Kraft Kennedy | Technology Blog » MOSS

SharePoint Redirection Options in Upload and New Item Forms

Michael Fettner — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 17:57:34 +0000

When you click “New Item” in any SharePoint list or “Upload” in any document library, SharePoint sends you to a standard form for creating the new item. Behind the scenes, SharePoint also passes in two parameters to let the form know where to post the item and where to go after the item is posted. By leveraging these two parameters in the URL, you can make a link anywhere that posts data to any list and sends you someplace else when finished. This has come in handy for us when creating intranet home pages, as we can create a list of links to post data to custom lists, which sends the person back to the home page afterwards. Otherwise, the person would end up in the root of the list or library they submitted the item to. So we were able to easily meet a requirement that the person be directed back to the home page after submitting the item.

A SharePoint new item link is structured as follows:

https://intranet.doman.com/site/Lists/listname/NewForm.aspx?RootFolder=/site/Lists/listname&Source=https://intranet.domain.com

The two parameters of interest are RootFolder and Source. RootFolder tells SharePoint where to post the document. If it is removed from the URL then SharePoint will post data to the root of the list where newform.aspx is located. You could also specify the path to a subfolder there, and SharePoint would post to that subfolder. Source tells SharePoint where to go when the posting is complete. The source needs to be a place in the site collection. In the example link above it is back to the home page. If source is left out of the URL then SharePoint will just return you back to the root of the list afterwards.

By using these two parameters, you can create lists of links on a page rather than having to drop in web parts, and you will gain more flexibility in how the user experience and navigation work.

Useful Free Web Parts for SharePoint – Part 2

Michael Fettner — Sun, 24 Jan 2010 14:25:22 +0000

In a previous post, I discussed some useful free web parts for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0. In this article I’ll discuss two more very helpful solutions for building extranets in SharePoint and for building more advanced workflows in SharePoint Designer.

CKS Forms Based Authentication Solution

http://www.codeplex.com/CKS/Release/ProjectReleases.aspx?ReleaseId=17901

This is a free open-source solution which handles much of the complexity of building extranets in SharePoint. It has web parts for creating new SQL user accounts, for extranet users to manage their password, and for access requests and approvals. You used to have to use third-party software or a Visual Studio project for even just creating users in a SQL database. With this solution installed, all forms-based user management is done right through the SharePoint settings interface. The only thing you still have to do by hand is provision the database, and modify the web application web.config files to add a SQL authentication provider. This solution has been extremely helpful for us in building a few client extranets.

Useful Sharepoint Designer Custom Workflow Activities

http://spdactivities.codeplex.com/

This solution adds a bunch of activities to SharePoint Designer’s Workflow Designer. The activities are listed below. This has allowed us to easily create several workflows in SharePoint Designer without writing any code. In particular, we’ve been able to get around the problem where SharePoint form libraries show all submitted items to contributors by default. This is an issue when users are submitting forms with sensitive data, which should only be viewable by administrators. Rather than resorting to a code solution, you can create a workflow that simply “Grants Permission on Item” to the creator, and “Deletes List Item Permission Assignment” for the contributor group. Presumably the admin group would already have full access.

Send Email with HTTP File attachment – Allows sending emails with attachments retrieved using a web request
Send Email with List Item attachments – Allows sending list item attachments as files attached to an email
Start Another Workflow- Starts another workflow associated with a list item
Grant Permission on Item- Allows granting of specified permission level on a specified item
Delete List Item Permission Assigment- Allows deleting of specified permission level assignment for a given user
Reset List Permissions Inheritance – removes any unique permissions assigned to an item by inheriting list permissions
Is User a member of a SharePoint group- Checks if a given user is part of given SharePoint group
Is Role assigned to User – Checks if a user role is already assigned on the current list item
Lookup user info- allows to lookup properties in site’s user information list for a given login
Copy List Item Extended Activity – Allows copying/moving list items and files cross site.
Send Email Extended- Enhaced version of the OOTB activity. Allows you to specify the sender. Also does not break links in body.
Get InfoPath field inner text
Get InfoPath field inner xml
Set InfoPath field inner text
Set InfoPath field inner xml

Importing Employee Photos into MOSS 2007 MySites

Michael Fettner — Fri, 25 Dec 2009 14:36:10 +0000

Most of the information in an employee’s MySite profile comes from the Active Directory profile import, which is set up in the SharePoint Shared Service Provider. However, this can be tricky with employee photos since links to photos are not normally stored in Active Directory. An easy way around this if you don’t want to store the links in Active Directory, is to simply create a picture library in SharePoint and upload all of the employee photos to the picture library with a standard name, such as username.jpg. Then you can write a script to update each MySite profile and associate the photo with the person.

The code below is VB.Net code to interact with the SharePoint profile database by using the userprofilemanager class. This will update one profile, so it would need to be put in a loop to update all of the employee profiles.

'Objects for profile database

dim strUrl as string =

dim site as Microsoft.SharePoint.SPSite = new SPSite(strUrl)

dim sc as Microsoft.Office.Server.ServerContext = Microsoft.Office.Server.ServerContext.GetContext(site)

dim upm as UserProfileManager = new UserProfileManager(sc)
dim sAccount as string = "domain\username"
Dim u As UserProfile = upm.GetUserProfile(sAccount)        
if u.ProfileManager.Properties.GetPropertyByName("PictureURL") is nothing then
 'error code
else
 u("PictureURL").Value = '
 u.Commit
end if
Remember to also include the following assembly and namespace...
<%@ Assembly Name="Microsoft.Office.Server, Version=12.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=71e9bce111e9429c" %>
<%@ Import Namespace="Microsoft.Office.Server.UserProfiles" %>
If you import additional fields into the profile store, it may be necessary to also run a complete profile import and an incremental search index process to make sure that everything is up to date.  Future profile imports won't overwrite the PictureURL property, so all employee photos should be permanent.  The only drawback is that you will have to run the script for new users or manually enter their picture URL.

Searching iManage and OpenText from SharePoint

Michael Fettner — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 18:50:24 +0000

Autonomy iManage and OpenText eDocs both have protocol handlers for SharePoint, which enable the SharePoint Enterprise Search engine to index documents stored in the DMS, while keeping the documents in the DMS. Many people haven’t been aware of this and thought you had to migrate all of the documents into SharePoint to search them, or to use an enterprise search engine provided by the DMS vendor. However, these protocol handlers can provide the best of both worlds by allowing you to continue managing documents in the current DMS, while taking advantage of Microsoft’s FAST enterprise search indexer to index the DMS content, SharePoint content, file shares, web sites, Exchange public folders, and other enterprise systems. Security trimming is preserved by the protocol handler, so users will never see documents in the DMS that they don’t have access to. The protocol handlers both support Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007.

More information on the OpenText eDocs SharePoint integration and protocol handler can be found here:

http://www.opentext.com/download/livelinkdownload.html?path=product/microsoft/ot-clmsp-edocs-po.pdf

More information on the iManage SharePoint protocol handler can be found in their partner portal, by filtering the list of products to “SharePointProtocol Handler.” Note that you need a partner login account to download the documentation and release notes.

http://worksitesupport.interwoven.com/WorkSite/scripts/portal.aspx

Both vendors also offer a comprehensive set of web parts to drop into a SharePoint environment to view and manage their documents from within a SharePoint site.

Useful Free Web Parts for SharePoint

Michael Fettner — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 11:52:12 +0000

Windows SharePoint Services (WSS) doesn’t come with a whole lot of web parts out of the box, but here’s a few handy ones we’ve found to spice up some of the home pages we’ve built. These are all free and work with WSS.

Tim Heuer’s RSS Feed Reader
http://feedreader.codeplex.com/

Only MOSS comes with an RSS reader, and even that one can display only one feed. This web part is invaluable if you’re using WSS. This is the best free RSS feed web part that I’ve found, and it allows you to neatly pull multiple feeds next to each other.

Bamboo World Clock and Weather
http://store.bamboosolutions.com/pc-55-1-world-clock-and-weather-web-part.aspx

This web part neatly displays the weather in 3 cities side-by-side and can optionally display the time if they are in different time zones. This is a nice looking web part and tends to fit nicely on the right-hand side of a home page for a firm with multiple offices.

Amrein MSN Money Stock Quote
http://www.amrein.com/apps/page.asp?Q=5731

This web part displays stock quotes, company names, changes, and percent changes pulled from MSN Money. It’s the best free web part I’ve seen to do this, and will save a lot of time over trying to follow one of the examples online for doing this with a data view.

Matt Jimison’s Twitter Search Web Part
http://www.mattjimison.com/blog/2009/03/04/twitter-search-webpart/

This uses the twitter search API to search twitter based on the parameters you specify in the web part, and you can download the wsp or the source code from the web page.

Kraft & Kennedy Google Search Box
(Code below)

We’ve had a few instances where we were asked to put a Google search box on a SharePoint page. This can easily be accomplished by just inserting a content editor web part on the page and editing the HTML directly. You can paste in the following code, which includes JavaScript, to open a Google results page after the person enters a search term and presses enter or clicks a button. This is of course a simple approach–you could also federate search results in your search center to include Google–but this simple html code works well in many cases.

Search Google:

Using SharePoint as a DMS for a Law Firm

Michael Fettner — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 20:03:13 +0000

Whether or not SharePoint can be a viable DMS at a law firm has been a big point of contention in the legal community. A lot of this comes down to the mentality and size of the firm, and the specific requirements that the firm has for document management. With proper planning and one or two simple addins, SharePoint may be a viable DMS for certain firms that are flexible and willing to invest in a development effort.

The advantages of using SharePoint as a DMS are many:

Being able to wrap an intranet or extranet around all of your content.
Having basic matter management features available in every workspace, such as a shared calendar, task lists, and discussion threads.
Having access to document workflows.
Being able to search all of your repositories with Enterprise Search (available free with Microsoft Search Server Express.)
Being able to integrate business intelligence dashboards.
Providing access to web 2.0 features such as wikis, blogs, and personal sites.
Leveraging native Word features, and not having to rely on vendors to update their software to support the latest version of Office.

The main way to ensure a successful SharePoint deployment as a DMS is with proper planning. SharePoint can all too easily be deployed out of the box, with no oversight in place. While this may work out ok for an intranet, it spells disaster for a DMS. Thought should go initially into defining what content types are needed for the firm. Content types are similar to document types in a DMS, and allow for the classification of documents by defining metadata, retention rules, associated workflows, and starter templates. After defining content types, you would need to create a taxonomy, or hierarchy for all of your clients and matters. One structure that works in WSS is to create a team site for each client, and then a document library for each matter. We’ve successfully written scripts to create client and matter workspaces based on this approach, and to import documents from the file system into SharePoint. When a user saves their own document into SharePoint, they would drill down the client site to the matter library, and then simply have to choose a content type associated with the document.

The thing that seems to scare people the most is something architectural rather than functional—the fact that SharePoint stores files in SQL blobs, rather than in the file system. This causes fears that corrupt files will not be able to be recovered, or that disk costs will get expensive or lead to unmanageable databases. However, we should remember that there are plenty of excellent third-party solutions for doing backups and restores of SharePoint at the individual file level, as well as native backups and restores in SharePoint. Microsoft Exchange stores all of its messages in a database format, and no one has ever raised an eyebrow. The backup and restore process in SharePoint ends up being quite similar to Exchange. In fact, Exchange stores its data in the JET database engine, which is even less robust that SQL. Microsoft has also certified their enterprise search engine to be able to index 50 million documents in a single SharePoint repository, and SharePoint can manipulate files in SQL faster than a traditional DMS can manipulate the files on a file system. All in all, it is our belief that this architectural design of SharePoint should not be a contributing factor in determining whether or not SharePoint is viable.

There are also some additional differences to keep in mind if you’re used to a traditional DMS:

Re-filing is more difficult in SharePoint. Metadata will not automatically update if you move documents between different matter libraries, and you’ll need some additional user training or third-party software.
Document permissions may be harder to keep track of. It’s important for the administrator to correctly assign permissions at the site or library level, and for users to individually secure their documents if need be.
Some features are only available in MOSS, the licensed version of SharePoint, such as document trail auditing.
The user interface is completely different. The firm will need to be open to working differently and retraining users.
SharePoint does not natively number documents—it only creates a unique URL for each document. We recommend an inexpensive tool from MacroView Wisdom for doing unique document numbering. Also worth noting is that SharePoint 2010 is supposed to natively support unique document numbering.
While SharePoint libraries can be viewed in Outlook, messages cannot be dragged into a SharePoint folder in Outlook. We recommend another tool from MacroView Wisdom for email management in Outlook. In addition, SharePoint Workspace 2010, which is a full desktop client for SharePoint, may alleviate some of this need in 2010.

As firms look for creative ways to cut costs, while maintaining functionality, it will be interesting to see if SharePoint gains momentum as a DMS in the legal community.

SharePoint WorkSpace 2010 – Groove, plus a desktop client for SharePoint

Michael Fettner — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 17:18:39 +0000

I recently downloaded the technical preview of SharePoint WorkSpace 2010, but was disappointed to find out that I couldn’t test any of the SharePoint features. It’s only compatible with SharePoint 2010, so anyone interested in exploring all of the new features will have to wait a few more weeks/months until the technical preview of SharePoint 2010 is made public.

SharePoint Workspace 2010 is the next version of Groove, the collaboration software acquired by Microsoft in 2005. Groove 2007 was only superficially integrated into the Office Suite, and never got a large following, as it was included in only the most expensive versions of Office, and most people had no idea what it was. SharePoint WorkSpace 2010 will be included in Office 2010 Professional Plus, on the other hand, allowing it to expand to a wider audience. Additionally, it will integrate seamlessly with SharePoint 2010 and other Office products.

SharePoint Workspace 2010 allows for the creation of “SharePoint Workspaces” and “Classic Workspaces.” SharePoint Workspaces allow you to access all SharePoint site content on your computer, whether online or offline. This is an improvement over SharePoint 2007, where only document libraries and certain types of lists could be synched with Outlook. While you had to go into a library’s action menu in SharePoint 2007 to connect it to Outlook, you can now connect the SharePoint 2010 complete site to SharePoint WorkSpace by clicking Site Actions –> Sync to Computer. Alternatively, you can sync to a site from inside SharePoint WorkSpace by creating a SharePoint Workspace and specifying the url.

Classic Workspaces are the workspaces that were available in Groove. Users can create document libraries, discussion threads, calendars, and invite other users and chat inside the workspace. Classic workspaces use peer-to-peer technology to synchronize documents and files between users. That allows users in different companies, on different networks, to still collaborate quickly and securely.

SharePoint WorkSpace 2010: New WorkSpace Menu

SharePoint WorkSpace 2010 is pretty much two products in one–A full client for SharePoint with offline syncing, and a peer-to-peer collaboration tool for collaboration without the need for a server. The Groove technology in the classic workspaces looks pretty good in the technical preview, but we’ll have to wait a bit more until we can test all the new things, such as taking a whole SharePoint site offline, and checking in and out SharePoint documents from within SharePoint WorkSpace.

SharePoint WorkSpace 2010: WorkSpace View

Connecting SharePoint libraries to Outlook with stssync

Michael Fettner — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 23:16:36 +0000

Outlook 2003 and 2007 support a protocol called stssync, which allow SharePoint libraries to be viewed in Outlook. Outlook 2003 allows for read-only viewing, whereas Outlook 2007 also allows for two-way synching of certain content. The most common way of connecting to a SharePoint library is through the SharePoint Actions menu, as shown below.

Another way to distribute the connection to a user is by sharing it through an Outlook context menu. If you’ve already connected the library to Outlook, just right-click the folder in Outlook and choose “Share…”. Then you can choose the people you want to email the connection to. Anyone who receives the message will get an “Open” section in their “Share” ribbon in Outlook 2007, and can click to connect to or preview the library.

White these methods work well, they’re not efficient for distributing SharePoint connections to large numbers of people. Fortunately, you can write scripts that directly run stssync commands and then deploy those scripts to multiple users.

In a batch file, the command looks like:

start iexplore.exe stssync://sts/?ver=version&type=folder-type&cmd=command-name&base-url=sts-url&guid=the-guid&site-name=site-friendly-name&list-name=list-friendly-name&list-url=list-url&user-id=uid

You can repeat this command multiple times in the batch file for each library that you want to connect to.

Ver 1.0 is used for Outlook 2003, and ver 1.1 is used for Outlook 2007. The command fields are based on the properties of the library, with the only difficult one to find being the GUID. In order to find the GUID, you have to actually open the source code of the default web page for the library and search for the text “ExportHailStorm.” That javascript function includes the library’s GUID and other properties.

Additionally, if you roll out reg keys first according to this article (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/941836) then you can mark these libraries as trusted, and the user won’t get the Yes/No box asking if they want to connect the list to Outlook. Otherwise the user will be prompted for each list that you attempt to connect. By rolling out that reg key first, you can ensure a truly silent install.

This specification has some more details on the stssync protocol:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd587524(office.11).aspx

Internet Explorer Security Zone Settings for Pass-Thru Authentication to SharePoint

Michael Fettner — Sun, 09 Aug 2009 21:17:04 +0000

We often come across instances where firms are using NTLM Authentication (Windows integrated authentication) for SharePoint, and expect that Internet Explorer will automatically pass through the authentication from machines within the company, however they still get prompted for credentials. This issue exists with any IIS website, not just SharePoint, but seems to come up more frequently with SharePoint sites.

The solution revolves around checking the security zones in Internet Explorer, and ensuring that the SharePoint site is included in a zone that will pass through the authentication. Adding the site to “Trusted Sites” is often the first thought, however that does not work by itself, because “Trusted Sites” only pass the username, not the password, by default in Internet Explorer 7+. The better choice is to put the SharePoint site in the “Local Intranet” zone, as that’s the only zone which passes both the username and password by default. If “Trusted Sites” is used, an additional step is necessary beacuse you have to change the custom settings, find user authentication, and check the box to do an “automatic logon with current username and password.”

In order to add your SharePoint site into the “Local Intranet” zone, click Tools –> Internet Options in Internet Explorer. Then click Security –> Local Intranet –> Sites. Click “Advanced,” enter the URL of the SharePoint site, and click “Add.” You’ll notice that the zone name listed in the lower-right corner of the browser changes from “Internet” to “Local Intranet,” and you won’t be prompted for credentials anymore. Note that this type of pass through authentication is only supported by Internet Explorer, and requires that the computer be inside the corporate network.

Audience Targeting in Windows SharePoint Services 3.0, based on AD Groups

Michael Fettner — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 19:07:34 +0000

WSS does not have a user profile service and does not allow any kind of native targeting of content to users in different groups. This is one of the more serious limitations of WSS, especially for corporate intranets, where pages might need to be customized for users in different offices. MOSS, on the other hand, allows for the creation of audiences and easy targeting of content. As is typically the case with WSS, it is possible to achieve this functionality by writing code.

One way to do this is by adding a reference in your code to “System.DirectoryServices,” which allows you to query Active Directory. With that class, you can compare the current user to an Active Directory group’s membership collection, and add logic based on whether or not the user is in the group. If you plan to edit an aspx page directly, you will also have to add a page parser path in web.config, so that the code in the page will run. Rather than editing the page directly, it is often preferable to create a control or web part for security and manageability reasons.

If editing an aspg page directly in SharePoint Designer, just add the following line to the top of the page, so that the correct assembly is referenced.

<%@ Assembly Name="System.DirectoryServices, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a" %>

Then add a code block into the page that gets the current user and compares it to the group membership. The following example uses VB.Net and sees if the current user is in the “NY Staff” group. If so, then the script redirects to the page “NY.aspx.” Rather than redirecting, you could also add code to write out customized content based on the membership information.

Try 'Get group membership for current user Dim DomainUser As String = Replace(User.Identity.Name, "\", "/") Dim ADEntry As New System.DirectoryServices.DirectoryEntry("WinNT://" & DomainUser) Dim MembersCollection As Object 'Underlaying is a IADsMembers interface MembersCollection = ADEntry.Invoke("Groups") Dim group As Object 'IADsGroup interface Dim vFound As Boolean = False For Each group In MembersCollection If LCase(group.Name) = "ny staff" Then vFound = True Exit For End If Next 'Do something if group is found If vFound Then Response.redirect("NY.aspx") End If Catch ex As Exception 'response.write(ex.message) End Try%>