Category Archives: Visual Studio Development

Get the port number of your Web Application Zone using server side object model

Although it seems pretty easy to get your web application’s port number from IIS or Central Admin, I didn’t find enough info on how to get the port number from server side object model. I was trying to customize the Authenticate.aspx application page where I had already written code to check users permission in a specific group of another web application. In the end, I was able to get a really simple method which is the following piece of code:

int webPort=SPContext.Current.Site.WebApplication.IisSettings[Microsoft.SharePoint.Administration.SPUrlZone.Default].ServerBindings[0].Port;
if (webPort==80)
{
//check user permission for a site collection which is using the web app on port 80
...
...
}

else
{
//check the user permission for rest of the web apps
SPUtility.EnsureAuthentication();
SPUtility.Redirect(spWeb.Url, SPRedirectFlags.UseSource, Context);
}

If you look at the code, you’ll easily understand I was actually trying to check the user permission for the web application which is using Port 80 and you can write your server side code there to check any user’s permission or group permission etc. Notice that, here I am actually checking the default zone’s port number for the web application. If you have multiple zones, or else if you have extended your web application on other zones which have different ports, then you have to specify  one from the below under WebPpplications.IisSettings property:

SPUrlZone.Custom,
SPUrlZOne.Default,
SPURlZone.Internet,
SPUrlZone.Intranet
SPUrlZOne.Extranet

Now, what if you want to create a method, which will get the port number of web application and later on you can call that method from anywhere; you can do that too. The code is given below:

int GetPortNumber(Microsoft.SharePoint.Administration.SPWebApplication application)
{
int result = 0;
Microsoft.SharePoint.Administration.SPIisSettings setting=null;
if (application.IisSettings.TryGetValue(Microsoft.SharePoint.Administration.SPUrlZone.Default, out setting))
{
if (null != setting)
{
var serverBindings = setting.ServerBindings;
if (0 < serverBindings.Count)
{
Microsoft.SharePoint.Administration.SPServerBinding serverBinding = serverBindings[0];
result = serverBinding.Port;
}
}
}
return result;
}
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Create Dynamic Visual Web Part in SharePoint

After a long time, I am going to discuss about creating a  dynamic visual web part in SharePoint 2010. Suppose, a company needs to create a sales forecasting web part on monthly basis. They want to display information in a web part of a page where the data will come from different lists from a web site and hence the result will be shown visually to highlight information based on conditions.

Objective:

Select a month from the drop down list of all months and based on the selected month, the grid view should change automatically. A LINQ will be executed in the background whenever you change a month from the drop down list and the data displayed inside the grid view should match the query results.

Solution:

First of all, Create a  visual studio project and select Visual Web Part from the SharePoint 2010 templates. This automatically adds a Feature with a Default Visual Web Part in your solution. Please note that, while creating a visual web part, you must choose as Farm Solution as the files of visual web parts (ASCX Files) need to be deployed physically inside 14 hive.

You will need to write LINQ to query your SharePoint Lists. So, create a Entity Class using SPMetal.exe. To know more about how to use SPMetal, go here. Create and add the entity class in your project. For my example; I named the class as MyEntity.cs.

To start off with the solution, let us drag and drop a drop down box and create SPGridView object. The ASCX code is given below:

  1. <%@ Assembly Name="$SharePoint.Project.AssemblyFullName$" %>
  2. <%@ Assembly Name="Microsoft.Web.CommandUI, Version=14.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=71e9bce111e9429c" %>
  3. <%@ Register Tagprefix="SharePoint" Namespace="Microsoft.SharePoint.WebControls" Assembly="Microsoft.SharePoint, Version=14.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=71e9bce111e9429c" %>
  4. <%@ Register Tagprefix="Utilities" Namespace="Microsoft.SharePoint.Utilities" Assembly="Microsoft.SharePoint, Version=14.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=71e9bce111e9429c" %>
  5. <%@ Register Tagprefix="asp" Namespace="System.Web.UI" Assembly="System.Web.Extensions, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35" %>
  6. <%@ Import Namespace="Microsoft.SharePoint" %>
  7. <%@ Register Tagprefix="WebPartPages" Namespace="Microsoft.SharePoint.WebPartPages" Assembly="Microsoft.SharePoint, Version=14.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=71e9bce111e9429c" %>
  8. <%@ Control Language="C#" AutoEventWireup="true" CodeBehind="VisualWebPart1UserControl.ascx.cs" Inherits="SalesForecastWebPart.VisualWebPart1.VisualWebPart1UserControl" %>
  9.  
  10. <asp:dropdownlist runat="server" ID="MonthList" AutoPostBack="True" onselectedindexchanged="MonthList_SelectedIndexChanged"
  11.     >
  12.     <asp:ListItem Selected="True">–Select Month–</asp:ListItem>
  13.     <asp:ListItem Value="1">January</asp:ListItem>
  14.     <asp:ListItem Value="2">February</asp:ListItem>
  15.     <asp:ListItem Value="3">March</asp:ListItem>
  16.     <asp:ListItem Value="4">April</asp:ListItem>
  17.     <asp:ListItem Value="5">May</asp:ListItem>
  18.     <asp:ListItem Value="6">June</asp:ListItem>
  19.     <asp:ListItem Value="7">July</asp:ListItem>
  20.     <asp:ListItem Value="8">August</asp:ListItem>
  21.     <asp:ListItem Value="9">September</asp:ListItem>
  22.     <asp:ListItem Value="10">October</asp:ListItem>
  23.     <asp:ListItem Value="11">November</asp:ListItem>
  24.     <asp:ListItem Value="12">December</asp:ListItem>
  25. </asp:dropdownlist>
  26.  
  27. &nbsp;&nbsp;<b>Monthly Forecast</b>
  28. <SharePoint:SPGridView ID="spGridView" runat="server"
  29.     AutoGenerateColumns="false"
  30.     onprerender="spGridView_PreRender" ondatabound="spGridView_DataBound" onrowdatabound="spGridView_RowDataBound">
  31.     <HeaderStyle HorizontalAlign="Left" ForeColor="Navy" Font-Bold="true" />
  32.     <Columns>
  33.         <SharePoint:SPBoundField DataField="Title" HeaderText="Consultant">
  34.         </SharePoint:SPBoundField>
  35.           <asp:TemplateField HeaderText="Total ITS Ricoh Lab Revenue">
  36.             <ItemTemplate>
  37.         <asp:Label ID="lblSales" runat="server" Text='<%# String.Format("{0:f2}",DataBinder.Eval(Container.DataItem,"TotalSales")) %>' ></asp:Label>
  38.         </ItemTemplate>
  39.         </asp:TemplateField>
  40.          <asp:TemplateField HeaderText="Total ITS Ricoh Lab Revenue Quota">
  41.             <ItemTemplate>
  42.         <asp:Label ID="lblQuota" runat="server" Text='<%# String.Format("{0:f2}",DataBinder.Eval(Container.DataItem,"ITSRicLabRev")) %>' ></asp:Label>
  43.         </ItemTemplate>
  44.         </asp:TemplateField>
  45.         <asp:TemplateField HeaderText="Status">
  46.             <ItemTemplate>
  47.                 <asp:Label ID="Status" runat="server" Text='<%# Eval("Status") %>' />
  48.             </ItemTemplate>
  49.              
  50.         </asp:TemplateField>
  51.       
  52.         
  53.     </Columns>
  54. </SharePoint:SPGridView>

If you look inside the above code, you will find that I have created four columns inside the grid view to display Employee (Consultant) Name, Total Revenue, Total Revenue Quota and Status and a drop down box containing all months. Now, create the entity object for the lists inside your ascx.cs file. For my scenario, I had to query two different lists and I created the entity and data context object as below:

EntityList<SCTXPSITSVCsForecastingItem> SCTXPSITSVCsForecasting;

EntityList<SolnConsultantsItem> SolnConsultants;

protected void Page_Load(object sender, EventArgs e)

{

    string spWebUrl = SPContext.Current.Web.Url;

    MyEntitiesDataContext dc = new MyEntitiesDataContext(spWebUrl);

    SCTXPSITSVCsForecasting = dc.GetList<SCTXPSITSVCsForecastingItem>(@"SCTX PS / ITSVCs Forecasting");

    SolnConsultants = dc.GetList<SolnConsultantsItem>("SolnConsultants");

 

}

 

From the above code, you can see I created two data context object where my entity class was “MyEntities”. I then called the two lists in the page load event by the GetList() Method.

Inside the SelectedIndexChanged() method of the drop down list for month, I called a method to create the LINQ and passed the selected item as the parameter. If you notice the LINQ below, you will see that I have used a join query to select data from two different lists. For my scenario, I had a list called “SCTXPSITSVCsForecasting” where there was a column named “ITSRicohLaborRevenue” in which all the employees (consultants) monthly forecast had to be summed up. So, I used an aggregated function (SUM) to sum up all the employees monthly forecast and divided by the standard monthly forecast to determine their status (if greater than 90%, “Green”, if greater than or equal to 75%, “Yellow” and if below 75%, “Red”).

  1. protected void MonthList_SelectedIndexChanged(object sender, EventArgs e)
  2.         {
  3.             var selected = MonthList.SelectedValue;
  4.             getConsultants(Convert.ToInt32(selected));
  5.            
  6.         }
  7.         private void getConsultants(int mo)
  8.         {
  9.  
  10.             var ConsultantQuery = from c in SolnConsultants.ToList()
  11.                                   join s in SCTXPSITSVCsForecasting.ToList()
  12.  
  13.                                on c.Title equals s.Consultant
  14.                                   where s.CloseDate.Value.Month.Equals(mo)
  15.                                   group s by new { s.Consultant, c.ITSRicLabRev } into result
  16.                                   select new
  17.                                   {
  18.                                       Title = result.Key.Consultant,
  19.                                       TotalSales = result.Sum(s => s.ITSRicohLaborRevenue),
  20.                                       ITSRicLabRev = result.Key.ITSRicLabRev / 12,
  21.                                       Status = (((result.Sum(s => s.ITSRicohLaborRevenue)) / (result.Key.ITSRicLabRev / 12) * 100) > 90 ? "Green" :
  22.                                       (((result.Sum(s => s.ITSRicohLaborRevenue)) / (result.Key.ITSRicLabRev / 12) * 100) >= 75 ? "Yellow" : "Red"))
  23.  
  24.                                   };
  25.  
  26.             spGridView.DataSource = ConsultantQuery;
  27.             spGridView.DataBind();
  28.  
  29.  
  30.         }

To display the status of the forecast visually, I had to add another method for the grid view on RowDataBound():

  1.  
  2.         protected void spGridView_RowDataBound(object sender, GridViewRowEventArgs e)
  3.         {
  4.             if (e.Row.RowType == DataControlRowType.DataRow)
  5.             {
  6.                 Label lblStatus = e.Row.FindControl("Status") as Label;
  7.                 string status = Convert.ToString(DataBinder.Eval(e.Row.DataItem, "Status"));
  8.                 if (status == "Red")
  9.                 {
  10.                     DataControlFieldCell d = lblStatus.Parent as DataControlFieldCell;
  11.                     // change the backcolor like this
  12.                     d.BackColor = System.Drawing.Color.Red;
  13.                     // change the row color like this
  14.                     e.Row.BackColor = System.Drawing.Color.LightBlue;
  15.                     // change the text color like this
  16.                     lblStatus.ForeColor = System.Drawing.Color.White;
  17.                 }
  18.                 else if (status == "Yellow")
  19.                 {
  20.                     DataControlFieldCell d1 = lblStatus.Parent as DataControlFieldCell;
  21.                     d1.BackColor = System.Drawing.Color.Yellow;
  22.                     e.Row.BackColor = System.Drawing.Color.Aqua;
  23.                     lblStatus.ForeColor = System.Drawing.Color.Blue;
  24.                 }
  25.                 else
  26.                 {
  27.                     DataControlFieldCell d2 = lblStatus.Parent as DataControlFieldCell;
  28.                     d2.BackColor = System.Drawing.Color.Green;
  29.                     e.Row.BackColor = System.Drawing.Color.LightCyan;
  30.                     lblStatus.ForeColor = System.Drawing.Color.WhiteSmoke;
  31.                 }
  32.             }
  33.         }

You can see from the above code that I am changing the Background color , Foreground color of the row based on the Status column’s value.

After deploying and adding the web part on a page, you will get a following screen:

ricohsaleswebpart

ricohsaleswebpart1

You can see from the above screenshots that the gird view is changing dynamically based on the selected month. Following this basic example, you can create more complex dynamic visual web parts in SharePoint.

Resolve issues while updating People Picker Column of a List in Event Handler

Let’s say, you have a List with a People Picker column (Person or Group) on your site. Now, you need to add an event handler for new item add/update. Normally, if you go by the conventional way, you would get the following error:

Invalid data has been used to update the list item . The field you are trying to update may be read only.

I tried to figure out what exactly caused this error while I trying to set a people picker column property in my event handler programmatically. Afterwards, I found out that People Picker Column in a List is a read-only field. By Default, the read-only mode of this field remains true while we try to add/update it for a list item. So, how to overcome this problem? Well, it’s not that difficult. You just need to set the read-only mode of the people picker column to be “False” at first and after that,  update the property of the people picker. After finishing everything, set the read-only mode of the field again to “True”. Here is an example how you can achieve this:


using (SPSite mySite = new SPSite(properties.SiteId))
 {
 using (SPWeb myWeb = mySite.OpenWeb(properties.RelativeWebUrl))
 {
 SPList currentList = myWeb.Lists[properties.ListId];
 SPListItem currentitem = currentList.GetItemById(properties.ListItem.ID);

 myWeb.AllowUnsafeUpdates = true;
 ServerContext ospServerContext = ServerContext.GetContext(mySite);

//Create a new UserProfileManager
 UserProfileManager pManager = new UserProfileManager(ospServerContext);

//Get the User Profile for the current user
 UserProfile uProfile = pManager.GetUserProfile(currentitem["Title"].ToString());

 //Set the read only mode of people picker column to FALSE
 currentitem.Fields["Direct Supervisor"].ReadOnlyField = false;

 if (uProfile["Manager"].Value != null)
 {
 string temp = @""+uProfile["Manager"].Value.ToString();
 string temp1=temp.Replace("\\",@"\");
 //Setting the property of people picker column
 currentitem["Direct Supervisor"] = myWeb.AllUsers[temp1].ID;

 }

//Update List Item
 currentitem.Update();
 //Update List
 currentList.Update();

//Set the read only mode to TRUE
 currentitem.Fields["Direct Supervisor"].ReadOnlyField = true;

//Update the List item again
 currentitem.Update();
 //update the List again
 currentList.Update();

}
}

Inside the above code, you can see that first of all, I set the property of current site’s allowUnsafeUpdates to True which will allow you to change the read-only mode of a field. I have used the User Profile service to set the value of People Picker Control (in this case, the field name is “Direct Supervisor”). After setting the value of the field, I updated the List item and the list before changing back the read-only mode to be “True” again. Afterwards, I updated the current item and current list once again which ensures that the update will take place without any such error which happened previously.


			

	
	


				
					

				
					


	

					

							

							
Few things to remember While Developing Sandboxed solutions

			


		

				
SharePoint 2010 provides a great new feature called “Sandboxed Solutions” which separates the User Code Host Process from IIS Worker Process and let the Site Collection Administrator deploy the solution easily from Solution Gallery without direct intervention or concern of Farm Administrator and thus it does not affect the application pool while maintaining stability across the Farm. But, Sandboxed Solution has got some limitations that we should remember:


1. You cannot develop any Visual Web Part, Application pages etc. as Sandboxed Solutions which requires direct access to 14 hive.


2. You cannot use any code which requires elevated privileges. For example: SPSecurity object is not supported in Sandboxed Solution. Often we are used to use SPSecurity.RunWithElevatedPriveleges which runs the segment of code as a system account which is not supported at all in Sandboxed Solution. Although, it will not throw any validation error while building the solution from Visual Studio 2010, it will eventually throw an error saying “Failied to load assembly” while running the feature which tries to execute SPSecurity object after deployment.


3. You cannot access another site collection as Sandboxed Solution restricts you only to Current Site Collection.


4. Normal Debugging method from Visual Studio 2010 will not work for Sandboxed Solution if you have already deployed it. You can debug it in normal way by pressing “F5” before deploying though. In order to debug an already Deployed Sandboxed Solution, you need to attach to Sandboxed Worker Process “SPUCWorkerProcess.exe” manually because it does not run under the IIS Worker Process used by SharePoint also known as w3wp.exe.



			

	
	


				
					


	

					

							

							
How to create Dynamic Column in a List Event Receiver & set the Column Name with a Dynamic Value and set Value of that Column for Current List item?

			


		

				
Few days ago, I was working on a List where the necessity of creating dynamic column raised. Also, the need to initiate the column name inside an event receiver and setting the value of the newly column for the current item were needed. So, I created a custom (demo) List which is named as “DemoProjects”.


I created the following columns:


Title, Description, Comments, RadComments (for checking the event)


I needed the column to be created for an existing List item. So, I created a new item like the following keeping “Comments” and “RadComments” blank.


image


image


Now, in order to create the event receiver I created a new project of “Event Receiver” type in Visual Studio 2010.


I set the “ItemUpdated” method to True as I need to create the column while updating the list item.


image


After that, Visual Studio automatically creates the method name and parameters for ItemUpdated method


 public override void ItemUpdated(SPItemEventProperties properties)
 {
    base.ItemUpdated(properties);
 }


Now, this base.ItemUpdated runs will run for each custom list. In order to attain my objective, I have modified this method to the following: ( I have tried to clarify all the steps by commenting each line of code )








    

  1. public override void ItemUpdated(SPItemEventProperties properties)
    2. 

  2.        {
    3. 

  3.            if (properties.ListTitle == “DemoProjects”)
    4. 

  4.            {
    5. 

  5. 

  6.                string colComments = “”; // Column Display name
    7. 

  7.                string colCommentsStr = “”;  //  Internal name of the Column name
    8. 

  8.                string curUser = “”;  // Current user name
    9. 

  9. 

  10.                using (SPSite site1 = new SPSite(properties.SiteId)) //Accessing the current site with current user permission
    11. 

  11.                {
    12. 

  12.                    using (SPWeb web1 = site1.OpenWeb(properties.RelativeWebUrl))
    13. 

  13.                    {
    14. 

  14.                        curUser = web1.CurrentUser.Name.ToString();  // Getting the current user display name
    15. 

  15.                    }
    16. 

  16.                }
    17. 

  17.                SPSecurity.RunWithElevatedPrivileges(delegate()  // To Elevate the permisson of the current user which runs as a system acc to create the list column
    18. 

  18.                {
    19. 

  19.                    using (SPSite site = new SPSite(properties.SiteId))
    20. 

  20.                    {
    21. 

  21.                        using (SPWeb web = site.OpenWeb(properties.RelativeWebUrl))
    22. 

  22.                        {
    23. 

  23.                            EventFiringEnabled = false;   // Disabling the events firing to prevent unnecessary actions
    24. 

  24.                            web.AllowUnsafeUpdates = true;  // To execute actions which are not permitted by default
    25. 

  25.                            SPList radList = web.Lists[properties.ListId];  // Getting the current List
    26. 

  26.                            SPListItem project = web.Lists[properties.ListId].GetItemById(properties.ListItem.ID); // Getting the Current List Item
    27. 

  27.                            colComments = “Comments: “ + curUser; // Setting the column name with current user name
    28. 

  28. 

  29.                            if (!radList.Fields.ContainsField(colComments))
    30. 

  30.                            {
    31. 

  31. 

  32.                                radList.Fields.Add(colComments, SPFieldType.Note, false); // Adding new column in current List
    33. 

  33.                                radList.Update(); // Updating the current List after adding new column
    34. 

  34. 

  35.                                Guid guidViewID = radList.Views[“All Items”].ID; // Getting the Guid for “All items” view of current list
    36. 

  36.                                SPView vw = radList.GetView(guidViewID);
    37. 

  37.                                vw.ViewFields.Add(colComments);  // Adding the new column in All items view
    38. 

  38.                                vw.Update();  // Updating the All items view
    39. 

  39. 

  40.                                project.Update(); // Updating the current List item
    41. 

  41.                                base.ItemUpdated(properties);  // Attaching current event to current list item
    42. 

  42.                                radList.Update();  // Updating the current list
    43. 

  43. 

  44.                            }
    45. 

  45. 

  46.                            colCommentsStr = radList.Fields[colComments].InternalName.ToString(); // Getting the internal name of newly created column
    47. 

  47. 

  48.                        }
    49. 

  49.                    }
    50. 

  50.                });
    51. 

  51. 

  52.                using (SPSite site2 = new SPSite(properties.SiteId))  // Again accessing the site with current user permission
    53. 

  53.                {
    54. 

  54.                    using (SPWeb web2 = site2.OpenWeb(properties.RelativeWebUrl))
    55. 

  55.                    {
    56. 

  56.                        SPListItem project1 = web2.Lists[properties.ListId].GetItemById(properties.ListItem.ID); // Getting current List item
    57. 

  57.                        project1[colCommentsStr] = project1[“Comments”].ToString(); // Setting current item’s new column’s value to Comments column
    58. 

  58.                        project1[“RadComments”] = “Done!”; // Settting RadComments column’s value to “Done”
    59. 

  59.                        project1.Update();   // Updating the current list item
    60. 

  60.                        web2.AllowUnsafeUpdates = false; // After completing the action setting unsafe updates to false
    61. 

  61.                    }
    62. 

  62.                }
    63. 

  63.            }
    64. 

  64.            EventFiringEnabled = true;  // Enabling event firing for user interaction
    65. 

  65.            base.ItemUpdated(properties); // Attaching current event to current list item
    66. 

  66.        }
    67. 









Now, after deploying this Event Receiver, I edited the previously created new item.


image


Notice that, I kept “RadComment” blank and there are currently no other columns in this list except these four. So, what happened when I clicked “Save”.


See the following window:


image


So, my dynamic column got created now (Comments: Current User name) and the value is also set by the event receiver which made it possible to know who commented the item. Now, if another user edits this item, another “Comment: Username” will be automatically be created and thus I can track all the comments made by the item editors and find out what he commented for that item. That’s pretty cool, isn’t it? Enjoy!!

			

	
	


				
					


	

					

							

							
How to save a site as template (WSP) and then import necessary files from that WSP in VS 2010 and deploy to another site or site collection?

			


		

				
In SharePoint 2010, there is a nice feature provided by VS 2010 which lets the developer import the WSP into VS 2010 environment where you can select your necessary lists, libraries, reusable workflows and see all these in code view in Visual Studio environment. You can later on deploy this to any site or site collection on your server. Important thing to note that, VS 2010 only allows you to deploy locally which means you cannot deploy anything if your SP server exists elsewhere.


First, let us see how easily you can save a site as a template from the web interface:


Go to site settings of your site. From “Site Actions”, select “Save Site as Template” (Publishing feature needs to be enabled for a site to view this option for a site [not site collection])


 


image


Now, Fill up the name of the file which will be saved as. You can select “Include Content” if you want your custom forms and custom reusable workflows to be available in the solution package. If you keep it unselected, it will not save any custom forms or reusable workflows.


image


Now, after clicking “OK”, you will be redirected to the page where the solution package is saved as template. Click on the file to download and save it.


After saving the WSP file, open your Visual Studio 2010 in “Administrator” mode and follow the steps below:


image


Choose “Import SharePoint Solution Package” from Installed templates.


image


Specify your site or site collection URL.


image


Browse to the location where you saved the “WSP” file.


image


After clicking on “Next”, you will see all the files available inside that WSP.


image


Now, you can deselect all and select only the required ones; after click on “Finish” you may get this window which will show a warning about the dependencies. Click “Yes” if required.


 


image


 


After that you will get a message saying “The solution is imported successfully”.


image


Now, you will be able drill down into all the fields you chose before and see the code for each field in VS. After modifying (if you require so), you will need to click on “Deploy” to deploy the site to your preferred location (which you mentioned while creating the project, you can change the URL from Solution Explorer too).


Once deployed, you will be able to see the elements in your site’s “All Site Content” and the settings for the lists and libraries will be exactly as it was in the other site settings from where you saved the template.