Exploring the Server Admin Templates - Board of Directors

Template Name: BoardDirectors.stp
Description: The Board of Directors application template provides a single location for an external group of members to store and locate common documents such as quarterly reviews, shareholder meeting notes and annual strategy documents.
Business Area: Business Management / Finance
Document Libraries:
1. Meeting Minutes
2. Meeting Documents
3. Board Information
Custom Lists:
1. Contact List - Default
2. Board Events – Calendar List

a. Workflows

i. Type of Workflow – SharePoint Designer

ii. Workflow –
1. Creates new item in a “Discussion” List.
2. Creates new item in the “Meeting Minutes”.
iii. Workflow Type - Manual
b. Views (Apart from Default)
i. All Events
1. Standard View
2. Sorted by StartTime – Default View
ii. Calendar
1. Calendar View
iii. Current Events
1. Standard View, with Expanded Recurring Events.
3. Tasks – Default

Customizations:
This template has workflow implemented in the “Board Events” List which creates a list item in the “Meeting Minutes” Document Library and the “Discussions” Discussion Board List whenever a new item is created in the “Board Events” List.

Exploring the 40 Application Templates of WSS 3.0

1. Introduction
   
   Microsoft had launched 40 application templates that can be used in Windows SharePoint Services to implement Custom Scenarios tailored to address the needs or requirements of specific business processes or sets of tasks. Microsoft states that these application templates “can function as a starting point for partners and developers looking to build more sophisticated Windows SharePoint Services solutions using Microsoft Office SharePoint Designer 2007”.


2. Availability of Application Templates
   The Templates are available for download at no extra charge from the following site, http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/windowsserver/sharepoint/bb407286.aspx.
   As Microsoft suggests, each application template addresses a business scenario and provides a base of functionality that can be either used directly out of the box, or customized for company specific needs.
   The Application Templates fall under two groups
   · 20 Site Admin Templates –
   o These custom templates can be installed by Administrator for the SharePoint site into the Template gallery without requiring server administration access.
   · 20 Server Admin Templates –
   o These are Site Definition files that implement tight integration and enhanced functionality with the Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 platform. To install these install the user needs to have administrator permissions on the server. The user also needs to be the administrator in the SharePoint groups to install the server admin templates.
   These templates are available for download as individual templates and also as a complete package.


3. Installing the Application Templates
   The downloaded templates will be in EXE format. Run the EXE file to extract them to a location on your computer.
   Install Site Admin Templates
   a) Select the Template file, .stp, from the extracted distribution for the application template you wish to install.
   b) Log into your SharePoint site as the site Administrator.
   c) From the Site Actions drop-down menu in the top right, select Site Settings.
   d) Under the Galleries section, select Site templates.
   e) Select Upload to load an application template into this SharePoint site.
   f) Browse to the .stp file from the distribution and select Open. If you have several application templates to load into your site, you can use the Upload Multiple Files… option to load them all at once.
   g) Click Ok to complete the upload of the application template to your SharePoint site.
   Install Server Admin Templates
   a) If you are downloading the templates individually then in order for the server admin templates to be installed the Application Template Core Solution needs to be installed first. The Application Template core solution is available for download in the following link http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=85162&clcid=0x409
   b) If the entire package of 40 templates in downloaded then Application Template Core Solution comes as a part of it.
   c) To install the Application Template Core Solution,
   i. Open command prompt and navigate to the following path “%PROGRAMFILES%\common files\microsoft shared\web server extensions\12\bin”
   ii. Types the following command, “stsadm.exe -o addsolution -filename \ApplicationTemplateCore.wsp”, where is the location you extracted the Application Template Core files to, and then press ENTER.
   iii. Type “stsadm.exe -o deploysolution -name ApplicationTemplateCore.wsp –allowgacdeployment”, and then press ENTER. This will deploy the solution in the GAC.
   iv. If any error encountered while deploying through the STSADM command then the solution can be deployed from the Central Administration -> Operations->Solution Management. If the Application Template Solution is not deployed then go ahead and deploy it manually.
   d) Now that the Application Template Core Solution is installed now we can go ahead and install the Server Admin Templates. The steps are as follows,
   i. Open command prompt and navigate to the following path “%PROGRAMFILES%\common files\microsoft shared\web server extensions\12\bin”
   ii. Type “stsadm.exe -o addsolution -filename \.wsp”, where is the location where the template files are located and .wsp is the .wsp file for your template, and then press ENTER
   iii. Type stsadm -o deploysolution -name .wsp -allowgacdeployment, and then press ENTER
   iv. Check if the templates are installed in the Central Administration site by browsing to Central Administration-> Operations -> Solution Management.
   v. If the templates are not deployed then go ahead and deploy them manually.
   vi. Run iisreset for the sites to be updated with the new templates.


4. Creating sites based on the Application Templates
   Using the application templates is easy.
   · Browse open the SharePoint Site using Administrator privileges.
   · Click on the Site Actions Menu
   · Select the Create Sub-Menu
   · Select the Sites and Workspaces
   · Provide the necessary information for creating the site
   · In the Template Selection section you can find two new tabs added,
   o Custom – Site Admin Templates
   o Application Templates – Server Admin Templates
   · Select the Template for the site and click on Create.

ReConnecting Content Databases in SharePoint 2007

After the failover of a SharePoint Products and technologies database, it is required to reconnect the content
databases. The following are the databases that are required to be reconnected,

• Content database
• Admin database
• Configuration Database
• Search Database
• Shared Services Provider

The following stsadm commands are used to reconnect to the content database after a failover, the deletecontentdb will remove the reference to the old database server and the addcontentdb will add the new database as the content database

stsadm –o deletecontentdb –url [Site] -databasename -databaseserver [Old Principal]

stsadm –o addcontentdb –url [Site] -databasename -databaseserver [Old Principal]

Reconnecting content databases can also done using Central Administration,

1. Navigate to Central Administration.
2. Navigate to Application management page
3. click on the Content Databases.
4. Select the content database that has failed-over.
5. In the Manage Content Databases page, choose the Remove content database option, and then click OK.
6. Select the Add a content database option, and enter the required details.
7. Replace the Database Server box with the new principal server, and then click OK.

Default Groups and permission levels in MOSS 2007

The out of the box SharePoint Groups created and the permission levels for each of the group is explained in the following segment


The Limited Access permission level will provide access to specific list, document library or an item or a document in a list or document library without providing access to the entire site.

The following are the special users that are available in SharePoint for high level administration tasks:

Site Collection Administrators:
One or more users can be designated as primary or secondary site collection administrators. These users have full control on the sites within the site collection and can audit site content. Site Administrators are assigned at the time of creating the site but can also be changed by using the Central Administration or Site Settings pages.

Farm Administrators:
Farm administrators are users who manage the server and the server farm settings. The Farm administrators can be added using the Central Administration tool only. Farm administrators have no access to the site’s content by default. They must be added as site collection administrators in order to view any content.

Administrators:
Administrators of the local server can perform all tasks similar to the Farm server administrator like installing new products or applications, deploying web parts and new features to the global assembly cache, creating new web applications and new IIS web sites, starting services etc. Like Farm administrators, administrators do not have access to view site content and need to be explicitly added as site collection administrators to view any content.

Create a custom context menu in SharePoint list or Document library

The context menu is the drop down menu displayed when a document library item or a list item is selected.



This menu is executed with the help of a JavaScript file located in "C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\web server extensions\12\TEMPLATE\LAYOUTS\1033\OWS.js.

The OWS.js file is the java script file that implements the functionality for the context menu. OWS.js also lets users to implement custom menu options that can be used to create a custom menu in the context menu. Changes made to the OWS.js java script file is implemented or reflected across all the applications in the server farm.
Alternatively, a content editor web part can be used to implement the same if the context menu is required only in a particular site collection.

Steps:

1. Go to Edit Page for the page or site for which you want to display the context menu.


2. Add a content editor web part for the library or the list for which the context menu needs to be applied.



3. Click on the link that says open the tool and pane which opens up the tool pane. In the Source Editor Web part add the following JavaScript code to add custom menu for a Document Library within the script tag.

function Custom_AddDocLibMenuItems(m, ctx)
{
var strDisplayText = "Navigate to Google";
var strAction = "STSNavigate('http://www.google.com')";
var strImagePath = "";

// Add our new menu item
CAMOpt(m, strDisplayText, strAction, strImagePath);

// add a separator to the menu
CAMSep(m);

// false means that the standard menu items should also be rendered
return false;
}


4. Save the script and check the Hidden option in the Layout section of the tool pane.

5. The context menu will be visible now.



6. In order to add a custom context menu for a Document Library, implement the custom functionality using the Custom_AddDocLibMenuItems function and in order to add a custom context menu for a list, implement the custom functionality using the Custom_AddListMenuItems function.

"One or more field types are not installed properly. Go to the list settings page to delete these field" error from SPQuery

When using SPQuery often one might often encounter this error. This errror is caused because the field that you are refrencing in your CAML query is repersented differently internally. This can be because either you renamed a column or another site column with the same name exists.

Though the Display name of the column may be the say the internal column name can be different in SharePoint. SPQuery Fieldref requires the internal column name in order to perform the query. Remedies for this error are,

1. Use the U2UCamlQueryBuilder to re-construct the query and determine the actual internal field name or
2. Delete the field and recreate it.

Happy coding :-)

Security for Web part connections

It is possible to enable security for web parts from the Central Administration. Enabling or disabling this option will establish the webpart connections in the Page.

Navigate to Central Administration-> Application Management - > Application Security

In the "Security for WebPart Pages" page, Select the web application for which the web part connections need to be disabled,

In the Web part connections sections enable the Prevents users from creating connections between webparts, and helps to improve security and performance.

The webparts connections will not be enabled and the users are prevented from creating webpart connections

Before Enabling:

After Enabling:

Disable Right Click in SharePoint Site

You can prevent users from right-clicking in your sharepoint site. Add a content editor web part and add the following piece of code in the source editor of the content editor web part.

Save the content editor web part. Users are now prevented from the right click option on the page. Happy coding

Creating custom links in the Quick Launch bar

Quick launch bar is the left panel in the SharePoint site that is used for navigation.

1. Navigate to the Site Actions Menu to the Site Settings Page of your site

2. In the Quick Launch page the Add Heading is used to create a new Group in the Quick launch, and new link can also be added in the already existing Headings

3. To create a new Heading, click on the New Heading link which will open the following page,

4. To create a new link, click on the New Link and add the new link with the group header for the link

5. The new link is now created under the Heading Yahoo and the link is now visible in the Quick Launch bar

Workflow Permissions in SharePoint 2007

Workflows are designed under the security concept that they run as System Account in the Windows SharePoint Services and the App Pool Identity on the server computer and domain. In Windows SharePoint Services the workflows always have administrator privileges, whatever privileges the App Pool has. This makes it possible for the workflows to perform actions routing of documents etc.

Workflows running under administrator privileges enable users who are not administrators to elevate their own privileges by running a workflow to perform actions they ordinarily could not. This setting cannot be changed, it is up to the workflow to detect user actions and decide whether or not to continue or rollback changes or impersonate a user to mimic their permissions.

When associating a workflow, the Start Options, allow users to manually start a workflow with edit permissions which is enabled by default. This means that any authenticated Windows SharePoint Services user with edit permissions on the list can start an instance of this workflow association. If the administrator checks the “Require Manage List Permissions to start the workflow”, then only the list administrators can start an instance of the workflow’s association. Administrators can use restrict users enabling user defined workflows associated to the site. This option is available in the Central Administration.





The enable user-defined workflows for this site option in the workflow settings of the application management of Central Administration, will enable custom workflows to be associated with the particular site. This option is enabled by default. Settings for alert notifications can also be changed for alert notifications need to be sent or not for internal users who do not have site access when they are assigned a workflow task, and also for sending alert notifications to external users to participate in workflow by sending them a copy of the document.

Programmatically retrieving Site Usage in SharePoint 2007

Site Usage reports can be retrieved programmatically by using the GetUsageData method from the SPWeb class. This method would return a Data Table that contains information about the usage of the site based on the specified type of report, interval, number of columns and the last day to display. The GetUsageData method can be obtained from the Microsoft.SharePoint Namespace.

Alternatively site usage reports can also be viewed from the site settings menu. However this option is available when it is enabled from the Central Administration's Usage Analysis Logging. The log file is located by default in the 12 hive of SharePoint in the LOGS folder. However there is an option available in central administration to change the logging path.

Summary Link Web Part

Summary Link Webpart can be used to provide a summary of links from both inside of your SharePoint site and also from outside for SharePoint. The Summary link webpart provides an easy way to build a page of links to various resources. This webpart is an out of the box webpart available in SharePoint. The Summary link webpart can be added to any page that supports the following welcome page layouts,

1. Advanced Search
2. Intranet Home
3. News home
4. People search results page
5. Search page
6. Search results
7. Site directory home
8. Welcome page with Table of contents

The summary link webpart can be configured to contain styles, headers, and groups. The links provided in this webpart can also contain images.

SharePoint Errors

The following are some articles that are useful in identifying SharePoint errors. SharePoint errors are logged in the event viewer and in SharePoint logs located in the 12 hive in the following path. C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\web server extensions\12\LOGS

Error codes logged in the Event viewer
http://www.brienposey.com/kb/troubleshooting_sharepoint_errors.asp

Single SignOn Error codes and what they mean
http://blogs.msdn.com/harsh/archive/2007/03/21/single-signon-error-codes-and-what-they-mean.aspx

WebPart error
“A Web Part or Web Form Control on this Web Part Page cannot be displayed or imported because it is not registered on this site as safe”
http://www.bluedoglimited.com/SharePointThoughts/ViewPost.aspx?ID=189

To turn on Custom Errorhttp://www.andrewconnell.com/blog/archive/2007/02/01/5935.aspx

Feature Element in Feature.xml

The Feature Element tag in a feature.xml file defines the feature and specifies the location of assemblies, files, dependencies or properties that support the Feature.

Some of the attributes that can be defined in a Feature Element are,

1. ActivateOnDefault - This attribute when set to true states that the feature is activated by default during installation of the feature. This attribute is provided at the web application scope and does not work at the site collection or web level.
2. AlwaysForceInstall - This attribute can be set to true if the feature is installed by force, even if the feature is installed already.
3. AutoActivateInCentralAdmin - This attribute can be set to true if the feature is activated by default in Administrative Web site, site collection or central administration. This attribute does not apply to Farm Scoped features.

Though these attributes are optional they prove very useful at times.

Form Services Limitations

Infopath 2007 has many new features and controls, however the following are the controls and features of Infopath 2007 that are not supported by Infopath Form services.

The controls that are not supported in Infopath Form Services are,
1.ActiveX control
2.Bulleted list control
3.Choice group
4.Choice section
5.Combo box
6.Horizontal repeating table
7.Horizontal region
8.Ink picture control
9.Master/detail control
10.Multiple-selection list box
11.Numbered list control
12.Picture control
13.Plain list control
14.Repeating choice group
15.Repeating recursive section
16.Scrolling region
17.Vertical label

The business logic features that are not supported in Infopath Form Services are,
1.Userroles

The security related features that are not supported in Form services are,
1.Restricted Security Level
2.Form Design Protection
3.Information Rights Management

The data connection features that are not supported in Infopath Form Servcies,
1.Query data from a Microsoft Office Access database
2.Submit data to a Microsoft Office Access Database
3.Submit data to a Microsoft SQL server database

The filling out forms features that are not supported by Infopath Form services,
1.Merge data from multiple forms
2.Export data to Microsoft Office Excel
3.Export data to Web
4.Ink support
5.Offline support
6.Spell checking
7.AutoSave, AutoRecover, or crash detection features
8.Custom task panes
9.Add-in menus

The view related features that are not supported in Infopath Form Services
1.Word print views
2.Multiple print views at once
3.Print Page breaks, headers or footers

The programming features that are not supported in Infopath Form services
1.Scripting
2.COM add-ins

WSS 3.0 and MOSS SP1 has been released

You can get the latest of the SharePoint 2007 service packs from the following links,
Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 Service Pack 1 (SP1)
2007 Microsoft Office Servers Service Pack 1 (SP1)

Microsoft's SharePoint Capacity Planning Tool Beta

Microsoft has released the beta version of the SharePoint Capacity Tool. This tool as the name says it all is will guide you on the kind of infrastructure needs and farm topology design based on the number of users, network bandwidth, hardware availability etc.

You can get the tool from this Link

Change the Welcome Page in Publishing template of SharePoint

To change the welcome page of a SharePoint site based on the publishing template to a custom aspx page,

1. Place your aspx page in the _layouts folder of the 12 hive of SharePoint
2. Navigate to the Site Settings page from the Site Actions menu of your site
3. Under the Look and feel section, click on the welcome page option
4. Type the url of the custom welcome page in the _layouts folder
5. Click ok

w3wp associated with your SharePoint application

To find which w3wp is associated with your SharePoint application,

1. Open command prompt
2. Navigate to C:\Windows\System32
3. Type CScript iisapp.vbs

The iisapp.vbs is a vbscript file that lists all the worker processes along with their process ids running in the IIS

Reschedule or Change the interval of a SharePoint custom Timer Job

To reschedule or change the interval of a SharePoint custom Timer Job

1. Change the schedule interval in the custom code using the SPDailySchedule class of the SharePoint object model


2. Build and deploy in the GAC.


3. IISRESET


4. Go to the command prompt and navigate to the 12 hive of SharePoint


5. Uninstall the existing Timer feature, for example, stsadm.exe –o uninstallfeature –filename yourfeaturename\feature.xml


6. Install the new Timer feature, for example, stsadm.exe –o installfeature –filename yourfeaturename\feature.xml


7. Go to the windows services and restart the Windows SharePoint Services Timer