Connect.Collaborate.SharePoint
Mar
29

Have you ever noticed when you get something wrong in an stsadm command that it lists out all the available commands in alphabetical order?
Or when you do want to try and find an operations name and its parameters that you are scrolling up and down the cmd window trying to discover the correct one?

I have created a SharePoint list for all the commands and options that groups them by the functional area.
http://www.wssdemo.com/Lists/stsadm/AllItems.aspx

Here is another example of why lists are better than a wiki or blog for publishing structured information. It would be very easy to repurpose this content into another format such as a spreadsheet (OOTB function) or a help file.

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Mar
24

I think it was because of the shadow caused by the light to dark transition. Anyway, took a snap shot with the digital camera + 3* digital zoom.

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Mar
24

I had hoped to do a screen cast of how to do this with SharePoint Designer but I'm living in a 3rd world subdivision (i.e. broadband that is no better than dial-up).

http://www.wssdemo.com/Pages/livesearch.aspx

Hope this makes it a bit clearer for those who have been trying to get this to work.

Work is insanely busy at the moment which is a shame because I have lots to blog about. I'm in Christchurch and Sydney over the next two weeks, maybe the hotel broadband will let me get some more stuff out.

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Mar
11

I threw some of these in a single Visio file and published them as a web page in a page viewer web part (another example of rich content...).

http://www.wssdemo.com/Pages/topologies.aspx

You can download the individual files from http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/office/solutions.mspx

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Mar
7

John Jansen is one of the Test Leads for the SharePoint Designer (SPD) product group. Whenever I'm in Redmond I always call in and see him. I can be sure that he has an answer for my sticky Data View web part problems.

I was going to blog about how to use an asp.net drop down control bound to a SharePoint list to filter a Data View after John told me how to do it (a year ago) but he also told me he was about to start bloging to show people how to do this sort of thing with SharePoint Designer. Better late than never J

View article...

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Mar
6

A lot of my posts involve using the Data View Web Part and I forget that SharePoint designers are yet to discover this powerful web part. I get lots of requests to explain this in more details which is hard to do with just screen shots so here is a screen cast….

http://www.wssdemo.com/Pages/flash/SimpleDVWP.htm

It s a bit rough but I ran out of time to tweak all the options. I will tidy it up and add some more annotations soon.

Shows how to render an RSS feed using SharePoint Designer, Data Source catalogue and Data View and format things like the date.

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Mar
2

I wrote some SharePoint code, couldn't help myself. A customer wanted some default text inserted as the description of a site in their new site provisioning process to save them a bit of time instead of opening a document where they store this standard text and copy & paste it in. Turns out that their process involves an awful (as in sickening) amount of copy & past between an email, 3 spreadsheets, employee directory, Portal Site Directory page and the new WSS site settings pages. Oh, and this process takes 20 minutes!

So I did the change they requested (took 5 minutes) then proceeded to document the current process and propose a new process that should cut the 20 down to 2 minutes.

Only problem, it means I have to write more code…

I'm on a mission with this particular customer to eradicate all no-financial spreadsheets and make this data visible and able to be used directly in supporting the business process that it supports (SharePoint Lists and connected Data Views). I've used the term "Workbench" to provide pages for specific tasks. All the pages share the same list/library data but aggregate in ways that assist with the task people need to perform.

It all comes down to information architecture and getting people to see that SharePoint is not just about documents & collaboration.

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Mar
1

OK, I'm too busy trying to keep up with everything I'm doing (both work and personal) to tell anybody what is going on, but yesterday, three of the things that happened were:

  1. Michael Sampson called in to say Hi. Unfortunately I also had another customer calling in at the same time and I had another customer on the phone confirming the kick off meeting for a new MOSS project. That's 4 projects on the go and with CJ departing for the SharePoint team in Redmond we need to find a good SharePoint developer (remember, I'm not a developer) so get your CV to me ASAP.
  2. The Wellington SharePoint User Group meeting was on. I couldn't make it because of #3 but Michael (#1) did make it and has a good write up of the meeting. And the answer is yes, Wellington does attract smart SharePoint people.
  3. I did the washing up for 115 dinner guests at M.A.S.H

I now have to prep for the MS Technical Briefings starting in Auckland next week. I'm trying to slash the PPT's and get some demo's in.

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