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Imagine a business scenario where we have a lookup field in our list. The reference list contains items Title and their status.  Previously it always difficult to create filtered lookup field with minimal development task. But now, we can use InfoPath 2010 to achieve that functionality.

Part III , InfoPath 2010 and SharePoint 2010 Productivity series webcast shows how to create filtered lookup field.  There are two lists in the scenario “Books” and “Members” list.  The Books list contains list of books Title, Author and Status. There are 2 status of books, “Available” , “In-Used” and “Missing”.

“Members” list has Books  , lookup field – which should show only the “Available” books.

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Imagine that user wants to build Book lending application using SharePoint 2010. Initially they must register the book description , and sub-sequently they will update book lending status.  On the registration, the status should not be available in the form – however on lending event , they have to modify the status of the book.
Following webcast shows how to use InfoPath Designer 2010 to customize New/Edit/View form in SharePoint List to build that application.

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You may encounter “Access denied by Business Data Connectivity” error when trying to access External List. The reason is because External List requires External Content type ; and External Content type is using Business Data Connectivity services proxy to access external Data Source. With the same principle of BDC in MOSS 2007 – users are required to have BDC Object permission before they can use it.  There are several set of permission available for the BDC object:

- Edit                                  
- Execute                            
- Selectable in Clients
- Set Permissions

How to configure the BDC access rights?

1. Open Central Administration page, and click on Manage service application.

2. Click on Business Data Connectivity Service

3. Open the context menu of the External Content type (ie. External CT in this example). Click on Set permissions.

4. Add account (Group, or User) and assign the permissions.

5. Set appropriate permission to the BDC object. Remember that BDC object permission rules the interaction between user and external data source through BDC object. It doesn’t rules his/her permission accessing Forms in the list (New / Edit / Delete  form).

English:

External Content type allows you to make seamless interface between SharePoint 2010 and external data storage (ie. SQL server). Using External Content type, you can create an External List which stores the data to predefined storage. You can imagine of having a table with SharePoint list interface.

To create an External Content type, you need SharePoint Designer 2010. If you curious enough, the External Content type is enhancement of Business Data Connector (BDC) in previous version. It will now depend on Business Connectivity Services (BCS) – which more or less same as BDC.

Imagine that you have a table in SQL Database and you want to create SharePoint list which directly stores the data in that table.

1. Open SharePoint Designer and click on External Content Types

2. Define the new External Content Type name. Then click on “External System” to start to connect to external Data Storage.

3. Define connection to external data storage. (ie. DB name,  and security)

In my case, I use SQL server as my data storage.

There are 3 security connection options in SQL Server Data Source:
– Connect with User’s Identity   => it will use running user’s credential to access to DB server. This implies that you need to manage user’s access rights in DB server.
– Connect with Impersonated Windows Identity => it will use impersonated Windows Identity ; usually the Application Pool identity.
– Connect with Impersonated Custom Identity => it will use specified user/password combination ; you need to define the Custom Identity separately.

Now, we already have the External List with the tables and views.

4. Select any table for the External Content types. In this scenario, I select RequestTbl for my data storage. Right click on the selected table, and SPD2010 will show you the available operations.
The External Content Types requires at least “Read Item” and “Read List” operation.  In every operation you will need at least 1 identifier.

Follow the wizard to create an operation.

Don’t forget that every operation requires at least 1 identifier. You can choose ID field from the table.

You can also define the default view filter, for example, by default this external content type will show only the first 100 items.

5. Publish the new content type by click “Save” button.

Now you already have new External Content Type. You can also create external content type to call .NET CLR and WCF Service. Next , how to use the external content type in a list.

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In SharePoint 2010 there we have more option to customize list form. For instance, you can use SharePoint Designer 2010 or InfoPath Designer 2010. Since modifying list form using SPD is already exist in previous version. I will just show you how to customize list form using InfoPath Designer 2010.

When customizing list form using InfoPath Designer 2010, you will get all form designer benefit. For example, you can define the field validation rules, parent-child relation etc. And bet what, the process is straight forward. In this very basic how-to, I will demonstrate how to start customize list form using InfoPath Designer 2010. I will create an Book List with “Title” – “Author” – “Status” column. In the New form, I will only show “Title” and “Author” – while in Edit form, “Title” and “Author” will be readonly, but “Status” is editable.

How to customize list form using InfoPath Designer 2010.

1. Prepare the custom list.

   

   Prepare custom “Book List” with 3 columns: “Title” – “Author” – “Status”. “Status” field is choice “Available” – “In Used” – “Missing”. After creating the list and preparing columns, we can start to use the list and add a new item in this form.

   

2. Start InfoPath Designer

   Start InfoPath Designer and select to design SharePoint List form.

   

   Type in the SharePoint site URL

   

   And then select the Book List from the list of available data.

   

   Finally, click on Finish.

   

3. When the form editor open , you can start to edit the New form. I add a title “Book List Entry” and delete the “Status” row.

   

   And here is the result:

   

4. Add “Edit Form” view in the designer, and set Title and Author as readonly.

   

   Type-in the view title.

   

   Design the form – add “Status” column in the form.

   

   Set “Title” and “Author” textbox property to “ReadOnly”

   

   

5. Publish the form to the list.

   

6. Configure the “Book List” to use designated form.

   Open the list setting page, and expand context menu for the Forms.

   

   Since the first view will be the default – our interest is only to the “(Item) Edit Form”. Click on (Item) Edit Form link, and change the Form view.

   You will realize that now you are seeing form services in web part.

   

   Click on Web Parts Tools tab, and then click on Web Part Properties.

   

   In the Web Part Properties, select the designated view.

   

7. And here we go with the custom “New Form” and “Edit Form” for the list.

   New Form.

   

   Edit Form.

   

   Happy design.
   [Update: Follow the InfoPath and SharePoint 2010 Productivity Series]

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SharePoint 2010 relies on 64 bit infrastructure and higher hardware specifications, where it is not always affordable for freelance consultant to upgrade existing laptop for that requirement. Then, a single box development server will become a choice. Sometimes, it also mean for simplification where everything run in the same box ; Domain Server – SQL Server 2008 – SharePoint 2010 – Office 2010 and Visual Studio 2010. There is nothing special when installing or configuring those roles / application in the server , EXCEPT SharePoint 2010 installation process will strangefully follow different path. There will be no selection on the installation type anymore. You will not be prompted for Standalone or Farm installation option anymore.

How to install SPS2010 in Single Box Development Server?

1.  After you have finished installing OS, start to add Active Directory Domain Service roles.
      Complete the installation procedure and configure the roles.

2.  Then, start to add Application Server and Web Server roles.
      This installation is straight forward, and you will be easily get your Application Server and Web Server roles configured in the machine.

3. Install SQL Server 2008 SP1 + CU KB970315
     Download SQL Server 2008 SP1 here: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=66AB3DBB-BF3E-4F46-9559-CCC6A4F9DC19&displaylang=en
     Download CU KB970315 here: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/970315

And here is the tricky part, installing SPS2010

4.  Extract SPS2010 installer to a folder

 <spsinstaller.exe> /extract:e:\sps2010

That command will extract <spsinstaller.exe> to folder e:\sps2010. Replace <spsinstaller.exe> with your own distribution.

5. You will see that there is several sub-folder under Files folder in the extracted location. Each sub-folder represents different setup option. For example, SetupFarm contains configuration files for farm installation option etc.

6. Start the installation sequence by executing following command in the extracted location.

        Setup.exe /config Files\SetupFarm\config.xml
 

If you want to know other options, you can execute : setup.exe /? command.

7.  Remember you will not see following installation option, so just follow the dialog and wait untill installation completed.

And now everything is normal again,

8.  Next start the Configuration Wizard. (If you have been doing SharePoint 2007, it is just straight forward and as easy as it was).

9. And finally you can start configuring the other development tools.

Remember that the step 4-7 are only necessary when you install Active Directory Domain Service in a Single Box – otherwise you can always execute the installer directly.

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When you are working in multi-sites environment you may sometimes confused with the timestamp given by the server. The timestamp (Created Date, Modified Date) is combination of several factors :

a. Server TimeZone   , is physical server timezone configuration.
b. Web Application TimeZone , is application level timezone configuration.
c. Site   , is subsite, web timezone configuration.

How would you make sure that you are working on correct timezone in SharePoint? This post will explain how to configure personal regional settings.

1. Click on Logon User menu, and select My Settings

2. On the User Information page, click on “My Regional Settings”

3. On Regional Settings page, uncheck “Always follow web settings” and configure your personal Time zone setting and click OK.

4.Sample of same page with different time zone configuration

   Original view.
   Website timezone : GMT+7
   Webserver timezone : GMT+8
   Client timezone        : GMT+8

   After configuring regional setting view.
   Website timezone : GMT+8
   Webserver timezone : GMT+8
   Client timezone        : GMT+8

So, don’t be fooled by website timezone configuration.

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When you work with Microsoft Office SharePoint Server (MOSS 2007), you’ll find that one of its component is User Profiles synchronization. The User Profiles synchronization is maintained by Shared Service Provider (SSP). It synchronized MOSS user profile with Active Directory profiles.

There are around 46 predefined profile with 21 are mapped to AD property.

Some of you might have an idea that you can add the new profile or change how it mapped to AD property. But how would you do it? Its not complex task, but I would like to make it graphical how-to.

1. Open SSP Administration page and click on User profiles and properties.

2. On “User profiles and properties” page, click on “Add profile property”

3. On “Add user profile property” page, define the new profile. I put yellow mark on the important things,

- Name              : Fieldname for new profile property

- Display Name   : Display name for new profile property

- Type               : Field type

- Source Data Connection : Profile property mapping definition

4. Finally, after you define the mapping in “Source Data Connection” you can click OK. Do full import to update current profiles with the new profile property.

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Alternate Access Mapping (AAM) is alternate URL address defined to access the same SharePoint site. For example, if you have SharePoint site to serve internal and external users – then you will consider AAM. Using AAM – we can also define different authentication method to the incoming request. For example, internal user will use Windows Integrated Authentication – while external user will use Form Based Authentication.

How-to configure alternate access mapping?

1. Open “Central Administration”  web and click on “Operations” tab.
 

2. In “Operations” page click on “Alternate access mappings” link.

3.  You will see list of existing URLs with existing AAM (if any). Click on “Show All” combo box to “Change Alternate Access Mapping Collection”

4.  Select the Web Application to which you want to modify the AAM.

5.  Click on “Add Internal URLs” to add new AAM ( or “Edit Public URLs’ to edit existing one).

6.  Type in the URL protocol, host and port – as alternative address for your users. For example, http://extranet.someserver.com.

Select the zone for the URL, (Intranet, Internet, Custom, Extranet, Default).

Then, click “Save”

7.  Now you can see new alternate URLs to access SharePoint site.

Happy configuring.

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This is graphical guidelines to disable MySite or My Links link in a portal.

A. Open Central Admin , and click on SSP which serve My Site.

B. In the SSP Management page, click on “Personalization services permissions”

C. Select the users/group, and click “Modify Permission of Selected Users”
 

D.  To remove "My Site” links, uncheck “Create personal site” , and to remove “My Links” link, uncheck “Use personal features” , and click OK.

E.  After you’ve saved the modification, the user will no longer see the links.