Book Review: SharePoint 2010 Plain & Simple

SharePoint 2010 Plain & Simple is a "SEE-HOW guide to SharePoint" and a good book for IT Pros or developers who are absolute beginners to SharePoint 2010. The book assumes that you already have all the required software installed & some Features activated.

It shows how to perform the following 140+ Tasks with step-by-step instructions and screen-shots -

• Create a Site Based on the Team Site Template
• Create a Document Workspace 
• Change the Title and Description of Your Site
• Turn Off the Quick Launch Bar
• Change the Color Theme of the Site
• View All Site Content
• Save a Site as a Template
• Open Site Columns
• Browse Site Columns
• Create a Site Column
• Edit Site Columns
• Access Content Types
• Inspect Content Types
• Associate a Document Template with a Content Type
• Associate a Workflow with a Library
• Start a Workflow
• Check the Status of a Running Workflow
• Create a List or Library
• Delete a List or Library
• Add a List Item
• Edit a List Item
• Delete a List Item
• Create a Folder to Organize Items in a List
• Create a Column in a List
• Edit Column Settings
• Add a Validation Rule to a Column
• Add a Validation Rule to a List
• Sort a List
• Filter a List
• Create a List View
• Select a List View
• Sort a List View
• Filter a List View
• Create a Document Library
• Modify the Document Template  for a Document Library
• Modify the Document Template for a Content Type
• Upload Multiple Files with Internet Explorer
• Upload Multiple Files with Windows Explorer
• Display the Check Out Status on a Document Library View
• Check Out a Document
• Check In a Document
• Require Document Check Out on a Library
• Enable the Document ID Service for tracking Documents
• Configure Document ID Settings
• Locate the Document ID on a Document
• Use the Find By Document ID Web  Part to search for a document
• Use the Send To Menu
• Add a Custom Send To Location
• Enable the Document Sets Site Collection Feature
• Configure Document Set Options
• Enable Document Sets on a Document Library
• Create a Document Set
• Enable the SharePoint Server Publishing Infrastructure Feature
• Enable the SharePoint Server Publishing Feature
• Create an Asset Library
• Enable Enterprise Keywords
• Enable Metadata Navigation
• Tag Files with Windows Explorer
• Upload Files to an Asset Library
• Connect an Asset Library to Office
• Insert Pictures or Video into PowerPoint
• Insert a Picture from SharePoint
• Insert a Video with the Media  Web Part
• Enable Auditing
• View an Audit Report
• Enable Document Labels
• Insert a Label in a Document
• Enable Document Bar Codes
• Insert a Barcode in a Document
• Enable an Expiration Policy
• Create a Project Task List
• Add a Project Task
• Update Multiple Tasks with the Datasheet
• Zoom the Gantt View
• Configure Task Columns
• Create a Calendar List
• Switch Calendar Views
• Schedule a Meeting
• Create an Issues List
• Configure Issue Categories
• Create a Discussion List 
• Start a Discussion Thread
• Reply to a Discussion Thread
• Sync MS Project 2010 with a Tasks List
• Manage Synchronization Fields
• Add a Quick Link to a SharePoint Site
• Save a Document to a SharePoint Site
• Manage SharePoint Site Quick Links
• Connect a Calendar List to Outlook
• Copy or Move SharePoint Calendar Items to Outlook
• Add Outlook E-Mail Messages to a Discussion List
• Create a Slide Library
• Publish Slides from PowerPoint
• Copy Slides from a slide library to a PowerPoint Presentation
• Broadcast a Slide Show
• Import a Spreadsheet to SharePoint
• Export a List to Excel from SharePoint
• Export a Table from Excel to SharePoint
• Opening a SharePoint List in Access
• Create a SharePoint Workspace Account
• Sync to SharePoint Workspace
• Create a Blog Site from Your SharePoint Profile
• Change Your Blog Picture
• Edit Your Blog Description
• Create a New Category within a Blog
• Edit a Category
• Create a Blog Post
• Publish a Blog Post Previously Saved as a Draft
• Add a Comment for a Blog Post
• View, Edit, or Delete Comments
• Publish a Blog Post from  Microsoft Word
• Add People to Groups
• Create a Group
• Grant an Individual  Permissions
• Break Inheritance to change an object’s permissions 
• Grant Access to a List or  Library
• Grant Access to Individual  Items
• Remove Someone from a  Group
• Remove a Group’s Site Permissions
• View Permissions on a Library
• Upload Content to Your My Site Shared Documents
• Upload Content to Your My Site Personal Documents
• Add a Colleague to My Site
• Edit Colleague Information
• Remove a Colleague
• Update Your Status
• View Colleague Status
• Create a Note on Content Within SharePoint
• Add the SharePoint Tags And Notes Tool to Your Favorites
• Add a Note to Content on an External Site
• View Notes
• Create a Search Center
• Access a Search Center
• Perform a Search with Search Center
• Create a Search Scope
• Add Rules to a Search Scope
• Use Refiners
• Create a Best Bet
• Subscribe to Search Results as an RSS Feed
• View Search Feeds in Internet Explorer 8
• View Search Feed in Outlook 2010
• Use Advanced Search

It doesn't get into the details of what practical scenarios these tasks could be useful for.

At 250+ pages, this is probably the slimmest book on SharePoint 2010. It does a good job of explaining the commonly used out-of-the-box features in SharePoint 2010 in plain-English. I recommend this book to beginners who may be daunted by the complexity of SharePoint 2010.  It provides enough information to find your way ahead.

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HOW TO make columns in an ASP.NET GridView sortable with jQuery

• Use the jQuery Tablesorter Plugin - see article with demo 
• Note that the jQuery Tablesorter Plugin requires the table generated by the GridView to have thead and tbody tags
• Assuming the Id of the GridView server control is set to grdEmployee, you can access the dynamically generated table's ID and build the selector like this -

         gridId = $("table[id$='grdEmployee']").attr("id");
         $('#' + gridid).tablesorter(); 

• If you have a checkbox in the column header to implement Select All/De-select All functionality for items in that GridView, that will fail as the Tablesorter plugin will override the click event. To overcome that, use this trick -

         $("#tablesorter").tablesorter({headers:{0:{sorter:false}}}); 


Also see:
Yours declaratively, GridView 
Beware of breaking changes in jQuery library versions 

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The first 20 employees of Google

List of the first 20 employees of Google, posted by an anonymous user on Quora -

7 of the first 20 employees are still at Google. Here are all the first 20 and what they're doing now. Current employees are in bold.

1. Sergey Brin: Google
2. Larry Page: Google
3. Craig Silverstein: Khan Academy [1]
4. Heather Cairns: angel investing [2]
5. Ray Sidney: Big George Ventures [3]
6. Harry Cheung: angel investing [4]
7. Amit Patel: Sunfire [5]
8. Urs Hölzle: Google
9. Georges Harik: imo.im, angel investing [6]
10. Salar Kamangar: Google
11. Omid Kordestani: Google
12. Steve Schimmel: angel investing [7]
13. Chris Skarakis: Blip.fm [8]
14. Joan Braddi: Google
15. Susan Wojcicki: Google
16. Gerald Aigner
17. Jim Reese
18. Larry Schwimmer
19. Kendra DiGirolamo: Driscoll's [9]
20. Marissa Mayer: Yahoo! [10]

Also see:

The History of Microsoft

The History of Apple

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Power Searching with Google (and Bing)

Did you know, you can even search with images of objects and not just textual keywords on Google (a feature probably first introduced in Google Goggles). Let's say you found an interesting looking object in your attic but didn't know what it is, you can take a photo of it and use it to search.

And did you know, Google queries cannot include most special characters:

You may have read the book 20000 Leagues Below the Sea but have you ever tried to visualize how much is 20000 Leagues? It's 69046.7669 miles!

These are tips I picked from the free online course Power Searching in Google conducted by Daniel Russell, Senior Research Scientist at Google.

You can attend it as well & apply some of the learning on Bing too.

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What is the difference between Browser Mode & Document Mode in IE

If you're a web developer and your job actively involves building web pages that work the same in all browsers including the last three versions of IE, you'll be no stranger to Browser  & Document Mode in Internet Explorer

These options are available with IE Developer Tools (F12 keyboard shortcut). In IE9, these modes let you emulate older versions of IE8 & IE7. Microsoft provides these modes so that websites that were built to target IE7 & lower versions don't fail hopelessly in the newer & more standards-based versions. IE provides a fallback in the form of the Compatibility View button which allows content designed for older web browsers to render well in newer versions of Internet Explorer 9. 

Here are the differences between Browser Mode & Document Mode -
Browser Mode determines the User Agent sent to the server & the Document Mode IE defaults to.
Document Mode determines the layout (rendering engine) and the JavaScript engine. Document Mode allows you to manually choose which rendering engine you want IE to render the page with; choosing the Internet Explorer 8 Standards mode uses the IE8 rendering engine, Internet Explorer 7 Standards Mode uses the IE7 rendering engine, or Quirks Mode uses the quirky, IE5.5 rendering engine. The Chakra JavaScript engine in IE9 is not the same as that shipped in IE8.

Changing the Browser Mode refreshes the page and  changes both the Document Mode and the User Agent string, which allows Internet Explorer to lie to a server about who it says it is.
Changing the Document Mode through IE’s Developer Tools refreshes the page, but does not resend the UA string or retrieve new markup from the server.

Sites cannot choose a Browser Mode.
Site developers can choose a Document Mode for their site, which overrides IE’s defaults and declares how a website is rendered. If a site does not specify a document mode then IE assumes the default document mode, which is IE9’s standards mode in IE9.

Here's how the User Agent string looks for different combinations of  Browser Mode & Document Mode in IE9 on a Windows 7 64-bit PC -
Browser Mode:IE9, Document Mode:IE9 standards
Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; MSIE 9.0; Windows NT 6.1; WOW64; Trident/5.0)

Browser Mode:IE9 Compat View, Document Mode:IE9 standards
Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 7.0; Windows NT 6.1; WOW64; Trident/5.0; SLCC2; .NET CLR 2.0.50727; .NET CLR 3.5.30729; .NET CLR 3.0.30729; Media Center PC 6.0; InfoPath.3; .NET4.0C; .NET4.0E; MS-RTC LM 8)

Browser Mode:IE8, Document Mode:IE8 standards
Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 8.0; Windows NT 6.1; WOW64; Trident/4.0; SLCC2; .NET CLR 2.0.50727; .NET CLR 3.5.30729; .NET CLR 3.0.30729; Media Center PC 6.0; InfoPath.3; .NET4.0C; .NET4.0E; MS-RTC LM 8)

Browser Mode:IE7, Document Mode:IE7 standards
Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 7.0; Windows NT 6.1; WOW64; SLCC2; .NET CLR 2.0.50727; .NET CLR 3.5.30729; .NET CLR 3.0.30729; Media Center PC 6.0; InfoPath.3; .NET4.0C; .NET4.0E; MS-RTC LM 8)

Browser Mode:IE7, Document Mode:Quirks
Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 7.0; Windows NT 6.1; WOW64; SLCC2; .NET CLR 2.0.50727; .NET CLR 3.5.30729; .NET CLR 3.0.30729; Media Center PC 6.0; InfoPath.3; .NET4.0C; .NET4.0E; MS-RTC LM 8)

Browser Mode:IE9, Document Mode:Quirks
Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; MSIE 9.0; Windows NT 6.1; WOW64; Trident/5.0)

Source: MSDN & StackOverflow

Related:
How IE determines Document Mode
Using X-UA-Compatible to Create Durable Enterprise Web Applications

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HOW TO find what movies two film personalities have in common

1) Use this special Search page on IMDb to find information about common cast/crew between two titles or two people who have worked together

See what movies A R Rahman & Mani Ratnam have worked on

(Source: How do I query IMDb for movies that two actors have in common?)

2) WolframAlpha can find movies two actors were in, if you try a query like this - movies with adam sandler and drew barrymore


Also see:
Does IMDb provide an API?

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Google institutes MVP/GDE award to recognize developer community contributions

Possibly inspired by Microsoft's MVP award, Google has started a Google Developers Expert (GDE) program "that recognizes and rewards outstanding developers". There are lots of similarities to Microsoft's MVP award - the GDE award too is annual, it provides awardees access to Product teams & developer releases, and an invitation to an annual summit at Google headquarters (MS has it in Seattle/Redmond). There is similarly even a member directory & a badge for winners.

There is no mention of any material rewards though. Microsoft gifts MVP awardees an MSDN/Technet Subscription & other goodies now & then.

The GDE awards will be given out in the areas of Android, Cloud, HTML5, Chrome, and Google Maps to experts who contribute to the developer community.

Also see:
MS MVP Authors from India

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HOW TO work with a JSON/JSONP feed locally

When you're working with a JSONP feed  like the one returned by Twitter Search API or Google News, the different results that show up each time may distract you from the functionality that you're building. You can instead work with a copy of the JSON resultset locally and hook up the code to the actual JSONP feed when you're done.

A JSONP feed is just JSON-formatted response wrapped in a function call. You can grab the JSONP content generated by an API by going to the Network Tab within Developer Tools (F12 keyboard shortcut) of Chrome or IE or Firebug within Firefox.

When a JSONP feed is called through jQuery, it will look something like this -
jQuery17109422175763174891_1337695981767({json})

To work with the dynamically generated JSON, we need the content within the brackets - {json}

Save that content within a text file & give it some name & a ".js" extension. To use the JSON content locally, specify the file name as the first parameter to the $.getJSON method -

$(document).ready(function(){
    $.getJSON('tsearch.js', function(response){
      for(var i=0;i<response.results.length; i++){
      $('#tweets').append("<li>" + response.results[i].text + "</li>");
    }});
});

The above example refers to  JSON returned by Twitter Search API.

Also see:

HOW TO show expanded form of shortened URL within a tweet using Twitter API 
HOW TO convert a RSS feeed to a JSONP feed on the fly

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Building a dynamic jQuery Selector for an element whose ID contains braces

For doing some table formatting through jQuery on a table generated dynamically by Sharepoint 2010 in a Web Part, I tried to pick the ID of a table so that I could use it as a selector. I needed to conditionally highlight a cell in each row of a table based on the value of an adjacent cell in the same row.

The problem was, a typical ID value of a table dynamically generated by Sharepoint 2010 for a Web Part looks like this - {8CC7EF38-31D8-4786-8C20-7E6D56E49AE2}-{E60CE5E2-6E64-4350-A884-654B72DA5A53}

Going by the rules, the value of an ID attribute can be only be alpha-numeric & include the underscore and hyphen character.

To simulate the Sharepoint 2010 requirement, I wrote some sample code that has a table with 2 columns and enclosed the ID of a dummy table within braces -
{myTable} 

...and "escaped" the brace character -
\{myTable\}  

...using the following regular expression to get at the rows -
var regex = /[}{]+/g;
var rows = '#' + tableid.replace(re, "\\$&") + ' tbody tr'

That selector now gives me access to the table rows & by looping through the rows I was able to accomplish the conditional highlighting -
$(rows).each(function() { .. }

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NOBR - a non-standard HTML tag that all browsers support

I ran into a NOBR tag within the code generated by Sharepoint 2010. That didn't look like a standard HTML tag and I was able to confirm that by looking up my favorite HTML Reference - W3Schools 

Here's what the SitePoint Reference says -

The nobr element is a proprietary (as it is not based on any standard) one that was used to define sections of text that the browser should not allow to wrap, regardless of what may happen, for example the user resizing the window to a small viewport. As it is deprecated - and the effects can be achieved using CSS - you should not use the element; this is here for reference only. 


The nobr element has good support in modern browsers (for backwards-compatibility reasons) but should not be used. 

rel="nofollow" is a non-standard attribute-value that popular browsers support for the sake of search engines.

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HOW TO convert HTML content to plain text - with Excel!

There may be times when you need to extract just the text from a glob of HTML copied from the source as the content couldn't be copied or the text on the web page was hidden. Recently, I wanted to get the subtitles of a YouTube video, but it wasn't easy to copy it from the transcript. I couldn't also locate the timedtext file that contains the subtitles so I had to point at the Transcript block using Developer Tools (F12 keyboard shortcut) and get the HTML.

Here's the trick I tried -

Now that I had the text in HTML format, I copied it to Excel, selected Ctrl+H to invoke the Replace dialog box and in the Find What textbox I typed <*> and hit the Replace All button after leaving the Replace With textbox blank. That removed all the tags alongwith its attributes and left just the text.

Also see -
HOW TO strip HTML tags and show just web page text programmatically and with EditPlus

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Websites that track traffic in Indian cities

Although currently not very accurate, there are websites that track traffic in Indian cities -

* (7/Sept/2012 Update) Google Maps Live Traffic - Google Maps has started offering live traffic information for major roads in six large Indian cities and their surrounding suburbs: Bengaluru, Mumbai, New Delhi, Chennai, Pune and Hyderabad.

The Google Maps feature of showing “typical” traffic conditions for a particular day and time, based on historical data is interesting.

The live traffic info does not currently appear to be accurate. I've been following their map along the route I take & though Google Maps shows there is congestion (represented in red) the road has been unusually traffic free.

In comparison, MapMyIndia does a better job -

* Traffic.MapMyIndia.com - Currently shows traffic conditions in Delhi, Mumbai & Bangalore

MapMyIndia uses information gathered from vehicle tracking systems that it has deployed with call centres as an enterprise solution, as well as GPS systems for taxis that are a primary source of information. These are all connected GPS systems. MapMyIndia has benchmarked average speeds on roads, which they compare with realtime data for traffic information. 

* BTIS.in - Currently tracks traffic in the following cities -

• Ahmedabad
• Bangalore
• Chennai
• Delhi
• Hyderabad
• Indore
• Kolkata
• Mumbai
• Mysore
• Pune
• Vadodara

* SabkaTraffic - Shows traffic info in the following cities and also provides updates over Twitter -

• Ahmedabad - @SabkaTrafficAMD
• Bengaluru - @SabkaTrafficBLR
• Chandigarh - @SabkaTrafficIXC
• Chennai - @SabkaTrafficMAA
• Delhi - @SabkaTrafficDEL
• Hyderabad - @SabkaTrafficHYD
• Indore - @SabkaTrafficIDR
• Jaipur - @SabkaTrafficJAI
• Kanpur - @SabkaTrafficKNU
• Kolkata - @SabkaTrafficCCU
• Lucknow - @SabkaTrafficLKO
• Mumbai - @SabkaTrafficMUM
• Nagpur - @SabkaTrafficNAG
• Pune - @SabkaTrafficPNQ
• Surat - @SabkaTrafficSTV
• Global Incidents - @SabkaTraffic

Also see:

• Online, SMS-based services to get distance, approximate autorickshaw fare and other location-related info
• How Google Builds Its Maps—and What It Means for the Future of Everything

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Web Apps Watch - 2

* Hotmail single user code - Many services now use your phone number to send passcodes through text messages for additional authentication. Hotmail provides a disposable single-use code when you're browsing from a public internet connection. 

Wonder if this feature will come to Live Connect  (the new name for Microsoft's single sign-on Passport Authentication technique)? 

* Google Search miscalculates - If a Google Search result points to a question on a discussion Forum, it may display the number of answers.

The way it tries to guess may be faulty. The StackOverflow question link referenced in the result (shown in image above) has just one answer & four comments but Google counts it as 5 answers

* WebRTC can enable video chat without browser plugins -  Google's open sourced technology for real time communications, WebRTC, MAY be used on Google Hangout and Skype on the browser in the future. WebRTC will allow developers to create voice and video chat applications via simple HTML and JavaScript APIs.

* Google on a killing spree - Google will be closing iGoogle, Google Video, Google Talk Chatback, Google Mini, and the Symbian Search App. Last year it announced it plans to shutdown Google Translate, Transliterate & ten other APIs and disappointed a lot of developers. Will developers trust when they release their future APIs?

* Lesson to learn from LinkedIn's security breach - "LinkedIn was using an outdated form of cryptography to secure its users' private information. The company should have known better than to guard its lists with just SHA-1, experts say.

The problem with SHA-1 is that it translates the same text the same way each time. So if your password is "password" and your friend's password is also "password," they will be hashed exactly the same way. That makes reversing the process to uncover the original password
significantly easier.

That's why security experts recommend that companies with giant lists of private data like LinkedIn add another security layer called "salt."

Salt randomly adds another piece of information to the password. It could be a user name, first name, or even a random number -- the point is that it changes the underlying text enough to make it almost
impossible to decode."

* Placehold.it - an image placeholder service that generates a blank image with desired dimensions. Useful when you are designing a page but you don't have real images yet.

Also see:
Web Apps Watch - 1

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NLPCaptcha - yet another CAPTCHA implementation

I don't like CAPTCHAs. CAPTCHA or Completely Automated Public Turing Test To Tell Computers and Humans Apart, is a technique to to stop bots from signing up for online accounts or automatically filling up forms. I think they are time-wasters and they seem to be a complex way to fight spam. I don't bother filling any form that has a CAPTCHA unless there is a strong motivation or incentive.


There are even automated ways to break a CAPTCHA, like the Firefox add-on called Captcha Monster that completes these tests automatically (Thanks Mateusz).

Google's reCaptcha (used by even its competitor Microsoft) cleverly adapted the traditional CAPTCHA to authenticate text in Google Books, its vast project to digitize and disseminate rare and out-of-print texts on the Internet and also to "improve data in Google Maps by having users identify things like street names and business addresses." Google estimates say that over 200 million Captchas are filled every day and "several million" words are being translated every day.

When I saw a cartoon (shown below) within a CAPTCHA on the Indian Express newspaper website's comment section that asked a single word of the punch-line in blue to be identified, I first thought this could be some novel way to extract text from popular cartoons on the lines of Google's experiments.

It turns out its nothing of that sort.

NLPCaptcha is a commercial "patent-pending" implementation of a CAPTCHA by an ambitious Indian startup that aspires to be a Captcha based advertising platform.

The idea doesn't appear to be deeply thought out as it doesn't factor in Accessibility. It helps advertisers and publishers but what users? I was put off by NLPCaptcha's Flash-based home page that doesn't let you in unless you have the Flash plugin installed.

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Free APIs for HTML5 Geolocation apps, mashups

HTML5 Geolocation is now supported by newer versions of all popular browsers. Explore these free APIs to build geo-location apps & mashups -

• Twitter 
• Google Maps 
• Bing Maps 
• GeoNames (HTTPS calls supported only for premium customers)
• OpenStreetMap 
• Foursquare 
• Data.gov 
• Data.gov.uk 
• Data.gov.in
• Wunderground Weather API (supports HTTP & HTTPS calls)
• Flickr (supports HTTP & HTTPS calls)

work in progress...

Also see:

There is an app for that?

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HOW TO read long text messages on the Samsung Omnia 652

Samsung Omnia 652 clumps text messages from a single recepient together.

Scrolling through a message doesn't reveal the entire message if it is long.

The fix I've found is to choose Copy/Paste from the Menu & then "Select Text" (Menu > 6 > 1)

The images below shows commands for Google's search service by SMS in India that is available through their 9773300000 mobile number -

This service can even get you the PNR status of a reserved train ticket after you send an SMS with you PNR number in the specified format. Indian Railways offers a similar service through its 139 number but mobile operators charge Rs.3 for sending each message to 139. Google offers its service for free but I've lately found it to be unreliable - it returns a standard message: "Indian Railways servers are very busy. Please try after some time." 

You may find the other commands useful when you are on the move.

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