Find answers to common questions about the new Application Templates for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0.
Q. Where are the application templates being made available?
A. Similarly to when Microsoft released the Application Templates for Windows SharePoint Services 2.0, the new templates are also available through TechNet. Please visit the application template home page for additional details and download links.
Q. What languages are the application templates available in?
A. All Application Templates for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 are available in English. A subset of twenty scenarios, the server admin templates, is also available in 13 additional languages: French, Italian, German, Swedish, Dutch, Spanish, Portuguese (BR), Portuguese (PT), Japanese, Korean, Hebrew, Chinese (simplified), Chinese (traditional), Russian, and Norwegian.
Q. Are there materials available that describe the application templates and help audiences choose the correct templates for their needs?
A. Each template will have a companion set of technical decision maker and business decision maker datasheets. The technical datasheet describes the scenario, web parts, relevant workflows, lists and document libraries that are part of the template. The business datasheet highlights the functionality and details of the scenario which a business decision maker can use to consider deployment.
Q. Is it true that some of these application templates are available in hosted mode?
A. We have a number of Web Hosting Partners creating offerings for online collaboration, using Windows SharePoint Services as a platform for hosted applications. Some of these offerings will include the application templates as well. For more details, view the directory of Web Hosting Partners offering Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 hosting services. Another example is Microsoft Office Live, which uses the Windows SharePoint Services platform and it’s own set of templates to provide business productivity and collaboration solutions targeted at the Small Business market. Office Live also offers solutions that are based on Application Templates for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0, including solutions that use parts of the Help Desk and Budgeting and Tracking Multiple Projects templates.
Q. Do the new Application Templates for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 function on a pre-existing Windows SharePoint Services 2.0 environment?
A. The new application templates were designed to highlight improvements in the Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 platform and should be installed on a Version 3.0 deployment. The new templates will not install correctly on a Windows SharePoint Services 2.0 site and as such, this scenario is neither supported nor recommended.
Q. Do the Application Templates for Windows SharePoint Services 2.0 run on a Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 environment?
A. Unfortunately, the existing Application Templates for Windows SharePoint Services 2.0 as downloaded from TechNet will not simply run once installed on a Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 server deployment. However, Microsoft has provided upgraded versions of those Version 2.0 templates that are compatible with the new platform. Upgraded Version 2.0 templates, along with guidance and tools for upgrading custom sites and templates, are available in the upgrade toolkit.
Q. What is the upgrade path for existing team sites and workspaces that were created based on the Application Templates for Windows SharePoint Services 2.0?
A. While Microsoft is investing on a clear upgrade path for the base Windows SharePoint Services platform from Version 2.0 to Version 3.0 (visit the Windows SharePoint Services Technical Library for detailed documentation and guidance), we recognize that any customizations of the base platform makes additional planning and testing necessary in upgrade scenarios. Microsoft has made available a set of tools and guidance that describe the process of upgrading customized Windows SharePoint Services sites and templates. In particular, this upgrade toolkit utilizes the Application Templates for Windows SharePoint Services 2.0 as examples of how this process is to occur.
Q. What scenarios are covered with the new Application Templates for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0?
A. Microsoft heard feedback from customers and partners, making available a rich set of business processes and workgroup tasks relevant for multiple departments, industries, and sizes of companies. The complete list of scenarios can be found on the application template page.
Q. Why are the forty templates divided in twenty “server admin templates” and twenty “site admin templates”? What is the difference?
A. The Application Templates for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 are separated into two groups, “site admin templates” and “server admin templates”, providing the right combination of integration with the platform and ease-of-deployment within an organization. Site Admin Templates are custom templates that have an *.stp extension and are easy for site administrators to install in a template gallery without requiring server administration access. Server Admin Templates have a *.wsp extension and are created as site definitions, providing tighter integration and enhanced functionality within the Windows SharePoint Services platform. They require a server administrator to install. In Windows SharePoint Services, site definitions and custom templates define how to instantiate a Web site when an end user selects a template to create a site through the user interface. For example, they determine the lists, files, Web parts, features or settings with which to provision a new SharePoint site. Where they differ is how each type is structured and deployed on a SharePoint site. Site definitions consist of multiple files on a front-end Web server that are located within folders under the template directory. Custom templates are created through the user interface or through the object model and are stored in the database, providing a means for reusing customized lists and sites.
Q. What happened to some of the Application Templates for Windows SharePoint Services 2.0 that are not present in the Version 3.0 templates?
A. Some scenarios addressed for Windows SharePoint Services 2.0 are not similarly addressed for Version 3.0. For customers that have been using the Version 2.0 templates and would like to continue to make use of them on a server running Windows SharePoint Services 3.0, Microsoft has provided upgraded versions of those initial templates compatible with the new version through the Solution Accelerator upgrade toolkit. The toolkit also offers guidance and tools for upgrading customized sites and templates from Version 2.0 to Version 3.0.
Q. As with Windows SharePoint Services 2.0, are the new application templates available in two formats: basic, with the traditional Windows SharePoint Services user interface; and customized, with a stylized look and feel?
A. Customer feedback about the Version 2.0 application templates indicated that although customers appreciated the ‘customized’ version, most of the styling often needed to be removed in order to fit within an organization’s explicit branding and design standards. With this release of the application templates, Microsoft took a different approach to provide similar look and feel options. To help enable more flexibility, the new Application Templates for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 have a standard look and feel out of the box. For those wanting more stylized application template sites, similar to the ‘customized’ templates for Version 2.0, it will be accomplished a different way with the use of master pages, a new feature supported with Windows SharePoint Services 3.0. Master pages are a feature of ASP.NET 2.0 that work the same way in Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 and Office SharePoint Server 2007 as they do in ASP.NET 2.0. With master pages, you can easily alter the look and feel of the application templates, while providing greater control over the styling of the entire site, by modifying just one set of files. (Learn more about master pages in this MSDN article.)
Q. Will Microsoft provide any master page examples to assist with customizing the application templates?
A. Yes. To help jump start your custom design work, Microsoft has created a package of four pre-designed sample master page sets, each with its own unique style: Clarity, Horizon, Reversal, and Block. Each master page set also comes in five color variations: blue, orange, red, purple and green. The sample master pages can be used with the application templates to create a variety of combinations of function and design. They should work with all forty Application Templates for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 and can be used as-is, or customized to match your company’s look and feel. The sample master pages are available for download now.
Q. While looking through some of the application templates, it appears as though they mainly consist of customized lists and document libraries. How does that equate to handling business processes or scenarios within the template?
A. Many of the application templates come pre-configured with common lists and document libraries relative to the business process or sets of tasks represented by the template in an effort to help save time and resources for the IT professional or user that would normally need to do those configurations for each site deployment. There are also a variety of event handlers, pre-built workflows, and additional features that function “behind the scenes” and act on those pre-configured lists and libraries that you don’t necessarily see upfront. While they can be used out-of-the-box, the templates are intended to provide a starting point from which advanced business applications can be built, helping to save time on development and deployment and enabling you to create customized solutions that meet your organization’s unique needs. You can learn more about some of the more in-depth features and functionality of each template by reading through the datasheets or, once deployed, by viewing “Site Settings”.
Q. I noticed two templates that relate to Project Management Scenarios: "Project Tracking Workspace" and "Budgeting and Tracking Multiple Projects." How do they relate to Microsoft Office Project Server 2007?
A. While these two templates cover the use scenario of collaborating to track activities and light projects, when users need richer functionality they can migrate their work to Office Project Server 2007, which offers the Project Web Access client built on the Windows SharePoint Services platform. This provides deeper and broader functionality, including load balancing, configuration flexibility, reporting, dependencies for critical path analysis, managing resources’ skills and schedules and more.
Q. What other templates are available?
A. In addition to the new Application Templates for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0, an English version of the GroupBoard Workspace 2007 template is available for download now. The GroupBoard Workspace 2007 template for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 creates a space for a group or team to connect and share information in a collaborative environment, improving team efficiency and productivity. There are also a number of Microsoft Partners that have been offering their own solutions based on or involving the Application Templates for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0. A directory of partners with such solutions can be found in the Solution Marketplace. For Office SharePoint Server 2007, Microsoft is developing seven customizable templates that extend the out-of-the-box My Site features by focusing on specific job roles within an organization. Called “Role-Based Templates for SharePoint My Sites”, these new templates will deliver personalized data and information relevant to your role and integrate with existing line of business systems, desktop tools, and portals.
Q. How do I customize these application templates and deploy them in more specific scenarios and organizations?
A. Microsoft offers a set of customization and development tools that help tailor the Application Templates to meet your specific business needs. Microsoft Office SharePoint Designer 2007 can be use to customize and extend instances of either the server or site admin templates. Using SharePoint Designer 2007, you can add or modify views on data in the site, as well as integrate external data from databases, Web services and RSS. Or, when partnered with Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 with Business Data Catalog enabled, integrate line-of-business data into your site. Using the rules-based workflow designer in SharePoint Designer 2007, you can also add to or customize existing business logic to better suit your organization’s processes. The rules-based workflow designer makes it easy to construct workflows with conditional branching and multiple steps. SharePoint Designer 2007 continues to be a strong tool for page design, enabling you to customize the master page of your site to dramatically change its layout. Best-of-breed CSS tools in SharePoint Designer 2007 make it much easier to customize the style and presentation of your site. Other productivity tools, such as Microsoft Office Access 2007 and Microsoft Office InfoPath 2007, also help increase the value of the templates. With Access 2007, you can create and integrate form and report views, coordinate structured data collection via email, and access SharePoint site lists offline. With InfoPath 2007, you can design form solutions to gather data which can integrate with business processes leveraging the workflow capabilities of Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 and SharePoint Server 2007. InfoPath 2007 designed forms can also be filled out in the most common browsers, further broadening the reach of such form solutions. Furthermore, Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 can be used to modify server admin templates or add new code to the server. Common tasks might include adding custom Web part assemblies, new server controls, or new workflow activities. After deploying these assemblies to the server, custom Web parts and workflow activities can be exposed and used in SharePoint Designer 2007. Beyond these Microsoft tools, there are a number of Microsoft Partners delivering services and solutions to implement, tailor, and customize the templates to fit specific customer scenarios. Many Partner solutions go beyond template-related solutions, reaching to sophisticated applications built on the Microsoft SharePoint Products and Technologies platform.
Q. Are the application templates supported by Microsoft?
A. Yes, Microsoft is supporting the new Application Templates for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 like any other product. Support information is detailed in the End-User License Agreement.
Q. Can customers, developers, ISVs, solution providers, etc. modify the application templates?
A. Yes. This is one of the main goals of the application templates, as a demonstration of the application building power in Windows SharePoint Services and as a potential starting point for larger applications. While the new templates are fully functional and usable out-of-the-box, Microsoft expects that people will tailor them to suit their own needs. And those looking for support on their customizations will find an appropriate channel when contacting Microsoft Customer Service and Support. Simpler modifications such as changing a master page, adding a new view or integrating new lists into the template are well within the scope of existing product support.
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