OUT OF DATE WITH MOSS 2007.

 

Below is a compilation of emails, training and documentation that I put together when rolling out SharePoint for internal intranet purposes as well as customer support sites in 2005.

 

Preface SharePoint? WSS Sites and Out of the Box Tools Document/Image Libraries Uploading a single file from a Web browser. Uploading multiple documents Checking Out/Editing and Checking In a Document from Sharepoint Checking Out/Editing and Checking In a document from within an application Document Versioning Navigation Discussion Boards More Like Administration Stuff Buzzzzzz Metadata Branding Ghosting (One way to Deply New WSS Sites) SharePoint 2007 Wish list Bibliography

 

Preface

 

There is a great deal of information available about SharePoint out there. Generally, I did find many of the advanced answers, however, the simple things often left me confounded. Like what was it? What could it do for me? Why should we use it? What was some of the out of the box functionality? Can I dance to it? Etc., etc., etc.

 

I will be placing most of my documentation and research here. Some of it is in reference to training and work, other info is just stuff I dug up. I am not a technical writer. I am not even a writer, more of a ranter and raver really. So if you find anything useful here, rock on mighty piglet! Upon reflection, it occurred to me that SharePoint doesn't feel quite complete with it's initial rollout, and in my humble opinion, I hope Microsoft returns to working on SharePoint after the release of Vista.

 

I have heard strange whispers of SharePoint 2007, some say that many of the issues/bugs/whatever have been addressed. Until I see it, it shall be a dream within a dream of something that has great potential. One of the main things I hope for is that once SharePoint is set up, that it become easier for the typical end user. One of the fantasies I had about SharePoint was that you could have one Admin and then train site Admins to manage their areas. There needs to be a little more simplicity for that. If someone can make a Google homepage they should be able to manage some basics in SharePoint, but unfortunately that isn't the case with many functions.

 

I will be focusing on WSS sites or SharePoint Team Services. There are a couple of reasons why. After much digging and way too much pain I discovered that SharePoint Portal Server wasn’t very easy to customize or 'brand' and functioned better as an ‘invisible backbone’ for our purposes.

I could definitely see it use and purpose in a very large company with a few domains and such. I am still working on ‘marrying’ my floating WSS sites to SharePoint Portals Server to fully utilize the search functions, ‘My Site’, audience targets and many other advanced features.

 

The first part of this site leans towards the User and is some of the SOP's that I distributed for training. The later half is Admin issues and some of the cheap vulgar tricks I have learned to maintain a professional appearance of the site with minimal effort. Please feel free to refer to my del.icio.us links below as I keep them relatively up to date. I list a Bibliography and there are MANY wonderful websites out there. Without them, one chick would not have been able to ramp up and roll out SharePoint to a company of 250+

 

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SharePoint?

 

SharePoint functions very much like an intranet while providing an adequate medium for work-group collaboration and team project management, which most intranet architectures fail to do. Teams require a combination of email and voice mail, shared documents both for shared review and edit purposes and for archival reference, and probably references to Web sites too.

 

In practice SharePoint Team Services is a straight replacement for Office 2000 Server Extensions. But it's easier to use and it makes fewer demands on users, administrator, and configuration requirements. Basically SharePoint installs a preconfigured Web sites and related services, all designed to allow participants to manage group activities easily and work together effectively.

 

It goes further, for the architecture also includes a database component (SQL Server or MSDE) to support new features such as Web document discussions and document libraries for sharing information and communicating within a team. By using the basic preconfigured template, a new team site can be created in minutes once SharePoint Team Services has been installed on a server and users can be managed using Active Directory.

 

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WSS Sites and Out of the Box Tools

 

The basic site template provides a home page, shared document library, general discussion boards, and shared areas for contacts, events, and team tasks. Team members can contribute to any of these pages using only Internet Explorer by filling out forms that populate the built in list templates with relevant information.

 

Types of Forms and Templates are us thus.

 

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Document/Image Libraries

 

I go into great depth about Document libraries because I feel they are an extremely powerful tool if utilized properly. Document libraries are collections of files that you can share with team members on a Web based platform by utilizing Windows SharePoint Services. For example, you can create a library of common documents for a project, and team members can use their Web browsers to find the files, read them, and make comments. Users with Microsoft Office 2003 can check out and edit the files as if they resided on a local or network drive. By default, your team Web site comes with a built-in document library named Shared Documents, which is listed on the Quick Launch bar as well as on the Documents and Lists page.

 

Note – It is important to remember that organization is similar as that on any hard drive. With out foresight and structure Document Libraries can become difficult to manage and administer.

 

 

Uploading a single file from a Web browser.

 

1. Once at your team's home page, along the left hand side you should see the Quick Launch Bar. Under Documents is the Shared Documents link. Click on the link and you will find the Document Work Area.
2. Upload Document (located in the black rectangle that also contains New Document, Upload Document, New Folder, Filter and Edit in Data-sheet).
3. On the Upload Document page, click Browse and find the folder with the sample document you wish to upload.
4. Click the file you wish to upload and then click Open.
5. Click Save and Close.

Note - You can add any other files to the document library this way. For example, you could go to your My Documents folder and add files from there.

 

Uploading multiple documents

 

1. Click Upload Document.
2. On the Upload Document page, click Upload Multiple Files.
3. Go the folder where you wish to upload the practice files.
4. Select the two files that you wish to upload by selecting the check box next to each file.
5. Click Save and Close.
6. When prompted to confirm that you want to upload the files, click Yes.
7. The files appear in the document library.

 

Checking Out/Editing and Checking In a Document from Sharepoint

 

With document library files, you should always check out a file before opening it and making changes. This prevents other users from changes to the file while you have it checked out. If a user views the file while you have it checked out, he or she will see the last version that was checked out, not the version that you're working on, and will only be able to view the file in a read only fashion. Once you check the file back in, users can see the changes that you made.

 

Note - When working with a document library from your Web browser, if you click the name of the file it opens in read-only mode. If this occurs and you want to edit the file and save changes, simply close the file and use the steps listed above to edit the document.

 

Checking Out/Editing and Checking In a document from within an application

 

1. In the Testing and Training Document Work Area, point to the file you wish to work with to display a down arrow.
2. Click the down arrow to reveal a menu, and then click Check Out.
3. Once you've checked out a file, the Check Out option on the menu changes to Check In. You can use this option to check the file back in after you're done making changes to the file. In this tutorial, however, you'll use the Check In option in Office Word 2003.
4. Now that file is checked out, you're ready to open it in Microsoft Word. Point to the file you Checked Out with to display a down arrow.
5. Select Edit in Microsoft Office Word.
6. Office Word 2003 opens, displaying the file. The Shared Workspace pane also opens.
7. To Check In a file that you have completed editing click File in Office Word 2003, and then click Check In.
8. Click File, and then click Exit.

 

Note - Properties may need to be changed in the document to Check In via Word. Click the Document Information tab. Change the Status property to Writing. Check In a file from within an application. With the properties set, you're ready to check the file in and close Office Word 2003.

 

Document Versioning

 

By Default Document Versioning is off. Only Departmental Site Administrators can turn the feature on. Document versioning allows you to keep multiple versions of a document. If a change needs to be reversed, you can restore the previous version and continue working. A Version History command is included on the drop-down list users see when they click the arrow next to a document name and on the toolbar in the Edit Properties page for the document.

 

Enable versioning for a document library

 

 

1. Navigate to the list, and on the left link bar, click Modify settings and columns.
2. On the Customize "Document Library" page, click Change general settings.
3. On the Document Library Settings page, in the Document Versions section, under Create a version each time you edit a file in this document library?, click Yes.
4. Click OK.

 

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Navigation

 

There are several ways to navigate around SharePoint.

 

• Along the left hand side and the left side top (along the black bar, directly at the top of the website) are navigation and site tools for the site you are presently in. For example if you are on a WSS site, you can find the different work area’s or Site Administration tools that will navigate or affect the Operations site only.
• On the top right hand (along the black bar) you are able to Navigate SharePoint via the hierarchy. For example starting at Home Site > Up to Test 01 > Up to Home Portal.
• A well trained site adminitrator would be wise to make the site more efficient and to be determined by utilizing the Links List and to place links to regularly used pages within various Work Areas. For added ease the Administrator can ensure that said list is presented in full view and the page instead of having to going to the ‘Work Area'.
• Access to My Site can usually be found on the main hub site. This creates a site geared toward the specific user that they can customize. This is an invaluable tool when one has to watch many SharePoint sites at one time.

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Discussion Boards

 

Discussion boards provide a forumn for conversing about topics that interest your team. Each discussion board appears on a page that includes buttons for starting new discussions, sorting and filtering discussions, switching to a different view of the discussion board, and changing the design of the discussion board. You can view discussion comments in either flat, threaded view.

Discussions serve several purposes.

 

• They reduce internal email traffic.
• A good place to save resolutions and decisions for future review and training.
• Using SharePoint’s search feature to find information in regards to an issue.
• Being able to save data that all team members can review and participate in.

 

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More Like Administration Stuff

 

Most of the babble above was used to explain/train/create SOP's. Now we get to the nitty gritty. Below are some tips, tricks, methods and workarounds I used to set up and utilize SharePoint.

 

Buzzzzzz Metadata

 

“Data about data. For example, the title, subject, author and size of a file constitute metadata about the file”.

 

We been hearing a great deal about this word lately and we are going to be hearing a heck of a great deal more as ‘tagging’ is the wave (also a wonderful way to review data as opposed to traditional hierarchical methods), as people reflect on security issues and so much more. One basic example, all documents have metadata associated with them. This information helps users to find files they are looking for and learn something about the contents of the file before having to open it.

 

Metadata is far from a new concept but in SharePoint we utilize its components in various ways. We use metadata to define, organize and search for information within SharePoint. Using Document Library work area to clarify, you will notice an action bar along top, surrounded by a black rectangle containing New Document, Upload Document etc… Directly below you will see Type, Name, Modified, Modified By and Checked Out To. It gives us pertinent information about the documents stored here and their status.

 

We can also click and sort by different metadata fields. Within SharePoint we can add more columns in this area and capture more data. For example we could create a column with the choices of Draft and Final Copy, informing us what is a work in progress or a complete Document.

 

For example one way that metadata could be used to our advantage would be to say set up a Document expiration.

 

Note, these changes should be made BEFORE you begin using the document library.

 

 

1. Create a new field called 'Uploaded Date'; it should be of type Date Only and its default value should be Today's Date; make sure to add it to the default view
2. Define a new field called 'Expiration Date'; it should be a calculated field and its formula should be '=[Posted Date] + n' where n is the number of days before expiration (i.e. 30 would cause the documents to disappear from the view in one month's time)
3. Alter the default view to include a Filter where Expiration Date is greater than or equal to [Today].

 

When you upload a new document the Posted Date is defaulted to the current date and the expiration clock starts ticking.

 

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Branding

 

First let me direct you to a wonderful Microsoft 'how to article' Using Microsoft Office FrontPage 2003 to Customize SharePoint Products and Technologies Sites. Also the MSDN Library (live it, love it, learn it) may have many of the answers you are looking for when it comes to design and implementation as well.

 

I am not a designer per say, but knowing what I know about networking, HTML, security, Active Directory, JAVA, people and now SharePoint (secretly I do wanna learn more about AJAX) I usually end up being the best person for the job.

 

Branding is more then slapping a corporate logo on a web page or in this case a WSS site. Designers and Marketing folk can make whole careers on what font invokes what. Hell I spent most of my early career critiquing corporate brand and public perception.  But actually working on each pixel, each tone etc… Well that takes a Pro and 9 times out of 10 the cost is very high.

 

So pretending that you have some decent imagines to work with, a palette (corporate colors) and fonts, we can start. Really using FrontPage, layout and adding pictures was the easy part (need to have FrontPage Extensions installed on your SharePoint server). Otherwise it the Microsoft palette.

 

 

The evil revolves around Themes. That’s right Themes; Microsoft has all these fun themes that you can apply to Word, Power Point etc… The same horrific themes affect EVERYTHING in SharePoint. So if your corporate colors are not puke green the fun really starts.

 

 

Now I did spare you the pain of some of the most scary designs available. Hate to say it but those are the best. I still have nightmares about the deep orange template/theme that was attempting some sort of siesta thing.

 

The easiest way to deal with themes is via FrontPage.

 

In FrontPage > Format > Themes.

 

I had to find one that didn’t make my eyes bleed just to edit. I suppose you could start from scratch and make your own Theme, but I am a slack and a hack so… Also it is important to remember that a Theme permeates every level of your SharePoint site. Directly interfacing with the CSS files for you code warriors out there will easily cost you weeks in trying to understand why the 'upload document' button no longer exists with in the space time continuum.

 

That point was nailed home as what I call the EVIL PEACH LINE! I lost hours, days and perhaps weeks to a ‘peach line’ that would show up when editing my themes. So much so that I spent a great deal of time trying to find preexisting themes and applying them to Team sites to see what color it would change the line too.

 

So I suggest finding a theme in FrontPage that you can live with and fine tuning it to your preference. Get to know Cascading Style Sheet Guide for Windows SharePoint Services and taste the pain. Themes I found to be the most difficult part of branding SharePoint, so much so I wonder if it would give a Designer of talent a breakdown.

 

For now we are avoiding dealing with Portal Server type pages because you can literally break SharePoint messing with that. Hopefully it is one of the many things reviewed in SharePoint 2007.

 

I chose to design an Intranet and then clients sites. This was to avoid confusion about internal and external data and also to give a more comfortable feel for the company staff that had to interface with SharePoint daily.

 

Intranet Style

 

 

Client/Corporate Style

 

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Ghosting (One way to Deply New WSS Sites)

 

In progress.

 

Stephen Cummins a SharePoint Consultant put out a wonderful SharePoint Cheat Sheet that covers different ways to install and configure SharePoint customization.

 

One thing I highly suggest is having a SharePoint test server to work with to see how your changes will effect stability in the long run.

 

The reason we went the way we did, ghosting as a way to create new WSS sites was to be able to make changes on the fly without having to worry about taking SharePoint down. FrontPage was the easiest way to do this. For large companies you may want to consider installing your custom themes/templates across the board, especially if you don't plan to make many changes.

 

Simply put, after creating a new WSS site, I would overwrite the data using an existing WSS site that had all ready been completed to specification. I would do this by opening the site I wanted to duplicate in FrontPage, File > Save As and inputing the URL of the newly created WSS site and saving.

Then I would open the new WSS site in FrontPage, copy images and the CSS file to the proper directory. After I just needed to corect links to the CSS file and images in the code, apply my theme and make the changes that where needed for the site.

 

SharePoint 2007 Wish list

 

 

• Easily designable or brandable SPS.
• Simple deployment of custom themes.
• Simple deployment of templates.

 

In progress.

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Bibliography

 

Microsoft SharePoint Products and Technologies – Resource Kit

2004

 

Bill English with the SharePoint Teams

 

Microsoft SharePoint 2003 in 10 Minutes

2005

Colin Spence & Michael Noel

 

Microsoft Office Assistance: Working with SharePoint document libraries

2005

Microsoft Press

 

SharePoint Random Thoughts and Musings

2005

Cassandra’s Brain

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