SharePoint Tutorial

Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services 3.0

Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 - An extentions build on Windows Server 2003, which Provides the infrastructure for collaboration and a foundation for building Web-based applications with this versatile technology. In short, it provides the base for SharePoint Server 2007.

SharePoint and .Net

SharePoint and .Net - SharePoint development stack is build upon .Net Framework 2.0 so, it pretty much uses all the .Net Framework 2.0 classes as its base classes. IT however, has its own SharePoint API model, which is commonly used for development.

SharePoint and SQL

SharePoint and SQL - SharePoint definitely uses SQL server to store the data which is uploaded into it. So be ready with a big SQl space to accommodate SharePoint data.

Now lets Start with the basic definition of SharePoint Server 2007

Now lets Start with the basic definition of SharePoint Server 2007 - Its a Collaboration software or a Content management Portal which effectively manage and repurpose the content to gain increased business value. In simple words, SharePoint's main purpose is to allow various departments\teams in the company to upload,manage and share documents using SharePoint sites. In addition to Sharing documents,it also allows you to create and manage web sites, use workflows and various other options to implement the business process.

What is sharepoint used for

Sharepoint as we know is a Content Management System developed by Microsoft that allows users to share the data (like word documents and stuff) in a web-based collaborative environment. SharePoint is mostaly used to create Companies Intranet Portal, where people can upload and Share documents they work on. In brief, SharePoint is Used to perform following functions in a company(Common Ones...) 1. Share Documents( like Word docs, excel sheets or simply some data values). 2. Start a Workflow on Document\Data. 3. Display Companies Announcements ( You are given a template to write and publish announcements on a aspx Page) 4. Display RSS feeds from various sources including SharePoint lists. 5. Display Data from other sources like SQL server, Access and other on companies Intranet Page. 6. Send E-mails (Automatic Alerts) for anything or everything happening in the companies portal. 7. Create aspx Pages and add data to them without writing code. 8. Make the intranet Portal Site Public ( It will behave like any other site on the web.) a lot more ....

SharePoint Administration

SharePoint Administration - As it a server, you would definitely need to learn its administartion. SharePoint has two options avaiable for administration. 1. Central admin - A website available to you immediately after you install SharePoint (and after you ran its Config wizard). This website pretty much allows you to perform and function in SharePoint like Creating\Deleting Websites, Backup\Restore Sites,Set up Users\accounts, Install Custom components and a lot more. 2. Stsadm Tool - This is a command line tool available in SharePoint, which allows you to perform all the administrative tasks that you can do with Central admin site.

12 Hive

12 Hive - SharePoint stores a lot its Pages and resources on the file system itself for fast retrieval. These Pages or Files which make SharePoint Interface, are arranged in a Folder structure which we call as 12 Hive. The 12 hive gets created at location "C:\ProgramFiles\CommonFiles\Web Server Extentions\12" when you install the SharePoint sever initially. To Know more about 12 hive and SharePoint solution structure see 12 hive Folder Structure SharePoint Development - SharePoint is also looked upon as a development platform, since all the components in SharePoint, right from a small hyperlink to a fancy button is customizable. You can add your links, buttons , pages and even whole asp.net application SharePoint using its deployment architecture

12 hive folder structure in sharepoint 2007

Few things about 12 hive folder structure and how well it is mapped with the wsp schema. SharePoint 2007 have a 12 hive structure which basically contains various files and folders that make SharePoint Interface. The files under 12 hive are mostly Uncustomized, that means they stay on the file system rather than in SharePoint database and perform better while rendering the Pages. You would normally, deploy your Custom files like Custom Pages\layouts, webparts, css or javascript files under 12 hive, so that they can well interact with SharePoint site. 12 hive in SharePoint 2007 has various folders that make up a virtual path for the resources they contain. For e.g to access a CSS file deployed under styles folder we can use a path like /_layouts/1033/styles/Customcss.css. The most commonly used folders are : \ISAPI\HELP\[LCID] - SharePoint help files. Deploy your own .chm files to this folder (or a localized subfolder) \CONFIG - Web.config customizations \ISAPI - SharePoint web services (deploy your custom web services here); this maps to /_vti_bin. \Resources Global .resx - Files accessed from custom features and site definitions \TEMPLATE\CONTROLTEMPLATES - deploy .ascx user controls here; maps to /_controltemplates \TEMPLATE\FEATURES - Features contain folder and related file for each feature. \TEMPLATE\LAYOUTS - Common site pages; maps to /_layouts \TEMPLATE\IMAGES - Common site image files; maps to /_layouts/images \TEMPLATE\SiteTemplates - All SharePoint site definitions; create a \xml to deploy your onet.xml custom site definition \TEMPLATE\THEMES - All UI elements used in themes; clone an existing theme folder to create your own \TEMPLATE\[LCID]\XML - Webtemp.xml files to define available site definitions; add an xml file here for your custom site definition \TEMPLATE\ADMIN Pages - Used by Central Admin; maps to /_admin \ADMISAPI Administration web services; maps to /_vti_adm Now lets discuss the most commonly used Folder in SharePoint development. TEMPLATE Folder - The most commonly used folder in 12 hive is the template folder or 12\TEMPLATE\. This is where developers deploy all of there custom files like Custom css, javascript file, Image file, Usercontrol, Custom aspx page, layouts page etc. etc.. These Custom files then run under SharePoint context and can well interact with Out-of-Box sharePoint components. Now, lets talk about how a wsp (or solution package) interacts with the 12 hive - When you deploy a Solution using stsadm or Visual Studio( using VseWss), SharePoint copies various files from the WSP to the hive. The file responsible in wsp to perform various deployments\copying is the "manifest file".The manifest.xml file specifies how the WSP file is put together. So, when the deployment starts the sharepoint compiler looks for the first tag i.e the <solution > tag. This tag tells sharepoint about the solution id that uniquely identifies your solution. Next it looks for the <FeatureManifest> tag. This location however, is virtually mapped to the root of the FEATURES folder at 12 hive i.e to 12\TEMPLATE\FEATURES. So, the SharePoint compiler reads this location and creates a Cutsom Folder usually specified in <FeatureManifest> tag and places the feature.xml file into that folder. Next it looks for <TemplateFile> tag. This location is virtually mapped to the root of the TEMPLATE folder i.e. at 12\TEMPLATE. This tells compiler to deploy the files specified under this tag, into one or more folder under template directory. For e.g. if <TemplateFile> tag has location as Location="Layouts\CustomPage.aspx", the installer will drop the file CustomPage.aspx under the Layouts folder, since it is already pointing to the root of the Layouts folder Tempalte folder. Finally, the installer looks at the <Assemblygt; tag which specifies where the DLL is located. The root for this element is the web application bin file if you specify DeploymentTarget="WebApplication", and the GAC if you specify DeploymentTarget="GlobalAssemblyCache". While the manifest determines what’s in the WSP file, you still have to create a diamond definition file also known as .ddf file which is an instruction file for building WSP files. However, if you are using VseWSS you will not create all the deployment files manually. The extentions take care of that.

SharePoint 2007 Development Tutorial

Lets Start with what do you need for your development machine 1. First and foremost, you need Windows Server 2003 R2 with Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 Installed. Then you need to verify that you have Microsoft SQL Server 2005\2008 Developer Edition installed, before you began installing Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 also Known as "MOSS". Other quick way to start with development is to download SharePoint 2007 VHD from Here and run it with a software called Microsoft Virtual PC. This VHD Contains Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 and Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007, you will however need to install VS 2005\2008 to get started. Once you are all set with the machine you should consider installing Visual Studio Extensions for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 from Here. This will provide you with various SharePoint Templates to get started. Let's discuss the knowledge Part - First you need to be familiar with 12 Hive and the Solution structure of SharePoint. 12 hive - SharePoint 2007 have a 12 hive structure which basically contains various files and folders that make SharePoint Interface. The files\components that you will develop will also be deployed under this folder structure. Solution Package and Feature - Every component that you will develop for SharePoint should be in the form of a Solution Package. These packages are nothing but a .cab files which contain other files that needed to be deployed on the SharePoint server. These Solutions packages represented in SharePoint as .wsp files, also allows you to package Features and defines important metadata about those Features. Besides, Solution Package "Features" is also an important concept in SharePoint development. Feature is a functional component that can be activated and deactivated at various scopes throughout a SharePoint instances. Almost, every link, button or functional components in SharePoint is a Feature. Take it as a component that can be turned on\off when required. To understand the relation between 12 hive and the .wsp see 12 Hive Folder Structure Now, lets discuss about SharePoint 2007 Object Model - In SharePoint 2007 Object Model there are two important namespaces . 1. Microsoft.SharePoint namespace - This is the root namespace for all WSS objects. A developer would always use Micorsoft.SharePoint.dll namespace for creating WSS compatible components like webparts,features and solution packages. 2. Microsoft.Office.Server namespace - This is the root namespace of all Office Server 2007 (i.e. MOSS) objects. A developer will use the Microsoft.Office.Server namespace while accessing SharePoint 2007 server (or MOSS) specific components like BDC,Enterprise search etc. Creating WebParts - Lets Start with creating a very basic webpart using VseWss. This webpart will display some data from a SharePoint list using GridView control on a SharePoint Site Page. The webpart is created as a feature, that means you can activate\deactivate this webpart in your SharePoint site and is deployed in the SharePoint environment as a solution package. See detail Step-by-Step example Create and Deploy Webpart as Solution Package

SharePoint 2007 Object Model

n Sharepoint Object model there are two Important namespaces. The Microsoft.Office.Server namespace is the root namespace of all Office Server objects and Microsoft.SharePoint is the root namespace for all WSS objects. The Chart Below illustrates some of the key classes contained in each of these namespaces, as well as to which functional area they belong. Document Libraries (Microsoft.SharePoint) SPDocumentLibrary , SPPictureLibrary Business Data Catalog (Microsoft.Office.Server.ApplicationRegistry.Administration) EntityCollection , ApplicationRegistry Features (Microsoft.SharePoint) SPFeatureDefinition, SPFeatureScope, SPElementDefinition, SPFeature, SPFeatureProperty Sites (Microsoft.SharePoint) SPSite, SPSiteAdministration, SPSiteCollection, SPWeb Meetings (Microsoft.SharePoint.Meetings) SPMeeting, MtgUtility User Profiles (Microsoft.Office.Server.UserProfiles) UserProfile, UserProfileManager Solutions (Microsoft.SharePoint.Administration) SPsolution, SPFeatureReceiver, SPSolutionCollection Lists (Microsoft.SharePoint) SPList, SPListItem, SPListItemCollection Notes: * To use the SharePoint API, your code must reside on one of the machines in a SharePoint application server farm. Your code can still work with other sites in the farm from any other site in the farm, but you cannot, for example, work with the SharePoint API from a machine on which MOSS or WSS is not installed. * The only practical way to consume SharePoint data and functionality from a remote client is to use the SharePoint web services. * The object model is not designed to support Remoting. * To add a reference to a Sharepoint API, Right-click the project(in VS) and select Add Reference. Click the Browse tab and select the following directory: C:\program files\common files\microsoft shared\web server extensions\12\isapi

SharePoint Definitions

Web Parts are componentized, self-contained packages of user interface that can be dropped into place on SharePoint Web Part pages to provide discrete sets of functionality to users. It can be incredibly easy to get confused between sites, webs, web applications, and site collections. The farm is the topmost level in the hierarchy. Below the farm, you have web applications represented by the SPWebApplication class, which typically correspond to an IIS application pool. Below that, you have a collection of site collections contained in the SPSiteCollection class. Finally, you have site collections represented by the SPSite class and individual websites represented by the SPWeb class. Features allow reusable pieces of functionality to be created and deployed to other sites,without modifying site templates.It is always better to deploy a feature in new site instead ofdirectly embedding mountains of complex XML.Using Features, you can do everything from adding a link to the Site Settings page to creating a complete, fully functioning Project Management suite that can be added to any SharePoint site.Features are organized in folders under the Features directory located under 12 hives; Where SharePoint Server 2007 puts all of its system files, at the following path: %SystemDrive%\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\web server extensions\12. The two files that are used to define a feature are the feature.xml and Elements.xml .The feature XML file defines the actual feature and will make SharePoint aware of the installed feature. It usually identifies the Feature itself and its element manifest file and sets the Feature scope to Web site. Elements.xml file identifies the assembly, class, and method to implement in feature. You can directly deploy a feature in sharepoint site with stsadm -o installfeature -filename XYZEventHandler\Feature.xml stsadm -o activatefeature -filename DeletingEventHandler\Feature.xml -url href="http://server/Site/Subsite">http://Server/Site/Subsite iisreset OR To Deploy it as solution package you need a solution manifest (manifest.xml). Solutions allow you to package Features in a cabinet (.cab) file and define important metadata about those Features. After a Solution is installed on a server in the farm, you can then use SharePoint’s Solution management features to automate the deployment of that Solution to other sites within the farm. The solution manifest (always called manifest.xml) is stored at the root of a solution file. This file defines the list of features, site definitions, resource files, Web Part files, and assemblies to process. It does not define the file structure—if files are included in a solution but not listed in the manifest XML file, they are not processed in any way. Because the solution file is essentially a .cab file, use the makecab.exe tool to create the solution package. The makecab.exe tool takes a pointer to a .ddf file, which describes the structure of the .cab file. The format of a .ddf file is, declare a standard header and then enumerate, one file per line, the set of files by where they live on disk, separated by where they should live in the .cab file. Features & Solutions: The Feature Framework has been extended to allow developers to create custom Features. Features can be deployed by using SharePoint Portal Server 2007 new form of deployment, namely Solution Deployment. Solutions as you know, are custom packages (e.g. WSP file) or redistributable CAB files, created by developers and deployed by SharePoint Administrators. Administrator can deploy Features to the individual site or to all Web front End Servers. Features are a method for developers to package customisations and deploy them to the SharePoint portal. They can then be activated and deactivated at the Site Collection level. Solutions are a way to bundle features together for deployment. Custom action : Represents a link, toolbar button, menu item, or any control that can be added to a toolbar or menu that appears in the UI. You define custom actions by using a custom action element within a feature definition file. You can bind custom actions to a list type, content type, file type, or programmatic identifier (ProgID). For more information, see Custom Action Definitions. Event receiver: Evaluator of an event and definer of the behavior of an application. Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 allows you to define event handlers within libraries, lists, and sites. Event receivers can be defined by using a receiver element within a feature definition file. For more information, see Event Registrations. Master page: Pages that provide a consistent layout and appearance (look and feel) for SharePoint sites. They allow you to factor out layout, structure, and interface elements such as headers, footers, navigation bars, and content placeholders. Master pages in ASP.NET 2.0 and master pages in Windows SharePoint Services work in the same way. For more information, see Building Simple Master Pages for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0. Module : A file or collection of file instances that define the location where the files are installed during site creation. Modules are frequently used to implement a Web Part Page in the site. You can define modules by using a module element within a feature definition file. For more information, see Modules. SharePoint site: A Web site hosted in a virtual URL. A SharePoint site is a place for collaboration, communication, or content storage. Depending on your business needs, you can create sites such as team sites, blog sites, wiki sites, and others. You can customize a site's appearance, users, user permissions, galleries, and site administration by using the Site Settings administration pages. SharePoint site collection: A collection of SharePoint sites that share common administration pages and site settings. Site collections allow you to share content types, site columns, templates, and Web Parts within a group of SharePoint sites. SharePoint Web farm: A group of Office SharePoint 2007 servers that share the same configuration database. All site content and all configuration data is shared for all front-end Web servers in a server farm. Site definition.: A set of files that includes a master XML configuration file that is stored on all front-end Web servers. A site definition provides the basic blueprint for how sites look, what lists they include, their default navigational structures, and so on. For more information, see Working with Site Templates and Definitions. Theme: A group of files (CSS, images) that allow you to define the appearance (look and feel) of Web pages. Themes in ASP.NET 2.0 and themes in SharePoint Products and Technologies work in the same way. Themes are used to help organizations to brand their portals and team sites. Office SharePoint Server 2007 includes a set of predefined themes. However, as a developer, you can create custom themes for your company. For more information, see How to: Customize Themes.