Cross Browser Support for MOSS

The newer version of sharepoint , MOSS 2007 has better cross browser compatibility than the older version . It supports the following browswer :


Windows
Firefox 1.5+
Netscape 8.1+
Mozilla 1.7+
Macintosh
Safari 2.0+
Firefox 1.5+
Unix/Linux
Firefox 1.5+
Netscape 7.2+

Check out the following article to completely understand the browser compatibility and feature support by Level 2 browser :

http://technet2.microsoft.com/Office/en-us/library/ff6c5b8c-59bd-4079-8f0b-de4f8b4e0a861033.mspx?mfr=true

Timer Job Failed

ERRORS :

• The job to enable features on existing sites failed
• Application Server Administration Service Timer Job Failed

In such cases check the Windows Timer Service running in server , also check the credentials the timer is running which might be a reason of the Jobs failing in server.

The file web.sitemap required by XmlSiteMapProvider does not exist

I am using a custom XMLSiteMapProvider where in i have defined a web.sitemap file with urls.
The application worked fine for administrators but i got this error when i tried other users. I am using this control in a SharePoint 2007 Page . After lots of trial it came to my notice that actual error was not identification of the file .The problem was that the normal sharepoint user didn't had enough permission to access the web.sitemap file in web server .

This worked once i gave autheticated user access to the file,kind of fishy though , as i am not expecting this behaviour.

CSS not working on LinkButton

This was my issue , i had defined link button in asp.net like this :


_linkNewIncident = new System.Web.UI.WebControls.LinkButton();
_linkNewIncident.Text = "Creat New Incident";
_linkNewIncident.Click += new EventHandler(linkNewIncident_Click);
_linkNewIncident.CssClass = "HelpDeskLink";

and corresponding CSS as :
.HelpDeskLink { color:white ; font-weight :bolder ; font-size :x-small ; }

.HelpDeskLink a { color:white ; font-weight :bolder ; font-size :x-small ; }


when i ran the application , my links were still blue and was not reflecting any CSS behaviour which is supposed to be white as per my CSS :-(


After some search i got the solution .

Solution : Define "CSS Pseudo-classes"

I modified my CSS style class to the following and it worked ..


a.HelpDeskLink:link
{
color:white ;
font-weight :bolder ;
font-size :x-small ;
}

Server error: This item cannot be deleted because it is still referenced by other pages

You might get this error when you try to delete from the _catalogsmasterpage directory ,. Microsoft has provided a solution which doesn't look convincing at all :

check : http://support.microsoft.com/kb/926812

I used a different method:

• Open the Master gallery in Explorer view
• Create a Directory named "Delete"
• Cut all the un-wanted Master Pages and paste it inside the "Delete" directoty
• Delete the "Delete" Directory

And you got rid of all the unwanted pages .

Access Denied While Create Page Action

My user came back to me in morning and said that he is not able to create a page and was facing "Access Denied" error, i was amazed as the user had full control to the site. So i tried it with my ID and BANG same error. I was not able to make page too havig the same "Full Control" access.

After a complete half day of search and trying different things gladly it worked ,saved my weekend fun.

Solution which i used to get over the error is to add my ID to the "Administrators" group of site and it's all fixed.

Am not sure weather it is something by architecture of other issue but it saved my day.

I got one solution which still needs to be tested :
Check out :
http://wss.asaris.de/sites/walsh/Lists/WSSv3%20FAQ/DispForm.aspx?ID=1148

XML Editor

I found this very helpful XML Editor .

http://www.download.com/XML-Marker/3000-7241_4-10334011.html?tag=pdp_prod

Unable to open Page due to Web Part Error . "Saviour" Web Part Maintenance Page

At some day you decide to test your new webpart and unfortunately web part bombs badly and you end up with page which looks something like this :




Now second thought is to open the page using Sharepoint designer and removing web part , but to the height of disappointment even Designer throws all kind of error.You are all stuck thinking "How can i remove web part ? "

Well trick is to append your page url with querystring " ?contents=1 ".

So if your stuck url is http://localhost then append the query string
http://localhost?contents=1

This will take you to the saviour page "Web Part Maintenance Page" ,remove the webpart and have a happy day forward :)

Workflow Failed in SharePoint with Error: Failed on Start (retrying)

In case you are the unlucky one to get this error then i have couple of suggestions .One of them worked for me :)

Check out the 2 ways which might help you to overcome this error:

• The workflow definition is invalid. :This can be figured out as SPD pops error message in such case

• Changing the identity of the application pool to a user with administrative rights can cause the workflow to “fail to start“. If this sounds like something you've done, try changing it back to network service and try running the workflow again. (worked for me)

Check out the article by Jason Nadrowski

Connected Page Viewer Web Part

This is a very good Page viewer web part which can be connected to a link list .




http://dev.collutions.com/Beta/pages/Web%20Parts.aspx?View={9D739B14-CC7F-428D-A2E4-64B840B8506A}&SelectedID=2

"An unexpected error has occurred" in MOSS 2007

Ever wondered what the heck is going on when you are popped with error "Unexpected Error" when developing on SharePoint, well this approach might make life simpler ,it made mine.

Make the following changes :

• Open web.config of the site you are working on
• search for "CallStack" attribute in safe mode section and change the value to "true"
• Search for "CustomErrors" in System.web section and change the value to "false"

and take a sigh of relief atleast now you will have something on screen in developers language.

People Picker in MOSS 2007 unable to find user from Multiple Domain

When the sharepoint is installed in environment with multiple domains , the user profile import mechanism only imports the user from the domain in which the sharepoint server is installed.


For eg , if there are multiple domains Domain1.abc.com and Domain2.abc.com and sharepoint 2007 server is installed at Domain2.abc.com , in such case when user profile import is run in SSP , all the users from Domain2.abc.com are imported to user profile database.


when we try to use the people picker control to search for user present in Domain1.abc.com we don't get any results as shown below :

In order to import users from Domain1.abc.com , we need to define new import connection for the Domain1.abc.com and start user profile import once more .

Follow these steps :

• Open SSP(Shared Service provider)
  
• Go to User Profiles and Properties
  
• Click on View Import Connections
  
• Create New Connection
  
• Add the following entries , also shown in figure below

Domain Name :Domain1

Auto discover domain controller(Selected)

Search Base :DC=Domain1,DC=abc,DC=com

Other as default*

• Start full import and now you should get all users

Unable to add domain user to SharePoint 2007 Site

This behavior may occur if the user who you want to add is a member of a Microsoft Windows NT4.0 domain that is joined to your Active Directory forest. The Select users and groups -- Web Page Dialog dialog box does not support Windows NT 4.0 domains. You can use the dialog box to search for and add users who are members of a Microsoft Windows Server 2003 or Microsoft Windows 2000 domain. However, you cannot use the dialog box to retrieve user information from a Windows NT 4.0 domain.

Resolution :
Directly add the user ID to the "add user box" and assign permissions and press OK, this will add the user to the site.

"MySite" not working SharePoint 2007

I was working on MySite today and while playing around i had no clue what i did but i was sure of one thing that i totally messed it up .

MySite stopped responding and after that only thing which came to mind is "SOS"

Anyways in case you end up in same situation which is very possible in the life of a computer geek , then simply follow the steps .

1)Open Central Administration ->Operations and create a new web application with "My Site Host" as template.
2)Well once you are done with creation of site the only thing remaining is to point the MySite to the new application URL as , so change the URL.

- Go to SSP

- click on "My Site Settings"

- Specify the new Url at "Personal Site Service"

That's It .Try accessing the MySite now.It's up and running.

Custom Activity for SharePoint Designer 2007

Every time you start workflow development there is big question in mind, Should i use Visual Studio or SharePoint Designer 2007 and you might end up visual studio if the workflow requirement is bit more than the "out of box" functionality of SPD.

Would'nt it be nice if i can plug in more functionality to Sharepoint Designer.

When MOSS 2007 came into market the impression was that SPD is not much extensible and is to be used for very simple workflow , but i am glad Microsoft didn't made it that stringent and have provided a way to attach custom activities to the SPD.

I have created custom activities in number of work flow scenario and belive me its great .I won't put my procedures in this blog as there are blogs where you can get the complete process. They helped me a lot of understand the "Custom Activities" development.

Here they are :

By Carlos Segura Sanz
http://www.ideseg.com/AddCustomWorkflowActivitiesToSharePointDesignerPart1.aspx
http://www.ideseg.com/AddCustomWorkflowActivitiesToSharePointDesignerPart2.aspx

John Holliday
http://johnholliday.net/archive/2007/03/27/Add-Your-Own-Custom-Workflow-Activities-to-SharePoint-Designer-2007.aspx

SharePoint Designer Team Blog http://blogs.msdn.com/sharepointdesigner/archive/2007/03/15/adding-activities-to-spd.aspx

Well majority of them speak about same stuff , but cross reference helps to make understanding much clear .

HAPPY WORK~FLOWING!!!!

Infopath Form 2007 feature Unavailable in Infopath Form Services

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/infopath/HA102105871033.aspx#1

People Picker Control for Infopath 2007

Ever wanted to have a people picker kind of control in Infopath form and that too in browser mode. Did i heard yes :) , well there is a Active-X control which takes care of this part named "Contact Selector Control".

Just follow the steps to get it working :

Add Contact Selector to Controls Pane

• Click the "Add or Remove Controls " from the Control Task pane as shown in figure

• Click ADD
• Select Active-X
• This will display a list of controls , select "Contact Selector" ,click Next
• Select "Don't include a .cab file"
• From drop down select "Field or Group(any data type) and click finish
  

DataSource for the Contact Selector control

• Add non Repeating group named "group1"
• Add a repeating Group names "Person"
• Add following test field to the "Perosn " group (DisplayName,AccountId,AccountType)
  

Add Secondary datasource XMl file with details about the SharePoint Server , this is required by the form in order to validate the user against a particular sharepoint server .

• Open Notepad and add the following Tag <Context siteUrl="http://<servername>"/>
• Save the file as Context.xml
• Add new connection as "Receive Type" and source of data as "XML"
• Option “Include the data as a resource file” shoule be enabled
  

Drag control to the form and you are all set .

Best of Luck !!!!

MOSS 2007 Webcasts and Videos

I was planning to make a list of good webcast and video on SharePoint , Thanks to Steve Sofian for taking this initiative :-)

These are some good collection of sharepoint concepts :

http://www.sharepointblogs.com/ssofian/archive/2006/07/28/9532.aspx


Enjoy!!!!

People Picker not able to identify users in forest with multiple domain - SharePoint 2007

I am working on this issue from past 2 days and belive me it's very time consuming in case you dont get the solution ASAP . Thanks to Joel Oleson's Life blog which talks about the same.

To keep it short i would just give the problem statement and solution to get it working .


Problem Statement :
When Sharepoint server 2007 is installed in environment with more than one domain , there is a tendency of people picker control to search only in domain where the portal is installed .
E.G Consider following environment as example

Forest Name :test.com
First Domain :First.test.com
Second Domain :Second.test.com

In such case if you install sharepoint server in domain First.test.com , the people picker might not recognize users from Second.test.com.
So what could be done to make it work .

Solution Description :
Note : First make sure that there exist atleast a one way trust between the 2 domains(First.test.com /Second.test.com) and follow the steps.

First Step :
Run stsadm.exe to set the password used for encrytion/de-cryption

stsadm.exe -o setapppassword -password
eg stsadm.exe -o setapppassword -password testpassword


Second Step :

Format of command :
stsadm.exe –o setproperty -url {} –pn "peoplepicker-searchadforests" –pv {list of forests or domains}

The format of {list of forests or domains} is a list of

forest:DnsName,LoginName,Password
or
domain:DnsName,LoginName,Password

separated by semicolon.

As per our example the command is like

C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\web server extensions\12\BIN>stsa
dm.exe -o setproperty -url "http://localhost" -pn "people
picker-searchadforests" -pv "forest:test.com;domain:First.test.com;domain:Second.test.com" ,{domainusername},{domainuserpassword}


Last step IISRESET might not be needed (i did that :) ).

And you are all set , try the People picker search and you get all the users.

Customizing MySite in SharePoint 2007

Well i was searching for a methodology to customize MySite in SharePoint 2007 and Volla!!! i got this excellent article:

Customizing MOSS 2007 My Sites within the enterprise