SharePoint is Collaborative

SharePoint is in many aspects about participation, sharing and collaboration. Overall one wants helpful, ready to use information that can be put to work quickly and easily. Thus, because of this three categories are prevalent:

1)      SharePoint is for organizations – with just a simple browser, it can be used by individuals throughout the organization. SharePoint is purpose driven encompassing an audience that includes executives, managers, decision makers, staff, etc.

2)      SharePoint is for communities – users can foster relationships based on profiles, actual communities, groups, wiki, blogs, etc.

3)      SharePoint is for public engagement – every interest in being engaged and telling a story with content on a site is key.

 

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Authentication in SharePoint 2013

This question comes up a lot from companies moving from SharePoint 2010 to SharePoint 2013 – just how does authentication work in SharePoint 2013?

-In the 2013 version – user authentication remains the same with standard sites.

-When calling a web app – the authentication happens internally.

-Internal authentication happens when calling the web app.

-External authentication – is utilized from the remote web site/application.

-To establish an app identity claims based authentication must occur.

-Incoming calls must use CSOM/REST end – points.

-Essentially the authentication is the same except that calls to the web application are authenticated with both user identity and app identity.

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Site Pages vs. Application Pages in SharePoint

The following are some key differences between site pages and application pages:

-Site pages are located in the virtual file system of a site

-Site pages enhance customizations via web part and SharePoint designer

-Site pages are rendered via a template

-Site page is ghosted to that template

-Site page when customized is un-ghosted

-Site page customization can impact performance via memory usage

-Application pages are deployed once per farm

-Application pages are accessed via _layouts virtual directory

-Application pages are compiled via ASP.NET

-Application pages don’t support user customization

-Application pages are added via farm solutions

-Application pages are compiled into a single .dll and loaded for each web application

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Excel Services & Rest Overview

The Excel services is essentially a SOAP web service which can be accessed via: http://sharepointsite/_vti_bin/Excelservices.asmx

Excel forms have fields that are bound to cells in a workbook. The form can then be filled out and populates the spreadsheet.

Common events utilized are:

              Sheet.DataEntered()

              Workbook.DataEntered()

 Workbook.BeforeTyping()

Common method utilized is:

             Workbook.Reload(call back)

REST allows for information to be accessed via OData as long as regions named as tables are in the spreadsheet

REST can be used with published spreadsheets (.xlsx)

Formatted URL example:

http://sharepointsite/_vti_bin/ExcelRest.aspx/NameofExcelFile.xslx/Odata/TableName

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SharePoint Rules of Engagement

SharePoint Rules of Engagement

The following are some good items to follow before a user can get a site created:

1)      A Site Owner(s) needs named

2)      The site owner must take a SharePoint content editor class

3)      Only out of the box functionality can be utilized thus no new bells & whistles are allowed

4)      The site owner has dedicated resource time for updating content as needed

5)      Site owner needs to have bandwidth, knowledge and authority to participate and make decisions on behalf of their team

6)      Site owner will manage the site layout (look and feel), structure, and content

7)      They will need to attend recurring meetings as needed

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SharePoint Feature Receivers

In SharePoint, a feature receiver is used to add event handlers. Feature receivers derive from SPFeatureReceiver.

The following events are useful when activating a feature:

FeatureInstalled – runs after feature installed

FeatureActivated – runs after feature activated

FeatureDeactivating – runs before feature deactivated

FeatureUninstalling – runs before feature uninstalled
 

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Element Manifest.xml File

In SharePoint the element manifest file gives instructions for when the feature is activated. Common items to do in a feature:

ClientWebPart – create a client webpart

ContentType – create a content type

CustomAction – create new link or menu command

Field – create a site column

ListTemplate – create a custom list type

Workflow – create a workflow template

WorkflowAssociation – associate a workflow template with a list

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