With organizations moving towards self-serve experiences, they grapple with enabling this at scale, as information is often scattered across multiple platforms. Employees today struggle to find the information they need as they often have to search through multiple data sources manually. This can be time-consuming and inefficient. 


With Freshservice’s integrated knowledge search, enable effective self-service at scale by integrating with multiple knowledge sources and bringing all the information employees need in one pane. By aggregating information from various internal and external data sources, enable comprehensive and efficient search for your Freddy AI Agent experience to enable employees to find information quickly and accurately. 


Note: You need Freddy AI Agent enabled with Generative AI capabilities to get started with this integration. 


Learn how to setup Freddy AI Agent: MS Teams | Slack

Learn how to enable Gen AI capabilities for Freddy AI Agent


How do I integrate with SharePoint?

  1. Navigate to Admin > Automation & Productivity (Apps) and search for SharePoint Search Connector and install the app.



  1. Sign in using your SharePoint Admin Credentials to complete the authentication process to enable data synchronization.


Note: You need to be a SharePoint Administrator to set this up.




  1. Once logged in, you'll be prompted to authorize the application with specific permissions. Authorize and proceed with the setup.



  1. Now select the sites you want to sync information from. All the sites from your SharePoint account will be listed, and you can pick up to 100 sites. Once done, save your selection and proceed to the next step. 


Note: It's advisable to select sites with the most relevant and recent data to ensure precise information in your searches. This configuration can be adjusted later if you wish to add or remove sites for synchronization.





  1. Once the sync begins, information from Sharepoint will get indexed in Freshservice and will be available to answer employees’ questions to Freddy AI Agent. Once the data sync is completed, you will see the updated Sync Status and last sync time for you to track. 




  1. Click on the Logs tab to stay on top of sync logs of artifacts added, deleted, updated and failed. 



Note: 


  • Data sync time depends on the data volume from the selected sites. If the issue persists after retrying a few times, contact the Freshservice support team for further assistance. 

  • The data sync process needs to be manually initiated for the first time, and from then on, a scheduled daily sync will update the latest information. 

  • When the list of sites is modified after a successful sync, the changes will be updated in the next sync. 


Once the sync process is completed, information from all sites you have selected is now available to answer employees’ queries to the Freddy AI Agent. Based on employees’ permissions, Freddy AI Agent will pull relevant responses by searching the Freshservice knowledge base and Sharepoints sites simultaneously. 


Note : Currently, synchronization will exclusively occur for content within pages on the sites. Additionally, our support for synchronization and search functionality is limited to the English language.


How do access controls work for SharePoint content? 


  • The integration Syncs necessary sites and users' access control information from SharePoint to ensure search results match their access level
  • Example: Ganesh can access IT and Legal sites, while Kim only has access to the Legal site. Users like Ganesh and Kim will only see search results for content they have access to.
  • Ganesh won't see Finance site content in search results as he lacks access, while Kim's search won't show IT policy details
  • If Kim later gains access to the IT site, his search will then yield IT site content from the Freddy AI Agent as and when he searches



Understanding sync completion - how to track artifacts that failed to sync? 


Although synchronization may appear successful, certain documents might not have been synced. The following list highlights these scenarios, providing guidance on necessary corrective actions for these files.

  • 1. Empty File: This occurs when the synchronized file is empty, meaning it doesn't contain any data to be processed or indexed.

  • 2. Empty Document (Example: .doc, .docs)

    • This error arises when a document file (e.g., .doc, .docs) is empty or contains no readable text. Without text content, the document cannot be indexed for search purposes.

    • If a Document contains only images and no text then this document is considered empty .

  • 3. Incorrect File Format (Example: CSV)

    • This error occurs when the format of a file doesn't match the expected format, rendering its content unreadable. For instance, a CSV file might have content that doesn't adhere to the CSV format.

  • 4. Unsupported Document Type (Example: .mht)

    •  In cases where the document type (e.g., .mht) is not supported for sync. The error message suggests saving the document in a supported format to proceed with synchronization.


FAQ’s

  1. How do I enable this feature?

As of February 2024, this feature is in beta. If you wish to enable it, contact your CSM or contact us at support@freshservice.com.


  1. Can the Freddy AI Agent still search the Freshservice Knowledge Base?

Certainly! The Freddy AI Agent search is intelligently designed to respond using information from both the Freshservice Knowledge Base and external data connectors like SharePoint.


  1. What do I do if I face issues with setting this up?

If you encounter a sync error that persists even after retrying, please reach out to your CSM or contact support@freshservice.com for further assistance.


  1. What if part of my data is in Sharepoint and rest in Freshservice KB ? 

Our Freddy-powered Freddy AI Agent has the intelligence to provide you with the most relevant response by unifying the content from various sources.


  1. What happens when I uninstall the Sharepoint search connector App .


When the Sharepoint search connector app is uninstalled all the indexed context from sharepoint will be deleted in freshservice  and will not be able to search on these data in your Freddy AI Agent . Admin has to re-install and resync contents to enable search on these data sources .


  1. What are the various permissions that are required to install the SharePoint Data connector App?



Only Sharepoint Administrators can install this data connector app and the following are the permissions required for the data connector app from SharePoint .

  • Read Items in all Site Collections 

  • Signin and read user profile 

  • Full Control of all Site Collections


  1. What are the artefacts synced?

During the synchronization process, content from Pages in the selected sites that is publicly accessible is synced. Searching images is currently not supported.


  1. What are the artefacts that are not synced?

Attachments, Documents, Excel files, links. Personal sites, pages, and documents will not be synced and consequently, searching for them will not be possible. We will support this shortly.