Hi

It’s review week here at CleverworkArounds, and the next one on my list that I have been meaning to speak about is an application called Balsamiq Mockups. Mr Mindmapper himself, Ruven Gotz first turned me onto this application some time back, and I have found it very useful in taming RBO (rampant branding obsession).

Although I have written various posts on SharePoint branding, most of the time I find it a tiresome task that for many sites, is pushed way too far up the priority list to the point that much more critical success factors are overlooked or given lip service. Now in saying that, I will admit straight up that although I know how branding *should* be done from a sustainable governance point of view, I suck royally at making a site look good myself and I compensate by relentlessly pummelling SharePoint branding governance best-practices onto completely unsuspecting web designers.

Such fun

Balsamiq Mockups has adopted a visual based site wireframing approach that takes the opposite approach to the “Photoshop” approach to site design. A web designer using a tool like Photoshop will attempt to create an accurate visual representation of a site based on a stakeholder’s tastes (or lack thereof). The risk here with SharePoint is that the branding vision that is created using Photoshop can often be quite tricky to achieve in SharePoint without being “governance naughty”, particularly for collaborative sites that make extensive use of web parts, application pages and document libraries.

Some of the most difficult SharePoint recovery jobs that I have had to do were a direct result of seemingly innocent “customisations” that came from branding requirements.

So, how can Balsamiq help?

For a start, a complete design-challenged person like me can actually produce something useful .

More importantly, however, it is designed on a completely different premise than the Photoshop style approach to design. This tool works on a principle of emulating hand-drawn designs, supplying you with a bunch of drag-and-drop widgets and interface elements which allow you to construct the basic structure of a site in minutes. Out of the box, there are around 70 elements that can be used to construct a web site and you can see the results of my 5 minute effort in the image at the start of this article.

Want to see how easy it is? Then check the video below (assuming your IT department has not blocked Youtube).

Although the video shows how easy it is to create a mock up, you may be wondering if there are any SharePoint specific design elements. Out of the box there are not. But fear not, there is a flourishing community around this product that creates additional elements for you to use. SharePoint is well represented here.

Want to drop a SharePoint document library onto the page? Too easy.

Did someone say calendar, tasks or search?

This application does not take much of an investment in learning. One can pretty much learn the product just by watching the Youtube video and learning how to import other design elements is just a matter of clicking the help menu and choosing the “Download More Controls” option.

Would hard-core web designers may find the application cramps their artistic style? Maybe – I can only speculate. But for me, I spend most of my time in a PM, training, architect or advisory role. As a result, Balsamiq Mockups is perfect for me because, it above all else, it is quick to produce results. I can flesh out a SharePoint basic site design without having to fiddle around with master pages, SharePoint designer or CSS files (and for that I am eternally grateful!)

I can then export the mockup to a PNG file and use that in documentation, presentations, and best of all, my issue and dialogue maps which makes great strides in achieving the all-important goal of shared understanding among project participants.

Try Balsamiq Mockups out. It’s a great tool to add to your armoury.

Thanks for reading

Paul Culmsee

www.sevensigma.com.au

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I have to say, Perth is home to some great SharePoint Talent. MVP Sezai is one prime example and Jeremy Thake is another.

But there is also another colleague of mine who you may or may not know – Tommy Segoro, who is one of those mild-mannered guys who simply gets down to it and produces great things.

Tommy has released a free, open source CMS that sits on top of WSS. Publishing pages, page layouts, the page editing toolbar, all on WSS, without having to upgrade to MOSS at great expense to get the publishing feature.

http://www.codeplex.com/completesharepoint

http://www.completesharepoint.net/Home/Pages/Default.aspx

check it out for yourself!

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Hi again and welcome to part 6 of my series on the factors of why SharePoint projects fail. Joel Oleson’s write-up a while back gave me 5 minutes of fame, but like any contestant on Big Brother, I’ve had my time in the limelight, been voted out of the house (as in Joel’s front page) and I’m back to being an ordinary citizen again.

If you have followed events thus far, I covered off some wicked problem theory, before delving into the bigger ticket items that contribute to SharePoint project failure. In the last post, we pointed our virtual microscope at the infrastructure aspects that can cause a SharePoint problem to go off the rails.

Now we turn our magnifying glass onto application development issues and therefore application developers. Ah, what fun you can have with application developer stereotyping, eh! A strange breed indeed they are. As a group they have had a significant contribution to the bitter and twisted individual that I am today.

The CleverWorkarounds tequila shot rating is back!

for a project manager in denial

for the rest of us!

Continue reading “Why do SharePoint Projects Fail – Part 6″

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Note: version 0.2 posted with minor bugfix 15th March 08!

Note2: Only works with MOSS 2007 sorry as you WSS guys do not have audiences targeting

This is my small contribution to the SharePoint world. It is a web part that once added to a web part page, allows you to customise the display by adding JavaScript to selectively hide controls on the page . Ever needed to hide a field from display/edit for a certain audience? Well here is a way do it without requiring SharePoint Designer and having to break a page from it’s site definition (unghosting).

Before and after shots below (look ma – no top button!)

To fully understand what is being done here, I suggest you read my series of articles on the use of JavaScript in SharePoint. Part 3 in particular will show you how to safely add this web part to pages with editing disabled (NewForm.aspx, EditForm.aspx and DispForm.aspx)

The full series can be found here: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5 and Part 6.

Kudos to Jeremy Thake for feedback and some code contribution. Despite being seriously metrosexual, he is otherwise otherwise very cool .

Now two important warnings:

Warning 1: This is an alpha quality release and I may never touch it again So you very likely *will* break it. If there is enough interest, I am happy to pop it on codeplex

Warning 2: This web part should NOT be considered as a security measure and thus used in any security sensitive scenario (such as an extranet or WCM site). JavaScript by its very nature can be trivially interfered with and thus other methods (server side) should be employed in these scenarios to prevent interference at the browser.

You can download by reading the disclaimer and clicking the button below..

THIS CODE IS PROVIDED UNDER THIS LICENSE ON AN “AS IS” BASIS, WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EITHER EXPRESSED OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING, WITHOUT LIMITATION, WARRANTIES THAT THE COVERED CODE IS FREE OF DEFECTS, MERCHANTABLE, FIT FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE OR NON-INFRINGING. THE ENTIRE RISK AS TO THE QUALITY AND PERFORMANCE OF THE COVERED CODE IS WITH YOU. SHOULD ANY COVERED CODE PROVE DEFECTIVE IN ANY RESPECT, YOU (NOT THE INITIAL DEVELOPER OR ANY OTHER CONTRIBUTOR) ASSUME THE COST OF ANY NECESSARY SERVICING, REPAIR OR CORRECTION. THIS DISCLAIMER OF WARRANTY CONSTITUTES AN ESSENTIAL PART OF THIS LICENSE. NO USE OF ANY COVERED CODE IS AUTHORIZED HEREUNDER EXCEPT UNDER THIS DISCLAIMER

Use at your own risk!

To install perform the following commands

1. stsadm.exe” -o addsolution -filename CleverWorkAroundsHideFields.wsp
2. stsadm.exe” -o execadmsvcjobs
3. stsadm.exe” -o deploysolution -name CleverWorkAroundsHideFields.wsp -immediate -allowgacdeployment -allcontenturls
4. stsadm.exe” -o execadmsvcjobs

To remove/reinstall perform the following commands

1. stsadm.exe” -o retractsolution -name CleverWorkAroundsHideFields.wsp -immediate -allcontenturls
2. stsadm.exe” -o execadmsvcjobs
3. stsadm.exe” -o deletesolution -name CleverWorkAroundsHideFields.wsp
4. stsadm.exe” -o execadmsvcjobs
5. stsadm.exe” -o addsolution -filename CleverWorkAroundsHideFields.wsp
6. stsadm.exe” -o execadmsvcjobs
7. stsadm.exe” -o deploysolution -name CleverWorkAroundsHideFields.wsp -immediate -allowgacdeployment -allcontenturls
8. stsadm.exe” -o execadmsvcjobs

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God help me, I’m up to part 6 of series about a technology I dislike and still going. For those of you that have just joined us, then you might want to go back to the very beginning of this series where I used JavaScript to improve the SharePoint user experience. Since then, I’ve been trying to pick a path through the thorny maze of what you could term, ‘sustainable customisation’.

By that, I mean something that hopefully will not cause you grief and heartache the next time a service pack is applied!

So no mood for jokes this time – I want to get this over with so let’s get straight to it and finish this thing!

So where are we at?

• Part 1 looked at how we can use JavaScript to deal with the issue of hiding form elements from the user in lists and document libraries.
• Part 2 examined some of the issues with the part 1 JavaScript hacks and wrapped it into a web part using the content editor web part.
• Part 3 then examined the various issues of adding this new web part to certain SharePoint pages (NewForm.aspx, EditForm.aspx and DispForm.aspx). I also covered using SharePoint Audience targeting to make the hiding/unhiding of form elements personalised to particular groups of users.
• Part 4 started to address a couple of remaining usability issues, and introduced ‘proper’ web-part development using Visual Studio and STSDEV. I created a project to perform the same functionality in part 3, but would not requiring the user to have any JavaScript knowledge or experience.
• Part 5 then used STSDEV to create a solution package that allowed easy debugging, deployment and updating of the web part developed in part 4.

So what could we possibly have left to cover? Basically this article will revisit the web part code and make some functionality improvements and then I will cover off some remaining quirks/issues that you should be aware of.

[Quick Navigation: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5 and Part 6]

Continue reading “More SharePoint Branding – Customisation using JavaScript – Part 6″

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Hello and welcome to part 5 of another epic CleverWorkArounds blog post.

If you think I write a lot on my blog, you should see my documentation and training material! I seem to be rare insofar as I actually like to write documentation and can churn out reasonable quality pretty fast. So if you need your scary SharePoint farm/infrastructure audited and fully documented, you know who to call!

Anyhow, here is the current state of play.

• Part 1 of this series looked at how we can use JavaScript to deal with the common request of hiding form elements from the user in lists and document libraries. We looked at a Microsoft documented method, then a better, more flexible method.
• Part 2 wrapped this JavaScript code into a web part which has been loaded into the SharePoint web part gallery.
• Part 3 then examined the trials and tribulations of getting this new web part added to certain SharePoint pages (NewForm.aspx, EditForm.aspx and DispForm.aspx), and then with a few simple edits, use this web part to hide form fields as desired. Finally, I demonstrated the power of combining this with SharePoint Audiences targeting functionality to make the hiding/unhiding of form elements personalised to particular groups of users.
• Part 4 introduced Visual Studio and STSDEV. I created a project to perform the same functionality in part 3, but not requiring any JavaScript knowledge or experience. By the end of part 4 I had a STSDEV project that compiled with no errors.

And now we are onto Part 5 where we turn our attention to the packaging and deployment of our web part. As you are about to see, STSDEV makes this a very quick and painless experience. If you aren’t convinced of the merits of STSDEV and the SharePoint solution framework by the time you finish this article, then I don’t know what will convince you.

[Quick Navigation: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4 and Part 6]

Continue reading “More SharePoint Branding – Customisation using Javascript – Part 5″

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Hi there. As I write this post, the media are telling me that the stock market is stuffed, the US economy is going to the dogs and banks are writing down billions from sub-prime excess. I dare not check my online broker, road traffic this morning was abysmal, I was late, brought in the wrong laptop and left an important DVD at home.

Could it get any worse? Who knows, but it sounds like the sort of day to re-visit JavaScript and get frustrated with writing a web part for the first time.

So to recap on our journey thus far..

• Part 1 of this series looked at how we can use JavaScript to deal with the common request of hiding form elements from the user in lists and document libraries. It looked at a Microsoft documented method, then a better, more flexible method.
• Part 2 wrapped this JavaScript code into a web part which has been loaded into the SharePoint web part gallery.
• Part 3 then examined the trials and tribulations of getting this new web part added to certain SharePoint pages (NewForm.aspx, EditForm.aspx and DispForm.aspx), and then with a few simple edits, use this web part to hide form fields as desired. Finally, I demonstrated the power of combining this with SharePoint Audiences targeting functionality to make the hiding/unhiding of form elements personalised to particular groups of users.

All in all a pretty clever workaround so far if I say so myself.

My original goals for this JavaScript was to find an effective, easily repeatable way to customise SharePoint form pages by hiding fields or form elements when we need to. Specifically:

• Allow hidden fields based on identity/audience
• Avoid use of SharePoint Designer
• Avoid customisations to the form pages that unghosted the pages from the site definition

We achieved these goals in part three, but was I satisfied? No. The quest for more clever workarounds always goes on!

[Quick Navigation: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 5 and Part 6]

Continue reading “More SharePoint Branding – Customisation using JavaScript – Part 4″

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Hey there. Welcome to part 3 of my series on SharePoint customisation using JavaScript and web parts.

So here is the lowdown so far. We are trying to find an effective, repeatable way to easily customise SharePoint form pages, so that we can hide fields or form elements when we need to. The goals were to:

• Allow hidden fields based on identity
• Avoid use of SharePoint Designer
• Avoid customisations to the form pages that unghosted the pages from the site definition

So how have we progressed thus far?.

• Part 1 of this series looked at how we can use JavaScript to deal with the common request of hiding form elements from the user in lists and document libraries.
• Part 2 wrapped this JavaScript code into a web part which has been loaded into the SharePoint web part gallery.

So let’s knock the rest of this over and pick up right from we left off…

CleverWorkArounds Coffee requirement of this post depends on how much you hate JavaScript.

Metrosexual web developer   

Socially inept technical guy   

[Quick Navigation: Part 1, Part 2, Part 4, Part 5 and Part 6]

Continue reading “More SharePoint Branding – Customisation using JavaScript Part 3″

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Hi again.

JavaScript sucks! There I said it. Despite me hating it as a programming language, I can’t deny that in SharePoint, it does have its uses.

CleverWorkArounds Coffee requirement of this post depends on how much you hate JavaScript.

Metrosexual web developer
Socially inept technical guy
Luddite IT manager	(sorry … why are you here anyway?)

[Quick Navigation: Part 1, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5 and Part 6]

To quickly recap the first post of this series, we looked at how we can use JavaScript to deal with the common request of hiding form elements from the user in lists and document libraries. The technique demonstrated can be used for columns, buttons and whatever else you want. The method once debugged, is fairly easy to implement with SharePoint designer with and some cut and paste.

But there are several problems with the method that prevent it from getting a better CleverWorkaround rating than “Meh”. They include:

• One size fits all, fields are hidden for all visitors irrespective of need.
• You need to modify the page in SharePoint designer via cut and paste of JavaScript code
• You need to modify auto-generated pages
• You need to modify a page from its site definition
• Insecure, relying on client side to hide content/controls is not a secure solution

Continue reading “More SharePoint Branding – Customisation using JavaScript Part 2″

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Hi all

I thought with my last post that involved XSL/XSLT, I’d escape from horrid programming languages and write about more interesting topics but it wasn’t meant to be. This time round I had to delve back into the world of JavaScript – something I swore that I would never do again after a painful encounter back in 2000. (Yep, it’s taken me 8 years to face it again!)

But like everything else with SharePoint, by being a ‘specialist‘, you seem to have to use more technologies and IT disciplines than you would think possible.

As I progressed writing this article, I realised that I was delving back into branding again and toyed with the idea of making this part 8 of the branding series. But the governance topic in part 7 for me rounded off that series of posts nicely, so I will deal with this separately for now and perhaps refresh that series in the future.

Like a vast majority of my posts, this will also be a mini series.

CleverWorkArounds Coffee requirement rating (for Metrosexual web developers):

CleverWorkArounds Coffee requirement rating (for the rest of us ):

[Quick Navigation: Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5 and Part 6]

Continue reading “More SharePoint Branding – Customisation using JavaScript – Part 1″

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