But – if you try code from a Console App – you might get this error :

System.IO.FileNotFoundException: The Web application at <URL> could not be found

The code I’ve been developing is similar to this :

using (SPSite site = new SPSite(sourceWebUrl))
{
    using (SPWeb web = site.OpenWeb())
    {

And – the above error (not found) was happening on the first line.    Some searching around highlighted the following tips :

===========================================

Problem

When developing against the SharePoint object model in an application outside of IIS (service, console, Winforms etc..) you receive the error “FileNotFoundException” when creating an instance of the SPSite object.

Resolution

The user running the application needs to have the following permissions and group membership set:

• The user is a server farm administrator.
• The user has Read and Write permissions on the content database.
• The user is a site collection administrator.
• The user has permissions to access the Windows SharePoint Services site or the SharePoint Server 2007 site through which the code iterates.

Source : MSDN (question #10)

===========================================

BUT – this didn’t fix the problem…     WTF !?

The solution – as it turns out – when dealing with SharePoint 2010 is the “platform target”.

When you add a new solution/project in Visual Studio, the default is “x86” (32-bit) – and this needs to be changed to “x64” (64-bit) – as SharePoint 2010 is 64-bit (only).

• Right-click on the solution/project
• Click Properties
• Switch to the “Build” tab
• Make sure to change the dropdown to x64

• Re-build + run the project
• Hopefully, that fixed the problem !   
• Well – it fixed it for ME anyways.    

Good luck !

This is familiar to developers – it will show “In Progress” – or “Error Occurred” – or “Cancelled”.

This is great for users to click “In Progress” – and thus view the “Current User Task”, and the history of what’s occurred.

But – unfortunately – there’s a few clicks required to view the ‘display workflow’.   The Nintex Workflow ‘visual’ diagram is a great way for users to get an understanding of the actions at play – but here’s the click-thru :

• Click the drop-down for the item/document
• Click Workflow History
• Click on the ‘Running Workflow’

That’s THREE clicks – and a bunch of potential confusion (and/or training) for users.

Here’s a great tip to include a “View Process Flow” link, within the list view.

=====================================================

Add a new column to the SharePoint list/library :

• Name = “Workflow Process”
• Column type = “Hyperlink”

Edit the Workflow :

• Create a new variable – eg.  View Process
• Add an activity for “Build Dynamic String”
• Click Add Reference – and choose “Workflow Status URL”
• Add manual text after that – make sure to include a SPACE and a COMMA – and then the URL text.
• It should then look like this :

{Common:WorkflowStatusUrl}, View Workflow

• Next, add an “Item Update” activity
• Select to update the “Workflow Process” column

• Save the activity
• And then Publish the workflow

That’s it !    Just need to run the workflow process – and see it in action.

=====================================================

Here’s what the list/library will look like – with the new column.

When the user clicks on this link, it will go immediately to the Workflow Status page.

This technique can be very useful – much easier for users to understand – and there are many other ways you can use this approach.

Simply (1) build a string – including the URL + SPACE + COMMA + TEXT – and (2) set the URL hyperlink field.

Hope this is a cool + useless tip for someone out there…!

This is a bit tricky – and more annoying than anything.

There are some Powershell scripts – and awesome tools like CAML Builder – or SharePoint Manager – but if you don’t have those – and need it quickly, I have a great tip for you…

• Click Site Settings
• Click Content And Structure
• You might need to “go to root site settings” – if you’re within a sub-site

OR – you can simply enter the URL…>

http://SERVER:PORT/_layouts/sitemanager.aspx

• Within the Manage Content and Structure screen, find the site you want to check the GUID.
• Here’s the trick – need to RIGHT-CLICK on the URL – and then select PROPERTIES

• Within the dialog, highlight the URL – and right-click + copy

• Then, open a new Notepad screen – and click Paste

javascript:__doPostBack(‘TreeView1′,’sArea:?SPWeb:10640412-d27e-433c-abd1-795462d3fa60:\\SPWeb:c609ba9e-2ff2-413f-ba0c-034ba392dc18:’)

• Within the URL, the first bit is the GUID of the Site Collection
• The second part is the GUID of the SPWeb (ie. the WebSite you want !)

Just take a copy of the GUID – and you can then use wherever you need/want.

===========================================================

To get the GUID of a particular LIST – you can use the same approach.

• Choose the list you want, and right-click
• Copy the URL, and paste into Notepad

javascript:__doPostBack(‘TreeView1′,’sArea:?SPWeb:10640412-d27e-433c-abd1-795462d3fa60:\\SPList:0e6b1ecd-8573-44ab-b175-9ba561b9571a?SPWeb:10640412-d27e-433c-abd1-795462d3fa60:’)

===========================================================

Yet another easy way to get an SPList GUID is to look at the “Settings” page for a list.

• Switch to the List tab (in SP2010) – or just click Settings (in SP2007)
• Click List Settings
• Click on Audience Targetting Settings

• Check the URL – and you have ALL you need

http://SERVER:PORT/_layouts/ListEnableTargeting.aspx?List={297def5c-019d-4786-b0b5-fec2099200f5}

===========================================================

These tips/tricks have save me LOTS of time – hope they help you too…!

Usually the hardest part is working out the internal file names – and/or working out the “for each row” notion.

I find the best approach is to add a “ListView” – and then link to a separate XSLT file – which can then be tuned/tweaked within SharePoint Designer – as opposed to “all in one” – ie. one webpart (DVWP).

Let’s show with an example :

• Create a SharePoint page
• Edit page > Insert “Existing List”
• Pick “Pages” (or any other list you like)

You get a List View WebPart – something similar to this :

Next step is to create an XSLT file that will render out ALL files – ALL rows – ALL values :

• Click View All Site Content
• Open the Style Library folder
• Create a folder – entitled CustomXSLT – or whatever you like (perhaps company/client name)
• Open Notepad – and paste in the following

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<xsl:stylesheet version="1.0" xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform">
<xsl:output method="xml" version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" indent="yes"/>
<xsl:template match="/">
<xmp><xsl:copy-of select="*"/></xmp>
</xsl:template>
</xsl:stylesheet>

• Save the file as something like all.xslt
• Upload the file to the Style Library folder

Now – we can switch back to the list view you added earlier – and USE this new XSLT file.

• Click Edit Page > Edit WebPart
• Within the “Miscellaneous” section (!), set the XSL link to the file you uploaded

/Style Library/CustomXSLT/all.xslt

NOW – you should see ALL the data that the DVWP/XLV is displaying – very (VERY) useful !!

Especially when trying to work out the specific column/file names.

Here’s another very useful XSLT snippet – this does a “for each row”.

<xsl:stylesheet version="1.0" xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform">

<xsl:output method="html" indent="no"/>
  <xsl:template match="/" >
    <xsl:variable name="Rows" select="/dsQueryResponse/Rows/Row"/>
    <xsl:for-each select="$Rows">
        <h1>      
            <xsl:value-of select="@Title"/>
        </h1>
        <xsl:value-of select="@Body" disable-output-escaping="yes"/>
    </xsl:for-each>
  </xsl:template>
</xsl:stylesheet>

…..hope this helps someone out there – or simply for MY later reference.

I had a bunch of stuff to get through, sorry if I spoke quickly (!!).   The topics covered were :

• HTML5
  • Brief history
  • What/why we need a new HTML
  • New symantic tags
  • New functional tags
  • New API
• CSS3
  • New tags
• BUT – browser support problems (potentially)

SharePoint 2010 – HTML5 + CSS 3 + XSLT (Demo #1)

• jQuery
  • Overview + fundamentals
  • Deploying + using via JavaScript
  • jQuery Selectors, Actions and Events

SharePoint 2010 – jQuery (Demo #2)

• REST
  • Overview + introduction
  • Example URL’s
  • jQuery + REST + JSON

SharePoint 2010 – REST + JSON (Demo #3)

• jQuery Templates
  • Bring it all together

SharePoint 2010 – REST + JSON + jQuery + jQuery Templates (Demo #4)

• SharePoint vNext
  • Crystal Ball – what can we expect (?)
  • Where to from here ?
  • Get started – learn jQuery, learn REST

*PHEW*     See – I told you I had a lot to cover (!!)

If you’d like to have a look at the presentation – and the demos – I’ve loaded them both onto my SkyDrive :

• Chris O’Connor > AUSPC-12

Thanks for all those who attended – let me know any comments/feedback on the session…

Cheers !

The crawler could not communicate with the server. Check that the server is available and that the firewall access is configured correctly

This led me to check a number of things :

• Default Search Crawl Account – check – it HAS access to the server
• Can connect using a browser (with the account) – check – that works – while LOCAL logged on (RDP)
• Dump index – and re-crawl – no, didn’t fix it.
• Try crawling another site collection (eg. Central Admin) – ok – that works !!

I was beginning to run out of ideas, when I suddenly clicked on the page url that was shown in the error log.   And, I was shown an ACCESS DENIED page (proper ASP.NET stack trace) – for IUSR.

Hang on a sec – that’s the ANON account (!!!)

Yes – my site (intranet) has been extended to also allow anonymous users.

And – here’s the clincher – the page that was the HOME page was not anonymously accessible…

My home page was set to be “/SitePages/Home.aspx”.

I changed this to be “/Pages/Home.aspx” – with a new, blank page – checked-in and published – and then tried to re-crawl the content.

SUCCESS !!

The simple reasoning is (as far as I can tell) :

• Search will try to hit the home page in ANON mode first – when crawling.  
• If this fails (denied) – then crawling STOPS.
• If it succeeds, it flips to AUTH mode, and crawls all content happily.
• So – make sure your home page is ANON accessible – only if you need ANON access (of course).
• If you don’t have it turned on, this is a non-issue.

It was a wierd error for sure – I’ll probably never encounter it again – but hope this helps someone !

I’m presenting this time ‘round too – wow !   

Check out the agenda – I’m 2nd session in the ‘Technical – Dev’ track – and you can see my face+bio within the list of presenters.

Here’s the synopsis about my session :

HTML5, CSS3 and jQuery with SharePoint 2010 : what you can (and need to) start doing now.

With the next wave of SharePoint on the way (and Windows 8) – and the demise of Flash and Silverlight, the new buzz for UI is around HTML5.

This session will detail what this actually means for the current 2010 platform, and what you can start doing now. The session will include demos and show/tell of HTML5, CSS3 and jQuery – and how you can get started now.

I’ve been putting together a bunch of demos and slides – which I’ll make available after the session (next Tuesday.  

Here’s a sneak peak – at one of the slides (the agenda) :

=================================================================

It’s shaping up to be a great conference – with some awesome keynote speakers – Mike Fitzmaurice and Chris Johnson on day one – and then Dan Holme on day two.

AND – I’ll be around chatting to lots of people in the User Group booth – talking about MSPUG (Melbourne SharePoint User Group).

So – if you haven’t signed up for AUSPC yet – make sure you register – and I’ll see you there !

Don’t forget to follow via Twitter as well – the hashtag to check/follow is #AUSPC

I’ve heard it referred to as “SharePoint 15” (codename) – and “SharePoint 2013” – but no specific name is concreted or announced.

“SharePoint 15” is the codename – so it’ won’t be the final release name.

And Microsoft usually shy away from “13” – as they’re a bit superstitious – with Office 12 (2007) and then Office 14 (2010).     So – I don’t know if it will be “SharePoint 2013” – who knows…!?

Here’s an idea – based on the Office-365 cloud-based solution – they should call it Office-247…!

That way – you can have your on-premise farm as 24/7 – and the cloud 365 days a year.

Office 247 + Office 365 – what d’ya reckon ?!    

The main “take-aways” from the session were :

• jQuery + SharePoint work nicely together – it’s all comes down to HTML in the end…!
• Easy to create animations WITHOUT needing Flash, Silverlight – or HTML5
• Use DVWP – and external XSLT – to construct the HTML you want
• NB. This is a great way to display/layout data – regardless of whether you use jQuery or not !

The main steps from the slides were :

• Upload the files to SharePoint (JS, CSS)
• Include a script reference to use it
• Add a DataViewWebPart – to a list (eg. Announcements, Product List)
• Configure the XSLT to get the HTML you need/want
• Include JavaScript (jQuery syntax) to do Accordian, Click, Hover, Cycle, etc…

The session today showed three main demos – which I’ll blog about ‘separately’ :

• SharePoint Announcements list – Accordian
• SharePoint Image list – Image Rotator (photos of bikes/mountain bikes)
• SharePoint Announcements list – News Rotator

I’ve uploaded the files from today’s session (to SkyDrive) :

• Slide Deck (PPTX) : 396 KB
• ZIP containing jQuery + scripts + XSLT : 109 kb
• Click here to go to the SkyDrive folder for these files…

If you were at SharePoint Saturday – let me know any comments/feedback.

And – keep an eye on my blog/twitter – for an in-depth run-down of each of the demo’s…

Cheers !

SharePoint Saturday (SPSat) has become an amazing ‘movement’ within the SharePoint community – the day is free for all attendees – including lunch – thanks to generous sponsors, and a lot of hard work from the organisers (thanks – btw !)

This weekend also has SharePoint Saturday’s happening in Manila, Minnesota – and Minsk (Belarus – near Russia).  

Make sure you don’t go to the wrong venue – NOT at the Hotel Victoria !

For *MY* presentation this Saturday, I have re-jigged my session from TechEd – showing how to implement jQuery within a SharePoint 2010 environment.

I’ll show a quick overview – and then onto some demo’s :

• Include jQuery within the Master Page
• Add a DataView WebPart
• Change some XSLT
• Add some jQuery (JavaScript) statements
• And voila !   
• Animations without using FLASH…(!)

The demos will cover three main functions/features :

• Accordian
• Image Rotator
• News Rotator

Each of these are easy to get working – with some great tips & tricks for data views as well – DON’T write code for rendering out data !    I’ll show you why/how.

After SharePoint Saturday, I’ll write up a little more about the demo’s – and have some code/samples to download.   But – for now – you’ll just have to come along and see !

Here are the main details :

• Register via EventBrite : SharePoint Saturday Melbourne – Oct. 22nd
• Venue : Cliftons, 1/440 Collins St, Melbourne
• Click here to check out the schedule (PDF) – with the list of speakers and topics – and timeslots
• And – if you can’t make it along – follow the action via Twitter – using the hashtag #SPSMEL

P.S.  This event is being presented/supported by the “Melbourne SharePoint User Group” (MSPUG).

Click here for more information – and to subscribe to the newsletter.

Hope to see you there – Viva la SharePoint Saturday !