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Content and structure templates

This guide explains how to create content and structure and what you need to pay attention to.

Sub Site Collections

A sub site collection has the following properties which can be set:

Properties of a sub site collection

  • Template
    You need to provide a template in the form of “STS#0” which should be created. You don't need to know the internal names because you can select from a list with display names.
  • Language
    You need to provide a language in the form of “1033”.

    SharePoint 2010:

    There are no language packs officially released for RTM, but after release the language packs will be tested.

    SharePoint 2007:

    1033, English
    1030, Danish
    1031, German
    1035, Finnish
    1036, French 
    1040, Italian
    1043, Dutch
    1044, Norwegian 
    1046, Portuguese Brazilian
    1049, Russian
    1053, Swedish
    2070, Portuguese
    3082, Spanish

  • Check in
    You need to provide a value in the form of “True” or “False” if you are creating a publishing web and want to check in the default.aspx (welcome page).
  • Approve
    You need to provide a value in the form of “True” or “False” if you are creating a publishing web and want to approve the default.aspx (welcome page).
  • OwnerLogin1
    You need to provide a username in the form of “domain\login”.
  • OwnerName1
    You need to provide a username in the form of “username”.
  • OwnerMail1
    You need to provide a username in the form of “username@domain”.
  • OwnerLogin2
    Same as above.
  • OwnerName2
    Same as above.
  • OwnerMail2
    Same as above.
  • Additional values: Text, User, DateTime, RichHtml
    You can enter additional columns of the mentioned type using to fill content after the template has been created. You need to provide a fields internal name. The field has to be part of the pages library in form of a column.
    -Text: Some normal text like this one.
    -User: domain\loginname
    -DateTime: 04/12/2009 (this depends on the selected language and has to be in a language specific format)
    -RichHtml: <h1>Heading 1</h1><p>Content using html tags.</p>

Important: You need to provide at least a template, language, OwnerLogin1, OwnerName1 and OwnerMail1 to create a site collection.


Variations

The application doesn’t support programmatically creating variations because programmatically creating variations is not supported by SharePoint without using reflection. So you need to manually create variations using the SharePoint user interface:

  1. Create your content and structure
    Create your content and structure using the application like shown in this guide.
  2. Configure variations
    After the content and structure has been created use the SharePoint user interface to set the variation root and the variation labels.
  3. Create hierarchy
    Create the hierarchy. This might take a lot of time depending on the amount of content you have created. This process comes out-of-the-box with SharePoint and can’t be used or configured by the application.

Sites

A site has the following properties which can be set:

Properties of a site

  • Url
    You need to provide a short Url. This is the relative Url of the new site without any “/”. The complete Url is automatically created by the application depending on the Url provided by all parent sites. You first need to provide all parent site Urls before you can assign a short Url to a new site.
  • Template (predefined)
    You need to provide a template in the form of “STS#1” which should be created. You don't need to know the internal names because you can select from a list with display names.
  • Language You need to provide a language in the form of “1033”.

    SharePoint 2010:

    There are no language packs officially released for RTM, but after release the language packs will be tested.

    SharePoint 2007:

    1033, English
    1030, Danish
    1031, German
    1035, Finnish
    1036, French 
    1040, Italian
    1043, Dutch
    1044, Norwegian 
    1046, Portuguese Brazilian
    1049, Russian
    1053, Swedish
    2070, Portuguese
    3082, Spanish

  • Check in
    You need to provide a value in the form of “True” or “False” if you are creating a publishing web and want to check in the default.aspx (welcome page).
  • Approve
    You need to provide a value in the form of “True” or “False” if you are creating a publishing web and want to approve the default.aspx (welcome page).
  • Copies
    You can create the site more than once by providing a number between 0 and 500.
  • Additional values: Text, User, DateTime, RichHtml
    You can enter additional columns of the mentioned type using to fill content after the template has been created. You need to provide a fields internal name. The field has to be part of the pages library in form of a column.
    -Text: Some normal text like this one.
    -User: domain\loginname
    -DateTime: 04/12/2009 (this depends on the selected language and has to be in a language specific format)
    -RichHtml: <h1>Heading 1</h1><p>Content using html tags.</p>

Pages

A page has the following properties which can be set:

Properties of a page

  • Url (predefined)
    The Url is automatically provided by the site containing the page.
  • Template (predefined)
    You need to provide a template in the form of “Article page with body only” which should be created. You don't need to know the names because you can select from a list with display names.
  • ContentType (predefined)
    You need to provide a template in the form of “Article Page” which should be used to create the page. You don't need to know the names because you can select from a list with display names.
  • Check in
    You need to provide a value in the form of “True” or “False” if want to check in the page.
  • Approve
    You need to provide a value in the form of “True” or “False” if you want to approve the page.
  • Copies
    You can create the site more than once by providing a number between 0 and 500.
  • Additional values: Text, User, DateTime, RichHtml
    You can enter additional columns of the mentioned type using to fill content after the template has been created. You need to provide a fields internal name. The field has to be part of the pages library in form of a column.
    -Text: Some normal text like this one.
    -User: domain\loginname
    -DateTime: 04/12/2009 (this depends on the selected language and has to be in a language specific format)
    -RichHtml: <h1>Heading 1</h1><p>Content using html tags.</p>

Lists or document libraries

A list has the following properties which can be set:

Properties of a list or document library

  • Url (predefined)
    The Url is automatically provided by the application.
  • Template (predefined)
    You need to provide a template in the form of “Announcements” which should be created. You don't need to know the names because you can select from a list with display names.
  • Check in
    You need to provide a value in the form of “True” or “False” if you are creating a list allowing you to check in list items.
  • Approve
    You need to provide a value in the form of “True” or “False” if you are creating a list allowing you to approve list items
  • Copies
    You can create the site more than once by providing a number between 0 and 500.

Important: The application doesn’t support custom list templates deployed to SharePoint.


List items and documents

List items can be created or documents can be uploaded to list if the list type provides it.

Properties of a list item or document

  • File name
    If you provide a file name with an extension like .docx the applications looks in the attachments folder if the file can be found and uploads it to the library which needs to be of type e.g. document library.
    If you just provide a title without an extension a list item will be created in a list of type e.g. custom list or tasks.
  • Check in
    You need to provide a value in the form of “True” or “False” if you are creating a list allowing you to check in list items.
  • Approve
    You need to provide a value in the form of “True” or “False” if you are creating a list allowing you to approve list items
  • Copies
    You can create the site more than once by providing a number between 0 and 500.
  • Additional values: Text, User, DateTime, RichHtml
    You can enter additional columns of the mentioned type using to fill content after the template has been created. You need to provide a fields internal name. The field has to be part of the list or library in form of a column. 
    -Text: Some normal text like this one.
    -User: domain\loginname
    -DateTime: 04/12/2009 (this depends on the selected language and has to be in a language specific format)
    -RichHtml: <h1>Heading 1</h1><p>Content using html tags.</p>

Context menu

A right click on an element in the tree view opens a context menu with the following possibilities:

Context menu from tree view.

  • Add list item
    You can add list items to a list.
  • Expand
    Expands all sub nodes of the selected node.
  • Collapse
    Collapses all sub nodes of the selected node.
  • Count elements
    Counts all elements which are created inclusive the amount of copies selected locally or globally.
  • Copy
    Copies a node to clipboard.
  • Paste
    Paste a node from clipboard.
  • Delete
    An element is deleted.