Advanced Feature Development Neil Iversen Inetium

The Plan Feature Refresher Feature Limitations Custom Actions Dealing with Dependencies Stapling Managing Files Feature Receivers Some Techniques Questions

Feature Refresher Deployment vehicle for SharePoint applications The Goal ● Setup.exe style deployment The Reality ● Not exactly

Feature Refresher Ability to customize SharePoint ● Used extensively by SharePoint itself Actions ● Install/Uninstall ● Activate/Deactivate Stored in the Hive ● 12\TEMPLATE\FEATURES ● Separate directory for each feature Scopes ● Web, Site, Farm, Web App Common Scenarios ● List Templates ● Workflow

Key Feature Limitations Limited set of supported schemas Supports fewer file options than Solutions Must be bundled in Solutions for larger farms Upgrading deployed features is difficult ● Might not follow expected behavior

Feature Lifecycle InstalledActivatedDeactivatedUninstalled

Mentioning Solutions Bundled into one file (.wsp) Can combine multiple features Deploys across all web front ends Can easily update SafeControls in web.config Deploy Code Access Security (CAS)

Custom Actions Create your own menu options Many extensibility points Main Attributes ● Title ● Location ● GroupId ● Sequence HideCustomAction ● Hides an existing Custom Action

Custom Actions URL Prefixes ● ~site – Relative link to the SPWeb ● ~sitecollection – Relative link to the SPSite URL Replacements ● {ItemId} – List Item’s ID ● {ItemUrl} – List Item URL ● {ListId} – ID of the List ● {SiteUrl} – Like ~site except it can be used anywhere Example <CustomAction Id="325b7c78-f041-4d1b-856b-f9b1e49ddfeb" GroupId="PersonalActions" Location="Microsoft.SharePoint.StandardMenu" Sequence="1000" Title=“My Title" Description=“A Custom Action

Managing Files in Features Deploy a file into a site ● Web ● Document Library URL can be aliased ● MobileRedirect (\m) uses it Not as powerful as Solutions Uninstall behavior is non-intuitive Example:

DEMO: Features and Files

Dealing with Dependencies Problem: Feature depends on another SharePoint Object Solution: Create dependency between the features Example ●

Dependency Limitations Feature Chains ● Limited to one visible feature Dependencies can’t be triggered at a higher scope ● Ex: Farm Feature can’t depend on a Web Feature Features can’t be automatically activated at different scopes ● Ex: Web Feature can’t activate a Farm Feature Hidden Features ● Automatically Activated for Dependencies ● Automatically Deactivated when the last Dependency is Deactivated ● Can’t be depended on in different scopes ● Can’t have their own dependencies ● Can add an additional level to Feature Chains

Stapling Problem: Can’t customize out of the box Site Definitions Solution: Stapling! Scopes: Farm, Web App, Site ● Note: Not Web FeatureSiteTemplateAssociation ●

Site Template (STS#0) OOB Features teamcollab eventslist … Stapled Features (FeatureSiteTemplateAssoc) My Stapled Feature

DEMO: Stapling in Action

Feature Receivers The ‘Custom’ Feature.NET Code ● Override FeatureInstalled, FeatureUninstalling FeatureActivated, FeatureDeactivating Example ● <Feature Id="0a7e1ca9-ee a0-b5b57f4f6f5d" Title=“My Feature Reciever" Scope="Site" ReceiverAssembly=“MyAssembly, Version= , Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=e35a4d2663eae0ae" ReceiverClass=“MyAssembly.MyFeatureReciever" xmlns="

Feature Receivers – Getting Context Getting Context ● Retrieving the Current Scoped Object SPFeatureReceiverProperties –SPFeatureReceiverProperties.Feature.Parent Cast to the appropriate type –Scope: Web »SPWeb web = (SPWeb)properties.Feature.Parent; »SPSite site = (SPSite)properties.Feature.Parent Example Usages ● Perform clean uninstalls of features ● ‘Upgrade’ features using Activate ● Set dependencies to chain actions together ● Web.config changes ● Address gaps in current supported Features Policies, Custom Fields, …

Feature Receivers - Debugging Based on Deployment/Activation Method Stsadm ● Runs as currently logged in user ● Console.WriteLine Web Interface ● Runs as App Pool user ● Need to use logger (EventLog, or some Logging code) DLL Deployment ● Overwrite Existing DLL ● iisreset

Feature Properties Configuration for your Feature Allow different values for Dev/Test/Prod Combine with scoped property bags to set configurations Example

DEMO: Deploying SPWeb Properties

Manually Activating Features Why? ● Evade chaining restrictions (at your own peril) ● Working with Hidden Features ● Manage Stages of a Site with a Web Part ● Creating a ‘Suicide Feature’

Manually Activating Features Get your Context ● Ex: SPWeb Find the Feature Collection ● Ex: SPWeb.Features Find the Feature’s Guid ● Ex: Guid featureGuid = new Guid(“0a7e1ca9-ee a0-b5b57f4f6f5d”) Activate! ● Ex: SPWeb.Features.Add(featureGuid)

DEMO: Feature Activation

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Thanks! Neil Iversen Inetium Other Sessions: SharePoint 212 – Customizing the Mobile Experience When – Thursday 11:15am Where – Mandalay Bay B SharePoint 314 – PowerShell for SharePoint Developers When – Thursday 2pm Where – Mandalay Bay B