SharePoint 2013 Certifications

As of today, we have a total of 4 training courses available. These are:

FIrst Look Clinic: What’s new for IT Professionals in Microsoft SharePoint 2013 – it’s a 3 hour clinic, rather than a traditional training. I’d argue this is almost full day training, since it took more than 3 hours just to skim through. Since it’s a very early look at SharePoint 2013 there’s not certification alignment for this clinic.

The second one is First Look Clinic: What’s new for Developers in SharePoint 2013 and it’s also a 3 hour clinic. More like a day, although there are no labs available within the course material.

The third one is SharePoint 2013: IT Pro Ignite training. It’s a 3 to 5 day classroom-based training, including hands-on labs. It’s not widely available but does give you a deeper look and knowledge into what’s possible with SharePoint 2013 for IT Pros. As you might have guessed, the fourth course that is available is SharePoint 2013: Developer Ignite training. Also 3-5 days, lots of labs.

Finally, the Programming in HTML5 with JavaScript and CSS3 course was released for public use. A book is coming out in April from MS Press – see details here.

The first exam for anyone wanting to be fluent with developing solutions for SharePoint 2013 is Programming HTML5 with JavaScript and CSS3 (70-480). This exam was released August 20th, 2012. The accompanying preparation material is available (see here). This is a mandatory certification exam for the upcoming MCSD: SharePoint certification.

The second exam we already have details on, is for IT Pros: Core Solutions for SharePoint Server 2013 (70-331). Availability for this exam was scheduled for February 5th, 2013 and as of February 2nd, the certification exam was available from Prometric. 

The third exam is also for IT Pros called Advanced Solutions of Microsoft SharePoint Server 2013. It’s also available since February 2nd, 2013. Together with 70-331 and 70-332 you are two steps closer to being an MCSE: SharePoint.

The last requirement for MCSE: SharePoint (for IT Pros) is MCSA: Windows Server 2012. You can either complete this requirement with a single upgrade exam (70-417) or do all three certification exams: 70-410, 70-411 and 70-412.

In Windows PowerShell 2.0 (the November 2007 Community Technology Preview release) the PowerShell team has taken an interesting approach to script debugging. As you know, PowerShell doesn’t require a specialized script editor or development environment. Instead, PowerShell users can, and do, use any and all text editors (from Notepad on up) to write their scripts. Because of that, the PowerShell team decided to build their debugging tools into Windows PowerShell itself; in turn, that means that you can use the new debugging cmdlets to debug any script from the console window itself.

Complete Reference: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff730925.aspx

Failed to open a connection to the Nintex Workflow configuration database

Here we go with another new issue and easy resolutions & workarounds…

This time, the issue was with Nintex workflows at the time of activating a site collection feature. Let me describe the details in step by step so that it will be easy recognize as well as understand…

Problem Description:

Problem activating Site Feature. While activating the ‘Nintex workflow 2010’ at the site collection level, we faced the following error message:

Error Message:

An unexpected error has occurred.

Troubleshoot issues with Microsoft SharePoint Foundation.

Correlation ID: XXXXX

Troubleshooting Steps:

1)    Most imp regarding any exceptions: SharePoint logs (\14\logs)-specifically if we face “unexpected error”

2)    Windows event logs

3)    If we have a correlation id then it’s very easy to find out the exact error message

After reviewing the SP logs, this is what I found:

Exception was thrown while ensuring dependencies met for feature 'NintexWorkflow' (id: 0561d315-d5db-4736-929e-26da142812c5): Nintex.Workflow.NWFeatureActivatingException: Nintex.Workflow.NW2007DatabaseConnectionException: Failed to open a connection to the Nintex Workflow configuration database. ---> System.Data.SqlClient.SqlException: Cannot open database "NW2007WFDB" requested by the login. The login failed.  Login failed for user 'Contoso\Administrator'. 

What we need to target first in such conditions:

1.    What exactly the app pool identity is used by that web application? Does it have sufficient rights/not?

2.    The Nintex database has a role called WSS_Content_Application_Pools. This is the group that we need to add the app pool identity to

·         SQL SERVER

·         SharePoint_Config

·         Security

·         Users

·         The account which is running the app pool of the web application

·         Right Click-Properties

·         General

·         Database role membership

Resolution:

I have added this group named as WSS_Content_Application_Pools to the APP POOL identity and that it. It worked and issue has been successfully resolved…

If you have any queries/questions regarding the above mentioned information then please let me know.

I would be more than happy to help you as well as resolves your issues…

Thank you.

Customizing the SharePoint 2013 Developer Dashboard using custom scripts

Wow Stefan Gobner has shared a wonderful article on Customising Dev Dash in 2013.

In SharePoint 2013 Dev dash has helped the admins to help troubleshoot a lot of performance issues .
 The Developer Dashboard can now be extended by injecting custom JavaScript code into the developer dashboard window.

Two steps are necessary to achieve this:

1.Custom JavaScript code, which interacts with the developer dashboard DOM, has to be added to a script file that can be accessed from the Developer Dashboard page. E.g. by placing the script file into the _layouts/15 directory.

2.The custom script file(s) have to be registered to be loaded into the Developer Dashboard page.
Below is a short example, which hides the ULS tab in the Developer Dashboard. This example also shows how to use jquery within the Developer Dashboard.

Create the custom logic in a script file

Create a "hideULSTab.js" inside the layouts/15 directory (program files\common files\microsoft shared\web server extensions\15\template\layouts) and add the following script code to it:

// register a code block that runs after the page is loaded
$(document).ready(function()
{
   // iterate over all tabs (identified by CSS class "ms-dd-Tab")
   $('.ms-dd-Tab').each(function(index, para)
   {
      // look for the tab which has "ULS" title
      if ($(para).text().indexOf("ULS") !== -1)
      {
         // hide the title
         $(para).hide();
      }
   });
});

Register the script files with the Developer Dashboard

Our custom script code requires the jquery library – so we have to register two script files with the developer dashboard. That can be done using the following powershell commands:

$contentSvc = ([Microsoft.SharePoint.Administration.SPWebService]::ContentService)
$DevDashboardSettings = $contentSvc.DeveloperDashboardSettings
$DevDashboardSettings.DisplayLevel = [Microsoft.SharePoint.Administration.SPDeveloperDashboardLevel]::On

$DevDashboardSettings.userscripts.Add("http://ajax.aspnetcdn.com/ajax/jQuery/jquery-1.9.0.min.js")
$DevDashboardSettings.userscripts.Add("/_layouts/15/hideULSTab.js")

$DevDashboardSettings.Update()

As you can see we are registering two different script files: first the jquery library from an external site and second the script file we created earlier.

The powershell script will also enable the Developer Dashboard by setting the DisplayLevel to On.

http://blogs.technet.com/b/stefan_gossner/archive/2013/01/23/customizing-the-sharepoint-2013-developer-dashboard-using-custom-scripts.aspx

How to transfer a site collection from one database to another-SharePoint 2010

Guys- Few days back, I worked on one issue and would like share the experiences so that you can resolve it if you come across the same.

Problem Description:

We had two requirements:

1.   Stop creating site collections in existing databases

2.   Transfer some site collections from existing databases to new databases.

Let’s talk about the first scenario:

Stop creating site collections in existing databases

If you search in Google then you will get tons of results from many blogs/websites/forums/TechNet etc. Everybody is mentioning about ‘making the database offline’-let me tell you it’s very easy but I would recommend you that please don’t use this approach.

Here is the best approach that will be preferable to use across any conditions.

When you will open content database section in reference to any web application section then you will see following highlights:

·         Name of the database

·         Number of site collections exist

·         Maximum number of site collections

·         Minimum number of site collections

So yes-coming back to the main point…As we can see ‘how many site collections are currently holding by this database’ then we can restrict the entry by making proper changes in “maximum & minimum number of site collections”

That’s it-once you do this then you have applied the barrier to that DB and now its deadlocked. When you will create any new site collection now then it will go to new database.

CLEAN & SIMPLE J isn’t it?

Transfer some site collections from existing databases to new databases

Now coming back to second point, how to transfer the site collections from one DB to another. Many of us will give a thought (rocket serving thought J )that yes, it can be done by backup/restore, export/import!!!

If you are thinking like this then let me correct you that Microsoft has introduced some enhancements in the Power shell and it’s a point of one execution command only.  Let me refer you that TechNet article that reflects the same.

Power shell Command:

Move-SPSite http://servername/sites/sitename -DestinationDatabase ContentDb2

Note: This example moves the site collection http://servername/sites/sitename to the content database ContentDb2.

That’s it-Requirements fulfilled and we are done with this article J

If you have any queries/questions regarding the above mentioned information then please let me know.

I would be more than happy to help you as well as resolves your issues J

Reference: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff607915.aspx

Product applies to:

SharePoint Server 2010