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How to add email notification to a tasks list

May14
2011 Leave a Comment Written by sven

In the last week a customer asked me how he could enable email notification on a task list. The task owner should automatically receive an email when a task has been assigned to him.

In the template Teamsite email notification is set to disabled by default. Let us first create a standard teamsite. Before answering this question and talk the customer through this task I wanted to have this scenario set up.

Here we are. The teamsite has been created.

Now, I wanted to check this on my development box. The email notification should be found in the Advanced Settings of the Tasks list. Let’s check it out.

Looking at the settings I did not see any setting that could activate email notification for the task owner. Where could it be ?

After some thinking I realized that my dev machine had no email server configured. I opened Central Administration.

You need to input information at System Settings > Configured outgoing email settings. I added some dummy data.

I quickly saved the settings and opened the Advanced Settings of the Tasks list again.

There it is. The setting E-Mail Notification appeared. When you think about this you will realize that it makes sense to hide this setting if not email server was configured earlier.

Set the property to ‘yes’ and the task owner will automatically receive an email when a task has been assigned to him. An additional prequisite is that this user has a valid email address in his userprofile properties.

Here we are. Email notification is activated now.

Posted in configuration - Tagged ,

Having completed my first MOSS to SP2010 migration

Mar08
2011 Leave a Comment Written by sven
Only a few days ago I finished my first MOSS 2007 to SharePoint 2010 migration. I did a lot of testing and read a dozen of blogs, but doing it for the first time in the customers environment is always something special.
During the past years I did a lot of MOSS 2007 to MOSS 2007 migrations and that was really difficult, because on source and target side the contenttypes were different (changed from choice to lookup, text to person). We did not only need to copy content (documents), but needed to do metadata column mapping aswell. In order to accomplish this we coded our own migration tool. We added a 3rd party tool SSMM (Sharepoint Site Migration Manager) from Metalogix. SSMM is really robust, but it it needs to be licensed.
Knowing the problems from the past migrations made me act very carefully. I did a lot of analysis before actually starting the migration.
  • Custom code / installed WSPs
  • Customizations to masterpages
  • Excel Services,…
I was lucky, because no modifications have been done to this installation. They left it quite original. The size of the content database was the only thing that worried me – 110GB.
First step is to run the MS preupgradechecker. It analyses the Content DB and the environment.  It gives you advice and lists risks of the upgrade.
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc262231.aspx
On the target Sharepoint machine use the Powershell cmd ‘test-SPContentdatabase’ to check the compatibility of the content db with the webapplication which it will be connected to.
Try this Codeplex project aswell: extended migration tester. It gives you more detailed information.
http://sp2010extmigrareport.codeplex.com/
I did a trial migration on our development environment first. Doing trial migrations in clean separate environments helps you to do a kind of proof of concept. Starting with the productive environment without having tested in a trial before – that is not a good idea. Starting with migrations there should be a kind of confidence/trust building action before.. It is important for you that the customer supports the actual migration.

There are several (atleast three) upgrade approaches

Checklists for MS onboard-means

In my case the source environment was not fit for Sharepoint 2010 and the client wanted to get rid of Windows 2003 anyway. So, we want for the database attach upgrade.

I backuped the MOSS 2007 content database and copied to the new MSSQL 2008 which is connected to the new Sharepoint 2010 farm. Next step was to restore the database to the MSSQL 2008.

Does the disconnected contentdabase fit into the target environment ? Let’s find that out.

Powershell cmdlet

Test-SpContentDatabase -name xxx -webapplication http://xxxx

The Test-SPContentdatabase Cmdlet says that …

File [Features\ExcelServerSite\Microsoft.Office.Excel.WebUI.dwp] is referenced [x] times in the database [ABCD_Content], but exists only under Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 setup folder

http://izonemani.blogspot.com/2011/02/sp2010-upgrade-test-spcontentdatabase.html

This issue can be ignored. So, let’s carry on..

Now mount the content database in Sharepoint 2010.

PS C:\Users\SpFarm> Mount-SPContentDatabase -Name <Databasename> -databaseserver <server>-webapplication <url>

It takes hours .. 1,64%, 19,69%, …. And then suddenly

Action 4.0.98.0 of Microsoft.SharePoint.Upgrade.SPContentDatabaseSequence failed.

What happened ? I googled for the error text, but did not found anything. In my test environment all went well before, so I thought that it must have something to do with the live environment, but what. The Contentdatabase had the size of about 110 GB. 170GB were free on the device.

It was to less. Plan 2-3 times of free diskspace of the MOSS 2007 database size.

http://practicalsharepoint.blogspot.com/2010/08/sharepoint-2010-upgrade-failure.html

Disk size requirements

http://www.bradg.co.za/?p=57

Estimate the time necessary for the upgrade

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc262891.aspx

The transaction log grows and gets really HUGE!

Having extended the volume all went like a charm.

Now, check the site collections that are in the contentdatabase and access the URL that it provides access to it.

The MOSS 2007 welcomes you on Sharepoint 2010 asking for visual upgrade.

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff607998.aspx

In my case all

  • Permissions,
  • Content,
  • Users and
  • custom permission levels

included in the new SP2010 then. You need to redo all the things that reside in the old SSP like Managed Metadata, Search, Userprofiles,…

The advanced search XML can be reused in the advanced search aswell.

It is always good to do a trial upgrade first:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc262155.aspx

Happy migrating :-)

Some more interesting links..

Space Requirements

http://www.bradg.co.za/?p=57

Possible failures during database attach – upgrade

http://practicalsharepoint.blogspot.com/2010/08/sharepoint-2010-upgrade-failure.html

German Link: Describing upgrade procedure

http://www.scolab.ch/howto-office-sharepoint-server-2007-zu-sharepoint-2010-beta-migrieren.html

MS technet – database attach upgrade

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc287634.aspx

Posted in migration - Tagged ,

Basic Tweeking of the Advanced Search page

Mar05
2011 Leave a Comment Written by sven

The advanced search UI has not changed much since MOSS 2007, but nevertheless it needs to get tweeked in any SharePoint 2010 installation. The good thing with Sharepoint is not that it is perfect, but that it is flexible and can be adapted to nearly any situation.

XML in Notepad looks like Chinese. It should be modified either in a XML editor or in Visual Studio which I guess most of you have.
That is what the advanced search page of the basic search center looks like:
Sharepoint is always some kind of best practice. In this case you would normally modifiy the provided number of languages and the properties drop down box which is used to filter specific managed properties.
Edit the page and open the webpart properties of the advanced search box. From the webpart property pane open the node “Properties” copy the XML into an appropriate editor.
Having collapsed all nodes will make the XML look very handy.
This will give you an overview about the areas within this XML. It starts with the Language Definitions <LangDefs>:
Below there are the Languages <Languages> which define which Language names will show up in the page and are available for selection.
The LangRef refers to LangID of the <LangDef> area. Having not changed it will make it look like this:
Removing or adding LangRefs to LangDefs will change the number of available languages.
Below there is the area of the Property Definitions <PropertyDefs>:
Name is the name of the Managed Property. This is important to know.
This lists the whole set of Managed Properties available for the filters and in the ResultTypes area for the drop down.
We are really scraping the barrel now. The ResultTypes section define the available Properties in the dropdown in reference to the selected Result Type entry.
The structure of the ResultTypes is:
<Resulttype>
<KeywordQuery />
<PropertyRef />
</Resulttype>
  • <Resulttype> defines the name and displayname of the item that shows up in the Result Type drop down.
  • <KeywordQuery> defines which kind of documents or items will be used for the query.
  • <PropertyRef> defines which properties of the whole list will be used for this query and show up in the property filter drop down.
The keyword query is a very important part of this configuration.
All list items and documents are used for this query

All documents regardless of the file extension will be included in the search.

In order to add a new result type, just copy an existing one and modify it according to your requirements. PDFs are usually neither in the list of file extensions nor in the list of result types. I will do a post on this during the next days.
Only the documents mentioned with the FileExtensions are included in the search.
The FileExtension needs to included in the Search Administration – File Extensions list.

The PropertyRefs below indicate which properties of the PropertyDef show up in the filter drop down. Remember a PropertyRef refers to the PropertyDef list.
Now, lets come to my example:
I have added a PropertyDef called “mHobby” which is a Managed Property on my server.
Furthermore I added a ResultType entry called “My Special Documents” that queries for .docx Documents and uses my Managed Property called mHobby.
So, now.. what is the result ?
The Result Type shows up in the page and same with the property :-)
Happy tweeking ;-)
Posted in administration - Tagged , ,

How to add a Search Refiner

Feb21
2011 Leave a Comment Written by sven

In this post I will show you how enhance user experience of the Sharepoint 2010 search. Many of you know the Codeplex project faceted search (http://facetedsearch.codeplex.com/ ).  Since there was a huge user acceptance Microsoft decided to implement parts of the faceted search into Sharepoint 2010. With the help of the search facets users are able to narrow down the search results in an interactive and user-friendly way. With basic search you need to define all search criteria from the beginning on.

I am going to lead you through the configuration steps necessary to add the facets to the search results page. The facets are called refiners in Sharepoint 2010. The refiner (aswell as the facets in MOSS 2007) are based on values of managed properties.

At first we need to create a list column (or site column and add it to a document library). In my case I have created a column called “Hobby” that has a single line of text.

After adding the column to a document library adding content to it, please perform a full crawl. After having completed the full crawl point your browser to “Metadata Properties” in the search administration.

The site column added earlier should show up at  crawled properties named “ows_Hobby”.

Every crawled property has the prefix “ows_” .  The crawl to SharePoint calls a web service SiteData.asmx and it will return SharePoint discovered columns with the internal name appended to “ows_”. Having found the crawled property create a new managed property called “mHobby” and add a mapping to the crawled property “ows_Hobby”.

Having done so start a full crawl again.

Now it’s time to tweek the results page of the search site. Change to edit page mode. Edit the webpart properties of webpart “Refinement Panel” on the left.

In the properties of the Refinement Panel browse to node “Refinement” and uncollapse it. Here you will find the nuts and bolts of this configuration.

After having pasted the XML configuration back into the field it is important to uncheck the box, because otherwise your configuration will not be saved.

The XML configuration at “Filter Category Definition”  is this one:

Each category item defines a refiner. The following properties are most important:

  • Title
    displayname of the refiner
  • Description
    description of the refiner
  • Type
    type of the refiner. It’s either

    • “Microsoft.Office.Server.Search.WebControls.ManagedPropertyFilterGenerator” used for managed properties or
    • “Microsoft.Office.Server.Search.WebControls.TaxonomyFilterGenerator” used for tags/managed metadata
  • MetadataThreshold
    Minimum number of search results necessary to display the refiner. During testing this gave me headache. In my example I have 4 documents that have the column “Hobby” and the threshold was 5. It never showed up.
  • MappedProperty
    maps the refiner to a specific managed property (in this case it’s “mHobby”

Copy an existing item and configure  it according to your requirements.

Browse this link for a complete list

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/microsoft.office.server.search.webcontrols.filtercategory_members.aspx

Exit edit page mode of the results.aspx and give it a try.

In the end it’s very easy to configure. During the beginning I did the configuration correct except the fullcrawls in between to fill the managed property and the item property MetadataThreshold. The property never showed up. The reason was I had to less results.

Posted in administration - Tagged , ,

Hello world!

Feb19
2011 Leave a Comment Written by sven

Hello world,

This is going to be my first blog page ever. I have used to ‘google’ a lot during the last months about SharePoint related topics. I must say that this was very informative to me and now I want to give something back.

I hope that the posts will be interesting for you aswell since they will show certain configuration steps that were not directly logic to me ;-)

Yes – I am from Germany, so why don’t I write in German language ? Well, I think that most information will be posted and searched in English language and using English search keywords gave me always better results.

Have fun!

Sven

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