SharePoint Tools learned at ShareCamp

I had the opportunity to attend to ShareCamp in Microsoft München and hier are some interesting tools that I saw during the lessons:

Name	Description
Search query tool	Really nice tool for generating search queries against SharePoint 2013. You can see the xml and field names that come from SharePoint. Really helpful when creating custom search templates.
dotPeek	A free alternative to .NET Reflector by JetBrains
PowerGUI	A free tool like Powershell ISE but better.
IronSP	Interesting tool for development for SharePoint in Ruby. Currently under development and not simple to use without deep knowledge of the project.
Collaboration Manager	A commercial tool for managing SharePoint templates including upgrades. However it costs lots of money.

Hope you find this list helpful.

Advertisement

Creating Secure Store Service Application through Powershell

SSSA is a good way how to store credentials for accessing external systems.
Here is a script that will help you to create such a service application through powershell.
Thanks to the codeplex project autospinstaller for the inspiration.

Add-PsSnapin Microsoft.SharePoint.PowerShell
$serviceApplicationPool  = "SecurityTokenServiceApplicationPool" #name of the application pool under which the application should run
$secureStoreDatabaseName  = "SecureStoreServiceDatabase" #the sharepoint database where the service app will store the data
$secureStoreApplicationName  ="Secure Store Service Application" #name of the service application
$secureStoreApplicationProxyName  ="Secure Store Service Application Proxy" #name of the service application proxy
$secureStoreAdministrator = "domain\administrator" #the administrator of the application
$secureStoreUser = "domain\user" #the group or user that will have access to service application. I use the group configuration
$secureStoreAdministratorEmail = "adminemail" #email of the administrator
$serviceContext = "http://localhost" # the url for getting the service application context
$targeApplicationUserName= "administrator" #user name which will be used to access the external application
$targetApplicationUserPassword = "password"
#password which will be used to access the external application
$passPhrase = "PassPhrase" #passphrase for securing the application

If ($secureStoreApplicationName -eq $null) {$secureStoreApplicationName = "State Service Application"}
# Get the service instance
$SecureStoreServiceInstances = Get-SPServiceInstance | ? {$_.GetType().Equals([Microsoft.Office.SecureStoreService.Server.SecureStoreServiceInstance])}
$SecureStoreServiceInstance = $SecureStoreServiceInstances | ? {$_.Server.Address -eq $env:COMPUTERNAME}
If (-not $?) { Throw " - Failed to find Secure Store service instance" }
# Start Service instance
If ($SecureStoreServiceInstance.Status -eq "Disabled")
{
	Write-Host  " - Starting Secure Store Service Instance..."
	$SecureStoreServiceInstance.Provision()
	If (-not $?) { Throw " - Failed to start Secure Store service instance" }
	# Wait
	Write-Host  " - Waiting for Secure Store service..." -NoNewline
	While ($SecureStoreServiceInstance.Status -ne "Online")
	{
	   Write-Host  "." -NoNewline
		Start-Sleep 1
		$SecureStoreServiceInstances = Get-SPServiceInstance | ? {$_.GetType().ToString() -eq "Microsoft.Office.SecureStoreService.Server.SecureStoreServiceInstance"}
		$SecureStoreServiceInstance = $SecureStoreServiceInstances | ? {$_.Server.Address -eq $env:COMPUTERNAME}
	}
	Write-Host  $($SecureStoreServiceInstance.Status)
}
			# Create Service Application
			$GetSPSecureStoreServiceApplication = Get-SPServiceApplication | ? {$_.GetType().Equals([Microsoft.Office.SecureStoreService.Server.SecureStoreServiceApplication])}
			If ($GetSPSecureStoreServiceApplication -eq $Null)
			{
				Write-Host  " - Creating Secure Store Service Application..."
				New-SPSecureStoreServiceApplication -Name $secureStoreApplicationName -PartitionMode:$false -Sharing:$false -DatabaseName $secureStoreDatabaseName -ApplicationPool $serviceApplicationPool -AuditingEnabled:$true -AuditLogMaxSize 30 | Out-Null
				Write-Host  " - Creating Secure Store Service Application Proxy..."
				Get-SPServiceApplication | ? {$_.GetType().Equals([Microsoft.Office.SecureStoreService.Server.SecureStoreServiceApplication])} | New-SPSecureStoreServiceApplicationProxy -Name $secureStoreApplicationProxyName -DefaultProxyGroup | Out-Null
				Write-Host  " - Done creating Secure Store Service Application."
			}
			Else {Write-Host  " - Secure Store Service Application already provisioned."}

			$secureStore = Get-SPServiceApplicationProxy | Where {$_.GetType().Equals([Microsoft.Office.SecureStoreService.Server.SecureStoreServiceApplicationProxy])}
			Start-Sleep 5
			Write-Host  " - Creating the Master Key..."
			Update-SPSecureStoreMasterKey -ServiceApplicationProxy $secureStore.Id -Passphrase $passPhrase
			Start-Sleep 5
			Write-Host  " - Creating the Application Key..."
			Update-SPSecureStoreApplicationServerKey -ServiceApplicationProxy $secureStore.Id -Passphrase $passPhrase -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue

$usernameField = New-SPSecureStoreApplicationField –Name “UserName” -Type UserName –Masked:$false
$passwordField = New-SPSecureStoreApplicationField –Name “Password” –Type Password –Masked:$true
$fields = $usernameField,$passwordField

$adminClaim = New-SPClaimsPrincipal –Identity $secureStoreAdministrator –IdentityType  WindowsSamAccountName
$userClaim = New-SPClaimsPrincipal –Identity $secureStoreUser –IdentityType  WindowsSamAccountName
$targetApp = new-spsecurestoretargetapplication -name "externalApplication" -friendlyname "externalApplication" -contactemail $secureStoreAdministratorEmail -applicationtype Group -timeoutinminutes 3
$ssApp = New-SPSecureStoreApplication –ServiceContext $serviceContext –TargetApplication $targetApp –Field$fields –Administrator $adminClaim -CredentialsOwnerGroup $userClaim
$firstCredential = ConvertTo-SecureString $targeApplicationUserName –AsPlainText –Force
$secondCredential = ConvertTo-SecureString $targeApplicationUserPassword –AsPlainText –Force
$credentialValues = $firstCredential,$secondCredential
Update-SPSecureStoreGroupCredentialMapping  –Identity $ssApp –Values $credentialValues

Restoring site or list from a full farm backup

This post covers a scenario, when a user makes some irreversible changes and the only place where the undamaged data is, is the farm full backup. The scenarios can be list deletion, site deletion, permissions damage etc.
So here are the instructions:

1. Locate the folder where your farm full backup is and open the file spbackup.xml
2. Find the content database name in the file and in the found node  locate a line that looks like this:

   <SPParameter Key="SHAREPOINT2010:WSS_Content.dat"><![CDATA[00000055.bak]]></SPParameter>
   

3. 00000055.bak is the name of the database backup of the content database.
4. Go to SQL Management Studio and create a new database.
5. Perform a restore into this database from the backup file mentioned above. You have to change the name of the ldf and mdf file and check the “overwrite the existing database” checkbox.
6. Now open the Central administration. Click “Backup and Restore” tab and then “Recover data from an unattached content database” link.
7. Type in the name of the currently restored database and click Next.
8. Navigate to a list / site collection that you want to restore and click Next.
9. On the following page type in where you want to store the exported data of the list / site collection and click Next.
10. When the backup is created use the Import-SPWeb command to restore the data. The command should look like this:

Import-SPWeb -Path C:\temp\backup.bak -Identity http://localhost

Quick tips for using Powershell in SharePoint

Here are some helpful powershell commands that I am afraid that I will forget:

This powershell command will install PowerShell ISE. A Pretty tool for editing powershell scripts:

Import-Module ServerManager;Add-WindowsFeature PowerShell-ISE

This powershell command will enable SharePoint commands:

Add-PsSnapin Microsoft.SharePoint.PowerShell

This command opens a new SPSite and root SPWeb

$spsite = new-object Microsoft.SharePoint.SPSite(“http://localhost”)

$spweb = $spsite.OpenWeb()