As a SharePoint site administrator, you can specify how a SharePoint site is displayed in a browser on a mobile device. This article describes Mobile Browser View, how to configure a site to display correctly on multiple devices, and how to set up automatic notifications. If you’re looking for information about how to view a SharePoint site on mobile devices, see Use a mobile device to work with SharePoint sites.
Mobile view and PC view
Using a mobile device you can choose between two kinds of views—mobile view and pc view—for some kinds of SharePoint sites and a OneDrive for work or school library. In PC view, users see navigation links across the top of the page. In mobile view, users see the site formatted to display nicely on their device.
To try out mobile view on a device, use the following procedure:
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Open a SharePoint site on the device.
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In the upper right corner of the site, tap Settings
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Under Site Actions, tap Manage site features.
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Set the Mobile Browser View to Active. (The default setting is Active.)
To switch back to mobile view, tap Settings
Some sites are configured automatically to offer people the mobile view option. For other sites, you must activate the Mobile Browser View feature.
Activate Mobile Browser View
You can configure a SharePoint site to render on smartphones using an optimized mobile browser. You do this by activating the Mobile Browser View feature for a site. When activated, Mobile Browser View checks the device’s browser to determine whether it supports HTML5. If so, the site is displayed using mobile view. If not, the site is displayed using a classic experience that resembles what users would see on a computer.
You don’t have to turn on Mobile Browser View for all your SharePoint sites. By default, this feature is already turned on when sites are created by using any of the following site templates:
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Collaboration templates: Team Site, Blank Site, Document Workspace, Group Work Site, Visio Process Repository
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Meetings templates: Basic Meeting Workspace, Blank Meeting Workspace, Decision Meeting Workspace, Social Meeting Workspace, Multipage Meeting Workspace
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Enterprise templates: Document Center, Records Center, Business Intelligence Center, Basic Search Center, FAST Search Center
All other site templates require you to explicitly activate the feature. You can activate or deactivate Mobile Browser Viewer in Site Settings under Site Actions and Manage Site Features.
You can find more details on Mobile Browser Views in Plan for mobile views in SharePoint 2013. For a list of supported mobile devices see the article, Supported mobile device browsers in SharePoint 2013.
Set up a site to display in multiple views using device channels
The device channel feature is ideal for more complex SharePoint sites where you create a single site and author content for that site, but map the content to use different master pages and style sheets that are specific to a device or group of devices. By using the device channel feature, you can choose to show different content to different device channels using the same page and page layout. This work is typically done by a Web developer or designer. Device channels are only available for publishing sites.
For more information on what device channels are and how they are used in sites see the articles, Overview of mobile devices and SharePoint 2013 and Overview of the SharePoint 2013 page model.
Set alerts to update you of changes
Being away from the office doesn’t have to mean a loss in productivity. You can still be notified of any changes made to your site or its content by setting alerts to notify you if someone changes a SharePoint list or item.
To use this procedure while on a mobile device, tap Switch to PC View on the Settings
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In the list or library where you want to create the alert, click the Library or List tab on the ribbon.
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In the Share & Track group, click Alert Me and then click Set alert on this library. (In a list, the command will say Set alert on this list.)
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On the New Alert page, in the Alert Title section, change the title for the alert if you want.
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In the Send Alerts To section, enter the user names or email address of the person to whom you want the alerts to be sent.
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In the Delivery Method section, choose E-mail or Text Message (SMS).NOTE: If you are using SharePoint Online (as part of Microsoft 365), choose E-mail. The SMS option is not available for Microsoft 365.
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If the Change Type section is available, choose the types of changes that you want to be notified about.
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In the Send Alerts for These Changes section, specify whether you want to be alerted for all types of changes, or for specific changes.
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In the When to Send Alerts section, choose how frequently you want to receive the alerts, such as immediately or in a daily or weekly summary, and at what day or time.
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Click OK.
Receive notifications to your Windows Phone when certain events occur in the site, such as when a user adds an item to a list or updates an item. To set up notifications, the mobile device application must register with a SharePoint site. The Microsoft Push Notification Service for Windows Phone is more than just setting an alert; the Notification Service offers third-party developers a resilient, dedicated, and persistent channel to send data to a Windows Phone application from a web service in a power-efficient way. Setting up the Push Notification Service is typically done by a web developer and is designed for larger enterprise sites.
For more details on how to set up the Push Notification Service on your SharePoint site, see the articles, Push Notifications Overview for Windows Phone and How to: Configure and use push notifications in SharePoint 2013 apps for Windows Phone.
