If you send a sharing invitation to people who are unfamiliar with Microsoft Office Live Workspace, they may be hesitant to sign up to work with you. To encourage people who may be receiving their first sharing invitation, you can select an option that allows others to view a read-only version of your shared workspace or document without signing in to Office Live Workspace. Anyone who previews your workspace or document can then choose to sign up to start collaborating on the shared item in Office Live Workspace.

To permit others to preview your shared workspace or document without signing in to Office Live Workspace:

1. In Office Live Workspace, on the left navigation bar under My Workspaces, select the workspace that you want to share with others. Alternatively, under My Workspaces, select Documents, and then click the document that you would like to share.

2. On the toolbar, click the arrow next to Share. In the drop-down list that appears, select Share Document if you are sharing a single document. Or select Share Workspace if you are sharing an entire workspace. A Sharing pane appears.

   

3. In the Sharing pane, add e-mail addresses for the people you want to preview your content in the Editors and Viewers text boxes. To learn more about Editor and Viewer sharing roles, see Invite others to work on a shared workspace or document.

4. Next to Message, you can type an optional message up to 1,024 characters long that explains what you want the recipients to review.

5. Select Let everyone view this without signing in.

    Note:   Keep in mind that by selecting this check box, you are permitting anyone who gains access to this sharing invitation to preview your content. If an Editor or Viewer forwards your e-mail invitation to someone else, that person can use the link in the sharing invitation to view a read-only version of your content. To protect yourself, you may want to remove malicious or unprofessional content, or any content that could pose a security risk from your shared workspace or document.

6. Click Send. Your sharing invitation is sent to the recipients by e-mail. A link to a preview of your shared workspace or document appears in the body of the e-mail invitation.

After your recipients view a read-only version of a shared workspace or document, it's easy for them to sign up or sign in to start working on the shared item by clicking Sign up on the left navigation bar. For more information, see Sign up for Microsoft Office Live Workspace .