From feeling to insight

If you ever want to export site columns from an existing site collection, you might find yourself in a bit of a loop, since its quite hard to get a nice ‘export’ of all those columns if your no developer. So when I found out Gary had done that before I thought it was worth a blog.

Just some plain information about ‘exporting’ site columns from an existing site collection:

http://stsadm.blogspot.com/2008/02/export-site-columns.html 

The actual download can be found here:

http://stsadm.blogspot.com/2009/02/downloads.html

I did blog before about them extensions and the use of them in case of Ghosting.

I just ran into a nice SharePoint problem that is being described and resolved over here. Apparently there is a job trying to access your HOSTS file, in order to add some lines for the Search, and if it doesn’t have sufficient rights it complains about it. Whenever you decide to add users and give them ‘fulltrust’ it just deletes the host file..

So whenever you see your log filling up with:

Application Server Administration job failed for service instance Microsoft.Office.Server.Search.Administration.SearchServiceInstance

Reason: Access to the path ‘C:\WINDOWS\system32\drivers\etc\HOSTS’ is denied.

Or:

Application Server Administration job failed for service instance Microsoft.Office.Server.Search.Administration.SearchServiceInstance

Reason: Access to the path ‘C:\WINDOWS\system32\drivers\etc\HOSTS’ is denied.

Make sure that COMPUTERNAME\WSS_ADMIN_WPG has modify permissions on your HOSTS file. Whenever the HOSTS file is already gone, just create a new empty file with notepad and save it as HOSTS without an extension. (Make sure to add the COMPUTERNAMWSS_ADMIN_WPG with modify permissions after that again).

SharePoint 2007 has been around for a while and one of the things I recently stumbled up again made me creating my first CodePlex project. Whenever you create a custom masterpage, and use that on your site collection each created subsite that is not of the type publishing will use the default SharePoint style, and so ‘breaking’ your layout.

Now I know there are several solutions on the web that you can buy, or that you can simply ‘apply’ your custom masterpage manually. But I used some time making a feature that can be used to apply the masterpage used in the parent site on activation, and reset it to it’s default on deactivation. And in order to make it even easier I made another feature that staples the other feature to each site definition, so whenever you create a site the feature that applies the masterpage is automatically attached and activated.

The CodePlex project can be found on http://masterpagestapler.codeplex.com/ and contains both the 2 -wsp’s (in case you don’t care about the source, and just want to fix it), and it contains the source.

Next week I will be attending the SharePoint Ignite training, and thus this week means some catching up on SharePoint 2010, besides checking some of the presentations of the SPC, i found the following stencils pretty handy. There just released by Microsoft, so read-up.

Services

Download: Visio, PDF, XPS

Services architecture, including and common ways to deploy services in your overall solution design.

Cross-farm Services

Download: Visio, PDF, XPS

Illustrates how to deploy services across farms to provide centralized administration of services.

Topologies for SharePoint Server 2010

Download: Visio, PDF, XPS

Describes common ways to build and scale farm topologies, including planning which servers to start services on.

Hosting Environments in SharePoint Server 2010

Download: Visio, PDF, XPS

Summarizes the support for hosting environments and illustrates common hosting architectures.

Business Connectivity Services Model

Download: Visio, PDF, XPS

This model poster describes the architecture of Microsoft Business Connectivity Services in SharePoint Server 2010 and provides information about how to create solutions that are based on the service.

Use this model with the following article: Business Connectivity Services overview (SharePoint Server 2010)

SharePoint 2010 Upgrade Planning

Download: Visio, PDF, XPS

This model covers planning for an upgrade from Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 to SharePoint Server 2010. It includes information about the following:

• Upgrade requirements: Hardware, operating system, and database
• Upgrade process: specific steps to follow before, during, and after the upgrade

Use this model with the following article: Upgrading to SharePoint Server 2010

SharePoint Server 2010 Upgrade Approaches

Download: Visio, PDF, XPS

This model helps you understand the in-place, database attach, and hybrid approaches to upgrading from Office SharePoint Server 2007 to SharePoint Server 2010.

• See the farm topologies before, during, and after upgrade
• Compare the advantages of each type of upgrade approach

Use this model with the following articles:

• Determine upgrade approach (SharePoint Server 2010)
• Upgrade process overview (SharePoint Server 2010)

SharePoint Server 2010 — Test Your Upgrade Process

Download: Visio, PDF, XPS

This model explains the methodology for testing the upgrade process before upgrading from Office SharePoint Server 2007 to SharePoint Server 2010.

• Understand the goals for testing your upgrade process: customizations, hardware, timing, planning
• See specific steps to follow for testing your upgrade process

Use this model with the following article: Use a trial upgrade to find potential issues (SharePoint Server 2010)

SharePoint Server 2010 — Services Upgrade

Download: Visio, PDF, XPS

This model covers upgrading services from Office SharePoint Server 2007 to SharePoint Server 2010.

• Considerations for specific services: Personalization, Search, InfoPath Forms, Excel, Business Data Catalog, Single Sign-on
• In-place upgrade with services
• Database attach upgrade with services

Choose a tool for business intelligence in SharePoint Server 2010

Download: Visio, PDF, XPS

This model covers an overview of business intelligence in SharePoint Server 2010 and provides you with the following information.

• An overview of each business intelligence service and when you might use the service.
• Architecture for application of the business intelligence services and how they work together in a topology.
• A list of possible data sources for each business intelligence service.

Found on http://blogs.microsoft.nl/blogs/remco_ploeg/archive/2009/10/27/sharepoint-2010-visio-stencils.aspx (Dutch)

Whenever I make a new SharePoint web application trough the Central Admin, the next thing I do is beating myself up for the fact that it’s a .net 2.0 version, and since we use .net 3.5 stuff in most of the projects we do, we always have to ‘upgrade’.

Now there are two ways of doing that, either edit the web.config manually. Or copying it in a ‘blank’ site project in Visual Studio, and then changing the .net version in the project settings.

*Update 21-09-09:
My colleague Vishal pointed me to http://ajaxifymoss.codeplex.com/Release/ProjectReleases.aspx?ReleaseId=13360 that is actually a very nifty tool saving you lots of time updating your web.config! So whenever you have the rights to use install this tool I suggest you use that, instead of doing it manually.

However, when you find someone else mad a .net 2.0 web.config on a production environment and you don’t have a Visual Studio present the following might come in handy.

The following lines are the lines that have to be added to your web.config in order to upgrade it to version 3.5. So just make a backup copy of your existing web.config, and open the original in notepad. (Make sure that whenever you run it on a Windows 2008 Server, you run your notepad instance as an Administrator in order to be able to safe your work).

Add this to the configSections

<sectionGroup name="system.web.extensions" type="System.Web.Configuration.SystemWebExtensionsSectionGroup, System.Web.Extensions, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31BF3856AD364E35">

<sectionGroup name="scripting" type="System.Web.Configuration.ScriptingSectionGroup, System.Web.Extensions, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31BF3856AD364E35">

<section name="scriptResourceHandler" type="System.Web.Configuration.ScriptingScriptResourceHandlerSection, System.Web.Extensions, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31BF3856AD364E35" requirePermission="false" allowDefinition="MachineToApplication"/>

<sectionGroup name="webServices" type="System.Web.Configuration.ScriptingWebServicesSectionGroup, System.Web.Extensions, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31BF3856AD364E35">

<section name="jsonSerialization" type="System.Web.Configuration.ScriptingJsonSerializationSection, System.Web.Extensions, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31BF3856AD364E35" requirePermission="false" allowDefinition="Everywhere"/>

<section name="profileService" type="System.Web.Configuration.ScriptingProfileServiceSection, System.Web.Extensions, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31BF3856AD364E35" requirePermission="false" allowDefinition="MachineToApplication"/>

<section name="authenticationService" type="System.Web.Configuration.ScriptingAuthenticationServiceSection, System.Web.Extensions, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31BF3856AD364E35" requirePermission="false" allowDefinition="MachineToApplication"/>

<section name="roleService" type="System.Web.Configuration.ScriptingRoleServiceSection, System.Web.Extensions, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31BF3856AD364E35" requirePermission="false" allowDefinition="MachineToApplication"/>

    </sectionGroup>

  </sectionGroup>

</sectionGroup>

Add the following statement to the HttpHandlers

<remove verb="*" path="*.asmx"/>

<add verb="*" path="*.asmx" validate="false" type="System.Web.Script.Services.ScriptHandlerFactory, System.Web.Extensions, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31BF3856AD364E35"/>

<add verb="*" path="*_AppService.axd" validate="false" type="System.Web.Script.Services.ScriptHandlerFactory, System.Web.Extensions, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31BF3856AD364E35"/>

<add verb="GET,HEAD" path="ScriptResource.axd" validate="false" type="System.Web.Handlers.ScriptResourceHandler, System.Web.Extensions, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31BF3856AD364E35"/>

Add the following statement to the HttpModules

<add name="ScriptModule" type="System.Web.Handlers.ScriptModule, System.Web.Extensions, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31BF3856AD364E35"/>

Add the following statement to the Assemblies

<add assembly="System.Core, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=B77A5C561934E089"/>

<add assembly="System.Web.Extensions, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31BF3856AD364E35"/>

<add assembly="System.Xml.Linq, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=B77A5C561934E089"/>

<add assembly="System.Data.DataSetExtensions, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=B77A5C561934E089"/>

Add the following statement below the tagMapping

<controls>

      <add tagPrefix="asp" namespace="System.Web.UI" assembly="System.Web.Extensions, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31BF3856AD364E35"/>

      <add tagPrefix="asp" namespace="System.Web.UI.WebControls" assembly="System.Web.Extensions, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31BF3856AD364E35"/>

</controls>

Add the following statement to the Assemblybinding - runtime

<dependentAssembly>

        <assemblyIdentity name="System.Web.Extensions" publicKeyToken="31bf3856ad364e35"/>

        <bindingRedirect oldVersion="1.0.0.0-1.1.0.0" newVersion="3.5.0.0"/>

</dependentAssembly>

<dependentAssembly>

        <assemblyIdentity name="System.Web.Extensions.Design" publicKeyToken="31bf3856ad364e35"/>

        <bindingRedirect oldVersion="1.0.0.0-1.1.0.0" newVersion="3.5.0.0"/>

</dependentAssembly>

Add the following statement below the system.net

  <system.codedom>

    <compilers>

      <compiler language="c#;cs;csharp" extension=".cs" type="Microsoft.CSharp.CSharpCodeProvider,System, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089" warningLevel="4">

        <providerOption name="CompilerVersion" value="v3.5"/>

        <providerOption name="WarnAsError" value="false"/>

      </compiler>

    </compilers>

  </system.codedom>

  <system.webServer>

    <validation validateIntegratedModeConfiguration="false"/>

    <modules>

      <remove name="ScriptModule"/>

      <add name="ScriptModule" preCondition="managedHandler" type="System.Web.Handlers.ScriptModule, System.Web.Extensions, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31BF3856AD364E35"/>

    </modules>

    <handlers>

      <remove name="WebServiceHandlerFactory-Integrated"/>

      <remove name="ScriptHandlerFactory"/>

      <remove name="ScriptHandlerFactoryAppServices"/>

      <remove name="ScriptResource"/>

      <add name="ScriptHandlerFactory" verb="*" path="*.asmx" preCondition="integratedMode" type="System.Web.Script.Services.ScriptHandlerFactory, System.Web.Extensions, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31BF3856AD364E35"/>

      <add name="ScriptHandlerFactoryAppServices" verb="*" path="*_AppService.axd" preCondition="integratedMode" type="System.Web.Script.Services.ScriptHandlerFactory, System.Web.Extensions, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31BF3856AD364E35"/>

      <add name="ScriptResource" verb="GET,HEAD" path="ScriptResource.axd" preCondition="integratedMode" type="System.Web.Handlers.ScriptResourceHandler, System.Web.Extensions, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31BF3856AD364E35"/>

    </handlers>

  </system.webServer>

After this you’re done and can safe the web.config, and re-open your site, while being able using the .net 3.5 stuff you need.