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Archives / 2004 / May
  • PDC 2003 presentations... the new location

    There was a location where the PDC 2003 presentation were available: http://microsoft.sitestream.com/PDC2003/Default.htm. Was... they are gone now. You get the inspiring message: This content is no longer available online. No link to where it is available now...

    Have a look at: http://msdn.microsoft.com/events/pdc/agendaandsessions/sessions/default.aspx and you get happy!

  • SharePoint data view web part not something FrontPage specific

    UPDATE:I made a “typo“ in the title... My original title was “SharePoint data view web part not something SharePoint specific“, but of course I meant “SharePoint data view web part not something FrontPage specific“...

    The data view web part is not something from SharePoint, it's functionality is already available on any standard SharePoint installation. Only the web part definition (DWP file) is not available on a SharePoint installation. See the DataViewWebPart class in the object model: http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/spptsdk/html/smpcDataViewWebPart.asp for more information on the data view web part.

    This web part is one of the most powerful web parts available in SharePoint, and FrontPage 2003 unleashes it's power by providing the functionality to create views on databases, web services, XML files and the lists and libraries defined in SharePoint. FrontPage also provides the functionality to convert list views into XSLT views by converting the CAML defining the list view to XSLT code. See also http://weblogs.asp.net/soever/archive/2004/03/10/87295.aspx for more information. FrontPage is only a tool to do this conversion and configuration of this XSLT, but after that the created web part is in no way depending on FrontPage. The actual rendering is performed in the object model.

    It is almost impossible to do the creation and configuration of a data view web part by hand. FrontPage is an invaluable tool to create and configure the initial data view web part. Problem is that FrontPage contains some “features“ that make it impossible to modify a data view web part on a source that returns a lot of items. You can increase this performance during development by ensuring that only a few items are returned in the query defined by the data view web part, for example by setting a filter through the Data Source properties:

    Data Source Properties view in FrontPage 2003

    For example reduce the list of items to only items posted by myself. Don't forget to remove this filter after you are ready with developing your view!

    You can also modify the data view web part through the default web interface to modify properties in the web part tool-pane. If you don't need to do configuration as available through the FrontPage interface this approach is sometimes even easier than using FrontPage. See http://weblogs.asp.net/soever/archive/2004/05/14/131551.aspx for more information on enabling editing of list view pages and list item edit pages through the web interface.

     

  • Make SharePoint List pages editable through web interface...

    Currently doing a lot with the pages in a SharePoint list. I'm trying to improve the discussion list functionality (going quite well!). One of the problems is that the discussion list contains 288 items, and that I'm trying to modify XSLT data views, converted from initial list views (in CAML) using FrontPage which takes ages even in “code“ view of FrontPage. Seems like it's trying to rerender all 288 items on typing each character! It would be great if it was possible to modify the data view web part using the web interface, like you can do in “normal” SharePoint pages. And yes... this is possible after adding some “magic code”.

    Change the following code in the view pages (AllItems.aspx, ...):

    ....<SPSWC:RightBodySectionSearchBox runat="server" SearchResultPageURL="SEARCH_HOME" FrameType="None" WebPart="true" __WebPartId="{D3BCAB36-897B-4BAF-A947-1C71A63112F3}"/></td></tr> <tr style="padding-right:1px">......

    To

    ...<SPSWC:RightBodySectionSearchBox runat="server" SearchResultPageURL="SEARCH_HOME" FrameType="None" WebPart="true" __WebPartId="{D3BCAB36-897B-4BAF-A947-1C71A63112F3}"/></td></tr>
       <tr> <td nowrap align="right" class="ms-vb"><WebPartPages:SettingsLink runat="server"/> </td> </tr>
       <tr style="padding-right:1px">

    Change the following code in the item pages (DispForm.aspx, EditForm.aspx, NewForm.aspx):

    ...<SharePoint:ListItemProperty Property="Title" MaxLength=40 runat="server"/></a><!-- --></td> </tr></table>...

    To

    ...<SharePoint:ListItemProperty Property="Title" MaxLength=40 runat="server"/></a><!-- --></td> </tr> 
    <tr> <td nowrap align="right" class="ms-vb"><WebPartPages:SettingsLink runat="server"/> </td> </tr>
    </table>...

    And now add &mode=edit after you URL of the list page and you get the well none “Modify Shared Page” functionality and you can add extra web parts and configure the existing web parts like you are used to.

    You need to add these modifications using FrontPage or directly in the list pages in the list template.