SharePointRoot

The Microsoft Tech Ed (Australia) conference is being held at the Gold Coast Exhibition & Convention Centre from August 24-27, less than a month away now.  

There’s a flurry of activity with people preparing for prezzo’s, and studying for exams (me !), as well as the venue preparation, and attendee’s grabbing tickets, and sorting out flight & accommodation details.  

[ if you haven’t got your ticket, you’d better get a move on ! ]

The session catalog has been posted – there’s lots of great topics (still not sure on the “schedule” as yet) – will be a hard choice to pick what to see – and I’ll have to slot in some certification exams as well (they’re only $50 at TechEd !   Reduced from $180 !)

One thing about TechEd that always surprises me is the people, more so than the technology – I seriously under-estimated the ‘networking’ aspects of the Microsoft partner & customer community.  I’ve met sooo many great people, and have a lot of new friends in the same industry. 

The “SharePoint community” is very active within Australia – with recent SharePoint Saturdays, the SharePoint Conference in Sydney, SharePointDevWiki, countless user groups, and the simultaneous rolling launch party to celebrate the new SharePoint, Office & Project 2010 product lines.

It would make sense that there’s a bunch of the same “usual suspects” heading along to TechEd. 

So, I’ve been talking to some of the local SharePoint MVP’s about getting together for a SharePint evening. 

This will simply be a ‘gathering’ at a pub/bar – sorry, there won’t be any free food, or drinks – although we might be able to rustle up some prizes & giveaways – more to come, as we work it out.

There’s sure to be a lot of chit-chat about the sessions – and you should get a chance to ask some questions from the presenters, if you missed out on asking at the end of the session.  

And, I’m sure there will be lots of interesting conversation, Q&A and debate – and a few beers, or course. 

Here’s the details you need to know :

• Date : Wed August 25th, 2010
• Time : anytime from 7~8pm onwards (till late) – there’s a restaurant and bar food, or you may like to grab dinner elsewhere, and then wander over when you want.
• Location : Moo Moo Wine Bar & Grill

Here’s a quick map to guide you – if you get lost on the way there, you probably don’t deserve to come !

Hope you can make it along to meet-up and chat all things SharePoint (and don’t forget Office & Project too !)

Even if you’re NOT at TechEd to see/hear about SharePoint, you’re most welcome to come and just hang out with some friendly like-minded I.T. nerds.

** To give us an ‘idea’ about the number of people to expect, please RSVP by leaving a comment on this post – or contact me @GrumpyWookie.

And pls. tell everyone about it – via Twitter, FaceBook, blogs, etc…    See you at Tech Ed !

There’s a bunch of new Silverlight controls within SharePoint 2010 – if you haven’t seen the new ORGANIZATIONAL CHART – you should check it out.

Clicking on the left, right or top will make it scroll.

Here’s one from the Contoso demo server :

Example #1 :

Example #2 :

Of course, you need Active Directory to be ‘clean’ – and need to implement the User Profile Import.

With the move to be more standards compliant within SP2010, specifically targeting Accessibility (AA / WCAG / etc), there are some keyboard shortcuts that exist within SharePoint 2010.

This is implemented using the “accesskey” HTML tag – within a specific markup node :

<a href="javascript:;" onclick="javascript:this.href=’#mainContent’;" class="ms-SkiptoMainContent" accesskey="X">Skip to main content</a>

If needing to use a browser without a mouse, these are vital – and saves TAB-TAB-TAB’ing around the page.

Most developers loooove a good keyboard shortcut – so I had a look at the ‘view source’ for the standard SharePoint home page :

Most of these simply ‘jump you’ to a specific item on the page – remember that you have to use ALT+X (for example) to select the specific item – and then ENTER to do the ‘click’.

Here’s the list of keyboard shortcuts – for the default ‘team site’ home page :

• / – Site Actions Menu
• S – Search this site – can just start typing in the Search box
• W – Security (login) dropdown
• W – Shared Documents – can tab between these items – ie. ALT+W twice
• X – Skip to main content (hidden link)
• Y – Skip Ribbon Commands
• 1 – Home (hyperlink)
• 6 – Help – the little blue question mark in top right of screen
• 3 – View All Site Content

As mentioned, much of the need for shortcut keys is when you haven’t got a mouse – but I’m sure it could be useful for some folk – I like the ALT+3, ENTER – to go to ‘View All Site Content’ – might have to try & use that !

The last week of October 2010 is shaping up to be a big one for the SharePoint community.

Following on from the very successful SharePoint conference in Sydney, the next city to hold an event is SINGAPORE.  

The two-day conference is on October 26-27 – to be held at the Grand Copthorne Waterfront Hotel.

Registration is $400 (SGD) – which is only $330 AUD…!   And there is an early bird ticket price for only $300 ($250 AUD).

The SharePoint Conference is intended for a wide audience and has content to cover roles such as:

• Business Roles like End Users, Business Champions, Power Users and Business Managers
• Information Architects, Record and Information Managers
• IT Managers, CIO and Decision Makers
• Technical Roles including Developers, IT Pro, Systems Administration and DBA’s

Microsoft Technologies covered during the conference include:

• WSS 3.0 (Windows SharePoint Services)
• MOSS 2007 (Microsoft Office SharePoint Server)
• SharePoint Foundation 2010
• SharePoint Server 2010
• SharePoint Designer 2007 and 2010
• Integration with other Office 2007 and 2010 including InfoPath, Excel, Access and Visio
• Integration with 3rd Party products enhancing SharePoint functionality

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After wrapping up in Singapore on Wednesday night, the party moves to Saturday – for the SharePoint Saturday being held in Melbourne.  

IMPORTANT – There has been a recent change of date – due to schedule conflicts with the venue.  Check your calendar / travel / wife & kids – it’s now Saturday October 30th.

Speaker submissions are being taken (I’ve lodged one !) – click here to see all the details.  Entries close on September 17th.

Make sure to register – as there’s only 70 spaces left – going to be a great day.

Any other questions, there’s an email address too : spsmelbourne@live.com

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Three big days to round out October in SharePoint style !

From the Nintex Newsletter :

———————————————————-

Nintex today released its third generation SharePoint workflow product, Nintex Workflow 2010

Nintex Workflow 2010 adds a drag-and-drop workflow designer, connectivity and advanced workflow features to the Microsoft SharePoint 2010 document management and collaboration platform, empowering business users and IT Professionals alike to quickly and easily automate business processes.

Nintex Workflow 2010 builds on SharePoint 2010 platform improvements, such as the Fluent ribbon interface, reusable workflows, site workflows, content type workflows, InfoPath forms and the ability to export workflows to Visual Studio® 2010. 

Nintex Workflow 2010 also includes improved management features to secure, deploy, manage and report on workflows from individual sites up to entire farms.

———————————————————-

Here are some links for more information :

• Demo video – 10MB WMV
• Edition Comparison – Workgroup, Standard, Enterprise
• Request to download a 30 day trial

** International Version due end of July – allowing for Arabic, German, Lithuanian, Brazilian, Portuguese, Hungarian, Polish, Czech, Italian, Russian, Dutch, Japanese, Spanish, French, Latvian and Swedish !

Operations guide for Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010

Operate and maintain servers, server farms, sites, and solutions in Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010.

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?displaylang=en&FamilyID=944519e8-e130-4e7a-8a8d-978b10af77c1

Planning guide for Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010

Information and guidelines for planning the deployment of a solution based on Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?displaylang=en&FamilyID=10104e47-7dfe-4ae5-a9ea-459e6aebd34e

Operations guide for SharePoint Foundation 2010

Operate and maintain your servers, server farms, sites, and solutions in Microsoft SharePoint Foundation 2010.

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?displaylang=en&FamilyID=71434993-e26f-43be-b1bc-1dcae65d46b5

Upgrading to Microsoft SharePoint Foundation 2010

Guide for administrators and IT professionals for upgrading to Microsoft SharePoint Foundation 2010

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?displaylang=en&FamilyID=1c001579-1712-4e75-98a4-aa179021e140

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There’s been a few new arrivals of late – catching up after the RTM – all the doco is flooding through. 

Make sure you follow @MSDownloads – and nab any SharePoint related bits !   

Click here for a search link via Twitter.

When deploying a new SharePoint feature for a trial upgrade 2010 environment, I was striking a problem with the contents of the WSP.  

Inconsequential to this story, there was a SYSTEM.WEB.DLL file within the WSP – and SharePoint 2010 would not allow it to be deployed (which is a good thing !)

My thinking was to just ‘remove’ the offending DLL from the WSP, and re-deploy.

WSP –> CAB File

In case you were unaware, you can see the contents of the WSP by changing the file extension to CAB.

You can then open the file like a ZIP file within Windows Explorer, or via WinRAR (my choice of zipper).

Can’t Update Contents

BUT – and this is the annoying bit – you CANNOT change the contents of the CAB file, and thus the contents of the WSP.   For a file type that is vital to the operation of SharePoint 2010, there is no way to simply modify the innards of a WSP file.

The preferred approach (?) is to open the WSP within Visual Studio 2010 – and/or Visual Studio 2008 along with WSPBuilder.   BUT – that’s not really a workable solution, when needing to do a ‘quick’ update – or modify the contents within a server environment.  

No, I’m NOT going to install Visual Studio on the server !!

The Problem

So – how do you do it ??    How do you delete a file from a WSP – and/or update the MANIFEST.XML file ?

From some fiddling, testing and trials – these don’t work :

• Creating a new archive file within Windows Explorer – and changing to CAB or WSP extension
• Trying to delete or drag into an archive shown in Windows Explorer
• Creating a new archive with WinRAR – and/or dragging into a CAB file using WinRAR
• Using MAKECAB.EXE to create an archive via command line
  • It’s just too fiddly & difficult
  • Need a DDF definition file to define the constructs – if needing to do more than ONE file (!)
  • And, the help files from Microsoft (for MAKECAB + CAB SDK) have been dropped/yanked
  • All other technical documentation in this area relates to MS-BUILD instead.
• Try a different zipping tool (7-Zip), based on a recommendation from a work friend to create or edit CAB
• Try yet another zipping tool (IZArc) – after another work friend said that he’d used it with success (?)

BUT – none of the above worked for me !

aaarrrrgggghhhh !!

About the only way that I could think of – and supported by suggestions from other work colleagues – was to use WSPBuilder and/or Visual Studio.

I’m staggered – and a little bit annoyed – that there is no decent tools for managing the contents WSP’s – especially given the importance (vitality !) for SharePoint 2010.  

If anyone knows of any such tools – then let me know – please !

The Solution :   

I’m happy to report that there is one such zipper product (tool) that allows you to create a CAB archive – and then rename to be a WSP – and problem solved !   

It turns out I was sooo close to getting it sorted out – using IZArc – there’s a minor quirk which I’ll explain in a moment – but it definitely works !    Yay !

The steps involved to update the WSP are as follows :

1. Rename the WSP to CAB
2. Extract all contents to a folder – using Windows Explorer, or WinZip, WinRAR, or whatever
3. Change the items you want, ie. MANIFEST.XML and remove a DLL (in my case)
4. Create a new CAB file with the updated contents, using IZARC 
5. Rename the newly created CAB to WSP
6. Install to SharePoint

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NB. I’m using a WSP for the SharePoint Reporting Services webparts – just as an example – RSWebParts.wsp

As mentioned, the first steps are to rename the WSP to CAB, and extract the contents to a folder.

You don’t HAVE to use IZArc for this step; you could do using WinZip, or WinRAR – or even the default Windows Explorer.

Next – go into the folder, and change whatever you need – such as DLL’s or XML’s, whatever.  

For this example, I’m going to remove the language sets for DE, ES, FR, IT (German, Spanish, French & Italian).   No reason – other than to ‘invent’ a change for this post – I don’t have anything against the European Union – honest !  

The next step is to create a new WSP – by re-CAB’ing these files – and here’s the trick that caught me out.

You may be tempted to simply do CTRL-A – and then RIGHT-CLICK > IZArc > ‘Add to Archive File’

But – this won’t allow you do sub-folders – I don’t know why !!

See…>    !?!!?

Instead – the steps you need to do are these :

1. Open IZArc as a ‘program’
2. Create a new archive
3. Choose a CAB file type
4. Add the files – and check the box for “subfolders”

——————–

So – let’s give it a go :

• Click Start > LZArc
• Click New
• Give the new archive a name – eg. NewRSWebParts (can change it later)

The next window has two tabs – Selection – and Options

• Firstly select all the files you need for the new WSP – in the Selection tab
• I chose the folder and then did CTRL-A to select all the files needed

NEXT – switch to the Options tab >

• Change the archive type to be “CAB”
• Check the box for “Include sub-folders”
• Click OK

After half a milli-second, you’ll have your new CAB file.

• Can then click the big red “Exit” button – as we’re done with LZArc.
• Switch back to Windows Explorer
• Re-name the newly created CAB file –> WSP extension.

And – that’s it !

Only took a few steps to create a new WSP file – with updated contents – without needing Visual Studio – or WSP Builder !

Just remember that you might need to update your initial projects back in TFS, or Visual Studio anyway.

This is just for those emergency updates – or if you don’t have the source code/project.

Very nice indeed – very easy – and extremely useful !   

I’ve used the STSADM commands within SharePoint for many, many years, and with a lot more SharePoint 2010 activity, I’m deliberately forcing myself to use the PowerShell alternative.

The “deploy” and “activate” feature commands are probably the MOST used (for me, at least) – so the equivalent commands are these ones ;

(1) Add Solution

STSADM :

• stsadm –o addsolution –filename “D:\Deploy\MySharePointSolution.wsp“

PowerShell :

• Add-SPSolution “D:\Deploy\MySharePointSolution.wsp“

(2) Deploy Solution

STSADM :

• stsadm –o deploysolution –name MySharePointSolution.wsp –url http://myspwebappp –allowgacdeployment –immediate

PowerShell :

• Install-SPSolution –Identity MySharePointSolution.wsp –WebApplication http://myspwebapp –GACDeployment

(3) Activate Feature

STSADM :

• stsadm –o activatefeature –name MyFeatureName –url http://myspwebapp

PowerShell :

• Enable-SPFeature –Identity MyFeatureNameOrGuid –url http://myspwebapp

Check out this link from Patrick Boom – he also covers Retract, Delete and Deactivate.

The Microsoft Patterns & Practices site (MSDN) has been updated to cover the new SharePoint 2010 platform :

SharePoint 2010 introduces rich new areas of functionality that create more choices and fresh opportunities for developers and solution architects.

Sandboxed solutions, new options for data modelling and data access, and new client programming models with Silverlight and Ajax integration offer a step change in what you can accomplish with SharePoint applications.

This guidance provides a deep technical insight into the key concepts and issues for SharePoint 2010 solution developers.

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff770300.aspx

** I’ve used the SPG source code for the AJAX + ScriptManager in SharePoint 2007 – not sure on the compatibility (or need) with the new SharePoint 2010 platform….

Within Central Admin (CA), I’m really liking the new ribbon interface – just have to click on a Web App, and the options in the ribbon bar change to show what actions are ‘valid’ – just like within a SharePoint team site, etc

CA has become a very nice place to be.  

BUT – I was having a problem when trying to configure ANONYMOUS access – in which I needed to (1) extend a WebApp to a different zone; and (2) change the authentication providers to allow anon.

The problem is fairly clear in this screenshot :

The buttons for New, Extend, Auth Providers – and even Delete – are all disabled.

YES – this user has permission – I’m RDP’ed onto the server, and running as the ‘farm admin’ account. 

So I switch user to another account – the ‘farm’ (service) account – and no joy.  

Next stop is to check the Event Viewer – no errors.  And even the Permissions for the App Pool account.

To cut a long story short, this happens because of permissions within Internet Explorer (IE) – it occurs because of the “User Access Control” limiting what you’re able to do – damn it UAC, you got me again !

Resolution :

The simple answer is that you need to run the browser “as administrator” :

• Click in the address bar and take a copy of the URL (CTRL+C)
• Close Internet Explorer (all tabs)
• Within the Start Menu – right-click on the blue (e) logo
• Click “Run as administrator”

• UAC will ask if you want to confirm the action – just click YES

• Paste in the URL that you copied earlier – and hit enter.
• Voila !!  
• The buttons are enabled – and yes, you can do as needed – New, Extend, Delete, etc.

Quick Tip :

To avoid having to right-click, and choose “Run as administrator” each time, you can create an “Admin IE” icon :

• Create an IE shortcut on Desktop    (right-click+drag – and choose ‘Create Shortcut’)
• Right click on the blue (e) – and select Properties

• Click Advanced

• Tick the box for ‘Run as administrator’
• And then click OK – and then once again (OK).

You can then double-click on the Internet Explorer icon on the desktop – as you would normally do. 

The UAC confirmation message will still be shown; you need to click YES as before.

IMPORTANT.  DO NOT simply turn off User Access Control (as I’ve seen elsewhere on other blogs…!!)