Daniel | zevenseas | SharePoint Blog

Pragmatism and Mary-Jo Foley on SharePoint: New studies highlight the potential downsides of SharePoint

Daniel McPherson — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 23:52:54 GMT

New studies highlight the potential downsides of SharePoint

I try to keep track of articles about SharePoint that come from outside the SharePoint Bloggers “Echo Chamber”. I think it’s important to understand what the wider IT audience is thinking and hearing about SharePoint. For those who don’t know her, Mary-Jo Foley is a long time Microsoft watcher and pundit, and has a broad readership among the more senior IT ranks. Unfortunately this article doesn’t really go into enough detail to get a good understanding of the criticism and concerns that are being raised, and I don’t have the $900.00 USD spare to purchase the reports. However, that doesn’t mean I wouldn’t be very interested in reading them, and I’m sure that they will be read by key decision makers at customers zevenseas is working with right now.

I actually welcome this sort of report, as I think the “gold rush” to SharePoint we are seeing right now is resulting in the nail and hammer situation. “When all you have is a hammer, then everything looks like a nail”. SharePoint is certainly not the first product to be seen as the solution to every possible business problem. Lotus Notes, which was an incredible platform for its day, almost self-destructed under this weight. People were constantly trying to make it do “relational stuff”, and even its custodian, IBM, attempted to turn it into an email server (I suspect that may be a controversial statement). Building a great SharePoint solution requires that we, as consultants, know much more than just what the product can do.

Recently, during our first meeting, a customer asked me a question that went something like this: “What makes the zevenseas approach to building SharePoint solutions different?”. My answer came down to a single word. Pragmatism.

While we have great enthusiasm for SharePoint, and we only create SharePoint solutions, it doesn’t mean we feel every business problem can be solved with a healthy sprinkling of SharePoint teamsites. Actually, I would much rather recommend a customer use the specific technology, designed from the ground up to meet their need, than to attempt to coerce SharePoint in to doing something it doesn’t really want to. SharePoint is our technology, and fortunately it is very good at many of the things businesses need, but all business problems should be looked at pragmatically and in the absence of any preconceived solutions or “technical religion”.

The next key application of pragmatism comes when reviewing requirements, and perhaps it is here that it’s most important. Business problems are rarely simple, in fact even the simplest are actually quite complex. And complicating things further is the tendency for them trend toward greater complexity in proportion to the amount of time you spend talking about them as a group. I think you can see where I’m going here. SharePoint is a great platform because it lets you do things quickly, and easily, and often simply by tuning out of box functionality. We are big believers in rapidly prototyping solutions via weekly iterations and getting feedback via actual usage of the system. There really is nothing like actually watching people use your solution, and there are no end of surprises, its a great way to prioritise functionality and understand where your focus should be.

Finally, pragmatism plays a role in the overall design of your solution and it works in partnership with a deeper understanding of the bigger picture. A SharePoint consultant needs to understand exactly why the customer has invested in SharePoint. They must understand the overall landscape in which their projects fits, asking themselves what broader business objectives are being met by the implementation of this collaboration platform. While this is likely a post all on its own, the customers I work with have implemented SharePoint because:

It’s a very rich platform on which they can build rapid business solutions
One they can consolidate existing business solutions onto to, thereby reducing the number of platforms they have to support.

It huge out of box feature-set means they can minimise customisation, the ongoing maintenance of which is where the big costs really start creeping in. So, as a consultant, you have two jobs. The first is to make sure you build solutions that work with SharePoint, leveraging every bit of out of box functionality you can, and avoiding wheel reinvention wherever possible. The second is to help those who define the requirements understand just how best to map them to the platform. It means not just taking a requirement on face value and mindlessly building it out, but deciding if small compromises can be made which result in bigger long term cost savings.

What I’m really saying is that SharePoint projects require SharePoint consultants. It’s a discipline all on its own, you wouldn’t get a ASP.NET developer to build you a WinForms application. Just as SharePoint is not simply another Object Model for an ASP.NET developer to pick up. It requires a completely different mind-set, one focused on augmenting, pragmatically, rather than building.

So, in summary, that’s what is different about zevenseas, we’re very pragmatic.

Tagged Links – Walkthrough

Daniel McPherson — Sat, 19 Jul 2008 04:56:48 GMT

This brief walkthrough is designed to give you an idea about how Tagged Links could help you share those useful links you find on the Internet with those people your are collaborating with. You can try it on your own environments by downloading the evaluation here:

Download Tagged Links

Or try it on ours here:

Site: Tagged Links
Username: Coral\DemoUser
Password: DemoUser

Tagged Links Walkthrough

The Tagged Links List
A “Tagged Links” list is just like any other, they are created via the “Create” page in your site, and you can have as many of them as you like. Each one has its own list of tags that can be applied to links, as you add them.

As you can see, it looks just like every other SharePoint list, with one exception, browser integration that can be installed by following the instructions:

“To create a browser button for quickly adding links to this list, right-click the below link, select 'Add to Favorites...' and select the 'Links' folder in your favorites:
Add link to MyDemoSite - Tagged Links”

After following these directions a new button will appear in the links toolbar of your browser. Next time you are on a web site which you think other people in your team would be interested in, you can save it directly to this list by just clicking the button.

What’s even better is that Tagged Links does most of the hard work for you, by automatically adding the URL and Title to the new item. So all you have to do is add the relevant Tags and enter some notes.

In the screenshot to the left you can see that a number of tags already exist in the list and can be applied via a checkbox. Tagged Links makes it easy to add new tags by including a text box where you can enter new ones.

When you save the item these new tags are added to the list and will be available as a checkbox items for next time. You can see this in the next screenshot.

This is a real time saver, keeping your links organised in a more accurate and consistent way.

That sort of consistency is important not just within a single “Tagged Links” list, but across all tagged links lists. For this reason we added the concept of “Global Tags”. This is a list of tags that is defined at a Site Collection, and then used by all Tagged Links lists, regardless of which site in the site collection they belong to. Global Tags are created via the “Site Settings” page.

Clicking on “Global Tags” takes you to a standard SharePoint list where you can maintain the list of tags which you would like to be available through all Tagged Links lists. When global tags have been defined, the following appears at the bottom of the “New Item” form:

So far we have talked about how to create a new Tagged Link, in the process describing it via tags and a note, organising it for others. However, probably the most powerful feature in tagged links, is the advanced graphical views. A Tag Cloud and a Tag List help you quickly determine what tags are most popular, and allows you to quickly filter the list of links at the click of a button. This makes it easier to find what you are looking for. Words don’t do it justice, so here are a couple of screenshots:

That pretty much wraps up Tagged Links, please do take a look, we would love to hear your feedback. We hope it helps you work better together!

Product Release: Tagged Links – Social Bookmarking for SharePoint

Daniel McPherson — Sat, 19 Jul 2008 04:50:42 GMT

Sometime ago we released a beta version of Tagged Links, today, I’m pleased to announce the release of version 1.0!

Download Tagged Links

What is “Tagged Links”?
It’s social bookmarking for SharePoint, taking the standard “Links List” to a new level via browser integration, one-click tagging, advanced graphical views and global tags that allow you to define tags across an entire site collection. Take a look at the new “Walkthrough”.

We have spent quite a bit of time thinking about just how we release “Tagged Links”. For those who follow our blogs, you know that our instinct is to release the things we build to the community via CodePlex, its a rapidly growing portfolio, especially given we only just celebrated our 6 month anniversary, and there is more to come. Tagged Links however is a little different. The amount of time we put into developing this solution was longer than usual, and as a group of SharePoint consultants, we have lots of ideas, and would really love to be able to build more solutions just like this. Of course, the only way we can that, and eat, is by offering these solutions commercially. With that said, we want to make sure as many people as possible can take advantage of them, so pricing will reflect the modesty of our small, but useful products. We look forward to your feedback on this approach, let us know what you think.

So, Tagged Links becomes our first commercial offering!

While we are still finalising the details concerning exactly how you can purchase it (will have that within the week) we didn’t want to hold back any longer. An evaluation version of Tagged Links, with all functionality enabled but with a 30 item limit is available for you to download and try out here: Download Tagged Links. If you do decide it offer you enough benefits to buy, the full version will easily install right over the top.

We have also made a “Hosted” version available for you to test out here:

Site: Tagged Links
Username: Coral\DemoUser
Password: DemoUser

So, jump in, and feedback away!

SharePoint Magazine Launches

Daniel McPherson — Sat, 19 Jul 2008 02:34:50 GMT

Our congratulations go to Arno Nel and team who today launched the “SharePoint Magazine”.

There has been some great launch content and we look forward to more to come.

The International SharePoint Professionals Association is GO!

Daniel McPherson — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 11:31:47 GMT

Announcing the International SharePoint Professionals Association

My congrats go to Bob, Darrin, Christopher and Natalya on the launch of the International SharePoint Professionals Association. I, along with Mart Muller, have been lucky enough to play a small role over the last few weeks ensuring Holland is represented in this global endeavor. Certainly, anything that brings SharePoint Professional together in this still too wide world is something I support.

Anyway, jump across to the site and let Bob and the team know what you think, and even more, let them know what they can do to help you!

SearchCoder Tool: New Build Released on CodePlex

Daniel McPherson — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 03:37:08 GMT

I added a new build of SearchCoder to CodePlex today, it is still beta, so unfortunately the OM is pretty unstable. With that said I think a number of the changes I checked in today give it a more reliable platform for building on in the future.

For those who missed the initial announcement, SearchCoder is composed of two tools:

An SearchCoder Object Model which lets you produce MOSS SQL statements in code rather than by hand crafting SQL Strings
A Windows Application which helps you build and test the SQL Statements graphically AND produces C# code that uses the SearchCoder OM. There is a sample in this blog post which I think explains it best.

For those interested here are the improvements:

SearchCoder - Updated Release - V0.91
http://www.codeplex.com/MOSSSearchCoder/Release/ProjectReleases.aspx?ReleaseId=14061

- Changed to the use of generics
- Changed so that all objects output their portion of the SQL Statement via "ToString()"
- Changed the implementation of "WhereProperties" to support more functionality
- Changed the implementation of the "FROM" statement to support more functionality
- Added support for restricting searches by date using the DATEADD function in MOSS SQL (not yet in the graphical tool)
- Improved support for multiple search queries
- Fixed a number of small UI issues concerning error handling.
- Added option for "Friendly Formatting" of the SQL Statement so that each statement begins on a new line:

SELECT Title, Rank, Size, Description, Write, Path
FROM portal..scope()
WHERE ( ("SCOPE" = 'All Sites') )
ORDER BY "Rank" DESC

We are looking, for people who are looking, for the right change

Daniel McPherson — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 06:42:00 GMT

zevenseas is a new, small company, dedicated to SharePoint, and dedicated to making consulting the high value profession it once was.

In the last 6 months we have been crafting out a boutique organisation that allows us to do the things we think are important. Things like attending key international conferences and supporting the community via blogs and cool tools. We are an organisation that always works as a team, meeting each and every Friday through our Fridays@Sea concept, providing all of us with an opportunity to share experience, work collaboratively on problems, and most importantly, ensure we never feel we are out there on our own.

As SharePoint specialists we are able to focus on the product that excites us most, digging deep into the technology to ensure the best possible outcome for our customers. We bring a pragmatic, experienced and business focused approach to solving the problems our customers share with us, making the most of the strong platform SharePoint has become.

If you are looking for the right change, and want to join a team of people who enjoy working with each other, with great customers and on great SharePoint projects, drop me an email at daniel@zevenseas.com. Let us buy you a coffee.

Announcing: The zevenseas Choice Column Filter Web Part

Daniel McPherson — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 06:42:30 GMT

DOWNLOAD

I really love filter web parts and I really love connections. I've always looked at this functionality is SharePoint and dreamed of the incredible hybrid interface holy grail that together it could achieve. Imagine a page that everyday delivered you a single view onto the information you need to do your job, regardless of where the data was stored or how many logins you needed to access it. Imagine being able to mix and match these building blocks in any which way you like, tuning the information, and taking you to a place where you are able to make decisions the instant an opportunity presents itself.

Ok, I'm getting a little carried away, but this is the first in what will be a series of simple filter web parts that in their own small way move us toward this vision.

The zevenseas Choice Column Filter web part does three simple things:

It pulls the choices from a choice column
Displays them in a list of option buttons (drop down box to come, just I find options buttons so much more intuitive)
Passes the value you select to other web parts via a connection

Here is a simple walk through that shows you how:

1. First I added a new column called “CompanyName” to the standard “Contacts” list in SharePoint as follows:

2. Then I added in some sample data, and added a List View Web part for the list onto a new Web Part Page like so:

3. Everything is pretty simple so far, but his is where the Choice Filter web part comes in. The Choice Filter web part is attached to the “CompanyName” column, pulling out its values, creating a list of option boxes, and allowing you to sort the list at a single click. Here we add the Web Part, and the open the tool pane:

4. At the top of the tool pane we can select the list we want to attach to, and then any Choice fields that exist within the list, here we have changed it to point to our Contacts list:

5. When you have finished, click on “OK” to save the changes. The Choice Filter web part will now render with each choice appearing as an Option button:

6. All that remains is to connect up our new Choice Filter web part to the existing “Contacts” list view web part. First, make sure the page is in “Edit Mode”, then click on the “Choice Filter” edit drop down and select the following meni tree: “Connections” –> “Send Choice Filter To” –> “Contacts”, you will then have the following pop-up appear:

7. Match the “Choice Value” to the field you connected to earlier, in this case “CompanyName” and you are ready to go.

We have made it available via our CodePlex community solution site as a ready to install solution, or if your the developer sort, with full source code. Let us know what you think.

Dan Winter Writes: Migrating Wiki Pages Remotely

Daniel McPherson — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 05:00:36 GMT

I've known Dan Winter for years now, back when I was a Microsoft Rapid Response Engineer I would often hope he would be my point of escalation. We worked on a number of cases together, but it wasn't until the SharePoint conference in Seattle earlier this year that we finally met. He delivered a great session on supportability of customisations and we later ended up at the W drinking green apple martinis.

Anyway, today he dropped a massive series of blog posts (10 in all) and a toolkit that describes how to remotely migrate a Wiki. He describes it best:

I was doing some work recently where I needed to move a large volume (thousands) of Wiki Pages from one server to another. The problem was that while if I begged and pleaded, I probably could have gotten local admin access to the farms, I didn’t really want to go through that if I didn’t have to. I wanted to be able to manage the relocation of my Wiki Libraries from my client machine and not have to touch the server locally if I could help it. How do you do this kind of thing? Web Services of course… sounds simple right? Well, that’s what I thought until I gave it a try. As it turns out, it is very easy to use lists.asmx to pull all the data you want. You can do it for Wiki Libraries just like you would for any other list type.

In case you didn’t already figure this out, lucky you, I’ve done all the work for you already. If you are an adventurous or savvy developer, you could stop reading right here and go give it a shot. Otherwise keep reading and see how I made this all go. I have split up a much longer document into a series of posts where I will step through the different parts of the code and talk about the logic/etc behind them. I did this so that I was more reasonable on your RSS readers (my docx is 19 pages long). I will finish the final piece with a single post providing all of the code together.

Congrats to the new UK MVP's

Daniel McPherson — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 04:38:14 GMT

Just back from a week diving and relaxing in Sharm El Sheik and caught the very good news that Chris O'Brien and Vincent Rothwell have both been made MVP's. I had the pleasure of meeting both these guys at the SharePoint conference in Seattle earlier this year and at the time I actually thought they already WERE MVPs. They have been churning out great community content for a long time and its thoroughly well deserved.

Congrats guys!

SharePoint, Social Networking and “TownSquare”

Daniel McPherson — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 02:09:11 GMT

Its a pretty safe bet that the next version of SharePoint will include functionality aimed at bringing many of the benefits people are enjoying from sites like Facebook to the Enterprise. We certainly see lots of advantages in being able to map out the connections between colleagues, thereby providing mechanisms that effortlessly communicate what people are working on and organically identify subject matter experts. Having just read this article, it looks to me like this functionality is going to be driven out of the “OfficeLabs” team, an approach which gives me some confidence given the team is led by OneNote (one of my favourite all time apps) creator Chris Pratley.

With a layout that is strikingly similar to Facebook.com's (in which Microsoft invested $240 million in October 2007), TownSquare is fueled by enterprise news feeds that use Web services to query SharePoint for public information, such as promotions and company anniversaries, about an employee.

TownSquare also notifies users when a document or file is modified. Users can customize their feeds and monitor who is receiving information about them.

I have recently been thinking about how to build something that does just this, largely driven by the vastly improved SharePoint Search technology. Its one of the reasons why I built out the zevenseas Search OM that we release to codeplex last week, making search application easier to write. MOSS Search provides an excellent mechanism for aggregating information in a scalable and performant way. Anyway, be sure to watch the OfficeLabs site.

Microsoft testing prototype of Facebook-like social network | InfoWorld | News | 2008-06-11 | By Heather Havenstein, Computerworld
http://www.infoworld.com/article/08/06/11/Microsoft_testing_prototype_of_Facebooklike_social_network_1.html?source=rss&url=http://www.infoworld.com/article/08/06/11/Microsoft_testing_prototype_of_Facebooklike_social_network_1.html

PressPass: Microsoft releases a community initiative around SharePoint and Podcasting

Daniel McPherson — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 12:50:55 GMT

Just read today on PressPass that Microsoft has kicked off another community project (much like the Community Kits) focused on Podcasting. You can check it out here:

Podcasting Kit for SharePoint

A quick look at it leaves me fairly impressed, as I have been with the Community Kits projects on the whole. The announcement comes during the Enterprise 2.0 Conference which is going on in the US. I would have loved to be there, as zevenseas is keen on this area, in particular around community building (podcasting being just one of the elements), having recently posted about it on the Get The Point Blog here:

How can your organisation create an online community around its products and services?

Anyway, I have a download to make, interested in your experiences.

Announcing: MOSS SQL SearchCoder

Daniel McPherson — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 06:46:00 GMT

DOWNLOAD

Search in MOSS, from a programmatic perspective, has come a long way in MOSS, specifically it is more robust (though could still be MORE robust), more bug free and therefore more suited for use as plumbing in applications. I have found it particularly useful to get over some of the scale restrictions SharePoint places on developers, and taken advantage of it to meet the need for aggregation.

In a recent project however I found myself writing this little piece of spaghetti code.

        1: //Build the Select Statement

       2: string baseQuery =

       3:     @"SELECT Title, Rank, Description, Created, Path, NumComments, NumViews, NumLinkbacks, Tags, Categories FROM portal..scope()";

       4:  

       5: //Set the base scope

       6: string baseScope = @" (""SCOPE"" = 'All http://" + strSiteURL.Host + @"/ Blogs') ";

       7:  

       8: // Build the Where Clause

       9: string baseWhere;

switch (tag)

{

    case "":

        baseWhere = @"WHERE " + baseScope;

        break;

    default:

        //TODO: MUST ADD TAG FIELD SUPPORT

        baseWhere = @"WHERE CONTAINS (""Categories"",'""" + tag + @"""') AND " + baseScope;

        break;

}

  

//Build the OrderBy Clause

string localSortField;

if (_sortField == "")

    localSortField = "Created";

else

    localSortField = _sortField;

  

string orderQuery;

if (localSortField == "")

    orderQuery = "";

else

    orderQuery = @"ORDER BY """ + localSortField;

  

//End the Query

string endQuery = @""" DESC";

  

//Putting it all together

string strsql = baseQuery + baseWhere + orderQuery + endQuery;

Debug.Write(strsql);

  

return strsql;

I'm not proud of it, and couple of small bugs aside, was revisiting it to ensure it was "solid" (as if code like this could EVER be solid) when I threw in the towel, sick of writing code to write code every time I hit a project that needs to use search. There should be an easier/better way.

The result of my frustration is a tool that takes spaghetti code like this and turns it into:

       1: MOSSSearch mossSearch = new MOSSSearch();

       2:  

       3: ArrayList Scopes = new ArrayList();

       4: Scopes.Add("All http://" + strSiteURL.Host + @"/ Blogs");

       5: mossSearch.Scopes = Scopes;

       6:  

       7: ArrayList returnProperties = new ArrayList();

       8: returnProperties.Add("Title");

       9: returnProperties.Add("Path");

returnProperties.Add("Rank");

returnProperties.Add("Description");

returnProperties.Add("Created");

returnProperties.Add("NumComments");

returnProperties.Add("NumViews");

returnProperties.Add("NumLinkbacks");

returnProperties.Add("Tags");

returnProperties.Add("Categories");

mossSearch.ReturnProperties = returnProperties;

  

WhereContains whereStatement = new WhereContains();

whereStatement.FirstWhereProperty = "Categories";

  

if (!string.IsNullOrEmpty(tag))

{

    WhereProperty whereTags = new WhereProperty();

    whereTags.Property = "Tags";

    whereTags.SearchTerm = tag;

    whereTags.LogOperator = WhereProperty.LogicalOperator.OR;

    whereStatement.WhereProperties.Add(whereTags);

  

    WhereProperty whereCategories = new WhereProperty();

    whereCategories.Property = "Categories";

    whereCategories.SearchTerm = tag;

    whereStatement.WhereProperties.Add(whereCategories);

}

mossSearch.Where = whereStatement;

  

SortStatement sortStatement = new SortStatement();

sortStatement.SortProperty = _sortField;

sortStatement.ResultSortOrder = SortDirection.Descending;

mossSearch.SortStatement = sortStatement;

  

Debug.Write(mossSearch.GetSQLStatement());

return mossSearch.GetSQLStatement();

Which looks much more elegant to me. Of course actually creating the query in the first place is tricky too, and while a couple of test tools are available, I wanted to put one together that:

Tested the SQL generated by the OM
Output not only the SQL Statement, but the OM code as well, making using it as simple as cut and paste.
Was inspired by the now missing in action tool MossQueryTool.exe written by SharePoint legend Steve Peschka (was on GotDotNet).

The result is the zevenseas SearchCoder and it looks like this:

Here you build your query graphically, when done you click on the "Build SQL" or "Execute Query" buttons which take you here:

Note the SQL Statement is generated, an on the C# SearchCoder OM Tab:

Anyway, this is the .9 release, still a little polishing to do, including:

- Add Sort order (it is in the OM, but not in the tool)

- Add support for multiple sort orders

- Better exception handling (of course!)

But I would rather it was out there than sitting on my hard disk, so grab it now from CodePlex:

CodePlex Project

DOWNLOAD

The zevenseas Site Staple Feature Builder

Daniel McPherson — Thu, 08 May 2008 12:25:39 GMT

I recently completed the development of a feature which is attached to site definitions via a site staple. The feature is a building block, designed to be used by other solution developers when building their own custom site definitions. Rather than continually modifying the staple in my feature (requiring my solution to be rebuilt and redeployed) I wrote a quick little tool that allows them to generate their own staple. With just a little more work I made it generic enough for anyone, and today dropped it onto Codeplex. Hope it helps.

Download the Site Staple Feature Builder

Installation
This is just a single command-line executable, so download it from here and then get started.

Usage
Base Site Staple Feature Generator
-------------------------------
Usage: zsStapleGenerator <StapleTitle> <SiteDefinitions> <FeatureGuid> <Scope> <FeatureFolder>

<StapleTitle>         Name you would like to give the new StapleFeature
<SiteDefinitions> List of the SiteDefinition to be stapled (';' or ',' delimited)
<FeatureGuid>      The Guid of the Feature that is to be stapled
<Scope>                Either 'WebApplication' or 'Farm'
<FeatureFolder>   The New folder where you would like to create the feature.

Notes
This is obviously just producing the feature, you would next need to wrap it up into an installable solution file. I stopped here as there are many ways to do this.
After you have created the new feature you can obviously tweak it to your hearts content, the beauty is that all that typing is avoided.

New Build: Tagged Links - Social Bookmarking for SharePoint

Daniel McPherson — Sun, 04 May 2008 05:43:26 GMT

Just wanted to let you know that I dropped a new build of the Tagged Links solution today:

Download Tagged Links

I did a walk-through here: Tagged Links Walk-through

It introduces the following fixes:

Site Members can now submit links (so you don’t have to be an administrator anymore)
If you type a tag in the "Fill-in Choice" that already exists in the list, the tag is now checked
You can turn off the “Fill-in Choice” option, and then you can't add any more tags
The views now show “No items to display” when there are no items to display
Updated the feature icon (a new list graphic is on the way)
Fixed the issue with feature deactivation and then later activation
Fixed some general text issues, making it easier to read, added a description and fixing spelling errors
Fixed a bug with the “Global Tags” site settings link, it is now visible at the site collection only
Performed code analysis to pick out some best practice improvements

Getting close now, looking to have it complete by mid-May, as always, would like to get your feedback, email me at: daniel@zevenseas.com and you can always try it out here:

Site: Tagged Links
Username: Coral\DemoUser
Password: DemoUser

The IgnoreIfAlreadyExists File Element Attribute

Daniel McPherson — Sat, 26 Apr 2008 04:30:32 GMT

This attribute doesn't quite work the way I expected it to, or the way I have seen it described in other places on the web. (The documentation is not as clear as it should be. I really wish it did work the way described in Chris's great post!)

From the official documentation (http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms459213.aspx) we find that it is designed to:

IgnoreIfAlreadyExists

Optional Boolean. TRUE to provision the view even if the file already exists at the specified URL; otherwise, FALSE.

To fully understand how this attribute worked I set up the following test:

Created a Feature (ReplaceTest1) which simply provisioned a file (test.aspx) into a team sites /_catalogs/masterpage folder. The file simply contained "11111111".
I then tested this and confirmed that it worked correctly, I saw "11111111" when accessing the page.
I then created another feature (ReplaceTest2) based on ReplaceTest1, except with:
1. A new FeatureID
2. I added the IgnoreIfAlreadyExists parameter, and set it to TRUE
3. Modified the test.aspx file to contain "22222222" instead.
I then activated this feature, and in doing so found that it didn't actually replace the existing test.aspx file. In the browser I still saw "11111111". I didn't expect this.
I then decided to change ReplaceTest2 so that IgnoreIfAlreadyExists was equal to FALSE
I then repeated the tests and found that this time, when activating ReplaceTest2, I received an error telling me that the file already existed. I did expect this.

So, in summary, it appears this attribute actually does exactly what it says (even if it really could have said it clearer), it ignores the provisioning of the file if a file with the same name already exists. At this point I have to wonder just how useful such an attribute really is!

Anyway, I'm going to return to investigating the easiest way to replace an existing file via a feature, but if anyone out there has had a different experience then I would love to hear about it.

Technorati tags: WSS, Site Definitions, Customisation, IgnoreIfAlreadyExists, MOSS, SharePoint

Content from Point2Share

Daniel McPherson — Sun, 20 Apr 2008 07:15:27 GMT

I have had a couple of people ping me about content that was available on my old Point2Share site (especially the upgrade stuff) and I'm pleased to say that I have finally got around to going through the old blog and pulling out content that remains useful today.

Too much has changed now for me to just bring that server back online (not to mention maintenance effort) so I'm just going to republish them here, apologies for the duplication, you just never know when someone is going to find it useful via Google!