Challenges of Migrating Data From Google Drive to SharePoint

Introduction

The process to migrate data from Google Drive to SharePoint is not straightforward due to various reasons, including SharePoint Online’s limitations, complex migration needs, and security compliance. The complexities, in turn, create challenges for migrations of all sizes.

This post highlights some of the critical challenges businesses face to copy Google Drive to SharePoint. Also included are the solutions to overcome the challenges.

1. Overcoming the File/Folder Naming Limitations in SharePoint

Microsoft has set several limitations for file and folder naming conventions in the Microsoft 365 cloud suite, including special character usage limitations in file/folder names. Other limitations include unavailability of certain file and folder names, and 400-character limit for decoded file paths.

These limitations come as challenges for businesses planning to migrate to SharePoint Online. CloudFuze simplifies the process of overcoming these limitations with built-in functionalities that automatically modify file and folder names during the migration. The result? Automated solutions that not only overcome the naming convention limitations with accuracy but also help companies save a lot of time.

2. Migrating Permissions and Other Features

One of the biggest challenges of migrating data from Google Drive to SharePoint (or from any cloud to another) is transferring features such as root and inner sharing permissions, embedded links, timestamps, and shared links.

Transferring these features helps businesses ensure 100% replication of the source cloud (Google Drive) in the destination cloud (SharePoint Online). Companies cannot transfer these features with a manual migration process and therefore it becomes a major challenge.

CloudFuze helps SMBs, MSPs, and Enterprises transfer these features with a high level of accuracy. Businesses get the option to either go for all features or choose only the ones that are crucial to transfer. Contact our business migration team to learn more about features transfer.

3. Transferring Permissions to the Correct User Roles in SharePoint

Google Drive has various types of user roles, including Content Manager, Commenter, and Viewer. On the other hand, SharePoint Online has only two basic user roles, including Edit and View. The differences in user roles between Google Drive and SharePoint can make it challenging for businesses to transfer permissions and replicate the content access level.

However, despite the differences, CloudFuze makes it easy for businesses to transfer permissions to the correct user roles in SharePoint Online. Here is the mapping of permissions transfer from Google Drive to SharePoint Online.

Google Shared Drive has one more user role, Contributor. CloudFuze transfers Contributor permissions as Edit permission from Google Shared Drives to SharePoint.

4. Migrating To Different SharePoint Online Sites

One of the biggest Google to SharePoint migration challenges (that does not exist when migrating to OneDrive) is migrating users and data to different SharePoint Online sites, including Team and Communication sites.

The best way to overcome this challenge is to customize the mapping for each site in a CSV sheet. For example, the destination path will vary according to the SharePoint Online site, even if one or more source cloud users are mapped to the same destination cloud user account.

Here is a brief look at the way our managed migration team prepares CSV mapping. Our team helps businesses avoid going wrong in the mapping stage by offering extensive, end-to-end support.

5. Migrating Google Files to SharePoint Online

Since Google and Microsoft have their own office tools and files, migrating Google Drive files, including Google Docs, Google Sheets, and Google Slides to SharePoint Online is challenging as Microsoft 365 does not support them.

CloudFuze plays a key role in helping businesses overcome this challenge by migrating and converting Google files into respective Microsoft Office files. The automated conversion of Google files saves a significant amount of time and ensures on-time completion of the entire migration project.

Learn How CloudFuze Can Work for Your Migration Needs

CloudFuze offers more solutions and support apart from the ones listed in this post. Contact our business migration team to learn how our migration platform can work for your migration needs. You can also request a free trial, demo, or a POC migration.