Preparing for Submission to the Office Store : Things to keep in mind

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If you are a developer who is building Add In for Office , read through the below post to find out how you can avoid some common mistakes during the submission process and get your Add in validated in lesser number of iterations. If you are new to building Office Add In's check out the details here on how to get started for building super cool apps on the Office 365 platform.

  • First and foremost ensure that a valid Office Seller dashboard account is in place ahead of time before you are actually planning submission.
  • You can run your Add-In through Office app compatibility tool kit to ensure there are no schema related errors in the Add-In manifest files submitted to the office Store
  • All apps submitted to the Office Store must use HTTPS secured connection for all communications.
  • There is a checklist for Office Store policies which are available here , ensure that the apps are compliant for these policies.

Common Mistakes to avoid

Based on past experience some of the common areas where the apps might fail to comply to policies include the following:

  • Every Office Add in submitted to the store must have a privacy policy.
  • Often it happens that the person who is submitting the manifest on the seller Dashboard is different from the dev who has created the manifest file in such scenarios one must ensure that the App Title and Version No. must match those in the app manifest to the one entered in seller dashboard.
  • When submitting to the seller dashboard there is a field called as “Short Description” ensure that this field has less than 100 characters
  • Apps if not using Office 365 credentials for Sign in should  have a Sign Up option allowing the users to sign up from the Add-in itself
  • SharePoint Add-ins that request full-control permissions are not accepted in the Office Store.
  • Add-ins must be compatible with all versions of Internet Explorer 11 and later, and the latest versions of Chrome, Firefox, and Safari (Mac OS). The add-in must also be fully functional with the supported operating systems, browsers, and devices for Office 2013, Office 2016, SharePoint 2013, and Office 365.

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