Jennifer Ann Mason

I have been absent from the blog for a few weeks, but things should be picking back up soon! I wanted to do a quick post on some of the newest things going on in my world.

First, I wanted to let everyone know that two of my co-workers (John Ross & Nicola Young) have just released a new book- MOSS Explained: An Information Worker’s Deep Dive into Microsoft Office SharePoint Server. This is definitely a great resource to add to your collection! It covers just about everything that an information worker needs to know about working with MOSS. You won’t be disapointed with the content! Here is the link on Amazon- http://www.amazon.com/MOSS-Explained-Information-Microsoft-SharePoint/dp/1584506725

Second, I wanted to let everyone know about a few training/conference opportunitys that are coming up.

I had a request to show the sum for a calculated column in a list view. In this scenario there is a list of projects with the hours estimated, the actual and the remaining hours for each project. The hours estimated and the hours spent are number columns and the hours remaining is a calculation of the difference. Using the OOB features, we can show totals for the number columns, but not the calculated one (examples below).

 

 

Using SharePoint Designer we can configure the list view to have a calculated column for all three of the columns. Once you open the list view in SPD, you will want to convert the web part to an XSLT Data View.

 

Notice that once it has been converted, the Sums are removed. We will now re-add the different calculations.

 

First, we will need to add a row that will be used to store the columns. In this case, the requirement was that the sums showed at the top of the list. Once we have the added row, we will want to open the Data Source Details and add our desired field.

 

 

Now that the field has been added, we will need to edit the formula so that it is configured to SUM the items. To do this we can right click on the item and select the Edit Formula Option. Note: If you do not insert the item above formatted as a number then you may not see the option to edit the formula.

 

The following image shows the changes that will need to be made in order to SUM the column. You are adding the sum() operator around the field.

 

Once you select OK, you should be able to see that your column is now providing a SUM of the entire column. You can now complete the steps for the remaining columns. Now that the columns are being summed correctly, we can apply any desired formatting. Below is a screen shot of new list view.

 

Registration is open for the SharePoint Conference!  It will be in Vegas this year the 19th to the 22nd of October 2009 at the Mandalay Bay Hotel, Las Vegas, Nevada.

Should be a great conference!

 

I am excited to get the opportunity to lead two different presentations at this year’s SPTechCon 2009! The following are the descriptions of my two sessions:

W-6: GETTING STARTED WITH SHAREPOINT DEVELOPMENT
By Jennifer Mason and John Ross

Too often, IT professionals know what they are trying to do with SharePoint but need some direction on how to get started. This workshop will cover how to ramp up a development team to start working on SharePoint projects, giving you a better understanding of the skill sets needed for specific types of SharePoint development, the tools available to help your organization gain the expertise needed, and direction on how to leverage the tools to achieve your goals.

406: SUCCESSFULLY IMPLEMENTING NEW SOLUTIONS
By Jennifer Mason

Here’s a beginning look at ways to encourage and gain excitement about new SharePoint solutions. This class focuses on implementing new solutions in the organization, including how to support them, how to communicate the changes, and how to generate end-user enthusiasm. You will learn what to look out for during implementation, including the pitfalls to avoid, how SharePoint-based solutions are different from other solutions, and the importance of learning from today’s implementations to plan for tomorrow’s.

In some situations, there may be a need to restrict some of the options that users see on the toolbar in a list or a library. Codeplex has a tool for this that is part of the SharePoint Features project. I recommend that anyone interested in this functionality, take a look at this tool-

• http://www.codeplex.com/features
  
• http://scothillier.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!8F5DEA8AEA9E6FBB!280.entry
  

Here are some screenshots of the toolbar manager in my test environment:

This is just one of the many tools that are out there. Be sure to spend some time going through the other features on the Codeplex features project. You will probably find a tool there that you can easily incorporate into the solutions you are building.

This week in the forums, and interesting scenario was brought up. The user had a list of projects and a document library that had a lookup to associate each document with a project. They wanted to create a custom edit form that not only allowed them to edit the project content, but also showed all related documents. Here is a screenshot of the desired solution:

The steps to building this solution are as follows:

Create a custom edit form (I will give step by step instructions in a future blog post).

Add a DVWP to the new page that contains the projects list data.

Create a Parameter based on the ID that is passed in the Query String.

Filter the Web Part Based on the parameter you created.

Configure the web part to be hidden on the page.

Add the Documents Library Web Part to the Page.

Configure to show columns and desired layout.

Convert to a DVWP.

Create a data connection to the Projects Web part that filters the documents based on the value in the projects list.

Here are some screenshots of the final solution, notice the Value in ID and how it feeds the values in the web parts.

The reason that the DVWPs were necessary in this solution is because of the way web part connections work. If we did not create DVWPs we could not create a connection that passed data on the page load, instead users would have to select the radio button of the projects list. If you haven’t spent time looking at the differences in web part connections between LVWPs and DVWPs I would encourage you to do it!

We just opened the registration for the COSPUG SharePoint conference on October 31^st! We have a great day planned that you don’t want to miss. The event is open to the first 70 people to register, so be sure to get registered early! Below is the event information:

The Central Ohio SharePoint User Group (COSPUG) is hosting the first annual Central Ohio SharePoint Conference this Halloween! We are very excited to offer this one day event to build awareness and knowledge in our local SharePoint community. Jeff Warnat at local Microsoft Collaboration Specialist will be kicking the event off and Paul Stork from MindSharp will be our keynote speaker.

We will be offering three tracks offering different levels of learning opportunities for everyone to enjoy. Some of our speakers include:

 

Location: Platform Labs – http://www.platformlabs.org 1275 Kinnear Road, Columbus Ohio 43215

Conference Agenda:

Registration: 7:30am
Kick-off: 8:00 – 8:30am
Keynote: 8:30 – 9:30am
First Session: 10:15 – 11:15am
Showcase Lunch: 11:30 – 12:30pm
Second Session: 1:00 – 2:00pm
Third Session: 2:30 – 3:30pm
Adjourn: 3:30pm

Cost: Free to the community. Morning & Afternoon snacks will be provided by local sponsors & lunch will be provided by Quest Software.

Link to Register: https://www.clicktoattend.com/invitation.aspx?code=132164

In my presentation at tomorrow’s COSPUG event I will be going through a demo where I associated a custom list form with a content type. We only have an hour for the presentation, so I wanted to make sure I posted something with that included the steps to create the custom list form.

Scenario

Create a custom list entry form for a tasks list.

Solution

First off, we need to create a tasks list. Once we have done that we can open the site in SharePoint Designer.

In the folder list, expand your task list and right click on one of the view pages and select “New From Existing”.

A new page will be created for you and opened in Designer mode. Select the Common Content Tasks Menu and Select “Default to Master’s Content”.

Open the Common Content Tasks Menu again, and select “Create Custom Content”.

With your cursor in the desired cell, from the top menu select Insert > SharePoint Controls > Custom List Form.

From the Custom List Form menu, select the list and form you would like to customize.

At this point, you can customize the list form to meet your needs. For simplicity, I just changed the text size and color.

The last step is to associate the custom list form, with the list. In the folder list, right click on the list and select properties. Enter the information for your new custom list form.

From now on, when you create a new list item in your tasks list, your custom form will be displayed.

Recently the request was made that a user, who had only contributor permissions, also be able to see the usage reports. I could see this coming up on several different occasions, after all, it isn’t uncommon to have a manager that will need to see who is using the site but is also someone that you won’t want them to be able to make design changes to the site. You can accomplish this using SharePoint Permissions. The following shows the site permission levels that are available and can be configured together to create custom SharePoint access.

 

The approach I recommend would be to create a new permission level called “View Usage Reports”. You could then create a SP Group set to that permission level and add whatever users needed to be in that group. Doing it this way gives you some flexibility and allows you to granularly add the ability for any level of user to also be able to view usage reports.

The screenshots below are from a user who is part of the Members Group and the View Site Usage Group. Even though they can see the site actions tab, the only things they see on the settings page are the usage reports.

 

This week, a few of us were looking for a way to link to the list item detail page using a dvwp (data view web part) column value. We were originally trying to create a hyperlink to the list item that contained the current item ID. While this option works, SharePoint Designer offers an out of the box way to do this. In case you haven’t seen this feature before, here are some screen shots that show how to configure it.

After converting the web part to a dvwp, select the item you would like to format as the hyperlink:

 

Right Click on the item and select to Format Item as > Hyperlink to and then select the desired value.

 

Using my example, you can now navigate to the edit form by clicking the project title.

 

There are a lot of ways that you can use this feature. For instance, you could add icons to the web part that when selected you would be able to edit or view the properties.