4/16/2014

Change the SharePoint 2013 Suite Bar Text

 

Hacking around with PowerShell always finds some new property or method that I would never have gone looking for! This time it is a SPWebApplication property that sets the text in the "Suite Bar".

The default text in the suite bar is "SharePoint" for on premises installs and "Office 365" plus an icon for the cloud versions. The actual HTML for the text is "<div class="ms-core-brandingText">SharePoint</div>".

Examples from on premises SharePoint and Office 365:

image

… but… I don't know how to get access to the SPWebApplication object in Office 365 from PowerShell! You can still change it using JavaScript. (See notes at the end of this article.)

 

Using PowerShell

The following PowerShell will list the Suite Bar text for each of your web applications:

PS C:\> Get-SPWebApplication | Select DisplayName, SuiteBarBrandingElementHtml

DisplayName               SuiteBarBrandingElementHtml
-----------               ---------------------------
My Sites - 82             <div class="ms-core-brandingText">SharePoint</div>
SharePoint Intranet - 80  <div class="ms-core-brandingText">SharePoint</div>
SharePoint Testing - 81   <div class="ms-core-brandingText">SharePoint</div>

To change the text, access your web application object (mine will be the 2nd in the list, so [1]), and set the SuiteBarBrandingElementHtml to your new text. You will probably want to include the default CSS class for consistency. Remember to do the .Update, or nothing will be saved!

PS C:\> (Get-SPWebApplication)[1].suitebarbrandingelementhtml = 
"MA<span style='color:#FF2020'>X</span> Technical Training" PS C:\> (Get-SPWebApplication)[1].update()

The above will change the text to:
image

If I include the DIV and class from the default text then is will look like this:
image

 

Can't use PowerShell?

You can use JavaScript or jQuery to change the Suite Bar title text in both on premises SharePoint and Office 365. All you need is some code to find the DIV with the class of ms-core-brandingText and change it's contents. When working with Office 365, be aware that the text is also a hyperlink to https://portal.microsoftonline.com/, so be careful not to break it!

In jQuery it might look like this:

$('.ms-core-brandingText').text('Your New Title Text');

Here's an article about changing the text in Office 365: http://sharepoint-community.net/profiles/blogs/changing-the-office-365-main-link-text

 

Have fun and don't break anything!

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4/14/2014

Cincinnati PowerShell User Group meeting announcement

 

From Rob Dreyer, the organizer:

Our first meeting in 2014 will be extra special. Throughout 2014, Dr. Ferdinand Rios, the CEO of SAPIEN Technologies, Inc. is touring around the world. Last week, I received word that on Thursday April 17th he will be coming to MAX! I nearly fell out of my seat when I heard.

Please register here: http://www.meetup.com/TechLife-Cincinnati/events/154731982/

See you there!

  • Thursday, April 17, 2014
    6:00 PM to 8:30 PM
     

How to keep track of the PowerShell user group:

4/04/2014

Reduce Spacing in a SharePoint 2013 Top Link Bar

 

The top link bar in SharePoint 2013 and Office 365 adds a lot of space between each menu item, 30 pixels to be exact. You can tighten this up quite a bit by changing the default spacing with a block of CSS added to your master page.

Default spacing:

image

After the CSS change below:

image

Add the following to your master page somewhere after the CssLink control (<SharePoint:CssLink runat="server" Version="15"/>). Just before the </head> tag works.

<style>
.ms-core-listMenu-horizontalBox li.static > .ms-core-listMenu-item 
 { 
   padding-right:4px;
   margin-right:2px; 
   border-right:1px solid;
 }
</style> 

If you just want to adjust the space and not add the lines, then only change the margin:

<style>
.ms-core-listMenu-horizontalBox li.static > .ms-core-listMenu-item 
 { 
   margin-right:5px; 
 }
</style> 

 

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4/02/2014

Free eBook on Migrating to Office 365

 

I love free stuff, and I love books! Apress is making this new 680 page book available as an eBook for free, or as paper book for $39.95.

Office 365: Migrating and Managing Your Business in the Cloud

By Matt Katzer , Don Crawford

Go to Apress to get the EPUB, MOBI or PDF formats.

http://www.apress.com/9781430265269

You can also buy the paperback version at Amazon.com or get the Kindle version for free!

 

And while you are at it, take a look at this one too…

Rethinking the Internet of Things

A Scalable Approach to Connecting Everything

By Francis daCosta

Go to Apress to get the EPUB, MOBI or PDF formats.

Amazon.com

You can also buy the paperback version at Amazon.com or get the Kindle version for free!

 

 

Even more here: http://www.apress.com/apressopentitles

 

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3/29/2014

Office 365 / SharePoint–a Moving Target

 

If you support SharePoint on-premises and Office 365 in the cloud then you are well aware that there are differences that impact you, your users, your help desk and your governance plan (of course!). You can manage changes and updates when working with your on-premises servers by choosing when and if you apply service packs, features and updates. When it comes to Office 365 you have no control… changes just happen!

To keep up to date…

 

February updates

Last month saw several changes, a few available for your on-premises servers as part of Service Pack 1.

 

April 9th Updates

SharePoint Online / Office 365 will receive updates to SharePoint document libraries with the addition of a new command bar. The command bar will include frequently used tasks such as: new, upload, sync, edit, manage, and share. I have not found anything about similar updates to on-premises SharePoint.

You can see a partial screen capture of the new command bar at the link below. Notice that the "new document or drag files here" has been replaced with "new   upload   sync   edit …". Go to the page below and scroll down to each of the step 3's.

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/support/sync-onedrive-for-business-or-sharepoint-site-libraries-to-your-computer-HA102832401.aspx?CTT=1

 

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3/19/2014

Best Technical Article… and the winner is…

 

MSDN! "External lists in SharePoint 2013"

This MSDN article takes the prize!

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/office/jj966282(v=office.15).aspx

image

 

And the best part might be…

image

 

And the runners up?  The French version and the German version!

http://msdn.microsoft.com/fr-fr/library/office/jj966282(v=office.15).aspx

http://msdn.microsoft.com/de-de/library/office/jj966282(v=office.15).aspx

and a whole bunch more! https://www.google.com/#filter=0&q=jj966282+site:microsoft.com

image

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Cincinnati SharePoint User Group March 27th

 

The Cincinnati SharePoint User Group will now be meeting on the 4th Thursday of each month. The next meeting is 3/27/14.

Please register if you will be attending: http://www.meetup.com/TechLife-Cincinnati/events/171195112/

Topic: OneShell | Managing SharePoint Anywhere with Windows PowerShellTopic: Using PowerShell, and a web service call or two, to Administer SharePoint Office 365

Description: With the growing adoption of Office 365 and SharePoint Online and the continued prevalence of SharePoint on-premises, it’s becoming more difficult to manage both environments Scriptamatically™. While SharePoint Online does have native support for Windows PowerShell, there are very few cmdlets to manage the sites and site contents. SharePoint on-premises gives us well over 700 cmdlets, but it still doesn’t answer every situational scenario – leaving gaps in functionality which can be filled by scripters.
In this demo-heavy session, focused on both the developer AND the administrator – you’ll see how you can use OneShell to manage both scenarios (on-premises and Office 365). Demonstrations will focus on building OneShell for both target environments, and by the end of the session you’ll be ready to start Managing SharePoint Anywhere with PowerShell.

Speaker:

Ryan Dennis is a SharePoint Subject Matter Expert with Blue Chip Consulting Group in Central Ohio. Ryan is a Microsoft Certified Solutions Expert with experience in all versions of SharePoint. An accomplished blogger and speaker, he has worked on large-scale SharePoint solutions in the public, non-profit, and private sectors. He focuses primarily on SharePoint architecture, automation, and middle-tier development leveraging out-of-the-box features.

Ryan has worked on projects ranging from large scale Intranet deployments to secure extranets as well as public-facing Internet site deployments. Ryan has a passion for automation, whether it is automating business processes through forms and workflow; or automating deployment, migration and configuration using Windows PowerShell.

And of course... there will be food, door prizes and networking!

We've got books, gadgets and toys!

http://www.CincinnatiSPUG.org

3/14/2014

History of File and BLOB Storage in SharePoint

 

You always find the most interesting things while looking for something else…

I just ran across an interesting white paper from Microsoft on Shredded Storage in SharePoint 2013. What made it really interesting is that is has a nice history of file storage in SharePoint, starting with the Web Storage System in SharePoint 2001 through Shredded Storage in 2013.

 

Overview of Shredded Storage in SharePoint 2013

Download it here: http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=39719

 

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3/04/2014

Cincinnati PowerShell User Group 4/17/14 – SAPIEN Technologies

 

I just got the email below from Rob Dreyer of the Cincinnati PowerShell User Group. Cool stuff!

Mark your calendar! April 17th 2014 at MAX Technical Training in Mason, Ohio.

For more information and to register for the event (free!): http://www.meetup.com/TechLife-Cincinnati/events/154731982/ 


Hello Everyone,

I have some amazing news – our first meeting in 2014 will be extra special. Throughout 2014, Dr. Ferdinand Rios, the CEO of SAPIEN Technologies, Inc. is touring around the world. Last week, I received word that on Thursday April 17th he will be coming to MAX! I nearly fell out of my seat when I heard.

 

clip_image002clip_image004clip_image005clip_image007clip_image009

And, if you haven’t tried PrimalScript or PowerShell Studio, now is the time!

clip_image010

Check out the links below for more details. Thanks, Ferdinand!

Free Software Upgrades: http://www.sapien.com/blog/2014/02/13/2014-versions-out-march-15-buy-now-and-save/

Free PowerShell Training: http://www.sapien.com/blog/2013/12/23/sapiens-full-powershell-video-catalog-now-on-you-tube/

Let’s plan to give him a warm welcome. We’ll be hosting the event at MAX, but I will also provide remote access using GoToMeeting for those who cannot attend. I’ll send meeting information out as we get closer to the event. Hope to see you soon!

2/20/2014

Download a File from SharePoint using PowerShell

 

I recently had a request for a PowerShell script that could be run as a Windows scheduled task to download a file each night to a network share. As is typical, there's more than one way…

 

The PowerShell / .Net approach:

This is a ".Net approach" as it does not use any PowerShell cmdlets (beyond New-Object). The following will work from all versions of PowerShell and SharePoint 2007 – 2013, but not Office 365. It will work from any client PC as long as you have permissions to access the file. Why not Office 365? O365 requires an authentication cookie. (When I get some time I'll post an O365 version.)

$fromfile = "http://yourserver/sites/yoursite/shared%20documents/yourfile.xlsx"
$tofile   = "c:\somedirectory\yourfile.xlsx"

$webclient = New-Object System.Net.WebClient

$webclient.UseDefaultCredentials = $true
#  or
# $webclient.Credentials = …
$webclient.DownloadFile($fromfile, $tofile)

 

The SharePoint Approach:

This approach must be run from a SharePoint server and uses the Get-SPWeb cmdlet to access a site. As it is much more complicated, why would you ever use it? To do more complex things! Things like getting all of the files from a library and then downloading them (in a foreach loop), ZIPing the file(s) before download or otherwise manipulating the files before download.

The following will work from the SharePoint 2010 and 2013 Management Shells (but not for Office 365). Why not Office 365? The following needs to be run on the SharePoint server, and you are not allowed to do that with O365.

$fromsite = "http://yourserver/sites/yoursite"

$fromfile = "yourlibrary/yourfile.xlsx"
$tofile   = "c:\test\yourfile.xlsx"

$web = Get-SPWeb $fromsite
$file = $web.GetFile($fromfile)
$filebytes = $file.OpenBinary()

$filestream = New-Object System.IO.FileStream($tofile, "Create")
$binarywriter = New-Object System.IO.BinaryWriter($filestream)
$binarywriter.write($filebytes)
$binarywriter.Close()

 

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