Document Library Metadata Lost when Office File replaced?

Question

I have a Document Library with many properties on it's Content Type.

After uploading many types of files and enteringtheir metadata (properties), some users may need to re-upload that file in the future. To do this, they are opening the Library in Explorer view and dragging the updated document in. After being prompted to Replace the file, they click yes.

In most cases, the metadata is preserved (jpeg, pdf, txt) but when Office documents are uploaded (xlsx, docx), all the properties are cleared when replaced.

What what might cause this? Is there any way I can have Sharepoint save the properties for a document when it is replaced no matter what the file type?

Answer 1

Possible the problem caused by property promotion for Office documents. It hopes that metadata inside document is correct and overrides it. It ussualy happens when you upload a document that is already taken from SharePoint and it has some server property information inside. You can solve this with different approaches:

1. Change steps how you work with documents. When document is inside SharePoint you can open it directly, you can checkout it, or event you can attach the library using OneDrive for Business and work directly with documents, skipping upload and overwrite on top.
2. Clear document properties before uploading. This action will clear all server side information left inside document, that could be overwritten. To do this follow this steps (Word 2013): FILE -> Info -> Check for Issues -> Inspect Document.
3. Turn off property promotion. It can be done for whole site (SPWeb object) using PowerShell. Just set property SPWeb.ParserEnabled to false. Here is sample. Just remember that you will loose all integration with Office client applications for these documents.

Answer 2

The reason could be also related to having a whitespace in column static name + one of the fields is obligatory. This is strange I know, it cost us months of a delay in one projects