Netsuite Suitecloud IDE & Web Services - netsuite

This isn't much of a programming question, but I figure some here would know the answer.
I'm trying to setup the Suitecloud IDE, but you have to enable Web Services. Does it cost anything to do so? Our consultant keeps telling us that we have to buy another account to do so, whereas the Netsuite Tech Support seemed to indicate that it is free.
I'm just wondering what the cost is.

No it is free.
Go to Setup > Enable Features > Suitecloud (tab) > Web Services (check box).
You have to give roles (or global permissions to users) permission to use Web Services.
You can get the IDE from the help section. Search SuiteCloud IDE and it will come up.
SuiteCloud (Customization, Scripting, and Web Services) > SuiteCloud IDE > SuiteCloud IDE Overview

As far as I know, your consultant is wrong or at least isn't being clear.
Enabling Web Services(SuiteTalk) doesn't change your licensing costs at all.
When you connect to NetSuite using web services, you do so using a user account. So in that way, each IDE user would need a license. In most situations however, if the developers already have access to the NetSuite UI, and are therefore consuming a license, it works fine to have them connect with the IDE using the same credentials and thus the same account. That's what we do anyway.
What's more, you could probably (technically; if not necessarily within the letter of the license agreement) share a single license across all the IDE users. You would lose all audit control over who made what changes and you could conceivably run into conflicts with multiple users trying to interact with the account at the same time.
Bottom line: SuiteTalk doesn't cost extra to turn on. Anyone with a normal Netsuite user login can use the IDE at no extra cost.

Related

Admin permissions for Jira users (Core and Confluence)

We're running Jira 7.7.0 and Confluence 6.0.4
Our team is split into 2nd level support and 3rd level (us).
PROBLEM:
We would like to let 2nd level to do as much admin support as possible with as few permissions as needed.
1. The software offers for Core two admin groups, but both offer too many admin rights (Jira Administrators / Jira System Administrators)
2. Confluence has 2 groups Admins and users
DETAIL:
None of the global permissions of either permit, that we allow a group to
- Add Spaces
- Add projects
- Add users
- Add groups
but keep them otherwise out of all the rest
DESIRED
A way to have a super user be able to not just manage >existing<, but also add the entities mentioned above.
OPTIONS?
A) A plugin that enhances users to be "a bit" Administrator, BUT with ADDING feature (this does not seem to exists)
B) A plugin that hides the menu items, but would technically still enable the users to execute the tasks if a URL was known
QUESTION
- Does anyone have a hint on what plugin could manage this? Either permission or menu hiding?
- Is there a way to trick configuration to achieve this (I assume not)
Many thanks!
Carsten
There is an addon called Delegated Project Creator for Jira that address your request. To get it, search for it in the marketplace under "administration".
On the other hand you can tweak the UI of both apps to control access to options using Jquery. The addon Script Runner for JIRA has some options for this.

Spotfire Automation

Is it possible to automate the publish of dxp file to the server. What I want to achieve is build a command line tool, user navigates to the dxp file and runs a command (let's say publish), this should save the file to the library without opening spotfire client (something similar to running spotfire in Headless mode).
I got to know that Spotfire Automation Services can be of some help in this task, but I have never used the automation services and don't know how to install or find the automation services module. Any help or direction is highly appreciated. Thanks
Automation Services is a licensed framework from TIBCO that lets you automate several tasks including Open or Save analysis to library, replace or remap data sources, run alerts etc.
But if your sole requirement is to publish analysis to library then use the import-library-content on command line, or save it in a batch file and use IronPython to trigger that as using button from the DXP.
See API docs of import-library-content for usage.
you can check Google for Automation Services and see more details on its capabilities, but I'm pretty sure your use case is covered. Spotfire does not offer this feature out of the box (except maybe using the admin command tool, but that'd only be for admins).
your organization will need to buy a license for AS, since it's a separate product in the Spotfire suite. talk to your TIBCO rep or send me a PM.
Yes, you can use Automation Services for this. Automation Services needs to be licensed from TIBCO, but it provides a framework that will allow you to create job.xml files which specify a list of tasks for Automation Services to execute. You can then submit the job file to a web service when you want the tasks to be executed.

Provisioning Sites, Lists, Libraries etc within SharePoint

Previously when provisioning list, libraries, site columns, content types, list definitions etc in SharePoint I typically used SharePoint features, deployed via a WSP - or used PowerShell scripts. This meant I had a package that could be deployed to DEV / TEST / PROD.
I'm working with SharePoint within Office 365 and unsure on the best way to provision lists / libraries / features within SharePoint.
Options:
No Code Sandboxed Solutions
Trying to avoid using these as the information from Microsoft on whether they are deprecated is flaky - however sandboxed solutions would allow me to deploy features with list definitions etc. I know sandboxed solutions with c# are definitely deprecated, but the info around no code solutions is poor.
Apps
I know apps can provision at both the app and host web level, but creating lists, libraries etc using the CSOM seems like a lot of effort and a step backwards.
PowerShell
The SP Online PowerShell is nowhere near as powerful as on-prem SP. I can provision site collections through this, but not lists or libraries...
I'm keen to know how other developers are deploying to Office 365, specifically around provisioning sites with specific list definitions, libraries, content types and so on...
Thanks
Microsoft did clarify the position on No Code Sandbox solutions - http://blogs.msdn.com/b/sharepointdev/archive/2014/01/14/deprecation-of-custom-code-in-sandboxed-solutions.aspx
Also if you are looking at using Powershell to deploy then you might want to go down the route of using CSOM from within PowerShell - SharePoint Client Browser for SharePoint 2013 is good for setting up a session also very good for viewing the content of a 365 tenant - http://spcb.codeplex.com/
I have been using code based provision for almost two years without any issues at all.
Server side model works just fine, CSOM has some limitation but stil cool one and JSOM could deliver the same feature set as both CSOM and SSOM, sorta 95% :)
PowerShell is not the best option as it hard to integrate into CI, put some unit testing and regressions.
As you mentioned, this is "step back", but if only you don't have any framework or foundation for that. My libraries are internal one, but there is SPGenesis at codeplex and SPMeta2.
As community don't really care, need or with such libraries for provisioning (yep, let's face it), there are much such libraries at all, but there are lots of "MVP" samples sorta "hello world" level.
Finally, what I would suggest is to invest your time and effort in code based provision.
This is a future, that's it ;)
UPD
Struggling with SharePoint's API inconsistency, bugs, "by-design" behaviour, unaffordable amount of time to write, support and upgrade WSP packages and XML, a team of passionate SharePoint professionals decided to come up with robust, testable and repeatable way to deploy such artifacts like fields, content types, libraries, pages and many more.
Enjoy and let us know how it goes.
SPMeta2 at GitHub
SPMeta2 at Nuget
SPMeta2 Documentation Wiki
SPMeta2 Bugtracker

Application Lifecycle Management for Web Applications (TFS)

We are working on a web application (Javascript + php). We want to start using Team Foundation Server in order to apply application lifecycle management. but we don't know where to start! any good guide or tutorials?
If you are investigating TFS to be used as an ALM tool in your company, you probably want to take a look at the free preview of the service that is available in the cloud. That will allow you to see if this tool will get you what you need. There a lots of tools out there, but first you need to figure out what your problem is and what you are trying to solve. TFS may not be the solution you need, but it is a solution for certain teams.
You'll probably likely be using TFS as an ALM tool for the following:
Source Control. Ensure you have version history on your changes. Note: You can now tap into GIT as your repository, if you don't want to use the TFS source control.
Continuous Integration. You can make your build configurations deploy your files out to your environments, and run unit tests if necessary.
Bug Tracking. Use the built-in work items to track all your bugs.
Requirements Tracking. Use Scrum or Kanban for your project to take advantage of the boards that are available with the service. Work items like 'Stories' or 'Product Backlog Items' will let you track the work your team is delivering.
Burndown. The built-in reports should help you report to your management on progress, though you'll have to see if the TFS ones meet your needs.
Test Cases. Your QA team can write their test cases in TFS to document how to test the requirements. If you have the correct license, you can also tap in Microsoft Test Manager for your QA team to execute and plan their tests.
I would strongly advise doing some research into what ALM means, what it is used for, and why you should be doing it before deciding on a tool. The tool won't fix the problem, it just supports you in whatever you are doing to fix your problem.

Which parts of Sharepoint do I need to understand to build a publicly facing website?

I am building a publicly facing website that does the following.
Users log in.
And then view a list of their customers.
They click on a customer to view their past purchases, order them, change them etc.
This is not a shopping site by the way.
It is a simple look up tool.
Note that none of the data accessed by the website is in anything other than a SQL database - no office documents. Also, the login does not use users Windows credentials on a VPN or something like that.
Typically I would build this using a standard ASP.NET MVC website.
However the client says they want to use Sharepoint.
As I understand it, Sharepoint is used for workflow and websites that are collaboration tools such as the components you can see here http://www.sharepointhosting.com/sharepoint-features.html
Here are my questions:
Would I be right in saying that WSS is completely inappropriate for this task as it comes with an overhead that provides no benefits?
If I had to use it, would I need WSS or MOSS?
If I had to use it, would I be right in saying the site would consist of :
List item
a) Web Parts
b) And a custom site layout. How do I create one of these?
Addendum:The book Professional SharePoint 2007 Web Content Management Development looks like a good start
1.) I agree that SharePoint would be quite inappropriate for this task. A few reasons:
It costs thousands of dollars to license SharePoint for use on the open Internet
SharePoint will use a lot of resources (SQL Server, IIS, Active Directory...) that are unnecessarily demanding for your task
SP will give you very little flexibility to develop a solution in your way -- it sounds like you would need to create a database-connected Web Part in ASP.NET anyway (so that could be entirely independent of SP)
SharePoint has it's place--it can be remarkably helpful as a company's internal document management, intranet, and workflow/approval system--but it is not well suited for custom code nor Internet use.
2.) I believe MOSS would be required for the Internet license (as in the link above).
3.) SP development is not like typical relation database systems (for example, it uses flat, unnormalized tables). If your SQL matched the SharePoint way of thinking, you might be able to connect to your database as an external List using SharePoint Designer. More likely you would need to use Visual Studio to create a custom Web Part in ASP.NET.
Hopefully this'll be a few reasonable arguments you can use to help the customer see how SharePoint is inappropriate for the task... In fact, I expect just the first point (the cost of licensing) will turn them.
You can technically use WSS for this task but MOSS has more features aimed at building public facing websites. The publishing infrastructure comes to mind. It has has the CQWP which enables you to build custom interfaces which perform well in SharePoint. With SharePoint there are potentially challenges around scalability. If you know the platform well then doing something like what you have suggested would be a pretty quick task. If you don't know SharePoint and the underlying system well you could face challenges.
You do not want to approach building the final application with SharePoint Designer. It has behavior which can cause major problems with scalability. You want to create a SharePoint Solution comprising a number of features which can be easily deployed to SharePoint. Going this route does not alleviate performance problems but you are going to be closer to the right solution. You can package up the custom user interface elements as CQWPs or write Web Parts. I personally prefer to write Web Parts.
You do the overall site design in a Master Page. Pages within a site are then inheriting from this. If you have MOSS then you can create what are called publishing pages which contain your Web Parts. These are not available in WSS which is why people recommend against it for public websites.
To decide whether SharePoint (any version) is worth it, you need to find out if they are going to use any of the core features. If everything is going to be custom and you are not going to make use of any workflow or document management features in your deployment then I would stay away. To see whether you want to go further with SharePoint from a development perspective, take a look at the WSS developer labs. I recently ran an intro course at my employer using the materials from that site. They are dated, and need more info on best practices but they provide a quick way for you to dip a toe in the water and decide whether you want to go any further.
1) For the core functionality as you describe it SharePoint isn't going to add anything, BUT if you build it on SharePoints premisses it allows your client to add a lot of functionality outside the core for "free" like:
They can add Content Editor WebParts to pages where they can add descriptions, and messages
They can add lists where the customers can enter requests/comments/... and automatically have new entries mailed to anyone in the organisation subscribing to changes
The functionality you develop can be reused on their intranet
Any future small "web apps" can be included in the same site
...
So all in all unless you have a better framework to use then use SharePoint
2) WSS is all you need for now
3) Your main deliverable for now would be:
a feature with some Site Pages and a few Web Parts
a feature with a custom masterpage and corresponding css
True. Well not inappropriate but it doesn't add anything either.. but maybe in the future?
WSS is enough
You'd need web parts to expose your data, yes. The custom site layout is not necessary. If you want your own look and feel a SharePoint Theme may suffice. Even if you want some real custom layout tweaks you probably don't need a site template but you can get away with using just SharePoint Designer to edit the pages or master page.

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