Adil Baig's Tech Blog

SharePoint 2013 config wizard - SQL 2012 - Alias confusions - 32-bit vs 64-bit

2015-12-31T23:56:00.000+05:30

So obviously you are trying to follow the vast plethora of what i call an over-experienced deployable product - aka SharePoint Server.
As its deployment and administration best practices traveled through time with multiple puddle of sh#t situations to getting ourselves up and learning something new in every version, when it first started in 2003 with WSS 2.0 to a wonder of a product that is 2013 now.

One of the biggest lesson learnt all these years in my experience with multiple clients and deployment was missing out the importance of SQL aliases and the impact it has on migration and custom code in your farm.

So you are a good implementer and like a good implementer would do, you are configuring SQL Aliases for your instance (default or named) before u can run that "Configuration wizard" of yours and see your baby finally come to life. But like many road blocks in planning and designing phase, you get one more when your wizard fails and it turns out it cannot see your configuration database server.

there can be three permutation and combination of situation here.

1. Either your SQL Server management studio 2012 would fail with

2. Or your SharePoint Configuration wizard fails with:

3. Or both.

The core of the problem here is that SQL core database services, though being a 64-bit service. Its client aka Management studio is not, but your SharePoint 2013 is!!

So lesson learnt is to create both 32-bit and 64-bit aliases to avoid confusions

Exterbal Links in SharePoint ASPMENU

2010-04-18T21:34:00.002+05:30

Hi Folks,
Back after a long time off blogging. Anyways, just a simple stupid thing I wanted to alert you with:
Many times you may have 2 or 3 or even 4 AspMenu controls on your master page. This is usually the case in Publishing Internet facing portal, when you have links on top and bottom of master page other than the default Site level AspMenu navigation. Ones like these below, that will point to external sites out of our environment like www.myCompany.com or www.Mypartners.com

(picture taken from www.thoughtworks.com)

Well, nothing much, only that if you go with your default developer tendancy to copy paste the existing providers to create new ones will, kind of, make you scratch your head for a while as to why the links are not showing up. It took me 3 foolish hours to actually realise that, I'd had too much of vodka the night before to not see such a simple thing :
All the existing SharePoint providers registered in web.config have securityTrimmingEnabled set to true
So if you are copy pasting the existing providers and planning to simply change the required properties like providername or sitemap file, then keep this at back of your head to change this node, basically take this out or else, it will act upon the sharepoint's default role based membership and people and group membership and not let any of the external links render. For more Info in this, check out SiteMap Navigation Security.

Simple, you see, just dont waste time like i did.

Lots of stuff coming up ahead, keep checking out....

Custom Field Fever!!!

2008-09-13T10:24:00.002+05:30

Suddenly, i see people so enthusiastic about "custom fields" that they want almost all kind of data retrieval through custom fields only!!..(You can read the comments on my custom fields post.)

From parent-child cascading drop-downs, to grandchild drop-down to why now even great great grand child drop-down??!!!. I am seeing people asking me to give solutions wherein i am sure they will end-up making half a dozen custom fields on one Item Edit page itself!!!

Some wants Custom data from a SQL store. Others from custom List lying in differnt Site Collection. Some even want data from Partners date in Oracle apps!! I Know, the idea of custom fields initially marvelled the new comers (which includes me too) and was even true in a specific real life case that i pointed out in my post. But custom fields are far more generic solutions that scopes to entire server deployment and I purely feel is not Intended to be used if there is only a particular List or library that demands this special type of data retrieval

My question here is, where have BDC gone?? WebParts are also brilliant solutions to many problems. Only that these guys should be used at right places.

Let say, so if you have a special data retrieval requirement wherein on first drop-down select, you want values in second drop down and on its select, in third and finally on its select. you want a group of 5 textboxes to be pre-populated. I feel, its not justice to WSS 3.0/MOSS if we are to conclude that this should be done through custom fields and thus demoralizing clients by quoting ,let say, 120$/Hr * 120 hrs = 1440$ of development time for nothing. Why the Hell they bought this ECM package that costed them lots of $s already.

Dont you think, webpart here would still be a better and more maintainable solution. The perfect recipe for such scenario would be "Custom Content Type + webpart on edit page"

This webpart can then have custom Oracle connection or SQL connection code to get that data in the wildest ways precievable. Or even, a better approach here would be using BDC object model to get data from thrid party stores or WSS object model to get it from other List of lists in different Site Collections.

Custom fields are good, but not at all a solution if your custom data retrieval logic restricts to only a particular List or Library. So guys, please dont end up making a latin american or indian family of custom field controls, every where!!, every time!!

(opinions expressed here are purely from my experience and have got nothing to do with microsoft SharePoint's best practices and guidelines. Please contact Andrew or Rob or other MVPs if there is a difference of opinion here)

WSS Workflow sample in detail

2008-09-11T12:33:00.001+05:30

Hi folks,

Recently I came across this excellent workflow lab on Robert Shelton's Blog. This is one of the finest and most detailed sample I've seen till date on net. Ideal for first timers in MOSS/WSS 3.0 workflow development.
Go get it Here

Pattrick, We will surely miss you.

2008-09-05T22:18:00.001+05:30

This is really shocking newz coming in to hear that the legend of SharePoint/.NET, one of the few better SharePoint developer, excellent presenter, brilliant author, instructor and most importantly a very humble helper Patrick Tissghem passed away unexpectedly.

I dont believe this, just a month back, he helped me crack a problem over IM. And now, he is gone.. forever......

Pattrick, we will miss you...... Always.........

Windows Server 2008 Step-by-Step Guides

2008-08-17T10:55:00.001+05:30

Excellent Post on Shelton Blog for System Engineers regarding various Windows Server 2008 How-Tos':

Here's what's available: (all in MS Word format)

Creating and Deploying Active Directory Rights Management Services Templates Step-by-Step Guide
Deploying Active Directory Rights Management Services in a Multiple Forest Environment Step-by-Step Guide
Deploying Active Directory Rights Management Services in an Extranet Step-by-Step Guide
Deploying Active Directory Rights Management Services with Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 Step-By-Step Guide
Deploying an Active Directory Rights Management Services Licensing-only Cluster Step-by-Step Guide
Deploying SSTP Remote Access Step by Step Guide
Removing Active Directory Rights Management Services Step-by-Step Guide
Server Manager Scenarios Step-by-Step Guide
Server Core Installation Option of Windows Server 2008 Step-By-Step Guide
Step by Step Guide to Customizing TS Web Access by Using Windows SharePoint Services
Step-by-Step Guide for Configuring a Two-Node File Server Failover Cluster in Windows Server 2008
Step-by-Step Guide for Configuring a Two-Node Print Server Failover Cluster in Windows Server 2008
Step-by-Step Guide for File Server Resource Manager in Windows Server 2008
Step-by-Step Guide for Storage Manager for SANs in Windows Server 2008
Step-by-Step Guide to Deploying Policies for Windows Firewall with Advanced Security
Step-by-Step Guide for Configuring Network Load Balancing with Terminal Services in Windows Server 2008
Step-by-Step Guide for Windows Deployment Services in Windows Server 2008
Using Identity Federation with Active Directory Rights Management Services Step-by-Step Guide
Windows Server 2008 Active Directory Certificate Services Step-By-Step Guide
Windows Server 2008 Foundation Network Guide
Windows Server 2008 Network Policy Server (NPS) Operations Guide
Windows Server 2008 Step-by-Step Guide for DNS in Small Networks
Windows Server 2008 TS Gateway Server Step-By-Step Setup Guide
Windows Server 2008 TS Licensing Step-By-Step Guide
Windows Server Active Directory Rights Management Services Step-by-Step Guide
Windows Server 2008 Terminal Services RemoteApp Step-by-Step Guide
Windows Server 2008 TS Session Broker Load Balancing Step-By-Step Guide

Download Here

White Paper on Developing Custom Application with Sharepoint Server 2007

2008-08-17T10:20:00.004+05:30

Here's a good paper on building Solutions with SharePoint/MOSS as container.

Brief Description

With a close look at a real-world example, learn how to build business solutions that leverage a broad range of Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 Enterprise capabilities.

Download Here

MSDNs' 10 part Webcasts Series

2008-07-24T10:24:00.002+05:30

These webcast's are for .NET developers who are new to SharePoint. Seriously, Rob and Andrew have done a good job here.

Certified Distributed Application developer!!!!

2008-07-21T15:08:00.002+05:30

Ok folks... Its time for a relatively long (might be 2-3 weeks) hibernation from blogging as I am preparing for my 70-529. Hope the self-paced training Kit helps this time.. it really helped last time for 70-528.

Wish me luck!! ..and some good content if you think can help me..you know where to ping me!!

Date Picker control for Sharepoints' ghosted application pages

2008-07-19T14:41:00.002+05:30

This was the thing, one of my client needed a ghosted application page available across site collections. The form, as usual, had data fields one of which happened to be Date field.
Well, no problem, we very well have Sharepoints' DateTimeControl to do that job, dont we??. Only when i was testing the form, when i realized that control needs the required Javascript files on the page. referencing /_layouts/DatePicker.js dint quite solved my problem. On little research, i found out, there were couple of more javascript files that needs to be referenced on the page. Couldn't exactly nail till now..which. I was still doing a little research on net, when i found this cool ASP.NET datepicker control on my hard drive. Hell, dont even now from where and when did i downloaded this thing, but its cool. It was a little raw. i Sharepoint-ized the control and decorated it a little bit and showed it to my client as a temporary fix asking for sometime till i knock how to get DateTimeControl working on ghosted application pages. But it seems my client found this control cooler than Sharepoints' DatePicker. Frankly, this guy is really cool. I have put this thing up here as a CodePlex project.

Multiple Performance and Infrastructure updates for (SharePoint) WSS 3.0

2008-07-17T09:49:00.003+05:30

Update from Shelton blog:

The office team has just released a Infrastructure and Performance update for Windows SharePoint Server 3.0 (WSS 3.0). Anything to improve the performance of SharePoint in my Virtual PC environment is welcome! My physical servers run beautifully, but running multiple Virtual PC’s on a dual-core laptop and trying to show demonstrations of SharePoint development can be a challenge at times. Enough about my problems and on to the links for both the 32bit (x86) and 64bit (x64) installations of WSS 3.0.

The first update addresses the following issues from KB951695:

The Infrastructure Update for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 (KB951695) includes the latest performance updates and fixes for Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services 3.0.
Key updates for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 include:
Platform performance improvements and fixes.
Several backup and restore fixes.
Several core Workflow fixes.
To download the 32bit version: Click here
To download the 64bit version: Click here
The second update addresses the following issues from KB951297:
The Infrastructure Update for Microsoft Office Servers (KB951297) includes several new Enterprise Search features for SharePoint Server 2007 and the latest performance updates and fixes for the Microsoft Office Servers listed in the system requirements section below.
Key updates for SharePoint Server 2007 include:
New Search features such as federated search and a unified search administration dashboard.
Several core fixes to Search to improve performance and scale.
Platform performance improvements and fixes.
Several core fixes to the publishing Content Deployment features to improve reliability.

Key updates for Project Server 2007 include:
Timesheets and My Tasks stability and usability improvements
Queue management user interface improvements
Project Server 2003 to Project Server 2007 migration fixes
Database performance improvements to enhance the cube building process and Project Professional Save/Publish scenarios
To download the 32bit version: Click here
To download the 64bit version: Click here

The Autopsy Series for WSS 3.0

2008-07-16T15:04:00.004+05:30

All this time, when i searched for custom list definition, always saw people telling to copy paste the schema.xml and do stupid useless changes (just for heck of explanation), like add a new calculated field or something, and then they say.."your new site definition is ready to rock-n-roll!!"..what the heck??.. very soon i will start a serious of post.. which i would call it:
The Autopsy series wherein i would explain tiniest of the thing i can understand at the remotest location in th CAML.

First stop.....Autopsy - List definition

Dynamic dropdown as webpart custom property

2008-07-16T10:40:00.002+05:30

Was searching for how to get dynamic dropdown as custom webpart property instead of a static enum based dropdown. I hit this post which was not quite what i was expecting to do. I mean, i was hoping for some other workaround. Custom Toolpart is like a "last-resort" thing for me here, still....

Cool Downloadable stuffs for Sharepoint

2008-07-16T09:45:00.003+05:30

Hey Guys, Eamon barker posted some cool stuffs he used in his SharePoint development, Over Here. i knew all o them, but Fiddler (a free HTTP debugger), its really cool.. thanx Mr. Barker... Cool Stuff!!
(You can download Fiddler from here)

List of LINQ Providers

2008-07-12T10:22:00.002+05:30

These are great list of Hyperlinks to other LINQ Providers. I will list them below, to save you many clicks, but you should look at Charlie Calvert’s blog, it’s pretty good (I have subscribed to his feed).

Here’s the list:

LINQ to Amazon

LINQ to Active Directory

LINQ to Bindable Sources (SyncLINQ)

LINQ over C# project

LINQ to CRM

LINQ To Geo - Language Integrated Query for Geospatial Data

LINQ to Excel

LINQ to Expressions(MetaLinq)

LINQ Extender (Toolkit for building LINQ Providers)

LINQ to Flickr

LINQ to Google

LINQ to Indexes (LINQ and i40)

LINQ to IQueryable (Matt Warren on Providers)

LINQ to Metaweb(freebase)

LINQ to MySQL, Oracle and PostgreSql (DbLinq)

LINQ to NCover

LINQ to Opf3

LINQ to Parallel (PLINQ)

LINQ to WMI

How to Videos: Windows Presentation Foundation

2008-07-12T10:15:00.003+05:30

I am starting to research Windows Presentation Foundation for a demonstration that I am working on and one of the resources that I was pointed to was the 3 videos that I am linking to below. In addition to that, there are some Virtual Labs, provided by Microsoft, that look promising. After I’ve gone through them, I will post the ones that I think are descent (from my perspective). In the meantime, check out these videos, when you have some time, especially the first one, if you are a beginner on the subject like I am.

Build a Standard WPF Application

8 minutes, 25 seconds

Creating Navigation Applications in WPF

11 minutes 45 seconds

Creating Animated Buttons in Blend

Hands on Labs for Developing Applications on WSS 3.0 (SharePoint)

2008-07-11T11:51:00.004+05:30

Here's a free set (10 of them) Hands on labs for Developing applications for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 using Visual Studio 2005 (they will also work for Visual Studio 2008).

Here's a overview of the labs:

A set of 10 Hands on Labs for developing Applications for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 with Visual Studio 2005. These labs are provided in C# and VB.NET languages. Each Hands on Lab is expected to take 60 minutes to complete and no SharePoint development experience is required. Participants are expected to have .NET development experience. The download includes lab manuals, completed lab exercises and any resource files required by the labs. The HOLs included are:
1. Web Parts
2. Data Lists
3. Event Handlers
4. Workflow
5. Silverlight
6. Page Navigation
7. Page Branding
8. Web Services
9. Content Types
10. User Authentication
To download the labs: Click here

Free utility: Windows Remote Desktop connection for the Apple Macintosh

2008-07-11T09:11:00.002+05:30

Hehe.. this is funny:

Remote Desktop Connection Client for Mac 2 lets you connect from your Macintosh computer to a Windows-based computer or to multiple Windows-based computers at the same time. After you have connected, you can work with applications and files on the
Windows-based computer.

To learn about what's new in Remote Desktop connection Client for Mac 2, please visit the Microsoft Web site at www.microsoft.com/mac.

Here’s the download location: Click here

SPSiteDataQuery Vs. CrossListQueryInfo

2008-07-09T14:26:00.004+05:30

No body really thought of comparing these two guys.. i heared people always comparing SPSiteDataQuery and PortalSiteMapProvider. Good post by Tone Stegeman:

When I was writing the querying part of the new Content By Type webpart that I will introduce shortly, I noticed there are 2 ways you can use to query SharePoint sites for content. The first is well known and described in a lot of articles on the web. In the method we use the SPSiteDataQuery object to get the data we want. Below you find an example.

    string lists = "<Lists BaseType=\"5\" />";

    string viewFields = "<FieldRef Name=\"Title\" />";

    string webs = "<Webs Scope=\"SiteCollection\" />";

    SPSiteDataQuery siteQuery = new SPSiteDataQuery();

    siteQuery.Lists = lists;

    siteQuery.ViewFields = viewFields;

    siteQuery.Webs = webs;

    results = SPContext.Current.Web.GetSiteData(siteQuery);

This query returns the title of all items in Issue lists in all sites in the current site collection. Nothing special here. This method of crawling for content works in both WSS and in MOSS. If you are running Microsoft Office SharePoint Servers, you can also use the CrossListQueryInfo object to query for content. The advantage is that SharePoint has a caching mechanism for the queries that you run. By
using CrossListQueryInfo, your webpart will use this caching mechanism. And you can also make use of audience targeting. See this link for more info.

The query of the previous example now looks like this:

    string lists = "<Lists BaseType=\"5\" />";

    string viewFields = "<FieldRef Name=\"Title\" /><FieldRef Name=\"ContentType\" />";

    string webs = "<Webs Scope=\"SiteCollection\" />";

    CrossListQueryInfo query = new CrossListQueryInfo();

    query.RowLimit = 100;

    query.WebUrl = SPContext.Current.Site.ServerRelativeUrl;

    query.Lists = lists;

    query.Webs = webs;

    query.Query = "<Where><Neq><FieldRef Name=\"ContentType\" /><Value Type=\"Text\"></Value></Neq></Where>";

    query.ViewFields = viewFields;

    CrossListQueryCache cache = new CrossListQueryCache(query);

    results = cache.GetSiteData(SPContext.Current.Site);

Please not that for this query I added a where statement to the query. This just checks for items that have a value in the ContentType field. If you don't specify a query, the GetSiteData method will generate an error message.

A warning if you are querying your sites using field names instead of IDs. When testing my Content By Type webpart, I started querying using the field names (SPField.InternalName) that I got from the site columns that are attached to the content type. I found that there are a number of issues with this. The internal name of the site columns are not exactly the same as the internal names of the fields that are used in the lists. This is caused by little differences in the site column features and the schema XML files for the lists. the Task content type for example contains a field with internal name "TaskDueDate" The Task lists in your sites however have a field called "DueDate". If you query using TaskDueDate, you will not get the results you expeect. Below you find these exceptions:

Task: TaskDueDate in content type is called DueDate in list
Task: TaskStatus in content type is called Status in list
Issue: IssueStatus in content type is called Status in list
Contact: EMail in content type is called Email in list
Picture: Comments in content type is called Description in list

So I ended up querying using the ID guid of the fields. This applies to both methods described above.

Video: Building Simple Custom Approval Workflows with InfoPath 2007

2008-07-09T09:44:00.003+05:30

I just found this little video on Microsoft.com Downloads. Building Approval Workflows with InfoPath is a topic that many people have asked me to do, but I haven't had the time, so I figured that since someone
else did it, I would "socialize" it via this blog.

Here's the download location: Click here

How to video: Building Web Parts with User Controls and AJAX

2008-07-09T09:18:00.002+05:30

The Ted Pattison group has released a video on how to build AJAX-enabled web parts, using a real-world example. It’s a video goes into some depth, considering the subject, and will shorten your learning process a bit, so I thought that it was worthy of sharing.

Here’s the overview (from the site):

Learn about building Office SharePoint Server Web Parts with user controls and AJAX. Walk through a real-world example of separating your UI from your code-behind, using user controls to create input panels. Also, learn about using the AJAX update panel.

To download the video: Click here

8 New ASP.NET How to videos

2008-07-08T22:49:00.003+05:30

The ASP.NET community has released some new videos for June, ranging from how to “Detect Browser Capabilities in ASP.NET Web Pages” to “Managing the look and feel of Silverlight 2 controls”. They always do a great job, so check these out when you get a chance!

How Do I: Map an ASP.NET Server Control to the Adaptor Used to Render It

In this video Chris Pels will show how to use a control adaptor to provide different renderings for an ASP.NET server control without actually changing the control itself. In this video, an ASP.NET BulletList control will be adapted to display each list item horizontally using <div> elements instead of the traditional <ul> elements. First, see how to create a class that inherits WebControlAdaptor and then implements the code to render the new list format. Next, learn how to map the new control adaptor to the ASP.NET ,server control in the .browser definition file. Then see how to use the new control adaptor on pages in a web site. Finally, learn how a control adaptor can be associated with either all browsers or specific types of browsers.

How Do I: Detect Browser Capabilities in ASP.NET Web Pages

In this video Chris Pels will show how to determine what capabilities a user’s browser has when viewing pages in an ASP.NET web site. First, learn how to access an instance of the HttpBrowserCapabilities object from the ASP.NET Request object associated with the web page request.
Next, see the different information available in the HttpBrowserCapabilities object such as the type of browser and whether the user’s browser supports JavaScript and Cookies. Then see an example of how to user this information about the user’s browser and determine if a crawler is accessing the web site so it can be redirected to a
crawler specific web page.

How Do I: Work with Nested Master Pages to Create Standard Content Layouts

In this video Chris Pels will show how to use nested master pages to create individual master pages that represent different standard content layouts for a web site. First, see how several major commercial web sites use a standard set of content layouts. Next, see how to nest a master page within another master page, and use the design time support in Visual Studio 2008. Then, learn the considerations for establishing a “page architecture” which represents the major types of content layout used in a sample web site. Once that definition is complete see how to structure the nested master pages so developers can then select a master page, resulting in a standardized and consistent display of content for a web site.

Using Styles and Templates to manage the look and feel of Silverlight 2 Controls

Using styles to tweak the look of Silverlight 2 Controls and Templates to totally change the appearance of Silverlight 2 Controls (Creating round buttons)

Programming a Full-Blown AJAX Enterprise Application in 20 Minutes

It is all about simplicity when programming next–generation, complex Asynchronous JavaScript and XML (AJAX) applications. In this webcast, we develop a fully blown AJAX enterprise application by dragging and dropping controls using Windows Forms Designer and the Gizmox Visual
WebGui (VWG) framework. We extend, customize, and invoke client resources, and we demonstrate how you can cut your development cycle by as much as 90 percent. Visual WebGui is open source, so you can dive into the code.

Web Application Projects vs. Web Site Projects in Visual Studio 2008

In this webcast, by request, we examine the differences between Web application projects and Web site projects in Microsoft Visual Studio 2008. We focus specifically on the reasons you would choose one over the other and explain how to make informed decisions when creating a Web solution. Come and see this death-defying cage match!

SQL Injection Code Analyzer

2008-07-08T22:16:00.002+05:30

Microsoft has just released a free utility to help developers
analyze ASP code for SQL Injection vulnerabilities. Earlier this year,
several public sites went down when hackers unleashed a series of bots
to find and exploit servers where developers did not correctly code
their applications/pages to prevent SQL Injection attacks.

Here’s what the utility offers (from the original page):

In
response to the recent mass SQL injection attacks, Microsoft has
developed a new static code analysis tool for finding SQL Injection
vulnerabilities in ASP code. Web developers can run the tool on their
ASP source code to identify the root cause of the attack and address
them to reduce their exposure to future attacks. The tool will scan ASP
source code and generate warnings related to first order and second
order SQL Injection vulnerabilities. The tool also provides annotation
support that can be used to improve the analysis of the code.

Here’s the download location: Click here

Newly Updated Tools for SharePoint Developers using Visual Studio 2008 (Version 1.2)

2008-07-08T09:37:00.002+05:30

Tools for developing custom SharePoint applications: Visual Studio project templates for Web Parts, site definitions, and list definitions; and a stand-alone utility program, the SharePoint Solution Generator.

The User Guide for this tool can be found here: Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 Tools: Visual Studio 2005 Extensions User Guide, Version 1.1

The 1.1 version can be found here for Visual Studio 2005 support: Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 Tools: Visual Studio 2005 Extensions, Version 1.1

Version 1.2 of the Visual Studio 2008 Extensions for Windows SharePoint Services contains the following tools to aid developers in building SharePoint applications:

Visual Studio 2008 Project Templates

Web Part
Team Site Definition
Blank Site Definition
List Definition
Empty SharePoint Project

Visual Studio 2008 Item Templates (items that can be added into an existing project)
Web Part
Custom Field
List Definition (with optional Event Receiver)
Content Type (with optional Event Receiver)
Module
List Instance
List Event Handler
Template

SharePoint Solution Generator
This stand-alone program generates a Site Definition project from an existing SharePoint site. The program enables developers to use the browser and Microsoft Office SharePoint Designer to customize the content of their sites before creating code by using Visual Studio.

Note: This download does not work with an x64 OS. We currently recommend a x86 development machine for SharePoint development when targeting x64 OS for test and production. Output binaries are all .NET assemblies so you can reasonably expect all .NET assemblies built on the x86 dev box to still work on your x86 OS test and production machines. The CLR will JIT compile the .NET assembly on each target machine and will optimize for x64 OS when run on that architecture. Testing on x64 after doing development on x86 is still recommended.

Here’s the download location: Click here

Get Current User for Infopath and set file name - PART II

2008-07-04T11:17:00.017+05:30

In Last Post, we saw that how we get the current users' profile in form open.
In this post, we'll see how to save the Infopath Form in Library with a predefined file name formed from the fields. In our case, we'll have it is:

productName_ExpectedDate_CurrentUser

1. So, lets get back to our ProductRequestForm.xsn:

2. In browser forms by default, we have the options on the top to Save, Save As.., Update, PrintView,etc:

When you say Save, it gives you a pop for file name:

This is something you dont want if you are to save the file with predefined name.

3. In the Infopath Form (in design mode), Go to Tools -> Form Options -> Browser and uncheck Show toolbar at top of form and Show toolbar at bottom of form and check refresh the form before submitting it if form data might change during processing

4. Now we'll come on the Save and Cancel buttons we'd put on the form before. What we want here is on click of the save button, we want the file to be saved with the format as mentioned by concatenating the form field Data. For this we had to write some rules. Before that, we'll create a Submit Data Connection. Go to Design Tasks -> Data Source -> Manage Data Connections... -> Add... to open the Data Connection Wizard.

     a. Choose Create a new connection to: Submit data

     b. From Destination, choose To a document library on a Sharepoint site

     c. Here, Enter the full Library URL and click on the formula builder: 'fx' button and from the Main data source, choose filename field

     d. Name your connection as SetFileNameSubmit and click Finish to have the submit connection ready.

5. Now we'll come on to Save button and set some Rules.
Right Click the Save Button -> Button Properties... -> Rules -> Add..., give a name for the rule, say, SaveFileName and click Set Condition... to open a Condition Filter Dialog and set the query as below:

This is to ensure that the user has entered the right values before the save could proceed. As can be seen, if any of the one query is not satisfied, the save button wont proceed

6. Now, if everything is fine and the query is fulfilled, then we would like to add the Save form and close action. However, before this could be done, if you remember, we had just made a Submit data source and had chosen fileName field to be the name of the file. But for this, there has to be some value in that field before it could be used as a fileName.
Lets go ahead and add a Set a field's value action.

In "Field:" text box, select fileName field from the Main data Source and in "Value:" text box, choose the 'fx' (formula builder). Enter a formula to concatenate the fields' values:
concat(products,"_",expectedDate,"_",CurrentUserName) like this:

NOTE: the Underlined field are result of select from Insert Field or Group... from Main Data Source

7. Click Ok, to come back on the main Rule Dialog. Now there is a catch here that has different ways of going about. When we save the form, its all ok and the form is saved with desired name. But if someone reopens the form and change the values of the fields involved in file naming, infopath is not intelligent enough to understand this and rename the file. Instead, it creates a new copy with newer values. For this:

     a. Either we lock the fields that are dynamically forming the fileName on the first Virgin Save so that the consequent modifications ensures that these fields are not changed and hence the file name.
          OR
     b. We knock off the old file through Querying with CAML either in Library's Item Event Handlers or some other place that you find more feasible.

I choose to lock the fields after the file is saved and hence we created a field in the Main data source called IsFormLocked. We'll go ahead and set this field value to TRUE or 1 and then set Conditional Formatting on the controls to disable on open if they found value of this field as TRUE or 1. This will ensure that the values are never changed

8. Now add two more Actions to
   a. Submit using a Data Connection and choose SetFileNameSubmit connection we just created.

9. Finally add an action called Close the Form.
Your action list for this rule should look something like this:

10. Also set simple Close the form action for Cancel Button.

11. Now, in each of the controls'properties (those involved in setting the file name), set a Right Click the Control -> Conditional Formatting... -> Add... -> , set a Query like below to disable the control:

you would need to repeat this for controls mapped to each of these:products, expectedDate, CurrentUserName.
NOTE: for textbox and Datepicker, it would be read-Only

12. Also, if you rememeber, we had also made a section that had an error message in Red, we'll show this section when Button Save Query is not fullfiled. Or in other words, hide the control when Query is fulfilled.

13. For this go to the Section, Right Click -> Conditional Formatting... -> Add... and set the following query and select Hide this Control:

14. Now click on the Design Task -> Design Checker to see if there is any error. you might see one message saying Data connection contains parameterized query. Well, its nothing. its only saying that one of your receive connections needs a parameter and if you still remember, its the one that consumes UserProfileService.asmx

15. Now, i guess, we are good to go. Save the form and Publish it to SharePoint Library. I published it to a new document Library called Product Request Form Libary. You can do it to an existing library also. In any case, make sure the library is same as the one you entered in the textbox in the create new submit data connection wizard. The submit connection that we named here as SetFileNameSubmit

NOTE: Make sure that in Settings -> Form Library Settings -> Advanced Settings in Browser-enabled Documents section, Display as a web page is selected.

16. Now create a new Form item:

17. You'd see form open in browser like this:

fill in the appropiate details and see the error message go away.

18. Finally when you click save, you'd see the form item with the file name in the desired format as below:

      So, in these two post, we saw how can we get current users' identity when form opens and also, how to give you form, a predefined file name.