Josh Meyer

ASP.Net DataView and Viewstate

Josh Meyer — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 03:55:32 GMT

I've been banging my head on the desk for several days trying to figure out why the formulas in my FarPoint Spread (an awesome control, by the way) control aren't working and it turns out it has nothing to do with the Spread control at all.

I was binding my spread control to a DataSet up until a few days ago, when a requirements change caused me to alter the code a bit. One of the changes I made was to bind to a DataView instead of directly to the DataSet, which I did without giving it another thought. Well, it turns out that the DataView is NOT serializable, so it can't be saved to viewstate. So all this time I thought there was a problem with the spread control itself, when actually the spread control was just losing it's datasource between postbacks, and the nature of how the control performs updates kept this seemingly obvious fact hidden from me. The properties of the spread control, including formulas, were being preserved but the data was not so my formulas all returned 0.

The fact that the DataView does not serialize is probably well known by now, and I may have even known this at some point in the past, but if I did I forgot it and it has caused my several days of grief. Maybe I can save someone else a little time with this post.

How to Deploy an InfoPath 2007 Form Containing Managed Code to a Browser-Enabled WSS v3 Library

Josh Meyer — Mon, 26 Jun 2006 14:55:00 GMT

Update (8-14-2006): InfoPath Forms Services is NOT part of WSS v3. It is a separate install, or you can install it as part of the MOSS 2007 Beta 2 install. The RTM version, last I heard, will be available as a separate SKU or as part of MOSS 2007 Enterprise Edition.

Assuming you have already created an InfoPath form containing managed code, this document will explain the steps necessary to deploy it to a WSS form library that is “web-enabled” by InfoPath Forms Services.

Publish the Template to the File System (or file share)

Note: In Office 2007 you can’t publish an InfoPath form containing managed code directly to a WSS form library because it has to be first approved by a WSS Administrator.

Open the Design Tasks task pane and choose Publish Form Template.

Choose the first option, to publish to SharePoint, and click Next.

Enter the location of the SharePoint site you want to publish to.

You will be presented with the screen below. Make sure the checkbox is checked to enable the form to be filled out in a browser and click Next.

You must choose a location to save the template file, which will be uploaded to the SharePoint site by the site administrator.

Specify any columns you want to be made available as WSS columns in the form library.

Verify that the information is correct and click Publish. The form will be published to the specified file share location.

Upload the Template to the Central Administration Form Templates Library

Go to the Central Administration site for your farm (or web server if there's only one)
Click on the Application Management tab, go down to the InfoPath Forms Services section, and choose Manage Form Templates.
The Form Template library is opened, which is where admin-approved form templates for the farm are stored.

Click Upload Form Template. Choose your saved template file and click the Verify button. You will be shown any errors or warnings related to your template file. Read any warnings (hopefully there are no errors) and click OK.
Choose your template file again (Why is it not persisted in the text box between postbacks??). In the Upgrade section, you can choose to upgrade the form template if it already exists. You can also choose how to handle current sessions that are using the form template.

Click the Upload button to upload the form template. It is now available as a Feature to be activated on any site collections in the farm.

Activate the Form Template on a Site Collection

You can activate a form template feature from the Manage Form Templates page of Central Administration (the same page where you uploaded the template). On the context menu of the newly uploaded form template, choose Activate to a Site Collection.

In the Activation Location section of the page, choose the appropriate Site Collection and click the OK button.

Note: You may actually have to change Web Applications to find the site collection you are looking for. A Web Application maps to an IIS virtual server.

Associate the Form Template with a Form Library

Create a new form library (or use an existing one, it really doesn't matter),go to the settings page. and choose Advanced Settings.
Choose Yes for Allow management of content types. For Opening browser-enabled documents, choose Display as a web page.

Click the OK button to go back to the Form Library Settings page.
There should now be a Content Types section which displays the Content Types enabled for the form library. The form template feature that you activated added a new content type to the Site Content Type Gallery.

Choose Add from existing site content types and find your form template. Click on it and click Add, then click OK.

Go back to your form library, click the New dropdown, and choose your form template. It will be opened in the browser window where it can be filled out and saved or submitted.

OFC 327 Integrating Microsoft Office InfoPath 2007 Forms into Workflow Solutions and Business Processes

Josh Meyer — Thu, 15 Jun 2006 17:00:00 GMT

Ok, I think I'm just going to blog on the cool InfoPath sessions from TechEd, since there will probably be tons of people talking about all the great SharePoint sessions.

This session was great for us, since a lot of what we do involves form and workflow development. This session highlights the improvements for InfoPath 2007 with regard to workflows.

Here are the highlights…

InfoPath/WSS now has 2-way databinding, which means changes to form field values in WSS are saved in the form
Workflows - there are really 3 options, depending on specific requirements

InfoPath Workflow - workflow set up within the form that is kicked-off by the form; this is good for very simple workflows such as sending an email when a form is filled out
SharePoint Workflow - used for more complex workflow situations. These can be created either in SharePoint Designer for more straightforward workflows or in Visual Studio 2005 for complex, highly custom workflows
Biztalk Workflow - also used for more complex workflow situations. Biztalk should be considered if you need things like XML Schema mapping or connections to enterprise systems that have a Biztalk adapter.

Note: Biztalk and SharePoint workflows can both be used for extremely complex workflow requirements. John seemed to suggest that the SharePoint workflow is the best choice unless you have specific needs for Biztalk features.

Archiving Support

This is an extremely cool feature of MOSS, enabling forms to be automatically archived as an image file based on WSS Policies
Forms can be saved as PNG, EMF, or TIFF files out-of-the-box, but the framework is extensible
Policies are set at the document library level. When an archiving policy is set, forms dropped into the library will automatically be converted to the specified image format

KPI support

this is not specifically an InfoPath feature, it's part of MOSS, but it is very useful nonetheless.
KPI web parts allow dashboard creation to report on all list types, including document libraries containing InfoPath forms
Conditional formatting provides status information based on specified thresholds

Information Rights Management (IRM)

InfoPath now supports IRM, encrypting all form data to prevent unauthorized access
Can be applied either in WSS on a document library or in Outlook (for email forms)

Data Connections!!!

3 major pain points have been addressed

Test --> Production Migration, a major pain in 2003, has been greatly improved with the new Data Connection Library, where data connections can be stored and changed without modifying the form itself
Data Connection Sharing - Data Connection Library. Problem solved…
Authentication Delegation - the infamous "double-hop" issue with asp.net web services has been solved by using either Office SSO or the Web Service proxy

Data connections are stored as .UDCX files and then imported into the Data Connection Library
Data Connection Library - one located in Central Administration that is used for Admin-Approved (fully-trusted, managed code) forms, and others located at the site level for codeless forms

Excel Services integration - another topic altogether, but very cool!

TechEd OFC218 InfoPath 2007: Office Integration and Collaboration Scenarios

Josh Meyer — Wed, 14 Jun 2006 16:15:00 GMT

Monday morning I attended a great session, InfoPath 2007: Office Integration and Collaboration Scenarios. Here are some of the highlights…

New form import framework allows for importing of Microsoft Word forms into InfoPath, automatically converting Word fields to InfoPath fields

Underlines à Textboxes
Tables à Tables containing text boxes
Multi-row tables à Repeating tables

Improved Publishing Wizard

Publish to Email (moved from File menu)
Publish to install file (.js or .msi)

Integration with Outlook
Tight Outlook integration

You can now create a form folder to store InfoPath forms, with promoted properties displayed as columns
InfoPath icon
Support for conditional formatting
Fill out forms directly from the forms folder in Outlook

Browser forms

Possibly the coolest new feature, allows IP forms to be rendered as web forms in browser
Supports MOST of the same functionality as the thick client, with a few relatively minor exception

If you are an InfoPath 2003 developer you will find that most of the pain points from 2003 have been addressed in 2007, at least from what I can tell. Anyway, I haven't been able to blog as much as I would have liked, but oh well. I really want to blog on the awesome WSS v3 sessions from Todd Bleeker and Ted Pattison, so maybe I can find some time later. These guys have tons of insight into developing for WSS so they are great resources.

TechEd 2006 Less than a week away!

Josh Meyer — Tue, 06 Jun 2006 01:33:00 GMT

With TechEd 2006 less than a week away, I was looking through the session schedule and I thought I'd list some of the sessions I'm most looking forward too. I'm excited about all of the SharePoint Products and Technologies related sessions, but here are a few that I think will be particularly useful (or just fun)...

OFC201 The 2007 Microsoft Office System: Clients - Overview and What's New
Speaker(s): Mark Alexieff
The innovations in the 2007 Microsoft Office system client applications are significant and range across every aspect of the programs. This session provides an intense high-level tour of these major areas of innovation, including 1) demonstrations of the most important new capabilities in each of the client applications, 2) insights into migration and coexistence with the new Microsoft Office Open XML file formats, 3) examples of client integration with the new Office SharePoint Server 2007, and 4) a fast-paced overview of the new streamlined Microsoft Office User Interface. In addition, learn about important advances in making the Microsoft Office desktop applications easier to deploy and manage. This session concludes with a Tech·Ed Roadmap to help you identify the product-specific technical sessions, detailed hands-on labs and other content on the 2007 Microsoft Office client applications.

LNC001 Live from TechEd: NET Rocks! Show

Speaker(s): Richard Campbell, Carl Franklin
Come join .NET Rocks! talk show hosts Carl Franklin and Richard Campbell for a live recording of the ever-popular .NET Rocks! show, in which they interview the movers and shakers in the .NET world. Giveaways include an MSDN Platinum Subscription! Details of this session can be found at http://www.dotnetrocks.com

OFC406R Windows SharePoint Services (version 3) Development 2: ASP.NET, Web Parts, Master Pages, Field Types, and More

Speaker(s): Ted Pattison
This action-packed session takes a deep dive into the architecture of Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 (WSS) to examine how it has been redesigned and integrated with ASP.NET 2.0. See how WSS embraces master pages from ASP.NET 2.0 and learn how much easier it is to customize and brand sites. The session includes an in-depth discussion of the new Web Part infrastructure focusing on how it was designed to run Web Parts targeting for ASP.NET 2.0, as well as Web Parts targeting the previous version of WSS. Along the way there is a best practices discussion with tips and tricks for writing Web Parts showing you how to execute cross-site queries, how to bind SharePoint lists to the new SPGridView control, as well as how to host ASP.NET User Controls. The session shows you how and why to create extensible field types with managed code in Visual Studio 2005 and how to deploy them for use within a WSS Web Application.

OFC303 Windows SharePoint Services (version 3) Development 1: Working with Content Types, Field Types, and Other Facilities for SharePoint Lists and Libraries

Speaker(s): Todd Bleeker
Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 will include major new support for custom metadata around documents, lists, pages, sites, and just about everything else. 2007 Microsoft Office system clients and servers will make extensive use of this, and so can your own applications. This session explores the new Content Type environment as well as the new push-down options that they offer. It includes an extensive discussion about how developers can leverage the built-in base field types to create their own custom field types to customize the data entry experience. Finally, this session shows you how to leverage other list facilities to create your own SharePoint site solutions.

OFC308 Windows SharePoint Services (version 3) Development: Using Feature and Solution Definitions for Constructing Custom SharePoint Sites

Speaker(s): Todd Bleeker
Major improvements lie ahead for SharePoint site definition development, the biggest one being Feature definitions. Come discover how to reduce your site definition complexity, eliminate large chunks of copied code, improve versioning, eliminate inconsistency, and activate, deactivate, and deploy SharePoint features. This session also explores the environment for distributed deployment of SharePoint using a Solution Definition, also new to Windows SharePoint Services 3.0. Come see if the business solution you have been looking can be packaged in a Solution.

Well, really there's too many to list. I plan to blog while I'm there, we'll see how much I do.