Beginning SharePoint 2013 Development

INTEGRATING APPS FOR OFFICE WITH SHAREPOINT

You can integrate Apps for Office with SharePoint in two ways. One method is to configure Office clients to use SharePoint as the central location to browse the available Apps for Office internal to the enterprise. This is an IT/administrator-managed location for manifest files built in to SharePoint. Apps for Office managed this way can be considered standalone Apps for Office. These standalone apps only have SharePoint as the location for their manifest file but they have no other integration or dependency on SharePoint. This is the primary way that IT can centrally approve and manage Apps for Office they want to make available internally across the enterprise, whether the app was internally developed or purchased directly from a vendor.

Another way to integrate these is to incorporate Apps for Office into SharePoint and deploy them with an app for SharePoint. These might be documents or document templates that contain one or more Apps for Office, but they are associated specifically with an app for SharePoint that in turn provides a solution that specifically uses SharePoint artifacts, services, and APIs. The caveat is that Apps for Office deployed inside of an app for SharePoint are not discoverable through the Office client UI because the app for Office manifest file is deployed inside the AppWeb where the app for SharePoint is deployed. You will see an example of this in a later Try It Out.

Standalone Apps for Office

In the case ...