tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4126985520350746834.post4089726136310790912..comments2024-03-28T07:00:21.554+00:00Comments on Chris O'Brien: Developing for Office 365 – thoughts on use of custom master pages and web templates etc.Chris O'Brienhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10022906552670607366noreply@blogger.comBlogger23125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4126985520350746834.post-19236129608413521532015-02-09T15:00:43.179+00:002015-02-09T15:00:43.179+00:00It's interesting that MS would introduce the D...It's interesting that MS would introduce the Design Manager and discourage branding in the same release.omarhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07599596720190715483noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4126985520350746834.post-7564232951781312782015-01-27T15:18:57.287+00:002015-01-27T15:18:57.287+00:00Reading this excellent summation and the comments ...Reading this excellent summation and the comments that follow it, especially around the new direction on NOT using declarative XML provisioning techniques, I can't help but see this as yet another "solution to a non-problem", a la Furuknap.<br /><br />I have nearly 10 years experience in the SharePoint space, and I am really starting to despair with the direction Microsoft are going with all of this. I get the reasons why they are doing it (in many cases anyway), but the way it is asking SP Devs to jettison skills they have perfected over many years is hard to take. As someone who is not a young Dev fresh out of university, I'm not sure I have the desire to re-skill at this stage, especially when the cynicism based on hard experience tells me Microsoft will likely change direction again on all of this at some point in the future.Richard Walshhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03864187527352164357noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4126985520350746834.post-58841547768801057692015-01-20T06:21:11.859+00:002015-01-20T06:21:11.859+00:00@Nigel - I'm aware of that training (I got up ...@Nigel - I'm aware of that training (I got up early to attend the session live). I would question the feasibility of "injecting" boostrap markup at run-time. Even if you could get it working in this fashion, it would be incredibly brittle - the slightest change to the OOTB masterpage that it is manipulating could break it and then you're back where you started. Brucehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05975208826204543596noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4126985520350746834.post-39790103070553323032015-01-15T01:27:10.758+00:002015-01-15T01:27:10.758+00:00We also recently updated our Guidance around brand...We also recently updated our Guidance around branding and customization for SharePoint Online <br /><br /><a href="https://support.office.com/en-us/article/Plan-customizations-solutions-and-apps-for-SharePoint-Online-b7898ebf-69b7-4196-81e3-b04e1a4e7d67" rel="nofollow">Plan customizations, solutions, and apps for SharePoint Online</a>Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09195136786861908820noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4126985520350746834.post-33425788584115957152015-01-13T22:54:24.789+00:002015-01-13T22:54:24.789+00:00@Bruce There are patterns and practises expounded ...@Bruce There are patterns and practises expounded by Steve Walker and Vesa Juvonen of Microsoft here :- http://www.microsoftvirtualacademy.com/training-courses/transform-sharepoint-customizations-to-sharepoint-app-model<br /><br />Allow you to inject the Bootstrapper for the Responsive UI into a master page. So you can do this now.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4126985520350746834.post-5383206557900125442015-01-13T22:08:19.770+00:002015-01-13T22:08:19.770+00:00@Chris, the biggest thing that clients ask for tha...@Chris, the biggest thing that clients ask for that can't be achieved through composed looks/themes is a fully responsive design (commonly done by integrating bootstrap in the master page and page layouts). Jeremy has said that MS is slowly moving towards making the OOTB master more responsive (some components like the suite header already are), but they aren't there yet.Brucehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05975208826204543596noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4126985520350746834.post-305425929962406182015-01-12T11:19:36.768+00:002015-01-12T11:19:36.768+00:00@Sly Gryphon,
Agree 100% with all of those points...@Sly Gryphon,<br /><br />Agree 100% with all of those points I think. Could be a while until we get to that ideal state though - especially on aspects like rollback (never straightforward given the underlying SharePoint architecture).<br /><br />Good comments, cheers!<br /><br />COB.Chris O'Brienhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10022906552670607366noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4126985520350746834.post-56975715905023012632015-01-12T11:16:49.621+00:002015-01-12T11:16:49.621+00:00@Jeremy,
Thanks for adding the links. There's...@Jeremy,<br /><br />Thanks for adding the links. There's obviously a lot to think about/talk about here, so thanks for your efforts on being Microsoft's eyes and ears as usual :)<br /><br />Cheers,<br /><br />COB.Chris O'Brienhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10022906552670607366noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4126985520350746834.post-50588496416447259912015-01-11T22:21:52.839+00:002015-01-11T22:21:52.839+00:00It will be good to have this guidance from Microso...It will be good to have this guidance from Microsoft, as I often tell customers they should try and stick to out of the box if possible.<br /><br />One big area with remote provisioning is however the issue of tooling. The tool support in Visual Studio for declarative fields, content types, etc, has improved every version and to switch back to an entirely untooled approach (raw code) is a big productivity hit.<br /><br />(The other big area, as mentioned in the article, is existing skill sets, but MS can't really solve that problem.)<br /><br />If MS wants this to work, they really have to invest heavily in tool support for generated code (partial classes) for remote provisioning. (Similar to what is available in ASP.NET or Entity Framework).<br /><br />With some decent tooling, including support for modularisation and easy apply/rollback, a remote provisioning solution will be as easy as existing declarative (with improved benefits such as debugging).Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4126985520350746834.post-9608932726939916572015-01-08T18:16:44.712+00:002015-01-08T18:16:44.712+00:00As always Chris, thanks for a great balanced write...As always Chris, thanks for a great balanced write up.<br /><br />Vesa Juvonen and Steve Walker recently did a live event on this topic which is now available on-demand (http://www.microsoftvirtualacademy.com/training-courses/transform-sharepoint-customizations-to-sharepoint-app-model )<br /><br />I've also done some podcasts with Steve and Vesa on this too which can be found here http://blogs.office.com/2014/10/02/office-365-developer-podcast-episode-018-steve-walker-sharepoint-ux-developer-guidance/ and more shows here http://dev.office.com/podcasts .<br /><br />We also very recently updated the Solution Pack for SharePoint Online with more guidance on this topic http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=42030<br /><br />I will continue to monitor the comments around this as people chime in as its very useful to take back to engineering.Jeremy Thakehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14264476485361437612noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4126985520350746834.post-31315855653913823892015-01-07T11:43:48.813+00:002015-01-07T11:43:48.813+00:00@Adam,
Well, I definitely agree that using a cust...@Adam,<br /><br />Well, I definitely agree that using a custom master won't protect you from *all* breaking changes from Microsoft, and that some updates will come from web control DLLs for example. This is what I was trying to say with:<br /><br /><i>"If nothing else, perhaps using a custom web template/master page is one layer of protection against uncontrolled updates for publishing intranets. It won’t cover all scenarios (depending on the type of update), but certainly will cover many."</i><br /><br />But, I do still think a custom master page will give you something - otherwise Microsoft wouldn't care if folks used one or not! The fact that they are saying "you shouldn't use a custom master page if you want all the updates" is clear to me that some changes will be deployed this way. And in the scenario of the intranet home page for 50,000 users - well, frankly it might be worth taking every layer of protection you can get?<br /><br />Cheers,<br /><br />COB.Chris O'Brienhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10022906552670607366noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4126985520350746834.post-29762259205967315942015-01-07T09:12:18.794+00:002015-01-07T09:12:18.794+00:00@Nigel,
Yes, this is a good point - I'd say t...@Nigel,<br /><br />Yes, this is a good point - I'd say though, that this perhaps speaks to the wider aspects of "cloud-friendly" development. For a while now, many of the on-premises projects my team has worked on have used cloud-friendly approaches precisely to minimise any re-work if/when a move to Office 365 happens. This means developing exclusively using client-side techniques and the app model/remote code model, and avoiding all the things which cannot be used in SharePoint Online (e.g. server-side SharePoint code, timer jobs, files deployed to the _LAYOUTS directory and so on). More details on this stuff at <a href="http://www.sharepointnutsandbolts.com/2014/06/presentation-deck-modern-sharepoint-development-remote-code-techniques.html" rel="nofollow">Presentation deck: Modern SharePoint development - techniques for off-box code</a><br /><br />Ultimately, this "roadmap to the cloud" discussion is something we *always* have with our clients, even if they are on-premises and it isn't particularly on their radar. <br /><br />Cheers!<br /> <br />COB.Chris O'Brienhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10022906552670607366noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4126985520350746834.post-53098313531400475742015-01-06T17:23:24.424+00:002015-01-06T17:23:24.424+00:00Using a custom master page isn't going to insu...Using a custom master page isn't going to insulate/protect you from breaking changes from Microsoft. <br /><br />Your custom master page is going to reference controls (like the ribbon) whose underlying DLLs can be changed by Microsoft at any time, potentially changing the markup emitted from those controls. If you have custom JavaScript or CSS that targets specific page DOM elements, the markup changes may make those customizations fail.<br /><br />It's a really tough situation for customers to be in. Many companies I work with aren't willing to wait indefinitely for Microsoft to finally provide a responsive team site master page and create it themselves (and sign up for the customization tax in the process).<br /><br />All symptoms of a technology still based on ASP.NET 2.0, that never had a good separation of logic/UI.Adam Tothhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01743242224411600441noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4126985520350746834.post-44009635598414668482015-01-06T15:38:24.114+00:002015-01-06T15:38:24.114+00:00Hi Chris
Happy New Year !
I think this goes wider ...Hi Chris<br />Happy New Year !<br />I think this goes wider than you intimate. If you have a SP2010 farm and you are looking to move to SP2013 (online is not an option yet - no MS data centre in the UK yet !). How does one construct a SP2013 farm so that when it is time to move to SharePoint online how do we minimise the effort and the disruption. The things you have described should be taken into account now when constructing the SP2013 farm. Hopefully, you can use these techniques with locally hosted apps rather than Azure. If so then we are someway to reducing the effort and cost of "moving to the cloud" at a later date.<br /><br />NigelNigelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04922712835231276715noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4126985520350746834.post-8541483610370178522015-01-06T15:08:26.634+00:002015-01-06T15:08:26.634+00:00Great read Chris
I just started a new project wher...Great read Chris<br />I just started a new project where we will be designing and implementing a move to O365 and need to discuss a migration strategy with a branding component. This article has helped me in that decision making process. Cheers. see you in a few months in London mate.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17551353830087909766noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4126985520350746834.post-82412351037802336892015-01-06T12:29:06.267+00:002015-01-06T12:29:06.267+00:00@Unknown (second one),
Yes, I definitely hear you...@Unknown (second one),<br /><br />Yes, I definitely hear you that it can be frustrating when the direction of Microsoft travel changes - it often hurts the things I work on too. BUT, on the positive side, I believe the SharePoint/Office 365 engineering teams are now more sensitive to these changes than before. Also, as someone who perhaps sees a bit more behind the curtain, I do see the challenge Microsoft are often faced with - either improve things (but annoy people because changes are required along the way), or sacrifice the long-term improvements due to the disruption. Of course, sometimes the "new stuff" is simple and doesn't bring the need for changes to what's out there already, but with a platform that originated 10 years ago, clearly that's not always going to be the case.<br /><br />Tricky one!<br /><br />COB.Chris O'Brienhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10022906552670607366noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4126985520350746834.post-16415765076265131042015-01-06T10:05:54.657+00:002015-01-06T10:05:54.657+00:00@Bruce,
Yes, interesting thought, and we've d...@Bruce,<br /><br />Yes, interesting thought, and we've definitely used similar approaches in places. However, I feel they don't always fit because they heavily rely on sites being created by I.T. using the "magic script" - absolutely fine for some scenarios, but not always (e.g. self-service site provisioning).<br /><br />But as you say, this approach is indeed inadvertently (one form of) the winning side if moving away from declarative provisioning becomes mandatory/critical at some point :)<br /><br />On your other comment, do you find your clients ask for heavy UX customisation of team sites? i.e. more than could be achieved with themes/Composed Looks?<br /><br />Cheers,<br /><br />COB.Chris O'Brienhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10022906552670607366noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4126985520350746834.post-80007241242596707002015-01-06T09:01:22.155+00:002015-01-06T09:01:22.155+00:00@Unknown (first one),
It's a good question (o...@Unknown (first one),<br /><br />It's a good question (on how often master pages get updated in Office 365) - I don't have any numbers on this, so it's difficult to say exactly (unless someone who has been specifically monitoring this could chime in?). But several UX changes have been rolled out in the last year, from changes to the top navigation bar (and later, the introduction of the app launcher) through to changes to the mobile view of SharePoint sites. I guess another interesting point here is that, looking forward, I'd suggest even Microsoft couldn't tell you today how many changes they'll make in the next 12 months say - it will depend on the kinds of new features which get introduced, and this is now driven more by responding to analytics rather than long-range planning. <br /><br />Cheers,<br /><br />COB.Chris O'Brienhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10022906552670607366noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4126985520350746834.post-42673699551632940482015-01-06T00:18:05.462+00:002015-01-06T00:18:05.462+00:00"I completely get that if all customers used ..."I completely get that if all customers used imperative provisioning rather than declarative, certain things/upgrades would be simpler for Office 365 engineering." <br /><br />Annnd we've come full circle. Does Microsoft even properly understand the concept behind declarative? It's extremely frustrating from a consultant perspective to have things we've been told and thus have re-preached to all be thrown under the bus without any clear guidance in any direction. It's frustrating that other CMS solutions provide clear paths to the approach on branding and have opt-in versioning. Perhaps this the guidance that MS wants us to resell: go elsewhere.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4126985520350746834.post-13846328128520794242015-01-05T22:19:03.129+00:002015-01-05T22:19:03.129+00:00Nice write-up (as usual). I can appreciate your re...Nice write-up (as usual). I can appreciate your reluctance to move away from declarative provisioning of IA, considering how invested you are in that approach. <br /><br />For those of us who have been using Excel to define our IA and using that to feed PowerShell deployment scripts for years now, we get off lightly (or rather, have inadvertently picked the winning side in advance).<br /><br />The difficulty I have with Intranet = Branded vs Team Sites = not is that in my experience, clients want the same UX for both. Trying to sell them an uglier team sites experience is not going to be easy...Brucehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05975208826204543596noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4126985520350746834.post-70641453167167259502015-01-05T20:32:14.795+00:002015-01-05T20:32:14.795+00:00I always say, the closer the page is to the end us...I always say, the closer the page is to the end users daily processes, the more you want to stick to the out-of-the-box SharePoint interface. Which is in line with you. <br /><br />So I agree => corporate intranet => branded. Team site, project sites etc. => not branded (only use minor styling by e.g. themes)Quatichttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00924461430697773507noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4126985520350746834.post-23001273131676094092015-01-05T18:33:16.659+00:002015-01-05T18:33:16.659+00:00Interesting reading. As someone who works with an ...Interesting reading. As someone who works with an on-prem SharePoint 2010 installation, I'm not sure I've ever thought to look for the kind of "ripple" changes in v4.master you describe here. How often do master pages change in Office 365?Unknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09504726992352542632noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4126985520350746834.post-33276141008311239822015-01-05T17:19:22.636+00:002015-01-05T17:19:22.636+00:00Great thoughts on customisations of master pages a...Great thoughts on customisations of master pages and web templates.<br />I take a look into custom master pages and found something that might be worth to considered how Microsoft SharePoint Master Pages and changes to the user interface are might can be updated in the future. I documented this in the blog post <a href="http://www.n8d.at/blog/case-study-how-to-use-same-master-page-in-office-365-and-on-premise/" rel="nofollow">Case study how to use same master page in Office 365 and on-premises</a><br />Kind regards<br />Stefan.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10120468376896385118noreply@blogger.com