The NEW SharePoint Color Palette Builder Tool

In the past I covered 2 articles on the new SharePoint 2013 Composed Looks and Preview Files that mention theming and how it works:

Step-by-Step Create a SharePoint Composed Look
Understanding and Creating a Master Page Preview File

In those articles I talked about the new theming engine and how to create your own new Composed Look which was pretty cool. I also mentioned a tool that would help us build our SPCOLOR file or basically our theming file.

Our goal is to provide new color possiblities or “palettes” for the power user to choose from. Don’t forget that you can place these anywhere you want when building your own custom master page. Themes are not just for the out of the box look and feel. If I create my own Master Page and decide to allow the Power User to change the color of the top bar only, I can.

The new SharePoint SPCOLOR file builder tool

I have been waiting for this for a while, it was announced during a session at SPC12 in Vegas but never saw the day of light. This should be in everyones SharePoint Install in my opinion.

You can download it here: http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=38182

An email on April Fools – SharePoint MVP 2013

Well I won’t lie, I feel like a 5 year old on Christmas day.

I woke up on Monday morning, which I took off for a long weekend. The memory will forever be engraved in my mind, comfortably seating on my couch laptop on my lap and phone on the table. I see my phone light up from a distance and see the beginning of an email… “Congratulations 2013 Microsoft MVP!” and I remember telling myself “wait what?” and jumping on inbox from my laptop.

Brand your SharePoint?

I have been working with SharePoint for quite some time now with SharePoint 2003, 2007 and 2010. Having worked on numerous projects, it allowed me to see SharePoint as a platform, which allows companies to map their business processes, build Intranets and Extranets. It changes the way people see them from outside through a Public Facing site as well as other scenarios. Throughout my personal experiences of meeting different interesting people and evaluating their unique needs, it allowed me to touch many aspects of SharePoint like Governance, Information Architecture, Taxonomy, Server Architecture, Site Architecture and of course today’s topic, Branding.

I am not a developer nor am I a graphic designer but I have lost many hours getting that Team Site, Publishing Site, Web Part and even the Search Results to look the way that I wanted.

Why?

Some questions started popping in my mind like “Why do I feel it is so important for that logo to appear exactly the way I wanted it to? Why am I spending so many hours getting the global navigation to look the way I had planned it? Why is the Quicklaunch getting a makeover right now? Why do I spend time on TopSharePoint.com ?”.

And most importantly, “Why does the SharePoint Project only go into Production once it is perfectly Branded- even though it has been functional for quite some time?”

So why is it important to Brand?

Proud– As the person in charge of a Team Site, it is important for me that people that come and visit/collaborate with me on the Team Site are enthusiastic and interested. It is the same reason you always wear your favorite shoes, shirt to an important event; it is the image and feeling which it conveys which makes the item a staple of your wardrobe. Every Site Owner in SharePoint feels like their SharePoint Site is theirs.

Senses of belonging – Today, businesses have changed; they have taken very different inventive methods to give a sense of identity, of partnership to their employees. Why? Because it is believed that someone that is proud of where he works, that feels responsible or attached to his work, will use their skills and talents to their full potential. Just as large product companies develop Brand recognition through their website, it is no different with a SharePoint Site directed and used by the employees.

Would you show me your SharePoint? – I started asking this question to some at the SharePoint Summit in Québec and most of them tried to either evade the question with a grin, letting me know that it wasn’t really something they were proud of or were still using the out of the box look and feel.

Why not use SharePoint as an opportunity to showcase you- change your answer to yes.

Starting to Brand SharePoint

In coming weeks I will throw myself into this mystical world of branding to better understand how to apply it in SharePoint Sites. I will take apart the Site piece by piece, and see everything that we can do to it and how. I will show you the steps I took to get something to work, but I will also share with you the problems I encounter.

A friend of mine recommended I read this article:

5 Steps to Drastically Improve Your CSS Knowledge in 24 Hours

I strongly recommend you read this article, if like me, you feel it’s time you took your SharePoint Site to the next level with Branding. Yes it takes a good day to get through, but is an easy read and very informative.

Stay in touch as we go through this Branding experience together.

But meanwhile, would you show me your SharePoint?

Create a SharePoint Lookup Column to another Site

The story of a Site Column

I have been working with SharePoint for quite some time now, and have come to realize that a lot of SharePoint users do not use what is available out of the box. Very popular example for this is the lookup column.

The problem:

I want to create a lookup column in my list/library that looks up data that comes from a list/library of another site.

Many SharePoint users believe this is out right unavailable without coding some sort of a solution. Well there is a solution.

Solution:

As long as you stay in the same Site Collection, you can create a lookup Site Column that will be used to get information from a list that is available in a parent site. The Site Column must be created in the same site as the referenced list/library.

Let me guide you through this..

Our scenario has a Site called Training with a List I just created called Manufacturers in which I have 5 sample Manufacturers

Now while staying in the Training Site, I am going to create a Site Column of type “Lookup”:

1. Go to Site Actions then Site Settings

2. Click on Site Columns

3. Create a new Site Column

4. Give it a name and choose “Lookup” as type. In this example I chose to lookup my Manufacturers list

5. I went to my subsite called in this example “Subsite”

6. Add your Site Column to any list/library you would like to use it with. I am going to add it to my “Shared Documents” Library. Go to Library Settings:

7. Click on Add from Existing Site Columns under the Columns section of your settings

8. Find and add your Site Column

9. Success! Lookup column looking for values of a list/library on another Parent Site

Install a software update on #SharePoint 2010

Technet article on software update paths for sharepoint, must have.

Install a software update (SharePoint Server 2010).

Customize the SharePoint search directly in the url

SharePoint 2010 search parameter in the URL:

k
  Specify a keyword. Only one key word can be used.
results.aspx?k=sharepoint%20search

s
Specify a search scope. Can contain multiple values separated by %2c.

results.aspx?s=SDKContent
results.aspx?s=SDKContent%2cTechnicalArticles

v
Specify the result to sort by:
-relevance
-date

results.aspx?v=date
results.aspx?v=relevance

start
Specifying the page Result
results.aspx?start=3

a
Specify the property on which to filter.
Ex: Search SharePoint site where the property Companies=Microsoft
results.aspx?k=sharepoint&a=companies:microsoft

u
Specify the url from which the results will appear (without creating a new Scope)

results.aspx?k=sharepoint&u=http://www.contoso.com

Ref MSDN: http://bit.ly/wI75g0

On another note you can create a scope to include only the content classes that you want.

In search administration simply create a scope and add rules where the property contentclass=

here are some cases contentclass=STS_Web   will get you only Sites as results

case “STS_Web”:                             // Site
case “STS_List_850”:                        // Page Library
case “STS_ListItem_850”:                    // Page
case “STS_List_DocumentLibrary”:            // Document Library
case “STS_ListItem_DocumentLibrary”:        // Document Library Items
case “STS_List”:                            // Custom List
case “STS_ListItem”:                        // Custom List Item
case “STS_List_Links”:                      // Links List
case “STS_ListItem_Links”:                  // Links List Item
case “STS_List_Tasks”:                      // Tasks List
case “STS_ListItem_Tasks”:                  // Tasks List Item
case “STS_List_Events”:                     // Events List
case “STS_ListItem_Events”:                 // Events List Item
case “STS_List_Announcements”:              // Announcements List
case “STS_ListItem_Announcements”:          // Announcements List Item
case “STS_List_Contacts”:                   // Contacts List
case “STS_ListItem_Contacts”:               // Contacts List Item
case “STS_List_DiscussionBoard”:            // Discussion List
case “STS_ListItem_DiscussionBoard”:        // Discussion List Item
case “STS_List_IssueTracking”:              // Issue Tracking List
case “STS_ListItem_IssueTracking”:          // Issue Tracking List Item
case “STS_List_GanttTasks”:                 // Project Tasks List
case “STS_ListItem_GanttTasks”:             // Project Tasks List Item
case “STS_List_Survey”:                     // Survey List
case “STS_ListItem_Survey”:                 // Survey List Item
case “STS_List_PictureLibrary”:             // Picture Library
case “STS_ListItem_PictureLibrary”:         // Picture Library Item
case “STS_List_WebPageLibrary”:             // Web Page Library
case “STS_ListItem_WebPageLibrary”:         // Web Page Library Item
case “STS_List_XMLForm”:                    // Form Library
case “STS_ListItem_XMLForm”:                // Form Library Item

SharePoint 2010–Returning Document ID in Search Results

The SharePoint Search Center Site is a very powerful toll yet very underused.

I came across a Technet Article I thought I would share with you, it shows how to Return a Document ID in your search results using the Search Core Results Web Part.

Feel free to contact me if you would like to know more about the search center and how to customize it.

Here is the Article

SharePoint 2010 Best Practices:

SharePoint 2010 Best Practices:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc850682.aspx

#SharePoint 2010 #Visio Stencil Kit

“Designing for SharePoint can be a challenging endeavor; what may seem to be an innocuous design element can occasionally lead to days or even weeks of development effort. Download NLC’s SharePoint Stencil Kit to enable user experience designers to mock up funtionality for SharePoint quickly!”

Check out this cool link.

non~linear creations – Web Development and Marketing Solutions – Toronto, Ottawa, Calgary, Regina, New York.

Working with SharePoint Document Sets

Today I will show you how to manage your document sets in SharePoint 2010.

What is a Document Set? A Document Set is kind of a Folder on steroids, it allows you to group documents from different content types together, have it’s own metadata, versioning of all documents as 1 entity, workflows of all documents managed as 1, and best of all…  it has it’s own page per instance of Document Set created!

Huh? In SharePoint, Page means Web Parts! Video Web Parts, Images Web Parts, Content Query Web Parts, etc..

Here is the end Result of a Project Document Set:

First we need to create the Content Type from Site Settings – > Site Content Types –> Create Content Type

Then let’s create some columns:

In the Content Type Information Page click on Document Set Settings, this will bring you to a page where you will be able to share the document set’s columns with documents inside as well as choose which columns will appear on the Page as properties.

You may also click on Customize the Welcome Page to add any customizations to the page

Once you are done with your changes, click ok.

Go to the document library you wish to add your Document Set “Project” and in the Library Settings under Advanced Settings set Allow management of content types to Yes

Still in the library settings you should now be able to see your current content types, usually Document, and add yours

Now create your content:

Here is the result with out of box design:

Edit the page to add your personal touch:

 

Hope this helped