Share Point Magazine Issue 2

8/6/2019 Share Point Magazine Issue 2

1/67

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i #2 2011

$17 pp$9 t

New Series:

Silverlight in SharePoint

Page 8

A jQuery Primer for SharePoint:

Selectors, Attributes, and Traversin

Oh My!

Page 24

st sPtl t t t !

The end of an Era:

Joel Oleson Retires

Page 6

asPirauThocoMPeTifinalisTenTries!


3/67


4/67

i #2

ft at

Te end of an Era:

Joel Oleson Retires

One o the truly great heroes o the SharePoint commu-

nity, Joel Oleson, has decided to drastically reduce the tim

he spends in the community. For those who do not know

yet, Ill try to describe the loss the community will suer

rom this giants retirement.

Page 6

Silverlight in SharePoint

In the beginning there was SharePoint, a platorm or col-

laboration and content management. It allows people to

work together. Its an easy task to set up a site where peopl

can share inormation and manage documents rom start

to nish.

Page 8

Selectors, Attributes, raversing Oh

My!

Welcome back to a jQuery Primer or SharePoint here

on SharePoint Magazine. Its time to take a closer look at

some examples o using jQuery to locate the correct ele-

ments in an HML page.

Page 24

Contentsake 2 Action! ......................................................................4

Te end o an Era: Joel Oleson Retires ................................6

Introduction and Series Overview:

Silverlight in SharePoint ........................................................8

Basics o Hello World! ......................................................12

Deans Corner: raining as Employee Perks .....................16

Is SharePoint ready orEnterprise-Strength Applications? .....................................18

Herding cats How to Run a Successul conerence .......22

A jQuery Primer or SharePoint:

Selectors, Attributes, raversing Oh My! .......................24

Aspiring Authors Competition 2011 Finalists ..................30

Best Practices or SharePoint Groups ................................34

A Guide to Leaving Lotus Notes andMoving to Microso SharePoint ........................................40

Tree Main Reasons Why You Should

Upgrade to FAS or SharePoint ........................................46

SharePoint 2010 Backup and Recovery -Confguring Backup .............................................................52

Custom Auditing in SharePoint 2010

Working with ULS Logs and Event Logs...........................56

From the Archives:

10 Steps to Successul SharePoint Deployments ..............60


5/674

SharePoint Magazine

Letter From the editor

As you have noticed, this second issue o SharePointMagazine has a dierent layout than the rst issue.Or rather, we realized that we needed to make somechanges to increase readability and make it look moreproessional. I hope you like what weve done, but asalways were thrilled to hear any comments you mayhave, whether that is positive or negative eedback.

We can only improve i you let us know what youwant us to do better!

Tere are other changes too, and I would like to pointsome o these out.

Qr Cds

You may notice a lot o strange images spread aroundthe magazine, with what looks like black and whitepixel codes. In act, you will nd one somewhere onthis or the next page, and one on the ront page othe magazine.

Tese images as QR codes, or Quick Response codes,and they are amazingly cool. What they allow youto do is open pages, links, and articles by using yourmobile device to scan these codes. Tat way, youdont have to type long URLs in order to open theselinks, and they save a lot o layout space compared totyping out long URLs.

Tese codes also allow us to improve the connectionrom the paper version o SharePoint Magazine to our

online resources. For example, or many articles, wehave included the QR code both to the online versiono the article as well as resources or those articles.

Many mobile devices have built-in applications thatallow you to scan these tags. I your mobile devicedoes not include a QR scanner application, chancesare you can nd one or download, and they areusually always ree.

Te way such a scanner works is by using the camerao your mobile device. You launch the scannerapplication, hold the camera so that it can see thecode, and then the application will open the linkor perorm optional tasks, such as bookmarking,copying, or searching, depending on the particularapplication.

CNN has a brie guide or you to see onhttp://spm.to/qr

Go ahead, try it out! Youll nd lots o codes to tryout in this magazine.

Quck Cuss

Another neat new eature, also a result o requests ormore inormation rom readers, are Quick Courses.Tese courses are based on our parent companyUSPJAs training platorm.

Quick Courses are sel-paced training courses

i ws d mp, y cvc c-svvy uss pm s sll d d. Fkly, yu spss v b s m. S, s, scd ssu SP M p, d

wv ld l m s ssu s yu wll s.

Makesure you pickthe entry you

really like,

because you will

be reading a lot

more rom that

author in the

months to come.

Letter From the editor

Take 2 acTion!


6/675take 2 action!

covering a small topic, usually based on an articleor article series in SharePoint Magazine. Te QuickCourses are available or a small ee and gives you thetraining material and sometimes lab time available inour virtual lab environment so that you can get thehand-on experience too.

Our rst Quick Course will be available shortly, andi you are reading this magazine a ew weeks aterits release, thats likely now. We have several o thesecourses planned, so watch the Quick Courses page orsign up or the SharePoint Magazine mailing list tokeep inormed.

Were also looking into bringing partners on board toshowcase their products in ree courses and labs. Tat

way, youll have a chance to try o their products andservices or yoursel to make better decisions.

Oh, and o course, i you work or a company thatwants to showcase your products, webparts, solutions,or eatures, eel ree to contact us and we can outline

the options or you.

asp aus

Weve completed the rst stage o the AspiringAuthor Competition 2011, and in this issue, you canread the nalist entries.

Te jury had a very hard time picking these nalists.In act, we spent a ull week, reading and eedbackingall the entries, and were let with ve very good

articles.

Te nal three will now compete in a communitychallenge to determine the winner o thecompetition. You can join and vote or your avoritearticle up to May 31st, and we will announce the

winner in the next issue.

Te winner will receive a scholarship at USPJAcademy, a publishing deal with SharePointMagazine, and participation in our upcoming AuthorMentoring program. Te grand prize has a value o

over $6,000.

You can read more about the nalists and how tovote, including the nalist articles, rom Page 30.

Make sure you pick the entry you really like, becauseyou will be reading a lot more rom that author in themonths to come.

W J Us?

We are always looking or skilled and passionatewriters to help us bring the best SharePointknowledge out to the SharePoint community.

Although it is too late to join this years AspiringAuthors competition, that doesnt mean we stoplooking or talent. I you want to write or us, we

would be thrilled to hear your ideas.

On the last page o the magazine, you will ndinormation about the benets o working with us,but let me sum it up or you real quick:

We have a huge audience craving knowledge

We help you become a better author

We help you grow your audience and reach newarenas

We pay you or your work

What we dont do is pick up just anything, sobeore getting in touch, make sure you read throughour article content guidelines. You can nd theseguidelines at http://spm.to/acg

Ater reading through that, either send a generalinquiry to [email protected], or submit a pitchor an article on http://spm.to/ap

Ater that, one o our editors will get in touch withyou and discuss your ideas. Who knows, perhaps it

will be your mug shot adorning one o the articles inthe next SharePoint Magazine?

cnn on qrcodes quick courses

asPiringauThors

arTicleguidelines


7/676

SharePoint Magazine

the end oF an era

You dontget as manyans as Joel

has without

stepping on

some toes every

now and then.

Because I consider Joel a personal riend, who has onseveral occasions oered his guidance and supportboth in public and in private, Ive chosen to write thiseulogy not as a simple list o Joels accomplishments,but as an expression o what I personally eel at thismoment.

Jl W?

I realize there are billions o rocks in the world, andi youre just emerging rom underneath one o thoserocks, or rom some cave completely void o internetaccess, you may not know who SharePoint Joel is. Letme explain.

In days yonder, I started exploring SharePoint andas everyone else, literally had Google search orSharePoint topics as my start up page. More otenthan not, however, I ound mysel staring at oneparticular persons ace, that o some guy called

Joel Oleson, whenever I needed something reallythorough and well explained.

When witter came around and started becomingthe de acto standard or community interaction, JoelOleson quickly became the most ollowed SharePointsuperstars out there. Its not that he manicallyollowed everyone who ollowed him, like somepeople do to increase their ollowers. In act, it tookme almost a year o hard work beore I nally got anemail saying that @joeloleson is ollowing you.

No, Joel became as popular as he is by being there

or the community. By responding to questions, byspeaking at events, by providing valuable inormationin his blog, and by taking an active part in thecommunity that he loved and still loves. Joel has donean amazing job, bringing SharePoint knowledge tothe masses, and doing so in an entertaining ashion,making him perhaps the worlds most popular speakerat SharePoint events.

Bu i C B all gd,r?

You dont get as many ans as Joel has withoutstepping on some toes every now and then. Joel hasought several battles in the community, but whatdistinguishes Joels battles rom most o the otherpetty ghts we see sometimes, is that Joel alwaysghts or what he believes is best or that community.

When he launched the idea o the SharePointknights, or example, he got the wrath o a largegroup o inuential people thrown in his lap.

However, Joel didnt launch the idea because hehimsel needed a title; he already was the mostpopular SharePoint guy in the world. He thoroughlybelieved that an independent system o communityrecognition would benet that community and thuschampioned the idea. He ought valiantly, but in theend saw that the ght split the community and layhis idea to rest.

Another example is his periodical stabs at Steve

o uly s SP cmmuy, Jl ols, sdcdd dsclly duc m spds cmmuy. F s

w d kw y, ill y dscb lss cmmuy wll sum s s m.

The end of an era:joel olesonreTires


8/677

read ThisarTicle onl

JoeL oLeson retires

Ballmer. In short, and as he himsel publically says, hewants Steve Ballmer to step down. In less politicallycorrect terms, hes saying Steve Ballmer is bad newsand doesnt do his job very well.

However, Joel isnt asking Steve Ballmer to step downbecause Joel wants to be the CEO o Microsot. In hisarguments, he always ocuses on how communities,not just that o SharePoint, would benet romhaving resh blood in the Microsot leadership.

It is not even only SharePoint thats on Joels mind.Whenever there is a disaster somewhere in the world,or when people are in jeopardy, or ghting to claimtheir rights against oppressive dictators, Joel is amongthe very rst to oer whatever support he can, even ithat is just changing his witter avatar or mentioninga prayer or his riends in need.

It is no coincidence that when Joel now steps downrom his role in Quest and rom the public eye othe SharePoint community, he moves on to work or

a non-prot organization where he can urther helpand contribute in his own way to a better world.

S, Wy is h Lv ih Lvs T Cmmuy?

Only a ew people in the world can even be comparedwith Joel when it comes to single-handedly buildingand nourishing the SharePoint community. Joel hasspent the last ew years traveling around the world to

speak at everything rom small user groups to huge

conerences. He never orgets to bring his experiencesand stories out to his blog or his witter ollowers andthus contributing to bringing people rom around the

world together in a common interest.

What he seems to have orgotten though, is that allhis dedication has had a price, and a steep one. In theprevious three years, Joel has been traveling or 300days, most o the time away rom his amily. As hesays it himsel, they have been getting the short sideo the stick, which, I believe, means theyve been theones to suer rom his community dedication.

I have no problems understanding that. I dont thinkanyone will. Now, its time or those even closerto Joel to benet rom his kindness, wisdom, andpresence. Now, its time or those who have sacricedaccess to their ather and husband so that we couldenjoy Joel, to get their well-deserved rewards.

Joel will receive plenty o thanks. Im condent thecommunity will not squander our chances to express

that gratitude.

However, Id like to take this chance to thank Joelsamily.

Virginia, thank you, rom the bottom o my heart,or letting us spend so much time with your belovedhusband.

Dean, Scott, and Jared, you have a ather o whichyou should be very proud, and you should knowthere are thousands o people in the world who oweyour ather a great debt o gratitude.

Tank you.


9/678

SharePoint Magazine

SharePoint2010 comes

with a set o

client object

models that

makes it easier

or developers

to have aSilverlight

application

communicate

with SharePoint.

i b ws SP, plm cllb d

c mm. i llws ppl wk . is sy sk sup s w ppl c s m d m dcums ms s.

siLverLight in sharePoint

SharePoint 2007 was already good, but SharePoint2010 is even better. New eatures such as taxonomy,document sets, content organizers, and better recordmanagement make it to an attractive platorm. Teuser interace on the other side is not that attractive.But with a little bit o branding you can create a newlook.

And here enters Silverlight. Silverlight is a poweruldevelopment technology or creating attractive andinteractive user interaces.

Te rst version o Silverlight was released in 2007. Itwas merely JavaScript based. Almost everybody wasskeptical about it, and it was said that it would neverhave the grandeur o Flash. But as versions comeand go, Silverlight has become a ull-blown solidtechnology or designing powerul user interaces.

A Silverlight application can be more than a pretty

user interace created by designers; you can alsoadd code to it to give it a more unctional aspect.Because Silverlight classes are a subset o the .NEFramework, it makes it easy or .NE programmersto add the necessary unctionality. Moreover, adesigner can create the user interace with a tool likeMicrosot Expression Blend and hand it over to thedeveloper, who can open it in Microsot Visual Studioand complete the application.

In April 2010, Silverlight 4 was released with yet

another new set o eatures.

From the rst version o Silverlight, I have beeninvolved in the integration o it into SharePoint, andIm convinced that Silverlight can play a powerulrole in the branding o SharePoint sites. Silverlightapplications can communicate with a SharePoint site

and thus render SharePoint data in an attractive way.

Te rst versions o Silverlight were hard tointegrate with SharePoint, asking or a numbero modications in the web.cong le o eachSharePoint web application. It drove a lot oSharePoint developers (and even a number o well-known SharePoint gurus) mad. As o Silverlight 3,this hurdle has disappeared.

In SharePoint 2007, communication was possibleonly through the SharePoint web services or throughcustom WCF services. But SharePoint 2010 comes

with a set o client object models that makes iteasier or developers to have a Silverlight applicationcommunicate with SharePoint.

In SharePoint 2010, Silverlight is already integratedout o the box: i you want to create a list or asite, you are presented with a Silverlight wizard.SharePoint 2010 also comes with a Silverlight webpart that lets you render a Silverlight application thatyou uploaded to a document library or deployed tothe SharePoint hive. Tere is also the out-o-the-

inTroducTion and series overview:

silverlighT insharePoinTBy: Karine Bosch


10/679

read Thisseries onli

introduction and series overview

box Silverlight media player. Tis is a Silverlightapplication that you can host within the Silverlight

web part and that displays your media les.

a Vw Fuu

In December 2010, Scott Guthry announcedSilverlight 5. Tis version o Silverlight will addsome great new eatures and capabilities or premiummedia solutions across browsers, desktops, anddevices. Te rst beta version o Silverlight 5 isexpected in the rst hal o 2011.

Silverlight or Windows Phone is the applicationdevelopment platorm or Windows Phone 7.Silverlight uses the XNA ramework or audio captureand playback and can even access Xbox Live. Tis

XNA ramework is provided by Microsot or high-perormance gaming, used on Xbox.

In 2010 we entered the mobile phone era. We useour mobile phones or calling people or sending shortmessages, but more and more we are also using theInternet rom our phones. Many companies see thehole in the market and start developing mobile phoneapplications. Te banking sector, or example, willoer its services through mobile phone.

In that light, I believe that there is a uture orSharePoint-based applications running on mobilephones.

W expc m TsSs

When I talk about Silverlight integration inSharePoint, most developers think about web parts.But this integration can reach ar beyond that. Youcan host Silverlight applications rom within mostSharePoint artiacts such as custom elds, customlist orms, list views, application pages, master pages,navigation, search, and so on.

At the same time, we will demonstrate the dierentoptions or deploying a Silverlight application. Teapplication can be deployed to a document library,as well as to the SharePoint le system, or as anembedded resource i you dont want others to useyour Silverlight application.

We will build and extend a SharePoint demoapplication through this series. Te application allowsmembers to oer services and accept services inreturn. For example, John likes to garden, but he islousy in the kitchen. Trough the application he can

oer his services as a gardener andaccept Suzy to cook him a deliciousmeal.

P 1: ovvw

Tis series o articles will walk you throughthe dierent techniques that you can use to

integrate Silverlight 4 in almost any SharePoint2010 artiact. In part 1, this article, Ill give you anoverview, both o Silverlight and the remainder o theseries.

Most o these techniques are also applicable orSharePoint 2007.

P 2: i Slvl 4applc SP 2010 WbP d Wb P tl P

In the second article in this series, I will explain how

you can integrate a Silverlight 4 application in both aVisual web part and a classic web part. More complex

web parts can be congured in a custom tool part.Silverlight can also be hosted rom within such a toolpart.

Te web part will show a dynamic banner thatdisplays the services oered that day. Tis web partcan be added to the home page, or example. In thetool pane, the editor o the web part will be able tochoose a background color using a Silverlight colorpicker.

As the oered services are stored in a SharePointtable, they need to be retrieved by the Silverlightapplication beore they can be displayed in a dynamicbanner. Tis can be achieved by using the SilverlightClient Object Model and will also be highlighted inthis rst part.

P 3: Us Slvl applc Cusm Ls Fm

Custom list orms can be dened when working withcustom content types. When you dene a contenttype, you can go or the classic list orms, but youcan also dene a custom list orm to oer a moreattractive and intuitive user interace. Tis argumentmakes this SharePoint artiact as an excellentcandidate or hosting a Silverlight application.

I you want your Silverlight application to besomething more than a ancy header or ooter andyou want it to play a unctional role in your list orm,you will have to put some extra eort in the way yousave and display the data. In this sample, a user willbe able to post a new service oer or modiy certain

newseries


11/6710 siLverLight in sharePoint

properties o an existing service.

P 4: hs Slvl applcm W Cusm Fld typ

As you will see in part 4, hosting a Silverlightapplication directly rom within a custom list ormhas its own particularities. Tereore, encapsulating

unctionality in custom elds makes integratingSilverlight even easier.

Part 5: Hosting a Silverlight Application rom Withina SharePoint Application Page

Tis page will allow members to manage their oeredservices and choose the service they want to get inreturn or it. In part 5, we will see how this is done.

P 6: T Slvl Ls Vw Syl

SharePoint lists have a number o standard view styles

that you can apply when creating views. You coulddevelop your own view style using Silverlight toshow the content o a picture libraries in a ar moreattractive way.

P 7: Us Slvl ec Ms P

Master pages are used to ensure a standard look andeel through the whole website. You can decide tointegrate Silverlight into this standard look and eel.

Part 8: Replace the op Navigation Menu Bar by a

Windowless Silverlight Application

Tis sample will demonstrate how you can replacethe classic quick launch and the top navigation barby a Silverlight application. By making the Silverlightapplication windowless, you can avoid that thecontent o the page moves down while submenus yout.

P 9: empw Sdbx Slusw Slvl

Since SharePoint 2010, sandboxed solutions seem

the way to go because each solution runs in its ownisolated process without endangering the wholesystem or eating too much resources. Te drawbackis that the oered unctionality has a number o

limitations. By using Silverlight in your solution, youcan circumvent certain o these limitations.

P 10: i SlvlPvVw SP Sc

Te Silverlight PivotViewer is a Silverlight applicationthat makes it easier to interact with massive amounts

o data in ways that are powerul, inormative, andvaluable. You could integrate this PivotViewer on asearch page to build an inormative and attractivesearch experience.

P 11: i Slvl SP Wkw

Integrating Silverlight graphs in the task pages o acustom approval workow can make the decisionprocess easier.

P 12: i WPF ofc2010 tsk P

Silverlight is in act a subset o Windows PresentationFoundation. Like in Silverlight, the user interace isdened in XAML, and unctionality can be addedin code behind. Tis article will demonstrate howyou can host a WPF application rom within anOce task pane. Because this application does notrun within the SharePoint context, you cannot usethe Silverlight Client Object Model. However, thereare a number o alternatives to access SharePointinormation, such as, or example, using the RES

services.

P 13: Us SP WbSvcs m W Slvl

Another way to access SharePoint data remotely isusing the SharePoint web services. Tis technique iscertainly valid when working with SharePoint 2007data, whether the Silverlight application is running inor out o the SharePoint context.

So, thats what I have coming or you. Over the nextmonths, join me on this journey to explore Silverlight

in SharePoint, and youll learn how to eectivelyutilize this great technology to make your SharePointadventures that much more user riendly.


12/67

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SharePoint Magazine

i s scd cl ss, im buld Slvl pplc c b sd m w SP wb p. W wll us VsulSud 2010 buld smpl hll Wld yp pplc, bu dd wucs mk u pplc cubl.

Basics oF heLLo worLd!

In SharePoint 2010, we have an out o the boxSilverlight web part that can host almost anySilverlight application. For now, we will utilize thisbuilt-in web part and later in the series, we will createour own web part to host our applications.

Te Silverlight application in this example asksthe user to enter 3 words. Te words can alsobe congured through the Properties o the webpart. Tese words will be passed to the Silverlightapplication, which will render these words in ananimated way.

Dvlp SmplSlvl pplc

You can create a simple Silverlight 4 application usingVisual Studio 2010. I you need more complex designyou will need tools like Microsot Expression Blend,but the sample Silverlight application or this articlecan easily be build in Visual Studio 2010 using theSilverlight Application template.

When creating a Silverlight application with VisualStudio 2010, you will be asked which version oSilverlight application you want to design. Forthis sample I selected Silverlight 4. You can also

You candownload thesource code or

this article. Use

the QR code or

go to http://

spm.to/slc1

silverlighT in sharePoinT

basicsofhelloworld!

12

By: Karine Bosch


14/6713

indicate whether you want to create a test web siteor not. As the sample needs to communicate withSharePoint, it cannot be easily tested running outsidethe SharePoint context, so I choose not to host theSilverlight application in a web site.

When a Silverlight application is created, theollowing parts are automatically added to the project:

app.xml

Te App.xaml le is typically used to declare resourcesthat can be used throughout the application. Teseresources consist o brushes, styles and animations.

app.xml.cs

Te App.xaml.cs le is the code behind le or theApp.xaml and can be used to handle applicationlevel events. Tere is already a method stub orthe Application_Startup, Application_Exit and

Application_UnhandledException events available.When the Silverlight application initializes theApplication_Startup event is triggered. I typicallyuse this event handler to retrieve the incomingparameters.

MP.xml

Te MainPage.xaml le is by deault the initial UIcontrol. Within this UI control you can start deningthe user interace.

MP.xml.cs

Te MainPage.xaml.cs le is the code behind orthe MainPage.xaml. Te events generated in the UIcontrol are handled here. You can also dynamicallyload controls in code behind and consume WCFservices, or communicate with SharePoint using theSilverlight Client object model.

Basics oF heLLo worLd!

arTicle source code

13


15/6714 Basics oF heLLo worLd!

TheSilverlightapplication in

this sample

accepts 3 words

that will be

rendered using

storyboards.

Besides these parts a Silverlight application canalso contain other user controls, other classes andinteraces.

Te point o entry o the Silverlight application is theApplication_Startup method. Te StartupEventArgsargument contains inormation on how to initializethe Silverlight application. One o these elementsis the InitParams dictionary. It can be used to passinormation rom SharePoint to Silverlight.

Te Silverlight application in this sample accepts3 words that will be rendered using storyboards.Te values are stored in static variables that can beaccessed orm within the dierent controls that makeup the Silverlight application .

public static string Word1 =null;



Te Application_Startup method looks as ollows:

private void Application_Startup(object sender,

StartupEventArgs e){

if (e.InitParams != null)

{Word1 = GetParam(e.

InitParams, word1);Word2 = GetParam(e.

InitParams, word2);Word3 = GetParam(e.

InitParams, word3);}

this.RootVisual = newMainPage();}

private string

GetParam(IDictionary initParameters, string

paramName){

if (initParameters.ContainsKey(paramName) &&

! string.IsNullOrEmpty(initP

arameters[paramName])){

return

initParameters[paramName];}

else return null;}

Te last statement in the Application_Startup method

shown above initializes the main user control o theSilverlight application. Te XAML o this control isvery simple and contains the ollowing elements:

a Canvas: this is the root control o the usercontrol.

3 extBox controls: these will be populated withthe words passed in

3 Storyboard elements: these element areresponsible or making the words mover over thescreen rom bottom to top.

a Circle which represents the dot o the sentence.

a ourth Storyboard that will move the dot overthe screen as ying comet.

Te code behind o the MainPage user controlis stored in the MainPage.xaml.cs le and startsstoryboard ater storyboard: when the rst storyboardnishes, the second is started and so on. Teollowing code snippet demonstrates this technique:

private void StartAnimation()

{ Word1TextBlock.Visibility =

Visibility.Visible;Storyboard sb = (Storyboard)

this.FindName(MoveWord1);if (sb != null)

sb.Begin();}

private void MoveWord1_Completed(object sender,

EventArgs e){

Word2TextBlock.Visibility =Visibility.Visible;

Storyboard sb = (Storyboard)this.FindName(MoveWord2);

if (sb != null)

sb.Begin();}

Tats it or the code in the Silverlight application.


16/6715Basics oF heLLo worLd!

T Slvl Wb P

Now it is time to deploy the Silverlight application toSharePoint. Te easiest way is to upload the .xap leto a document library. In this demo Ill upload it toa document library with the name XAPS. SharePoint2010 comes with an out o the box Silverlight webpart. You can add this web part to any SharePoint

page and host your Silverlight application romwithin it. You can add this web part to or examplethe home page. When in the Web Part Gallery, youcan nd the Silverlight web part in the Media andContent category.

When you choose to add a Silverlight web part toyour page, a dialog pops up asking you to enter thelocation o your Silverlight application.

In the editor part o the web part you can enterthe initParams string requested by your Silverlightapplication. In this sample you have to pass thename o the list where the service oerings arestored. Scroll down in the editor part and expandthe Other Settings section. Tere you can enter yourinitialization parameters. I you have a parameter to

pass, you have to speciy the name o the parameterollowed by an equal sign and the value:

param1=value1

I you have more than one parameter to pass, youllhave to separate them with a comma:

param1=value1,param2=value2

Pay attention not to add spaces in between. Temaximum length o this string is 255 characters.

I you need to pass more data, youll have to use aworkaround. Tese workarounds will be explained inurther articles o this series.

Our parameter string exists o 3 words:

Once you set the initialization parameters you canclick the OK button o the web part. Te Silverlight

application will rendered on the page.

I your Silverlight application doesnt show on thepage, it is possible you have typed an error in the pathto the Silverlight application, you can always correctby editing the web part and clicking the Congurebutton in the Properties pane.

In this article you learned how to host a Silverlightapplication rom within the out o the box Silverlight

web part. Te Silverlight application in this articleis a very simple application that accepts a numbero initialization parameters that are passed rom theSharePoint web part to the Silverlight application.

In the next article o this series you will learn how touse the Silverlight Client Object Model to retrieveand update data stored within SharePoint.


17/6716

SharePoint Magazine

training as emPLoyee Perks

Beore I expand on the hard numbers, however, Iwould like to mention another important aspect o

the return on investment (ROI) o training, that oemployee satisaction and motivation.

Fd rSP Pssl

At this time, SharePoint proessionals are in hugedemand due to SharePoints success at deliveringvalue to organizations. Tese organizations spendhuge amounts o resources nding and recruiting

skilled employees. Wages are through the roo becauseemployees know that with the right skillset, they caneasily get a new job any time, and when they need a

job, they will have plenty o job oers.

At the time o this writing, a simple search orSharePoint at monster.com gives more than 1,000results or vacant positions. Filtering the resultsor jobs paying more than US$100,000 still leaves163 available jobs. At US$150,000 and above, 35

jobs remain. Tis means that even i you oer new

employees $150,000 every year, they can still pickrom 35 available positions right now.

You can probably realize the challenge employers acein nding skilled labor.

o attract the right people, most employers oerincentives to employees, in the orm o perks, higher

wages, extended vacations, and so on. However,these types o extrinsic perks are pure expenses orthe employer; they get nothing in return beyond theemployees demands being met. Ater securing themomentary happiness and signature o the employee,the employer does not share in the benets theemployee gets.

Luminaries such as B.F. Skinner question the eect osuch extrinsic incentives. Te result is oten reducedmotivation because employees come to expect theseincentives and will be disappointed when theydont get them continuously. In a amous study, acompany started giving out turkeys to all employeesor Tanksgiving. Initially, all the employees wereextremely happy about this, but ater a ew years,everyone simply saw it as a routine, so when thecompany decided to stop giving out these turkeys,

Even iyou oer newemployees

$150,000 every

year, they can

still pick rom

35 available

positions right

now.

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deans corner

Training aseMPloyeePerks


18/6717


training as emPLoyee Perks

employees became extremely demotivated, seeing theannual turkey as a part o their regular benet.

I companies that rely on extrinsic motivation

wants to keep motivating employees, they need tocontinually increase the value o these perks, leadingto a spiral o death where expectations increaseevery time a perk is oered. Paying people more isntenough to keep them motivated.

Besides, every other company that may be competingor your employees may also buy turkeys and thusremove your competitive advantage with the signingo a purchase order with their local urkey arm.

Kp emplys hppyFinding and recruiting SharePoint proessionals isdicult enough, but hanging on to them and makingsure they dont leave the company is an even biggerchallenge. Ater all, paying employees the high salaryis only part o the cost. Te cost o recruitment is alsoa actor and can easily reach 20-30% in commissionsto headhunters alone. For a $100,000 job, thats$30,000 every time you need to get a new employee.Its an investment you dont want to lose.

But how do you actually retain those hard-earned

SharePoint proessionals? You do that by keepingyour employees motivated and satised, which begsthe question: What motivates employees?

Even basic research will quickly tell you a ew keypoints:

Feeling o job and task mastery

Healthy work environment

Work/O-work balance

Varied and challenging tasks

Community and social aspects

Extended training directly aect many o thesepoints. Increases in skill means that employees eelthey master their jobs, eel less unhealthy stress, canperorm their work aster and thus get more reetime, and allow the employees to tackle a wider rangeo tasks.

As or community, well, one thing is the communitythat the employee meets during their training, buteven better is the community building eects otraining groups o employees in the organization.People who share more than project deadlines tend tobond better through shared experiences and skills.

Employees that eel valued by their employers arelikely less concerned with what other employersmay oer. Employers that help employees mastertheir jobs are more likely to keep skilled employees.Increasing the eeling o job satisaction and masteryis ar more important than increased salary or otherextrinsic benets.

Te nal benet Ill talk about here, which makestraining as a perk an absolute no-brainer, is thatthe employers will also gain rom having skilledemployees. As I have discussed previously in thiscolumn, skilled employees help the organizationdeliver what they promise, when they promise, and

within the expected budget. Skilled employees willaect also other employees and urther increase theirskills, multiplying the training eect.

In short, its a win-win situation. Investing in trainingbenets both the employees and the employer.

When you know that getting these benets or theorganization also benets the employee, I really cantunderstand why youre not right now planning thenext training course or your SharePoint team.


19/6718

SharePoint Magazine

rc sc m glbl 360 bcks w vdc SP scsly b dplyd jus smpl cllbv ls, bu s bus plm ps-wd qums, supp umusdpms mss-ccl pcsss.

a cs p s umd cc lcycl mm, wc u w

xpc, w s w umb cmps dp, cssmulpl dpms.

When we were designing our own contract liecyclemanagement system, because we were starting romscratch, we were able to evaluate all the potentialtechnology options available to us. We choseSharePoint as our basis, because it provides everything

we and our customers need in one platorm. As

im Wallis, CEO o Content and Code, one othe original pioneers o SharePoint solutions, says:SharePoint is a platorm that can do everything well.

While some point solutions may do some thingsbetter, SharePoint is a good all-rounder.

is sharePoint ready For enterPrise-strength aPPLications?

Contractsreally aremission

critical. Around

two thirds o

all business

transactions

are governed

by contracts

or agreements

o one kind or

another

is sharePoinT

ready forenTerPrise-

sTrengThaPPlicaTions?By Ronan Lavelle


20/6719


Predicted by Forrester Research to be a marketgrowing at 27% per annum as an I market, contractliecycle management (CLM) systems make a goodmarriage with SharePoint. Indeed, SharePoint hasproved to be a catalyst or the contract management,because it has exactly the right attributes required: itcan be enterprise-wide, it is exible enough to inter-operate with a variety o systems and devices, and it is

highly collaborative.You may be thinking to yoursel So contractliecycle management systems and SharePoint go welltogether, but so what? Why should I be interestedin suggesting better contract management to myorganization anyway?

wo main reasons: contract liecycle managementcan provide organizations with tangible cost andeciency benets; and second, it is an ideal exampleo how return-on-investment and advocacy oSharePoint can be spread beyond the boundaries othe I department to other parts o the organization.

Starting with that rst statement, let me describe theimportance o contracts, why managing them is sucha challenge and how introducing contract liecyclemanagement systems help.

Contracts really are mission critical: around twothirds o all business transactions are governed bycontracts or agreements o one kind or anotherand Gartner estimates that at any one time, a largeorganization will typically have 20,000-40,000contracts.

Despite their central role in an organization, ewcompanies have managed to implement contractmanagement, largely because it is so ragmented.Contracts are generally created and stored atdepartmental-level such as nance, procurement,sales, human resources - typically using a variety oormats and systems, both electronic and in somecases, paper-based.

Te legal department usually only gets involved iit has to review a document, or i a problem arises.Review o contract revisions is a pretty archaicprocess: oten involving posting or axing drats

between the negotiating parties, so it may be nosurprise to hear that Forrester Research says a contracttakes on average 3.4 weeks to create.

Tis lack o control is urther exacerbated by the actthat ater they are created, these contracts are thenstored in a variety o dierent ormats and locations,ranging rom emails through to paper-based copiesstashed away in orgotten ling cabinets. Tis meansthat the vital data in these contracts may be noteasily visible or accessible, and perhaps dicult to

nd again. Indeed, Faulkner Institute estimates thatapproximately 10 per cent o all contracts created arelost.

W cc lcyclmm lly ms

Does this matter? Yes, because ailure to observecontractual milestones and obligations, or just a sheerinability to have a total picture o contract liabilities,can cause problems such as wasted expenditure,ineciency and increased exposure to business risk.Here are some anecdotal examples that we have comeacross in the past ew years:

Failure to observe automatic contract renewal clauses- One company was tied into a 15-year renewal ona property lease that it had intended to terminate,simply because no-one was aware o the impendingautomatic renewal date.

Missing a chance to negotiate better terms withsuppliers lack o organization-wide visibility o thecontracts may that one department may be enjoyingbetter contract terms with a particular vendor thananother.

Missing opportunities or rebates or example,contracts may include incentives or early repayments.

Compliance and legislative issues an inability tohave ull visibility o all contractual liabilities cancause lack o compliance with industry regulation orlegislation. Human resources contracts may containterms that could lead to litigation rom ex employeesi not observed.

Mergers and acquisitions we know o one instancewhen an acquisition ell through because thecompany being purchased was unable to provide ulldisclosure o its contractual obligations

is sharePoint ready For enterPrise-strength aPPLications?


21/67

creatingcontracttemplates

means that

non-legal

proessionals

can have

greater

condence

that they are

adhering to

corporate

guidelines.

Cc LcyclMm Sysms

Clearly, contract liecycle management is an arearipe or improvement. Enter contract liecyclemanagement systems as the solution.

angible benets include aster contract creation,reduced manual eort and less risk o missingcontractual milestones and obligations, becausethe system can be set up to send out automaticallygenerated alerts concerning these.

Greater visibility o contractual obligationsorganization-wide means that the legal unctioncan more eectively support colleagues in otherdepartments, but at the same time, individualdepartments do not lose control or responsibility orcreation contracts.

For example, creating contract templates means thatnon-legal proessionals can have greater condencethat they are adhering to corporate guidelines, whilethe legal department does not have to spend hoursdealing with problems that have arisen through poorcontract processes.

By providing organization or department-widevisibility, contract liecycle management systems alsoreduce dependency on any one individual having ullcontrol over a particular contract. Jim Callaghanis General Counsel or Etihad Airways, the worldsastest growing airline, which has implemented aSharePoint-based contract liecycle managementsystem rom Dolphin Sotware. Te system hasperect transparency we can see where a documentis at any one time, and because the system isaccessible to the whole department, i someone goeson leave, a colleague can pick it up.

So what eatures can one expect to nd in a contractliecycle management system? Dierent vendors(and there are quite a ew now) oer dierent eaturesets, but a comprehensive solution might include: Acontract clause tracker; compliance monitoring &regulatory requirements; automated alerts; trackingo price rebates; reporting; contract negotiation

workspaces; workow and reporting tools; authorworkspaces; contract drating and storage; toolsthat support collaboration on contract with externalparties.

Te latest generation o contract liecyclemanagement systems also include e-discovery olegacy contracts. Tis is an important point, because

while it is tempting to rush into implementing acontract liecycle management system or all new

contracts, unless existing contractual milestones andobligations are included, then an organization doesnot have the ull picture.

Our own research shows that around 80% ocompanies admit to not having ull knowledge o alltheir legacy contracts, yet considering that contractsmany last or many years, then it is reasonable toassume that a large organization will have thousandso legacy documents. Indeed, we have just helpedone media company discover approximately 30,000legacy contracts.

os-wd ppl

Hopeully Ive demonstrated the potential benetso contract liecycle management (CLM) systemsto an organization, but they also have a benet toproponents o SharePoint. Since CLM systemscan touch on so many parts o an organization,they are a classic example o SharePoint solutionsthat are not only enterprise strength, but in manycases, their adoption is being spearheaded by legal,CFO or procurement unctions. O course, the Idepartment is still very much involved, but CLMsystems are ambassadors or the SharePoint causebeyond the boundaries o the CIOs remit. Indeed,the content within CLM systems supports theargument that many SharePoint applications shouldnot be managed by the I unction, but instead, by arecords manager or someone with content expertise.

Tis brings me back neatly to my opening claimthat SharePoint has huge potential as an enterprise-strength solution and contract liecycle managementsystems are one example o how SharePoint cangenerate a an base across the organization, providetangible value. I would argue that it is a win-winsituation: the business as a whole benets, whilethe original internal champions o SharePoint arevindicated and can look orward to increased returnon its investment.

Prior to ounding Dolphin Sotware, Ronan Lavelle heldsenior positions at Hummingbird and OpenText. Heis an associate member o the International Associationor Contract and Commercial Management (IACCM)and an established author on contract management. In2009, Ronan Lavelle ounded Dolphin Sotware, shortlyollowed by the launch o Dolphin Contract Manager,which has been adopted by organisations in the USA,Europe, Middle East and Australasia - including EtihadAirways, Valve, Inc, Cricket Australia - and supportedby a network o global oces and partners.

20 is sharePoint ready For enterPrise-strength aPPLications?


22/67

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23/67herding cats how to run a successFuL conFerence22

SharePoint Magazine

Tey say running a conerence is like herding cats.Its more like herding cats, then eeding them, takingthem to the vet, changing their litter boxes andshowing them love while getting back a cold shoulder all while avoiding scratches and eas.

And thats when they run smoothly!

Ive been the technical chairman o SPechCon BZMedias SharePoint echnology Conerence sinceits inception, and i theres one thing Ive learned, itsthat when all is said and done, someones going tohave scratches and eas and its usually me.

Im about to give you a rare peek behind the curtaino what goes into making a successul conerence.Names have been avoided to protect the innocent,and so that I can remain on very riendly terms withall the olks who help make our event so great!

My rst task when a conerence is coming up is toput out a Call or Speakers. Tis gives our speakerbase a heads-up that its time to submit sessions orthe next event, and (we hope) attracts some newvoices in the community. When we did the rstSPechCon, I had to beg speakers to participate.Tose that did would oer a session or two, and Idhave to go back to them to see i they could presentsix or seven. Most oten, they were tremendouslyaccommodating, considering we were a new playercoming into the space.

Now that were more established, I nd mysel in theunenviable position o having to turn speakers andtheir submissions away. For the last SPechCon, inSan Francisco in February, I had 163 session pitchesrom 57 speakers; I could only use 81 sessions, anddidnt want to impose upon speakers to travel to

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We tryto move romintroductory

sessions to

more advanced

and esoteric,

while ensuring

we have

something or

most job titles in

each time slot.

herding caTs

how To runa successful

conferenceBy David Rubinstein


24/6723herding cats how to run a successFuL conFerence


present just one session.

Ater the Call or Speakers closes, I get a veritableood o emails rom people who claim they neversaw the call or speakers, and can they still submitsessions. Sorry, I reply with a smiley icon, but by nowI have more than enough sessions or the program.

Now its time to look through the submissions.

Usually, I have about 15 session pitches on upgradingto SharePoint 2010, metadata and taxonomies,SharePoint governance and the always popular armadministration and maintenance topics. So, atermuch give and take, we get sessions that more closelyreect the broad capabilities o the platorm.

Ten they need to get slotted into the program.We try to move rom introductory sessions to moreadvanced and esoteric, while ensuring we havesomething or most job titles in each time slot. Wedont want a developer or an administrator or abusiness user, or instance, to have to choose rom

three sessions at 10 a.m., and not have one targetinghim at 2 p.m.

Ater much more deliberation (I use sticky notes on awall quite high tech!), we get all the sessions slotted,take a step back, and do a considerable amount osel-congratulation. O we go to get the catalog andprogram printed up.

Within a week, the printed materials arrive all shinyand new, ull o promise o a great conerence, withgreat classes and great speakers.

Not so ast. No sooner do we have the printedmaterials in hand when I get the rst email rom aspeaker telling me that now he can only speak on therst day o the conerence, or rom a speaker whoonly now realizes the dates conict with somethingelse in their lives and theyre sorry, but they have to

withdraw rom the conerence. (Ive probably beentold no ewer than 10 times rom speakers that their

wives are due to have a baby at the same time as theconerence, so theyll have to stay home! No kidding!

At LEAS 10 times! Tere are a lot o SharePointbabies in his world! alk about sharing the love!)

No worries, I reply with a smiley icon. But in act, Inow have to nd someone willing to present anothersession in that time slot, or switch with anotherspeaker. And you cant do an easy switch, because

we try to switch a developer session or a developersession, but other speakers also have limits on whenthey can speak, so moving one class to another timeslot usually involves moving a hal-dozen classes

around. So much or those shiny new programs andcatalogs!

So we print an addendum to the catalog, listing thenew order o classes, with the new speakers replacingthose who have dropped out along the way, in theroom in which the session will be presented. Finally,success, right? RIGH???

Almost. We get on-site, and see that a class thatonly a ew attendees indicated they would attend issuddenly overowing, and olks have to stand in theback, or skip the session entirely. So we scramble tond chairs and make people comortable.

As I said, scratches and eas.

But all kidding aside or a moment, working withthe SharePoint community speakers, third-partyproduct providers and especially hearing the storiesrom our attendees o the projects theyre working onand the problems they ace has been a remarkablyrewarding experience or me.

And based on the most important eedback o all people actually showing up we must be doing agood job. SPechCon 2010 in Boston sold out six

week beore the event, so or this year, weve movedto a bigger hotel (which will help us overcome oneo our most requent complaints too ew, too slowelevators!)

We hope you choose to join us in Boston this June1-3 at the downtown Sheraton Hotel. I promise you

will leave with a lot more knowledge o SharePointthan you came with.

And no eas!

http://www.sptechcon.com/


25/6724

SharePoint Magazine

a JQuery Printer For sharePoint

Now, wedneed to becareul about

this because o

one o the really

cool things

about jQuery: it

will select ALL

the elements

that match the

selector in the

DOM.

So what can you do with jQuery in a SharePointcontext? I touched upon some o the general thingsthat you can do in my last article, but in this one Ithought Id start to go through the main categories ounctionality jQuery gives you, explain what they are,and give you some simple examples to show why theycan be useul.

Te jQuery site breaks jQuerys unctionality intosome really nice buckets:

jQuery Core

Selectors

Attributes

raversing

Manipulation

CSS

Events

Eects

Ajax

Utilities

jQuery UI

I nd that this breakdown makes it relativelystraightorward to think about jQuery, though it mayseem a bit mystical to you until you can internalizethe groupings.

In this article, we will look at three o the rst ouro these, selectors, attributes, and traversing. Te

jQuery Core is sort o an anachronism, harkingback to the time when it was a separate component.Generally speaking, you dont need to think about the

jQuery Core, as it is what gives you the jQuery and $capabilities.

Wlcm bck jQuy Pm SP SPM. is m k cls lk sm xmpls us jQuy lc cc lms htML p.

a jquery PriMer for sharePoinT:

selecTors,aTTribuTes,Traversing oh My!


26/6725


seLectors, attriButes, traversing oh my!

Slcs

I think that about hal the battle with learningjQuery is getting the idea behind selectors.

Heres how I think about it: everything in theDocument Object Model (DOM) that is sent romthe server to the browser is data. Te DOM happens

to be a type o data called HML, which is a specialavor o XML.

I youre starting rom scratch, HML lookssomething like this:

Untitled 1

Hello, world!

Tis is the simplest HML page you can create inSharePoint Designer 2007 by choosing File / New /HML with the exception that Ive added one divelement with the Hello, world! text into the bodysection. Its such a simple page that you may noteven see any value in it, but bear with me as we moveorward, using this page as the basis or the examples.

A very simple selector or this page would look likethis:

$(#helloDiv)

Tis selector will return an object which representsthe div surrounding the Hello, world! text.

I youre amiliar with Cascading Style Sheets (CSS),then youll know that the pound sign (#) meanssomething with this id. So what we are doing in theselector is saying: nd me something that has an idequal to helloDiv. Ids are simply a way to attach a

name to an HML element so that you can reer to itmore easily. Generally, in well-ormed HML, ids areunique within the DOM.

Heres a real example rom a WSS 3.0 page. Tis isthe part at the top o the Quick Launch where yousee the View All Site Content link.

View All Site Content

I we wanted to select the outer div above, we could

do this:

$(div.ms-quicklaunchheader)

Now, wed need to be careul about this because oone o the really cool things about jQuery: it willselect ALL the elements that match the selector in theDOM. So i there were more than one div with itsclass set to ms-quicklaunchheader, then wed end up

with those objects as well. Although this truly is OneVery Cool Ting, its something you need to thinkabout in your selectors.

tp

Since there is only one div with theclass ms-quicklaunchheader, it probablywould have made more sense orMicrosot to have given the div a uniqueid. Tis sort o thing is one o thereasons that Web developers complainabout SharePoints markup all thetime. It sometimes doesnt ollow bestpractices heck, it oten doesnt ollowbest practices which makes so-calledront end developers jobs harder.


27/6726

Bang,we just didsomething which

has an impact

on what the

user sees on the

page.

In this case, there is exactly one (1) div with the ms-quicklaunchheader class in any SharePoint page, atleast as SharePoint renders them out o the box.

Here is another example:

var thisNavLinkViewAll =$(#ctl00_PlaceHolderLeftNavBar_

idNavLinkViewAll);

Te variable thisNavLinkViewAll now contains anobject reerence to the anchor tag. Note that I usedthe ugly id which SharePoint assigned to the anchortag in my selector.

As you may know, SharePoint is built on top o ASP.NE, and ASP.NE is rie with really long and uglyids, oten containing long GUIDS, strings built o othe names o components and controls, and the like.

But wait, jQuery has capabilities to help with thosesilly, long ids (which are actually necessary, by the

way, but still ugly). Looking at the id above, we cansee that it ends in NavLinkViewAll. It turns outthat is in act unique in the DOM. So we can takeadvantage o a nice jQuery trick:

var thisNavLinkViewAll =$(a[id$=NavLinkViewAll]);

Tis dierent notation means: nd me an anchor tagwhich has an id which ends with NavLinkViewAll.Nice, eh?

Tere are a bunch o other notation options whichyou can use in your selectors based on the start osomething [^=], whether it contains something [*=],and so on.

As I said, this is hal the battle: nding what you wantto work with in the DOM. Especially when you are

working with SharePoint-generated pages, where youmay not have a lot o control over what is renderedto the browser, you need to gure out something toselect to get started.

I think o the initial selector as a sort o anchorwhich allows me to move orward. I we cant reliablynd our place in the DOM, then we cant reliablymanipulate anything down the line.

abus

Attributes are characteristics o HML elements,such as the hre attribute o an element or the srcattribute o an element.

In the rst example above, the only attribute that thediv has is the id. Tats not very exciting, so lets add

something else. Im going to use just the div elementrom the example above going orward so that I dontclutter up the page too much.

Hello, world!

Ive added a class attribute to the div. A class reers toa named section in the CSS which describes how theelement ought to be ormatted.

In this case, Ive borrowed a class that Microsotput into SharePoints core.css (but not core4.css inSharePoint 2010, or some reason) called ms-bold. Allthat class does is add

ont-weight: bold;

to the ormatting o the element to which it isapplied. Te net eect is that you get bold text.

Well, thats all well and good, but so what? Well,

we can nd and set attributes on elements by usingjQuery.

$(#helloDiv).attr(class);

Tis returns the string ms-bold. We might use thisto nd out what the currently applied style is or thehelloDiv element. We can also set attributes likethis:

$(#helloDiv).attr(class, ms-hidden);

Tere are special jQuery unctions to work withclasses (which are part o CSS wait or it!) but

we can also make changes this way. In the exampleabove, Im changing the class rom ms-bold to ms-hidden. Te eect o this is to hide the element

a JQuery Printer For sharePoint


28/6727

in the DOM because the ms-hidden class whichMicrosot put into SharePoints CSS sets

display: none;

From the users perspective, the div just disappeared!Bang, we just did something which has an impact on

what the user sees on the page.

Lets go back to our View All Site Content linkagain. Note that the anchor tag (the ) has anattribute called accessKey, set to the value o 3.


We can grab the value like this:

var thisAccessKey =$(a[id$=NavLinkViewAll]).

attr(accessKey);

Now the variable thisAccessKey is set to the value 3.

We can also set the accessKey:

$(a[id$=NavLinkViewAll]).attr(accessKey, 5);

Now the accessKey is set to 5.

tvs

We know that we need to nd a good anchor in theDOM rom which to operate. What i we want to

work with something which SharePoint generates thatisnt tidily packaged up with an id or class? Tis is

where traversing comes in. We can locate somethingwhich we do know how to nd and traverse up,down, or over in the DOM tree to nd what wereally need.

Te simple Hello world! example rom earlier inthis article has about outlived its useulness, so letslook at the View All Site Content link again.


$(a[id$=NavLinkViewA

ll]).parent();

would give us the div which surrounds the anchortag.

XML, and thereore HML, has a concept o parents

and children, just like databases and your own amily.Everything comes rom somewhere. Te parent o theanchor tag here is the div. Tis means that the anchortag is enclosed by the div.

We also can do something more like the reverse:select the parent and then traverse to the child:

$(div.ms-quicklaunchheader).

fnd(a);

Tis will select the div and then nd all o the a tagswithin it. We know that there is only one in this case.

raversing is incredibly important in working withSharePoint pages. When we want to work with theSharePoint out o the box orms, or example, manyo the control elements dont have ids or classes which

we can use in our selectors.

Te next example is rom SPServices. Here, Im tryingto nd the let and right boxes or a multi-selectlookup column like the one you see in the image.

Te jQuery code is a little messy, but take a look:

seLectors, attriButes, traversing oh my!


29/67


30/67

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31/6730

SharePoint Magazine

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SharePoint Magazine

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Best Practices For sharePoint grouPs

SharePoint permissions are conusing or most newsite admins. At my company I see the majority o siteadmins (we call them site owners) struggle with them.Te topic is complex because SharePoint provides somany options or managing permissions. Between thevarious permissions levels, inheritance, site/list/item-level permissions, version control, drat item security,

Active Directory (AD) groups, and SharePointgroups, explaining the best way to manage permission

would take several articles.

With that in mind, I want to ocus on one particularareaSharePoint groups. Use o SharePoint groupsis key to eective permissions management inSharePoint. Without them, sites quickly becomeoverrun with dozens o individual users that have

varying degrees o access, including the dreadullyunhelpul limited access permission level.

W SPgups?

A SharePoint group is a container that allows siteadmins to group users so certain tasks are easier tomanage. Examples o SharePoint groups include:

All authenticated users they should have read accessto all department top-level sites. Tey would beadded to the Visitors groups o those sites.

Whenyourpermissions get

more complex,

its important

that you not only

manage your

permissions, but

also manage

your groups

and use them

eectively.

besT

PracTices forsharePoinT

grouPsBy: Josh McCarty


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Best Practices For sharePoint grouPs

All members o a department they all needcontribute access to the department site so they canupload and update team documents. Tey would beadded to the Members group o their department site.

All C-level executives (CEO, CFO, COO, CIO,etc.) they need special access to a site with sensitivedocuments that nobody else can access. Tey wouldbe added to the Members group or the special site.

All SharePoint Admins they need ull access to theroot o the site collection. Tey would be added tothe Owners group or the site collection.

A good site administrator uses SharePoint groups toassign permissions to users that need similar accessto the same sites, lists, and libraries. Tey can also beused in workows to assign tasks to groups o peopleinstead o just individuals. Even i only one personneeds to have special access to something, its a goodidea to create a SharePoint group and add that personto the group. You may need to give others the same

special access in the uture, and adding them to agroup is quick and easy; you also have the benet ogiving the group a descriptive name and a description

with a link to the site/list/library that has the specialaccess.

SharePoint does an OK job or you by creating anOwners, Members, and Visitors group when youcreate a site (unless o course you choose to inheritpermissions rom the parent site). However, whenyour permissions get more complex, its importantthat you not only manage your permissions, but alsomanage your groups and use them eectively. As

you start creating more specialized groups beyondthe deault Owners, Members, and Visitors groupsthat SharePoint creates, you should ollow some bestpractices to ensure that you can easily keep track othe groups over time. Te inormation below appliesto both SharePoint 2007 and 2010 except wherenoted.

gup Ss

SharePoint groups have several settings that can

be changed, including the Name, About Me, andGroup Owner elds. o modiy group settings, go tothe People and Groups page or the site (/_layouts/people.aspx), select the group you want to modiyrom the Group Quick Launch, and go to Settings >Group Settings.

By deault any groups you create manually and anygroups that SharePoint creates as part o the sitecreation process are initially owned by you. Tismeans you can add and remove people rom thegroup and change the various settings or the group.

However, you will want to change the Group ownero every group to another group and make sure thatthis other group contains at least two people. Bydoing so, you ensure that i any one person in theowning group is unavailable, the other person(s) inthe owning group can perorm any tasks or that

group. Tis applies to the deault Owners group orthe site as well; you can even set the Owners group toown itsel (this is what I usually do).

Sometimes you might want to let the members o thegroup manage themselves; this way the owner(s) othe group dont always have to be bothered with everyrequest to add or remove members. For example, iyou create a team site, you might want to let the teamadd/remove people rom the sites Members group. odo this, select the Group Members radio button inthe Who can edit the membership o the group? eldon the Group Settings page or the Members group.


37/6736 Best Practices For sharePoint grouPs

Memberso this Sitesetting in

particular has

a ew extra

eatures or My

Site proles and

the Site Users

web part

Notice the naming convention that SharePointuses when it creates groups. Te name o the groupincludes the site nameExternal Aairs in thescreenshot abovealong with a brie description othe role or access level o the groupOwners. Justby looking at the name o this group, a site admincan quickly determine that the group most likely hasull control access to the External Aairs site.

Also take note that the About Me eld in theprevious screenshot has a description that SharePointgenerated automatically. Tis is a great practice toollow when creating your own groups to meet morecomplex permissions requirements.

For example, lets say you create a group calledExternal Aairs Blog Approvers. Tis groupincludes several users who are responsible orapproving comments on the blog site or the External

Aairs department. You could include a descriptionthat says Use this group to give people approvepermissions to the comments list on the SharePoint

site External Aairs/Blog. I also recommend makingthe name o the site into a hyperlink to the site itsel.

Why is this important? It lets other people knowwhat the group is used or and provides a quick wayor them to view the specic site that the group isbeing used on without having to hunt or it. Whenviewing the list o all groups on the /_layouts/groups.aspx page, the About Me inormation is displayednext to the group, providing a one-click link to get tothe site that the group is being used on.

acv Dcy dgups

Depending on your environment, you might haveActive Directory (AD) groups that you can use tomanage permissions in SharePoint. You could assignpermissions directly to the AD groups themselves;this practice sounds good on paperwhy re-creategroups when they are already created and maintainedby the I department? However, there are a couple ocaveats with this approach.

I suggest reading http://sympmarc.com/2011/02/16/active-directory-groups-vs-sharepoint-groups-or-user-management-a-dilemma/ and http://sympmarc.com/2011/02/22/active-directory-groups-vs-sharepoint-groups-or-user-management-the-denouement/ to learn about some o the advantagesand disadvantages to using AD groups. o sum it up,

AD groups do not let you look inside them romthe web UI in SharePoint. You have no idea who

is in the AD group, which could be a problem orsite admins. SharePoint groups do allow you to lookinside them, and you can even display all memberso a group using the Site Users web part. Tis is ahandy eature or collaboration sites that Ill cover ina moment.

Neither way is right or wrong, just dierent. Youcould even create a SharePoint group with all o themembers, and then you could add the AD group to itas well or redundancy.

S Up gups d gupQuck Luc

When you create a new site and use uniquepermissions, SharePoint asks you i you want to useexisting groups or create new ones. It also asks youto assign either the new groups or existing groups as

the Visitors to this Site, Members o this Site, andOwners o this Site as shown in the screenshot below.Tis seems like no big deal, right? You tell SharePointto create new groups (or re-use groups i you alreadyhave some made), and it assigns Read, Contribute,and Full Control access to each group accordingly.

Although this is convenient, it doesnt seem all thatspecial at rst glance. However, the Members o thisSite setting in particular has a ew extra eatures orMy Site proles and the Site Users web part (more onthis below).

Te Visitors and Owners group settings dontprovide any cool eatures like this; they simplyassign Read and Full Control access to the respective


38/6737Best Practices For sharePoint grouPs

groups. However, this is still a convenient way to setpermissions i you decide to change which groups youuse on the site or Visitors and Owners.

I you created a site that inherited permissions, thesesettings will also be inherited. However, i you laterdecide to change what the Owners, Members, andVisitors groups or the site are, youll want to editthese settings instead o just changing the permissionsor the site. You can do this rom the People andGroups page in SharePoint 2007 by going to Settings> Set Up Groups and selecting the groups you wantto use in each eld.

In SharePoint 2010, you can access this page at/_layouts/permsetup.aspx. Alternatively, i you wantto change which group is used as the Members othis Site group to enable the Site Users and My Siteeatures, rst view the group you want to use, thenselect Settings > Make Deault Group.

T My S Pl d Mmbsgup

When a user is in the Members group or a site, andthat members group is used in the Members o this

Site eld, the SharePoint will list the site on the usersMy Site prole page. When someone else views thatusers prole, they can see that he/she is a member othe SharePoint site. Tis can be useul or networkingor looking up contacts or a particular site.

T S Uss Wb P d Mmbs gup

When I build an ad-hoc site or a project, I like toadd the Site Users web part to the home page andhave it display all people in the sites Members group.

A lot o project teams get a kick out o this because it

lets them see whos busy (via Oce Communicatorpresence) and also lets them look up someones phonenumber or email. Oten these sites are being usedby people across departments, and not everyoneknows each other. Using the Site Users web part inthis manner gives them a convenient way to look upcontact inormation or their teammates.

o do this, add the Site Users web part to the page.Modiy the web part and select the option to Showpeople in this sites member group. Te web part willnow display all o the people who are in the Membersgroup or the site, with presence inormation.

Te web part also displays a convenient link oradding new users to the Members group.

gup Quck LucWhen Im on the People and Groups page, I alwaysmake sure that every group I need to work with orthe site is included in the Group Quick Launch. Tisprovides a one-click shortcut to view the memberso each group being used on the site. SharePointincludes the Owners, Members, and Visitors groupsby deault, and it will also include any new groups


39/6738 Best Practices For sharePoint grouPs

you create i you create them rom the current site.Unortunately it does not automatically includegroups i you created them on another site and decideto add them to the current sites permissions at a laterdate.

You can remedy this by adding the groups to thegroup quick launch. In SharePoint 2007, on thePeople and Groups page or your site, go to Settings >Edit Group Quick Launch.

In SharePoint 2010 this option isnt on the Peopleand Groups page. Navigate to the People and Groups:

All Groups page (accessed at _layouts/groups.aspxor by clicking on the Groups link at the top o theGroup Quick Launch or the More link at thebottom), then youll see the option in the Settingsmenu.

From here you can add any additional groups thatyoud like to manage on the site. Tis is site-specic,so youll need to do this or every site and sub-siteindividually (when creating new sub-sites that inheritpermissions, the sub-site will have all o the groupsthat the parent site has). Im a bit o a neat-reak, so Ialso use this page to re-order the groups alphabeticallyand by access level.

Now all o your groups will be included in the GroupQuick Launch or convenient access when you needto manage them!

Full Cl Us Cu!

Beore we wrap up, I strongly recommend keepingyour Owners group(s) to a small number o people.Owners groups are usually set up to have ull controlaccess to a site, which means that people in theOwners group can give others ull control access, whoin turn can give even more people ull control access.

You can see how this could quickly explode into apermissions nightmare i the people in your Ownersgroup(s) dont understand your permissions strategy.By keeping the Owners group(s) to just a ew people,you can help to uphold the governance policies oyour sites.

All too oten Ive seen sub-site sprawl because adirector didnt have time to manage a site and gaveull control to his/her subordinate managers, whoin turn gave ull control to some o their employeesbecause they also didnt have time. Instead o two orthree people with ull control access to the site, allo a sudden 15 people had access and were creatingsub-sites or bowling leagues, picnic photos, bookclubs, etc. Its not that these kinds o sites are bad,its just that they should be planned and built with alittle bit o strategy in mind instead o having silos ouncontrolled, totally organic sub-site sprawl or everyteam in the department.

Ls rvw

SharePoint groups allow you to manage permissionsor multiple users at the same time while keepingthings more organized.

Always manage permissions with groups; i anappropriate group doesnt exist, create it, even ora single personat the very least you can add adescription or what kind o access the group/person

has, and at best you can easily grant the same accessto additional people as-needed.

Use standard naming conventionssite name +access level or role.

Use a description that includes a hyperlink to thesite(s) or lists/libraries that the group has access to.

Never set the owner o a group to an individual


40/6739Best Practices For sharePoint grouPs

person; i that person is unavailable, it will be moredicult to manage the group. ypically youll want touse the Owners group o the current site as the ownero all groups used on that site.

You can use AD groups to manage permissions, withsome caveats. You can also include AD groups insideSharePoint groups.

Make sure that Visitors, Members, and Ownersgroups are established on the Set Up Groups orTis Site page. For SharePoint 2010, use the MakeDeault Group option in the Settings menu to set theMembers group or the site.

SharePoint will list the site on the members My Siteproles.

Te members can be automagically listed in the SiteUsers web part.

Include all groups or your site in the Group QuickLaunch, that way you can quickly and easily accessthem to manage group membership rom the Peopleand Groups page.

Keep your Owners group membership to aminimum. Anyone with ull control access can grantull control access to others, so permissions can getout o control i too many people have ull controland dont understand your permissions managementstrategy.

I hope these best practices can help you to manageyour SharePoint groups as they start to grow incomplexity. Teyve denitely helped me over the pastew years! Keep in mind that this is mostly based onMOSS 2007, but the principles still apply or WSSand SharePoint 2010.

This article is a fnalist entry in the Aspiring AuthorsCompetition 2011.

Vote or your avorite article online!

http://spm.to/26


41/6740

SharePoint Magazine

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a guide to Leaving Lotus notes and moving to microsoFt sharePoint

An organisations investment in a collaborativeplatorm can mean signicant nancial andsta investment. Moving an organisation romone platorm to another produces a number o

challenges. Tis article, aimed at a SharePoint2010 developer who also understands Lotus Notesdevelopment, introduces some o the considerations

when migrating applications rom Lotus Notes to

Im not sureits quitelike thisbut, or various

reasons, many

organisations

are moving rom

Lotus Notes to

SharePoint.

a guide To

leaving loTusnoTes and

Moving ToMicrosofT

sharePoinTBy: Andrew Vevers


42/6741


a guide to Leaving Lotus notes and moving to microsoFt sharePoint

SharePoint. Although you wont be a migration ninjaater rea

Documents

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