SharePoint knowledge base software
SharePoint knowledge base software: who writes the pages?
SharePoint gives a knowledge base its structure, and Copilot can draft a page when someone asks for one. The pages still have to come from somewhere — usually from a person with a day job. This page is about that part: who writes them. SecondBrain 365 is an AI agent inside your Microsoft 365 that writes and updates the pages from email, Teams meetings and chats.
The short answer
If your company runs on Microsoft 365, the container for a knowledge base is already there: SharePoint gives you a site, pages kept in its Pages library, news posts, navigation, permissions from the site's group, version history and — if you want one — an approval step before a page is published. Most tools sold as SharePoint knowledge base software add more of the same: templates, categories, review reminders, better search.
None of that writes the pages. Someone still has to notice that a decision was made in a meeting or an email, open the site, turn it into a page, and come back when the decision changes. Copilot in SharePoint shortens the typing: it drafts a page when a person asks for one. Software that writes the knowledge base starts earlier — in the conversations where the knowledge is produced.
Still deciding the structure? Sites, templates, categories and navigation are covered on intranet.ai, our sister product for SharePoint intranets: structuring a knowledge base in your SharePoint intranet and how FAQ pages work on a SharePoint intranet. This page assumes the structure is there, or soon will be.
Who does which job in a SharePoint knowledge base
“Automated” can mean the workflow around a page, a draft on request, or the writing itself as the work happens. SharePoint, Copilot in SharePoint and SecondBrain 365 each take a different share.
SharePoint- Copilot in SharePoint
- SecondBrain 365
- The structure
- You set it up: a site, pages in its Pages library, news posts, navigation
- Copilot in SharePoint: Creates sites, pages, lists and libraries from a prompt
- Uses a SharePoint site you own, organised by rules you write in plain language
- Who writes a page
- A site member with edit permissions
- Copilot in SharePoint: Copilot drafts it when someone asks
- The agent, as the work happens
- What it is written from
- What the author knows, or copies across
- Copilot in SharePoint: A prompt, and optionally files you give it
- The email, Teams meetings, chats and documents it is brought into
- When a fact changes
- Someone has to notice and edit the page. Version history shows who changed it, and when
- Copilot in SharePoint: “Improve this site” works from views, edits, searches and broken links. Checking a page against newer information is not something Microsoft describes
- Updates the page from what it is shown, and asks the team on Teams when something new contradicts it
- What you need
- Microsoft 365
- Copilot in SharePoint: A Microsoft Copilot licence. In preview
- Microsoft 365 with Teams and SharePoint. Demo on request
Sources: Microsoft, modern pages, page approval with Power Automate, page versions, authoring with Copilot in SharePoint, Improve this site and Copilot in SharePoint (preview).
The row to test any tool against is the fourth. A page that is opened every day can still carry last month's date, and nothing in its views or searches will say so. The sign that it is wrong sits in an email or a meeting — which is why the writing has to start there.
Two related questions: what each part of Confluence becomes in SharePoint — moving off Confluence without leaving Microsoft 365 — and what is left of the topic pages Viva Topics kept on SharePoint.
Five questions to ask any SharePoint knowledge base tool
Before comparing features, find out which half of the job the tool does. Most answer the first question with “organise”.
- Does it write pages, or organise pages someone else writes?
- Templates, categories and review reminders make a knowledge base tidier, not fuller. If the answer is “organise”, budget the writing time separately.
- Where do the pages live?
- On your SharePoint site, or in the vendor's system with a window into SharePoint. Only the first keeps your permissions, retention and search as they are — and keeps the pages if you stop paying.
- What does it read from?
- Pages already on the site, files someone uploads, or the conversations where things get decided. A knowledge base is only as current as its source.
- What happens when a fact changes?
- Does it notice, and who decides which version is right? A tool that overwrites without asking is as risky as one that never updates.
- Can a person check it before and after?
- An approval step before anything is published, and pages that anyone with rights can still edit by hand.
With or without software, some habits keep pages honest — see what keeps a knowledge base accurate without new software.
Where SecondBrain 365 fits
An author with its own Microsoft 365 account
SecondBrain 365 is an agent with its own identity and company email inside your Microsoft 365. You copy it on an email, invite it to a Teams meeting, add it to a Teams group or share a document with it. From what it is shown, it writes and updates pages on a SharePoint site in your tenant, following rules you write in plain language, links related pages and highlights the people, clients and acronyms in them.
When something new contradicts a page, it asks the team on Teams which version holds. You can require approval before anything is written, and every page stays an ordinary SharePoint page that anyone with rights can edit.
It only knows what it is brought into. A decision taken in a corridor reaches the page when someone puts it in writing where the agent can read it.
More on the four ways to bring the agent into your work, on an IT knowledge base written from the replies the desk already sends, and on why an AI that answers still needs something to be written.
FAQ
Questions about SharePoint knowledge base software
Yes, and if you are on Microsoft 365 you already have what it needs: sites, pages, news, search, permissions and version history. What SharePoint leaves to you is who writes the pages and who keeps them current — which is where most SharePoint knowledge bases stall.
Microsoft's instructions for wiki page libraries and the Enterprise Wiki site are written for SharePoint Server 2016 and 2019. In SharePoint in Microsoft 365, pages are modern pages kept in each site's Pages library, and a wiki-style knowledge base is built from those, linked through the site's navigation.
It can draft a site, a page or a section when someone asks, from a prompt and optionally files you provide, and its Improve this site suggestions point out pages nobody views or edits, broken links and searches that find nothing. It needs a Microsoft Copilot licence and is in preview. Microsoft does not describe it writing from email or meetings, or checking a page against newer information: a person still decides that a page is needed.
Power Automate can automate the process around a page, such as approval before it is published. Changing what a page says needs a source of new information. SecondBrain 365 takes it from the email, Teams meetings, chats and documents it is brought into — and when something new contradicts a page, it asks the team which version holds instead of deciding on its own.
On a SharePoint site in your own Microsoft 365 tenant. They are ordinary pages: you can edit, restructure or delete them, and if you stopped using SecondBrain 365 they would stay exactly where they are.
No. It writes pages into a SharePoint site; it does not provide an intranet's home page, news or navigation. If you already have an intranet on SharePoint, the knowledge base it writes sits alongside it, with the same permissions and search.