iLove SharePoint

Issue with Azure SDK on a SharePoint Server

2011-11-19T13:13:00.003+01:00

Few weeks ago I and Hilton Giesenow prepared togheter a SharePoint & Azure session for the TechEd Africa and the European SharePoint conference. During the preparation we discovered an issue running the Azure Compute Emulator on a SharePoint box (Azure SDK 1.5 and 1.6). First it seemed that the user profile service screwed up after you had started the emulator for the first time, but further investigations had shown that many service applications didn’t work properly anymore. The problem was, that the emulator sets the IIS anonymous user account to the application pool’s identity. Many thanks to Wictor Wilen for telling us which IIS setting has been affected ( we owe you a pint=>summit 2011 :)

The Error

The SharePoint error after you have started the Azure Compute Emulator for the first time: “Object reference not set to an instance of an object”

SharePoint trace:

Unexpected System.NullReferenceException: Object reference not set to an instance of an object.    
at Microsoft.Office.Server.Administration.UserProfileApplicationProxy.get_ApplicationProperties()     
at Microsoft.Office.Server.Administration.UserProfileApplicationProxy.get_PartitionIDs()     
at Microsoft.Office.Server.Administration.UserProfileApplicationProxy.IsAvailable(SPServiceContext serviceContext)     
at Microsoft.Office.Server.WebControls.MyLinksRibbon.get_PortalAvailable()     at Microsoft.Office.Server.WebControls.MyLinksRibbon.EnsureMySiteUrls()     
at Microsoft.Office.Server.WebControls.MyLinksRibbon.get_PortalMySiteUrlAvailable()

Fix it

To fix this you have just to set the IIS anonymous user back to IUSR. But unfortunately you have to do this every time after you have run the emulator.

Open IIS Manager (inetmgr) and do the following steps.

Done.

Fix it with PowerShell

If you don’t like clicking like a monkey, you can fix it with PowerShell
PS> import-module webadministration

PS> set-webconfigurationproperty /system.webServer/security/authentication/anonymousAuthentication -name userName -value "IUSR"

Hope this will save you time.

Programming with External Lists In SharePoint Online (Office 365)

2011-11-09T09:41:00.007+01:00

In my previous post I announced that SharePoint Online (SPO) in Office 365 now supports Business Connectivity Services (BCS) and shown an example how to connect SPO via BCS to SQL Azure. In this post we’re going to have a look at what you can do programmatically with external lists in SPO. In general we’ve three options: Sanboxed Solutions, Client Object Model and SharePoint Web Services.

Sandboxed Solutions

Especially using the sanboxed object model to program against external lists in SPO sounds promising. Just imagine, event receivers and workflow actions that can access external systems through an external list. I was really excited! But the disillusionment followed soon. It seems you can’t connect external systems in SPO via BCS from within sandboxed solutions!
If I try to programmatically access an external list within a sandboxed web part, I get an “The shim execution failed unexpectedly - Access is denied….” exception.

SPList externalList = SPContext.Current.Web.Lists["Customers"];

foreach (SPListItem externalItem in externalList.Items)
{
  writer.Write(externalList.Item["CustomerID"] + ", ");
  writer.Write(externalItem["CompanyName"] + "<br/>");
}

The sandbox stripes out the user’s security token and this means that the credential mapping (e.g. All Users) defined in the Secure Store Service doesn’t work within in the sandbox. The behavior is described in following MSDN article. The suggested work around is that the managed account that runs the user code proxy service (SPUCWorkerProcessProxy.exe) is mapped to the external credentials. But this is not possible in SPO

Client Object Model

What indeed does work is using external lists with Client Object Model. There is nice post about this from Steve Fox.
You can use the SharePoint ECMA Client Object Model to access the external customer list from my previous post.

<script type='text/javascript'>
ExecuteOrDelayUntilScriptLoaded(function () {

  var ctx = new SP.ClientContext.get_current();
  var web = ctx.get_web();
  var list = web.get_lists().getByTitle('Customers');
  var query = new SP.CamlQuery();

  query.set_viewXml('<View><ViewFields><FieldRef´Name="CustomerID" /><FieldRef Name="CompanyName" /></ViewFields></View>');
var items = list.getItems(query);

//If you try to use a "default" ClientContext.Load of ListItem data from an external list,

//you will get the following error: "The given key was not present in the dictionary." Instead, you need to explicitly specify the fields you want in the CamlQuery,

//and also in the ClientContext.Load method.
  ctx.load(items, 'Include(CustomerID, CompanyName)');

  ctx.executeQueryAsync(
    function (sender, args) {
      var strHtml = "";
      var listItemEnumerator = items.getEnumerator();
      while (listItemEnumerator.moveNext()) {
         var item= listItemEnumerator.get_current();
         strHtml += "<p>" +  item.get_item('CustomerID');
         strHtml += "," + item.get_item('CompanyName') + "</p>";
      }
      $get('output').innerHTML = strHtml;

    }, function (sender, args) { alert(args.get_message()); });

 }, "sp.js");

</script>
<div id='output'></div>

Web Services

Another way to program against the external list in SPO is using the SharePoint built-in Lists.asmx web service.

Summary

Although it's nice that SharePoint Online in Office 365 now supports BCS, but as developer I really miss the support for the sandboxed object model. I hope Microsoft will add it with the next service update.

Connecting SQL Azure To SharePoint Online with BCS

2011-11-05T13:35:00.005+01:00

*Diret connections to SQL Azure aren't supported by SharePoint Online. You need a Azure WCF Service as a wrapper around SQL Azure. Steve Fox has written a blog post about this: Leveraging Windows Azure WCF Services to Connect BCS with SharePoint Online. Seems that it had worked was a bug ;-)*

Exciting news SharePoint Online now supports Business Connectivity Services (BCS)! What many people really missed in SharePoint online was the ability to connect to external systems. With the last update Microsoft has enabled the eagerly awaited BCS support in SharePoint Online. BCS within SharePoint Online supports SQL and WCF connections which you can easily setup with SharePoint Designer. What is not supported are custom .NET connectors build in Visual Studio. The reason for this restriction is the fact that custom .NET assemblies have to be deployed to the global assembly cache on the server and this sort of deployments aren’t allowed in SharePoint Online.
In this post I’m going to show you how to connect SharePoint Online to SQL Azure.

Setup Northwind Sample DB in SQL Azure

If you haven’t an Azure account yet, you can request a free trial here. Go to the Azure Management Portal and select database on the left pane. Choose your subscription and create a new database server. Enter your admin credentials for the server and add a firewall rule to enable connections from outside (IP Range 0.0.0.0 – 255.255.255.255). Create a new database called Northwind. In the ribbon click on manage to open the SQL Azure Management tool. Login, go to database schema and data and click open query and upload and run the following SQL script (the script has been adapted from the following CodePlex project http://nwindazure.codeplex.com).

Configure SharePoint Secure Store

In order to be able to connect BCS to SQL Azure we must add the SQL credentials to the Secure Store in SharePoint Online. Go to the SharePoint Online Admin Console within the Office 365 Management Portal. You will find two new menu items (Manage Business Data Connectivity and Manage Secure Store Service).

Go to “Manage Secure Store Service” and create a new Secure Store Application called “Northwind” as shown bellow.

After the application has been created you need to set the credentials. You could create a new user in SQL Azure or you can use the admin user that you have specified when you’ve created the database (not recommended for production).

Configure Business Data Connectivity Services

Before you can create a new external content type you have to give your user admin rights in BCS. Go to “Manage Business Data Connectivity” and select “Set Metadata Store Permissions”.

Create the External Content Type in SharePoint Designer

Now we can create a new external content type in SharePoint Designer. Start SharePoint Designer and open a site in SharePoint Online.

Name the external content type “Customer” and choose the external system to connect to.

Choose “SQL Server” for data source type.

Copy and paste the full qualified name of your Azure SQL Server to the “Database Server” field (you can find the name in the Azure Management Portal). Choose “Connect with Impersonated Custom Identity” and enter “Northwind” (the name that we have defined for our Secure Store Application).

Create all operations for the Customer table (read list, read, edit, new, delete)

Go to the following dialogs with next, next, next and save the external content type. To create a list based on on our new external content type select “Create Lists & Form” (optionally you can decide to generate infopath forms instead of usual SharePoint list forms ).

Set Permissions for The External Content Type

To define who has access to our new external content type go back to the SharePoint Online Admin Console and navigate to “Manage Business Data Connectivity” and choose set permissions.

Test It

Now check that everything works as expected. Open your team site and navigate to your new external list.

The End

In my next post I’ll show you how to connect an Azure WCF Service to SharePoint Online.

The Perfect Loop - Looping Through All Webs in A Site Collection

2011-07-05T15:20:00.003+02:00

Adequate memory management and disposing are still hot topics in SharePoint 2010. That’s why I would like to share some insights about iterating through a SPWebCollection.
Take a look at the following snippets:
using(SPSite site = new SPSite(“http://myserver/mysitecol”)
{
          foreach(SPWeb web in site.AllWebs)
          {
                    Console.WriteLine(web.ServerRelativeUrl + “: ” + web.Title);
                    web.Dispose();
          }
}
-or in SP context -
foreach(SPWeb web in SPContext.Current.Site.AllWebs)
{
      writer.Write(web.ServerRelativeUrl + “: ” + web.Title +”,”);
      web.Dispose();
}

what happens in the background

The call to the AllWebs property will instantiate a new instance of SPWebCollection (if there is not all ready an instance).
When the iterator moves to the first item in the SPWebCollection and the collection has not already been initialized it will executes a single unmanaged API call to fetch the most important meta data for all the webs within the site collection. You could say it loads the “Header” data of the SPWeb objects. The unmanaged COM API is wrapped within an internal class called SPRequest. You could say SPRequest is kind of a data access layer for SharePoint. SPRequest will then call the stored procedure “proc_ListAllWebsOfSite” to load the required data from the content database.
After the above operation has finished you can access the following properties of each web without any further database round-trip:

ID
Title
Name
ServerRelativeUrl
Description
Language
Created
Modified
Template
Configuration
UserIsWebAdmin
UIVersion
MasterUrl
CustomMasterUrl
MeetingCount (in case of an SPMeeting web)

As long as you only access this properties the loop will be fast.
Output from the developer dashboard when I run the above snippet in a web part. My test site collection contains 1000 websites.

BUT What happens when I access a property that has not been loaded YET?

When you access a property of the SPWeb that has not already been loaded (maybe by accident or through lack of knowledge) by “proc_ListAllWebsOfSite”, SharePoint will reload them (lazy loading). You could say the “body” of the SPWeb gets loaded.
using(SPSite site = new SPSite(“http://myserver/mysitecol”)
{
   foreach(SPWeb web in site.AllWebs)
   {
      Console.WriteLine(web.AlternateCssUrl + “: ” + web.Title);
      web.Dispose();
   }
}
Output from the developer dashboard when I run the above snippet in a web part.

The first thing that we notice is that SharePoint now does a database request for every SPWeb in the loop! Very expensive regards resource usage and performance!

Secondly we notice that that there are now many SPRequest allocations. Internally each SPWeb gets it’s own instance of SPRequest assigned when its “body” will be loaded. The call of web.Dispose() helps to get rid of them as fast as possible.

New in SharePoint 2010 – SPWebInfo

As you could see it is really bad for the performance when you access an unloaded (body) property of SPWeb. That’s one of the reasons why the SharePoint team adds a new property called WebsInfo to SPWebCollection. WebsInfo is a collection of SPWebInfo and each SPWebInfo object is a wrapper for the SPWeb header that will be loaded in the background when you access the AllWebs collection of the SPSite. Internally SPWebInfo will not allocate any SPRequest and must not be disposed.
The perfect loop:
using(SPSite site = new SPSite(“http://myserver/mysitecol”)
{
   foreach(SPWebInfo webInfo in site.AllWebs.WebsInfo)
   {
        Console.WriteLine(webInfo.ServerRelativeUrl + “: ” + web.Title);
   }
}
-or in LINQ
using(SPSite site = new SPSite(“http://myserver/mysitecol”)
{
     site.AllWebs.WebsInfo.ForEach(wi=>Console.WriteLine(wi.ServerRelativeUrl));
}

Lookup Field With Picker 2010

2011-06-01T23:21:00.001+02:00

I’m glad to announce the new release of Lookup Field with Picker. Lookup Field with Picker allows you to select list items from a lookup list via a searchable and configurable picker dialog.

Features

NEW Cross site picking
Single- and multi-Selection Mode
Search in picker dialog
Search Operators: equals, not equal, contains, begins with, greater than, greater or equal than, less than, less or equal than.
Select fields you would like to search for.
Relationship behaviors
Supports default values (constants, current user id and default values by url param, useful for 1-n scenarios) must be configured via PowerShell
Languages: English, German
Delivered as SharePoint Solution Package (WSP)

Not supported

Document Information Panel
Data Sheet Views

Requirements

SharePoint Foundation 2010

Installation

Install Lookup Field with Picker with the following commands within the SharePoint Management Shell:

Add-SPSolution "C:\Install\iLoveSharePoint.Fields.LookupFieldWithPicker.wsp"
Install-SPSolution ilovesharepoint.fields.lookupfieldwithpicker.wsp -WebApplication http://myserver –GACDeployment

Usage

Add Lookup Field with Picker

You can add a Lookup Field with Picker column either to a list or a content type.

Configure Lookup Field with Picker

Select the source site, list and column of the lookup.

Select the columns that you want to use for search in picker dialog.

Select the additional columns that you want to show in the target list.

Choose whether multiple values are allowed or not and what should be happen when the picked item is being deleted. The relationship behaviors “restrict delete” and “cascade delete” are only supported for the single lookup mode (Known Issue: When you choose multiple values and select any other relationship behavior than “none” an exception will be thrown).

Pick Items

Open the picker dialog (or enter a value and resolve the entity with the first button)

Find a and select item(s) within the picker dialog.

Done.

Interview With Marc Anderson, Founder OF the SPServiceS Library on COdeplex

2011-04-15T20:39:00.001+02:00

To follow up on my previous post “SharePoint is the #1 Search Term On Codeplex”, I’ve published a short interview with SharePoint MVP Marc Anderson, founder of the jQuery Library for SharePoint Web Services (SPServices) library on CodePlex. Currently SPServices is the top SharePoint search result on CodePlex (sorted by relevance). Interested in what Marc has to say:

SharePoint is the #1 Search Term On Codeplex!

2011-04-10T22:30:00.003+02:00

Short interview with Matt Hawley one of the developers of Microsoft’s open source platform CodePlex. What’s the most searched term on CodePlex?

The current top ten SharePoint projects on CodePlex (10.04.2011)

1. jQuery Library for SharePoint Web Services This is a jQuery library which abstracts SharePoint's Web Services and makes them easier to use. It also includes functions which use the various Web Service operations to provide more useful (and cool) capabilities. It works entirely client side and requires no server install. Page Views: 12544* \| Downloads: 821* \| Started: Aug 19 2009 \| Contributors: 2 \| License: MIT Tags: Sharepoint, jQuery, Ajax, Cascading dropdown, client-side, SharePoint 2007, Sharepoint Designer

2. Community Kit for SharePoint The Community Kit for SharePoint is a set of best practices, templates, Web Parts, tools, and source code that enables practically anyone to create a community website based on SharePoint technology for practically any group of people with a common interest. Page Views: 6716* \| Downloads: 1009* \| Started: Feb 20 2007 \| Contributors: 76 \| License: Ms-PL Tags: Sharepoint, CKS, Community, WSS, community kit, Community Kit for Sh, SharePoint 2007

3. SharePoint Manager 2010 The SharePoint Manager 2010 is a SharePoint object model explorer. It enables you to browse every site on the local farm and view every property. It also enables you to change the properties. Page Views: 6550* \| Downloads: 1394* \| Started: Dec 12 2007 \| Contributors: 4 \| License: GPLv2 Tags: Sharepoint, SharePoint 2010, administration, QTG, QTG-SharePoint, SharePoint 2007, SharePoint Adm Tools

4. WSPBuilder (SharePoint WSP tool) A SharePoint Solution Package (WSP) creation tool for WSS 3.0 & MOSS 2007 No more manually creating the manifest.xml file. No more manually specifying the DDF file. No more using the makecab.exe application. Page Views: 6237* \| Downloads: 955* \| Started: Jun 4 2007 \| Contributors: 4 \| License: GPLv2 Tags: Sharepoint, WSPBuilder, Sharepoint Tools, MOSS, MOSS webparts, myfav, QTG

5. Useful Sharepoint Designer Custom Workflow Activities This project takes aim at making it easier to create advanced workflows using Sharepoint Designer by providing a set of custom workflow activities. Page Views: 5601* \| Downloads: 322* \| Started: Jul 4 2007 \| Contributors: 8 \| License: Ms-PL Tags: Sharepoint, workflow, MOSS, Sharepoint Designer, WSS, SharePoint Workflow, SPD

6. SharePoint Learning Kit The SharePoint Learning Kit is a community-source eLearning tool that integrates with Learning Gateway. Rich content is supported with full SCORM 2004 compliance and basic functions are supported for any electronic document. Page Views: 4297* \| Downloads: 326* \| Started: Jun 30 2006 \| Contributors: 5 \| License: Ms-PL Tags: Sharepoint, SLK, SharePoint Learning , Education, Learning, scorm, eLearning

7. Starter Master Pages for SharePoint 2010 Starter Master Pages for SharePoint 2010 are a clean, commented starting point for creating your own SharePoint 2010 branding. Starter Master Pages were known previously as Minimal Master Pages in SharePoint 2007. Page Views: 3025* \| Downloads: 617* \| Started: Nov 18 2009 \| Contributors: 1 \| License: Ms-RL Tags: SharePoint 2010, masterpage, Sharepoint, 2010, Branding, Master Page, minimal master page

8. SharePoint Management PowerShell scripts This project site stores all the PowerShell scripts developed for SharePoint farms (WSS or MOSS) management. Each script is available independently and can be modified as desired Page Views: 2170* \| Downloads: 581* \| Started: Jan 11 2009 \| Contributors: 9 \| License: Ms-PL Tags: Sharepoint, powershell, management, MOSS, PowerShell Scripts, scripts, Sharepoint Admin

9. patterns & practices SharePoint Guidance We develop guidance to help devs and architects build applications on SharePoint. Page Views: 2688* \| Downloads: 456* \| Started: Jul 30 2008 \| Contributors: 8 \| License: Custom Tags: Sharepoint, patterns & practices, SharePoint 2007, Guidance, MOSS, SharePoint Architect, SharePoint Dev Tools

10. iLove SharePoint SharePoint Tools: Lookup Field with Picker, PowerShell Scripts, SharePoint Designer Actions, PowerActivity, PowerWebPart, PowerEventReceiver... ...you will love it too. Page Views: 2526* \| Downloads: 251* \| Started: Jul 2 2008 \| Contributors: 2 \| License: GPLv2 Tags: Sharepoint, powershell, .NET, lookup, MOSS, Sharepoint Designer, wcf At least I’m in the top ten

MVP Award PART II

2011-04-03T21:45:00.001+02:00

I’m glad to announce that I have been awarded to a SharePoint MVP for the second time.

Thanks to Microsoft for the recognition of my effort and to the amazing SharePoint Community around the world for their support.

See you…

Why Andrew Connell loves sharepoint

2011-04-03T21:22:00.002+02:00

Short interview with Andrew Connell (SharePoint MVP) about SharePoint 2010 on the MVP Summit 2011 Product Group Evening at the Lucky Strike bar.

Interview with Andrew Connell about SharePoint 2010

Sharecamp 2011 - born2share.

2011-03-20T22:29:00.001+01:00

I’m happy to announce the ShareCamp 2011. It will be at the weekend from 14th to 15th May at the Microsoft Headquarter in Munich. The ShareCamp is a BarCamp about SharePoint. Our slogan is born2share. (spoken born to SharePoint). We did it for for the first time last year in April and were very curious if it would be a success or not. And it was a great success! We got really amazing feedback and actually I would say it has become THE SharePoint community event in Germany!

The idea for this kind of event arise from the insight that the commercial events often tend to be one-sided, uncreative and boring. Always the same sessions, same speakers and novice session levels. So the ShareCamp was born! As I mentioned earlier the ShareCamp is a special kind of an unconference, a such called BarCamp. The base idea is that there are no predefined time schedules, sessions and speakers. Everyone should contribute! It doesn’t matter if you are an end user, admin, manager, developer, novice, expert, speaker, geek or MVP if you have something to say, say it!

Sounds crazy, doesn’t it? But it works! Be part of it and register now! (The attendance is for free but the seats are limited!)

Call a Web Service Action (Advanced SharePoint Designer 2010 Workflow Actions)

2011-03-19T11:12:00.006+01:00

With this custom SharePoint Designer Action you are able to call web services from SPD workflows. The action is included in my Advanced SharePoint Designer 2010 Workflow Actions release on CodePlex. The source code is available too. Let’s go!

1. Add “Call a Web Service” Action to a SharePoint Designer 2010 Workflow

2. Configure the Action

URL: The URL of the Web Service
SOAP Version: The SOAP Version of the request (1.1. or 1.2)
Action: The SOAP Action for the request
SOAP Request Envelope: The SOAP Envelope for the request (http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/envelope/). The request will be UTF8 encoded. You can use two special tokens in the request that can not be inserted via the UI: [WebUrl] and [WorkflowInstanceId].
User: The user name for requests that needs authentication e.g. “Contoso\Administrator”. Instead of using user name and password you can use Secure Store Credentials.
Password: The password for the user. Unfortunately there isn’t a masked text box :-( You could either specify the password in clear text or encrypted like described here: Encrypt Passwords for SharePoint Designer Workflow Actions
AppId: The The Secure Store Application ID. The Secure Store App have to define 2 Fields. One of type “User Name” and one of type “Password”. The Field Name doesn’t matter, important is the Field Type! You have to map the credentials of the SharePoint Service Accounts (AppPool/owstimer.exe). The secure store option will only works with SharePoint Server not with Foundation!

3. Example

Create a new List with the SharePoint Lists.asmx Web Service.

Configuration of “Call Web Service”

URL: http://[siteurl]/_vti_bin/Lists.asmx
SOAP Version: SOAP 1.2
SOAPAction: not needed for SOAP 1.2
Response: The response will be stored in the variable “Response”
User: empty
Password: empty
Secure Store AppId: Instead of using user name and password we use the secure store app with the ID test. The app defines “User Name” and Password. The format of the user name for windows user should be “Domain\username”.
SOAP Request Envelope:

<soap12:Envelope xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" 
xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema" xmlns:soap12="http://www.w3.org/2003/05/soap-envelope">
<soap12:Body>
<AddList xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/sharepoint/soap/">
<listName>[%MyList:Title%]</listName>
<description>Created by iLSP action</description>
<templateID>100</templateID>
</AddList>
</soap12:Body>
</soap12:Envelope>

For the title of the list we use the title of the current list item that runs the workflow. To figure out how the request should looks like you could inspect request with fiddler. I often create a WCF service proxy with Visual Studio, execute the call and inspect the request and result XML with fiddler.

Next we extract the ID of the new list.from the resulting XML. To do this you can use the “Query XML” action that is also included in the package.

Configuration of “Query XML”

XML: The XML of the SOAP-Reponse that has been stored in the Variabe “Response”
XPath: //*[local-name()='List']/@ID
Output: The output (List Id) will be stored in the Variable “ListID”

Write the “ListID” to the history log

download | documentation

PowerActivity 2010 (Advanced SharePoint Designer 2010 Workflow Actions)

2011-02-22T16:10:00.004+01:00

I’m glad to announce that I’ve just added the “Execute PowerShell Script” action (aka PowerActivity 2010) to the latest build of Advanced SharePoint Designer 2010 Workflow Actions.

Add “Execute PowerShell Script” action to a SharePoint Designer Workflow

Configuration

Script

The PowerShell script to execute. You can use the following predefined variables:

$site = the current Microft.SharePoint.SPSite
$web = the current Microft.SharePoint.SPWeb
$list = the current Microft.SharePoint.SPList (null in site workflows)
$item= the current Microft.SharePoint.SPListItem (null in site workflows)
$ctx = the current workflow context Microsoft.SharePoint.WorkflowActions.WorkflowContext
$sharePointService = the current Microsoft.SharePoint.Workflow.ISharePointService service
$listItemService = the curent Microsoft.SharePoint.Workflow.IListItemService service

The process will run as system account. However, by default $site and $web will run as the current workflow initiator or author (impersonation step). When you want to impersonate the site to the system account create a site like this: $impersonatedSite = new-object Microsoft.SharePoint.SPSite($site.Id).

Avoid the usage of the SharePoint Designer Text Editor tokens in the script, because of the potential risk for script injection attacks. Instead use variable binding ($var1, $var2…)

Signature

By default every script you that want to execute must be digitally signed. However, you can change the setting to not require a digital signature (dev system). The corresponding PowerShell script is included in package.

Disable Script Signing

The script must run on a SharePoint machine

PS> & .\Set-PowerActivityScriptSigning.ps1 $false

Sign Scripts

In order to sign scripts you need the private key that has been generated during the installation of solution.

1. Export Private Key

The script must run on a SharePoint machine. Keep the private key secure.

PS> & .\Export-Key.ps1 –path “C:\private.key” –includePrivateKey $true

2. Sign the Script

After you have exported the private key you can sign the script. The signing must not be done on a SharePoint machine, you only need the private key and the script. To sign the script you have to save it temporarily to a file.

PS> & .\Sign-PowerActivityScript.ps1 –keyPath “C:\private.key” –scriptPath “C:\script.ps1”

The signature will look like this:

YoVKP2lCKF1B8Q9ZIBvy98+T2haNayr81aGTfXEPyRmFxLNII3R6pagaHVZfZ7j5L2zTga53SqetVRLgTUebiOan2WUnCR2HualqvvdXYX1LhwAZ/Kda
OibqpE5aGgZTesJJln8+81Qwy4wOqSxCv3iQjIgVbJz7+D3kIm9dP7Q=

Simply copy & paste the script and the signature to the script and signature field of the “Execute PowerShell Script” action.

White spaces in the script will be ignored in the signing process.

$var1, $var2, $var3, $var4, $var5

You can bind PowerShell variables ($var1, $var2…) to workflow variables.

$web.Title = $var1

$web.Update()

The binding is two way, this means you can change the workflow variables in the script.

$var2 = “my value”

$secure

$secure is a special variable that can contain an encrypted string that will be decrypted during runtime. You could use this variable to securely store a password. The binding ot this variable is one way, means you can not set the value in the script during runtime. For how to encrypt strings read this.

Secure Store AppId

The Secure Store App have to define 2 Fields. One of type “User Name” and one of type “Password”. The Field Name doesn’t matter, important is the Field Type! You have to map the credentials of the SharePoint Service Accounts (AppPool/owstimer.exe). The secure store option will only works with SharePoint Server, not with Foundation! You can access the credentials during runtime with the $credential variable (System.Net.NetworkCredentials).

Wiki Documentation

Execute SQL Action (Advanced SharePoint Designer 2010 Workflow Actions)

2011-02-21T18:42:00.003+01:00

Execute a SQL statement from within a SharePoint Designer 2010 Workflow. The action and its source can be downloaded here.

Add “Execute SQL” Action to a SharePoint Designer 2010 Workflow

Configure the Action

SQL: The SQL statement that you want to execute. You could also use stored procedures e.g. “EXEC [test_Proc] @var1=N’test’ ”-You can use two special tokens in the statement that can not be inserted via the UI: [WebUrl] and [WorkflowInstanceId].
Provider: The .NET ADO Provider. Default is MS SQL Server (System.Data.SqlClient). You can use other providers like ODBC, Oracle…
Connection: The connection string e.g. “Server=localhost\SQLExpress;Database=test;User ID=sa;Password=P@ssw0rd”. Integrated Security is for security reasons not supported! You could either specify the password in clear text or encrypted like described in [Encrypt Passwords for SharePoint Designer Workflow Actions].
Result: The first column of the first row in the result set returned by the query. Additional columns or rows are ignored.
AppId: The The Secure Store Application ID. The Secure Store App have to define 2 Fields. One of type “User Name” and one of type “Password”. The Field Name doesn’t matter, important is the Field Type! You have to map the credentials of the SharePoint Service Accounts (AppPool/owstimer.exe). The secure store option will only works with SharePoint Server not with Foundation! In order to use the credentials in the Connection String you can use the token {0} for the User Name and {1} for the password. E.g. “Server=localhost;Database=test;User ID={0};Password={1}”

Example

Simple insert statement.

Configuration of “Execute SQL”

SQL: INSERT INTO MyTable (Column1, Column2) VALUES ([%Current Items:ID%],’[%Current Items:Title%]’)
Provider: System.Data.SqlClient
Connection String: Server=localhost; Database=MyDatabase;User ID={0}; Password={1}
Secure Store AppId: DBCred ({0} in the connection string will be replaced with User Name and {1} with Password defined in the Secure Store App)
Output: Workflow Variable “Result” (will return 0)

Wiki Documentation

Create Site Action (Advanced SharePoint Designer 2010 Workflow Actions)

2011-02-19T19:05:00.006+01:00

The first action I would like to introduce is the “Create a Site” workflow action. With this action you can create SharePoint sites via SharePoint Designer Workflows. The action and the source can be downloaded here.

Add the “Create a Site” action to a SharePoint 2010 Designer Workflow

Configuration

URL: The url of the web site. You could either use an relative url to create the site direct under the current site or an absolute url to create the site under any site. The workflow initiator needs appropriate permissions. Or you can use an impersonation step to run the action under the permissions of the workflow author.
Title: Title of the site
Description: Description of the site
Template: Template name of the new site. Default is Team Site (STS#0).
You can get a list of all farm templates with the PowerShell command “Get-SPWebTemplates”.
To get a list of templates from a specific site’s template catalog use the following PowerShell command:
Get-SPWeb http://contoso/sites/spd | %{$_.GetAvailableWebTemplates($_.Language)}

Use the name of the template e.g. WIKI#0
Language Code: The language code for the new site e.g. 1033 for English or 1031 for German. 0 means inherit the language from the parent site.
Inherit Permission: Inherit permissions from the parent site.
Inherit Top Navigation: Use the same top navigation as the parent site.
Output: Returns the absolute url of the new site

Publish and run the workflow…

Wiki Documentaion

Just Released: Advanced Workflow Actions for SharePoint Designer 2010

2011-02-17T21:05:00.004+01:00

I’m glad to announce that I’ve just published my Advanced Workflow Actions for SharePoint Designer 2010. The solution contains the following Workflow Actions:

Create Site Action
Get Parent Folder Action
Create XML File Action
HTTP-Request Action
Query XML Action
Query XML-File Action
Set XML Action
Update XML Document Action
Call a Web Service Action
Execute SQL Action
Wait for External Data
Regular Expression Actions

download | documentation
The source code is available too :-)
In further posts I will introduce each of the actions…
PS: I’m not a fun of SharePoint Designer Workflows. In almost every customer project I use Nintex Workflow!

FAST Search Web Crawler – Part I

2010-12-04T22:18:00.002+01:00

Many people don’t know that FAST Search for SharePoint contains two Web Crawler (I was one of them ;).

Web site indexing connector
- Use when you have a limited amount of Web sites to crawl, without dynamic content.
FAST Search Web crawler
- Use when you have many Web sites to crawl.
- Use when the Web site content contains dynamic data, including JavaScript.
- Use when the organization needs access to advanced Web crawling, configuration and scheduling options.
- Use when you want to crawl RSS Web content.
- Use when the Web site content uses advanced logon options

The Web site indexing connector can simply be configured in the central administration and is kind of limited. I really was dissatisfied, because it was not able to met my requirements. What are my requirements?
I want to crawl our enterprise wikis, team sites, profiles and especially the social bookmarks. This could easily be achieved with a SharePoint content source. BUT, I also want to crawl external (internet) pages that are referenced within wikis and social bookmarks. A big part of our company knowledge consist of hyperlinks to internet resources like articles and blog posts that has been collected and verified from our employees. I want that the crawler follows the external links and only crawl that page (1 hop, page depth 0). Additionally I want to crawl our internet blogs which are also an important part of our company knowledge (0 hops, page depth full). The SharePoint crawler is not able to follow external links at all. So I started to evaluate the simple web crawler, but unfortunately with no luck. The web crawler was only able to specify hops and page depth with no further constraints. For our blogs this would be okay, but not for the wikis and the social bookmarks. The configuration for the blogs and our homepage could easily be achieved through 0 hops and a full page depth. But for the wikis and the social bookmarks I need a more fine grained configuration. Crawl the intranet with 1 hop and full page depth and after the hop (the external site) just crawl this page (page depth 0).

This was not possible with the simple web crawler. I couldn’t believe that FAST would not be able to satisfy this requirement…
…and finally I found the FAST Search Web Crawler.
…but I also found a lack of documentation ;-) First of all forget the UI! This crawler can only be configured through command line tools and XML configs living on the FAST servers. The most important part is to create the Web Crawler Configuration as described here.

Web Crawler Configuration

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<CrawlerConfig>
<!-- Crawl collection name, must be unique for each collection.      -->
<!-- Documents are indexed in the collection by the same name.       -->
<DomainSpecification name="sp">
<SubDomain name="intranet">
<attrib name="start_uris" type="list-string">
<member>http://intranet</member>
</attrib>
<section name="include_uris">
<attrib name="prefix" type="list-string">
<member>http://intranet</member>
<member>http://mysite</member>
</attrib>
</section>
<section name="passwd">
<attrib name="http://intranet" type="string">
FastCrawl:pass@word1:contoso:auto
</attrib>
<attrib name="http://mysite" type="string">
FastCrawl:pass@word1:contoso:auto
</attrib>
</section>
<section name="crawlmode">
<!--Crawl depth (use DEPTH:n to do level crawling).-->
<attrib name="mode" type="string">FULL</attrib>
<!--Follow links from one hostname to another (interlinks).-->
<attrib name="fwdlinks" type="boolean">yes</attrib>
<!--Reset crawl level when following interlinks.-->
<attrib name="reset_level" type="boolean">no</attrib>
<attrib name="robots" type="boolean">no</attrib>
<attrib name="max_uri_recursion" type="integer">5</attrib>
</section>
</SubDomain>

<SubDomain name="full_depth_no_hops">
<attrib name="start_uris" type="list-string">
<member>http://dataone.de</member>
<member>http://iLoveSharePoint.com</member>
<member>http://aknauer.blogspot.com</member>
<member>http://www.markus-alt.de</member>
<member>http://aknauer.blogspot.com</member>
<member>http://bydprojekt.blogspot.com</member>
<member>http://www.andreaseissmann.de</member>
<member>http://cglessner.blogspot.com</member>

</attrib>
<section name="include_uris">
<attrib name="prefix" type="list-string">
<member>http://dataone.de</member>
<member>http://iLoveSharePoint.com</member>
<member>http://aknauer.blogspot.com</member>
<member>http://www.markus-alt.de</member>
<member>http://bydprojekt.blogspot.com</member>
<member>http://www.andreaseissmann.de</member>
<member>http://cglessner.blogspot.com</member>
</attrib>
</section>

<section name="crawlmode">
<!--Crawl depth (use DEPTH:n to do level crawling).-->
<attrib name="mode" type="string">FULL</attrib>
<!--Follow links from one hostname to another (interlinks).-->
<attrib name="fwdlinks" type="boolean">no</attrib>
<!--Reset crawl level when following interlinks.-->
<attrib name="reset_level" type="boolean">no</attrib>
</section>
<attrib name="max_uri_recursion" type="integer">5</attrib>
</SubDomain>

<!-- List of start (seed) URIs. -->
<attrib name="start_uris" type="list-string">
<member>http://intranet</member>
<member>http://dataone.de</member>
<member>http://iLoveSharePoint.com</member>
<member>http://www.markus-alt.de/blog</member>
<member>http://aknauer.blogspot.com</member>
<member>http://bydprojekt.blogspot.com</member>
<member>http://www.andreaseissmann.de</member>
<member>http://cglessner.blogspot.com</member>
</attrib>

<!-- Include and exclude rules. Each type of rule may contain a   -->
<!-- the following types: exact, prefix, suffix, regexp and file. -->
<!-- See "include domains" for an example.                        -->

<!-- Include the following hostnames in the crawl. If no hostnames -->
<!-- are specified, the crawler will crawl any hostname unless     -->
<!-- "include_uris" are specified, in which case only URIs         -->
<!-- those rules are crawled.                                      -->
<section name="include_domains">
<attrib name="exact" type="list-string"></attrib>
<attrib name="prefix" type="list-string"></attrib>
<attrib name="suffix" type="list-string"></attrib>
<attrib name="file" type="list-string"></attrib>
</section>

<!-- Include the following URIs in the crawl. -->
<section name="include_uris"></section>

<!-- The following hostnames will be excluded from the crawl, -->
<!-- even if they were included by include rules above.       -->
<section name="exclude_domains"></section>

<!-- The following URIS will be excluded from the crawl, -->
<!-- even if they were included by include rules above.  -->
<section name="exclude_uris"></section>

<!-- Crawl Mode -->
<section name="crawlmode">
<!-- Crawl depth (use DEPTH:n to do level crawling). -->
<attrib name="mode" type="string">DEPTH:0</attrib>
<!-- Follow links from one hostname to another (interlinks). -->
<attrib name="fwdlinks" type="boolean">no</attrib>
<!-- Reset crawl level when following interlinks. -->
<attrib name="reset_level" type="boolean">no</attrib>
</section>
<section name="passwd">
<attrib name="http://intranet" type="string">
FastCrawl:pass@word1:contoso:auto
</attrib>
</section>

<attrib name="robots" type="boolean">no</attrib>
<attrib name="max_uri_recursion" type="integer">5</attrib>
<!-- Delay in seconds between requests to a single site -->
<attrib name="delay" type="real">60</attrib>
<!-- Length of crawl cycle expressed in minutes -->
<attrib name="refresh" type="real">1440</attrib>
<!-- Maximum number of documents to retrieve from one site. -->
<attrib name="max_doc" type="integer">5000</attrib>
<!-- Let each Node Scheduler crawl this many sites simultaneously. -->
<attrib name="max_sites" type="integer">32</attrib>
<!-- Maximum size of a document (bytes). -->
<attrib name="cut_off" type="integer"> 5000000 </attrib>
<!-- Toggle JavaScript support (using the Browser Engine). -->
<attrib name="use_javascript" type="boolean"> no </attrib>
<!-- Toggle near duplicate detection. -->
<attrib name="near_duplicate_detection" type="boolean">no</attrib>

<!-- Inclusion and exclusion.                                   -->
<!--                                                            -->
<!-- The following section sets up what content to crawl and    -->
<!-- not to crawl.                                              -->
<!-- Only crawl HTTP/HTTPS (e.g., don't crawl FTP). -->
<attrib name="allowed_schemes" type="list-string">
<member> http </member>
<member> https </member>
</attrib>
<!-- Allow these MIME types to be retrieved. -->
<attrib name="allowed_types" type="list-string">
<member> text/* </member>
<member> application/* </member>
</attrib>

</DomainSpecification>
</CrawlerConfig>

The main domain specification for content collection sp (sp is the default collection for SharePoint) is configured to crawl a page depth of 0 (DEPTH:0) and to not forward to hyperlinks pointing to other domains (fwdlinks=false). The start uris contains the url to our intranet, homepage and blogs. At this level there isn’t any include uri or domain pattern specified. This means any url will match the rule. In the sub domain “intranet” I defined as start uri http://intranet/ and very important to only include uris that start with http://intranet/ or http://mysite/ to this sub domain. I also defined a page depth of full and to follow external urls. Every url that start with the previous defined url prefixes will follow that crawl rule. This means that the http://intranet/ will be crawled with full depth and also follows external links to other domains. But the followed domains (e.g. “http://microsoft.com”) will not match the intranet sub domain pattern and will fallback to the main domain specification which only allows to crawl the particular page. There is also a sub domain called “full_depth_no_hops” which includes our blogs and homepage in the include uri patterns with full page depth and no forwarding. Exactly what I want :-)

Deploy the configuration

Log on to the FAST Search Server
Copy your configuration to “%FASTSEARCH%\etc\” (e.g. MyCollection.xml)
Start the FAST Search PowerShell Shell
Ensure that crawler is started: nctrl.exe start crawler
Register the config: cawleradmin.exe --addconfig “%FASTSEARCH%\etc\MyCollection.xml”
(optional) Start a new crawl: cawleradmin.exe –refetch
Monitor the fetch log: “%FASTSEARCH%\etc\var\log\crawler\node\fetch\sp”

Fetch log will look like this:
2010-12-03-17:03:43 200 REDIRECT http://ilovesharepoint.com/ Redirect URI=http://cglessner.de/ 2010-12-03-17:03:44 200 NEW http://bydprojekt.blogspot.com/ 2010-12-03-17:03:46 200 REDIRECT http://www.markus-alt.de/ Redirect URI=http://www.markus-alt.de/blog 2010-12-03-17:03:46 200 NEW http://aknauer.blogspot.com/ 2010-12-03-17:03:53 200 NEW http://www.andreaseissmann.de/ 2010-12-03-17:04:43 302 REDIRECT http://intranet/ Redirect URI=http://intranet/Pages/Home.aspx 2010-12-03-17:04:43 301 REDIRECT http://www.markus-alt.de/blog Redirect URI=http://www.markus-alt.de/blog/ 2010-12-03-17:04:43 302 REDIRECT http://dataone.de/Seiten/VariationRoot.aspx Redirect URI=http://dataone.de/de
….

The FAST Search Web crawler is a high end Web Crawler!

Keep in mind that you still need the SharePoint crawler because of the keywords, taxonomy and security. The web crawler will do an additional crawl. FAST can handle this duplicates. The second crawl is a drawback, but the result is worth it.
I will post more details (hopefully) soon…

Review Collaboration Days 2010

2010-12-04T16:39:00.001+01:00

Last week has been the Collaboration Days Swiss, with about 300 attendees it has been the biggest SharePoint event in Switzerland so far. I liked the fact that the event has been community driven. Especially many thanks to Samuel Zürcher and Stefan Heinz for their effort and commitment that has contributed significantly to the success of the event. I believe this was a big step forward for the SharePoint Community Swiss. What I personally regret, is that I had to cancel two session (and missed the #SharePint ;) because of hoarseness. Thanks to Thorsten Hans and Nicki Borell for the great backup.

Interview with Eric Swift (Microsoft SharePoint General Manager)

Interview with Nicolette du Toit (Marketing Manager for Office at Microsoft Swiss)

I’m looking forward for the Collaboration Days 2011…

PS: Thanks to the HLMC stuff for all the ginger tea. I’m almost fit :-)

My Impressions from TechEd Europe 2010

2010-11-14T20:57:00.001+01:00

Unfortunately I haven’t seen much sessions. On the one hand I’ve worked at the SharePoint TLC booth and on the other I’ve missed some sessions cause of interesting discussions with other geeks and partners. Some sessions I’ve seen was great, others wasn't. Especially I don’t like the boring, visionless TechEd keynotes. But the magic of the TechEd aren’t merely the sessions, but rather the all the people from different nations. It has been amazing to meet in person all the geeks from Europe – many soul mates :)

SharePinting at TechEd Europe 2010

If you think there’s an typo in the title, read this first: SharePoint by day, SharePint at night.

For sure we’ve organized a SharePint and I was responsible for choosing the location. I had picked out the PURO - an amazing sky lounge. But unfortunately the PURO didn’t let all the techies in – #FAIL!
No problem for the agile SharePoint geeks. Andrew Woodword just opened a second SharePint – the underground SharePint - at the Irish Pub. So we have had two simultaneous SharePints at one building, one at the 20th floor and one at the basement. In addition the two SharePints had been very different. Seems different styles of SharePints are emerging…

Top of the Roof SharePinting

Meanwhile at the basement - Underground SharePinting

Thanks for the great week to: @mysharepoint, @tlanni, @andrewwoody, @katko, @mosslive, @robinmeure, @danmc, @markvlunenburg, @rubykon, @draken, @jefffried, @atwork, Sven Maier, Patrick Heyde, AvePoint …

My Event Tips for End of 2010

2010-10-28T10:12:00.001+02:00

TechEd Europe 2010 (Berlin, 08-12.11.2010)

I will work at the Technical Learning Center (TLC) for Office/SharePoint. (Twitter: #tee10)

Social Software 2010 (Munich, 23-25.11.2010)

Conference about Social Software for Enterprise. I’ will hold a session called “Cave Painting to Social Computing” and will show examples with SharePoint 2010. Save 100€ with the promo code: ChGl_550. (Twitter: #soso)

Collaboration Days (Luzern, 01-02.2010)

The most important SharePoint Event in Switzerland. I will hold a 1 day SharePoint Development Workshop on 30.11.2010 and got two sessions: “Social Computing with SharePoint 2010” and “Diving into the SharePoint 2010 Fluent User Interface”. Additionally I’m glad to support the content board from the SharePoint Community Switzerland. (Twitter: #collabdays)

SharePoint Scripts On Demand (SP.SOD)

2010-08-20T16:33:00.003+02:00

When you are working with Ribbon UI extensions, Client OM or with complex SharePoint 2010 java scripts, you may noticed a Java Script class called SP.SOD. Built-in SharePoint scripts use this class extensively. Unfortunately SP.SOD (I guess it stands for SharePoint Scripts On Demand) is very rarely documented – until yet :)

SharePoint 2010 makes extensive use of java scripts. These scripts are located in several different files. And commonly these scripts have dependencies to functions and classes defined in other script files. Means the built-in SharePoint scripts and for sure your own scripts have to care about when which script will be loaded. And exactly this is the job of SP.SOD class! SP.SOD is defined in init.js and will be load in the HTML head section automatically.

ScriptLink

SP.SOD works tightly together with the ScriptLink server control. ScriptLink is a SharePoint server control for registering java script files.
<SharePoint:ScriptLink ID="scriptLink1" runat="server" Name="My_Script.js" LoadAfterUI="true" OnDemand="false" />

In the “Name” property you should enter the name of the script file. The control assumes that the script is located in the layout’s root folder. You could also use a relative URL instead of the script name, but cause problems with OnDemand=true. The intention is definitely to use the script name. Putting your scripts directly into the layouts folder without a solution/feature specific subfolder seems to be against the best practice, but is required! I recommend using solution/feature prefix for the files instead of a folder.

“Localizable” true instructs the control to search the script in the language specific subfolders of the layout’s folder (e.g. _layouts/1033/MyScript.js).

“LoadAfterUI” determines where the script reference will be rendered in the HTML document. False inserts the reference into the HTML head. True inserts the reference at the end of the HTML body.

“OnDemand” true specifies that the script should be loaded on demand. False will render the following script code:

<script type="text/javascript">
// <![CDATA[
document.write('<script type="text/javascript" src="/_layouts/my_script.js"></' + 'script>');
// ]]>
</script>

True will render:

<script type="text/javascript">RegisterSod("my_script.js", "\u002f_layouts\u002fmy_script.js");</script>

As you see “true” doesn’t insert the script reference directly, instead it calls the function RegistedSod. RegisterSod is the same as SP.SOD.registerSod(key, url). The script will not be loaded until it get explicitly requested (see SP.SOD.executeFunc)!

Instead of using SPScriptLink in a declarative way to register scripts you could also do this with some static methods of SPScriptLink in the code behind:

ScriptLink.RegisterScriptAfterUI (LoadAfterUI=true)
ScriptLink.RegisterOnDemand (OnDemand=true)

SP.SOD.executeOrDelayUntilScriptLoaded

SP.SOD.executeOrDelayUntilScriptLoaded(func, scriptName) schedules an asynchronous callback function (func) which will be called when the script has signaled finished loading. Signaled finished loading means that the script has called notifyScriptLoadedAndExecuteWaitingJobs(scriptName). All SharePoint built-in scripts will call notifyScriptLoadedAndExecuteWaitingJobs when they have finished loading. ExcuteOrDelayUntilScriptLoaded does not trigger loading an on demand script (SOD)!

There is a very similar function pair called executeOrDelayUntilEventNotified/notifyEventAndExecuteWaitingJobs. The only diffrence is that the executeOrDelayUntilScriptLoaded/executeOrDelayUntilScriptLoaded function pair prefixes internally the scriptName with “sp.scriptloaded-“.

Example 1:

My_ApplicationPage.aspx

<asp:Content ID="PageHead" ContentPlaceHolderID="PlaceHolderAdditionalPageHead" runat="server">
<SharePoint:ScriptLink ID="sl" runat="server" Name="My_Script.js" LoadAfterUI="true" OnDemand="false" />
<script type="text/javascript" language="javascript">

function myCallback() {
//sayHello is defined in MyScript.js
sayHello();
}

alert('1');

ExecuteOrDelayUntilScriptLoaded(myCallback, "my_script.js");

alert('2');

</script>
</asp:Content>

My_Script.js

alert('3');

function sayHello() {
alert('4');
}

SP.SOD.notifyScriptLoadedAndExecuteWaitingJobs("my_script.js");

We have defined a script link for My_Script.js which will be inserted at the end of the HTML body (LoadAfterUI=true). In the inline script in the head we have registered the function myCallback to get executed when MyScript.js has signaled finished loading. The alerts will popup in the sequence 1-2-3-4. You could also wait for any built-in script to have finished loading e.g. executeOrDelayUntilScriptLoaded(myCallback, “sp.ui.js”).

You could also use the static method ScriptLink.RegisterDelayedExecutionScript of SPScriptLink to register a delayed script execution (instead of the line: ExecuteOrDelayUntilScriptLoaded(myCallback, "my_script.js");

SP.SOD.registerSod

With SP.SOD.registerSod(key, url) you can manual register an on demand script via JavaScript.

<script type='text/javascript'>RegisterSod('my_script.js', '/_layouts/my_script.js'); </script>

SP.SOD.executeFunc

SP.SOD.executeFunc(key, functionName, fn) is used to load on demand scripts (ScriptLink.OnDemand=true).
The “key” parameter must match to the ScriptLink’s Name property (Use small letters for key, because an issue with string normalizing in RegisterSodDep).

“functionName” awaits a type name of an ASP.NET AJAX JavaScript class. ExecuteFunc first checks if the AJAX class has already been registered, when not it checks additionally if a SOD with this key has already been loaded and finally it will load the SOD. Load means adding dynamically the corresponding script tag to the HTML head. The check for the type helps to ensure that the script has not been already loaded via an usual script tag before. When you don’t want to work with AJAX JavaScript classes you can use “null” value for the functionName.

fn defines a callback that will be executed when the SOD has signaled finished loading.

Example 2:

My_ApplicationPage.aspx

<asp:Content ID="PageHead" ContentPlaceHolderID="PlaceHolderAdditionalPageHead" runat="server">
<SharePoint:ScriptLink ID="sl" runat="server" Name="My_Script.js" LoadAfterUI="true" OnDemand="false" />
<!-- RegisterSod('my_script.js', '/_layouts/My_Script.js'); -->

<script type="text/javascript" language="javascript">

function myCallback() {
sayHello();       
}

alert('1');

SP.SOD.executeFunc("my_script.js", null, myCallback);

alert('2');

</script>
</asp:Content>

My_Script.js keeps unchanged.

The example is similar to example 1. The difference is that ScriptLink registers a SOD (ScriptLink.OnDemand=true) script. MyScript.js will not be loaded until it will be explicitly demanded with “SP.SOD.executeFunc(‘my_script.js’);”. When the SOD has signaled finished loading with “SP.SOD.notifyScriptLoadedAndExecuteWaitingJobs(‘my_script.js’);” myCallback will be executed. The alerts will popup in the sequence 1-2-3-4 again.

SP.SOD.registerSodDep

SP.SOD.registerSodDep(key, dep) can register SOD dependency. Key defines the SOD that depends on the SOD defined in dep. When the SOD in key will be requested, the SOD dependency will ensure that the SOD defined in dep will loaded before the actual SOD defined in key. You can also define a chain of dependencyies. This means the SOD in dep can also have dependencies, and the dependencies can have dependencies too and so on. The SOD loading mechanism keeps care to resolve all the required dependencies.

Example 3:

My_ApplicationPage.aspx

<asp:Content ID="PageHead" ContentPlaceHolderID="PlaceHolderAdditionalPageHead" runat="server">
<script type="text/javascript" language="javascript">
function myCallback() {
sayHello();       
}

alert('1');

function myInit(){
SP.SOD.executeFunc("my_script.js", null, myCallback);
alert('2');
}

_spBodyOnLoadFunctionNames.push("myInit");

RegisterSod('my_script.js', '/_layouts/My_Script.js');
RegisterSod('my_script2.js', '/_layouts/My_Script2.js');

RegisterSodDep('my_script.js', 'my_script2.js');

</script>
</asp:Content>

My_Script.js

alert('4');

function sayHello() {
alert('5');
sayHello2();
}

SP.SOD.notifyScriptLoadedAndExecuteWaitingJobs("my_script.js");

My_Script2.js

alert('3');

function sayHello2() {
alert('6');
}

SP.SOD.notifyScriptLoadedAndExecuteWaitingJobs("my_script2.js");

The example registers two SODs via JavaScript (you could do this with the ScriptLink control as well) and defines that my_script.js depends on my_script2.js. When my_script.js will be requested via “SP.SOD.executeFunc(‘my_script.js’, null, myCallback);” SP.SOD will first load my_script2.js and then my_script.js. The alerts will popup in the sequence 1-2-3-4-5-6.

Summary

The idea of on demand script loading make really sense. SharePoint 2010 loads really a lot of JavaScripts - this takes time! So the idea is: first load the HTML and let it render by the browser so that the user is able to read the requested information as fast as possible. And in the second step load the behavior (the JavaScripts).

My Development Box

2010-07-28T09:13:00.001+02:00

Here is the actual configuration of my development box. SharePoint and for sure .NET development works like a charm :)

Hardware

HP Elitebook 8540w
Processor: Intel Core i7 -820 Quad 1.73 GHz
RAM: 16 GB DDR3-SDRAM 1333 MHz (4x 4GB)
Display: 15.6” HD+ integrated 2 MP Webcam
Graphic: nVidia Quadro FX880M
HD: 500 GB SATA 7.200rpm
Connect: Intel 802.11 a/b/g/n , Bluetooth, UMTS

Software

OS: Windows Server 2008 R2 Enterprise
Hyper-V
Office 2010 Prof. Plus
Visual Studio 2010 Ultimate
Expression Studio 4
.NET Reflector
ReSharper
Typemock Isolator 2010
SnagIt
Camtasia
MindManager
Paint.NET
Tweetdeck
Windows Live Writer

For SharePoint demos and workshops I’m using the Contoso Hyper-V image. Because Contoso didn’t use setup best practices (e.g. admin service accounts) I use for development a from scratch installed SharePoint Hyper-V image.

User Defined Actions in Nintex Workflow 2010 (Domain Actions)

2010-07-18T23:40:00.001+02:00

My favorite new feature in Nintex Workflow 2010 are User Defined Actions (UDA). An UDA is a kind of workflow template which can be used like any other Nintex action. More technically spoken it is an composite activity. Comfortable is that you can design them in the same easy way as an usual Nintex workflow. A technically minded workflow designer can create domain UDAs, maybe to encapsulate web service calls to a SAP system. And later on the business users can use them in their workflows without any technical background knowledge. Time for an example…

The “Send Tweet” User Defined Action

In this example we will create a UDA for posting Twitter status updates. Imagine we are an social marketing aware company and want to give our marketing team the ability to send tweets from Nintex workflows. They should be able to design the workflows themselves (usually approval workflows) and should not care about technical details. Perfect scenario for an UDA.

Site Actions > Nintex Workflow 2010 > Manage UDAs

Click “Create”

Start designing the UDA in the familiar Nintex WF designer

Define input and output parameters

Create an input parameter for the status update message (Message).

Drag an “Build dynamic string” action for building the URL and a “Web request” action for posting the update to the designer.

Configuration of the “Build Url…” action.

http://api.twitter.com/1/statuses/update.xml?status={WorkflowVariable:Message}

The result variable “Url” can be created directly the config dialog via the “Variables” menu item in the ribbon.

Configuration of the “Post…” action.

You only need to configure Url, Username & Password and that the POST verb should be used.

Tip: Instead of defining the user credentials inline you can use a Nintex workflow constant of type credentials. The advantage is that you can change the credentials without changing and republishing the UDA.

Configure UDA settings

The “Title” defines the display name of the action and the “Category” defines in which group it will be shown in the designer. Also nice is that you can define you own icons.

Publish the UDA

By default the UDA is scoped for the current team site, but you can promote it to the site collection or farm level. Additionally you can import and export UDAs.

Use the “Send tweet” action in a workflow

The “Send tweet” action is now available in the “Twitter” group on the workflow actions menu on the left. Now the marketing team could easily use it within an approval action.

Configuration of “Send Tweet”

The marketing team only have to provide the message for the Twitter status update and don’t care about any technical detail.

Test it

Start the workflow and approve the tweet.

You can easily encapsulate more Twitter API calls like this and build kind of a domain language. More ideas about Twitter and Nintex you can find on Markus Alt’s blog. Twitter is just a trivial example, you could also use this approach to design domain actions SAP or for any other system.

Amazing Nintex Workflow 2010 Promotion Video

2010-07-16T09:07:00.001+02:00

Watch this amazing video from Mike Fitzmaurice about Nintex Workflow 2010. One of the coolest and most creative promotion videos I’ve ever seen!

Well done Mike :-)

SharePoint 2010 Development Beta Exams Passed

2010-07-16T08:45:00.000+02:00

Happy to have passed the SharePoint 2010 development beta exams:

Exam 70-573: MCTS: Microsoft SharePoint 2010, Application Development
Exam 70-576: PRO: Designing and Developing Microsoft SharePoint 2010 Applications

The the MCTS exam was moderate, but the PRO was hard.
Good luck.

“Unsocial” - FAST Search for SharePoint 2010

2010-06-15T10:43:00.003+02:00

I’ve just noticed that FAST Search is not able to crawl social tags. Social tags are tags created with the Tags & Note board. Social tags are different from Enterprise Keywords (managed tags). Enterprise Keywords will be persisted with the list item itself in the Content DB and social tags will be persisted in the Profile DB. Though FAST Search is able to crawl managed tags pretty well, it doesn't support social tags at the moment. In turn the SharePoint Server OOB Search supports both. This a feature restriction of FAST Search. Microsoft’s edition comparison sheet suggests that there is only a plus, but this isn’t the truth for any particular case. I really miss the social tag crawling in FAST Search. Social tagging in combination with a great search like FAST would be a huge benefit for companies. Now I’ve three options:

Use the OOB Search and miss all the great FAST Search features
Use FAST and miss the social tag crawling and refinement
Wait for third party tools…

FAST Search for “I like it”:

OOB Search for “I like it”:

There isn’t always a plus - that’s life!

Selective Restore? Yes! But which Backup?

2010-04-21T13:01:00.001+02:00

Here a real user story and solution. One of our customers would be able to selective restore SharePoint content. Because he has already a great SQL backup strategy he decided for a third party tool from from Metalogix, Selective Restore Manager, which gives him the ability to selective restore from SQL backups or databases. Not a very extra extraordinary scenario. But which backup should he use? Maybe a document or site has been deleted accidently some weeks or months ago. Searching in all backups for the missing item would be very cumbersome. How we can solve this in an agile manner? Sure, with our good old friend PowerShell! The approach is a scheduled PowerShell script querying the SharePoint audit logs for delete events in all site collection from a specific web app and write the log entries in a usual SharePoint list on another web app (central admin). Writing this script has taken less than an hour. Even lunch has taken longer ;) I really love the speed, power and flexibility you gain with PowerShell!

The list looks like this (click to enlarge):

The script:

Review ShareCamp 2010

2010-04-13T22:49:00.001+02:00

Last week end was the very first ShareCamp (BarCamp about SharePoint) at the Microsoft Headquarter Germany in Munich. We got about 200 participants, 45 session and the spirit was really amazing! I think we could fulfill our slogan born2share.

You can find many more pictures here.

Thanks to all participants and sponsors for making this great event possible. I’m convinced there will be a ShareCamp 2011!

Freshly Graduated MVP

2010-04-05T22:22:00.000+02:00

I'm glad to announce that I am since the 1th of Avril a Microsoft SharePoint MVP. What for the actor is a Oscar, is for a Microsoft tech geek the MVP Award. This is a big honor for me and I would like to thank Microsoft and the SharePoint community!

SharePoint Disposing Myth: You have to dispose SPWeb explicitly!?

2010-03-10T20:44:00.012+01:00

It seems to me that every post, article and book tells you to explicitly dispose every SPWeb (excepts them coming from SPContext). But is that right?
Not quite! Every SPSite tracks the SPWebs that it has emitted. A internal list named “m_openedWebs” holds these references. It doesn’t matter from which member of the SPSite you will get the SPWeb (RootWeb, OpenWeb, AllWebs, Add) the SPSite holds a reference on it. When you dispose the SPSite it loops through all SPWebs in “m_openedWebs” and calls the Close method on each. The dispose method of SPWeb does nothing else than calling it’s close method. Means when you dispose a SPSite, all SPWebs that it has emitted will be disposed implicitly! A construct like this

using(SPSite site = new SPSite("http://server/site"))
{
     using(SPWeb web = site.OpenWeb())
     {
       //...
     }
}

is not necessary, because the using for the SPSite will implicitly dispose all of it SPWebs. By the way if you call the dispose method of the SPWeb explicitly it will internally remove itself from the “m_openedWebs” list. Sure there are scenarios where explicitly disposing of SPWebs is important, for example when you loop through the AllWebs property of the SPSite with maybe hundreds of SPWebs. Because every SPWeb consumes a lot of memory! On the other hand you don’t have to be afraid when you pass a SPWeb reference across your API. When you finally dispose the SPSite, all SPWebs it has emitted will be disposed too and you will not cause a memory leak. I think the SharePoint team have implemented this pretty well.

When you create an instance of SPSite you are responsible to dispose it. When to dispose SPWeb that have been emitted by your SPSite depends on the scenario.

What could cause problems indeed is when you still use a SPWeb that has already been disposed, doesn’t matter if it has been disposed implicitly or explicitly. The SPWeb will be reopened but will not be listed in the “m_openedWebs” of the SPSite. Means it can not be implicitly disposed by the SPSite anymore. A better and approach would have been to throw an ObjectDisposedException on all members after the SPWeb has been disposed.

You don’t believe? Just take a look at the following snippet or even better let it run:

Console.WriteLine("Create a SPSite");
SPSite site = new SPSite("http://localhost:101");

Console.WriteLine("Open 5 SPWebs...");
SPWeb web1 = site.RootWeb;
SPWeb web2 = site.OpenWeb();
SPWeb web3 = site.OpenWeb("my");
SPWeb web4 = site.AllWebs[1];
SPWeb web5 = site.AllWebs.Add(Guid.NewGuid().ToString());

int openedWebs = (typeof(SPSite).InvokeMember("m_openedWebs",
BindingFlags.NonPublic | BindingFlags.Instance | BindingFlags.GetField,
null, site, null) as ICollection).Count;      

Console.WriteLine("Acutally opened SPWebs: " + openedWebs.ToString());

Console.WriteLine("Dispose web1 explicitly");
web1.Dispose();

openedWebs = (typeof(SPSite).InvokeMember("m_openedWebs",
BindingFlags.NonPublic | BindingFlags.Instance | BindingFlags.GetField,
null, site, null) as ICollection).Count;     

Console.WriteLine("Dispose the SPSite");         
site.Dispose();

openedWebs = (typeof(SPSite).InvokeMember("m_openedWebs",
BindingFlags.NonPublic | BindingFlags.Instance | BindingFlags.GetField,
null, site, null) as ICollection).Count;

Console.WriteLine("Acutally opened SPWebs: " + openedWebs.ToString());

Console.ReadKey();

Any feedback?

Manage ASP.NET Providers with PowerShell

2010-03-01T21:39:00.001+01:00

I’ve written this script to manage SQL users on a SharePoint box with form based security (FBA).

Usage:

Load the script
PS>. .\Manage_ASP_NET_Providers.ps1 “C:\..\web.config”

You have to provide the path to the web.config which contains the membership provider configurations.

The script will change the current app domain’s config path and then loads the System.Web Assembly. The sequence is important. If you want to change app config path later, you have to restart PowerShell and load the script again with another path.

Examples:

Get Membership Provider “sqlMembers”
PS> $provider = Get-MembershipProvider “sqlMembers”

Add a new user (login, mail, question, answer)
PS> $provider | Add-MembershipUser “cglessner” “cg@test.de” “Best Portal” “SharePoint”

List first 1000 users
PS> $provider | Get-MembershipUser –maxResult 1000

….

Bye, Christian

ShareCamp – born2share.

2010-02-10T09:42:00.008+01:00

the SharePoint Community Germany is conducting a first-of-its-kind BarCamp format on SharePoint, coined ShareCamp.

Our slogan is “born2share.” (spoken born to share point ;)

ShareCamp will be a two-day BarCamp event. BarCamps, also called non-conferences, that is looking for active contributors rather than passive consumers. There is no fixed, up-front agenda, but all participants are invited to present – contents will be decided upon among the participants. Spontaneous sessions replace the pre-prepared presentations found at traditional conferences. Developing ideas freely and mutual interaction are not only allowed, but explicitly encouraged.

ShareCamp addresses technical issues (installation, administration, migration, …) as well as social aspects of collaboration and their effects on company cultures. Best practices, helpful tools and add-ons – all topics of interest to the participants are welcomed, in particular special interest topics.
We expect a mixed audience of up to 200 SharePoint administrators, developers, end users, Microsoft staff and solution providers.

ShareCamp takes place April 10/11 at the Microsoft headquarters in Unterschleissheim (Munich); Microsoft will also serve as a diamant sponsor of the event.

Participation and catering is free of charge for all participants.

ShareCamp is non-profit oriented, but an independent event organized by volunteers from within the SharePoint community. ShareCamps are only made possible by the kind contribution of sponsors that allow for a such an event to be free of charge and to cover expenses for event site, infrastructure, and catering.
The idea a BarCamp about SharePoint was born at TechEd Europe by Michael Greth and myself. Here we go!

SharePoint 2010, PowerShell and Disposing

2009-11-10T00:14:00.008+01:00

When you are already familiar with the SharePoint object model, you might know that SPSite and SPWeb allocate large amounts of memory and adequate memory management and disposing is essential. To make life easier the SharePoint team introduced two Cmdlets dealing with this in SharePoint 2010:

Start-SPAssignment
Stop-SPAssignment

By default, all Get commands dispose of these objects immediately after the pipeline finishes, but using SPAssignment, you can assign the list of objects to a variable and dispose of the objects after they are no longer needed. You can also ensure that the objects will remain as long as you need them, even throughout multiple iterations of commands
There are three levels of assignment:

No Assignment

The object is not assigned to a variable and is disposed after each iteration of the command.

Get-SPWeb http://server/sites/* |
     foreach { $_.Title | out-host }

Simple Assignment

All objects are assigned to the global assignment store. This is done by using the Global parameter. When using this level, all objects are assigned to a global store and are disposed of when the Stop-SPAssignment command is called.

Start-SPAssignment -GlobalGlobal
$web = Get-SPWeb "http://server/sites/web"
$web.Title = "Greetings from PowerShell"
$web.Update()
Stop-SPAssignment -Global
# $web will be disposed

Note: Use global assignment with caution! For example, if you use Start-SPAssignment – Global with and then call Get-SPSite –Limit ALL, every site collection object will be loaded, every site collection object will be loaded into memory. In a live server farm, this is likely to cause to cause serious performance issues

Advanced Assignment

Objects are assigned to named stores for disposal. You can dispose of objects by using the -Identity parameter with the Stop-SPAssignment command.

$siteScope = Start-SPAssignment
foreach($site in ($siteScope | Get-SPSite "http://server/*"))
{
   $webScope = Start-SPAssignment
   $web = $webScope | Get-SPWeb $site.RootWeb.Url
   $web.Title = "Greetings from PowerShell"
   $web.Update()
   Stop-SPAssignment $webScope
}
Stop-SPAssignment $siteScope

Regardless of the level used, all objects are disposed of when the PowerShell runspace is closed.

Preview - Wikis in SharePoint 2010

2009-10-26T23:14:00.002+01:00

Refers to build 14.0.4006.1010 (BETA 1)

Wiki functionality in SharePoint 2007 was kind of spartan. In this post I’ll have a look what will come with SharePoint 2010.

The Wiki Homepage Feature

When you create a blank site in SharePoint 2010 the homepage (default.aspx) will be a web part page as usual. But now there’s a new feature called “Wiki Page Home Page”.

When you activate the feature it creates a document library called “SitePages”, adds a wiki page named “default.aspx” and set it as the new homepage for the site.

The feature transforms your whole site to a wiki. Every time you create a new page it will create a new wiki page and store it in the “SitePages” lib (similar to the publishing features in 2007).

For sure you can tag Wiki pages as any other page as described in my previous post Managing Metadata in SharePoint 2010.

Content

While in SharePoint you could only write some rich text, you now could upload files (will be stored as a separate file) and add Web Parts.

No joke, you can now add Web Parts at any place within the wiki rich text!

[[Wiki Linking]]

In SharePoint 2010 you will get an intellisense like linking experience. That’s kind of cool :-) Just an enter [[ and press ctrl+space

You can now link easily pages, lists, items, documents and views.

Enterprise Wiki Layouts

Additionally there’s a new Site Collection feature called “Enterprise Wiki Layouts” for creating a large-scale wiki with categories and page layouts.

Seems to be correlated with the publishing infrastructure, because the feature add a new page layout content type. This means you can create wiki page layouts with SharePoint Designer 2010.
Click and see the beautiful new SharePoint 2010 error message.
Never mind this a technical preview and lot of things already work great. Can’t await to continue with the beta in November…

Managing Metadata in SharePoint 2010

2009-10-22T14:20:00.011+02:00

Obsolete: Refers to build 14.0.4006.1010 (beta 1)

SharePoint 2010 comes with a bunch of web 2.0 features, tags, tag clouds, rating, social bookmarking and enhanced blogs and wikis. What I really missed in SharePoint 2007 was tags and tag clouds. On the other hand this was a free space for developers like me, see Power Tag Cloud ;-) My experience with SharePoint 2003 already showed that text, dropdowns and lookup columns are to inflexible and people tend to over categorize in the conception stage.

Less is more!

This could lead to a confusing meta taxonomy. What we have learned from the web 2.0 wave in the last years is that tags and tag clouds are a great, simple and flexible way to organize information.
Now with SharePoint 2010 this and much, much more comes out of the box. Tagging becomes one of the most significant concepts for building enterprise taxonomies in SharePoint 2010.

What can be tagged?

List Items (Terms, Keywords, Social Tags)
Documents (Terms, Keywords, Social Tags)
Pages (Terms, Keywords, Social Tags)
External pages (Social Tags)

This means everything that has an URL can be social tagged. Do you know anything in the web that hasn’t one?

Talked enough, let’s play around with this stuff…

Tag a list item or a document:

Almost any built-in list has per default a “Managed Keywords” column. When you start to write you get a filtered list of suggestions. When you enter a tag that not exist it will be automatically added to the managed keywords list.

Tag and note a SharePoint page:

To tag a SharePoint page you can use the user’s context menu as shown above. Clicking “Tag or Note this Page” opens the following dialog.
You can tag the page just like the list item before, but in addition you will get a list of suggested tags and you can mark them as private, so other user will not see them. At the bottom of the dialog you see a tag and note history. Furthermore you can add notes to the page (see in the second tab on the top).

How to tag an external page?

Since years I miss a tool from Microsoft to centrally manage bookmarks and I believe I’m not alone. To tag external pages you have first to add a link to the SharePoint tagging dialog to your browser’s favorites:

This adds the “Tags and Noteboard” bookmark (JavaScript) to your browsers favorites list. Now you tag an external page like this:
Clicking to the “Tag and Noteboard” brings up the same dialog as in the previous example for a SharePoint page. You can tag and write notes as usual.

This looks similar to social bookmark tools like Diigo. But I miss some features like highlighting text, sticky notes, share bookmarks with a group, and a good browser plug-in. But hope this will come in later builds…

My Tags and Notes

You can manage your tags globally as shown bellow.

Managing Enterprise Metadata

All you seen above is not enough for building an enterprise taxonomy. You don’t want let the users build your taxonomy on the fly with some tags, you want to predefine keywords and terms for your whole SharePoint farm. And what’s about multilingual terms and keywords? That’s why Microsoft added a something called “Term Store Management Tool”:

Here you can delete or create new tags and terms centrally for the whole farm. There is also support for multilingual terms! In my current build I’ve got the feeling this isn’t feature completed yet (there is already some documentation on MSDN), so I stop here and wait for further builds…

Although all this cool new web 2.0 features in SharePoint 2010, don’t forget that the most significant part is to get all this rocking is your company’s culture! Are you ready for culture 2.0?

UPDATE 26th Nov 09 (beta 2):
I've just seen in a screencast from Steffen Kraus (Microsoft Germany) some enhancements in newer builds:

support for hierachical tags (Taxonomy)
tag picker functionality
tag based hierachical navigation in a list (Metadata navigation)

There's a huge different between social tags (will be stored at the user profile) and Enterprise Keywords and Terms (will be stored in the item itself)

FAST Search can't use tag refinment for social tags - read more.

Built-in Features Overview in SharePoint 2010

2009-10-20T22:44:00.001+02:00

Refers to build 14.0.4006.1010

Just an overview, I haven’t had time to check them all out yet, but want to share them with you…

Site Collection Features:

Advanced Web Analytics
This feature comprises advanced Web Analytics reports, data-driven workflows, workflow for scheduling reports, the What's Popular Web Part and customize reports functionality(for Enterprise SKU) at the site collection level.

Collect Signatures Workflow
Gathers signatures needed to complete a Microsoft Office document.

Collect Signatures Workflow - SharePoint 14
Gathers signatures needed to complete a Microsoft Office document. This workflow can be edited in SharePoint Designer.

Disposition Approval Workflow
Manages document expiration and retention by allowing participants to decide whether to retain or delete expired documents.

Document ID Service
Assigns IDs to documents in the Site Collection, which can be used to retrieve items independent of their current location.

Document Sets
Provides the content types required for creating and using document sets. Create a document set when you want to manage multiple documents as a single work product.

Enterprise Wiki Layouts
Create a large-scale wiki with categories and page layouts.

In Place Records Management
Enable the definition and declaration of records in place.

Library and Folder Based Retention
Allows list administrators to override content type retention schedules and set schedules on libraries and folders.

Microsoft Search Server Web Parts
This feature uploads all web parts required for Search Center.

Office SharePoint Server Enterprise Site Collection features
Features such as the business data catalog, forms services, and Excel Services, included in the Office SharePoint Server Enterprise License.

Office SharePoint Server Publishing Infrastructure
Provides centralized libraries, content types, master pages and page layouts and enables page scheduling and other publishing functionality for a site collection.

Office SharePoint Server Standard Site Collection features
Features such as user profiles and search, included in the Office SharePoint Server Standard License.

Reporting
Creates reports about information in Windows SharePoint Services.

Routing Workflows
Workflows that send a document for feedback or approval.

Routing Workflows - SharePoint 14
Workflows that send a document for feedback or approval. These workflows can be edited in SharePoint Designer.

Site Help
Create Help content for this site collection.

Three-state workflow
Use this workflow to track items in a list.

Translation Management Workflow
Manages document translation by creating copies of the document to be translated and assigning translation tasks to translators.

Visio Web Access
View Visio Drawing in Web Browser

Site Features:

Access Services System Tables
Access Services System Tables

Content Organizer
Create metadata based rules that move content submitted to this site to the correct library or folder.

E-mail Router
This enables a site's document router to accept and route email messages. This feature should be used only in a highly managed store, like a Records Center.

Entity Collaboration Configuration
Creates the infrastructure necessary to enable users to create entity collaboration sites.

Entity Collaboration Instance Configuration
Creates the infrastructure necessary to enable users to create entity collaboration instance sites.

GroupBoard Lists
Provides Calendar lists with added functionality for team and resource scheduling.

Hold and eDiscovery
This feature is used to track external actions like litigations, investigations, or audits that require you to suspend the disposition of documents.

Metadata Navigation and Filtering
Provides each list in the site with a settings pages for configuring that list to use metadata tree view hierarchies and filter controls to improve navigation and filtering of the contained items.

Office Business Application Design Tools
Document libraries, lists, content types and pages required to build an Office Business Application solution.

Office SharePoint Server Enterprise Site features
Features such as the business data catalog, forms services, and Excel Services, included in the Office SharePoint Server Enterprise License.

Office SharePoint Server Publishing
Create a Web page library as well as supporting libraries to create and publish pages based on page layouts.

Office SharePoint Server Standard Site features
Features such as user profiles and search, included in the Office SharePoint Server Standard License.

Take list offline
Take a virtual list offline into Outlook or Groove.

Team Collaboration Lists
Provides team collaboration capabilities for a site by making standard lists, such as document libraries and issues, available.

Translation Management Library
Create a translation management library when you want to create documents in multiple languages and manage translation tasks. Translation management libraries include a workflow to manage the translation process and provide sub-folders, file versioning, and check-in/check-out.

Wiki Page Home Page
This site feature will create a wiki page and set it as your site home page.

Early look at LINQ to SharePoint

2009-10-19T18:00:00.012+02:00

This post is preliminary and is subject to change, but should give you at least an idea. It refers to build 14.0.4006.1010.

In SharePoint 2007 you have to user CAML to query SharePoint lists. Anybody who have already written CAML queries knows that this can be tedious with complex queries. To make life easier the community had developed various helper tools like the U2U CAML Query Builder, YACAMLQT (Yet Another CAML Query Tool), CAML.NET… Meanwhile .NET 3.5 has been released with a cool new feature called LINQ (Language Integrated Queries). LINQ allows you to query in an object-oriented way, supports compile-time check, gives you intellisense support in Visual Studio and defines a unified, SQL like syntax to query any data source.

var result = from c in Contacts 
where c.FirstName == "Christian"
select c

The abstraction to allow querying any data source has been implemented through an interface called IQueryable(T), but don’t want to go deep in LINQ. Since now Microsoft has been delivered four LINQ providers:

LINQ to Object
LINQ to XML
LINQ to SQL
LINQ to Entity

With SharePoint 2010 the fifth LINQ Provider will be available:

LINQ to SharePoint

To don’t overlook the community efforts, there is already a LINQ provider for SharePoint on CodePlex, but since now it is in an alpha stadium.
LINQ to SharePoint works similar to LINQ to SQL or LINQ to Entity. You write business objects (or maybe a DAOs) and decorate them with mapping attributes. When the query will be executed the LINQ statements will be translated to CAML.
The example class Contact maps to a custom Content Type with the name MyContact and the columns ID and FirstName. Writing this manual is cumbersome, therefore there’s a command line tool called SPMetal, which generates this classes for a whole site. E.g:
SPMetal /web:http://localhost/anysite /namespace:iLoveSharePoint /code:SPDataContext.cs

Now we want to query our SharePoint list with LINQ. This is done by a class called Microsoft.SharePoint.Linq.DataContext. The DataContext represents a whole web site. SPMetal additionally generates a derived DataContext containing all lists as Properties.

Adding, editing and deleting Items with LINQ to SharePoint

Certainly you can add, edit and delete items with LINQ to SharePoint. To enable change tracking you must (not really all) implement some interfaces in your class:

Microsoft.SharePoint.Linq.ITrackEntityState
Microsoft.SharePoint.Linq.ITrackOriginalValues
System.ComponentModel.INotifyPropertyChanged
System.ComponentModel.INotifyPropertyChanging

Don’t panic, SPMetal does the job for you. I recommend to use SPMetal to generate the classes.

Let’s add new contact:

The method SumbitChanges of the DataContext persist all changes (add, edit, delete) to the SharePoint Content DB.

Relations in LINQ to SharePoint

Another hot topic in SharePoint are relations between lists. In SharePoint 2007 CAML hasn’t any support for joins! This have made it almost impossible to build data centric applications for SharePoint 2007 (among other restrictions). But many, many customer want do that! Now with LINQ to SharePoint comes support for relational queries – Yippee!
Now we extend our sample Content Type with a lookup column to another Content Type called MyCountry and map the relation.

To map a multi Lookup you have to use EntitySet<T> instead of EntityRef<T> and set the MultivalueType property of the Association attribute to Multi. The loading of the relation is deferred. The Country object of the Contact will be loaded from the DB when the property will accessed and not before.
Get all contacts from Germany:

Yet I haven’t verified that this relational query really ends up in a SQL joins If not, this would really be bad. I will verify that as soon as possible…

I think I stop here, because things could change in further builds…

Early look at SharePoint 2010 & PowerShell

2009-10-19T18:00:00.000+02:00

This post is preliminary and is subject to change. It refers to build 14.0.4006.1010.

In the community the combination of SharePoint and PowerShell is already a best practice for SharePoint 2007. Thanks to guys like Zach Rosenfield, Eric Kraus and hopefully myself.

I’m glad to announce that SharePoint 2010 comes with built-in PowerShell support. What a surprise ;-)

You have two options to use PowerShell with SharePoint 2010, either you can launch the built-in SharePoint 2010 Management Console

or import the SharePoint PowerShell snap in manually (Add-PSSnapin Microsoft.SharePoint.PowerShell).

Out of the box there are 492 SharePoint PowerShell commands!

You don’t believe, check it out yourself:
get-command -Noun SP* | measure-object

As expected the naming convention for the commands is

[Verb]-SP[Noun]

like Eric and I have done before in SPoshMod or myself in the PowerShell profile script for SharePoint. This is great because you are already familiar with the usage and it minimizes script migration efforts. The example in my SharePoint & PowerShell Quick Start post works without any changes with the SharePoint 2010 PowerShell Snap In.

$web = get-spweb “http://localhost”
$web.Title = "Hello PowerShell"
$web.Update()

You can also provide a wildcard (*) in the URL to return a collection of sub sites. See all options with “get-help get-spweb”

Appendix - List of SharePoint 2010 PowerShell Commands

Add-SPClaimMapping
Add-SPFeatureSetMember
Add-SPInfoPathUserAgent
Add-SPProfileServiceApplicationTenant
Add-SPServiceApplicationProxyGroupMember
Add-SPSolution
Add-SPUserSolution
Backup-SPConfigurationDatabase
Backup-SPFarm
Backup-SPSite
Check-SPContentDatabase
Clear-SPBusinessDataCatalogPartitionData
Clear-SPLogLevel
Clear-SPMetadataWebServicePartitionData
Clear-SPSecureStoreCredentialMapping
Connect-SPConfigurationDatabase
Copy-SPBusinessDataCatalogAclToChildren
Disable-SPBusinessDataCatalogEntity
Disable-SPFeature
Disable-SPInfoPathFormTemplate
Disable-SPSessionStateService
Disable-SPSingleSignOn
Disable-SPTimerJob
Disable-SPWebApplicationHttpThrottling
Disconnect-SPConfigurationDatabase
Dismount-SPContentDatabase
Dismount-SPStateServiceDatabase
Enable-SPBusinessDataCatalogEntity
Enable-SPFeature
Enable-SPInfoPathFormTemplate
Enable-SPSessionStateService
Enable-SPTimerJob
Enable-SPWebApplicationHttpThrottling
Export-SPBusinessDataCatalogModel
Export-SPBusinessDataCatalogPartitionData
Export-SPEnterpriseSearchTopology
Export-SPInfoPathAdministrationFiles
Export-SPMetadataWebServicePartitionData
Export-SPProfileServiceApplicationTenant
Export-SPSiteSubscriptionSettings
Export-SPWeb
Get-SPAccessServiceApplication
Get-SPAlternateURL
Get-SPBackupHistory
Get-SPBrowserCustomerExperienceImprovementProgram
Get-SPBusinessDataCatalogMetadataObject
Get-SPBusinessDataCatalogThrottleConfig
Get-SPCertificate
Get-SPCertificateStore
Get-SPClaimProviderManager
Get-SPContentDatabase
Get-SPContentDeploymentJob
Get-SPContentDeploymentPath
Get-SPCustomLayoutsPage
Get-SPDatabase
Get-SPDataConnectionFile
Get-SPDataConnectionFileDependent
Get-SPDesignerSettings
Get-SPDiagnosticConfig
Get-SPDiagnosticsProvider
Get-SPEdiscoveryHubSearchScope
Get-SPediscoveryHubSite
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchAdministrationComponent
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchCrawlComponent
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchCrawlContentSource
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchCrawlCustomConnector
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchCrawlDatabase
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchCrawlExtension
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchCrawlMapping
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchCrawlRule
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchCrawlTopology
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchExtendedClickThroughExtractorJobDefinition
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchExtendedConnectorProperty
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchExtendedQueryProperty
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchIndexPartition
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchLanguageResourcePhrase
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchManagerService
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchManagerServiceInstance
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchManagerServiceProxy
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchMetadataCategory
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchMetadataCrawledProperty
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchMetadataManagedProperty
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchMetadataMapping
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchPropertyDatabase
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchQueryAuthority
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchQueryComponent
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchQueryDemoted
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchQueryKeyword
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchQueryScope
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchQueryScopeRule
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchQuerySuggestionCandidates
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchQueryTopology
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchRankingModel
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchSecurityTrimmer
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchService
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchServiceApplication
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchServiceApplicationProxy
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchServiceInstance
Get-SPEnterpriseSearchSiteHitRule
Get-SPExcelBlockedFileType
Get-SPExcelDataConnectionLibrary
Get-SPExcelDataProvider
Get-SPExcelFileLocation
Get-SPExcelServiceApplication
Get-SPExcelUserDefinedFunction
Get-SPFarm
Get-SPFarmConfig
Get-SPFeature
Get-SPFeatureSet
Get-SPHelpCollection
Get-SPIdentityProvider
Get-SPIisWebServiceApplicationPool
Get-SPIisWebServiceSettings
Get-SPInfoPathFormsService
Get-SPInfoPathFormTemplate
Get-SPInfoPathUserAgent
Get-SPInfoPathWebServiceProxy
Get-SPLogEvent
Get-SPLogLevel
Get-SPManagedAccount
Get-SPManagedPath
Get-SPMetadataServiceApplication
Get-SPMetadataServiceApplicationProxy
Get-SPMobileMessagingAccount
Get-SPObjectSecurity
Get-SPParentFarmTrust
Get-SPProcessAccount
Get-SPProduct
Get-SPSearchService
Get-SPSearchServiceInstance
Get-SPSecureStoreApplication
Get-SPSecurityTokenService
Get-SPServer
Get-SPServiceApplication
Get-SPServiceApplicationProxy
Get-SPServiceApplicationProxyGroup
Get-SPServiceContext
Get-SPServiceEndpoint
Get-SPServiceInstance
Get-SPSessionStateService
Get-SPSite
Get-SPSiteAdministration
Get-SPSiteSubscription
Get-SPSiteSubscriptionConfig
Get-SPSiteSubscriptionMetadataConfig
Get-SPSolution
Get-SPStateServiceApplication
Get-SPStateServiceApplicationProxy
Get-SPStateServiceDatabase
Get-SPTaxonomySession
Get-SPTimerJob
Get-SPTopologyWebServiceApplication
Get-SPTopologyWebServiceProxy
Get-SPUsageApplication
Get-SPUsageDefinition
Get-SPUsageService
Get-SPUser
Get-SPUserSolution
Get-SPVisioExternalData
Get-SPVisioPerformance
Get-SPVisioSafeDataProvider
Get-SPVisioServiceApplication
Get-SPVisioServiceApplicationProxy
Get-SPWeb
Get-SPWebAnalyticsServiceApplication
Get-SPWebApplication
Get-SPWebApplicationHttpThrottlingMonitors
Get-SPWebPartPack
Get-SPWebTemplate
Get-SPWorkflowConfig
Grant-SPBusinessDataCatalogMetadataObject
Grant-SPServiceApplication
Import-SPBusinessDataCatalogModel
Import-SPBusinessDataCatalogPartitionData
Import-SPEnterpriseSearchTopology
Import-SPInfoPathAdministrationFiles
Import-SPMetadataWebServicePartitionData
Import-SPProfileServiceApplicationTenant
Import-SPSiteSubscriptionSettings
Import-SPWeb
Initialize-SPContentDatabase
Initialize-SPResourceSecurity
Initialize-SPStateServiceDatabase
Install-SPApplicationContent
Install-SPDataConnectionFile
Install-SPFeature
Install-SPHelpCollection
Install-SPInfoPathFormTemplate
Install-SPSolution
Install-SPUserSolution
Install-SPWebPartPack
Install-SPWebTemplate
Merge-SPLogFile
Mount-SPContentDatabase
Mount-SPStateServiceDatabase
Move-SPBlobStorageLocation
Move-SPUser
New-SPAccessServiceApplication
New-SPAlternateURL
New-SPBusinessDataCatalogServiceApplication
New-SPBusinessDataCatalogServiceApplicationProxy
New-SPCentralAdministration
New-SPCertificate
New-SPClaimMapping
New-SPClaimsObject
New-SPClaimsPrincipal
New-SPConfigurationDatabase
New-SPContentDatabase
New-SPContentDeploymentJob
New-SPContentDeploymentPath
New-SPEnterpriseSearchCrawlComponent
New-SPEnterpriseSearchCrawlContentSource
New-SPEnterpriseSearchCrawlCustomConnector
New-SPEnterpriseSearchCrawlDatabase
New-SPEnterpriseSearchCrawlExtension
New-SPEnterpriseSearchCrawlMapping
New-SPEnterpriseSearchCrawlRule
New-SPEnterpriseSearchCrawlTopology
New-SPEnterpriseSearchLanguageResourcePhrase
New-SPEnterpriseSearchMetadataCategory
New-SPEnterpriseSearchMetadataCrawledProperty
New-SPEnterpriseSearchMetadataManagedProperty
New-SPEnterpriseSearchMetadataMapping
New-SPEnterpriseSearchPropertyDatabase
New-SPEnterpriseSearchQueryAuthority
New-SPEnterpriseSearchQueryComponent
New-SPEnterpriseSearchQueryDemoted
New-SPEnterpriseSearchQueryKeyword
New-SPEnterpriseSearchQueryScope
New-SPEnterpriseSearchQueryScopeRule
New-SPEnterpriseSearchQueryTopology
New-SPEnterpriseSearchRankingModel
New-SPEnterpriseSearchSecurityTrimmer
New-SPEnterpriseSearchServiceApplication
New-SPEnterpriseSearchServiceApplicationProxy
New-SPEnterpriseSearchSiteHitRule
New-SPExcelBlockedFileType
New-SPExcelDataConnectionLibrary
New-SPExcelDataProvider
New-SPExcelFileLocation
New-SPExcelServiceApplication
New-SPExcelUserDefinedFunction
New-SPFeatureSet
New-SPIdentityProvider
New-SPIisWebServiceApplicationPool
New-SPLogFile
New-SPManagedAccount
New-SPManagedPath
New-SPMetadataServiceApplication
New-SPMetadataServiceApplicationProxy
New-SPObaSolutionPackage
New-SPParentFarmTrust
New-SPProfileServiceApplication
New-SPProfileServiceApplicationProxy
New-SPSecureStoreApplication
New-SPSecureStoreApplicationField
New-SPSecureStoreServiceApplication
New-SPSecureStoreServiceApplicationProxy
New-SPSecureStoreTargetApplication
New-SPServiceApplicationProxyGroup
New-SPSite
New-SPSiteSubscription
New-SPStateServiceApplication
New-SPStateServiceApplicationProxy
New-SPStateServiceDatabase
New-SPSubscriptionSettingsServiceApplication
New-SPSubscriptionSettingsServiceApplicationProxy
New-SPUsageApplication
New-SPUsageLogFile
New-SPUser
New-SPVisioSafeDataProvider
New-SPVisioServiceApplication
New-SPVisioServiceApplicationProxy
New-SPWeb
New-SPWebAnalyticsServiceApplication
New-SPWebAnalyticsServiceApplicationProxy
New-SPWebApplication
New-SPWebApplicationExtension
New-SPWordConversionServiceApplication
New-SPWordConversionServiceApplicationProxy
Publish-SPServiceApplication
Receive-SPSharedServiceApplicationInfo
Remove-SPAlternateURL
Remove-SPBusinessDataCatalogModel
Remove-SPBusinessDataCatalogPartition
Remove-SPBusinessDataCatalogThrottleConfig
Remove-SPCertificate
Remove-SPClaimMapping
Remove-SPConfigurationDatabase
Remove-SPContentDatabase
Remove-SPContentDeploymentJob
Remove-SPContentDeploymentPath
Remove-SPEnterpriseSearchCrawlComponent
Remove-SPEnterpriseSearchCrawlContentSource
Remove-SPEnterpriseSearchCrawlCustomConnector
Remove-SPEnterpriseSearchCrawlDatabase
Remove-SPEnterpriseSearchCrawlExtension
Remove-SPEnterpriseSearchCrawlMapping
Remove-SPEnterpriseSearchCrawlRule
Remove-SPEnterpriseSearchCrawlTopology
Remove-SPEnterpriseSearchLanguageResourcePhrase
Remove-SPEnterpriseSearchMetadataCategory
Remove-SPEnterpriseSearchMetadataManagedProperty
Remove-SPEnterpriseSearchMetadataMapping
Remove-SPEnterpriseSearchPropertyDatabase
Remove-SPEnterpriseSearchQueryAuthority
Remove-SPEnterpriseSearchQueryComponent
Remove-SPEnterpriseSearchQueryDemoted
Remove-SPEnterpriseSearchQueryKeyword
Remove-SPEnterpriseSearchQueryScope
Remove-SPEnterpriseSearchQueryScopeRule
Remove-SPEnterpriseSearchQueryTopology
Remove-SPEnterpriseSearchRankingModel
Remove-SPEnterpriseSearchSecurityTrimmer
Remove-SPEnterpriseSearchServiceApplication
Remove-SPEnterpriseSearchServiceApplicationProxy
Remove-SPEnterpriseSearchSiteHitRule
Remove-SPExcelBlockedFileType
Remove-SPExcelDataConnectionLibrary
Remove-SPExcelDataProvider
Remove-SPExcelFileLocation
Remove-SPExcelUserDefinedFunction
Remove-SPFeatureSet
Remove-SPFeatureSetMember
Remove-SPIdentityProvider
Remove-SPIisWebServiceApplicationPool
Remove-SPInfoPathUserAgent
Remove-SPManagedAccount
Remove-SPManagedPath
Remove-SPParentFarmTrust
Remove-SPProfileServiceApplicationTenant
Remove-SPSecureStoreApplication
Remove-SPServiceApplication
Remove-SPServiceApplicationProxy
Remove-SPServiceApplicationProxyGroup
Remove-SPServiceApplicationProxyGroupMember
Remove-SPSite
Remove-SPSiteSubscription
Remove-SPSiteSubscriptionMetadataConfig
Remove-SPSiteSubscriptionSettings
Remove-SPSolution
Remove-SPSolutionDeploymentLock
Remove-SPStateServiceDatabase
Remove-SPUsageApplication
Remove-SPUser
Remove-SPUserSolution
Remove-SPVisioSafeDataProvider
Remove-SPVisioServiceApplication
Remove-SPVisioServiceApplicationProxy
Remove-SPWeb
Remove-SPWebApplication
Rename-SPServer
Restart-SPEnterpriseSearchQueryComponent
Restore-SPEnterpriseSearchServiceApplication
Restore-SPFarm
Restore-SPSite
Resume-SPStateServiceDatabase
Revoke-SPBusinessDataCatalogMetadataObject
Revoke-SPServiceApplication
Set-SPAccessServiceApplication
Set-SPAlternateURL
Set-SPBrowserCustomerExperienceImprovementProgram
Set-SPBusinessDataCatalogMetadataObject
Set-SPBusinessDataCatalogServiceApplication
Set-SPBusinessDataCatalogThrottleConfig
Set-SPCentralAdministration
Set-SPContentDatabase
Set-SPContentDeploymentJob
Set-SPContentDeploymentPath
Set-SPCustomLayoutsPage
Set-SPDataConnectionFile
Set-SPDesignerSettings
Set-SPDiagnosticConfig
Set-SPDiagnosticsProvider
Set-SPediscoveryHub
Set-SPEnterpriseSearchAdministrationComponent
Set-SPEnterpriseSearchCrawlContentSource
Set-SPEnterpriseSearchCrawlDatabase
Set-SPEnterpriseSearchCrawlRule
Set-SPEnterpriseSearchCrawlTopology
Set-SPEnterpriseSearchExtendedConnectorProperty
Set-SPEnterpriseSearchExtendedQueryProperty
Set-SPEnterpriseSearchIndexPartition
Set-SPEnterpriseSearchMetadataCategory
Set-SPEnterpriseSearchMetadataCrawledProperty
Set-SPEnterpriseSearchMetadataManagedProperty
Set-SPEnterpriseSearchMetadataMapping
Set-SPEnterpriseSearchPropertyDatabase
Set-SPEnterpriseSearchQueryAuthority
Set-SPEnterpriseSearchQueryComponent
Set-SPEnterpriseSearchQueryKeyword
Set-SPEnterpriseSearchQueryScope
Set-SPEnterpriseSearchQueryScopeRule
Set-SPEnterpriseSearchQueryTopology
Set-SPEnterpriseSearchRankingModel
Set-SPEnterpriseSearchService
Set-SPEnterpriseSearchServiceApplication
Set-SPEnterpriseSearchServiceApplicationProxy
Set-SPEnterpriseSearchServiceInstance
Set-SPExcelDataConnectionLibrary
Set-SPExcelDataProvider
Set-SPExcelFileLocation
Set-SPExcelServiceApplication
Set-SPExcelUserDefinedFunction
Set-SPFarmConfig
Set-SPIdentityProvider
Set-SPIisWebServiceApplicationPool
Set-SPIisWebServiceSettings
Set-SPInfoPathFormsService
Set-SPInfoPathFormTemplate
Set-SPInfoPathWebServiceProxy
Set-SPLogLevel
Set-SPManagedAccount
Set-SPMetadataServiceApplication
Set-SPMetadataServiceApplicationProxy
Set-SPMobileMessagingAccount
Set-SPParentFarmTrust
Set-SPPassPhrase
Set-SPProfileServiceApplication
Set-SPProfileServiceApplicationProxy
Set-SPProfileServiceApplicationTenant
Set-SPSearchService
Set-SPSearchServiceInstance
Set-SPSecureStoreApplication
Set-SPSecureStoreServiceApplication
Set-SPServiceApplication
Set-SPServiceEndpoint
Set-SPSessionStateService
Set-SPSite
Set-SPSiteAdministration
Set-SPSiteSubscriptionConfig
Set-SPSiteSubscriptionMetadataConfig
Set-SPStateServiceApplication
Set-SPStateServiceApplicationProxy
Set-SPStateServiceDatabase
Set-SPSubscriptionSettingsServiceApplication
Set-SPTimerJob
Set-SPTopologyWebServiceApplication
Set-SPTopologyWebServiceProxy
Set-SPUsageApplication
Set-SPUsageDefinition
Set-SPUsageService
Set-SPUser
Set-SPVisioExternalData
Set-SPVisioPerformance
Set-SPVisioSafeDataProvider
Set-SPVisioServiceApplication
Set-SPWeb
Set-SPWebAnalyticsServiceApplication
Set-SPWebApplication
Set-SPWebApplicationHttpThrottlingMonitor
Set-SPWebApplicationSiginRedirectUrl
Set-SPWebTemplate
Set-SPWordConversionServiceApplication
Set-SPWorkflowConfig
Start-SPAdminJob
Start-SPAssignment
Start-SPContentDeploymentJob
Start-SPEnterpriseSearchManagerServiceInstance
Start-SPEnterpriseSearchServiceInstance
Start-SPInfoPathFormTemplate
Start-SPServiceInstance
Start-SPTimerJob
Stop-SPAssignment
Stop-SPEnterpriseSearchManagerServiceInstance
Stop-SPEnterpriseSearchServiceInstance
Stop-SPInfoPathFormTemplate
Stop-SPServiceInstance
Suspend-SPStateServiceDatabase
Test-SPInfoPathFormTemplate
Uninstall-SPDataConnectionFile
Uninstall-SPFeature
Uninstall-SPHelpCollection
Uninstall-SPInfoPathFormTemplate
Uninstall-SPSolution
Uninstall-SPUserSolution
Uninstall-SPWebPartPack
Uninstall-SPWebTemplate
Unpublish-SPServiceApplication
Update-SPFarmEncryptionKey
Update-SPInfoPathFormTemplate
Update-SPInfoPathUrl
Update-SPSecureStoreApplicationServerKey
Update-SPSecureStoreCredentialMapping
Update-SPSecureStoreGroupCredentialMapping
Update-SPSecureStoreMasterKey
Update-SPSolution
Update-SPUserProfilePhotoStore
Update-SPUserSolution
Upgrade-SPContentDatabase
Upgrade-SPEnterpriseSearchServiceApplication
Upgrade-SPSingleSignOnDatabase

My Impressions from the Azure World Tour 2009

2009-10-07T21:40:00.001+02:00

I’m just travelling home from the Azure Worldtour in Munich. I really was the only guy who worn a shirt! But…

…this mustn’t necessarily be something bad.

Seems Steve loves SharePoint too :-)

Back to Azure: I really like the cloud strategy from Microsoft, the .NET Services, .NET Service Bus and SQL Services and all the Azure stuff. Gartner says the market will grow from $46 billion to $150 billion in 2013. And one is “azure” Microsoft want to have a big chunk of the cake! And they are on a good way…

There is one thing frightening me when I think of cloud computing. When in the near future almost anybody would make use of cloud computing and there are only a few data centers around the world, they would obviously be a good target for terrorism. A destroyed data center could seriously harm the global economy.

Will this be Terrorism 2.0?!

One of the base ideas of the Internet, the ARPANET was to create a distributed network which will survive an nuclear attack (semi-myth). What would be in case of a war, maybe between the USA and Europe? Would Microsoft sill provide their cloud services? Would this really be a risk? Maybe this wouldn’t matter in case of a nuclear war anymore. But luckily we have freedom and are friends (see pic above:), so I stop this “mindmare” here.

Additionally cloud computing always remembers me at Skynet in Terminator, iRobot and Matrix – great movies :-)

Using the SharePoint Object Model with IronPython

2009-10-01T22:24:00.001+02:00

Same with IronPython, download IronPython and go!

# import CLR
import clr

# add a reference to the SharePoint assembly
clr.AddReference(‚Microsoft.SharePoint‘)

# import all types from the Microsoft.SharePoint namespace
from Microsoft.SharePoint import *

# instantiate SPSite at http://localhost/mysite
site = SPSite("http://localhost/mysite")

# open the web
web = site.OpenWeb()

# set the title of the web - just trivial example 
web.Title = "Greetings from IronPython"

# persist changes to content DB
web.Update()

# clean up
web.Dispose()
site.Dispose()

# the end

Using the SharePoint Object Model with IronRuby

2009-10-01T21:59:00.001+02:00

Install the latest version from IronRuby and let's script!

# load the SharePoint Assembly
require "Microsoft.SharePoint, Version=12.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=71e9bce111e9429c"

# import SPSite 
SPSite = Microsoft::SharePoint::SPSite

# instantiate the SPSite at http://localhost/anysite 
site = SPSite.new("http://localhost/anysite")

# open the corresponding web
web = site.OpenWeb

#Set the title -> just a trivial Demo!
web.Title = "Greetings from IronRuby"

# persist the changes to the Content DB
web.Update

# clean up. Don't forget as I did ;-)
web.Dispose
site.Dispose

# have a cup of coffee and enjoy to be a developer :-)

Thanks @ Thorsten Hans for the IronRuby crash course.

jQuery Test Panel for SharePoint

2009-09-26T21:07:00.005+02:00

I don’t think I’ve to told anybody how cool jQuery is, you know already, nor how to integrate in SharePoint. Let’s start with a screenshot:

The idea is to have a Webpart on your SharePoint site that simply executes jQuery statements.

Just great to experiment with jQuery and SharePoint or to learn jQuery.

All you need is a standard Content Editor Webpart with the following with the following content (source).

Works great with IE Developer Toolbar together.

Examples:

$(“.ms-sitetitle”) // selects the site title

$(“a[href^=’http://’]”).attr(“target”,”_blank”) // open all absolute links in a new window

$("*").click(function(event){
$(this).hide("slow"); return false;
}); //just fun ;-)

Customize the My Site Portal Link

2009-09-10T14:44:00.001+02:00

I’m waiting for two buttons from our designer, so I’ve got 10 minutes for trivial post…

One of our customers has already created hundreds of My Sites, but unfortunately all this sites are missing the portal link to the intranet. Two simple requirements: all new sites should have the portal link automatically and all existing sites should get the portal link too.

Customizing the portal link of the root My Site site takes care that the portal link will automatically added to new my sites. You have to enter the url to the setting page directly (e.g. http://localhost:8020/_layouts/portal.aspx), otherwise you get routed to your My Site.
To migrate all existing My Sites I’ve written a simple PowerShell script – what else ;-)

# Set-SPPortalLink.ps1
# e.g. . .\Set-SPPortalLink "http://localhost:81/" "Intranet" "http://intranet"

param($webAppUrl, $portalName, $portalUrl)

[void][System.Reflection.Assembly]::LoadWithPartialName("Microsoft.SharePoint")

$webApp = [Microsoft.SharePoint.Administration.SPWebApplication]::Lookup($webAppUrl)

foreach($site in $webApp.Sites)
{
	$site.Url | Out-Host
	#impersonate site to system user
	$impSite = new-object Microsoft.SharePoint.SPSite($site.ID, $site.SystemAccount.UserToken)
	$impSite.PortalName = $portalName
	$impsite.PortalUrl = $portalUrl

	$impSite.Dispose()
	$site.Dispose()
}

WebPart Connections With Power WebPart 3.0

2009-08-02T19:07:00.002+02:00

Web Part connections in SharePoint allows you to connect different Web Parts and to exchange data between them, even if they are from different suppliers. This is possible through the ASP.NET WebPart Connection Framework and some interfaces. For sure Power WebPart supports Web Part connections. It can act either as a row and table provider or as a consumer.

The example shows on the left a Power WebPart using a SPGridView to display current processes and acts as a row provider. It uses a DataTable as data source and sends the selected DataRow to the consumers. Theoretically you can send any object, but PowerShell dynamic types/properties (add-member) behave different and can not be reflected by the Web Part Connection Framework, so I recommend using DataTables and DataRows for WebPart connections ( in PowerShell 2.0 you can alternatively use add-type to generate C# types on the fly). On the right you see two consumers, a Power WebPart and a SharePoint List View WebPart. Both consume the DataRow from the provider on the left. The Power WebPart consumer simply shows the first column and the SharePoint List View uses the “Name” column of the provided row to filter the list items.

A script says more than thousand words.

The row provider web part:

# SPGridView to display the result 
$gridView = New-Object Microsoft.SharePoint.WebControls.SPGridView

# DataTable is used as data container
$table = New-Object System.Data.DataTable("Container")

function CreateChildControls($controls)
{ 
# add columns to the table
$table.Columns.Add($(New-Object System.Data.DataColumn("ID",[Int32])))
$table.Columns.Add($(New-Object System.Data.DataColumn("Name",[String])))
$table.Columns.Add($(New-Object System.Data.DataColumn("CPU",[double])))

# fill the table with processes
foreach($p in $(get-process))
{
$row = $table.NewRow()
$row.ID = $p.ID
$row.Name = $p.Name
$row.CPU = [double]$p.CPU

$table.Rows.Add($row)
}

# add columns to the SPGridView
$colSelectButton = New-Object System.Web.UI.WebControls.CommandField
$colSelectButton.HeaderText = "Action"
$colSelectButton.SelectText = "select"
$colSelectButton.ShowSelectButton = $true
$gridView.Columns.Add($colSelectButton)


$colId = New-Object Microsoft.SharePoint.WebControls.SPBoundField
$colId.HeaderText = "ID"
$colId.DataField = "ID"
$gridView.Columns.Add($colId)

$colName = New-Object Microsoft.SharePoint.WebControls.SPBoundField
$colName.HeaderText = "Name"
$colName.DataField = "Name"
$gridView.Columns.Add($colName)

$colCPU = New-Object Microsoft.SharePoint.WebControls.SPBoundField
$colCPU.HeaderText = "CPU"
$colCPU.DataField = "CPU"
$gridView.Columns.Add($colCPU);

# configure SPGridView
$gridView.AutoGenerateColumns=$false
$gridView.DataSource = $table
$gridView.DataBind()

$controls.Add($gridView)
}

# returns the schema to the WP Connection Framework
function GetSchema
{  
# return an empty row (or type, used for reflection)
return $table.NewRow()
}

# sends the selected row to the WP Connection Framework
function SendRow
{ 
if($gridView.SelectedIndex -gt -1) 
{
return $table.Rows[$gridView.SelectedIndex]
}
else
{
# return $null when nothing is selected
return $null
}
}

The row consumer web part:

$label = New-Object System.Web.UI.WebControls.Label

function OnReceiveRow($row, $schema)
{
if ($row -ne $null){$label.Text= $row[0]}
}

function OnPreRender
{ 
# request the row from the web part connection
# will fire "OnReceiveRow" 
Query-Connections 
}

function Render($writer)
{
$writer.Write("")
$label.RenderControl($writer)
$writer.Write("
")
}

WebPart Connections work with Power WebPart 3.0 build 0908020651 or greater.

Charts with Power WebPart ( Management-Eye-Catchers )

2009-06-11T23:51:00.001+02:00

In this post I’ll give you some ideas how you can script charts in SharePoint with Power WebPart featuring Microsoft Chart Controls.

Visualizing a SharePoint list as a pie

Setup and Configuration:

1. Download and install Microsoft Chart Controls (ensure that System.Web.DataVisualization.dll is either in the GAC or in the web app’s bin folder)
2. Download and install Power WebPart (follow the instructions in the readme.txt)
3. To use the Chart Controls in ASP.NET or SharePoint you have to modify the web.config:

Add this line to appSettings section:

<add key="ChartImageHandler" value="Storage=session;Timeout=20;" />

Add this line to the httpHandlers section:

The Script

[void][System.Reflection.Assembly]::LoadWithPartialName("System.Web.DataVisualization")

$chart = New-Object System.Web.UI.DataVisualization.Charting.Chart
$series = new-object System.Web.UI.DataVisualization.Charting.Series
$chartArea = New-Object System.Web.UI.DataVisualization.Charting.ChartArea
$legend = New-Object System.Web.UI.DataVisualization.Charting.Legend

function createchildcontrols($controls) 
{	
	$data = $web.Lists["Chart"].Items.GetDataTable() 
	
	$chart.DataSource = $data
	$chart.Width=500

	$series.ChartType = [System.Web.UI.DataVisualization.Charting.SeriesChartType]::Pie
	$series.XValueMember ="Title"
	$series.YValueMembers ="Value"
	$series.ShadowOffset = 2
	$series.IsValueShownAsLabel = $true
	
	$chart.Series.Add($series)
	
	$chartArea.Area3DStyle.Enable3D = $true
	$chart.ChartAreas.Add($chartArea)
	
	$chart.Legends.Add($legend)

	$controls.Add($chart)
	
	$chart.DataBind()
	
	$series.Points.FindMaxByValue()["Exploded"] = $true
}

This just one example! The Chart Control is really mighty! Download the chart control examples from Microsoft to get an impression:

The limitation is your imagination!

SPoshMod v1.0 Released!

2009-06-10T22:03:00.004+02:00

I'm glad to annouce that SPoshMod V1.0 has been released today. SPoshMod is a PowerShell 2.0 Module for SharePoint wrapping the most common SharePoint object model calls (e.g. Get-SPWeb, Get-SPSite...).

SPoshMod is a joint project from Eric Kraus (founder) and me. If you have written a helpful script or function and think it would be useful in the module, please send them to sposhmod@live.com we will give credit to you in the module.

More coming soon...

Using SharePoint Controls with Power WebPart

2009-06-08T21:31:00.002+02:00

SharePoint comes with a bunch of custom ASP.NET Controls. For sure you can use them with Power WebPart.
This example shows how you can search for list items by title containing a specified search string and display the result in a SharePoint list view, featuring the SharePoint ListViewByQuery control.

The Script

$textBox = New-Object System.Web.UI.WebControls.TextBox;
$button = New-Object System.Web.UI.WebControls.Button;
$button.Text = "Search"
$listView = New-Object Microsoft.SharePoint.WebControls.ListViewByQuery;
$br = New-Object System.Web.UI.WebControls.WebControl([System.Web.UI.HtmlTextWriterTag]::Br)

function createchildcontrols($controls)
{
$controls.Add($textBox)
$controls.Add($button)
$controls.Add($br)
$controls.Add($listView)
}

function onprerender()
{
# Parameter 1 can be configured in the webpart editor
$listTitle = $webpart.Parameter1

$list = $web.Lists[$listTitle]
$listView.List = $list;
$query = New-Object Microsoft.SharePoint.SPQuery -ArgumentList $list.DefaultView;

$query.Query = "
                                 


$($textBox.Text)

"

$listView.Query = $query
$listView.DisableFilter = $true
$listView.DisableSort = $true 
}

function onerror($writer)
{
$writer.Write("List title is not configured or the list does not exist.")
}

IronPython In Action

2009-05-31T13:35:00.002+02:00

For about six years I felt in love with .NET and SharePoint. In the last year I’ve also learned to love PowerShell. I was really impressed of the dynamic and power you can gain with a scripting language in combination with the .NET Framework. So I’ve started to combine SharePoint and PowerShell through embedding PowerShell and developed SharePoint PowerActivity, Power EventReceiver and Power WebPart. It was really amazing to see how fast you can develop small SharePoint apps with this stuff. But as a C# developer you sometime miss the object orientation in PowerShell. On the BASTA! Spring I first meet Michael J Foord after his talk about the DLR and embedding IronPython. The talk was similar to my talk about embedding PowerShell. Embedding IronPython seemed to be almost as simple as embedding PowerShell, but with a dynamic and object oriented language. I was really excited - for sure I’ve to learn IronPython. Unfortunately resources about IronPython are very limited. Luckily Michael and Christian Muirhead has just written IronPython In Action.

IronPython In Action covers all you need to getting started with IronPython for an .NET or Python developer. It is written coherent without needless ballast, well suited to the philosophy of the language itself. My favorite chapters are “Sliverlight: IronPython in the browser”, “Agile testing where dynamic typing shines” and “Embedding the IronPython engine”. The book has inspired me to found the CodePlex project IronSharePoint (coming soon) showing how you can develop SharePoint apps with IronPython. I’m convinced that in the near future dynamic languages will get more attention again, just think at the “dynamic” keyword in C# 4.0. Absolutely worth to keep an eye on it!

The power of combining statically and dynamically typed languages are really incredible!

Power WebPart 3.0 – Runas-System

2009-05-10T13:08:00.004+02:00

In general code in SharePoint runs with the privileges of the current user, but sometimes you need to run code with elevated privileges. The SharePoint object model covers this scenario with the SPSecurity.RunWithElevatedPrivileges. In Power WebPart you can use the “Runas-System” function to run script with elevated privileges. Usage: Runas-System –script

Example 1: Output Current Identity

function render($writer)
{
   $identiy1 = [System.Security.Principal.WindowsIdentity]::GetCurrent().Name
   $identiy2 = Runas-System "[System.Security.Principal.WindowsIdentity]::GetCurrent().Name"

   $writer.Write($identiy1)
   $writer.Write($identiy2)
}

Example 2: Call a Function with Parameters

function Render-Identity($writer)
{
    $identity = [System.Security.Principal.WindowsIdentity]::GetCurrent().Name
    $writer.Write($identity)
}  
function render($writer)
{
   Render-Identity $writer
   Runas-System "Render-Identity `$writer"
}

Example 3: Call a Function with Return Value

function Get-Identity
{
    return [System.Security.Principal.WindowsIdentity]::GetCurrent().Name 
}

function render($writer)
{
   $identity1 = Get-Identity
   $identity2 = Runas-System "Get-Identity"

   $writer.Write($identity1)
   $writer.Write($identity2)
}

Example 4: Impersonate SPWeb

function render($writer)
{
   $writer.Write($web.CurrentUser.LoginName)

    $impersonatedWeb = Runas-System "Get-SPWeb $($web.Url)"
    $writer.Write($impersonatedWeb.CurrentUser.LoginName)
    $impersonatedWeb.Dispose()
}

Power Tag Cloud - SharePoint Tag Cloud written in PowerShell

2009-05-02T22:40:00.003+02:00

I'm a tag cloud fan but unfortunately there isn’t any in SharePoint 2007 out of the box. So let’s write a reusable tag cloud as an example for PowerWebPart. The Power Tag Cloud consists of two web parts, the tag cloud itself and the tag browser.

Tag an item. You can either use a text field with a semicolon as separator or any lookup field. Maybe I show in following post how you can pimp the tag field with a jQuery AJAX auto completion script and PowerWebPart.

Configure how your cloud should looks like and behaves. The editor panel is written in PowerShell too!

The tag cloud

When you click on a tag the tag browser shows all items tagged with this tag within the chosen scope.

All this stuff is written in PowerShell!

To get a feeling how PowerWebPart scripts look like:

Power Tag Cloud Script

#init parameters
$scope = Init-Parameter "Parameter1" [String]::Empty
$tagField = Init-Parameter "Parameter2" "Tags" -defaultOnEmpty
$maxFontSize = Init-Parameter "Parameter3" "40" -defaultOnEmpty
$minFontSize = Init-Parameter "Parameter4" "6" -defaultOnEmpty
$color1 = Init-Parameter "Parameter5" "#003399" -defaultOnEmpty
$color2 = Init-Parameter "Parameter6" "#CCCCCC" -defaultOnEmpty 
$listType = Init-Parameter "Parameter7" "0" -defaultOnEmpty
$tagBrowser = Init-Parameter "Parameter8" [String]::Empty

# calculate gradient
$r1 = [Convert]::ToInt32($color1.Substring(1,2),16)
$g1 = [Convert]::ToInt32($color1.Substring(3,2),16)
$b1 = [Convert]::ToInt32($color1.Substring(5,2),16)
	
$r2 = [Convert]::ToInt32($color2.Substring(1,2),16)
$g2 = [Convert]::ToInt32($color2.Substring(3,2),16)
$b2 = [Convert]::ToInt32($color2.Substring(5,2),16) 

$diff_r = $r2-$r1
$diff_g = $g2-$g1
$diff_b = $b2-$b1

# css
$defaultCss =@"
	.power-cloud A {	
		TEXT-DECORATION: none
	}
	.power-cloud A:hover {	
		TEXT-DECORATION: underline
	}
	.power-cloud UL {	
		PADDING-RIGHT: 0px;	
		PADDING-LEFT: 0px;	
		PADDING-BOTTOM: 0px;	
		MARGIN: 0px;	
		PADDING-TOP: 0px;	
		LIST-STYLE-TYPE: none;	
		TEXT-ALIGN: center
	}
	.power-cloud LI 
	{	
		PADDING-RIGHT: 0px;	
		DISPLAY: inline;	
		PADDING-LEFT: 0px;	
		BACKGROUND-IMAGE: none !important;	
		PADDING-BOTTOM: 0px;	
		MARGIN: 0px;	
		PADDING-TOP: 0px;	
		TEXT-ALIGN: justify
	}
"@ 

$css = Init-Parameter "Parameter9" $defaultCss -defaultOnEmpty

Register-CSSBlock $css

function CreateChildControls($controls)
{	
	#find all tagged list items
	$query = New-Object "Microsoft.SharePoint.SPSiteDataQuery"
	$query.Query = @"
 
		
			
      

"@ 
	$query.ViewFields = ""
	#set query scope
	if([String]::IsNullOrEmpty($scope) -eq $false){ $query.Webs=""}
	
	#set list type
	$query.Lists = ""
	
	$dataTable = $web.GetSiteData($query)
	
	# extract all tags in a list
	$global:tags = New-Object System.Collections.ArrayList
	$dataTable | Select-Object Tags | %{$_.Tags.Split(';')} | %{$tags.Add($_.Trim().TrimStart('#'))}
	
	# group tags
	$global:tagGroups = $tags | Group-Object | Sort-Object Count -Descending
} 

function Render($writer)
{	
	$gradientSteps = $tagGroups.Count
	
	#begin cloud
	$writer.Write("")  
	
	for($i=0; $i -lt $tagGroups.Count; $i++ )
	{
		# calculate font size
		$size = [Math]::Round(($tagGroups[$i].Count * $maxFontSize) / $tagGroups[0].Count)
		if($size -lt $minFontSize){$size = $minFontSize}
		
		# calculate color
		$gradientFactor = $i / $gradientSteps 
		$r = $r1 + $diff_r * $gradientFactor
		$g = $g1 + $diff_g * $gradientFactor
		$b = $b1 + $diff_b * $gradientFactor		
		$color = "rgb($r, $g, $b)"		
				
		$tagName = $tagGroups[$i].Name
		$tagUrl = "{0}?tag={1}&listType={2}&scope={3}&tagField={4}" -f $tagBrowser, $tagName, $listType ,$scope, $tagField
	
		#render tag
		$writer.Write("`n$tagName`n")
	}
	
	# end cloud
	$writer.Write("
")
}

Power Tag Cloud Editor Script

$txtMaxFontSize = New-Object System.Web.UI.WebControls.TextBox
$txtMaxFontSize = New-Object System.Web.UI.WebControls.TextBox
$txtMinFontSize = New-Object System.Web.UI.WebControls.TextBox
$txtMaxColor = New-Object System.Web.UI.WebControls.TextBox
$txtMinColor = New-Object System.Web.UI.WebControls.TextBox
$txtTagField = New-Object System.Web.UI.WebControls.TextBox
$txtTagBrowser = New-Object System.Web.UI.WebControls.TextBox
$drpdScope = New-Object System.Web.UI.WebControls.DropDownList
$drpdLists = New-Object System.Web.UI.WebControls.DropDownList
$txtCss = New-Object iLoveSharePoint.WebControls.SimpleTextEditor

function CreateChildControls($controls)
{
	$drpdScope.Items.Add([String]::Empty)
	$drpdScope.Items.Add("Recursive")
	$drpdScope.Items.Add("SiteCollection")	
	
	
	$drpdLists.Items.Add($(New-Object System.Web.UI.WebControls.ListItem("Generic list","0")))
	$drpdLists.Items.Add($(New-Object System.Web.UI.WebControls.ListItem("Document Library","1")))
	$drpdLists.Items.Add($(New-Object System.Web.UI.WebControls.ListItem("Discussion forum","3")))
	$drpdLists.Items.Add($(New-Object System.Web.UI.WebControls.ListItem("Vote or Survey","4")))
	$drpdLists.Items.Add($(New-Object System.Web.UI.WebControls.ListItem("Issues List","5")))
				
	$controls.Add($drpdScope)
	$controls.Add($drpdLists)
	$controls.Add($txtTagField)
	$controls.Add($txtMaxFontSize)
	$controls.Add($txtMinFontSize)
	$controls.Add($txtMaxColor)
	$controls.Add($txtMinColor)
	$controls.Add($txtTagBrowser)
	
	$txtCss.DisplayText = "Edit CSS"
	$controls.Add($txtCss) 
}


function OnSyncChanges()
{ 
	$this.EnsureChildControls() 
	
	$drpdScope.SelectedValue = $webpart.Parameter1 
	$txtTagField.Text = $webpart.Parameter2
	$txtMaxFontSize.Text = $webpart.Parameter3
	$txtMinFontSize.Text = $webpart.Parameter4 
	$txtMaxColor.Text = $webpart.Parameter5
	$txtMinColor.Text = $webpart.Parameter6 
	$drpdLists.SelectedValue = $webpart.Parameter7
	$txtTagBrowser.Text = $webpart.Parameter8
	$txtCss.Text = $webpart.Parameter9
}

function OnApplyChanges() 
{
	$this.EnsureChildControls()
		
    $webpart.Parameter1 = $drpdScope.SelectedValue
	$webpart.Parameter2 = $txtTagField.Text
	$webpart.Parameter3 = $txtMaxFontSize.Text
	$webpart.Parameter4 = $txtMinFontSize.Text
	$webpart.Parameter5 = $txtMaxColor.Text
	$webpart.Parameter6 = $txtMinColor.Text
	$webpart.Parameter7 = $drpdLists.SelectedValue
	$webpart.Parameter8 = $txtTagBrowser.Text
	$webpart.Parameter9 = $txtCss.Text
	
	return $true
}

function Render($writer)
{
	$writer.Write("")

	Render-Row "Scope" $drpdScope $writer
	Render-Row "List Type" $drpdLists $writer
	Render-Row "Tag Column Name" $txtTagField $writer
	Render-Row "Tag Browser Url" $txtTagBrowser $writer
	Render-Row "Max font size" $txtMaxFontSize $writer
	Render-Row "Min font size" $txtMinFontSize $writer
	Render-Row "Max color (hex)" $txtMaxColor $writer
	Render-Row "Min color (hex)" $txtMinColor $writer
	Render-Row "Style" $txtCss $writer

	$writer.Write("		
")
	 
}

function Render-Row($text, $control, $writer)
{
	$writer.Write("")
		$writer.Write("")
		$writer.Write("$text
")
		$control.RenderControl($writer)
		$writer.Write("")
	$writer.Write("")
}

Power Tag Cloud Browser Script

function CreateChildControls($controls)
{
	$global:tag = $page.Request["tag"].ToString()
	$global:scope = $page.Request["scope"]
	$global:listType = $page.Request["listType"].ToString()
	$global:tagField = $page.Request["tagField"].ToString() 
	
	$query = New-Object "Microsoft.SharePoint.SPSiteDataQuery"
	
	#set query scope
	if([String]::IsNullOrEmpty($scope) -eq $false){ $query.Webs=""}
	
	$query.Lists = ""
	  
	$query.Query = @"

		
			$tag
      

"@  
	$query.ViewFields = ""
	if($listType -ne "1"){$query.ViewFields +=""}
	
	$global:table = $web.GetSiteData($query) 	
} 

function Render($writer)
{
	$writer.Write("Tag: $tag
")
	foreach($row in $table)
	{
		$writer.Write("")
		$writer.Write($(Build-Headline $row))
		$writer.Write($(Build-Body $row))
		$writer.Write("

")
	}
}

function Build-Headline($row)
{
	$siteId = $site.ID
	$href = "/_layouts/CopyUtil.aspx?Use=id&Action=dispform&ItemId={0}&ListId={1}&WebId={2}&SiteId=$siteId" -f $row["Id"],$row["ListId"],$row["WebId"]
	if($global:table.Columns.Contains('Title') -eq $false -or [String]::IsNullOrEmpty($row["Title"]))
	{
		$title = $row["FileLeafRef"].Split('#')[1]
	}
	else
	{
		$title = $row["Title"]
	}
	
	$html = "{1}
" -f $href, $title
	
	return $html
} 

function Build-Body($row)
{
	$tags = $row[$tagField].Split(';')
	
	$html = "Tags: "
	
	foreach($tag in $tags)
	{
		$tag = $tag.Trim().TrimStart('#')
		$html += "$tag "
	}
	
	$html += "
"
	
	return $html
}

function OnError($ex, $writer)  
{
	$writer.Write("Please ensure that tag, listType, tagField and scope url parameters are provided.")
}

You can download the two wepart files on the PowerWebPart 3.0 release homepage and then import them into the web part gallery or just copy and paste the scripts. An exported PowerWebPart .webart file self contains it script and digital signature, so you can simply export and import PowerWebParts. An end user will never notice if the web part is written in PowerShell or C#. Only farm admins can see and change the scripts. Note that when you import a PowerWebPart from a foreign SharePoint farm the signature will be invalid. A farm admin can simply resign the script through a click on “Apply” in the web part’s editor panel.

Getting Started with SharePoint PowerWebPart 3.0

2009-04-25T12:11:00.001+02:00

I’ve just released PowerWebPart 3.0 on my iLove SharePoint project at CodePlex. What can you do with PowerWebPart?

Write reusable SharePoint WebParts with PowerShell

Features:

Simple HTML Rendering
ASP.NET and SharePoint WebControls
Supports WebPart Connections (Row Provider/Consumer, Table Provider/Consumer)
AJAX enabled
jQuery enabled
Configurable parameters
SharePoint Object Model
NEW: PowerGUI Script Editor Integration
NEW: Script Signing
NEW: Custom Editor Parts written in PowerShell
NEW: Central Script Repository
NEW: Import and Export
NEW: Error Handling
NEW: Debugging
No compile, no packaging, no deploy, no iis reset deployment
Copy & Paste deployment
Anything PowerShell can do :-)

One of the major improvements is the automatically script signing. Only farm administrators are allowed to edit scripts in the UI. But what is when you export a web part, change the script and import it to a web part gallery again? The signature will be broken and the script will not run anymore. So exporting and importing is now secure. The script will automatically be signed when a farm administrator clicks on ‘Apply’ in the web part's editor panel. The signing key will generated randomly on installation, but can be changed anytime later.

For installation and configuration see documentation.

Getting Started Screen Cast:

Soon I will post a PowerWebPart Tag Cloud example…

Do you know what’s going on in your SharePoint? No?!

2009-04-10T23:01:00.002+02:00

Option 1

Option 2

SharePoint Object Model - From SPFarm to SPListItem

2009-04-09T22:32:00.003+02:00

In a layer model ASP.NET builds the UI Layer (and also the service facade), the SharePoint Object Model is the business layer and for sure there is also a data access layer. The data access layer is the dark side of SharePoint, because it’s mainly unmanaged. It’s a mixture of unmanaged code and T-SQL. Unfortunately the unmanaged part isn’t under the control of the developer and vulnerable for memory leaks. What you can do is query (only read!) the database with SQL directly, but isn’t that intuitive and not recommended. There are unverified stories that with SharePoint 14 there will be a one to one relation between SharePoint lists and database tables – we will see. To cut a long story short, the way of choice to interact with the SharePoint database is the object model.

The SharePoint object model is simply a beauty. I felt in love with it since I used it the first time about 6 years ago.

SharePoint Object Hierarchy Overview

Example – From Farm to List Item

Here is an example for beginners how to traverse from SPFarm to SPListItem. The objects used in this example can be found in two namespaces. From SPFarm to SPWebApplication in Microsoft.SharePoint.Administratation, from SPSite to SPListItem in Microsoft.SharePoint. The Namespaces resides both in the Microsoft.SharePoint.dll at “%commonprogramfiles%\Microsoft Shared\web server extensions\12\ISAPI”. Any clue where you will find it in SharePoint 14 ;-)

Always keep in mind that the object model is not remotable and have to run on the SharePoint server!

Console.ForegroundColor = ConsoleColor.Green;
Console.BufferHeight = 1000;

//Get local farm
SPFarm farm = SPFarm.Local;
Console.Write(farm.Id.ToString("N").ToLower());

//loop Services
foreach (SPService service in farm.Services)
{
    //find WebService
    if (service is SPWebService)
    {
        SPWebService webService = (SPWebService)service;

        //Loop WebApps
        foreach (SPWebApplication webApp in webService.WebApplications)
        {
            Console.Write(webApp.Id.ToString("N").ToLower());

            //Loop Site Collections
            foreach (SPSite site in webApp.Sites)
            {
                Console.Write(site.ID.ToString("N").ToLower());

                //Loop Sites
                foreach (SPWeb web in site.AllWebs)
                {
                    Console.Write(web.ID.ToString("N").ToLower());

                    //Loop Lists
                    foreach (SPList list in web.Lists)
                    {
                        Console.Write(list.ID.ToString("N").ToLower());

                        //Loop Items
                        foreach (SPListItem item in list.Items)
                        {
                            Console.Write(item.UniqueId.ToString("N").ToLower());
                        }
                    }
                    web.Dispose();
                }
                site.Dispose();
            }
        }

    }
}

If you will run it, it will run and run and run and look like this: I call it the SharePoint Matrix ;-)

BASTA! Spring 09: SharePoint & PowerShell

2009-03-01T12:48:00.001+01:00

Many peoples asked me to share my presentation about SharePoint & PowerShell from the BASTA! Spring 09 – here it is.

In general .NET developers aren’t familiar with PowerShell, though it’s really great and helpful tool. I recommend everyone just use it! If you master it, every piece of software is your slave, regardless it is based on .NET, COM or WMI.

The base evolution of PowerShell is everything in PowerShell is a .NET object!

In the Java magazine they compared the Bash with PowerShell and PowerShell won, because it is build on .NET.

There are many SharePoint-Solution-Life-Cycle-Tasks and for sure .NET tasks PowerShell can help you:

Migration
Build Process
Deployment
Prototyping
Automate Admin Tasks
Rapid Development
Learning
Alternative UI
Trouble Shooting
Admin-Tool for your own Software
Testing
Scripting language for your own software

My favorite is scripting language for your own software. It is really cool and powerful to build PowerShell functions around your .NET DLLs. By the way, same does Microsoft.

What do you think how SharePoint 14 can be scripted? Stsadm.exe?

One of my fun demos to demonstrate the power of PowerShell:

Automate PowerPoint, create slide on the fly and post a tweet

$pptApp = new-object -com "powerpoint.application"

$ppt = $pptApp.Presentations.Add()

$slide = $ppt.Slides.Add(1,1)

$shape = $slide.Shapes.Item(1)

$shape.TextFrame.TextRange.Text ="PowerShell rocks!"

$shape.AnimationSettings.Animate=$true

$shape.AnimationSettings.EntryEffect=3332

## Now replace "PowerShell rocks!" with the following script:

## "Twitter this via PowerPoint" | out-twitter

## out-twitter is slightly modified version of Jeff Hicks Out-Twitter

## paste the out-twitter script to your $profile

## http://blog.sapien.com/index.php/2008/06/23/out-twitter/

## you have to add "$request.ServicePoint.Expect100Continue = $false"

## Now invoke your script from PowerShell with the following line:

Invoke-Expression $shape.TextFrame.TextRange.Text

Made the complete presentation this way ;-)

I’ve also a done a demo how you can embed PowerShell in a SharePoint WebPart in about 5 minutes. Following soon…

Some pics of the presenation:

You will see what the chain saw meant when you watch the presentation ;-)

PowerShell the Swiss Army Knife of IT

2009-02-28T20:23:00.001+01:00

SPTip : Show Custom Locations in Office File Dialogs

2009-01-31T20:53:00.001+01:00

By this time many companies use SharePoint as their central document repository. To simplify and accelerate the access, it would be comfortable to add a link to the Office “My Places” bar. The My Places bar appears in the left pane of both the Open and the Save As dialog boxes in Microsoft Office programs.

To add an item create the following registry key:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\12.0\Common\Open Find\Places\UserDefinedPlaces\Place0]
"Name"="Document Center"
"Path"=http://mysharepoint/Docs/

You can also hide items you don’t need. Read more on the MS Knowledgebase: How to customize the My Places bar in both the Open and the Save As dialog boxes in Office

To deploy the key to all clients in the domain you can use group policies.

Self-Awareness With Twitter

2009-01-25T17:12:00.002+01:00

Have you ever take a look at your Twitter cloud?

My Twitter cloud:

taken from http://twitter.grader.com/cglessner

What does this tell about me?

The largest cloud is “my” followed by “SharePoint” and “PowerShell”:

I’m a selfish SharePoint-PowerShell geek!

Psychoanalyzing with Twitter – just great!

Or maybe this is market niche for fortune-tellers. Tarot cards and crystal balls are snows of yesteryear. Read the future in the clouds…

What does the clouds tell about you?

Publish Major Versions & Declarative SharePoint Workflows

2009-01-24T19:38:00.002+01:00

In general there are four start options for SharePoint workflows:

Start manual
Start when an item changed
Start when a new item is created
Start workflow to approve publishing a major version of an item

When you use Visual Studio workflows or the built-in MOSS Approval Workflow you have all options. But with declarative workflows like SharePoint Designer and Nintex Workflows you have only the first three options.

~~Start workflow to approve publishing a major version of an item~~

You can’t use declarative workflows to approve publishing a major version of an item. Lose that option can really hurts!

Take a look at the SharePoint object model

In the object model the DefaultContentApprovalWorkflowId property of the SPList contains the the id of the workflow association which should be started to publish a major version.

So we only need to find the association id of our declarative workflow and set the DefaultContentApprovalWorkflowId property – maybe with PowerShell?

Yes and No! This works until the association id will change. And it will change every time the workflow changes! Manual set the DefaultContentApprovalWorkflowId every time the workflow changes? Cumbersome!

The solution

Declarative workflows (xoml files) will be stores in a hidden document library. You can see the library in SharePoint Designer:

Just let an event receiver do the work! Every time the workflow file changes get the new association id and set the DefaultContentApprovalWorkflowId of the target list.

PowerShell Implementation

Exemplarily I will show an implementation with PowerShell and PowerEventReceiver.

Install, deploy and activate the PowerEventReceiver
Get the of the hidden “Workflows” library. Read Get the Id of a SharePoint List or View
Navigate to the list settings http://[siteurl]/_layouts/listedit.aspx?List=[GUIDfromPreviousStep] of the workflows library
Enter the following script

#workflow must be associated with the target list $workflowFileName = "Nintex Test.xoml"
$targetListTitle = "TestLib"

function ItemUpdated()
{

if($item.DisplayName -eq "$($workflowFileName).wfconfig")
{

$binFile = $item.File.OpenBinary() $wfConfig = [xml][System.Text.Encoding]::UTF8.GetString($binFile)

$baseId = [Guid]$wfConfig.WorkflowConfig.Template.BaseID

$lib = $web.Lists[$targetListTitle]

$assoc = $lib.WorkflowAssociations.GetAssociationByBaseId($baseId)

$lib.DefaultApprovalWorkflowId = $assoc.Id $lib.Update()
}
}

Change $workflowFileName and $targetListTitle appropriately. The workflow should already be deployed on the target list. Manual start option must be activated for the workflow. You can find the file name of the workflow with help of SharePoint Designer or PowerShell.
Save the script and resave/republish the SPD/Nintex workflow.
Publish a major version of a document:

After entering a comment you’ll see the initiation form of your content approval workflow. In my case a beautiful Nintex Workflow, in other cases an ugly SharePoint Designer Workflow ;-)

Start

Now you can change the workflow without lose the content approval workflow.

Software, Open Source And The Theory Of Evolution

2009-01-20T17:43:00.001+01:00

Have you ever thought about software, open source and Darwin’s theory of evolution? No?

What is evolution?

In biology, evolution is change in the inherited traits of a population of organisms from one generation to the next. These changes are caused by a combination of three main processes (Wikipedia):

reproduction

variation

selection

How does this works?

An evolving entity must be able to reproduce (reproduction). These copies can slightly vary from the source (variation). Some of this variations will survive and reproduce better than others (selection). The copies surviving better will become more common in population (the fittest will survive). This process will run from generation to generation from the beginning. Is this a powerful mechanism? Take a look in the mirror!

What to hell has this to do with Software and Open Source?!

Source code, the building block of software, is simple to reproduce – copy & paste (reproduction). If you share the source code on a blog, on a open source platform like CodePlex or on a script repository like http://poshcode.org, others will copy and slightly modify the original code (variations). Slightly, because the chosen code must fit some to the problem domain. Some of these variations will be better than the original source. If the variations will be republished, better code variations will be used and reproduced more often, consequently become more common in the internet (selection). This process will run from code generation to code generation from the beginning.

What’s about compiled code? Compiled code is also simple to copy, but copying doesn’t produce variations. Consequently compiled code can’t evolve!

Open source is the booster for the evolution of software!

In fact many processes out there are related to the theory of evolution. A gen is a blueprint for the production of a protein. What’s a business process? Maybe a blueprint for producing a car. Can we reproduce processes? Can processes vary? Can we select processes? What is benchmarking? There are many questions left to ask….

iLSP - SharePoint Designer “Execute SQL” Action

2009-01-19T18:53:00.001+01:00

With the “Execute SQL” action you can execute SQL statements from within SharePoint Designer workflows.

The action is included in my SharePoint Designer Actions 1.0 release on CodePlex. Source code is available.

Documentation

Configuration in SharePoint Designer

Provider: The .NET ADO Provider. Default is MS SQL Server (System.Data.SqlClient). You can use other providers like ODBC, Oracle…
Connection: The connection string e.g. “Data Source=localhost\SQLExpress;Initial Catalog=test;Integrated Security=SSPI”
SQL: The SQL statement you want to execute. You can use Lookups to parameterize the statement. You can also use stored procedures e.g. “EXEC [test_Proc] @var1=N’test’ ”

Result: The variable where you want to store the first column of the first row of the result from the SQL statement. Actual the result variable is mandatory. If you don’t need it you have to use dummy variable.

NOTE: The action runs under the user account of the application pool

iLSP - SharePoint Designer “Create Site” Action

2009-01-19T17:00:00.001+01:00

With the “Create a site” action you can create SharePoint sites from within SharePoint Designer workflows.

The action is included in my SharePoint Designer Actions 1.0 release on CodePlex. Source code is available.

Short Documentation

Configuration in SharePoint Designer

URL: The site relative url of the new site e.g. current site: http://localhost/websites/parent, URL: ”Child1” = http://localhost/websites/parent/Child1
Title: Title of the new site
Description: Description of the new site
Template: The filename of the template to use e.g. “MyTemplate.stp”
Inherit Permissions: Inherit the permission from parent site (yes/no)
Result: The absolute Url of the new site e.g. http://localhost/websites/parent/Child1

Note: The activity creates the site while execution. From a WF design point of view, it would be preferable to do heavy work in a Work Batch. Maybe I show this in another post…

My Sessions on BASTA! Spring 2009

2009-01-19T12:08:00.001+01:00

On the SharePoint Days (Germany) at 25th February 2009 I’ll have two sessions:

Mega Merger (SharePoint & PowerShell)

Nintex Workflow 2007

Would be glad to see you…

iLSP - SharePoint Designer “Get Parent Folder” Action

2009-01-18T22:12:00.001+01:00

This action can be used to get the list item id of the parent folder of an item. After you got the id of the folder you can use it with any other SPD action.

The action is included in my SharePoint Designer Actions 1.0 release on CodePlex. Source code is available.

Example scenario: Approver Folder Inheritance

You need a document based SharePoint Designer approval workflow with different approvers and permissions depending on the department of the document. But you don’t want to assign the approvers and permissions for each document individually! To inherit the permissions you would create for each department a folder and assign the permissions to it. Also you want to assign the approvers to the folder, because all documents within have the same approvers. But how you can get the approvers from the folder in the workflow? This is where the “Get Parent Folder” action comes in.

Step by Step

Create a site column named “Approvers” type of “Person or Group”, allow multiple selection.

Create a site content type named “Approval Folder”, as parent content type choose “Folder”

Add the previous created site column to the just created content type

Create a Document Library named “Approval Documents” and allow content types (Advanced Settings)

Add the previous created site column to the just created content type

Create a Document Library named “Approval Documents”

In the “Advanced Settings” allow content types

Add our “Approval Folder” content type to the document library

Create a new “Approval Folder” named “Development” and assign the approvers (in this example myself and the administrator)

At this point we could start with the SharePoint Designer Workflow. To simplify the scenario I don’t set the approval status and simply create a to do item for the approvers.

Create a new Workflow named “Approver Folder Inheritance”
Add the “Get parent folder” action from the category “iLove SharePoint”

For “this list” choose current item

To store the “Result” create a new workflow variable type of “List Item ID”

Now we have the list item id of the folder. To get approvers add a “Build Dynamic String” action.
- Click on “dynamic string” choose “Lookup Value” in the editor. In the lookup details choose as source “Approval Documents” and for field “Approvers”. To select the folder item choose ID as field. To choose the value click on “fx”, select “Workflow Data” and “folderId” as variable.

Store the dynamic string in a new Workflow Variable named “approvers” and type of “Text”
Next, add an “Assign a To-Do Item” action. Name the to-do item task “Approval Task”. In the people picker double click on “Workflow-Lookup”, choose “Workflow Data” and the “approvers” variable.

Now we can save and test the workflow. Upload any document into the “Development” folder and start the workflow. The workflow creates tasks for the approvers we have assigned to the Development folder.

That’s it.

By the way: I don’t like SharePoint Designer Workflows , I prefer Nintex Workflow!

Just Born: Lilly May Glessner

2009-01-13T14:05:00.001+01:00

After a long and drawn out wait, Jenny and I are proud to announce the birth of our wonderful daughter! Lilly May was born at 6th of January 2009, at 21:52pm weighing in at 3,040kg and 52cm in length.

iLSP - SharePoint Designer “Call a Web Service” Action

2008-12-23T22:47:00.004+01:00

“iLSP” – is the abbreviation for iLove SharePoint.

The “Call a WebService” workflow action is included in the iLSP -SharePoint Designer Actions 1.0 release. Installation see readme.txt.

The action supports SOAP 1.1, SOAP 1.2, basic and windows authentication.

Let’s go and call a built-in SharePoint web service – Lists.asmx and create a new List with the AddList operation.

Bring up SharePoint Designer and create a new workflow on an list with a “Title” and “Response” (Multiple lines of text – plain text) column.
Add the “Call a Web Service” action from the “iLove SharePoint” category

Configure the action as follows:
- URL: http://[siteurl]/_vti_bin/Lists.asmx
- SOAP Version: SOAP 1.2
- SOAPAction: not needed for SOAP 1.2
- Envelope:

<soap12:Envelope xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema" xmlns:soap12="http://www.w3.org/2003/05/soap-envelope">
<soap12:Body>
<AddList xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/sharepoint/soap/">
<listName>[%MyList:Title%]</listName>
<description>Created by iLSP action</description>
<templateID>100</templateID>
</AddList>
</soap12:Body>
</soap12:Envelope>

You can copy the SOAP 1.2 example request from http://[siteurl]/_vti_bin/Lists.asmx?op=AddList

For the <listName> insert a reference to the current item’s title.

As <description> enter “Created by iLSP action”
Set the <templateID> to “100” = custom list

Response: create a new string workflow variable named “response” and assign it. The action will fill the variable with the response from web service call (xml string).
User: leave empty. Empty user = use default credentials.
Password: leave empty

Now the “Call a WebService” action is configured.

To check the response, we will write it in the “Response” column of the item using the built-in “Set field in current item” action. Set field to “Response” and “Value” to the above defined workflow variable “response”

Try it – Start the workflow on an item

The response:

The new list:

Because the raw response isn’t very useful, we now parse it using iLSP “Query XML” action. Place the action between the “Call a WebService” and the “Set field in current item” action.

Add the “Query XML” action to the workflow

Configure the “Query XML” action
- Input: choose the above defined workflow variable “response”
- XPath: “//*[local-name()='List']/@ID”
  - You can use any valid XPath expression e.g. count(//*). Is the expression result is a single node it will write the node’s inner XML to the result variable. Is the result a node collection, it will merge all the node’s inner XML separated by an semicolon into the result variable. You should identify the node by the local name, because you can’t use xml namespaces.
- Result: Create a new string workflow variable named “ListID” and assign it.

The “Query XML” action is now configured

Now modify the “Set field in current item” action so that the response column is set to the ListID variable.

Start the workflow again

Result:

THE END

iLove SharePoint – SharePoint Designer Actions 1.0

2008-12-23T14:20:00.003+01:00

I’ve just uploaded some SharePoint Designer Actions (beta) to my CodePlex project iLove SharePoint.

Included Actions

Call a WebService (supports SOAP 1.1 and SOAP 1.2)
Query XML
Execute SQL (supports ADO Provider Model, returns a scalar value)
Get parent folder (returns the ID of the folder)
Create a site
Start workflow
Set role inheritance of an item
Clear role assignments of an item
Assign role to an item

...other useful Actions can be found under: http://www.codeplex.com/SPDActivities

At the moment the actions aren't well tested. Any feedback would be appreciated.
I'm going to write some blog posts how to use them soon...

Bye, Christian

Call WCF Services With PowerShell

2008-12-22T15:38:00.001+01:00

Call WCF Services with PowerShell using any binding. Generates proxies on the fly without any tool expect .NET 3.5. You can also discover the service endpoints, bindings and contracts.

The PS2WCF script

Example:

Download sample WCF Hello Service project and start ConsoleShell

Meatdata discovery:

$wsdl = Get-WsdlImporter -wsdlUrl "net.tcp://localhost:8888/HelloService/mex" $wsdl.ImportAllEndpoints() | format-list

Output:

Note: For none mex endpoints use: Get-WsdlImporter -wsdlUrl http://anyurl/service.svc?wsdl –httpGet $true

Generate the WCF proxy

$proxyTypes = Get-WcfProxy -wsdlUrl "net.tcp://localhost:8888/HelloService/mex"

$proxyTypes = Get-WcfProxy –wsdlImporter $wsdl

$proxyTypes | format-table

Output:

Call a service operation

$address = New-Object System.ServiceModel.EndpointAddress("net.tcp://localhost:8888/HelloService/")

$binding = new-object System.ServiceModel.NetTcpBinding

$proxy = New-Object $proxyTypes -ArgumentList $binding, $address

$proxy.SayHello("Christian")

or use bindings and addresses generated from WsdlImporter

$endpoints = $wsdl.ImportAllEndpoints()

$proxy = New-Object $proxyTypes($endpoints[0].Binding, $endpoints[0].Address)

$proxy.SayHello("Christian")

Output:

By Christian Glessner

SharePoint Power Event Receiver 2.0 Released!

2008-12-01T00:20:00.008+01:00

New Features in Version 2.0:

Security: Only Farm Administrators are permitted to edit scripts
The scripts will be included in SharePoint site templates (*.stp)
New predefined functions: Get-SPSite, Get-SPWeb, Select-SPListItem
Supports editing in PowerGUI (needs iLoveSharePoint PowerGUILauncher)
Fixes invalid cast issue with $properties, fixes issue with unregistering item events

Download on my Codeplex Project iLove SharePoint.

Bye, Christian

Manage SharePoint WebParts with PowerShell

2008-11-29T21:05:00.001+01:00

Get the WebPart Manager:

The function get-spweb is defined in my PowerShell profile.

List all web parts on the page

Update the "Site Image" - Web Part's image

Add a "Content Editor" Web Part

Download the example.

Unit Testing with SharePoint

2008-11-26T10:07:00.001+01:00

Typemock are offering their new product for unit testing SharePoint called Isolator For SharePoint, for a special introduction price. it is the only tool that allows you to unit test SharePoint without a SharePoint server. To learn more click here.

I'm curious testing it...

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