Obilogic - SharePoint Community Area

The International SharePoint Conference 2012 - Blogs, Slides, Downloads & Photos

aobi — Sun, 29 Apr 2012 23:20:00 GMT

Unfortunately I haven't had time to write my usual rundown for this year's International SharePoint Conference, which took place last week...

So this year's rundown will basically consist of the following, in an attempt to ‘syndicate content' on the subject

Live Blogging :

http://engageinsharepoint.co.uk/2012/03/international-sharepoint-conference-live-bloggers-wanted-isclondon/

http://thomasvochten.com/categories/live/

http://sharepointfrancois.posterous.com/live-blogging-from-the-international-sharepoi

http://engageinsharepoint.co.uk/author/baddaz/

http://engageinsharepoint.co.uk/author/spdoctor/

Slides :

http://www.21apps.com/sharepoint/isclondonbus301/
http://www.criticalpathtraining.com/Members/Pages/Presentations.aspx

http://www.joiningdots.com/blog/2012/04/when-technical-projects-fail/

https://skydrive.live.com/view.aspx?resid=6AF8677B7DC0B21D!2285&cid=6af8677b7dc0b21d
http://www.paulgrimley.com/2012/04/supporting-sharepoint-internally-slides.html
http://techblurt.com/2012/04/28/international-sharepoint-conference-slides/

Downloads :

http://visualstudiogallery.msdn.microsoft.com/166d71d6-0fb8-433d-bf08-72d5a3efe800

http://visualstudiogallery.msdn.microsoft.com/668d3881-b641-4f30-a513-0f9609892ac5

http://visualstudiogallery.msdn.microsoft.com/51a85e45-4a45-42cd-b21f-ff0c4cf729c1

http://spkbase.codeplex.com/

Subsequent Blog Posts :

http://blog.falchionconsulting.com/index.php/2012/05/international-sharepoint-conference-2012-follow-up/ (Note: Gary Lapointe is a Legend!)
http://www.21apps.com/sharepoint/isclondon-a-personal-review/
http://www.sharepoint911.com/blogs/laura/Lists/Posts/Post.aspx?ID=174
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/ukmsdn/archive/2012/05/08/event-international-sharepoint-conference-a-review.aspx
http://www.sharepointstudio.com/Blog/Lists/Posts/Post.aspx?ID=46

http://www.sharepointpromag.com/blog/dan-holmes-viewpoint-on-sharepoint-blog-24/sharepoint/sharepoint-presented-international-sharepoint-conference-142929

http://blog.mastykarz.nl/international-sharepoint-conference-london-2012-recap/
http://ghamson.wordpress.com/2012/04/25/last-day-at-the-international-conference-in-london/
http://www.andrewconnell.com/blog/archive/2012/04/30/wrapup-ndash-international-sharepoint-conference-2012-london.aspx
http://www.thesharepointbaker.co.uk/2012/04/internation-sharepoint-conference-2012/

http://sharepointsarcasm.sharepoint.com/Pages/default.aspx

http://www.sharepointblog.co.uk/2012/04/the-international-sharepoint-conference/

Photos :

www.mattgrovesblog.com/search/label/ISC
photos-from-the-international-sharepoint-conference-2012-Day-1

photos-from-the-international-sharepoint-conference-2012-Day-2

photos-from-the-international-sharepoint-conference-2012-Day-3

Again, huge thanks to @SteveSmithCK, @ZoeWatsonCK and everyone at @CKUKLtd for another great conference.

SharePoint 2010 – Export SPList Data into SQL using PowerShell

aobi — Sat, 21 Apr 2012 23:02:00 GMT

Following my previous post 'Import SQL Query Data into a SPList using PowerShell' I thought I should also post on how to achieve the reverse and export data from an SPList into a SQL Table

(if only for completeness, if nothing else...)

First task is to make the SQL Connection and prepare the SQL Command ..

######connect to SQL database windows authentication ###########

$connection= new-object system.data.sqlclient.sqlconnection #Set new object to connect to sql database 

$Connection.ConnectionString ="server=<ServerName>;database=<databasename>;trusted_connection=true" # Connectiongstring setting for <ServerName> <databasename> with window authentication

#$Connection.ConnectionString ="server=<ServerName>;database=<databasename>;User Id=<username>;Password=<password>;trusted_connection=False; # Connectiongstring setting for <ServerName> <databasename> with SQL authentication <username><password>

Write-host "connection information:" 

$connection #List connection information 

Write-host "Connecting to database.." 

$connection.open() #Open Connection

$SqlCmd = New-Object System.Data.SqlClient.SqlCommand #setting object to use sql commands

$SqlCmd.Connection = $connection

Then retrieve the data from SPList...

######### Get SPList ########
$spWeb = Get-SPWeb -identity "http://sp2010server/TeamSite/"  #  Get SPWeb 

$list = $spWeb.Lists["<My List Name>"] # Get SPList

foreach ($item in $list.items)
{ 
ExecuteSQLInsert $item["Title"].replace("'","''") $item["splistColumn2"].replace("'","''") $item["splistColumn3"].replace("'","''") $item["splistColumn4"].replace("'","''") $item["splistColumn5"].replace("'","''")
}

$connection.Close() 

$spWeb.Dispose()

...and finally populate the target SQL Table using the data from the SPListItem
(Obviously, you will need to give some consideration in relation to matching the 'DataTypes' of the SQL Columns, with those of the source SPList)

######### ExecuteSQLInsert function #############
function ExecuteSQLInsert($sqlVAL1, $sqlVAL2, $sqlVAL3, $sqlVAL4, $sqlVAL5)
{

$ErrorActionPreference = 'stop' # Prepare script for stopping
$SqlCmd.CommandText ="INSERT INTO [sqlTABLE] ([sqlCOLUMN1], [sqlCOLUMN2], [sqlCOLUMN3], [sqlCOLUMN4], [sqlCOLUMN5]) VALUES ('$sqlVAL1', '$sqlVAL2', '$sqlVAL3', '$sqlVAL4', '$sqlVAL5')" # Configure TSQL

Try
{
$SqlCmd.ExecuteNonQuery() #
}
Catch
{
Write-Warning "$_" # Report Errors
Write-Warning $SqlCmd.CommandText
Write-host 
} 

}

SP2010ImportExportSPListToSQL - Examples.zip

SharePoint 2010 – Import SQL Query Data into a SPList using PowerShell

aobi — Fri, 20 Apr 2012 23:20:00 GMT

Ever needed to quickly transfer SQL data into a SharePoint list?...

A recent task required exactly this, when i needed to migrate some SQL data held in a legacy application into SharePoint.

After a bit of messing around exporting multiple CSV files from SQL and importing them into SharePoint, I was confident that I could speed up the process with the use of a little 'Powershell'...

First task is to make the SQL Connection ..


######connect to SQL database windows authentication ###########

$connection= new-object system.data.sqlclient.sqlconnection #Set new object to connect to sql database 

$Connection.ConnectionString ="server=<ServerName>;database=<databasename>;trusted_connection=true" # Connectiongstring setting for <ServerName> <databasename> with window authentication

#$Connection.ConnectionString ="server=<ServerName>;database=<databasename>;User Id=<username>;Password=<password>;trusted_connection=False; # Connectiongstring setting for <ServerName> <databasename> with SQL authentication <username><password>

Write-host "connection information:" 

$connection #List connection information 

Write-host "Connecting to database.." 

$connection.open() #Open Connection

Then retrieve the data from SQL Table.. (or theoretically from a 'SQL View', 'SQL Query' or even 'Stored Procedure')


######### SQL query #############

$SqlCmd = New-Object System.Data.SqlClient.SqlCommand #setting object to use sql commands 

$SqlQuery = "SELECT [sqlCOLUMN1], [sqlCOLUMN2], [sqlCOLUMN3], [sqlCOLUMN4], [sqlCOLUMN5] FROM [sqlTABLEorView] " #set SQL query 

$SqlCmd.CommandText = $SqlQuery # get query 

$SqlAdapter = New-Object System.Data.SqlClient.SqlDataAdapter # 

$SqlAdapter.SelectCommand = $SqlCmd # 

$SqlCmd.Connection = $connection 

$DataSet = New-Object System.Data.DataSet 

$SqlAdapter.Fill($DataSet) 

$SqlAdapter.Dispose()

$connection.Close() 

$DataSet.Tables[0]

...and finally populate the SharePoint List using the retrieved data.
(Obviously, you will need to give some consideration in relation to matching the 'DataTypes' of the SQL Columns, with those of the target SPList)


######### Add to SPList ########

$spWeb = Get-SPWeb -identity "http://sp2010server/TeamSite/"  #  Get SPWeb 

$list = $spWeb.Lists["<My List Name>"] # Get SPList

foreach ($Row in $DataSet.Tables[0].Rows)
{ 

$item = $list.Items.Add();

$item["Title"] = $Row["sqlCOLUMN1"]
$item["splistColumn2"] = $Row["sqlCOLUMN2"]
$item["splistColumn3"] = $Row["sqlCOLUMN3"]
$item["splistColumn45"] = $Row["sqlCOLUMN4"] + $Row["sqlCOLUMN5"]

$item.Update()

}

$spWeb.Dispose()

This can greatly speed up the process and also enables to you import data from multiple SQL Tables/Views/Queries and even target multiple SPLists.

SP2010ImportExportSPListToSQL - Examples.zip

Andy Dale (OfficeTalk) SharePoint Awards 2012 Winners Announced

aobi — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 14:03:00 GMT

Andy Dale from OfficeTalk has announced the results for the "SharePoint Awards 2012", with some very interesting results ....

SharePoint Awards 2012 Winners Announced

The International SharePoint Conference 2012

aobi — Fri, 23 Mar 2012 09:00:00 GMT

With only a month to go until the start of "The International SharePoint Conference 2012" (formerly known as the 'European SharePoint Best Practice Conference'), I thought it was about time I added a post on the subject.

Well, the guys and gals over at CK are planning to do things a little differently at this years conference.

Quote:

In 2012 we are going to be doing something very special and unique which is to have the IT Pro and Developer tracks follow a 3 day solution process and instead of doing standard 1 hour sessions we will be using as much time as necessary to cover a complete topic. How many times have you heard a speaker say ‘you can also do this and that’ but the speaker just runs out of time to show you exactly how. And wouldn’t it be nice to see some of these demos being done in a real world model say over 8 SharePoint Servers in a large farm design! Well this is exactly what our 2012 conference is going to be doing, with speakers from around the world who have the knowledge and real world skills to deliver such a track and over the course of the 3 days build the solution all the way through to the final design, everyone using the exact same servers over the 3 day duration.

http://www.internationalsharepointconference.com/blog/

Full details on the different 'Tracks' (IT Pro, Developer, Information Worker (IW) / End User and Business) as well as 'Full Agenda', with details of the different 'Track Solution Teams', is also now available.

http://www.internationalsharepointconference.com/Pages/Track-Overviews.aspx
http://www.internationalsharepointconference.com/Pages/Agenda.aspx

All in all, it looks like things are shaping up to be another great SharePoint conference!

SharePoint 2010 – Migrate/Replicate Three-state List Workflows between Site Collections with PowerShell

aobi — Fri, 16 Mar 2012 18:59:00 GMT

I had an interesting request come in the other day, which on the face it, sounded a fairly simple thing to resolve. But, as is often the case, it turned out to be a little trickier than I first anticipated.

Basically the requirement was to move one or more SharePoint Lists from one site (or SPWeb) to an alternative site, located in an alternative site collection. The issue being, each list that needed to be moved had a SharePoint Workflow associated with it, which also needed to be moved along with the list.

Now moving a SharePoint list can be achieved fairly easily using the Export-SPWeb/Import-SPWeb cmdlets and just a couple of lines of PowerShell.

For example, to move a standard "issues" list between site collections:

Export-SPWeb http://sp2010dev/ sites/SiteCollection001/Team/ -ItemUrl Lists/Issues -Path C:\Temp\IssuesList.cmp

Import-SPWeb http://sp2010dev/sites/SiteCollection002/Team/ -Path C:\Temp\IssuesList.cmp

For further information on the Export/Import-SPWeb cmdlets see

Export-SPWeb -Identity <Site URL> -Path <Path and file name> [-ItemUrl <URL of site, list, or library>] [-IncludeUserSecurity] [-IncludeVersions] [-NoFileCompression] [-GradualDelete] [-Verbose]
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee428301.aspx#section1

Import-SPWeb -Identity <Site URL> -Path <Export file name> [-Force] [-NoFileCompression] [-Verbose]
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee428322.aspx

However, as you may (or may not) be aware, the Import-SPWeb cmdlet does not successfully rebind any Workflows which may be associated with the source List or Site being exported.

For further information on what doesn't get included with the Built in SharePoint Import/Export see: http://www.sharepointjoel.com/Lists/Posts/ViewPost.aspx?ID=405

So, what to do?

Well, there are various posts and how-to's on how this can be achieved using SharePoint Designer, which essentially boils to down to creating a "blank/empty" workflow on the new/migrated list, then updating the ".xoml, .xoml.rules, .xoml.wfconfig.xml and .xsn" files based on the original workflow (replacing the list GUIDs with those of the new).

However, there are a couple of caveats to this approach. The key one being that this is only possible when dealing with Declarative No-Code Workflows available in SharePoint Designer, the other caveat being one of practicality (having to manually update large numbers of xml and rule files, if dealing with a large number of lists, may simply not be a practical option)

This particular support request was in relation to the OOTB "Three-state" SharePoint workflow (http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-sharepoint-services-help/use-a-three-state-workflow-HA010154431.aspx) which is NOT a Declarative Workflow.

(you can confirm this by creating/assigning a new "Three-state" Workflow on a list and attempting to open the ".xoml, .xoml.rules, .xoml.wfconfig.xml and .xsn" files - they won't be visible / accessible via the "workflows" used by Declarative Workflows)

So, PowerShell to the rescue...

Again, there are various posts and how-to's detailing how to associate a SharePoint Workflow to a SharePoint List using PowerShell.

However, simply "associating" the Three-State Workflow to a list simply creates a new "blank/un-configured" instance of the Workflow on the target list.
It does not set any of the options available for the Workflow.

To fully migrate (or rather "replicate") a Three-State Workflow, it is necessary to get and set the information stored in the "SPWorkflowAssociation.AssociationData" property of the Workflow Association (http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/microsoft.sharepoint.workflow.spworkflowassociation.associationdata.aspx). Using this approach, not only do you get a new Workflow associated with the migrated List, but also a replica of the Workflow options that were set on the Source Workflow.

I came up with the following "PowerShell" to achieve this:

MigrateWorkflowAssociation_ps1.zip

Usage:



Migrate / Move SharePoint List or SharePoint Site using Export-SPWeb and Import-SPWeb cmdlets

MigrateWorkflowAssociation.ps1 -SrcUrl -SrcList -TargetUrl 
-TargetList -workflowName -workflowAssociationName 
-workflowAssociationTasksList -workflowAssociationHistoryList -replaceExistingMatchingWorkflows

Example:



Export-SPWeb http://sourceweb/Team/ -Path C:\Temp\TeamSite.cmp

New-SPWeb http://targetweb/sites/SiteColl/Team/ 

Import-SPWeb http://targetweb/sites/SiteColl/Team/ -Path C:\Temp\TeamSite.cmp



MigrateWorkflowAssociation.ps1 -SrcUrl 'http://sourceweb/Team/' -SrcList 'Issues' -TargetUrl 'http://targetweb/sites/SiteColl/Team/'
 -TargetList 'Issues' -workflowName 'Three-state' 
-workflowAssociationName 'My Existing Workflow Display Name' 
-workflowAssociationTasksList 'Tasks' -workflowAssociationHistoryList 
'Workflow History' -replaceExistingMatchingWorkflows $true

PowerShell Script:


Param ([string]$SrcUrl, [string]$TargetUrl, [string]$SrcList, [string]$TargetList, [string]$workflowName, [string]$workflowAssociationName, [string]$workflowAssociationTasksList, [string]$workflowAssociationHistoryList, [bool]$replaceExistingMatchingWorkflows)
# Check for the site url input parameter
if(!$SrcUrl -or !$TargetUrl -or !$SrcList -or !$workflowName  -or !$workflowAssociationTasksList -or !$workflowAssociationHistoryList)
{
	Write-Host ""
	Write-Host -ForegroundColor Red "Please specify the following parameters:";
	Write-Host ""
	Write-Host -ForegroundColor Yellow "Parameters:"
	Write-Host ""
	Write-Host -ForegroundColor Yellow "-SrcUrl ['Url of source web containg existing list workflow']"
	Write-Host ""
	Write-Host -ForegroundColor Yellow "-TargetUrl ['Url of target web for new/migrated list workflow']"
	Write-Host ""
	Write-Host -ForegroundColor Yellow "-SrcList ['Name of the list to associated with existing workflow']"
	Write-Host ""
	Write-Host -ForegroundColor Yellow "-TargetList (optional) ['Name of  list the new/migrated workflow is to be to associated with - SrcList Name assumed if omitted']"
	Write-Host ""
	Write-Host -ForegroundColor Yellow "-workflowName ['Name of the workflow (template)']"
	Write-Host ""
	Write-Host -ForegroundColor Yellow "-workflowAssociationName (optional) ['Display Name of the workflow association - if omitted ALL workflows with matching -workflowName (workflow template) will be processed']"
	Write-Host ""
	Write-Host -ForegroundColor Yellow "-workflowAssociationTasksList ['Name of the Workflow Tasks list']"
	Write-Host ""
	Write-Host -ForegroundColor Yellow "-workflowAssociationHistoryList ['Name of the Workflow History list']"
	Write-Host ""
	Write-Host -ForegroundColor Yellow "-replaceExistingMatchingWorkflows (optional) ['Remove & Replace Existing Workflows on Target (Default: False)']"
	Write-Host ""
	
	Write-Host -ForegroundColor Yellow "Example:
	MigrateWorkflowAssociation.ps1 -SrcUrl 'http://sourceweb/' -SrcList 'Issues' -TargetUrl 'http://targetweb/' -TargetList 'Issues' -workflowName 'Three-state' -workflowAssociationName 'My Existing Workflow to be Transferred' -workflowAssociationTasksList 'Tasks' -workflowAssociationHistoryList 'Workflow History' -replaceExistingMatchingWorkflows $true
	"	
	Break
}
Write-Host ""
write-host "Parameters Received:"
write-host "-SrcUrl: "  -nonewline; write-host $SrcUrl
write-host "-SrcList: "  -nonewline; write-host $SrcList	
write-host "-TargetUrl: "  -nonewline; write-host $TargetUrl
write-host "-TargetList: "  -nonewline; write-host $TargetList
write-host "-workflowName: "  -nonewline; write-host $workflowName
write-host "-workflowAssociationName: "  -nonewline; write-host $workflowAssociationName
write-host "-workflowAssociationTasksList: "  -nonewline; write-host $workflowAssociationTasksList
write-host "-workflowAssociationHistoryList: "  -nonewline; write-host $workflowAssociationHistoryList
if(!$workflowAssociationName)
{
	write-host -ForegroundColor Yellow "No -workflowAssociationName Parameter Provided"
	write-host -ForegroundColor Yellow "All Workflows with matching -workflowName ($workflowName) will be processed"
}
write-host ""
write-host "Checking Source Web and Lists."
$srcSiteUrl = $SrcUrl
$targetSiteUrl = $TargetUrl
$site = Get-SPWeb $srcSiteUrl
$targetsite = Get-SPWeb $targetSiteUrl
[Guid]$crTemplateId = New-Object Guid
$srcListName = $SrcList
$targetListName = $TargetList
$wfTemplateName = $workflowName
$wfTaskListName = $workflowAssociationTasksList
$wfHistListName = $workflowAssociationHistoryList
$list = $site.Lists[$srcListName]
$wfTaskList = $site.Lists[$wfTaskListName]
$wfHistList = $site.Lists[$wfHistListName]
if (!$TargetList )
{
	$listTarget = $targetsite.Lists[$srcListName]
} 
else 
{
	$listTarget = $targetsite.Lists[$targetListName]
}
function Add-WorkflowAssociation($listTargetParam, $srcworkflowAssociationParam, $newworkflowAssociationParam ) {
	# Add the workflow association to the list
	$listTargetParam.WorkflowAssociations.Add($newworkflowAssociationParam);
	# Enable workflow  
	$newworkflowAssociationParam.Enabled = $srcworkflowAssociationParam.Enabled
	write-host -ForegroundColor Green ""
	write-host -ForegroundColor Green "WorkflowAssociation: '"$newworkflowAssociationParam.Name"' Added Successfully"
	write-host -ForegroundColor Green "To the list: " $listTargetParam.Title
	write-host -ForegroundColor Green "On the web: " $listTargetParam.ParentWeb.Title
	Write-Host -ForegroundColor Green "Url: " $listTargetParam.ParentWeb.Url
	write-host -ForegroundColor Green ""
}
function Get-WorkflowAssociation($workflowassociation) { 
	write-host ""
	write-host "Get-WorkflowAssociation "
	write-host "Web: "  -nonewline; write-host $_.ParentWeb.Url
	write-host "List: "  -nonewline; write-host $_.ParentList.Title;
	write-host "WorkflowTemplate: "  -nonewline; write-host $_.BaseTemplate.Name
	write-host "WorkflowName: "  -nonewline; write-host $_.Name
	#write-host "Soap Xml:"; write-host $_.SoapXml
	write-host ""
	if(!$workflowAssociationName)
	{
		CreateWorkflowAssociation $targetsite $listTarget $_.BaseTemplate.Name $_.Name $_
	}
	elseif($workflowAssociationName -eq $_.Name)
	{
		CreateWorkflowAssociation $targetsite $listTarget $_.BaseTemplate.Name $_.Name $_
	}
}
function CreateWorkflowAssociation($web, $listTarget, $workflowName, $srcworkflowAssociationName, $srcworkflowAssociation)
{
	write-host "CreateWorkflowAssociation Parameters"
	write-host "web :" $web
	write-host "listTarget :" $listTarget
	write-host "workflowName :" $workflowName
	write-host "srcworkflowAssociationName :" $srcworkflowAssociationName
	#write-host "srcworkflowAssociation :" $srcworkflowAssociation
	write-host ""
	write-host ""
	write-host "Creating Workflow Association" 
	$workflowTemplate=$web.workflowtemplates.gettemplatebyname($workflowName, [System.Globalization.CultureInfo]::CurrentCulture);
    
	if(!$workflowTemplate)
	{
	Write-Host -ForegroundColor Red "No workflow installed or activated with this workflowname : " $workflowName "on the web: "
	Write-Host -ForegroundColor Red "Name : " $web
	   Write-Host -ForegroundColor Red "Url  : " $web.Url
	}
	else
	{
            # Check if the site already has a workflow history list - if not, create it
            if(!$web.Lists[$wfHistListName])
            {
                $web.Lists.Add($wfHistListName, "A system library used to store workflow history information.", [Microsoft.SharePoint.SPListTemplateType]::WorkflowHistory);                
                $wfHistory = $web.Lists[$wfHistListName]
                $wfHistory.Hidden = $true
                $wfHistory.Update()
            }            
            
            #Check if the site already has a workflow tasks list - if not, create it
            if(!$web.Lists[$wfTaskListName])
            {
                $web.Lists.Add($wfTaskListName, "This system library used to store workflow tasks information.", [Microsoft.SharePoint.SPListTemplateType]::Tasks);                
                $wfTasks = $web.Lists[$wfTaskListName]
                $wfTasks.Hidden = $true
                $wfTasks.Update()
            }
            
            $wfHistory = $web.Lists[$wfHistListName]
            $wfTasks = $web.Lists[$wfTaskListName]
            
            #Create new workflow association
            $newworkflowAssociation = [Microsoft.SharePoint.Workflow.SPWorkflowAssociation]::CreateListAssociation($workflowTemplate, $srcworkflowAssociationName, $wfTasks, $wfhistory)
			
            #Set workflow AssociationData and config from source workflow association
            $newworkflowAssociation.AssociationData = $srcworkflowAssociation.AssociationData
            $newworkflowAssociation.AllowManual = $srcworkflowAssociation.AllowManual
            $newworkflowAssociation.AutoStartChange = $srcworkflowAssociation.AutoStartChange
            $newworkflowAssociation.AutoStartCreate = $srcworkflowAssociation.AutoStartCreate
            
            # Optional debug info
            #write-host "ParentWeb: "  -nonewline; write-host $newworkflowAssociation.ParentWeb.Url
            #write-host "HistoryList: " -nonewline;  write-host $newworkflowAssociation.HistoryListTitle
            #write-host "HistoryListID: " -nonewline;  write-host $newworkflowAssociation.HistoryListId
            #write-host "TaskList: " -nonewline;  write-host $newworkflowAssociation.TaskListTitle
            #write-host "TaskListID: " -nonewline;  write-host $newworkflowAssociation.TaskListId
			
            write-host "New Workflow Association Created Succesfully with Following Attributes:"
            write-host ""
            $newworkflowAssociation
            write-host ""
            write-host "Associating New Workflow Association With Target List"
            write-host ""
            [guid]$wfId = New-Object Guid
            [bool]$wfFound = $false
            # Optional step if you want to remove the default Page Approval work association from your list
            #foreach ($wf in $listTarget.WorkflowAssociations) {
            #    if($wf.Name -eq "Page Approval"){
            #        Write-Host -Foreground Yellow "Removing Page Approval work flow association from the target list";
            #        $listTarget.WorkflowAssociations.Remove($wf.Id);
            #    }             
            #}
            
            if(!$workflowAssociationName)
            {
		write-host "-workflowAssociationName not provided"
		write-host "Checking for matches using -workflowName: $workflowName (Workflow Template Name)"
	        write-host ""
		foreach ($wf in $listTarget.WorkflowAssociations) {
	        	if ($wf.Name -eq $newworkflowAssociation.Name) {
				$wfId = $wf.Id
	                	write-host -ForegroundColor Yellow "Workflow " $wf.Name " already exists on the target list:" $listTarget.Title
				write-host -ForegroundColor Yellow ""
	                	$wfFound = $true
	                }
            	}
					            
            	if ($wfFound -eq $true) {
			if($replaceExistingMatchingWorkflows)
			{
	               		write-host -ForegroundColor Yellow "-replaceExistingMatchingWorkflows true"
				# Remove exisiting workflow association
				$listTarget.WorkflowAssociations.Remove($wfId)
	        	        write-host -ForegroundColor Yellow "Removed workflow" $newworkflowAssociation.Name "from the list: " $listTarget.Title
	                	write-host -ForegroundColor Yellow "on the web:"$web
			        Write-Host -ForegroundColor Yellow "Url: " $web.Url
		       		Write-Host -ForegroundColor Yellow ""
	        	  	Add-WorkflowAssociation $listTarget $srcworkflowAssociation $newworkflowAssociation
			}
			else
			{
				write-host -ForegroundColor Yellow "Rerun MigrateWorkflowAssociation.ps1 using '-replaceExistingMatchingWorkflows true'" 
				write-host -ForegroundColor Yellow "or remove Workflow" $wf.Name "from target list:" $listTarget.Title  "manually" 
			}
            	}
            	else
            	{
			Add-WorkflowAssociation $listTarget $srcworkflowAssociation $newworkflowAssociation
            	}
            }
            else
            {
		write-host "-workflowAssociationName provided"
		write-host "Checking for matches using -workflowAssociationName: $workflowAssociationName"
	        write-host ""
		foreach ($wf in $listTarget.WorkflowAssociations) {
	                if ($wf.Name -eq $workflowAssociationName) {
	                    	$wfId = $wf.Id
	                    	write-host -ForegroundColor Yellow "Workflow " $wf.Name " already exists on the target list:" $listTarget.Title
	                    	$wfFound = $true
	                }
	        }
		
		if ($wfFound -eq $true) 
		{
			if($replaceExistingMatchingWorkflows)
			{
		        	#Remove exisiting workflow association
				$listTarget.WorkflowAssociations.Remove($wfId)
				write-host -ForegroundColor Yellow "Removed workflow" $newworkflowAssociation.Name "from the list: " $listTarget.Title 
				write-host -ForegroundColor Yellow "on the web:"
				Write-Host -ForegroundColor Yellow "Name : "$web
			        Write-Host -ForegroundColor Yellow "Url :  " $web.Url
		          	Add-WorkflowAssociation $listTarget $srcworkflowAssociation $newworkflowAssociation
						}
			else
			{
				write-host -ForegroundColor Yellow "Rerun MigrateWorkflowAssociation.ps1 using '-replaceExistingMatchingWorkflows true'"
				write-host -ForegroundColor Yellow "or remove Workflow" $wf.Name "from target list:" $listTarget.Title  "manually"
			}
		}
		else
		{
			Add-WorkflowAssociation $listTarget $srcworkflowAssociation $newworkflowAssociation
		}
            }
    }
}
write-host "Preparing to associate workflow with list."
#
if ($list -ne $null)
{
	write-host "List: "  -nonewline;  $list.Title
	$wfTemplate=$site.workflowtemplates.gettemplatebyname($wfTemplateName, [System.Globalization.CultureInfo]::CurrentCulture);
    
	if(!$wfTemplate)
	{
		Write-Host -ForegroundColor Red "No workflow installed or activated with this workflowname : " $workflowName "on the web: "
		Write-Host -ForegroundColor Red "Name : " $site
		Write-Host -ForegroundColor Red "Url  : " $site.Url
	}
	else
	{
		if ($wfTemplate.Name -eq $wfTemplateName) 
		{
			write-host "Template Name: "  -nonewline;  $wfTemplate.Name
			$wfTemplateId = $wfTemplate.Id
			write-host "Template ID: "  -nonewline; write-host $wfTemplateId
			
		}
		write-host "WorkflowAssociations: "  -nonewline;  $list.WorkflowAssociations.Count
		$list.WorkflowAssociations | foreach { Get-WorkflowAssociation($_) }
	}
	
}
else
{
	write-host "ERROR: Could not find source list, association will have to be made manually." -ForegroundColor red
}
#
$site.Dispose()
$targetsite.Dispose()

SharePoint Saturday UK 2011 Rundown...

aobi — Sun, 13 Nov 2011 18:15:00 GMT

Well SharePoint Saturday UK (#spsuk) has been and gone for another year...

For anyone who's not aware, it's

"an educational, informative & lively day filled with sessions from respected SharePoint professionals & MVPs, covering a wide variety of SharePoint-orientated topics. SharePoint Saturday is FREE, open to the public and is your local chance to immerse yourself in SharePoint!"

This year's event was held at Nottingham Conferences University Park and was attended by 500+ avid SharePointers.

The day kicked off with a great Keynote from Todd Klindt (@ToddKlindt) entitled "Making Nerds Better People" in which Todd attempted to encourage people to "step out of their comfort zone and/or their area of personal expertise". Touching on his own personal experiences of taking the SharePoint Dev exams, whilst primarily being an SP Admin/IT Pro (he did also admit that the x2 main reasons for even attempting the exams were ‘Knowledge' and ‘Spite'). When asked how many people in the room had currently taken (and passed) all x4 SP exams, very few hands went up. Which probably only goes to prove he's got a valid point... we can all learn a bit more about the areas we already focus on, simply by learning about the areas that we don't.

http://toddklindt.com/Slides/spsuk2011/Keynote - Making Nerds better People.pdf

My first session of the day was "Putting you at the centre of the Social Intranet" presented by Wes Hackett (@weshackett), in which he covered the various challenges and approaches of successfully implementing a truly "Social Intranet" using SharePoint. A few of the highlights were ‘making a big social change - centre on collaboration not publishing', ‘attempt to make social spaces primary places of work' and a particular favourite "Location Based Subscriptions" - a custom extension to the in-built SP alerts.

http://weshackett.com/2011/11/sharepoint-saturday-2011/

twitter: #spsuk16

Next session was "Deploying SharePoint 2010 Globally - The options" by Paul Grimely (@paulgrimley), in which he covered the various supported architecture options for deploying SharePoint 2010 across geographically dispersed locations (single farm, multi-farm or 3^rd party replication). As well has the vast amount of considerations that need to be painstakingly thought-out, planned and tested (from Business Requirements and Budgets to careful planning of ‘SP Variations' for Multilanguage deployments)

http://www.paulgrimley.com/2011/11/deploying-sharepoint-globally-slides.html

twitter: #spsuk07

Next up was "How we did it - Combined Knowledge SharePoint Design" presented by Matt Hughes (@mattmoo2), in which Matt not only showed us an "under the hood demo" of the new www.internationalsharepointconference.com website (previously known as the "European SharePoint Best Practices Conference"), but also presented the entire session sporting "full face paint". He also made the recommendation (amongst others) of avoiding the use of "!important" (or bang important) in CSS, whenever attempting to brand SharePoint ...although personally I think the practical do's and don'ts of this in real world scenarios is yet another thing the SP camp could discuss at length (and could even add to the "SharePoint > To Brand or Not to Brand ?" discussion)

http://sp365.co.uk/2011/11/sharepoint-saturday-how-we-did-it-the-combined-knowledge-sharepoint-design-spsuk13/

twitter: #spsuk13

I followed this up with Mark Miller's (@EUSP) "Something Awesome" (aka ‘To Host or Not to Host - the Good, the Bad and the Ugly Decisions') session, which turned out to be one of the most informative sessions of the day. Mark initially covered the pros and cons of ‘On-Premise' vs. ‘Cloud'. Highlighting such issues as ‘On Premise: gives full control but at what cost?' usually has significant on-going infrastructure, monitoring and management overheads. Whereas ‘Cloud' gives less control (no farm solutions - sandbox solutions only, no ‘Central Admin' access - ‘Tenant Admin' access only) but is potentially far more cost effective for SMEs (However, annual subscription costs can quickly spiral for larger enterprise deployments). The session then went on to discuss other potential issues which should also be considered such as the ‘US Patriot Act' (anyone considering Office365 and/or Cloud solutions should seriously look into the implications of this before signing up to anything), using ‘generic cloud providers' who provide reliable infrastructure with %99.9 uptime, but are often not experts in supporting SharePoint. He then continued with the conclusion that in reality the majority of ‘Cloud' solutions over the coming years, will in fact be a combination of both of ‘On-Premise' and ‘Cloud' or "Hybrid solutions".

twitter: #spsuk34

My final session of the day was Todd Klindt's (@ToddKlindt) "PowerShell", which again was another fantastic session from Todd. Even though some may argue that it was less complicated when compared to some other SharePoint PowerShell sessions (such as Gary Lapointe's ‘PowerShell Best Practices for SharePoint Administrators' at last year's "Best Practices conference"), it was still full of various useful tips: such as use ‘Start-Transcript', try to avoid using aliases and always ensure you understand the difference between "evaluation" and "assignment" before running any script (Todd gave an example of how he'd learnt this the ‘hard way' by once successfully re-naming all of his SP databases to "SP_Config")

http://toddklindt.com/Slides/spsuk2011/PowerShell.pdf

http://toddklindt.com/Slides/spsuk2011/PowerShell_transcript.20111112080916.txt

twitter: #spsuk10

The day ended with a Closing Keynote "SharePoint and the Cloud: Crash or Convergence?" from Steve Fox. In which he ran through various demos (at the audience's request) on using Azure with both SharePoint as well as the new ‘Power View' which will ship with SQL Server 2012 aka ('Denali') (His "no code" demo of combining an Azure data source with Excel and publishing it via Excel Services was particularly impressive).

From what I understand there were numerous other "highlight sessions" that ran throughout the day which I wasn't able to attend, as ran simultaneously to those above (Becky Isserman's "HTML 5 vs SilverLight 5" #spsuk01, Eric Schupps' "Customizing the SharePoint Packaging and Deployment Process in Visual Studio 2010" #spsuk02, Chris O'Brien's "Custom Ribbon Development" #spsuk03, Ant Clay and Andrew Woodward's "SharePoint ‘Innovation Games' Workshop" #spsuk38 to name but a few).

All in all another great SharePoint Saturday!

As usual a HUGE THANKS goes to the event organisers Brett Lonsdale (@brettlonsdale) , Tony Pounder(@WorTony) and Mark Macrae(@m_macrae) as well as all of the event sponsors who made the day possible.

Photos of the day's events are available "here"

SharePoint 2010 - Edit Document via Citrix XenApp

aobi — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 23:30:00 GMT

Whilst recently performing a new SharePoint 2010 deployment for a client, I was presented with the following problem. The client was using Citrix XenApp to deploy and manage Office 2010 on their users' desktops and as such was receiving the following error message

"The document could not be opened for editing. A Microsoft SharePoint Foundation compatible application could not be found to edit the document."

...when attempting to use the "Edit in {office app}" from the document menu.

Now as you may (or may not) already be aware, by default SharePoint is configured to use the ‘owssupp.dll' ActiveX control to open Office documents in "edit mode", which is installed as part of the "SharePoint Support features" of the client's Office installation. (Further info on the subject see: http://bradleychetty.blogspot.com/2011/08/microsoft-sharepoint-foundation.html )

Now as the client was running Office via Citrix, there was no local installation of Office on the desktop machines and therefore no ‘owssupp.dll'.

The obvious solution to the problem was to simply run the "IE browser session" via Citrix as well, which does work as long as the "webclient service" is running on the Citrix server (see http://support.citrix.com/article/CTX125214).

However, the client didn't want to use Citrix for all web and internet traffic and didn't really want to give their users two browser links on the desktops (ie. one to browse SharePoint via Citrix and another local one for all other web/internet access).

So, what to do?

Well, SharePoint uses the DOCICON.XML file to control which documents are associated with a particular application (More information on how this works can be found at "Understanding DocIcon.xml files"), but basically the "OpenControl" attribute is used to specify the name of the ActiveX control used to open the particular document type (see http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa979488.aspx).

So one quick Google search later, and I found a useful article from "Manpreet's SharePoint Developer Blog", which covered the basics of "writing a custom SharePoint.OpenDocuments" control (and even includes source code for his ‘Malag.OpenDocuments control' as a starter for ten!).

It was at this point that the client pointed out they also had some "remote users" (connected over vpn) who didn't have access to Citrix, but DID have a local copy of Office installed on their Laptops and would need the same ability to "Edit Office Documents" directly from SharePoint...

Now as far as I'm aware, the DOCICON.XML file only permits a "one-to-one" association per file type, so using a "custom OpenDocuments" control (to open files via Citrix) wasn't going to be an option as the Citrix PNAgent wouldn't be available on the laptops of the remote users.

It seemed there was a requirement for two "Edit in {office app}" menu items to be available via the SharePoint user interface. One to open/edit the file via Citrix and another to use local installation of Office (ie. the default SharePoint "Edit" action)

So I came up with the following "sandbox solution" to achieve this:

1. Create a "custom menu item"

See the following for further info:

http://www.thespgeek.com/2011/01/how-to-add-custom-menu-item-in.html

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms473643.aspx

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms460194.aspx

I set the "Scope" of my feature to "Site", so that it could be activated on a "per site-collection" basis, but obviously if you'd prefer it be controlled on a "per site" basis you could set your scope to be "Web".

2. In the Elements.xml file,

..include a reference to a "CustomAction ScriptBlock", which includes the following code:


<CustomAction

   
Location="ScriptLink"

   
ScriptBlock='function doOpenWithCitrix(paramval, OfficeApp){ 

   
openCitrixOfficApp(getUNCPath(paramval), OfficeApp);}

   
function openCitrixOfficApp(strFileapth, strOfficeAppName){

   
var oShell = new ActiveXObject("Shell.Application");

   
var citrixCmd = "C:\\Program Files\\Citrix\\ICA Client\\pnagent.exe";

  
/*Note - The Path to your pnagent.exe may need to be adjusted */

   
var commandParms = " /QLaunch \""+ strOfficeAppName
+"\" /param:\"" + strFileapth +"\" ";

   
oShell.ShellExecute(citrixCmd, commandParms, "",
"open", "1");}

   
function getUNCPath(url){           


   
var returnVal;

   
returnVal = decodeURI(url);

   
returnVal = returnVal.replace(new RegExp("/", "g"),
"\\");

   
returnVal = returnVal.replace(new RegExp("http:",
"g"), "");

   
returnVal = "\\\\" + location.hostname + returnVal;

   
return returnVal;}'

   
Sequence="101">

</CustomAction>

This JavaScript attempts to run the Citrix PNAgent.exe, along with the path to the Office document stored in SharePoint as a parameter.

For some reason Citrix didn't seem to like "http://" paths, so I have included a ‘getUNCPath' function which attempts to convert the URL of the document item to a UNC path.

(Again, please note that Citrix requires the "webclient service" to be running on the Citrix server so that it is able access the files via UNC paths - or rather via webDAV)

It is possible include the script in a ".js file" if you prefer (see http://blog.voyta.net/2010/09/12/referencing-javascript-files-using-customaction-in-sharepoint-2010-sandboxed-solutions/), but it's not necessary for the purposes of this example.

3. Include the following "Custom Action"(s)


<CustomAction

   
Id="CitrixOffice_Word2010"

   
RegistrationType="FileType"

   
RegistrationId="doc"

   
Rights="EditListItems"


   
ImageUrl="/_layouts/images/icdoc.png"

   
Location="EditControlBlock"

   
Sequence="252"

   
Title="Edit in Microsoft Word 2010 (via Citrix)" >

   
<UrlAction Url="javascript : doOpenWithCitrix('{ItemUrl}', 'Word
2010');"/>

 
</CustomAction>

 
<CustomAction

   
Id="CitrixOffice_Word2010"

   
RegistrationType="FileType"

   
RegistrationId="docx"

   
Rights="EditListItems" 


   
ImageUrl="/_layouts/images/icdoc.png"

   
Location="EditControlBlock"

   
Sequence="252"

   
Title="Edit in Microsoft Word 2010 (via Citrix)" >

   
<UrlAction Url="javascript : doOpenWithCitrix('{ItemUrl}', 'Word
2010');"/>

 
</CustomAction>

 

 
<CustomAction

   
Id="CitrixOffice_Excel2010"

   
RegistrationType="FileType"

   
RegistrationId="xls"

   
Rights="EditListItems" 


   
ImageUrl="/_layouts/images/icxls.png"

   
Location="EditControlBlock"

   
Sequence="252"

   
Title="Edit in Microsoft Excel 2010 (via Citrix)" >

   
<UrlAction Url="javascript : doOpenWithCitrix('{ItemUrl}', 'Excel
2010');"/>

 
</CustomAction>

 
<CustomAction

   
Id="CitrixOffice_Excel2010"

   
RegistrationType="FileType"

   
RegistrationId="xlsx"

   
Rights="EditListItems" 


   
ImageUrl="/_layouts/images/icxls.png"

   
Location="EditControlBlock"

   
Sequence="252"

   
Title="Edit in Microsoft Excel (via Citrix)" >

   
<UrlAction Url="javascript : doOpenWithCitrix('{ItemUrl}', 'Excel
2010');"/>

 
</CustomAction>

  

 
<CustomAction

   
Id="CitrixOffice_Ppoint2010"

    RegistrationType="FileType"

   
RegistrationId="ppt"

   
Rights="EditListItems" 


   
ImageUrl="/_layouts/images/icppt.png"

   
Location="EditControlBlock"

   
Sequence="252"

   
Title="Edit in Microsoft PowerPoint 2010 (via Citrix)" >

   
<UrlAction Url="javascript : doOpenWithCitrix('{ItemUrl}',
'PowerPoint 2010');"/>

 
</CustomAction>

 
<CustomAction

   
Id="CitrixOffice_Ppoint2010"

   
RegistrationType="FileType"

   
RegistrationId="pptx"

   
Rights="EditListItems" 


   
ImageUrl="/_layouts/images/icppt.pngg"

   
Location="EditControlBlock"

   
Sequence="252"

    Title="Edit
in Microsoft PowerPoint 2010 (via Citrix)" >

   
<UrlAction Url="javascript : doOpenWithCitrix('{ItemUrl}',
'PowerPoint 2010');"/>

 
</CustomAction>

Each of these, creates a new Menu Item (with the call to the custom JavaScript ) based on the associated FileType/FileExtension.

Note: the second parameter passed to the "doOpenWithCitrix" function needs to be the Application Name that is published in Citrix.

In this particular example, I have simply specified "'Word 2010', ‘Excel 2010' or ‘PowerPoint 2010'", but obviously these may vary depending on your Citrix setup.

You should then be able to publish your feature as a Sandbox Solution and see the following additional menu item

The final step that is required to get this working is to "Enable" the "Initialize and script ActiveX controls not marked as safe"in the Internet Explorer Security Options.

(unfortunately the "new ActiveXObject("Shell.Application");" javascript call requires this setting to be enabled to function correctly).

NOTE: To prevent creating a security risk I would ONLY RECOMMEND changing this security option for "Trusted Sites" (which obviously then needs to be controlled and/or restricted).

The source code and Visual Studio 2010 project is attached along with a complied ".wsp" file:

EditViaCitrixOffice_MenuItem.zip

Obilogic RSS Reader 2010 Now Available - Free Download

aobi — Sun, 17 Apr 2011 20:52:00 GMT

"RSS Reader" Web Part for SharePoint 2010 is now available to Download ...

Demo available at:
http://wssv3.obilogic.co.uk/ObilogicWebParts/RSSReader/

RSS Reader 2010 is also available for download from Codeplex:
http://obilogicrssreader.codeplex.com/

European SharePoint Best Practices Conference 2011 Rundown...

aobi — Sun, 17 Apr 2011 08:34:00 GMT

So... where to start?

Although the event itself didn't officially kick off until Monday 11^th April, Mark Macrae organised the annual football tournament at the Powerleague London City - 5-a-side pitch. I didn't attend this myself, but believe it was as successful as the preceding year (although there did seem to be some dispute over which team actually won - Combined Knowledge or Lightning Tools?)

Photos: http://www.mattgrovesblog.com/2011/04/best-practice-conference-day0.html

Day 1

Following a successful (and very optimistic) Key Note Session from Chris Johnson, Day 1 kicked off for me with the "DEV201 - Creating custom SharePoint service apps" session by the ultra enthusiastic Todd Bleeker (@toddbleeker). Which although didn't contain any actual coding examples, still managed to impress and made for a great start to the conference.

I followed this up with the "DEV202 - Upgrading Web Parts" session by Maurice Prather. This gave insight to the Development Lifecycle of SharePoint Web Parts, including upgrading web part code from SP2007 to SP2010... and made it 2 for 2.

After lunch I was absolutely blown away by the "IT103- Windows PowerShell Best Practices for SharePoint 2010 Administrators" session by Gary Lapointe (@glapointe). I realised my PowerShell knowledge was far from "up to speed" but didn't realise quite how "off the pace" I actually was. Have to say this particular session turned out to be one of the highlights from the entire 3 days. Slide Decks available via: http://blog.falchionconsulting.com/index.php/2011/04/european-sharepoint-best-practices-conference-wrap-up/

I followed this up with the "IT104 - Rational Guide to SharePoint 2010 User Profile Synchronization" session by Spencer Harbar (@harbars) who took a detailed look at the new UPS in SharePoint 2010 and the potential configuration pitfalls (such as causes of the infamous "stuck on starting").

The final session of my day was "DEV205 - Creating Dynamic Client Applications in SharePoint 2010" by Eric Shupps (@eschupps), which had plenty of great (fast paced) code examples as well as the my personal favourite quote of the entire conference "I'm not a designer... I don't make things pretty, I just make things work". Slide Decks available via: http://www.binarywave.com/blogs/eshupps/Lists/Posts/Post.aspx?ID=248

Photos: http://www.mattgrovesblog.com/2011/04/photos-from-bpc-day-1-so-far.html

Day 2

Started off with the "IT106 - This is me, is that you? Identity management in SharePoint 2010" by Rick Taylor (@slkrck) who explained it pretty much boiled down to "four A's" - Authentication, Authorization, Access and Auditing. He approached the subject from a fairly unique perspective, discussing FIM and even how he uses SharePoint in his own home to check his kids have done their homework.

The second session of the day was my first ever community track "COM607 - The secrets of successful Enterprise Social Computing with SharePoint 2010" by Symon Garfield (@symon_garfield) and probably one of the busiest sessions of the day. The session covered the differences in the approach which are needed for successful Social Computing Enterprise, such as starting from "bottom up" opposed to the "top down". (A full rundown of his session is available via Bamboo Nation)

Next it was "IT108 - SharePoint 2010 Upgrade Strategy and Best Practices" by the infamous Joel Oleson (with a little help from the family), covering the various options available when upgrading from SP2007 to SP2010. A great session which was direct and to the point, with tips such as sys requirements including "80Gb OS drives" (minimum!)

After lunch was "IW509 - Content Aggregation in SharePoint 2010" by Christina Wheeler (@cwheeler76) and Brett Lonsdale(@brettlonsdale), in which we were advised to "aggregate not duplicate". This covered the new features of the "Content Editor Web Part (CEWP)", the Data View Web Part (DVWP) and the new "Calendar Overlay".

The final session for day 2 was "IT111 - Health & Monitoring for the ITPro (Part 1) session" by Todd Carter, where we were shown how it's possible to create and deploy "Custom SP Health Rules" such as "a rule to check ContentDB SQL Backups have been performed "... v.cool!

Photos: http://www.mattgrovesblog.com/2011/04/photos-from-bpc-day-2.html

Day 3

The first session of the final day was "IT112 - Users, Profiles, and MySites: Managing a Changing SharePoint User population" by Paul Stork (@pstork). Another great session where Paul started off explaining the causes of various common "user profile" issues (such as display name not updating due to SP not regarding an account as "active" until it has "contributed" content in some way... simply "logging in" isn't enough to be regarded as active!). He then went on to discuss the background architecture between the "user profile synchronization service (UPS)" and the underlying "UserInfo Table" (used by SP Foundation), along with the various associated timer jobs. All in all this session turned out to be another particular highlight of the conference.

Next was "IT113 - Planning extranet environments with SharePoint 2010" by Michael Noel (@michaeltnoel). In which Michael went through the different extranet scenarios that are available in SP2010. He then went on to discuss uses of Forefront Identity Manager (FIM) as as means to manage multiple authentication providers and UAG. (A full rundown of his session is available via Bamboo Nation)

The afternoon started well with "DEV215 - SharePoint Data Access Shootout" by Ted Pattison (@tedpattison) discussing different coding approaches for accessing data in SharePoint SP2010, including as "SPQuery", "SPsiteDataQuery "(to query multiple lists) and "LINQ for SharePoint". This included some excellent coding examples and plenty of humour. He then went on to demo various Lambda expressions, LINQ techniques and how to create Entity Classes using SPMetal.exe. Conclusion, everyone approach can be a winner... it's just knowing when to use which approach. Overall, yet another fantastic session!

The final session of the day (and for me, the conference) was "IT116 - Real World Service Application federation with SharePoint 2010" by Spencer Harbar (@harbars). This covered which of service applications supported "publishing" and "federation" and more importantly which didn't and when (such as in WAN environments).

Photos: http://www.mattgrovesblog.com/2011/04/bpc-photosthird-and-final-day.html

(Unfortunately I'd forgotten my camera due to a last minute dash to catch my train, so all pictures of the event are thanks to Matt Groves AKA "the silent ninja clicker").

Additional Resources:

Matthew Hughes "Live BPCUK Blog": http://engageinsharepoint.co.uk/bpcuk-live-blog/

BPCUK Video: http://videobam.com/AYpfA

European SharePoint Best Practices Session Attendance Survey

aobi — Sun, 03 Apr 2011 08:44:00 GMT

Purely in the interests of science (and not simply a popularity contest) I've published a SP Survey asking which "track sessions" people are planning on attending at this year's European SharePoint Best Practices Conference.

http://wssv3.obilogic.co.uk/sites/BestPracticesSPConference2011/default.aspx

Andy Dale (OfficeTalk) SharePoint Awards 2011

aobi — Tue, 15 Mar 2011 16:26:00 GMT

Andy Dale from OfficeTalk has started the new round of "SharePoint Awards" for 2011, with some very interesting vote options....

Andy Dale SharePoint Awards 2011.

Categories included:

1. Best SharePoint Information Site

2. Best SharePoint Webpart Provider

3. Best SharePoint Management Tool

4. Best Website Built On SharePoint

5. Best SharePoint Training

6. Best SharePoint Offline/Mobile Solution

7. Most Useful SharePoint Webpart

8. Favourite Free SharePoint Webpart/add-Ons

9. Best Hosted SharePoint Provider

10. Best SharePoint Application

SharePoint Best Practice Conference 2011 - Full Agenda and Event Speakers now available

aobi — Wed, 19 Jan 2011 12:36:00 GMT

The full event agenda for the 2011 SharePoint Best Practice Conference has now been released along with details of all event speakers.

http://sharepointbestpractices.co.uk/Agenda.html

http://sharepointbestpractices.co.uk/Event_Speakers.html

SharePoint Journeys Contest

aobi — Fri, 17 Dec 2010 23:44:00 GMT

Microsoft recently launched a unique online video contest called "SharePoint Journeys", in which customers and/or partners are encouraged to submit a story about "where they are on their SharePoint journey,” as well as the unique ways they’ve used SharePoint.

Until February 16th 2011, SharePoint users can create and submit a two-minute video illustrating their use of SharePoint in one of three categories:

Ramping Up: Early use of SharePoint using a few of the workloads for part of an organization to improve how people share information and work together.
Examples include building team sites or MySites, deploying Intranet sites or portals, or implementation of an extranet to collaborate with partners.

Building Momentum: Consolidation of content management and collaboration infrastructure on SharePoint to drive broad adoption across an organization and beyond.
Examples include using multiple workloads, implementing dotcom sites, and end user adoption success.

Driving Business Value: Building applications on SharePoint that integrate back end data in documents, business processes and web experiences.
Examples include building custom applications, business intelligence solutions and FAST search for Internet sites.

http://www.sharepointjourneys.com
(contest rules and criteria)

Sometimes you just can't see the BDC Metadata Store for the Proxies...

aobi — Thu, 04 Nov 2010 22:56:00 GMT

Stumbled across this problem earlier today, which I have to admit had me stumped for a little while...

Whilst attempting to create an External Content Type in SharePoint Designer I was presented with the "Business Data Connectivity Metadata Store is currently unavailable" error.

For those who may not have come across this error before, it's one that's been around for while and has various posts detailing a variety of possible causes and solutions...

..from the Beta release (which required a WCF hotfix), running the Config Wizard and simply checking the services are running, to checking for necessary security permissions on the BDC Service Application ... as well a report of the problem being resolved using the 'disableloopbackcheck' (...which should only be used with caution)

Well it seems there may be yet another possible cause ...and I'm pleased to say fairly simple 'solution'.

After 'OK'ing the initial error message... click on the 'New External Content Type'

If you're presented with a new error stating the remote server returned a '(407) Proxy Authentication Required'

..then the following tip may be of some use to you.

Now I should also mention at this point, that I was working on a standalone SP2010 dev box with a local instance of SQL and a local install of SP Designer 2010 (... so basically, there were NO REMOTE servers involved).
In addition I was also able to successfully browse (..and authenticate) the SP site in question from the same machine.

Open the 'spdesign.exe.config' file...

.. and simply provide a "<defaultProxy> Element".

In my case, the 'usesystemdefault=false' and 'bypassonlocal=true' was all that was needed, however I suspect this may vary depending on your specific environment

Restart SP Designer, and when you now select 'External Content Types' you should no longer be presented with the error..

..and clicking on the 'New External Content Type' should display the expected 'new external content type' screen.

Voila... you can now go about creating your external content type as required.

SharePoint Saturday UK Rundown...

aobi — Mon, 04 Oct 2010 18:41:00 GMT

I was lucky enough to be one of the 400 SharePointers who attended the first ever SharePoint Saturday event in the UK this weekend.
For anyone who doesn't know this is a FREE event, open to the public with registration on a "first come first serve" basis.

The day consisted of five sessions tracks "Developer", "IT Pro", "Info Worker", "Cool Stuff" and "Business" as well as a "Gold Sponsor Demo" track.

My first session of the day was "SharePoint in the Cloud" presented by Matt Groves, in which Matt covered everything from the shortcomings of the current MS services (... simply put MS are still running SP2007!!), to the various pros and cons when considering BPOS or SP Online (the "no flex down during the inital 12 month" clause is a particular gotcha to watch out for...)

This was followed by the "SharePoint Branding" session from Sam Dolan (aka PinkPetrol), in which Sam proceeded to run through a simple, yet affective demonstration of SharePoint UI branding using only FireFox/FireBug and SP Designer 2010. (I have to admit I was really torn between this and the "SharePoint, JQuery and AJAX" session from Chris O’Brien, which I heard was a real highlight of the event but was unfortunately scheduled for the same time...)

After a great lunch (which again was free) I sat in on the "Real World Sandboxed Solutions" session from Andrew Woodward, which was delivered with his usual level of fun and enthusiasm which is simply infectious. And although it wasn't an actual "coding" session the content was still invaluable, covering when it's appropriate (or not) to develop Sandboxed Solutions as well as the implications and restrictions to be considered and approaches needed to perform certain tasks (for example using the new "SharePoint Client Object Model" to make Web Service calls opposed to the common approach of making the same calls server-side).

Next was the "Business Connectivity Services (BCS)" session from Brett Lonsdale, in which he demonstrated the vastly improved features compared to it's BDC predecessor (..no more creating XML files) which can now be created, configured and consumed with relative simplicity. As well as covering the new BCS External lists (which you'll be pleased to hear can be accessed via the standard SPList API...)

My final session was the "Community Kit for SharePoint: Development Tools Edition" presented by Wes Hackett. In spite of a few technical hiccups during the early part of the session, I have to admit this was a particular favorite. These VS 2010 extensions are simply essential to anyone developing with SharePoint 2010.

A huge thanks to the organisers - Brett Lonsdale, Tony Pounder and Mark Macrae, as well as all of the event sponsors.

MS Security Advisory (2416728) Vulnerability in ASP.NET

aobi — Tue, 21 Sep 2010 21:51:00 GMT

Microsoft Security Advisory (2416728)
Vulnerability in ASP.NET Could Allow Information Disclosure

...which unfortunately also affects SharePoint

Security Advisory 2416728 (Vulnerability in ASP.NET) and SharePoint
SharePoint Team Blog

Obilogic SharePoint 2010 Picture Library Web Parts (Beta Release)

aobi — Mon, 20 Sep 2010 21:20:00 GMT

I'm pleased to announce that the first SharePoint 2010 Web Parts from Obilogic are now available for download.

The SharePoint 2010 Picture Library Web Parts currently consist of x3 (jQuery) Visual Web Parts which provide alternative ways of displaying image files stored in a Picture Library.

1) Picture Library Image Slider

This web part displays all image files in a Picture Library, with a "slide image out of view" mouse over affect.
(includes "image size", "number of display columns" and "slide direction" web part options)

2) Picture Library Expanding Zoom

This web part displays all image files in a Picture Library, using an "expanding zoom" mouse over affect.
(includes "image size", "number of display columns" and "hyperlink" web part options)

Picture Library Zoom with Caption

This web part displays all image files in a Picture Library, using a "zoom with caption" mouse over affect.
(includes "image size", "number of display columns" and "hyperlink" web part options)

Download

(also available for download from Codeplex - http://sp2010piclibrarywps.codeplex.com/)

OfficeTalk Launch Sharepoint Village

aobi — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 22:30:00 GMT

Andy Dale and the guys at Office Talk have launched their new SharePoint Village site (www.sharepointvillage.com) which aims to be a revolutionary new site for everything SharePoint related.

Constructed as a Vitual SharePoint Shopping Centre the site offers eight different categories of vitual SharePoint Shops covering:

SharePoint Consultancy
SharePoint Hosting
SharePoint Software
SharePoint Training
SharePoint Design
SharePoint Web Parts
SharePoint User Groups
SharePoint Library

For further information see:
http://suguk.org/forums/thread/25063.aspx
http://www.office-talk.com/index.php?id=168

SharePoint Guidance: Developing Applications for SharePoint 2010

aobi — Thu, 08 Jul 2010 21:25:00 GMT

Microsoft patterns & practices has recently announced the release of the 'Developing Applications for SharePoint 2010' guide, which is now available online at MSDN Patterns & Practices Developer Center and to download from Microsoft's Download Center

The guide provides technical information covering key areas of SharePoint 2010 application development, and contains a general guide consisting of "Application Foundations for SharePoint 2010", "Execution Models in SharePoint 2010", "Data Models in SharePoint 2010", "Client Models in SharePoint 2010", reference implementations along with source code and documentation, and a library of reusable source code components.

Full details on the guide are available from the Microsft SharePoint Team Blog

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/sharepoint/archive/2010/06/30/developing-applications-for-sharepoint-2010.aspx

PowerShell Plus (Beta) Available from Idera

aobi — Tue, 22 Jun 2010 16:26:00 GMT

Idera have made the Beta version of their "PowerShell Plus 3.5 scripting IDE" available for download:

http://www.idera.com/Products/PowerShell/PowerShell-Plus-Beta/

The SharePoint Conference 2011 Announced

aobi — Tue, 08 Jun 2010 22:02:00 GMT

The SharePoint Conference 2011 is being held October 3-6, 2011 in Anaheim, California and is described as

the premier worldwide conference dedicated to SharePoint and related technologies

Learn more at www.mssharepointconference.com

SharePoint 2010 Official Launch

aobi — Wed, 12 May 2010 21:21:00 GMT

Today saw the official launch of SharePoint and Office 2010 with live keynote speech from Stephen Elop (President of the Microsoft Business Division) streamed live from the "MS Office and SharePoint Launch Event" site

SharePoint v4 has officially arrived !!

SharePoint 2010 Evolution Conference Rundown...

aobi — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 22:49:00 GMT

Despite the recent travel chaos, the SharePoint 2010 Evolution conference managed to go ahead in London last week, consisting of x6 session tracks covering "IT Pro", "Developer", "Power User", "Business Adoption" and two new session tracks "Community - Tales from the trenches" and "Deep Dive - level 400"

For some, the event began with a Football Tournament which took place on the Sunday evening. (...which I unfortunately missed, as although in London, I failed to spot the announcement on the conference website and so unknowingly went to watch the "Exit Through The Gift Shop" movie)

The conference itself kicked off with a Keynote Session which took a look at SharePoint's Evolution, from SharePoint Portal Server 2001 through to MOSS 2007

From there, attendees were free to choose from the numerous SharePoint session tracks on offer. Which though affected by some last minute re-scheduling (and huge amount of work from the guys and gals at Combined Knowledge) were all able to go ahead in one form or another.

I tended to stick to the "IT Pro", "Developer" and "Deep Dive" for the majority of the conference, but occasionally found myself sensing that I should have attended a couple of the "Community" sessions.

Day 1

KeyNote
SharePoint's Evolution

DEV101
Introduction to SharePoint 2010 development.
Eric Shupps

DD102
PowerShell for SharePoint 2010.
Penny Coventry

DEV103 - Part 1
Managing the SharePoint Application Lifecycle - going beyond version 1.0.0.0.
Chris O'Brien

IT104
SQL and Storage.
Mike Watson

DEV105
Using SharePoint search to develop custom solutions.
Mirjam van Olst

Day 2

IT106
What, Why, When & How Sandbox solutions.
Mirjam van Olst

IT107
The SharePoint Iron Man.
Mike Watson

DEV108
Managing the SharePoint Application Lifecycle - going beyond version 1.0.0.0.
Chris O'Brien

DEV109
Mashups for the Enterprise.
Daniel Wessels

DEV110
The client object model in SharePoint 2010.
Eric Shupps & Ben Robb

DD111
SharePoint scaling out and capacity planning for SharePoint 2010
Steve Smith

Day 3

IT112
SharePoint 2010 Mythbusters
Spence Harbar

DEV113
What's new with Web Content management in SharePoint Server 2010.
Chris O'Brien

IT114
Deep drive into RBS
Neil Hodgkinson

IT115
IT Pro Ask the experts Panel

DEV116
Developer Ask the experts Panel

Some of the main focal points for SharePoint 2010 that I came away with were:

PowerShell

Learn it, use it... unless you enjoy clicking through the "central admin pages".

(...and for all those old ".vbs" scripters looking for a reason to finally learn PowerShell ... well you found one!)

Sandbox Solutions

Appear to be a step in the right direction, in spite of the potential "full trust proxy" issue highlighted by Eric Schupps

We all know deploying ‘custom code' to the GAC is a bad thing, but anyone who has attempted to implement CAS successfully (and deploy to 80\bin instead of to the GAC) will know the potential headaches that come with it...

Sandbox solutions address things from a slightly different angle (...and arguable move some of the responsibility from the "Dev" to the "Admin") by allowing ‘custom code' solutions to run in a type of "isolation", which SharePoint can then monitor or even terminate based on variety of "points" calculated on various ‘quota metrics' which are designed to

"monitor the resource usage of the server to accurately reflect the true health of the server"

Although these ‘quota metrics' are configurable, SharePoint does not provide any administration pages for adjusting them. However you can access and update them using the SharePoint object model or Windows PowerShell (... see, I said you're going to need it)

SQL Databases

Simply put there are more... lots more. This highlights the need and importance of a well performing back-end SQL Server configuration

The working demo of "SQL RBS" (Remote Blob Storage) from Neil Hodgkinson was first-rate. With the only obvious ‘gotcha' being the fact the OOTB provider from Microsoft currently only supports "local disks" (3^rd party providers apparently being available for SAN, NAS storage etc)

Feature Versioning

No more entering "1.0.0.0" in all your code. You're going to have to start thinking ‘upgrades'. Or more specifically, starting thinking how are you going to deal with your ‘upgrades'.

The two part session from Chris O'Brien on the subject was a particular highlight of the conference.

Not that I felt this was a particular area of SharePoint 2007 which was in desperate need of significant improvement, but again it‘s definitely has the potential to be yet another "feather in the cap" for SharePoint 2010.

Client Object Model

Accessing SharePoint data directly from client applications just got a whole lot more interesting...

The new Client Object Model that comes with SharePoint 2010 provides a common API for accessing all SharePoint data regardless of the client app being used/developed.

(However it does currently only contain a ‘sub-set' of classes, so do expect to see all SharePoint classes and methods available in your Visual Studio intellisense)

Slides from Ben Robb are available from his blog

A complete Photo Rundown of my conference sessions are also available here:

Eyjafjallajokull vs the SharePoint 2010 Evolution Conference...

aobi — Thu, 22 Apr 2010 01:27:00 GMT

OK, just got back from the SharePoint 2010 Evolution Conference in London.

Despite Eyjafjallajokull ‘s best attempts to prevent the conference from happening at all (...apparently pronounced "AY-yah-fyah-lah-YOH-kuul.") Steve Smith and everyone else at Combined Knowledge did an outstanding job organising (... or should that be re-organising) the event and managed to put on another great conference for the second year in a row...

... loads of SharePoint 2010 info from a variety of top SharePoint speakers , with 90% of delegates apparently able to attend and 98% of exhibitors.

There were numerous stories of people travelling outlandish distances or via an array of transport methods... (it's amazing what people will do to attend a great conference)

My personal thanks to Zoe Watson @ CK and look forward to hopefully seeing everyone again at next year's conference.