Challenges with SharePoint lists and library experiences
What Happened with SharePoint Lists?
The new Microsoft Lists user experience has rolled out for SharePoint. With this a lot of changes have happened. In the past, the lists and libraries experiences in SharePoint were owned by different teams at Microsoft. Meaning that the same features would be implemented by two different teams, which often resulted in two different user experiences. Additionally, the Microsoft Lists app, likely managed by yet another team, further complicates this issue. The Microsoft Lists experience was intended to bring about performance improvements and increase efficiency. However, some of these improvements have inadvertently created new challenges that we discuss below.
User Experience Differences Between Lists and Libraries
When the Modern SharePoint experience was introduced, it first rolled out to libraries and later to lists, leading to an uneven evolution. While today’s modern interface brings some similarities, such as consistent views and toolbars, differences remain. For example, libraries offer the option to “PIN to quick access,” while lists do not. Lists now include new SharePoint list forms for data entry, a feature not available in libraries. These differences, though subtle, can affect how users interact with lists and libraries in their day-to-day tasks and increase the users cognitive load.
Modern List User Experience
With the modern SharePoint list interface, users have noticed some significant changes. The views drop-down menu, once organized alphabetically, have been replaced with tabs across the top of the screen. The filter function has been expanded to allow for more advanced features like sorting, grouping, and filtering. Unfortunately, this update came with the removal of the details pane which users were finally getting used to using. A particularly frustrating change is the background color, which is not theme-aware. Instead, users are presented with an off-white color that affects contrast and can lead to increased eye strain over extended use.
List Issues as a Result of Caching
Modern SharePoint introduced new ways of handling page caching and performance. This includes partial page loading. This has impacted how users interact with lists and libraries, particularly when working with large sets of data. For example, when trying to delete multiple items, only the items that have been loaded on the screen will be selected. This load issue is also present when it comes to filtering, meaning that only the results that are loaded on the page are available to be filtered on (e.g. if you are filtering by state and no results have been loaded for New Hampshire yet, that will not be a value you can sort on even though there are items tagged to New Hampshire in the list). On the positive side, a notification with a direct link to the recycle bin appears when items are deleted, allowing for easy recovery of mistakenly deleted data.
Miscellaneous List Issues
The modern user interface has also removed certain functionalities, such as the ability to add content types when creating new views. Users must revert to the classic view to make these types of changes, adding an extra step to what should be a simple process. Additionally, the first column in modern lists is frozen by default, and there’s no current option to disable this. While this can be helpful in some cases, it’s not always desirable.
Changes in View Presentation
Another shift in the user experience is the way list views are presented. Previously, views were displayed in a drop-down in alphabetical order, making it easy to navigate. Now, views are displayed in tabs. If the number of tabs exceeds the screen’s width, an ellipsis is used, but the items in the ellipsis aren’t always alphabetized as you click on different items to view. This lack of order makes it harder for users to locate specific views, diminishing the logic that once made list navigation more intuitive.
Document Templates in Libraries – Update
If you’re using a content type hub and want to associate specific document templates with content types, you need to centrally manage those templates. The best approach is to create a document library within the content type hub and use a relative URL for your templates. Unfortunately, this means you can’t designate this library as your organization’s asset library. However, once the document library is set up, the templates can be published to your content types and made available across your SharePoint sites.
These challenges highlight both the progress and the areas where SharePoint lists and libraries still require improvement. While the modern interface offers new tools and features, it also introduces new complexities. Understanding these nuances can help users better navigate SharePoint’s evolving landscape and make the most of its capabilities.
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