I'm creating a fairly complex orchard form and need the results saved to a sql server database. From what I understand, I should be creating a workflow activity and then on form submit, connecting to the database and saving the data through C#. Is this the correct approach?
I could also just create a module which is my custom form, and build the form myself, but would like to take advantage of orchards forms.
My question is
1. Am I approaching this correctly? or is there an easier way to do this.
2. I haven't been able to find any documentation on creating custom workflow activities. Is this even possible to do? Can someone point me in the right direction.
No, the custom forms module already saves the results, you don't have to do anything more.
Yes, you can create custom activities. Look at the code for the existing activities for examples.
Related
I am quite new to CMS MAde Simple. I am not able to understand how the
data can be saved to database. I think its in smarty framework.
Storing form data in your database is actually a built-in feature of the FormBuilder module.
To do this add a new field to your form, and choose "*Store Results In Database" as the type of field. Data will be stored in an XML format in the [PREFIX]_module_fb_formbrowser database table.
It uses ADOdb as an "interface" to the database. Basically developers of CMSMS already wrote SQL statements for update and delete content. I am really sorry but this is a very wide topic. The actual purpose of a CMS is to remove the burden from the user to actually know these kinds of stuff. I suggest you first do some reading on PHP, SQL and then come back with a more specific question.
SQL
PHP
CMS Made Simple Documentation
I have to work on a Drupal project to create user profile for some specific users on the website with some special fields. They can be a different role. Main idea is to search. User profile must be searchable with provided criteria.
I have two options,
1- Using node with (content_profile)
2. Create my own form and tables.
One my question is, is it possible to create a separate search machanism for custom created database? and is there a way to cache search result? or should I use node based? please advice some one with idea on this..
Thanks.
Yes it is possible to create a search mechanism using views and exposing the custom table to views via the api (there is a blog post here: http://blog.menhir.be/2008/10/22/expose-database-fields-to-views-in-a-custom-drupal-module/ and there is more info using the advanced help module (http://drupal.org/project/advanced_help) (install and look through the views documetation), then you could also use the Views caching.
A custom table and fields would be my preferred method if you have a lot of users as the profile tables can get pretty big (this may not be an issue for you), or you could use the content profile module http://drupal.org/project/content_profile and possibly save yourself some work!
If you wanted to perform a complete custom search not using views you'd probably need to implement that and the caching yourself if you went the custom field/table route, but you'd gain a lot of flexibility.
I need to learn how to build custom workflows in SharePoint. In addition to basic stuff like having legal sign-off on documents, I need to be able to execute arbitrary custom code at certain points. For example, after legal signs off it should export the document and update a database table indicating that a new version is ready.
Is this possible using SharePoint? If so, where can I find the documentation or tutorials I would need to get started?
Getting Started Link 1,Getting Started Link 2 links will help you to get started with the SharePoint Custom Workflows. And also it is possible to do any arbitrary code inside the workflow. Also there is another type of work flow called State machine for which there is a class one article
Workflow as the whole is built using sub parts called Activities which dictates what the workflow should do at a particular point of time, I remember you have an activity called Code Activity which will help you to achieve what you want.
Robert Shelton's Workflow Video Tutorial series is very helpful:
http://rshelton.com/Tags/Workflow/default.aspx
I'm not sure that there will be a definitive answer to my question, but I'd like to read some discussion from other folks on this... here's some quick background.
I'm creating a request form that will handle adding new equipment to our datacenter. I'm collecting some pretty basic info about the submitter and the equipment to add. Some of the metadata gets pretty complex, but I won't get into that here.
At first I started with a browser enabled InfoPath form, because most of our users aren't licensed for the InfoPath rich client. After much frustration I got things working, but could never get a level of performance that I was happy with. Since then I have been playing around with SharePoint's web services and I have a GREAT form that I've written in HTML (with some jQuery magic) that submits to a SharePoint list.
So now I'm asking myself... why not just use this form? First, I can get rid of InfoPath completely... that also helps us out with licensing since I won't need Enterprise licensing. Second, performance... Third, sure I have to hand code it, but I can, and I enjoy it.
So, InfoPath is out the door.
That leads to where I need some best practice ideas mixed in with new ideas. I've got this form that works great, but I want everything to work within SharePoint. As a test, I just created a new view for my list, removed the web part that shows the list, and plopped in my form. Aside from some CSS issues, everything works and it updates the list lightning quick!
But should it be a custom view? Should it live somewhere else? Should I just edit NewForm.aspx?
I'd love to hear some thoughts on this. Ultimately, my entire solution will be deployed as a Feature, but I'm not sure that's relevant.
Thanks!!
I would've done it mostly the same way:
Create a new form (via SharePoint Designer or a custom ASPX page)
Encapsulate the form in a Web Part (you can use the SmartPart Web Part if you're in a hurry)
Create as many custom views as you want, it doesn't really interfere with the way you code the form
If you must modify NewForm.aspx, don't delete the default ListForm Webpart since it's used by SharePoint for other things. You're better of just hiding it to avoid future issues.
Hope that helps
I think you should create custom form templates for your request SharePoint-List.
See MSDN: Creating Custom Form Templates.
I also recommend reading Understanding SharePoint: List Forms.
There's nothing wrong with using a custom form or a completely seperate app to edit SharePoint data. You end up with the same data you would get from using the standard new form, so it can't possibly break anything beyond the modified view.
Setting up a custom newform is probably the most appropriate place for it - easy enough to change the newform url in schema.xml or through designer.
I've built a web part for Sharepoint that retrieves data from an external service. I'd like to display the items in a way that's UI-compatible with Sharepoint (fits in with its surroundings.)
I'm aware of the "DataFormWebPart" but was unable to get one working properly. It requires a valid DataSource and I was unable to build one from the results of a web service call... Part of the problem is that my web service wrappers don't expose the XML return info, rather I have a bunch of deserialized objects. There doesn't seem to be an easy way to turn actual objects into a datasource, or populate a "generic" datasource from object data.
I could use an SPGridView to get the same UI, but the grid control doesn't have much in the way of smarts -and- it forces every field into its own column. I'd prefer to render each list item as a single cell with complex rendering (for instance the way that StackOverflow shows its lists of questions.) I'd also like to get as much of the Sharepoint-standard UI as possible, such as the sorting, filtering, and paging controls.
So, first: Has anyone here written a Sharepoint control that does this, and if so do you have sample code to share? If not: am I overlooking some useful control, whether MS-supplied or available in an external library?
Thanks!
Steve
Sharepoint: Best way to display lists
of non-Sharepoint content with
“compatible” UI?
Take a look at the built in sharepoint web controls:
Microsoft.SharePoint.WebControls Namespace
It contains all the controls used in sharepoint. I'd tell you more, but the documentation is very thorough.
Problem with SharePoint is that there are a bunch of different ways to do this. If your data is not changing too often and is not overly large it may be worth considering entering it into a list for display.
If you have the Enterprise licence it may be worth getting your data into the BDC and using it there.
you may have to convert the objects into xml or use the serialised objects with the XML webpart for display. This still has the issue of custom rendering using XSLT.
Here's a great article that explains how to configure BDC connections to web services using the BDC Definition Editor:
Creating a Web Service Connection by Using the Business Data Catalog Definition Editor
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb737887.aspx
The best way to do this IMO is to make a Web Part. As a Web Part the UI will be automatically rendered to be the same as the theme the site is using (unless you override it) and it will be able to be placed anywhere by anyone with admin privileges.
Tutorial on making a Web Part
Tutorial on packaging and deploying a Web Part
Example Web Part Source Code
You could create a custom web part and use an SPGridView. You say you don't like it, because it forces every field into its own column, but that's not true. You can create a template (ITemplate) for every column and fully customize what's shown inside it, just like you would using a normal ASP.Net GridView. Using this approach I've added the little "New" images right next to a list item's Title, just like SharePoint does itself.