I missed the first session of the day. The hotel bed was just wayyyy too comfy.

The first session I attended was with Thomas Daly (@_tdaly_) discussing branding by dissecting customized SharePoint sites. If you read my blog post about #SPSVB this might sound familiar. I attended the same session there, but it was the first time he was presenting this session and it was a bit clunky. Today was not the same! Tom provided several options for applying branding to your site, from master pages to feature themes. Using Visual Studio, he showed us how to apply a parent master page to webs (sub sites). By simply having the feature activated on the Site Collection, it will automatically apply the branding to new sites (webs). This was a great session that I would recommend anyone interested in branding and custom SharePoint UIs attend the next time Tom presents. Disclaimer: Tom is not a graphic designer. This session is geared more for SharePoint branders looking to implement wireframes and graphic designs into a SharePoint environment using SharePoint Designer, Visual Studio, and other dev tools.

Oh, look! Sandwiches!

Next up is Tony Testa (silly Tony doesn’t use Twitter) presenting “Setting up a SharePoint 2010 Continuous Integration (CI) process”. CI is a software practice where members of a team check in their work frequently resulting in multiple builds over the course of the day allowing for integration errors to be reported frequently. Tony has experience utilizing CI in a large development effort with one-click builds. You will need development machines and developers writing good/bad code, a version control system (VCS), build server, and integration server(s) to setup a CI process for SharePoint. There are multiple VCS tools available. A build server connects to VCS, runs builds, and reports errors. Make sure you build server and VCS are compatible. Integration servers mimic QA/PROD with SharePoint running. With a demo, Tony showed us how TeamServer (a build server tool) reports errors on builds. Additional demos reinforced Tony’s presentation nicely. This session was pretty interesting and something I will definitely look back at if I ever go Agile.

Unfortunately I had to miss the next session block, so the last session I attended was “Enabling Your End Users and Yourself with Custom SPD Activities” with Paul Galvin (@pagalvin). Firstly, Paul talked about OOTB workflows in SharePoint 2010. Then he covered SharePoint Designer (SPD) and how it is used to create declarative workflows using XML. The last option is Visual Studio. While it is complex and inaccessible to end users, it is powerful. It can do almost anything imaginable. Extending SPD to the end users gets them off your back by making them happy. It also allows you to work on harder stuff. However, it is not always appropriate. Custom activities are server side code, so the full SDLC must be considered. Even a well meaning end user with SPD access could do considerable damage to the environment. Paul used relevant demos and real world examples which rounded out a fine-tuned, informative session.

Over all this SharePoint Saturday was a well organized event packed with great speakers and sessions. The crew here in Philadelphia did a fantastic job putting this shindig together. I strong recommend attending a SharePoint Saturday if you have yet to do so. They are awesome events jammed with good food, great people, and informative sessions.

See you at the SharePint!

Here’s the link for those of you who didn’t realize “Standardista” was hyper-linked above: http://www.standardista.com/css3/css-specificity/

The first session I attended was concerning custom SP sites and branding facilitated by Thomas Daly. His blog can be found at http://thomasdaly.net. @_TomDaly_ He introduced some handy tools for quick branding application to sub-sites as well as a couple demo sites. Branding may be a facet of SP to look into if you have a hankering for some creativity. I am considering digging into it a bit myself.

Second session attended was how to create a parent-child accordion using SPServices and qQuery by Dan Walker (@spevilgenius). http://spevilgenius.sharepointspace.com/blog. Unfortunately technical difficulties meant this session was a bit slow and laborious. Since the site wouldn’t pull up for a live demo, Dan opened the page up in Visual Studio. Some of the code used CAML queries, which I had not been introduced to prior. Luckily there was a session later in the day covering CAML.

After a delightful lunch of sandwiches and pasta salad, I attended Mike Orzyacks’ (@next_connect) session on reusable workflows. Custom actions built in Visual Studio to help with workflows in Designer. Workflows are usually developed one at a time with config and admin content being localized. Maintaining data is difficult and process admin is focused. We should use goals and centralize common configuration data. Leverage central farm services and make it easier for users to maintain their data. This reduces time in creating workflows and improves efficiency of managing workflows.

The next session I attended was about CAML, REST and LINQ, Data Access Options in SP2010 given by Rob Windsor (@robwindsor). The data storage mechanism in SP is lists. Virtually all content is stored in lists. Field values are accessed via SPListItem indexer and generally by internal name. Internal names are set when the field is created and can not be changed. Any non-alphanumerical characters will be escaped. They can be found in the server explorer. CAML (Collaborative Applicaiton Markup Language) is the SP query language. SPQuery queries a single list and SPSiteDataQuery queries multiple lists across the site. Joins can be used on lists that have a lookup connection. Some code examples drove the presentation home! This was by far the best put together presentation I’d seen all day.

I wasn’t intending on attending (ing ing ing) one of the last sessions, but as I was descending the stairs to the main floor I passed by a colleague/friend who motioned for me to join them in the session they were heading to. It was over user adoption and led by Shannon Bray (@noidentity29). Although the content of the session was below my current level of knowledge, it was still entertaining as Shannon was heckled by a couple other notable speakers of the weekend. (@usher and @next_connect)

I’d like to thank the organizers and sponsors for hosting this event. The SharePoint community is a vibrant one filled with an ecclectic mix of characters who are eager to share their knowledge with anyone willing to listen. Without the organizers and sponsors, speakers and attendees alike would not have gotten to experience the epicness which was #SPSVB.

Some of the presentations and sample code from those listed above and others can be found on the #SPSVB website: http://bit.ly/ABBzuX

I hope to see everyone out at #SPSPhilly on February 4th. Happy SharePointing!