Quick start guide for PnP PowerShell

1st of February, 2018 / / 2 Comments

It is quite easy and quick to set up PnP PowerShell on a local system and start using it. Considering that PnP PowerShell has been gaining a lot of momentum among Devs and Admins, I thought it would be good to have a post for everyone’s reference.
So why PnP PowerShell? Because it is the recommended and most updated PowerShell module for IT Pros to work on SharePoint Online, SharePoint on-premise and Office 365 Groups. It allows us to remotely maintain a SharePoint Online and Office 365 tenancy as we will see below.… [Keep reading] “Quick start guide for PnP PowerShell”

Query multiple object classes from AD using LDAP Query

31st of January, 2018 / / No Comments

Recently I had to make a query to the Active Directory to get the list of users and contacts. To achieve this, I used the LDAP query. See the following function:

 ///<summary>
/// Queries the Active Directory using LDAP
///</summary>
///<param name="entry">Directory entry</param>
///<param name="search">Directory searcher with properties to load and filters</param>
///<returns>A dictionary with ObjectGuid as the key</returns>
public static Dictionary<string, SearchResult> QueryLDAP(DirectoryEntry entry, DirectorySearcher search)
{
    entry.AuthenticationType
… [Keep reading] “Query multiple object classes from AD using LDAP Query”

Automate SharePoint Document Libraries Management using Flow, Azure Functions and SharePoint CSOM

30th of January, 2018 / / 1 Comment

I’ve been working on a client requirement to automate SharePoint library management via scripts to implement a document lifecycle with many document libraries that have custom content types and requires regular housekeeping for ownership and permissions.
Solution overview
To provide a seamless user experience, we decided to do the following:

1. Create a document library template (.stp) with all the prerequisite folders and content types applied.

2. Create a list to store the data about entries for said libraries.… [Keep reading] “Automate SharePoint Document Libraries Management using Flow, Azure Functions and SharePoint CSOM”

Cosmos DB Server-Side Programming with TypeScript – Part 4: Triggers

30th of January, 2018 / / 7 Comments

scTriggers are the third type of server-side code in Cosmos DB. Triggers allow for logic to be run while an operation is running on a document. When a document is to be created, modified, or deleted, our custom logic can be executed – either before or after the operation takes place – allowing us to validate documents, transform documents, and even create secondary documents or perform other operations on the collection. As with stored procedures, this all takes place within the scope of an implicit transaction.… [Keep reading] “Cosmos DB Server-Side Programming with TypeScript – Part 4: Triggers”

Export/Import SharePoint Designer Workflows using PowerShell

24th of January, 2018 / / 3 Comments

Background

Your organisation is using SharePoint as a collaboration and productivity platform, and your business units have built their solutions on it. As part of business solutions, IT teams have built workflows using SharePoint designer to cater business needs. One of the challenges developers or IT professionals used to have is how to export and import this workflow to other SharePoint sites in case if you are having multiple environments like Dev, Test, UAT and Prod.… [Keep reading] “Export/Import SharePoint Designer Workflows using PowerShell”

Cosmos DB Server-Side Programming with TypeScript – Part 3: Stored Procedures

19th of January, 2018 / / 6 Comments

Stored procedures, the second type of server-side code that can run within Cosmos DB, provide the ability to execute blocks of functionality from inside the database engine. Typically we use stored procedures for discrete tasks that can be encapsulated within a single invocation. In this post, we will discuss some situations where stored procedures can be used and the actions and queries that they can perform. We’ll then start to work through the server-side API model, and look at how we can work with the incoming stored procedure invocation’s request and response as well as the Cosmos DB collection itself.… [Keep reading] “Cosmos DB Server-Side Programming with TypeScript – Part 3: Stored Procedures”

Xamarin Application Architecture

17th of January, 2018 / / 1 Comment

In this post, I will talk about strategies for developing a cross-platform Xamarin application with a focus on code sharing, increasing testability, and reducing overall development and maintenance efforts.
The application architecture is itself problem specific, but there are certain design patterns that can guide the overall structure of the application. The ones I mostly work with are Model-View-Controller, Model-View-Presenter, and Model-View-ViewModel.
MVC should be adopted for small applications or proof of concept. Since Android and iOS both natively support MVC, it will mean fewer roadblocks and faster implementation.… [Keep reading] “Xamarin Application Architecture”

Cosmos DB Server-Side Programming with TypeScript – Part 2: User-Defined Functions

12th of January, 2018 / / No Comments

User-defined functions (UDFs) in Cosmos DB allow for simple calculations and computations to be performed on values, entities, and documents. In this post I will introduce UDFs, and then provide detailed steps to set up a basic UDF written in TypeScript. Many of these same steps will be applicable to stored procedures and triggers, which we’ll look at in future posts.

This is the second part of a series of blog posts on server-side development using Cosmos DB with TypeScript.… [Keep reading] “Cosmos DB Server-Side Programming with TypeScript – Part 2: User-Defined Functions”

Cosmos DB Server-Side Programming with TypeScript – Part 1: Introduction

5th of January, 2018 / / No Comments

Cosmos DB is a NoSQL database provided as part of Microsoft’s Azure platform. Designed for very high performance and scalability, Cosmos DB is rapidly becoming one of the default data storage options I recommend for new green-field applications and microservices. It is a fairly opinionated database, with some guidelines that you need to follow to take full advantage of its scalability and performance, but it also provides a number of features to enable sophisticated and powerful applications to be built on top of its engine.… [Keep reading] “Cosmos DB Server-Side Programming with TypeScript – Part 1: Introduction”