SharePoint 2019 - Migration Information

OVERVIEW

In alignment with What’s Next: The SFU Strategy and SFU’s digital transformation goals, SFU IT Services is strengthening cybersecurity and protecting our research, academic and business data. As part of these changes, SharePoint 2019 (sharepoint.sfu.ca) will be retired by July 2026. This service will be replaced by Microsoft Teams and SharePoint Online.

For more SharePoint Online resources:

• SharePoint Online - How-To Guides
• SharePoint Online - FAQs

This article contains information on the following:

• What's Happening?
• What are my Options?
• How to Migrate?
• Site Audit
  • Step 1: Check Your Inventory
  • Step 2: Review and Cleanup
  • Step 3: Take Notes on Access Permissions
  • Step 4: Specify How You Want to Move Your Content
  • Step 5: You're Ready to Submit a Request

WHAT'S HAPPENING?

• SharePoint 2019 will be retired by July 2026 and replaced by Microsoft Teams and SharePoint Online.
• Between November 2024 and January 2025, site owners will receive an email from the SharePoint team (IT Services). Site owners should move active content to another service when available.
• Site owners will have two options to migrate:
  • Option 1: IT Services can migrate their site content to Microsoft Teams or SharePoint Online after a site audit has been completed by the site owner.
  • Option 2: Site owners will migrate their site content themselves.

WHAT ARE MY OPTIONS?

Site owners will have two options to migrate their site content.

HOW TO MIGRATE?

To migrate your site using IT Services Migration (Option 1):

1. Between November 2024 and January 2025, site owners will receive an email from the SharePoint team with an attached Content Inventory Spreadsheet file.
2. The email will contain some details on the migration process. Site owners will be asked to complete a Site Audit (details outlined below).
3. After completing the Site Audit, submit a request to SharePoint 2019 Migration Request Form and attach the completed Content Inventory Spreadsheet.
4. You will be reached out to have a short consultation with IT Services to finalize the Content Inventory Spreadsheet. IT Services will begin migrating content to the specified locations.
5. An email notification will be sent when the migration is finished. You will be asked to verify its completeness at the new location.
6. Any items or settings that aren't migrated will need to be manually replicated by site owners:
   • Site access permissions
   • File or folder shared permissions
   • Workflows
   • Some page webparts, layouts and styling
7. After migration is verified by site owners, your SharePoint 2019 site collection will be deleted.

To migrate your site using Self-Migration (Option 2):

1. Between November 2024 and January 2025, site owners will receive an email from the SharePoint team with an attached Content Inventory Spreadsheet file.
2. The email will contain some details on the migration process. Visit our self-migration resources for instructions on downloading your site content:
   • SharePoint 2019 - Self Migration Guide on Files & Documents
   • SharePoint 2019 - Self Migration Guide on Lists
   • If you have questions, you can submit a request ticket at SharePoint.
3. When you've completed the self-migration of all your content on the Content Inventory Spreadsheet, reply to the email to let us know. Your SharePoint 2019 site collection will be deleted once we have confirmation.

SITE AUDIT

Completing a Site Audit is required as part of Step 2 on "How to Migrate?". This is to clean up any inactive content and prepare for the migration.

Each site owner will receive a site Content Inventory Spreadsheet when you receive an email notification to move out of SharePoint 2019. Use this site spreadsheet to complete your Site Audit by completing the following steps:

STEP 1: CHECK YOUR INVENTORY

Open the Content Inventory Spreadsheet to see what should be moved out of SharePoint 2019. Review to ensure what's listed is correct to your knowledge.

The spreadsheet contains the list of site pages, document libraries, forms and more that you own on SharePoint 2019 (referred to as containers for your site collection, which also includes any subsites and its containers).

STEP 2: REVIEW AND CLEAN UP

Visit your sites, subsites and containers (document libraries, lists, forms, etc.) to review and cleanup your content. Sift through your documents, files and content to determine if they should be kept, archived or destroyed.

Standard practice to determine if content should be migrated, archived or destroyed goes as follows:

1. Identify Inactive Content: Any content that is past its retention schedule (as defined by SFU Archives and Records Management) can be inactive content. This can vary greatly depending on the contents of your site.
2. Archive or Destroy Inactive Content:
   • Follow the content's retention and filing guidelines on its retention schedule to either archive or destroy the inactive content.
   • If you need to archive the inactive content (as specified by the guidelines to be kept as a university record), the content should be transferred to SFU Archives and Records Management.
   • If you need to destroy the inactive content, follow the the guidelines on how to destroy, which typically involve deleting the content or move the content to your personal space.
3. Any remaining items or content should be migrated to a new or different work space.

STEP 3: TAKE NOTES ON ACCESS PERMISSIONS

Take notes on access permissions to your site collection. This includes:

• Access permissions to your site, subsites, containers (document libraries, list, forms, pages, etc.)
• Individual file or folder sharing in the document library

You will need to replicate it in the new location since access/shared permissions are not migrated.

STEP 4: SPECIFY HOW YOU WANT TO MOVE YOUR CONTENT

Open the Content Inventory Spreadsheet.

There will be two blank columns: Migrate (Y/N) and Target URL. Complete the spreadsheet by specifying on each container of your site collection (rows in the sheet) if it should be migrated and its target URL.

For Target URLs, you can choose your root site (to migrate the entire container with its content) or an existing library/folder (to migrate all content from the container).

Save the Content Inventory Spreadsheet. This will be attached to your submission when requesting a migration in Step 3 of "How to Migrate?".

Example of a completed Content Inventory Spreadsheet indicated by the two 'filled' last columns:

STEP 5: YOU'RE READY TO SUBMIT A REQUEST

Congratulations! You've finished the Site Audit and completed the Content Inventory Spreadsheet. You are now ready to move onto Step 3 of "How to Migrate?" where the site owner sends a request to SharePoint 2019 Migration Request Form, attaching the completed content inventory spreadsheet.