Doug Ware

Meta: Attributes in Page Layouts Provisioned by Features are Unghosted (Customized)

2012-01-18T19:53:19Z

Body: One of my clients was having an issue where solution upgrade or redeployment didn't change certain page layouts. I checked the CustomizedPageStatus property of the affected layouts and it said they are customized. However, they had not actually been customized. I activated the problem feature in another environment. Much to my surprise, the particular layouts indicated that they were customized immediately based on the provisioning for the module! I didn't see any difference between...(read more)

Monkey Patching and SharePoint / Office 365

2012-01-06T02:03:00Z

Body: This post is a prelude for the one to follow in which I will show an application of this technique that overrides the workspace sizing routine in SharePoint 2010. JavaScript is a wonderful language. It is easily accessible to anyone who understands C style syntax. This includes C# developers. However JavaScript is a dynamic language. In my experience most C# developers write poor JavaScript in a style that is appropriate to C#. However, getting the most out of SharePoint requires a good understanding...(read more)

I am a SharePoint Server MVP!

2011-12-04T19:58:00Z

Body: The last couple of months have been extremely busy for me; a demanding client, Cub Scout den leader activities, user group stuff, and life in general! The best proof of this? I was awarded the MVP award for SharePoint Server while on a Cub Scout camping trip at the beginning of October and I am just now blogging about it. Not a good way to start… ;) I am extremely grateful to be an MVP again! This is the second product for which I have been awarded; Access was the first waaay back in...(read more)

Using the People Picker Control in Sandbox Solutions / Office 365

2011-09-23T16:09:00Z

Body: The SharePoint sandbox does not allow you to use the Microsoft.SharePoint.WebControls namespace in your code. This means you can't instantiate objects from classes in that namespace or automate existing object instances of classes in that namespace. Because of this restriction, the MSDN documentation for PeopleEditor you will see the following: Sandbox is a Server Thing As I wrote above, this restriction is enforced by the sandbox. Available in Sandboxed Solutions: No means you can't...(read more)

jQuery Plugin to Display SharePoint 2010 List Views

2011-08-30T13:39:00Z

Body: I'm working on a new line of products for SharePoint Online / Office 365. A few of the pages need to display list views whose locations are unknown at design time – the lists are created on the fly and can have any title and a single page displays a view based on what the user chooses. This means that I can't use a data view Web Part because it is tied to a specific list and view. RenderAsHtml My first attempt involved the use of the RenderAsHtml method of SPList and SPView. The...(read more)

Tip: Debugging Feature Event Receivers in SharePoint Sandbox Solutions

2011-08-05T13:39:00Z

Body: I accidently discovered this yesterday and thought I'd share. If only this same technique worked with farm solutions… If you've done any sandbox development you have probably had many moments when you pressed F5 to start debugging or done Build|Deploy only to see a failure because one of your feature receivers threw an error. To debug these problems in farm mode, you attach the debugger and then try to activate the feature via the site, PowerShell, or stsadm. It's kind of...(read more)

Hiding a SharePoint Ribbon Button with CSS

2011-08-02T16:17:35Z

Body: I spent far too long this morning trying to hide a single ribbon button on a single page. The page is part of a sandbox solution so I couldn't do the work server side, and because the page was a one-off in a library I didn't want to use a HideCustomAction. My first attempt was CSS, but that didn't work. I assumed (incorrectly) that the reason my style didn't stick was because the ribbon's JavaScript was toggling the display. The problem turned out to be that I didn't...(read more)

Office 365/SharePoint Sandbox Service Pages in Action – Autocomplete Text Boxes

2011-07-26T11:38:00Z

Body: A couple weeks ago I wrote about an Unorthodox Architecture for Services in SharePoint Sandbox Solutions and Office 365 . This post is about an application of this architecture to create an autocomplete text box using jQuery UI. An autocomplete field looks like this: It is a great alternative to the stock lookup field UI when the source list of the lookup field has a large amount of data. With hundreds of items the standard dropdown list just isn't a good experience. The jQuery Autocomplete...(read more)

How Office 365 Made Me Hate My Windows 7 Phone

2011-07-17T17:44:20Z

Body: I had a hard time deciding on a title for this post. The experience I am going through is just ridiculous on so many levels and there is a lot of hate to go around. SharePoint Online in Office 365 uses claims based authentication which is cool, and it supports federated authentication and trust to let you use your corporate credentials which is even cooler. Microsoft has been a leader in this space for a long time and everyone I know has a Live ID. However, for reasons that are unexplained...(read more)

Unorthodox Architecture for Services in SharePoint Sandbox Solutions and Office 365

2011-07-15T17:12:00Z

Body: These days we are spending a lot of time on a series of sandbox applications that will run on Office 365. If you are a follower of this blog you know I was more than a bit disappointed in the restrictions the SharePoint 2010 sandbox implementation imposes. However, if you want to play in the sandbox, you can either just say no to requirements that aren't directly supported, or you can earn your money and get creative! I've been getting creative. These applications are going to be great...(read more)

Screen Scraped Authentication to Office 365 and SharePoint Online

2011-07-01T20:25:37Z

Body: Way back in April, Microsoft published a very good article by Robert Bogue entitled Remote Authentication in SharePoint Online Using Claims-Based Authentication . This article describes one way to get the FedAuth cookie required to talk to SharePoint online via any of its many interfaces. While the article is very informative and the associated code works, I didn't like the implementation as it involved the web browser control and PInvoke (The former has a lot of overhead, the latter requires...(read more)

SharePoint Security and the Object Model – Part 3

2011-07-01T16:52:33Z

Body: Authorization and Access Control – Evaluating Permissions This is the third part of a three part post on security object model basics in SharePoint. The other posts are: SharePoint Security and the Object Model – Part 1 and SharePoint Security and the Object Model – Part 2 . The first post covers users and groups, the second post covers the mechanics of defining and applying permissions. This post is about using and applying user, groups, and permissions to control the user's access and...(read more)

Serialization in Sandbox Solutions

2011-06-03T15:06:38Z

Body: If you have the pleasure of writing sandbox solutions, perhaps for Office365, you know that doing so involves a wide variety of creative workarounds. Serialization is one area where this creativity comes into play. The problem with the XMLSerializer is that it creates and loads a serialization assembly on the fly. This doesn't work in the sandbox. A good discussion and one solution to this problem is discussed here: Using the Application Setting Manager in Sandboxed Solutions . An alternative...(read more)

Creating List Indexes with the SharePoint Object Model

2011-06-02T14:18:55Z

Body: Many scenarios in SharePoint 2010 require you to create indexes on lists – e.g. enforcing unique values, CAML joins, and referential integrity. I was writing some code yesterday that needed an index and I wasn't able to find a sample – so I figured I'd put up a quick post. Before you get started, understand that you can only index certain field types and that compound indexes are even more restricted. See this page for the types of indexable fields: Metadata Navigation and Filtering...(read more)

Atlanta Code Camp 2011–June 25

2011-06-01T14:32:08Z

Body: At long last, we're happy to announce the 2011 edition of the Atlanta Code Camp which will be held at the Southern Polytechnic State University . Event Details Call for Speakers: click here Registration: click here Date: Saturday, June 25 th Registration Time: 7:45AM to 8:30AM Time: 8:30AM to 5:30PM Location: Southern Polytechnic State University in Marietta, GA Address: 1100 South Marietta Parkway, Marietta, GA 30060 ( directions ) Cost: This event is free to everyone that wishes to attend...(read more)