In this post, we will talk about issues that may occur due to incorrect processing of certain inherited permissions.

As a site collection administrator, you need to be very careful about configuring permissions for specific sites under your site collection. You can definitely inherit or break permissions(configure unique permissions) for any sub site based on site users’ requirements however certain scenarios may result in incorrect processing of permissions and bring down the entire site collection.

We had experienced this issue where a site collection administrator changed the permissions of couple of sub sites, which brought down the entire site collection and resulted in being unable access the site collection or any of the sub sites under that site collection.

After struggling with this issue for a while, we came across following KB Article, which exactly explains our situation and hot fix to resolve this issue.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/935958

Here are the steps to reproduce this error,

• You create a site collection or a top level site – e.g. Test SC.
• You create a site that is named Site A. Site A inherits permissions from the parent site – Test SC. Then, you configure Site A to stop inheriting permissions.
• Under Site A, you create a sub site that is named Site B. Site B inherits permissions from the parent site – Site A. Then, you configure Site B to stop inheriting permissions.
• You configure Site A to inherit permissions from the top-level site – Test SC.
• You create a document library in Site B, and then you configure the document library to inherit permissions from Site B.

In this scenario, the document library inherits permissions from Site B. However, you receive the error message “HTTP 500 - Internal server error” when you try to access a site in the site collection. Additionally you may receive “Cannot complete this action” error.

The interesting thing is, you will not be able to perform any operation on this site collection and any of its sub sites. This includes deleting entire site collection – GUI or command line (stsadm operations).

Let me share one more scenario with you…

You have a folder inside document library. You have “Contribute” access to this folder but you are unable to upload the files. This issue is permission specific and will not result in any site access issues.

Here are the steps to reproduce this error,

• You create a document library e.g. “ProjDocs” in SharePoint site.
• You create a folder e.g. “Specifications” under this document library. Then, you configure this folder to stop inheriting permissions.
• You add a new user e.g. “domain\xyz” and assign “Contribute” permissions on this folder (Specifications). This will automatically add this user (domain\xyz) to document library (ProjDocs) with “Limited Access” permissions. This user (domain\xyz) does NOT have any permission at site level. He is allowed to access contents of “Specification” folder only.
• Then, you login as this new user (domain\xyz). You see “Upload” menu but you are unable to upload documents and receive “Access Denied” error.

There are two temporary resolutions to this issue.

1. Use Windows Explorer to upload the documents from “Actions > Open with Windows Explorer” menu.
2. Stop inheriting permissions for the document library where this folder resides and give that user “Read” permissions on document library. In above scenario break permission inheritance for “ProjDocs” document library and give “Read” permissions to the user “domain\xyz”. Please use work around #1, If you do not want user to see any of the contents in document library.

The ultimate solution for both of the above issues is to install Service Pack 1 (SP1) for Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007. Installing just a hot fix will upgrade your SharePoint farm to some intermediate version and may result in some environment specific issues. Therefore, it is highly recommended to install Service Pack 1 (SP1) for MOSS 2007.

Select File > New > Create from Master Page… to create a new page for Data View web part.

Select appropriate Master Page for creating a new page. I want default look and feel of WSS site so I have used Default Master Page.

The new page should look like this,

Next step is to create a web part zone where you can add the Data View web part. Select “PlaceHolderMain (Master)” and click “>” arrow on right hand side top corner. Click “Create Custom Content” under “Common Content Tasks” menu as shown below,

Now you should be able to click inside the “PlaceHolderMain (Custom)” and add a new web part zone. Select Insert > SharePoint Controls > Web Part Zone

This should add a new web part zone, which we will use to add the Data View web part. Select “Data Source Library” tab on the right hand side panel of SharePoint Designer and click “Connect to a databases…” link.

This will open “Data Source Properties” window. Click “Configure Database Connection” button.

There are multiple ways of connecting to SQL Server

1. Saving username and password as clear text in the data connection.

2. Using Single Sign-On authentication

3. Providing custom connection string

I have used the first method – Saving username and password as clear text in the data connection. I have created a new user called “DBAdmin”, which will work with SQL Server authentication as shown below.

Note: You may need to configure database connection with Single Sign-On authentication, if you want to use Windows authentication. You may provide custom connection string but that may require stored procedure to query the database instead of custom query. I have seen few blog posts regarding the issues in using custom query with custom connection string and you can query database only with stored procedures.

http://www.u2u.info/Blogs/karine/Lists/Posts/Post.aspx?ID=4

Provide the name of the database server, username and password by selecting “Save this username and password in the data connection” under Authentication.

Click “OK” on warning message window – “The selected authentication option saves the username and password as clear text in the data connection. Other authors of this Web site can access this information.”

Select appropriate database and table to bring the data in Data View web part. I have chosen “Emp” table of “test” database as shown below.

You may select only certain fields instead of all by clicking “Fields…” button. You may also use “Filter…” and “Sort…” buttons for customizing your query. You may provide appropriate name to this data connection in “General” tab. I have named it “Employee Details”. Click “OK” after you are done.

Click “Employee Details” under Database Connections in Data Source Library tab and click “Show Data”.

This will display data under “Data Source Details” tab. Click “Insert Selected Fields as…” button and select appropriate view. I have selected “Multiple Item View”.

This will add the Data View web part to the web part zone. Select Data View web part and select appropriate operation under “Common Data View Tasks” menu if you want to customize it further.

Finally click “Save” icon on the top of SharePoint Designer and save this page to the desired location. I stored it as “EmpDetails.aspx” at http://sharepoint-dev.corp.netapp.com/sites/SCTest/EmpDetails.aspx.

Following screen capture shows EmpDetails.aspx in SharePoint Designer 2007.

Here is the screen capture after browsing EmpDetails.aspx page which shows Data View web part with the data pulled from SQL Server 2005.

These steps assume following SharePoint topology:

1. SPSRVR1: Query Server and SharePoint Central Administration Site

2. SPSRVR2: Index Server and Dedicated Web Front End server for crawling

3. SPDB: Database Server – SQL Server 2005

Note: We have heterogeneous environment, where SPSRVR1 and SPSRVR2 have Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition with SP1-32 bit (x86) and SPDB has Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition with SP1-64 bit. We have installed Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 Standard Edition-32 bit (x86) with SQL Server 2005 Standard Edition with SP1-64 bit.

SharePoint Topology overview:

ExchangeServer2003:
Windows SharePoint Services Outgoing E-Mail

SPSRVR1:
Central Administration
Office SharePoint Server Search (Query Role)
Windows SharePoint Services Help Search
Windows SharePoint Services Incoming E-Mail
Windows SharePoint Services Web Application

SPSRVR2:
Office SharePoint Server Search (Index Role with dedicated web front end (SPSRVR2) for crawling)
Windows SharePoint Services Web Application

SPDB:
Windows SharePoint Services Database

Steps to install Service Pack1 for Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007:

1. Stop Word Wide Web Publishing Services on SPSRVR1 server. Use following batch file,
“C:\Stop And Start All SharePoint Services\Stop SharePoint Services SPSRVR1.bat”

2. Stop Word Wide Web Publishing Services on SPSRVR2 server. Use following batch file,
“C:\Stop And Start All SharePoint Services\Stop SharePoint Services SPSRVR2.bat”

3. Download and Run (double click on .exe file) WSS 3.0 SP1 on SPSRVR1 server.

4. Read the license terms and click “Accept” button.

5. Click “Continue”.

6. At the reminder message click “OK”.

7. At the installation complete message click “OK”.

8. If SharePoint Products and Technologies Configuration wizard starts, CANCEL/CLOSE it.

9. Repeat steps 3-8 for SPSRVR2 server.

10. Download and Run (double click on .exe file) MOSS 2007 SP1 on SPSRVR1 server.

11. Read the license terms and click “Accept” button.

12. Click “Continue”.

13. At the reminder message click “OK”.

14. At the installation complete message click “OK”.

15. At the end of the software update installation, SharePoint Products and Technologies Configuration wizard starts, if it does NOT then go to Start > All Programs > Microsoft Office Server > SharePoint Product and Technologies Configuration Wizard to start it manually.

16. On the SharePoint Products and Technologies Configuration wizard welcome screen, click “Next” button.

17. Click “Yes” if it notifies for services might need to be restarted.

18. On completing SharePoint Products and Technologies Configuration wizard, click “Next”.

19. When the dialog box about installation in a server farm appears, do NOT click “OK”. Instead leave each server with the following dialog box displayed.

“You must run setup to install new binary files for every server in your server farm. If you have multiple servers in your server farm, run setup and the configuration wizard on the other servers now, and then return to this server and click “OK” to continue.”

20. Repeat steps 10-19 for SPSRVR2 server.

21. Return to SPSRVR1 server and click “OK” button to finalize the installation.

22. SharePoint Products and Technologies Configuration wizard will go through configuration steps (typically from step1-9).

23. On the configuration successful page, click “Finish”.

24. Verify installation. Open SharePoint Central Administration site, Click Operations > Topologies and Services > Servers in Farm and verify version number next to each server, it should be 12.0.0.6219. You may check log files to review any errors while installing updates (SP1). Log files can be found at C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\web server extensions\12\LOGS with the name “Upgrade.log”.

25. Go to SPSRVR2 server and click “OK” button to finalize the installation.

26. Go through steps 22-24 for SPSRVR2 server.

27. After you verify that the installation of Service Pack1 was successful for both the servers – SPSRVR1 and SPSRVR2 servers, start Word Wide Web Publishing Services on SPSRVR2 server and then on SPSRVR1 server. Use following batch files,

“C:\ Stop And Start All SharePoint Services\Start SharePoint Services SPSRVR2.bat”

“C:\ Stop And Start All SharePoint Services\Start SharePoint Services SPSRVR1.bat”

28. Verify access to SharePoint application – SharePoint sites. It should be available to all (Intranet).

Note: It would be a good idea to reboot all the SharePoint servers in the farm after installing Service Pack 1 for Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 – MOSS 2007.

Here are the batch files to stop and start all SharePoint services while updating the SharePoint server farm,

1. Stop SharePoint Services SPSRVR1.bat/SPSRVR2.bat:

echo This script will stop all SharePoint and IIS Services. Press any key to continue...

pause

net stop w3svc
net stop "HTTP SSL"
net stop SPAdmin
net stop spsearch (SPSRVR1 server only)
net stop SPTimerv3
net stop SPTrace
net stop oSearch
net stop smtpsvc (SPSRVR1 server only)
net stop msdtc
net stop iisadmin

pause

2. Start SharePoint Services SPSRVR1.bat/SPSRVR2.bat:

echo This script will start all SharePoint and IIS Services. Press any key to continue...

pause

net start w3svc
net start "HTTP SSL"
net start SPAdmin
net start spsearch (SPSRVR1 server only)
net start SPTimerv3
net start SPTrace
net start oSearch
net start smtpsvc (SPSRVR1 server only)
net start msdtc
net start iisadmin

pause

Note: You may stop and start World Wide Web publishing service (w3svc) only while installing Service Pack 1 for your Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 however we decided to stop and start all SharePoint and IIS services.

References:
Download WSS 3.0 SP1 and for description KB Article 936988
Download MOSS 2007 SP1 and for description KB Article 936984
Download WSS 3.0 Post SP1 hot fixes and for description KB Article 941422
Download MOSS 2007 Post SP1 hot fixes (request Microsoft for download) and for description KB Article 942819
More updates – KB Article 956056
More information regarding SharePoint 2007 Post Service Pack 1 hot fixes
Troubleshoot errors that occur when you run the SharePoint Products and Technologies Configuration Wizard
Prompted unexpectedly to restart the computer after you install a 2007 Office service pack or a 2007 Office update

Issue: Query Server does not respond for content index propagation and SharePoint search does not work for searching new contents. It may work for searching old contents.

These steps assume following SharePoint topology:

1. SPSRVR1: Query Server and SharePoint Central Administration Site
2. SPSRVR2: Index Server and Dedicated Web Front End server for crawling
3. SPDB: Database Server – SQL Server 2005

Note: We have heterogeneous environment, where SPSRVR1 and SPSRVR2 have Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition with SP1-32 bit (x86) and SPDB has Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition with SP1-64 bit. We have installed Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 Standard Edition-32 bit (x86) with SQL Server 2005 Standard Edition with SP1-64 bit.

Create a new folder (e.g. “Applications2”) on SPSRVR1 (Query Server) for content index propagation. There is no need to share it. SharePoint will do it automatically and remove sharing for “Application” folder (original location for content index propagation). It is highly recommended to create a new folder (“Application2”) at the same level as its original folder (“Application”).

Run following command on SPSRVR1 (Query Server)

Note: Do not move existing content index from old location (“Application”) to a new location (“Application2”) manually. In fact, SharePoint does it automatically once you create a new location for content index propagation and run above command

E:\Program Files\Microsoft Office Servers\12.0\Data\Office Server\Applications on SPSRVR1 – Query Server (Currently it is 4.84 GB with the items in index = 1271197)

E:\Program Files\Microsoft Office Servers\12.0\Data\Office Server\Applications on SPSRVR2 – Index Server (Currently it is 12 GB with the items in index = 1271197)

Above command should reinitialize Query Server for Shared Service Provider- SSP in your SharePoint Server farm. Check Search Settings from SharePoint Central Administration site. Index Server should start propagating content index to a new location on Query Server with the message stating “Propagating to new Query Server (Name of the Query Server).

Once “Indexing Status” and “Propagation Status” are idle, you should start “Full Crawl” to crawl the new contents and update the content index which will be propagated to a new location on Query Server automatically.

This should fix your issue and SharePoint search should be working fine for searching new as well as old contents after you finish “Full Crawl”.

These steps assume that you have deployed small, medium or large SharePoint server farm and you have established Remote Desktop Connection to one of the Front End Web Servers or Application Servers using account which has full database access privileges and you want to test database connectivity.

For example, following screen shots were taken while testing database connectivity from Front End Web Server - "SPWeb"

1. Establish Remote Desktop Connection to "SPWeb" using "domain\SPAdmin" AD account.

Note: AD Account - "domain\SPAdmin" was used for installing MOSS 2007 and it was assigned DBCreator and SecurityAdmin server roles on SQL Server.

2. Create a new text document.

3. Rename and change the file extension of text document to .udl extension (e.g. DBTest.udl).

4. Double click on DBTest.udl. It will take you to "Connection" tab by default.

5. Select "Provider" tab on the top and choose "Microsoft OLE DB Provider for SQL Server" under "Select the data you want to connect to: " and OLE DB Provider(s) menu. Click "Next" button at the bottom.

6. When you hit next button on previous screen ("Provider" tab), it will bring you back to "Connection" tab.

Step 1: Enter the name of the database server to test the database connectivity (e.g. "Database Server")

Step 2: Select "Use Windows NT Integrated security" option. This is because you are testing database connectivity from "SPWeb" Front End Web Server and you are already logged into that server using AD account "domain\SPAdmin" which has full database access privileges.

Now, click "Refresh" button.

7. This will take few seconds (5-20 seconds) and it will load all the database names to pull down menu.

8. You may select one of the SharePoint databases (e.g. SharePoint_Config_DB) and hit "Test Connection" button at the bottom. It should popup window with "Test connection succeeded." message.

Conclusion: I wanted to test database connectivity from Front Web Server - "SPWeb". So I established Remote Desktop Connection to "SPWeb" using AD Account "domain\SPAdmin", which has full database access privileges on all the SharePoint databases. I used "DBTest.udl" file to test connectivity to "SharePoint_Config_DB" database (SharePoint Configuration database) on database server - "Database Server".

This may help verifying database connectivity and if this test fails, you need to troubleshoot database connectivity issues before you start looking in to the SharePoint errors/issues.

DOS command to create file of any size:

fsutil file createnew C:\Brij\One_MB_File.doc 1024000

Above command will create 1 MB file called "One_MB_File.doc" at C:\Brij location.

You can provide any file extension - e.g. .txt, .xls, .ppt, .pdf etc.

This command may help in creating files for upload/download test in SharePoint or any other application.

Click “Workflow settings” under “Permissions and Management” menu of document library settings,

Select “Approval” for the workflow template,

I am assigning this workflow to “Workflow Approvers” SharePoint group. As we can see, “Assign a single task to each group entered(Do not expand groups)” checkbox is not selected by default. We will keep this default setting and see what happens,

Click “OK” and add this workflow. Once you add a new document to “Project Document Library” instead of starting workflow it will show you following error,

Also, it will show “Error Occurred” status for Approval Workflow as shown below,

So here is how you can fix this issue. You need to select “Assign a single task to each group entered(Do not expand groups)” checkbox when you assign it to a SharePoint group otherwise it will not start the workflow and result in error.

This will start the approval workflow and update its status accordingly. We can see “In Progress” status and “Approved” status, once the document is approved as shown below,

Note: All the documents will be checked out when you upload them. This happens only when you have “Require documents to be checked out before they can be edited” is turned on in document library settings as shown below,

Now, I would like to “Check In” all the documents of “Shared Documents” library at the same time – All at once.

Go to Site Actions > Site Settings or Site Actions > Site Settings > Modify All Site Settings,

Click “Content and structure” under “Site Administration” category,

Click Actions > Check In

Enter appropriate Check In comments,

This will check in all the documents as shown below,

- How to display more than one columns in SharePoint Calendar view

- How to customize ASPX pages/forms used for adding, editing or displaying list items using SharePoint Designer

So let’s start with how to display concatenated columns in Calendar view. Here is the simple Calendar Month view,

First requirement is, I want to add an additional column for organizer of the event and display title and time instead of just title in Calendar month view. I am going to add “Organizer” column to Calendar by creating a new column and selecting “People or Group” in column type so that I can select organizer of an event from AD users. Also it is set to display name of a person in organizer column.

As shown below, I can select organizer from AD users now,

My second requirement is to display more than one column in Calendar month view. I want to display “Title” and “Time” instead of just “Title”. So create a new column for the Calendar and select “Calculated (calculation based on other columns)” for column type. Next step is to define formula for this column. I have used following formula,

=Title&" | "&TEXT ([Start Time],"HH:MM AM/PM") &"-"&TEXT ([End Time],"HH:MM AM/PM")

Which will convert start time and end time to “Hours: Minutes AM/PM” string and then append it to “Title” of the event.

Finally I need to change column to display in month view of Calendar to “TitleAndTime” as shown below,

That’s it! You are done. Now you can see “Title” and “Time” in month view of Calendar.

Now, let’s see how we can customize ASPX pages (forms) to add, edit or display list items. I will walk you through the steps for customizing “NewForm.aspx” for adding a new event to a Calendar. To start with let’s open that SharePoint site in SharePoint Designer 2007. Once the SharePoint site is opened in SharePoint Designer, Go to the “Lists” and expand “Calendar”, Right click on “NewForm.aspx” and select “New From Existing Page” as shown below,

I would recommend you to save this page with different name at the same location - “Lists > Calendar”. So that “NewForm.aspx” page will remain intact and you will have an option to switch it back to original page in case you mess up this form while customizing it. So I am going to store it as “NewForm2.aspx”

Now we can start customizing “NewForm.aspx” page. The requirement is to keep only Title, Location, Start Time, End Time and Organizer columns and delete the rest. Here are the steps,

Select “PlaceHolderMain (Custom)” and click “Default to Master’s Content”,

Select “Yes” on the confirmation window,

“NewForm2.aspx” will look like this after following above steps,

With “PlaceHolderMain (Custom)” selected, Select “Insert” menu on the top and select “SharePoint Controls > Custom List Form…” as shown below,

Select “Calendar” in list and “Event” in content type. Also, select “New item form (used to add new items to the list)” in type of form to create,

“NewForm2.aspx” form will look like this after following above steps,

Now, we want to select all unwanted columns from this page – “NewForm2.aspx”. Select rows for Description, All Day Event, Recurrence and Workspace fields; Right click it and select Delete > Delete Rows to delete all these rows,

Here is how “NewForm2.aspx” looks like after customizing it as per above requirements,

Finally we want to set this page – “NewForm2.aspx” as default form when somebody adds a new event item to the Calendar. In order to do that, Right click on “Calendar” and select “Properties”,

Select “Supporting Files” tab and change new item form to “NewForm2.aspx” page with the help of “Browse” button,

Save all your changes and you are done!

Go to the Calendar of a SharePoint site and click “New” button to add a new event. You will have “NewForm2.aspx” page opened for adding new items,

Similarly you can customize pages/forms used for editing or displaying list items.

Note: You will not be able to open or view SharePoint alert directly but you can click “Reply” button and see the alert message in reply window.

SharePoint alerts will not open in MS Outlook 2007 however you will be able to open them in Outlook Web Access – OWA,

1. Click Start > Settings > Control Panel > Mail

2. On the Mail Setup - Outlook window, click “Data Files”

3. On the Account Settings window, select “Data Files” tab, highlight your email account if you see more than one email accounts and then click “Settings”

4. On the Microsoft Exchange window, select “Advanced” tab and uncheck "Use Cached Exchange Mode" checkbox.

5. Click “Apply” and “OK”.

6. If it prompts for "You must restart Outlook for these changes to take effect“, click “OK” and restart MS Outlook 2007.

You should be able to open and view SharePoint email alerts in MS Outlook 2007 after following above steps,

Caveats:

After you turn off "Cached Exchange Mode", you will notice a slow down as you will be accessing your mail directly on the Exchange server rather than a locally cached copy.

In many companies there are upwards of several hundred mega bytes of e-mail on Exchange Server. You'll waste hours and tons of bandwidth for re-syncing your mailbox. If you are a laptop or remote user DO NOT USE THIS WORK AROUND; if you are using hosted Exchange service DO NOT DO THIS.

Recommendation:

Install MS Exchange Server 2003 Service Pack 2 and then apply hot fix for this issue (KB 930807) or Click “Reply” and you will see the message in the contents of the reply window. That's a lot easier and less disruptive than turning off "Cached Exchange Mode" for MS Outlook 2007.

Microsoft KB article and hot fix information:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/930807

Thanks to Kathy Hughes for posting this information in her blog.

Let’s take a look how Site Actions > Site Settings menu looks like without enabling “Office SharePoint Server Publishing Infrastructure” for your top level team site. Here is the screen capture,

Note that you will see “Top link bar” for managing navigation links for your site,

I have created another two sub sites under this top level site – Test Site Collection (sites/TestSC) and you can see three tabs on the top. “Home” tab for top level site, “Site1” tab for sub site – sites/TestSC/Site1 and “Site2” tab for another sub site – sites/TestSC/Site2 as shown below. It will add these tabs on top automatically as you create them.

Now, let’s enable “Publishing” feature – “Office SharePoint Server Publishing Infrastructure” for Test Site Collection,

You will also need to enable it from Site Actions > Site Settings > Site Features – “Office SharePoint Server Publishing”.

After enabling “Publishing” feature for Test Site Collection, here is how Site Actions > Site Settings menu looks like,

Note that “Top link bar” link is no more available and it has been replaced with “Navigation” link. Also note that “Home” tab has been replaced with the actual name of the top level site – “Test Site Collection”,

Next few screen captures are very important to avoid issues when you turn on and turn off publishing feature for your team site.

If you go to Site Actions > Site Settings > Navigation and delete tabs for sub sites and then you turn off publishing feature for your team site from “Site features” and “Site collection features” then it will create tabs for all the sub sites on the top but it will NOT restore “Home” tab. Let’s try to produce this error. So I am going to delete tabs for all the sub sites under the top level site – “Test Site Collection”,

So I have only one tab on the top, which is “Test Site Collection” – for top level site itself and I would expect to have this tab as “Home” when I turn of publishing feature for this site,

Here is what happens, when I turn off publishing feature for Test Site Collection. “Home” tab is missing and a tab will be created for each sub site under this top level site,

You can definitely add “Home” tab by going to “Top link bar” but it will NOT be highlighted even though you are on top level site – “Test Site Collection”,

As shown below, “Site1” tab is highlighted even though I am browsing top level site – “Test Site Collection”, which is pretty misleading.

Following step is to connect top level site to the portal. This is to show a link to a portal site on the top. Note that the “SharePoint Global Portal > Test Site Collection” link is added on the top. (Note: This has nothing to do with the issues occur when you turn on and turn off publishing features).

If you turn on the publishing feature for your team site again then it will be alright with showing “Test Site Collection”, “Site1” and “Site2” tabs on the top but for some reasons, when you turn off publishing feature it will not result in “Home”, “Site1” and “Site2” tabs on the top, the way it was before, when we created the top level site for the first time (you can take a look from previous screen captures).

Conclusion: If you want to enable publishing feature for your top level team site and you also want to remove tabs for sub sites from the top, remove them before activating publishing feature. If you will remove tabs for sub sites after activating publishing feature and then turn off publishing feature, it will not restore “Home” tab for the top level site.

Subject view of Discussion Board in SharePoint 2007 does not have “Reply” column available in default view settings. Here is the example of a new Discussion Board created for one of the SharePoint sites,

Let’s add “Reply” column by going to Discussion Board settings.

This will make “Reply” column visible with “Reply” button for each topic in Discussion Board.

Now, when you click on “Reply” button to reply to any of the topics, you will receive an "HTTP 400" error message – “The page cannot be found” error.

The only way to reply to a topic is by clicking on a topic under the “Subject” column and then hit the “Reply” button.

Yes, somebody can reply to a topic this way.

Here is the KB Article from Microsoft to show you the work around on how to reply a topic in Discussion Board,

KB Title: Error message when you click Reply in a Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 discussion board in Subject view: "The page cannot be found"

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/936859

Looks like, this issue has been addressed in WSS 3.0 Service Pack 1. Here is the Microsoft KB Article,

Note: Unfortunately we haven't installed Service Pack 1 in our SharePoint (MOSS 2007) environment yet to confirm this.

KB Title: Issues that are fixed in Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 by Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 Service Pack 1

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/942388

When you reply to a discussion in the Subject view of a discussion board, you receive an "HTTP 400" error message

Consider the following scenario. The Subject view of a discussion board contains the Reply column. You click Reply in the Subject view. In this scenario, you receive an "HTTP 400" error message – “The page cannot be found”.

Let’s assume that I want to create a new dedicated content database for a new site collection. This site collection will have huge contents and it may require database of size 60-80 GB. Also we do not want any of the content databases to grow more than 100 GB (Microsoft recommended content database size). So we decided to create a new dedicated content database for this site collection. Any new site collection after this must be created in a content database with a least number of sites in it, provided it is not crossing the limit of maximum allowed sites in that content database. 

As usual, I have taken few screen captures for better understanding of this scenario.

We have total 8 content databases for our MOSS 2007 deployment. I have created a new content database with the name “New_Content_DB”.

I want to create a new site collection in this new content database – “New_Content_DB” and then lock it. So that any new site collection after this will be created in a content database (any one from SPS01 to SPS08) with least number of sites in it. Let’s create a new site collection,

New site collection – “sites/newsc” was created in “New_Content_DB” as expected. Now, I would like to lock it so this content database will be used only for this site collection – “sites/newsc”.

I ran following query to confirm that the site collection – “sites/newsc” was created in “New_Content_DB” database.

Now, let’s lock it. I have set “Site Level Warning” to 0 and “Maximum Number of Sites” to 1 for this. Here is the screen capture,

Any new site collection after this must be created in content database with least number of sites in it. In our case it is SPS07. So let’s create a second site collection and it must be created in SPS07 instead of New_Content_DB. Here is the screen capture,

As shown below, the second site collection – “sites/newsc2” was created in SPS07 database.

One more time, SQL query to confirm that second site collection – “sites/newsc2” was created in SPS07 database.

Any new site collection after this point will be created in SPS07 and then SPS08 and so on…Here is the screen capture after creating couple of other site collections – “sites/newsc3”, “sites/newsc4” etc.

As per Microsoft recommendation SharePoint content database should not grow more than 100 GB in size. So you may want to move site collections with maximum contents or fastest growth from one content database to another (the smallest content database in your SharePoint farm or a new content database). Here are the few support links which can help you achieving this.

For SharePoint 2007:

First Release of the Microsoft SharePoint Administration Toolkit:
http://blogs.msdn.com/sharepoint/archive/2008/04/30/announcing-the-first-release-of-the-microsoft-sharepoint-administration-toolkit.aspx

Mergecontentdbs: Stsadm operation:
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc288557.aspx

One of the best posts for moving site collections to another content database:
http://www.toddklindt.com/blog/Lists/Posts/Post.aspx?List=56f96349-3bb6-4087-94f4-7f95ff4ca81f&ID=53

For SharePoint 2003:

MS IT Database Split for WSS2.0 and SPS2003:
http://www.codeplex.com/Release/ProjectReleases.aspx?ProjectName=governance&ReleaseId=5351

Audience Targeting:

MOSS 2007 has a feature that allows you to enable audience targeting (although this is not available in WSS 3.0). Turning on this feature means any items in a list or library can be set to appear only for a particular audience. An audience can be defined as a SharePoint group, distribution list, security group, or a global audience. The advantage of this feature lies in showing a group of users only relevant information, as opposed to overwhelming them with less relevant information. For example, a company may have a list of all new employees, perhaps including some trivia and background information. Audience targeting permits administrators to show a list of only those employees that joined a particular business unit, and only the primary identification information. The disadvantage of audience targeting is that users are not prevented from seeing the entire list, by selecting a different view or URL hacking, unless item-level security is applied.

Item-Level Security:

This feature enables users to set specific security on each item in a list or library. This means that, as items are added to the library, the user can indicate who can view the item. When setting the security for a single item, SharePoint allows the user to give access to an individual or group within AD and/or SharePoint. Item-level security is useful when uploading specific documents that only certain users should be able to see and completely prevent others from accessing them. For example, an internal portal for a company could display employee benefits only to that specific employee. Item-level security could allow only those users to see those documents without making the same documents available to the entire company.

The disadvantage of item-level security is the headache it poses for administrators in cases where it is unclear who the intended viewer is. For users of the older SharePoint Portal Server 2003, item-level security is not ideal given that users could see all items in a list, and only discover upon clicking whether they were authorized to view the item. SharePoint 2007 has now updated this feature with security trimming: Users see only the items listed that they are authorized to view, and all other items are filtered, or "trimmed" out.

Reference:
http://www.developer.com/tech/article.php/3722456

Choosing between AD Groups and SharePoint Groups. What is the best approach for assigning permission levels in SharePoint?

Here are some guidelines:

A general rule of thumb is the less security principals you have, the more scalable your security design will be.  In other words, it is easier to assign permission levels to 1 group than 100 users.

Avoid assigning permission levels directly to user accounts—use either an Active Directory (AD) group or a SharePoint group to contain the users.  If there is a one-to-one mapping between an AD group and a SharePoint permission level, you could assign permissions to the AD Group rather than creating a SharePoint group, but if you always use a SharePoint group, you have a clean way to add more users/groups later if you need to.

Use SharePoint groups over AD security groups.   You can delegate control of SharePoint groups to site administrators.  If you use AD groups, there could be a bottleneck getting users added/removed from them since only a select few in the organization have permissions.  Another issue with AD groups is you cannot view the members in SharePoint, making it difficult to determine who has access to what.

Difference between SharePoint Groups and AD Groups:

Domain Groups

•       Normally created and maintained by the IT department
•       Can be used across different SharePoint sites and site collections
•       Organizations may already have good AD group structures that map well to your SharePoint implementation
•       Groups can be nested - e.g. you can add another AD Group as a member to an existing AD group
•       No features for users to submit a request to join a group

SharePoint Groups

•       The creation of groups can be done by business users
•       When a group is being created, you can define who "owns" the group
•       Can allow users to submit a request to join a group
•       Can determine who has permissions to see the users within groups
•       Groups are created within a particular Site Collection - cannot be used in other site collections
•       You cannot add a SharePoint Group as a member of another SharePoint group (no nesting)
•       SharePoint Groups cannot be used in other systems (e.g. network Shares)
•       The SharePoint Groups are separate from Active Directory - so you can go wild with the SharePoint Groups without upsetting your AD administrator

References:
http://www.sharepointblogs.com/johnwpowell/default.aspx
http://guru-web.blogspot.com/2007/10/difference-between-sharepoint-and-ad.html

Recently we had an issue for receiving emails with larger file attachments in SharePoint. Here is how we fixed this issue.

Note: We have maximum email size set to 10 MB in MS Exchange. So MS Exchange will not allow any emails bigger than 10 MB. Also default setting for maximum email size in SMTP Virtual server is 2 MB.

Steps to modify SMTP Virtual Server properties and increase incoming email size limit to accept bigger emails in SharePoint.

1. Open IIS on SharePoint Server where SMTP Virtual Server is hosted.

2. Right click on Default SMTP Virtual Server and select properties.

3. Click on "Messages" tab of Default SMTP Virtual Server Properties.

4. Change "Limit message size to(KB)": 10240

5. Change "Limit session size to(KB)": 51200

6. Click "Apply" and then "OK" button at the bottom.

- We can NOT increase this limit more than 10 MB (10240 KB) because this is the maximum email size allowed in MS Exchange.

- You will not be able to receive emails bigger than 10 MB even by setting this limit to 20 MB or more. (Provided you have maximum email size set to 10 MB in MS Exchange Server of your company).

=====================================================
Query to get total number of items in each list of SharePoint farm:
=====================================================

Use SP_DB01

select

case when webs.fullurl = ''

then 'Portal Site'

else webs.fullurl

end as [Site Relative Url], webs.Title As [Site Title],

case tp_servertemplate

when 104 then 'Announcement'

when 105 then 'Contacts'

When 108 then 'Discussion Boards'

when 101 then 'Docuemnt Library'

when 106 then 'Events'

when 100 then 'Generic List'

when 1100 then 'Issue List'

when 103 then 'Links List'

when 109 then 'Image Library'

when 115 then 'InfoPath Form Library'

when 102 then 'Survey'

when 107 then 'Task List'

else 'Other' end as Type, tp_title 'Title', tp_description As Description, tp_itemcount As [Total Item]

from lists inner join webs ON lists.tp_webid = webs.Id

Where tp_servertemplate IN (104,105,108,101, 106,100,1100,103,109,115,102,107,120)

order by tp_itemcount desc

Note: Repeat above query for each SharePoint content database.

==========================
Query to find all site collections:
==========================

Use SP_DB01

Select SiteId, FullUrl, Title, Author, TimeCreated
From Webs
Where ParentWebId IS NULL

Note: Repeat above query for each SharePoint content database.

=======================================================================================
Query to get Site Collection Statistics - Created, Owner, Contents size, Bandwidth usage, Last Modified etc.
=======================================================================================

Use SP_DB01

select distinct a.fullurl as [SiteUrl], a.TimeCreated as Created,

b.tp_login as [SiteAdmin],

sum(cast(c.size as decimal))/1024/1024 as [recyclebin],

cast(d.bwused as decimal)/1024/1024 as [BandwidthUsed],

cast(d.diskused as decimal)/1024/1024 as [SiteSize],

cast(d.diskquota as decimal)/1024/1024 as [SiteMaxQuota],

d.id as [SiteID],(select db_name(dbid) from master..sysprocesses where spid=@@SPID) as [Content_DB],

(select @@servername) as [ServerName],

d.lastcontentchange as [LastContentChange],

(select datediff(day,d.lastcontentchange,current_timestamp)) as [DaysSinceLastChange]

from webs as a inner join  

            sites as d on a.siteid=d.id inner join

       userinfo as b on a.siteid=b.tp_siteid left join

         recyclebin as c on a.siteid=c.siteid where b.tp_siteadmin = '1' and a.parentwebid is null   

group by a.fullurl, b.tp_login, d.diskused, d.id, d.bwused, d.diskquota, d.lastcontentchange, a.TimeCreated

Order by a.fullurl

Note: Repeat above query for each SharePoint content database.

References:
http://blogs.technet.com/corybu
http://www.codeplex.com/MSITSRF
http://www.codeproject.com/KB/dotnet/QueriesToAnalyzeSPUsage.aspx

• Click drop down menu on the right hand side of “Glass” icon and select “Find More Providers…” in IE 7.0

• Under “Create Your Own” enter URL and Name. Please make sure you search for TEST (k=TEST) in URL. For example,

URL:
http://sharepoint.domain.com/sites/TestSC/SearchCenter/Results.aspx?k=TEST&s=All%20Sites

Note: Above URL is for searching in "All Sites" (in entire SharePoint Server Farm).

Also note that I have specified "SharePoint Search" as the name of the search provider.

• Click “View” link, if you want to look at the XML file, click “Install” button otherwise, which will add this custom search provider to IE 7.0

• Once the Search Provider will be added, you will see it listed in Search Engine List.

• Search for something, let’s say “sharepoint” and select “SharePoint Search” – the custom search provider, which we have added in previous steps. It will ask you for credentials to connect to the SharePoint site. Enter your credentials and it will return search results.

Let’s start with understanding the purpose of setting up Records Center site. Why do we need central repository for our contents? Well, you can store almost all kind of contents in SharePoint but if you will not manage it properly, SharePoint contents will grow tremendously and eventually it will go out of control. The only way to prevent SharePoint servers from deteriorating in the future with an overload of content is to start archiving unwanted information. This is done by linking live or active SharePoint sites to a Record Center.

I am going to create a new site collection for Records Center in my existing SharePoint server farm however it is possible to create a Records Center in a separate farm and link it to SharePoint sites in this farm. In fact, that would be a better approach as you will be moving unwanted SharePoint contents to the content databases of another farm which will help you in keeping your live or active SharePoint farm content databases as small as possible.

Here are the steps:

1. Create Records Center site.

2. Create library for storing archive contents from SharePoint live sites.

3. Create and apply Information Management Policy for the retention period.

4. Define Record Routing rule for the content type.

5. Configure Record Center from SharePoint Central Administration site.

6. Start archiving unwanted SharePoint contents.

· Create a new site collection for Records Center.

· I have named it “Records Center Site”.

· Here is the Records Center site out of the box. In this example, we will configure Record Center site to archive project documents from live or active SharePoint site - “Test Site Collection”. Create a new document library for unwanted project records (documents).

· I have named it “Project Documents Repository”. Please note that I have selected “None” in Document Template as my project document could be a word, excel or any other document.

· Define policy for the retention period. Click “Site collection policies” link under Site Collection Administration.

· Create a new policy. Click “Create” link on the top right corner.

· I have named it “Project Document Policy”. I have selected all auditing options to keep the track of any changes in these documents. I have selected 5 years retention period for these documents after they are last modified. They will be deleted after 5 years.

Note: Records (documents) older than 5 years will be deleted and sent to “Recycle Bin”. Records Center administrator will then decide to delete them permanently. If there is a need, administrator can restore documents from recycle bin.

· Site collection policy is successfully created.

· Apply policy “Project Documents Repository” document library. Click “Information management policy settings” link under Permissions and Management.

· Select “Use a site collection policy” option and apply “Project Document Policy” , which we created in previous steps.

· Set same Meta data for this document library - “Project Documents Repository”. This is because when you archive contents from live SharePoint site, it will be stored here and that’s why it is good to have same Meta data as document library of live SharePoint site. Click “Add from existing site columns” link under Columns.

· Add all those columns (properties), which you have for your live document library contents.

· I have also modified “All Documents” under Views to show these Meta data in default view.

· Here is how “Project Documents Repository” looks like after following above steps.

· Create “Record Routing” to archive project documents in “Project Documents Repository”. Click New => New Item under Record Routing.

· I have used “Project Content Type” for creating project documents in my live site – Test Site Collection. Record Routing title will be the content type which you want to archive from live SharePoint site. So in title I have “Project Content Type”. Location will be the name of the document library where you want to route these records. In our case it is “Project Documents Repository”.

· Everything is set in our Records Center and here is how it looks like after following above steps.

Note: If you have not specified Records Routing properly, it will route all the documents to “Unclassified Records” document library using default “Unclassified Records” routing when you archive them from SharePoint live sites.

· Now, configure Record Center from SharePoint Central Administration site. Go to Application Management and click “Records center” link under External Service Connections.

· Provide the URL of the Records Center site appended with /_vti_bin/officialfile.asmx as shown in example. I have used display name as “Records Center”. So when somebody will right click on document to be archived, he/she will see “Send To => Records Center” in the menu.

URL: http://sharepoint.domain.com/sites/RC/_vti_bin/officialfile.asmx

Display Name: Records Center

· That’s it. You have successfully configured Records Center. Now, let’s test it. As shown below, I am going to archive one of the documents from “Project Document Library” of my live site – “Test Site Collection”. Right click on the document to be archived, select “Send To => Records Center”.

· If you have followed all above steps properly, you will see “Operation Completed Successfully” message.

· Document will still remain in the document library of your live site. You may delete it as it has been stored in Records Center already and it is not needed any more.

· Let’s go back to Records Center site to check, if the document is successfully archived and yes, it is. It will create folder with the time stamp to store those archive documents.

· In side the folder, you can see the document and the Meta data (properties) of that document. Properties are stored in the form of an XML file.

There is lot more you can do with Records Center other than just moving archive contents however idea behind this post is just to give an overall idea of how Records Center site works.

· Following screen captures explain how to copy accidentally archived document (if you have deleted it from everywhere – document library, recycle bin etc. in your live site) back to its original location. This has nothing to do with Records Center but I have added this just to give you an idea of copying document from one location to the other. Right click on document to be copied and click “Send To => Other Location”

· Provide the destination URL.

Destination document library or folder:

http://sharepoint.domain.com/sites/TestSC/ProDL

Also you can change the document name if you wish.

· Click “OK” button at the bottom.

· Document successfully copied to “Project Document Library” for Test Site Collection.

1. Create a new document library. I am going to create document library for project documents.

2. As shown below, I have named this document library as “ProDL” and entered “Project Document Library” as description.

Note: It is a good idea to abbreviate your list or library name when you create them. This will help in keeping SharePoint URLs as short as possible. You can change the name of the document library to whatever you want later on by going to document library settings. Please keep going to learn how?

3. Go to the document library settings of document library – “ProDL”, which you created in previous step. Click on “Title, description and navigation” link under General Settings

4. You can change name here to whatever you want. I have changed it to full name – “Project Document Library” and that is what it will display as name for this document library in SharePoint but the URL for this document library will still use the abbreviated name – “ProDL”, which we entered at the time of creating it.

5. As shown below, name appears as “Project Document Library” in SharePoint site.

6. Click “Advanced settings” link under General Settings

7. Select “Yes” for “Allow management of content types?” as shown below.

8. After you finish step 7, you will be able to see “Add from existing site content types” link under Content Types. Click this link - “Add from existing site content types”

9. Select “Link to a Document” content type and add it.

10. After step 9, you should be able to see “Link to a Document” in “New” menu of your document library.

11. Click “Link to a Document” under “New” menu.

12. Enter “Document Name” and “Document URL” for the existing document at other location (in another document library).

13. Here is how “Project Document Library” looks like after adding one document and one “Link to a Document” content.

Note: Always use “Link to a Document” content type instead of adding the same document to another document library or the document library of another site.

How to add link to the document to Announcements list?

1. Go to Announcement Settings => List Settings as shown below.

2. Click “Add from existing site columns” link under Columns.

3. Select “Web Page” column and add it. Please make sure you have selected “Add to all content types” and “Add to default view” as shown below.

4. That’s it. You are done. Now you can add link to a document when you add announcement items to Announcement list.

5. Here is how Announcement list looks like after adding announcement items with link to a document.

Finally let’s talk about Meta data for folder content type. Never use folders, always use views. It is NOT recommended to use folders in document library or any other list but there are certain situations where you may want to add folders and then Meta data for those folders.

How can you add Meta data to folders?

1. Go to Site Actions => Site Settings => Modify All Site Settings

2. Click “Site content types” link under Galleries.

3. Click “Create” link on top left corner.

4. We are going to create folder content type for defining Meta data for folder contents. Please select the settings as shown below. You can add this new content type to “Custom Content Types” by choosing it under “Existing group” or you can create a new group.

5. Go to the document library where you want to define Meta data for folder contents. Click Settings => Document Library Settings.

6. Click “Advanced settings” under General Settings

7. Select “Yes” for “Allow management of content types?” as shown below.

8. After step 7, you will be able to see Content Types in document library settings. Click “Add from existing site content types” link under Content Types.

9. Select “Folder Content” content type, which we have created in previous steps and add it.

10. As shown below, “Folder Content” is now added to your document library. Click “Folder Content” link under Content Types.

11. Add appropriate columns for your folder contents. I will add couple of columns by clicking “Add from existing site or list columns” link under Columns.

12. I have added “Category” and “Release Date” columns as shown below.

13. Now, it will allow me add Meta data whenever I create a new folder in this document library. Following screen shots show how to add Meta data to existing folders in your document library.

14. Right click on folder and select “Edit Properties”.

15. Select “Folder Content” (which is what we have created in previous steps), if you have more than one content type listed in drop down menu.

16. Enter Meta data as shown below.

17. Here is how document library looks like after adding Meta data for folders.