While implementing variations we started investigating how document libraries will react once the source sites are updated. The scenarios were pretty interesting and I thought I’d quickly share them:
Scenario 1 – Web part is propagated
Initially we were not entirely sure how the creation of a web part in the source site will react as variations is ’sold’ to only keep web content in synch. We were pretty happy to find that if you drag a web part onto a page in the source site, the actual web part is also propagated to the target site(s).
Scenario 2 – Document Library with same name?
So now that the document library web part has propagated to the target site, what document library is actually referenced in the web part? To our astonishment we found that if a document library with the exact same name exists in the target and source library the web part on the target site will reference its document library. Therefore if a document is uploaded in the source site, English, the document will not be visible in say German.
Scenario 3 – Document Library with different name?
Once we realised that scenario 2 removes the ability to manage documents across multiple languages we started scratching with options and found that if the source document library has a unique name, the web part that is propagated to the target will in fact reference back to the source site. Therefore if a document is uploaded in the source site, English, it will also be visible in German.
