAX user, the field is always a picklist.

Associations: With External lists, lookup columns are accomplished by creating associations. Due to the data structure of External lists, these association records need to be declared in EBAX for lookups to work correctly. EBAX Designer for SharePoint allows administrators to define these associations so that EBAX users can have a full easy to use front end experience.

FAQ

Can’t I just do this in the datasheet view?
Some benefits that EBAX has over the datasheet view:

• Most people pefer Excel
• Cross listing – You can edit multiple lists at the same time with EBAX as well as show 1 to many and many to 1 relationships.
• Offline Use – Put your list into an Excel sheet and take it with you
• Undo changes – With EBAX you can make changes to a row and then if you make a mistake you can mark the row to be ignored. With the datasheet view, if you move off of the row, the changes are made. If you don’t remember the previous value, you can lose the data.

Can’t I just use Access?
Using Access is almost the same as the data sheet view. If you want to update data in a grid, it is the same. Do your SharePoint users have Access? Do they want to use Access?

Can’t you update SharePoint lists from Excel out of the box?
No. In Excel 2003 there was functionality to modify SharePoint lists inside of Excel but it was removed in 2007. The functionality in Excel 2003 doesn’t have the capabilities that EBAX does: Cross listing, data validation and more!

Does EBAX require/work with Excel Services?
No. EBAX is a pure Excel add-on. Excel Services is using an Excel sheet as your data source for things like reporting. With EBAX your data source stays as the SharePoint list, you just access it from Excel.

IS EBAX like Power Pivot (Project Gemini)?
No. PowerPivot is a BI tool used to process large amounts of data. EBAX for SharePoint is a way of taking SharePoint list data and updating it from Excel. You can use EBAX as a BI tool but it’s not the same as PowerPivot.

Licensing

Licensing FAQ:

EBAX is sold in License Packs as outlined in our store.

Licensing requiring more than 100 seats - please contact us for Enterprise Licensing.

We have a special installer for clients using Excel on terminal services/Hyper-V. Please contact us for details

EBAX is based on a named user license. You are not required to have matching EBAX licenses count as your SharePoint license count. If your organization has 100 SharePoint CALs but only 50 would use EBAX you would only purchase 50 EBAX licenses.

Requirements

EBAX requires the following:

• WSS 3.0 or MOSS 2007 and above
• SharePoint Online/Office 365 is supported
• Microsoft Excel 2007 and above
• ASP .Net Framework 3.5**
• Visual Studio Tools for the Office System 3.0 Runtime (VSTO)**

** ASP .Net Framework 3.5 and VSTO are installed with EBAX if they are not previously installed. An internet connection is required during the installation.