Microsoft SharePoint Connector Deployment Overview

The following procedure outlines the steps needed to deploy the second generation Microsoft SharePoint connector. The SharePoint connector supports several SharePoint versions as well as various authentication modes. The configuration steps depend on the configuration of your SharePoint environment.

1. Validate that your environment meets the requirements: 

   • Coveo license for the Microsoft SharePoint connector

     Your Coveo license must include support for the Microsoft SharePoint connector to be able to use this connector (see What Information Is Displayed in the License Page?).

   • CES 7.0.8047+ (December 2015) (For SharePoint Online only) Configure DNS settings for Office 365 at your DNS hosting provider.

     1. Log in to Office 365 admin center with an administrator account.

     2. In the navigation bar on the left, select Setup, and then Domains.

     3. In the Home > Domains page, under Domain Name, click your corporate domain (company.onmicrosoft.com).

     4. In the [domain name] page, in the DNS settings section, take note of the DNS records.

     5. Configure these DNS records in your DNS host provider (see Create DNS records at any DNS hosting provider for Office 365).

     6. In the [domain name] page, in the DNS records section, click the Troubleshoot domain link to ensure the DNS records were correctly configured.

   • CES 7.0.6767+ (June 2014) [more]

   • ADFS requirements

     When your SharePoint environment uses ADFS as a trusted identity provider, your ADFS setup must meet specific requirements (see ADFS Server Requirements for a Claims Security Provider).

   • Okta requirements

     When your SharePoint environment uses Okta as an SSO provider, your Okta setup must meet specific requirements (see Okta Single Sign-On Provider for SharePoint On-Premises).

   • Supported SharePoint version:

     • SharePoint Online

     • CES 7.0.8541+ (September 2016) SharePoint 2016 (on-premises)

     • SharePoint 2013 (on-premises)

       • Microsoft SharePoint Foundation 2013

       • Microsoft SharePoint 2013 (SharePoint 2013)

     • SharePoint 2010 (on-premises)

       • Microsoft SharePoint Foundation 2010 (WSS 4)

       • Microsoft SharePoint 2010 (SharePoint 2010)

     Notes:

     • You can index on-premises SharePoint 2007 content with the SharePoint Legacy connector (see Microsoft SharePoint Legacy Connector).

     • Coveo Platform 7 does not support indexing SharePoint 2003 content.

2. Referring to the following table, identify the SharePoint environment type that you want to index (Classic, Claims, or Online type).

   SharePoint environment type	SharePoint Version	Online		2016/2013/2010 on-premises
   	Web app authentication	Office 365 Native	SSO ADFS	Classic Windows	Claims-based	Okta
   Classic				✓
   Claims					✓	✓
   Online		✓	✓

3. On your SharePoint farm (tenant in SharePoint Online):

   1. Select or create a user that the connector will use to crawl your SharePoint content. Refer to the following table to identify the required type of user for your type of SharePoint environment.

      SharePoint environment	SharePoint Web Application Enabled authentication	Type of user	User format
      Classic (2010, 2013, or 2016)	Windows	Windows account	domain\username or username@domain.com
      Claims (2010, 2013, or 2016)	Windows	Windows account
      	ADFS	ADFS SSO
      	Okta	Okta SSO	username@domain.com
      Online	Native	Native Office 365 account	username@domain.onmicrosoft.com
      	SSO with ADFS	Single Sign-On Office 365 account	username@domain.com
      	SSO with Okta

   2. For on-premises environments, install the Coveo web service, search box, and search interface on your SharePoint farm (see Installing the Coveo Web Service, Search Box, and Search Interface into SharePoint).

      Note: With this installation procedure, you can also integrate the Coveo search box to SharePoint. Integrating the search box is not required to deploy the connector and it can be done later.

      CES 7.0.9093+ (September 2017) If you plan on creating a JavaScript search page and want to leverage claims from your on-premises SharePoint farm, you can install the Coveo Claims Security Module rather than the Coveo .NET Front-End web service (see Coveo JavaScript Search Framework and Allowing a JavaScript Search Page to Retrieve SharePoint Claims).

      Important: Do not install both the Coveo Claims Security Module and the Coveo .NET Front-End web service, as this would create duplicate files on your server.

   3. Grant appropriate SharePoint permissions to the crawling account you selected to ensure access to all the content that you want to index (see Granting SharePoint Permissions to the Crawling Account).

   4. CES 7.0.8541+ (September 2016) For on-premises environments, when you have thousands of user profiles in your farm, it is recommended to create a search service application to list your user profiles (see Listing User Profiles With a SharePoint Search Service Application).

4. On the Coveo Master server, in the Administration Tool:

   1. Configure the user identity

      Once the crawling account has been set up, you must create a CES user identity for this account (see Adding a User Identity).

   2. When indexing SharePoint Online content, you must install the Windows Azure AD module on the Coveo Master server because it is needed by the Office 365 security provider (see Installing the Windows Azure AD Module for Windows PowerShell).

   3. Referring to the following table, create the security providers required for your SharePoint environment following the order in the numerical icons.

      Required security provider type	Online		2016/2013/2010 on-premises
      	Office 365 Native	SSO ADFS	Classic Windows	Claims-based	Okta
      Active Directory			1	1
      Claims for SharePoint on-premises				2	1
      Claims for SharePoint Online	1 OR	1 OR
      Claim to Email for SharePoint Online	1	1
      Office 365	2	2
      SharePoint	3	3	2	3	2

      Note: When an Active Directory security provider is required, use the out-of-the-box Active Directory security provider.

   4. CES 7.0.6607+ (April 2014) Create a SharePoint field set to take advantage of the metadata available on SharePoint content.

      1. It is recommended to start by importing the default SharePoint field set file ([CES_Path]\Bin\Coveo.CES.CustomCrawlers.SharePoint.FieldSet.xml) to create fields for all the metadata available by default from SharePoint documents (see Exporting and Importing a Field Set).

      2. When you created custom metadata for your SharePoint documents, add corresponding fields to the field set (see Adding or Modifying Custom Fields).

   5. Configure and index the Microsoft SharePoint source

      The Coveo connector needs to know details about your Microsoft SharePoint server or farm to be able to index its content (see Configuring and Indexing a Microsoft SharePoint Source).

5. When you provide a Coveo .NET search interface residing outside SharePoint and want users to be able to find Claims-secured SharePoint content without having to log in again to SharePoint, configure the search interface to manage single sign-on (see Manually Configuring a .NET Search Interface Claims SSO for an On-Premises SharePoint).