SDN Magazine 99 Preview
On November the 21st
SDN-Magazine no. 99 will be released. I wrote an article for that release about Portal Technology. It discusses some advantages- and disadvantages from Microsoft SharePoint v.s. DotNetNuke. The Goal of this article is helping people make a better choice of using SharePoint or DotNetNuke. For developers there is a part describing WebPart development (SharePoint) v.s. Module development (DNN). A main difference between SharePoint and DotNetNuke is that SharePoint can use several contentdatabases (e.g. for each SiteCollection). DotNetNuke contains only one instance database. DNN has out of the box multi language support. SharePoint is verry strong in Office integration. This and more could be read in my article: Portaltechnology - SharePoint or DotNetNuke?
Trial Period Evaluation Period for this product has expired
Microsoft has published a fix for this problem in SharePoint 2007, available at http://download.microsoft.com/download/b/1/a/b1a6dceb-92a3-4808-8dac-b4e40c90ce00/StandaloneDCWorkaround.msi.
IISReset and the problem is fixed.
FREE World Clock and Weather Web Part
Bamboo Solutions offer a free World Clock & Weather WebPart. This WebPart allows users to display local time and weather for selected major cities around the globe.
Google Maps in Content Editor WebPart
You can use Google Maps on your website by registering for an API Key on the Google Maps API Site. After getting the API key you can use Google Maps by inserting a Javascript to you site. The problem is that most code examples use the <body onload> Javascript. By using the "Body Onload" event it is not possible to make Google Maps working using the Content Editor WebPart. After changing the javascript a little bit it is possible to simply past the Javascript in the SharePoint Content Editor WebPart. In this case you can use Google Maps in a few minutes. Note that the next code is not only useful for SharePoint but also for example BlogEngine.NET. Using this script needs no modifications in a masterpage 
<script src="http://maps.google.com/maps?file=api&v=1&key=YOURKEY" type="text/javascript"></script>
<div id="map" style="width: 400px;height:300px"></div>
<script type="text/javascript">
var map = new GMap(document.getElementById("map"));
map.addControl(new GLargeMapControl());
map.addControl(new GMapTypeControl());
map.setCenter(new GLatLng( 51.03275840574761, 5.81451416015625), 9);
map.setMapType(G_NORMAL_MAP);
// You can use your favourite Map properties (like markers)
</script>
[/code]
Sample output:
Google Maps
MOSS 2007 products comparison
I got a lot of questions about differences between SharePoint 2003 and SharePoint 2007. In the Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 products comparison (document) you can find a complete breakdown of the features and a comparison between different server editions.
You can find the document at the Microsoft Office site.
Another thing you really need on the wall in your development office are the Developer Posters for the Microsoft Office 2007 System. They are also very clear to explain differences between the different Office Server Products (e.g. WSS3.0 and MOSS 2007). Download the posters from the Microsoft site.
For the Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) supporters there is also an Interactive Developer Map for Microsoft Office which is installable via ClickOnce.
Making DIV a Link - Javascript Vs CSS
If you want to turn a complete <div> into an hyperlink you have to write CSS classes voor the "a" and the "a:hover" class for that specific div. For example:
.mydiv a {
display:block;
width:100%;
height:100%;
text-decoration:none;
}
You can also reach this goal by using Javascript. This is faster but remember some people disable Javascript in the browser. In that case people won't see the div link.
<div class="mydiv" onclick="location.href='http://www.sharepointdevelopment.nl;" style="cursor:pointer;"> </div>
Microsoft Pre-release Software Visual Studio 2010 and .NET Framework 4.0 Community Technology Preview
Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 and the .NET Framework 4.0 are the next generation development tools and platform for Windows Vista, the 2007 Office System, and the Web. You can download them from the
Microsoft Site.
Embrace the new .NET Logo
On the MOSSY Blog you can read about the new .NET-logo which stand for: consistency, robustness and great user experiences.
Announcing Service Pack 2 for the 2007 Microsoft Office System
As you can read on the
Microsoft SharePoint Team Blog Service Pack 2 (SP2) for the 2007 Microsoft Office system is expected to be released between February and April of 2009. Improvements to read-only content databases and index rebuild timer jobs in Windows SharePoint Services 3. Improvements to read-only content databases and index rebuild timer jobs in Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 are some major improvements.
Javascript Logic based on Url
It could be necessary to add some Javascript Logic in your masterpage. For example you could load an image dynamically based on the url. The advantage is you don't have to build N masterpages but also have the freedom to use two (or more) different images for a masterpage.
<script language="javascript" type="text/javascript">
var query = document.location.href;
if(query.indexOf("/en/") == -1 ) //if url not contains an index for "/en/" then
{
// <img src image header 1
}
else // it contains "/en/"
{
// <img src image header 2
}
</script>
[/code]
Note: You can also use this logic for other decissions based on the Url String (other than switching images).