MOSS
has many out-of-the-box new features that make it easier to customize
using the browser interface. This provides nonprogrammers with a
mechanism to create and customize sites to meet their needs.
For developers, the
following provides an overview of the SharePoint technical structure.
MOSS is built on the .NET platform. Use of the .NET platform enables
SharePoint to assimilate information from multiple systems into an
integrated solution. ASP.NET contains many new features, and it is more
responsible, secure, and scalable than ASP. Using ASP.NET reduces the
amount of code that needs to be written over similar ASP solutions.
SharePoint’s SQL
back end provides access to internal database components using
industry-standard tools. From an application standpoint, integration
with BizTalk provides access to over 300 application connectors using
Web Services calls.
In MOSS, sites and lists can
be saved as templates, stored in a Site or List Template library, and
then made available to all sites in the collection. There is also a
library for Web Parts that can be shared across all sites in the
collection.
Features such as these
provide an environment for developing fully customized MOSS solutions.
Additional customization and development features are highlighted in the
following sections.
Using the Browser to Customize SharePoint
Through the browser, you can add a logo to the team site, apply a theme, modify a list, or create a new Web Part page.
In SharePoint Team
Services, there was a template that contained three “zones” for placing
Web Parts, producing a three-column view. In MOSS, there are additional
zone layouts to choose from, making customization much more user
friendly.
The new Web Part tool
pane is a feature that enables users to easily customize sites. It
provides the ability to do the following:
- Drag/drop Web Parts onto a page
- Customize Web Parts
- Change the home page site logo
The site
administrator can control what goes into the Web Part libraries and who
has access to the libraries for adding Web Parts to a site. Figure 1 illustrates the Web Part tool pane with its various Web Part libraries and the capability to display the contents of the library.
Development Enhancements for Site Templates
MOSS includes
multiple templates that can be used when you create a new site. Each
template includes a set of features from MOSS to satisfy a specific
collaboration need. Templates are included for the following:
Document collaboration
Team collaboration
Wiki sites
Blogs
Records repositories
Publishing sites
Basic meetings
Decision meeting workspaces
Social meeting workspaces
Multipage meeting workspaces
Document centers
Personalization sites
Report center sites
If these don’t
satisfy the organization’s requirements, customized templates can easily
be put together using the browser-based customization features, using
SharePoint Designer 2007 or some other web design tool, or using
programming. For example, if an organization always put its company logo
on the home page and used specific Web Parts that were unique to their
organization, it could save the site as a template and then just
duplicate the template when necessary to maintain consistency and
security.
Editing MOSS 2007 with SharePoint Designer 2007
With SharePoint Team
Services, it was difficult to modify SharePoint sites. SharePoint 2003
made it easier with the use of FrontPage 2003, but performance was
affected by editing sites directly. With MOSS 2007, a new product,
SharePoint Designer, shown in Figure 25.7,
is more tightly integrated with Windows SharePoint Services and
Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 and fully supports Web Parts,
Web Part pages, and Web Part zones. This means that Web Parts can be
added and customized using SharePoint Designer to provide the look,
feel, and content to meet organizational requirements.
Web Parts can be
previewed in SharePoint Designer before being published to the
SharePoint site, thus providing an “audit” to ensure that the changes
have the desired effect. The SharePoint Designer client can be used to
back up and restore MOSS sites, providing a much-needed feature that was
lacking in older versions of the product.
Other features provided in SharePoint Designer 2007 include the ability to do the following:
- Deploy a
site throughout the organization using solution packages. This provides a
means for implementing changes and modifications to organizations that
have multiple sites and servers.
- Search Web Part
libraries directly. This enables the product to be a complete editing
source for web pages, as opposed to a two-step process in which the Web
Parts would be added using the MOSS interface, and then further
modifications made in SharePoint Designer.
- Create list
templates and create, edit, and delete SharePoint list views. For
experienced SharePoint Designer users, the SharePoint interface might be
cumbersome for performing functions such as these. Therefore,
SharePoint Designer can be more efficient for these users when creating
templates and managing list views.
- Connect Web Parts
across pages or on the same page to create a new user interface. Because
SharePoint Designer is a web development tool, it has more capabilities
and is more flexible than SharePoint; thus, features such as these are
available for more complete customization.
- Use an
Extensible Stylesheet Language (XSL) data view Web Part that can bring
data from external sources into SharePoint sites. This is a great new
integration feature that shows Microsoft’s commitment toward a truly
integrated Office solution.