Make opening Office files from OneDrive asynchronous, i.e. non-blocking
When opening an Office document from OneDrive (doesn't matter if Business or regular), it is tried to dynamically update the document from the server (i.e. SharePoint). This works well when you don't have an internet connection (the offline document is used) or if you have an internet connection.
Things get ugly fast if your connection is slow (e.g. mobile) or laggy or bad in general. I have had PowerPoint/Word lock up multiple times in front of customers because they were either saving to SharePoint (modal dialog popup with none-saying progress bar) or the logos of the applications were "loading" forever and trying to contact SharePoint.
This is rather sub-optimal as the files are synched by the OneDrive client app, so the files on my desktop are rather current sans the updates of people currently working on them.
Please make the whole opening and saving behavior non-blocking, non modal. Open the file from the local hard drive. When you determine there is a good enough connection, try to contact the server for updates. When I close the program, just let me close it. CTRL+S? Just save it locally, OneDrive will take care of synching.

1 comment
-
Weston commented
I have an issue that may also be associated with this. My office files do not seem to update on my computer if I change them from another computer. When I try to open the file, it will almost always asks me which version to keep (local or server). It is true even if the computer has been online for quite a while and one-drive says that it is synched. If one-drive says that it is 'up to date,' I expect the server files to be the same as the locally saved files, yes?