Remotely Manage SharePoint Online

To efficiently and remotely manage SharePoint Online users, sites and site collections you can use a Windows PowerShell module called SharePoint Online Management Shell. You need to be a SharePoint Online global administrator to run the SharePoint Online Management Shell cmdlets.

To create the environment on your remote machine you need to use the following procedure.

1. Install Windows Management Framework 3.0
   
   
   
2.  Install SharePoint Online Management Shell
   
   
   
3. Once these are installed you will see
   
   

Once the environment is set up, the following procedure is required to start managing the environment.

1. Click Start -> Programs -> SharePoint Online Management Shell (Run as administrator) else you will get an error as in the following:
   
   
   
   
2. Run Connect-SPOService. Please note to provide "-admin" in your URL else you will get the error "not a tenant administration site" as in the following:
   
   
   
   Connect-SPOService -URL https://xxx-admin.sharepoint.com -credential [email protected]  
   
   
3. Depending on your requirements you can use the PowerShell cmdlets as provided by Microsoft here.
   
   
4. In case you need help to update you can run Get-Help as in the following:
   
   

I hope this procedure has helped. Though the cmdlets are limited as of writing this article, it will increase in the future as SharePoint Online becomes the mainstream.