SharePoint Kings

Connectable web parts in MOSS / SharePoint 2010

noreply@blogger.com (SharePoint Kings) — Thu, 24 May 2012 06:28:00 +0000

Well I thought for a while and saw that we have still not covered a basic topic that is how to connect two different custom web parts with custom properties.

So here we are explaining you how to connect two web parts.

In web part connection we have two types of web part. One is the provider web part and the other is consumer web part.

Provider web part sends a property which is received by the consumer web part and then processed in a code.

Create new empty project give it a name connectabewebpart.

Add as a farm solution and then click on add item. Point to an Interface.

We need to add interface as this interface will be implemented by provider web part. We have to define all the properties in this interface which we want provider web part to be able to send to consumer web part.

I am going to have one single property called OrderNumber just for demonstration purpose.

Define an interface like this. We are declaring one property called OrderNumber.

Now we are going to add new item to the project and select type web part and call it OrderNumberProviderWebPart.

Now this web part class must implement interface that we defined. So let’s implement this interface in provider class.

Now because we implemented interface, we need to define property which is declared in the interface.

So we have defined local variable and public property with the same name. Plus we have decorated that property with several attribute so that we can set the property with editor pane when we edit the web part. The property is set to have shared behavior.

Then we have defined one very important method which returns the interface and able to pass on this property which we defined as connection provider attribute of the method.

So here is a complete code for connection provider web part.

Now we are going to add consumer web part. So add new item, add web part. Call it OrderNumberConsumerWebPart. Now this web part will not implement interface. We need to declare a local variable which will receive the order number from provider.

So we’ve added a local variable called providedordernumber.

We need to define a method which has connectionconsumer attribute with property name that is defined in an interface. Parameter will be an interface which has that property that can be set to a local variable.

And then in create child control method we are showing the provided order number. Here is a code.

We are done with creating both web parts. It’s time to deploy them and check how they work.

I have deployed both web parts and I am on a page where I want to add them. Click to add web part.

Go to custom tab and you’ll find both web parts there. Add them wherever you want on a page.

Now we have something like this.

Edit the provider web part and set order number in editor part.

Now we need to send this order number to consumer web part. Either you can send from provider to consumer or you can receive from provider in consumer. Both way works.

Once you set that you are done with connecting two web parts.

Set default field value using SharePoint Designer

noreply@blogger.com (SharePoint Kings) — Thu, 17 May 2012 05:46:00 +0000

We can set a default field value in SharePoint. But if we want to pass a field value with parameter and then set field value then we have several option. One of them if use jQuery and set the field.

The other one is the one that I am going to show you in this post and that is through SharePoint Designer.

I have one dummy list just to show you how this work. This list has two dates. One start date and the other end date. We are going to pass two dates as parameters and then set those dates with the values. Both are date time fields.

The idea is those two dates should be disabled and cannot be edited by the end user plus they should have default value set passed by query string.

Now open SharePoint Designer 2010 and connect with the site. Note that this can also be done using Designer 2007 for MOSS 2007 / WSS 3.0 sites.

We are going to create a new form and have that new form as default new form. We will not make any changes to the actual new form.

Click on New

Configure properties like this

Now we have set the new item form for us and we have made it default form for new item instead of built in newform.aspx

Now click on that new item form that we’ve just created.

Page opens in HTML and design view. Now the idea is we need to remove the entire web part and to remove it. Select the entire web part and click delete that web part.

You will have something like this

Place cursor where highlighted and then click on Insert tab, custom list form.

Select Default Value Check list and new form and then click on ok. We are adding custom list new form now on this page instead of the default new page.

Now you’ll get this

Select start date and change it to a text box, do that same for end date.

You will observe a change in HTML code. Both have turned in to textboxes now.

Select both textboxes and check properties and select enabled to false for start date and end date.

We are yet not done with this. We now have to create parameters first. First save the form.

Click on options and the parameters from the ribbon

We need to create two parameters one for start date and the other for end date.

Configure it like this

Now we need to set these parameters with start date and end date fields on the form. Locate the start date text box in HTML and check out the text property.

Change it to this. This is the name of the query string and not the query string variable. Query string variable needs to be passed in URL.

Do the same for end date.

Save the form now.

And now go back to actual form via browser and pass on Start and End as parameters and you are done.

How Modify MasterPage or Pagelayout programmatically? (Especially when it is in use)

noreply@blogger.com (SharePoint Kings) — Tue, 15 May 2012 14:57:00 +0000

Most of the time we are using SharePoint Designer for master page and page layout deployment, which is fine for first time going live because for the first time we mostly used backup restore or other stuff.

But problem occurs when you want to update master page or page layout in subsequent release. We can do that easily with SharePoint designer but some unlucky fellow like us who do not have access to production will have to find some workaround for that. And if master page and Page Layout being used then it will not allow to delete and add it again.

Here are simple steps what we had done

Add physical copy of master page/page layout in your project (or put it in 14 hive)
Create a feature receiver which will read that file added in 14 hive, read as binary stream.
Find master page in master page gallery (_catalog folder)
If (not found) then add new master page/layout (will be used for first time deployment)
If (found) then open/read master page/layout from library

Check out

Open as binary form and copy binary object from physical copy

Commit transection, so new version will be added for master page/layout.

Check in

Publish

This way if master page is currently used in site or page layout has been used any of the page you can easily update it from code.

It will not require access to production. You can add feature receiver in WSP and activate it on deployment; and you are done.

We will provide code snippet for this soon :)

Workflow Event handlers in SharePoint 2010

noreply@blogger.com (SharePoint Kings) — Mon, 14 May 2012 06:23:00 +0000

In SharePoint 2010, we now have new receivers and one of them is workflow event receivers. We can handle different events with respect to the workflows that triggers in SharePoint.

You can handle multiple events with regards to the workflow. These are:

1) When workflow is starting

2) When workflow is started

3) When workflow is completed

4) When workflow is postponed

As name suggests you can trap different events of the workflow.

These come handy if you have requirement to start series of workflow based on completion criteria from one workflow to another. If one workflow completes and then you want to start another workflow in chain, that can be done now by trapping these events.

This is only for list or library workflows and not for the site workflow.

Here is an example with code.

/// <summary>

/// List Workflow Events

/// </summary>

public class EventReceiver1 : SPWorkflowEventReceiver

{

/// <summary>

/// A workflow is starting.

/// </summary>

public override void WorkflowStarting(SPWorkflowEventProperties properties)

{

SPWeb Web = properties.ActivationProperties.List.ParentWeb;

SPList lstTracking = Web.Lists["Track Different Events"];

SPListItem item = lstTracking.Items.Add();

item["Title"] = "Starting the workflow";

item.Update();

}

/// <summary>

/// A workflow was started.

/// </summary>

public override void WorkflowStarted(SPWorkflowEventProperties properties)

{

using (SPSite site = new SPSite(properties.WebUrl))

{

using (SPWeb Web = site.OpenWeb())

{

SPList lstTracking = Web.Lists["Track Different Events"];

SPListItem item = lstTracking.Items.Add();

item["Title"] = "workflow has been started";

item.Update();

}

/// <summary>

/// A workflow was completed.

/// </summary>

public override void WorkflowCompleted(SPWorkflowEventProperties properties)

{

using (SPSite site = new SPSite(properties.WebUrl))

{

using (SPWeb Web = site.OpenWeb())

{

SPList lstTracking = Web.Lists["Track Different Events"];

SPListItem item = lstTracking.Items.Add();

item["Title"] = "workflow has been completed";

item.Update();

}

You can also handle several completion type enumerations in WorkflowCompleted method that helps you to execute certain code based on the completion criteria.

You can also check completion type enumerations in WorkflowCompleted method.

Site Workflow in SharePoint 2010

noreply@blogger.com (SharePoint Kings) — Thu, 10 May 2012 08:41:00 +0000

In SharePoint 2010 we now have a new workflow which is site workflow. Just like how we can set a workflow on list, library and content type, now we can associate a workflow with the site.

Site workflow is different than list or library level workflow as it has advantages over them.

It can run on different libraries, different lists, and different items at the same time. We can check in, check out a document in one library, create an item in list, capture version of document set all in one workflow.

Other advantage is those site workflows are always triggered manually through site workflow link from view all site content page. The link to start the individual site workflow can be placed on any page as it does not involve any dynamic parameter.

If your site workflow has a requirement of interacting with user, then the form will be in InfoPath. Hence we can always go ahead and make changes to InfoPath form that workflow creates.

There are certain limitations of site workflow though. It cannot be created in Visio. Some actions related to current item are not available while creating site workflow

We would be diving into creating a site workflow and then test it how it works. I am taking a very simple example of creating orders with few fields. Real business scenario can simple be anything.

I’ve got a list called orders.

Now we are going to go and open our SharePoint Designer 2010. Connect with your site. click on workflows and then click on site workflows from ribbon.

Click on create list item in workflow designer.

Now before starting on this, we need certain parameters to start with. The form will have these parameters so that user can enter values in them and then those get inserted to the orders list.

Click on Initiate parameters from the ribbon.

Enter names of the parameters. These will be similar to our fields in the list.

In this way, define all four parameters.

So at the end, you should have something like this.

Now click on create list link and that will open up a dialog which allows us to select the list

where we want to create an item and then bind parameters to the fields from that list.

In this way associate all parameters to its respective fields.

At the end you should have something like this

Save and publish the workflow. Open the site and click on view all site content.

Click on site workflow.

You will find our workflow that we’ve just created.

Click on the order enter workflow and you’ll be presented with the form. You can copy and use this URL wherever you want as it is a static URL to this workflow form.

Enter the values and you’ll see that workflow starts and then ends and at the end it creates an entry in orders list.

Now you must be wondering this form does not look good. If you observe the workflow settings page in designer, you can see one xsn InfoPath form has been created for us by Designer.

Click on that form to open in InfoPath to modify.

I’ve modified the form in this. Now save and publish back to the same location.

Try to start the site workflow now and you will see modified form this time.

I hope this will help to create site workflow. Do let us know if you have any questions or face any issues.

Result is out

noreply@blogger.com (SharePoint Kings) — Tue, 08 May 2012 05:49:00 +0000

Finally result is out

Add summary task to task list programatically

noreply@blogger.com (SharePoint Kings) — Wed, 02 May 2012 07:50:00 +0000

When we add summary task we need to ensure that we add it as a folder because summary task is not the alone list item type. it is actually a folder which contains another sub tasks.

Hence we can add summary task like this. I am taking an example of button click.

protected void btnAddSummaryTask_Click(Object sender, EventArgs e)
{
SPList myList = SPContext.Current.Web.Lists["Tasks"];
SPContentType type = myList.ContentTypes["Summary Task"];
SPListItem newItem = myList.Items.Add("{site url}/Lists/Tasks", SPFileSystemObjectType.Folder, "Summary Task Title");
newItem["ContentTypeId"] = type.Id;
newItem["Body"] = "This is a sample description";
//Set another fields as needed.
newItem.Update();
}

Working with Chart web part in SharePoint 2010

noreply@blogger.com (SharePoint Kings) — Mon, 30 Apr 2012 04:16:00 +0000

One of the lacking feature in MOSS 2007 was not having functionality to draw chart based on various sources even not with list.

Now with SharePoint 2010, we can draw chart not only from lists but also from various sources like SQL server or excel for example.

In this post, I am going to demonstrate you a way to draw chart using list by using SharePoint Chart web part.

I have a list in my site with following data. Data is only shown for an example. Real scenario can be different based on business need.

Find and add chart web part to a page.

The moment you add chart web part, you get something like this

Click on data and appearances. It gives you two options, connect with the data and customize your chart.

Click on connect chart to data. You get an option to get the data from list, BDC, excel or another web part. Select list.

Advantage is you not only can select list from the same site but from the entire site collection.

You get a screen showing data from the list. You can also set the filter option as mentioned in a screen shot. It allows you to return only limited number of data from the list if you wish to. You can also preview it. I am leaving it empty.

Now you are on a screen where you can actually bind the data with the chart web part. Here we can select type of chart, columns for x and y axes, labels for the chart, Grouping option etc.

Click on finish. Bingo!! We now have a chart on our page.

But still it does not give proper picture. So let us go ahead and now click on advanced properties.

You can set various properties here. You can change back ground color, gradient style, hatch style, skin style, change the palette.

You can check out different options from left hand side which also allows you to show legends, 2D or 3D chart.

You can also show labels of data.

If you would like to have connection for the chart web part, you can also use content menu and then configuring data section.

Now if you go back to data and appearances and click on customize the chart, you get an option to select a chart type from range of different chart types.

And then you can follow the same procedure to configure the chart the way you want.

The best part is the chart web part is dynamic, means any changes to the data or any addition to the data gets reflected automatically

Let’s change our existing list data and add one more list item.

I changed February data from 1670 to 2500 and added one more list item for September month.

I hope you like this post. Keep exploring chart web part which is definitely a welcome addition to SharePoint 2010.

Implement SharePoint 2010 Site event receivers

noreply@blogger.com (SharePoint Kings) — Mon, 23 Apr 2012 05:53:00 +0000

In SharePoint 2010 we now have a new type of receiver which is related to site. We now can track when a web is adding, provisioned, moving, moved, deleting and deleted.

All receivers that end with ing are synchronous and those which ends with ed are asynchronous.

So let us go ahead and explore some of the receiver types and try to understand how it works.

Open up visual studio 2010 and select SharePoint 2010 and select event receivers in the template type.

Connect with the site and select farm solution.

Select Web receivers from the list. Let us select these four options and explore them. Rest you can check on your own and let us know if you face any issue.

You then will be presented with four receivers.

Go ahead and add following code in each of them. Now build and deploy the solution. And now try creating site, and then delete the site.

public override void WebDeleting(SPWebEventProperties properties)

{

//This code actually triggers for sub sites that is being deleted. Hence we have taken reference of parent web to write the entry.

SPList lstTracking = properties.Web.ParentWeb.Lists["Track Different Events"];

properties.Web.ParentWeb.AllowUnsafeUpdates = true;

SPListItem item = lstTracking.Items.Add();

item["Title"] = "Deleting the Web";

item.Update();

properties.Web.ParentWeb.AllowUnsafeUpdates = false;

}

///

/// A site is being provisioned.

///

public override void WebAdding(SPWebEventProperties properties)

{

//This handler will trigger at the time of web being added as a sub site. Track Different Events list is in the parent site.

SPList lstTracking = properties.Web.Lists["Track Different Events"];

properties.Web.AllowUnsafeUpdates = true;

SPListItem item = lstTracking.Items.Add();

item["Title"] = "Adding the Web";

item.Update();

properties.Web.AllowUnsafeUpdates = false;

}

///

/// A site was deleted.

///

public override void WebDeleted(SPWebEventProperties properties)

{

//This code actually triggers for sub sites that is deleted. Hence we have taken reference of parent web to write the entry by

//instantiating SPSite. properties.Web returns null as web has been deleted by this time.

SPSite site = new SPSite("");

SPWeb web = site.AllWebs["ECMA"];

SPList lstTracking = web.Lists["Track Different Events"];

web.AllowUnsafeUpdates = true;

SPListItem item = lstTracking.Items.Add();

item["Title"] = "Web has been deleted";

item.Update();

web.AllowUnsafeUpdates = false;

}

///

/// A site was provisioned.

///

public override void WebProvisioned(SPWebEventProperties properties)

{

//This code actually triggers for sub sites that is created. Hence we have taken reference of parent web to write the entry.

SPList lstTracking = properties.Web.ParentWeb.Lists["Track Different Events"];

properties.Web.ParentWeb.AllowUnsafeUpdates = true;

SPListItem item = lstTracking.Items.Add();

item["Title"] = "Web has been provisioned";

item.Update();

properties.Web.ParentWeb.AllowUnsafeUpdates = false;

}

We’ve created a site. So now we can see two entries in the list.

Now delete the sub site and we get this.

Result is out

noreply@blogger.com (SharePoint Kings) — Thu, 19 Apr 2012 05:19:00 +0000

It seems that IE will have tough time in future

Create Folder in library using ECMA client object model

noreply@blogger.com (SharePoint Kings) — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 09:30:00 +0000

Here is a simple way to create folder inside library using ECMA client object model

<script type="text/javascript">
var clientcontext = null;
var web = null;
ExecuteOrDelayUntilScriptLoaded(AddFolder, “sp.js”);
function AddFolder()
{
clientcontext = new SP.ClientContext.get_current();
web = clientcontext.get_web();
this.list = web.get_lists().getByTitle("LibraryName");
var listItemCreationInfo = new SP.ListItemCreationInformation();
listItemCreationInfo.set_underlyingObjectType(SP.FileSystemObjectType.folder);
listItemCreationInfo.set_leafName('NameofTheFolder');
var newItem = list.addItem(listItemCreationInfo);
newItem.update();
clientcontext.load(web);
clientcontext.load(list);
clientcontext.executeQueryAsync(Function.createDelegate(this, this.ExecuteOnSuccess),
Function.createDelegate(this, this.ExecuteOnFailure));
}
function ExecuteOnSuccess(sender, args) {
SP.UI.Notify.addNotification('Folder has been successfully created', false);
}
function ExecuteOnFailure(sender, args) {
alert("Some error");
}
</script>

Exception handling in client object model

noreply@blogger.com (SharePoint Kings) — Mon, 16 Apr 2012 06:24:00 +0000

We are familiar with try, catch and finally. It has been around for many years. We cannot ignore that at all as it plays a vital role in development.

Same is the case when we write a client object model code for SharePoint 2010.

ExceptionHandlingScope is a new class that has been introduced in SharePoint 2010 which allows us to perform the same action.

Let’s say you are working with managed client object model.

Here is a way to get a context of ExceptionHandlingScope and to work with it.

ClientContext ccontext = new ClientContext("site collection path");

ExceptionHandlingScope exceptionscope = new ExceptionHandlingScope(ccontext);

using (exceptionscope.StartScope())

                using (exceptionscope.StartTry())

                               // Code Block

                using (exceptionscope.StartCatch())

                     //Code Block which handles the exception

                using (exceptionscope.StartFinally())

                    //Code Block that always executes

Let’s say you are working in ECMA client object model and would like to handle exception

function Example()
{

this.clientcontext = new SP.ClientContext.get_current();

var clientScope = new SP.ExceptionHandlingScope(this.clientcontext);

var startScope = clientScope.startScope();

var tryScope = clientScope.startTry();

// Code Block

tryScope.dispose();

var catchScope = clientScope.startCatch();

 //Code Block which handles the exception

catchScope.dispose();

var finallyScope = clientScope.startFinally();

//Code Block that always executes

finallyScope.dispose();

startScope.dispose();

}

I hope this will help developing smoother and robust client object model application.

Custom Task form in workflow

noreply@blogger.com (SharePoint Kings) — Fri, 13 Apr 2012 06:05:00 +0000

In workflow we many times have a requirement to create custom task form four our business logic. Yes you must be telling that it was possible through creating custom content type which inherits from task content type and then associate that with workflow in an workflow xml file.

All true, but with SharePoint 2010 designer now we also can customize task form for any of the workflow.

We are going to see how we can customize it and also we are going to see what new actions are available for that process.

I have one list called Orders and we are going to associate a workflow and then in that we are going to have custom task form. So open SPD 2010, connect with the site and then go to workflow.

Create a workflow and attach it with a list called “Orders”. In your case it may be a different list than me.

Now we are going to add an action called start approval process.

Click on the first parameter in the action that we need to configure.

This allows us to configure the entire task handling process the way we want. Here we can handle when the task end, overall behavior of task process, individual should task item process etc.

As you can see you can also configure reassignments, change requests are allowed in the task or not.

If you look at the right panel in task editor, you will find fields. I have already added three fields to it just for a demonstration purpose. Do not go on the logic. But it will serve the purpose of customizing the task form.

Go ahead and add some fields to it. These fields will appear on the task form. You can also choose the existing field.

If you look at change the completion condition, change behavior of individual task and change overall task process closely, you will find a lot of conditions and actions inside them. This is the pre-built logic that follows approval process.

If you wish to make changes to any of these, feel free to do that and see how your workflow goes according to the change that you make.

I am going to add some logic to each task. We can add logic when task it created, expires, Pending, deleted or even completes.

You can also change the overall task process. For example, if in your requirement you have five approvers and if three out of five approves then you do not want to waste your time with two more approvers to approve or reject. You simply want to approve the item as majority of them have approved it. In this scenario, you can use overall task process.

If you go back to the workflow settings to edit the workflow, (one level above task editing page) where we had added start approval process on this item with approver.

Click on approver.

Here you can select any individual, active directory DL or SharePoint group or even field from the list or library.

You can also define to start the process as a sequence or in a parallel.

Let’s publish the workflow and then test the workflow. Make sure that you have selected start workflow when new item is added option from workflow settings page.

I’ve added an item to orders list and workflow has now started as you can see the status in in progress.

If I now open the task allocated to me, I would see three more fields in the task form.

Once you are done with all the task items, you will see outcome that is again governed by the workflow logic.

You can also customize the way task form looks like. Open the Approval Task Form.

You should have the InfoPath to perform the modification in a form.

Save it and publish it. Advantage it you are customizing task form only for your custom workflow and not globally.

Now then we have modified the workflow, let’s go ahead and add one more item in orders list to see this change.

If you would like to make any change in your conditions inside workflow, you can also get these additional fields that you’ve added on the form. We have external participant and reason in the list.

I hope you have liked this post. Do try different actions and conditions. Try out customizing task process, outcome. Let us know if you face any difficulty or query and I would be more than happy to answer them if I can. J

Add metadata to folder content type

noreply@blogger.com (SharePoint Kings) — Wed, 11 Apr 2012 06:22:00 +0000

When we want to add folder to document library, it is a very basic step of creating folder. Now what if I say create a folder with metadata like the way we have for documents. Now this is interesting. Isn’t it?

There is no way by default to have metadata for folders. We create columns for document library that actually becomes metadata for documents and not for the folders.

So let us go ahead and create a custom content type. We cannot change default folder content type as it is sealed.

Go to site actions, site settings, site content types.

Click on create

Give a name advance folder and keep the settings like shown in figure below.

Click on ok and then click on add from new site column when you are on content type settings page.

And then add a column called department

Now go back to library, set allow management of content type to true from library settings , advanced settings.

Click on add from existing site content types

Select custom content type, select advance folder and add it

Now under New Document, you can find advance folder.

Once you click on it, dialog opens to create folder with a column that we had specified earlier.

Once you add that then you should be able to view the folder in library and by editing its property you get to see the department column in that.

Hope this helps.

Change document library file name programmatically

noreply@blogger.com (SharePoint Kings) — Mon, 09 Apr 2012 06:57:00 +0000

You must be wondering what is new in this. We can certainly change the name or the title of the document inside document library from code.

Well, no. we cannot do that right away as Name and Title of SPFile are read only fields. As each document is SPFile inside document library we might think that changing name and title field would do the job. But it’s not. Check the below images. Properties are read only.

So what can be done? Well as we all know that each document inside document library is not only SPFile but also SPListItem.

Now these are my shared documents and check the document name.

And let’s re write our code in this way.

And when you execute

I hope this will help.

Hiding Ribbon from SharePoint Page

noreply@blogger.com (SharePoint Kings) — Fri, 06 Apr 2012 06:28:00 +0000

Wonder how to hide ribbon from any SharePoint page if you wish to. If you have an access on the page and if you have placed a web part on it, then this is the way to hide ribbon.

It’s one simple line of code that does the magic. I am writing it in button click just to demonstrate you.

And you write a code on button.

SPRibbon.GetCurrent(this.Page).CommandUIVisible = false;

Click the button. And you are done.

Import SharePoint Designer workflow to Visio diagram

noreply@blogger.com (SharePoint Kings) — Wed, 04 Apr 2012 07:03:00 +0000

In this post we are going to see how we can import a workflow created inside SharePoint Designer 2010 into Visio diagram and visualize the flow written in the workflow.

If you also would like to read about how we can export diagram created in Visio to Designer

Workflow, then I would recommend you read Exporting Visio diagram to Workflow Designer as well.

To demonstrate I have created a simple workflow in Designer and it looks like this.

We are pausing until some date and then checking a condition and based on condition we perform an action.

So let’s go ahead and save the workflow. Click on export to Visio option in ribbon under Manage group.

It will ask to save it as Visio workflow Interchange file. This is the same format even when we would like to open Visio diagram into Designer workflow as a name suggest its interchangeable - from one to the other form.

Open Visio and select Microsoft SharePoint Workflow as template and then go to Process group and click on Import button.

The moment you import the workflow created previously turns in to a Visio diagram.

As you can see we first have pause until date, then we have condition of field which is source and then we have send email activity only if condition is true, if condition is false we directly end the workflow.

As you can see that this diagram is easy to understand from an end user point rather than looking at Designer workflow and wondering what is going on.

Export Visio diagram to SharePoint Designer workflow – Part 2

noreply@blogger.com (SharePoint Kings) — Mon, 02 Apr 2012 09:11:00 +0000

If you have not gone through Part-1 of this series I would recommend you reading part-1 first and then continue reading from here.

We have now saved the diagram and its time to export it to the SharePoint Designer 2010 workflow. Click on the export button on the ribbon from process tab.

Save it as Visio workflow interchange format file.

Now open SharePoint Designer 2010 and connect with the site and click on workflows. Then click on Import from Visio button from the ribbon.

Locate the interchangeable file that we saved earlier and open that file.

Now in next screen, it asks us to attach it with the list, name of the workflow and select if it’s a reusable workflow.

Click on finish and you get all the conditions and actions already been set up based on the Visio flow that we created.

Only thing that is pending is set up parameters in the workflow and we are good to go with the workflow.

Also read Importing SharePoint Designer Workflow to Visio

Result is out

noreply@blogger.com (SharePoint Kings) — Mon, 02 Apr 2012 06:45:00 +0000

Hi,

The result is out

Export Visio diagram to SharePoint Designer workflow – Part 1

noreply@blogger.com (SharePoint Kings) — Wed, 28 Mar 2012 07:59:00 +0000

We saw how we can use Visio web access to display Visio diagram in the browser and even the client does not have Visio client then also they are able to view the diagram in the browser via Silverlight and that too with interactivity with the base list.

Read Visio services series.

There is one more advance feature available for Visio premium and that is the Visio diagram that can be exported to SharePoint Designer.

If we consider a business scenario, then drawing diagram is something that most of the people would love to do and as a business analyst knowing the requirement of a client for certain purpose can certainly draw a Visio diagram.

Once a diagram is ready, it can be handed over to the developer or site administrator which can take it forward to build a meaningful logic that actually works in SharePoint site.

So let’s dive into this series of creating Visio diagram and then exporting it to SharePoint Designer 2010 to make it functional.

Open up Visio premium 2010.

Click on flow chart diagram and then Microsoft SharePoint Workflow and select Metrics Unit and then click on create.

Workflow diagram consists of three groups. One is actions, the other is conditions and the last one is terminators

Any Visio diagram that needs to be converted to SharePoint Designer workflow must start with start indicator and end with stop terminator.

So let’s open up the last group and drag both start and stop terminators to the diagram.

Let’s start with setting a filed and then compare document field and drag it to the diagram. Set a field and compare document field can be found it under action and conditions group respectively.

We have now included the condition and hence always have yes or no logic associated with that. So we need to add two actions to the branch. First let us add do calculation action and send email action.

Now we need to specify which branch will get executed when condition evaluates to true and which when false.

First attach all the connectors between shapes and now select the upper connector with the condition and action and right click to get an option to set branching logic.

And then same way to the lower branch.

So at the end you should have something like this

Save the file. We are ready with our simple workflow and ready to take it to the SharePoint Designer. Read Part-2 for further reading.

Tasks list Visio diagram

noreply@blogger.com (SharePoint Kings) — Mon, 26 Mar 2012 06:35:00 +0000

Tasks list in SharePoint 2010 has got one new feature. When we are on a tasks list you can now see that there is an option on ribbon bar with create Visio diagram.

This is a great new feature that allows exporting the tasks data to Visio diagram and having that task list connect with that to see the changes that happens in the tasks list.

If you have fix set of tasks that are assigned to individual person who performs those tasks, then you can have a better look at those tasks by using this Visio diagram than to look at row data in the tasks list.

Yes one important thing to consider here is you must have Visio client if you wish to use this functionality.

Here I have tasks list and several tasks assigned just to demonstrate you.

Here I have some data with assigned to and task priority and task statuses.

Now clicking on create vision diagram will get us Visio diagram. Once the diagram is created, then you can see that you can have a look at the diagram in different ways.

1) Through status

2) Through workload distribution

3) Incompleted tasks assigned to

4) Workflow status

These options give us better visualization than looking at row data.

Same way you can explore the remaining two options. It also gives you an option to include more fields in the diagram from tasks list if you wish to see them also in diagram.

This diagram is connected with tasks list. Any changes into the items which are mapped with tasks list will automatically reflected in this diagram each time you open, manually click on refresh or set auto refresh.

Converting document format from browser

noreply@blogger.com (SharePoint Kings) — Thu, 22 Mar 2012 13:30:00 +0000

Conversion timer job allows us to convert one document to another. As we have seen in previous posts. If you have not gone through previous posts I would recommend you reading them first and then continue reading from here.

Open the document library in which you would like to convert a document format.

I have shared document which I have opened up. When you select a document to convert and then open up the ECB menu, point to the convert this document

And then it asks you to convert a document to aspx page (a webpage). It allows us to configure certain options at that time. Make sure that the publishing feature is activated at this time otherwise it won't allow us to convert the document to a web page.

Click on create and then wait for few minutes if you have selected an option or else after few minutes you can go to pages library and can see that the word document has been converted to the aspx page.

Now what we are trying to do is to use ribbon convert document functionality. However it seems that it is uncovered topic in many of the web sites and not sure as how to use it and how to configure output library etc. We are still working on it.

If you get a chance to work on this feature, do let us know and we would share it with your name mentioned in the post.

Document ID in SharePoint 2010

noreply@blogger.com (SharePoint Kings) — Mon, 19 Mar 2012 06:27:00 +0000

We all have heard a lot about document ID feature in SharePoint 2010 and wonder what this feature actually does.

Well let me tell you this, this is one of the welcome features from SharePoint 2010. If I have to tell you in a single line what this Document ID can help us with is that it can simply solve our problem with the document URL link.

When we turn on the feature Document ID which is at site collection level scoped feature every document uploaded in site collection gets document ID associated with it.

The advantage is even if you move a document from one location to another location throughout site collection, ID of document remains the same. This gives us an advantage over a broken link URLs for the documents.

Let’s say that you have uploaded a document in a document library called Projects Document. And then you have decided to move that document to some other library called Departmental Repository. So the document now does not reside in projects library but in departmental repository. If you have given a URL to many users to access your document and if they have the old link all they will get it page does not found because document actually does not exist now.

SharePoint 2010 has come up with a new URL associated with Document ID. So first think go ahead and activate Document ID feature and then from the site settings go to the Document ID settings.

You can then configure the document ID to start with certain characters and also if you would like to configure it for all existing documents inside the site.

Remember the there is a timer job called Document ID assignment job that does it. So it might take a while to generate Document ID for documents.

And there is one more service Document ID enable/disable job. This created a column called Document ID in library.

Once we have the Document ID then we can use this new URL to send to users.

Right click Document ID and go to properties. Check out the URL and use that URL in the browser URL and enter. You get the document.

{site URL}/_layouts/DocIdRedir.aspx?ID=DCMT2012-3-31

The advantage is even though document has been moved to any other library across site collection, user still would be able to get the document and as a result will not get broken link URL.

Because we had also enabled Document ID enable/disable job, we also have a field in document library called Document ID associated with each document and of course the ID field which is the base for auto generating Document ID

I hope you must have got the idea now that it's a welcome feature and really a useful when the link to document is broken.

Document set Part – 5

noreply@blogger.com (SharePoint Kings) — Thu, 15 Mar 2012 07:28:00 +0000

If you have not gone through part-1 to part-4, I would recommend you reading them first and then continue reading from here on.

In this post, we are going to do the same stuff what we did in part-4. So open up SharePoint Designer 2010 and connect to the site.

Go to the list and libraries and find the Shared Documents. You may have a different library. I have document set in shared documents hence I have chosen shared documents.

Go to workflow and create a new workflow. I am showing this just to demonstrate the concept, the real scenario may vary and you need to use the conditions and workflow accordingly.

Now set a condition which is true and we will start the workflow on document set. We will first start with capturing the version.

Open up the actions menu and select capture the version of document set. Provide comments and major or minor version input. Save and publish the workflow. Go back to document set and run the workflow and see that we now have new version captured for the workflow.

Result is out

noreply@blogger.com (SharePoint Kings) — Wed, 14 Mar 2012 08:09:00 +0000

Finally the result is out

Many people rely on Windows Security Essentials.