A Brief History of the Microsoft BI Platform (DOCX)Over the past few years Microsoft has shifted its business intelligence (BI) strategy to focus providing applications, tools and service that embrace the tenants of self-service BI (SSBI). To this end, Microsoft has introduced a new tabular model for data analysis which has many benefits over the older multidimensional model. Microsoft has complimented the new tabular model with a new set of SSBI tools in Microsoft Excel 2013 which include Power Query, PowerPivot, Power View and Power Map. These new tools combined with Excel Services provides a fast and effective way to complete a BI project with shared dashboards and reports in an on-premises environment running SharePoint Server 2013. In the year 2015, Microsoft is now investing in a cloud-based BI strategy in the Office 365 environment which is known as Power BI. Power BI provides a robust infrastructure which can extract data from just about anywhere on the Internet and load it into a data cache in the Office 365 cloud where it can be used for data analysis and reporting. Microsoft has positioned Excel 2013 as the high-end analysis tool for Power BI because it provides powerful SSBI tools such as Power Query, PowerPivot, Power View and Power Map. However, Power BI also provides a wide reach strategy based on pure HTML5 which makes it possible to create BI dashboards and reports that target any type of browser as well as mobile devices including iPhones, iPads, Android phones and Windows phones.

A Brief History of the Microsoft BI Platform (PDF)Over the past few years Microsoft has shifted its business intelligence (BI) strategy to focus providing applications, tools and service that embrace the tenants of self-service BI (SSBI). To this end, Microsoft has introduced a new tabular model for data analysis which has many benefits over the older multidimensional model. Microsoft has complimented the new tabular model with a new set of SSBI tools in Microsoft Excel 2013 which include Power Query, PowerPivot, Power View and Power Map. These new tools combined with Excel Services provides a fast and effective way to complete a BI project with shared dashboards and reports in an on-premises environment running SharePoint Server 2013. In the year 2015, Microsoft is now investing in a cloud-based BI strategy in the Office 365 environment which is known as Power BI. Power BI provides a robust infrastructure which can extract data from just about anywhere on the Internet and load it into a data cache in the Office 365 cloud where it can be used for data analysis and reporting. Microsoft has positioned Excel 2013 as the high-end analysis tool for Power BI because it provides powerful SSBI tools such as Power Query, PowerPivot, Power View and Power Map. However, Power BI also provides a wide reach strategy based on pure HTML5 which makes it possible to create BI dashboards and reports that target any type of browser as well as mobile devices including iPhones, iPads, Android phones and Windows phones.

SharePoint Server 2013 Virtual Machine Setup Guide (v3.0)

The very best SharePoint Server 2013 RTM Virtual Machine Setup Guide available. A step-by-step guide complete with links to trial versions of all the software needed to create a SharePoint Server 2013 VM for development, testing or to complete the labs associated with Critical Path Training’s technical classes.

UPDATES:

3/1/2014: (v2.0) Now includes the latest version of Visual Studio, new updated PowerShell scripts and enhanced error reporting to troubleshoot issues when building the VM.

5/28/2014: (v2.1) VM Setup Guide updated to include new software releases by Microsoft.

• Update the OS from Windows Server 2012 to Windows Server 2012 R2
• Update SharePoint Server 2013 install/configuration instructions to use SP1.
• Update Visual Studio 2013 install to get the latest version (March 2014) of the Office/SharePoint dev tools
• Update Office 2013 Pro install to add SP1
• Update the SharePoint Designer 2013 install to add SP1

7/2/2014: (v2.1.1) Miscellaneous bug fixes.

7/15/2014: (v3.0) MAJOR RELEASE. Version 3.0 will step you through configuring and testing each and every SharePoint BI-integration feature. This includes step-by-step directions for configuring Excel Services, PowerPivot for SharePoint, SQL Reporting Services, PowerView for SharePoint, PerformancePoint Services, Visio Services and, last but not least, Access Services. The guide will also step you through setting up Microsoft’s infamous AdventureWorks database in SQL Server and building a multidimensional cube with SQL Server Analysis Services. By install this sample data, you can immediately begin to kick the tires on all the new data analysis features and reporting tools.

Consuming the SharePoint 2013 REST Interface via WCF Data ServicesAs of the April 2013 CU for SharePoint 2013, the $metadata endpoint is now available. This whitepaper discusses consuming this REST API using the WCF Data Services library, highlighting similarities and differences with other approaches for consuming REST services as well as other approaches for consuming SharePoint data.

CPT Admin Class SharePoint Server 2013 Setup Guide (v1.1)NOTE: This VM set-up guide is for students taking a Critical Path Training IT Pro/admin class. This is a modified version of our SharePoint 2013 VM Setup Guide. If you are not taking our SharePoint 2013 IT Pro class, you want to download the SharePoint Server 2013 Virtual Machine Setup Guide (v1.0).

The SharePoint Server 2013 Farm Build-out scripts (v1.0)This zip file contains a set of Windows PowerShell scripts and accompanying documentation that can by used to automate the creation and configuration of a SharePoint Server 2013 farm in an on-premises environment. These scripts should be used to create the virtual machines (VMs) that students work on to complete lab exercises in SharePoint 2013 courses created by Critical Path Training.

Inside Microsoft SharePoint 2010 Sneak PreviewGet an early look at the upcoming Inside Microsoft SharePoint 2010 book by Ted Pattison, Andrew Connell and Scot Hillier from Microsoft Press®. Learn what’s new with the SharePoint developer platform from the industry’s leading experts on SharePoint Foundation 2010 and SharePoint Server 2010. This special excerpt provides insightful information for professional developers who are already experienced with SharePoint Server 2007, as well as .NET developers just beginning with the SharePoint development platform.

SharePoint Server 2010 RTM Virtual Machine Setup Guide (v1.8)The very best SharePoint Server 2010 RTM Virtual Machine Setup Guide available. A step-by-step guide complete with links to trial versions of all the software needed to create a SharePoint Server 2010 VM for development, testing or to complete the labs associated with Critical Path Training’s technical classes.

SharePoint 2010 Guidance from the Patterns & Practices GroupRecently the Patterns & Practices (P&P) group at Microsoft announced their completion and public availability of the SharePoint 2010 Guidance (SPG). The SPG provides technical details on key areas of SharePoint 2010 app development and contains a written guide (as a compiled CHM help file), reference implementations with source code and fully documented in the CHM as well as a library of reusable code. In this article I explain what the SPG is and why it is import to developers.

Troubleshooting SharePoint SearchMatthew McDermott presents two approaches he uses to troubleshoot specific search errors. The first is a tool for troubleshooting iFilters the second for watching the actual crawl activity.

Understanding Field Controls and Web Parts in Publishing sitesAndrew Connell explains the details of Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 field controls and Web Parts and how they differ, and best practices for when to use each type of control.

SharePoint Designer – Friend or Foe?As SharePoint sites continue to spread like wildfire across the corporate landscape, many companies are contemplating when and where to use the SharePoint Designer (SPD) to apply their corporate branding and to utilize SPD productivity features such as creating and formatting DataView Web Parts. While the SPD makes performing customization work quick and easy, Ted Pattison writes there are some things you should always keep in mind.

Finding Developer Help for SharePoint Products and TechnologiesAndrew Connell helps you discover where to find the SDKs, peer-to-peer forums, MSDN developer centers, and Microsoft TechNet resources you need as you develop with Microsoft SharePoint Products and Technologies.

Creating Custom SharePoint ThemesWhen it comes to branding in SharePoint, few things are as important as the effective use of Cascading Style Sheets (CSS). This is because CSS is the primary mechanism that Microsoft gives us to override their out of the box look and feel. One excellent way to use CSS to style SharePoint is to use a theme. SharePoint themes take advantage of the CSS concept of “cascading”. The basic idea is that styles that are loaded last on a page typically override styles of the same specificity that were loaded earlier on the page. SharePoint themes are mostly made up of CSS that is overriding already defined out‐of‐the box SharePoint branding. That familiar light blue and white UI can be changed to look radically different just by creating a custom SharePoint theme and applying it to a site.

Understanding the Required Accounts Needed to Install & Config a SharePoint FarmTo say installing SharePoint properly can be overwhelming can be an understatement. Among the many challenges is choosing the correct install accounts. While some administrator may choose to just plug in one “super user” account for everything in the name of convenience this is less than ideal. Also, unknown to many administrators even choosing the proper account to run the install and configuration wizard with initially is very important. In this article we will cover all of the various accounts required to build your farm, what levels of access you need to configure them with, what access SharePoint will assign to them for you, and where you might get away with some reuse.

CPT Sample Database for BI projectsThis download consists of a ZIP archive named CPT_BI_SAMPLE_DATA.zip which contains the resources and setup instructions that are required to create the sample data that we use in the Critical Path Training course titled SBI2013: Building BI Solutions using Excel and SharePoint 2013. This download provides setup instructions to create the WingtipSales database in SQL Server 2012 R2 and it also explains how to import the WingtipSales data into the data model inside a new Excel 2013 workbook. You will find that this sample data provides a much better learning experience when compared to the outdated and overly-complicated AdventureWorks databases that is used in most of Microsoft’s BI examples. This download additionally contains an example of an Excel workbook named WingtipSalesModel_Final.xslx which contains a data model that has already been designed with calculated columns, calculated fields, KPIs and dimensional hierarchies which can provide you with a great starting point if you are beginning to work with Power View reports. Finally, the download contains two completed SQL Server Data Tools projects named WingtipSalesModelMD and WingtipSalesModelTabular which demonstrate how to create SQL Server Analysis Server databases using both the older, classic multidimensional model based on cubes as well as the newer tabular model based on the Business Intelligence Schematic Model (BISM). If you are sick and tired of working with Adventure Works database samples, you will absolutely love working with the Wingtip sales sample data.

Ted’s #SPC14 App Security SamplesSamples from Ted Pattison's Deep dive: SharePoint and Office App Security Model (OAuth & S2S) session at #SPC14. (#SPC409)

Ted’s #SPC14 REST SamplesSamples from Ted's SharePoint App best practices using OData and the SharePoint REST API presentation at SPC14. (#SPC323)

AC’s SPSite Create ScriptSimple utility script AC uses to create site collections.

The Csom Rest Party PackThis zip archive contains four sample SharePoint apps that are discussed in Ted Pattison’s blog post titled “SharePoint app code calls into SharePoint using CSOM and REST calls”.

CPT’s SharePoint 2013 Script LibraryCollection of scripts for SharePoint 2013.

AC’s SharePoint 2010 Sample MetaNav for Publishing SitesAndrew Connell’s sample metadata based navigation for SharePoint 2010. Check this series for more info:http://www.andrewconnell.com/archive/2012/07/30/sharepoint-2010-metadata-based-navigation-in-publishing-sites-series-overview.aspx

CPT’s Office365/SharePoint Online Claims Authentication Helper LibrarySee this blog post for more information on this library: http://www.andrewconnell.com/archive/2012/01/11/o365spo-azure-authz-critical-path-trainings-office365.aspx

My First jQuery ProjectA demo SharePoint project created with Visual Studio 2010 which shows how to use a Feature and a Module to deploy the core jQuery library as well as the jQuery UI library and a custom jQuery theme within the scope of a site collection.

AC’s SharePoint+Silverlight+MVVM Sample Product BrowserA sample Silverlight 4 application I used to demonstrate developing an app with MVVM Light Toolkit and SharePoint with REST and CSOM. I’ve used it in various presentations as the subject in a few blog posts.

Ted’s MSDN Claim Provider SampleThis code sample is associated with the MSDN article Ted Pattison wrote on “Creating Custom Claims Providers in SharePoint 2010″ that you can find on MSDN.

AC’s DevExpress Webinar DemosSamples from my webinars (more info here: http://tinyurl.com/4vn2nch).

SharePoint 2010 Custom Document SetThis sample goes along with the MSDN Visual How To that demonstrates how to create a document set declaratively.

SharePoint 2010 Custom Service ApplicationThis sample goes along with the MSDN Visual How To (http://bit.ly/hYlsbj) that demonstrates how to create a custom service application.

AC’s MVVM CodeRush TemplatesCode expansion templates for Visual Studio 2010 & DevExpress’ CodeRush for Silverlight devleopers.

Adventure Works Travel – Custom Content DB (used in a sample SP2007 WCM to SP2010 WCM Upgrade)The ZIP linked in the attached document contains a SharePoint 2007 SP2 content database containing the customized Adventure Works Travel sample SharePoint 2007 Web Content Management site. This is intended to be used in following the upgrade to SharePoint 2010 steps oulined in this article: http://bit.ly/cEI42j

AC’s SharePoint 2010 Site Collection Keep Alive Job Utility (v1.1 – Updated June 7, 2010)Automatically issues an HTTP/HTTPS request to specified pages within a site collection. More details here:http://bit.ly/bes6Ot. Update posted June 7, 2010 (v1.1)… details here: http://bit.ly/92HgA2.

AC’s SharePoint 2010 Client Object Model DemosThere are three demos in this ZIP and a single WSP. Take the WSP and add it to a SharePoint 2010 site collection’s Solution Gallery, activate the solution and create a new subsite “ClientOM” using the template in the solution. This creates a Team Site with two special lists filled with data: Products and Product Categories. There are three demos in the ZIP. Each demo implements a Product Browser using the different client object models: .NET ClientOM (actually WPF), Silverlight & ECMAScript.

SharePoint 2010 Publishing Site Silverlight 3 Custom Field Type and ControlThis sample goes along with the MSDN white paper (http://bit.ly/dkzGy1) that demonstrates how to build a Silverlight 3 field type/control for use in a SharePoint 2010 Publishing Site.

SharePoint Conference 2009 – Custom Service ApplicationSample service application from Andrew Connell’s session at the SharePoint Conference 2009 (SPC406)

Auditing DemoThis zip archive contains a sample project created in Visual Studio which demonstrates how to create a custom auditing solution for WSS. This sample is the basis of Ted Pattison’s September 2008 Office Space column for MSDN Magazine.

Litware BrandingThis zip archive contains a sample project demonstrating an end-to-end SharePoint branding solution using a Visual Studio project with three features, a custom HttpModule and a custom UI for branding administration.

CAML_IntelliSense for Visual Studio 2005 & 2008Support for adding SharePoint CAML IntelliSense to Visual Studio 2005 Visual Studio 2008. This zip file contains an XML file named sharepoint_catalog.xml and a batch file named install.bat which copies to the correct XML schema directories for versions of Visual Studio.

Sharepoint DebuggerA sample Visual Studio 2005 project which shows how to feature scoped to the Web Application level which uses the WSS object model to update the web.config file back and forth between debug mode setting and standard settings.

Custom Application PagesA sample Visual Studio 2005 project which shows how to develop custom application pages for a WSS 3.0 solution. The project also includes a feature to add menu items to the Site Settings menu to allow for navigation to these custom application pages. The example also shows how to wrap all deployable components inside a solution package for deployment.

Custom Site pagesA sample Visual Studio 2005 project including a feature which provisions site pages from page templates. This sample also shows how to design custom Web Part Pages and how to automatically populate them with Web Parts.

Sample demonstrating Feature staplingSample WSS/MOSS Feature wrapped up in Visual Studio project to demonstrate Feature stapling to GLOBAL site definition.

Document ManagerA sample Visual Studio 2005 project which demonstrates the use of CAML and programming techniques of how to provision document libraries and configure them with custom templates. It also includes examples of generating customer letters with serer-side code using the Office Open XML File Formats.

WSS Object Model ExplorationA sample Visual Studio 2005 project for Ted Pattison’s Tech Ed session on WSS obbject model exploration. I demonstrates all kinds of ways to use the WSS OM that were not possible in WSS 2.0.

Litware Web PartsA sample Visual Studio 2005 project with Web Parts for WSS 3.0. The project includes a feature for provisioning .webpart files into the Web Part gallery and a WSS 3.0 solution package for deploying Web Parts into a production environment.

SharePoint Site BrowserA utility for examines all the sites in the farm written for WSS 2.0 which still works with WSS 3.0.

Advanced Query Design with Power BI Desktop

5 Minutes To WOW with SharePoint SearchCheck out our SharePoint courses and start learning the skills to Wow your team.

GSA2016: Great SharePoint Adventure 2016This 5-day course explores the development opportunities available with SharePoint On-premises using either SharePoint Server 2016 and SharePoint Server 2013. Students will learn about the tradeoffs of developing SharePoint full trust solutions versus SharePoint add-ins (aka SharePoint apps). This course teaches students how to develop SharePoint-hosted add-ins using JavaScript, jQuery and the Angular-JS framework and also teaches students how to develop provider-hosted SharePoint add-ins using server-side C# and the ASP.NET MVC framework. The course also reinforces recognized best practices within the world-wide SharePoint developer community such as using JavaScript Injection and Remote Provisioning. The course provides students with a wealth of hands-on lab exercises using Visual Studio 2015 to reinforce the concepts and techniques discussed during lectures. Students may choose to work through lab exercises using either SharePoint Server 2016 or SharePoint Server 2013. Students will also learn the low level details of how security and authentication work when developing and deploying provider-hosted add-ins within a private local area network. Along the way, students will learn how to use important Microsoft frameworks such as the Entity Framework for creating custom databases and Web API 2 for creating custom web services. The last two days of this class examine essential SharePoint Server service applications which provide additional development opportunities working with Business Connectivity Services, the Secure Store Service, the SharePoint Search service, the Managed Metadata Service and SharePoint Workflow.

Managing Office 365 Identities and Services (select modules)Recordings for module 8 (Configuring SharePoint Online) and module 12 (Monitoring Office 365) from the class: Managing Office 365 Identities and Services.

DSU365: Office 365 Developer Skills UpdateIt's been over three years now since Microsoft released SharePoint 2013 and introduced the SharePoint app model back in October of 2012. At Critical Path Training, we've spent the last three years teaching professional developers how develop SharePoint apps (aka SharePoint add-ins) using the SharePoint REST API and the Client-side Object Model (CSOM). However, the developer landscape for SharePoint On-premises, SharePoint Online and Office 365 continues to evolve at a rapid pace and the developer community is responding by establishing new best practices and embracing new technologies and developer frameworks. At Critical Path Training, we know that we only succeed when our students succeed. To that end, we have designed a free, one-day training classes titled Office 365 Developer Skills Update (DSU365) to provide a continuing education path for students who already taken one of our SharePoint 2013 development classes. If you attend Office 365 Developer Skills Update, you will learn about new technologies and development techniques that have become mainstream within the SharePoint and Office 365 development community over the last 18 months. In addition to the video, Office 365 MVP Ted Pattison has also posted the slide decks, code samples and lab exercises on GitHub.

PBI365: Power BI BootcampPower BI Bootcamp is fast-paced 3-day training course designed to get students up to speed on building and deploying custom analytics and reporting solutions using Microsoft’s rapidly evolving Power BI platform. Students will work through in-depth, hands-on lab exercises to reinforce the benefits of using a project-based approach for creating custom analytics solutions using Power BI Desktop. The course also teaches students about team-based development with group workspaces as well as how to move a Power BI project and its assets from a design/development workspace into production workspace in the Office 365 environment. Students will learn what can be accomplished with the Power BI service using just a browser as well as which types of project work must be completed using Power BI Desktop. Students will learn how to use Power Query to import and transform data as it loads into a project’s data model. The course also teaches students how to use Power Pivot and the DAX programming language to extend the data model to support rich data analytics and reporting. Students will additionally learn how to create reports and dashboards as well as how to deploy a project using dashboard sharing and using organizational content packs. Along the way, students will learn how to create and manage custom Power BI solutions which analyze, report on and refresh data extracted from SharePoint lists and SQL server databases in an on-premises environment. Students will also learn how to create reports and dashboards which target mobile devices. The course concludes by examining how to integrate the Power BI platform together with Excel 2016 and Excel Online.

BBS365: Building Business Solutions with Office 365 and SharePoint OnlineThis 3-day course will teach you how to build powerful SharePoint business solutions without having to engage in any custom development. You will be amazed exactly how far you can take things with Office 365 and SharePoint Online just using the out-of-the-box features and functionality. This course has been specifically designed for business users using SharePoint Online in the Office 365 environment. You will complete all lab exercises for this course using the browser and SharePoint Designer 2013.
 
 

GOA365: The Great Office 365 AdventureIt's no secret that Microsoft has been shifting its development strategy away from the SharePoint on-premises environment to focus on the Office 365 environment and Windows Azure. Microsoft introduced the SharePoint add-in model (formerly known as the SharePoint app model) with the release of SharePoint 2013. Then in October of 2014 Microsoft announced a new and distinct development platform for Office 365 based on Azure Active Directory and the Office 365 APIs. As a consequence, many professional developers with SharePoint development experience are beginning to feel that their skillsets have become outdated and need an extreme makeover to catch up and keep pace with the constantly-evolving Office 365 platform.

SBU2013: SharePoint 2013 for Business UsersThis course is for anyone who has little to no experience with SharePoint from an end user perspective. The lectures and lab exercises in this course will teach students how to become productive with SharePoint 2013 whether they will be working in private SharePoint 2013 environment on-premises or in the SharePoint Online environment provided by Office 365. The course begins with a browser-based tour which teaches students how to get around in a SharePoint 2013 Team site. Students will learn about the various SharePoint 2013 list types which can be used to create lists which track business data such as announcements, contacts, calendar events, links and tasks. Students will also learn how to configure a SharePoint lists by adding columns and custom validation rules as well as how to import data into SharePoint 2013 by creating a list from an Excel workbook. This course will teach students how to create document libraries and configure them to support popular features in SharePoint 2013 such as alerts, versioning, required document checkout and offline access to documents. However, the course goes beyond the basics to explain why it's essential to use industry-accepted practices for managing large numbers of documents in a fashion that is easier to maintain and easier to navigate. Students will learn to add content to SharePoint sites by creating and editing web part pages and wiki pages. This course also covers how to use Microsoft InfoPath 2013 as a tool for creating user input forms that are easy to integrate with SharePoint lists and document libraries. The final module of the course discusses the social networking features in SharePoint 2013 where students will learn how to make use of their My Sites to better interact with other SharePoint users within the organization.    

Cloud-based Identity for ApplicationsPresented by Paul Schaeflein, Office 365 MVP Is your organization moving to cloud-hosted services? Do you need to extend or integrate code with those services? If so, then you will need to understand how those services implement authentication and authorization. And your users will want you to do the same, since they undoubtedly want to us3e the same credentials. Fortunately, there are SDK/libraries/protocols available to accomplish this task, but it can be very complicated. And, the identity landscape for cloud-based applications is rapidly evolving and very confusing. How does AAD, OWIN, ADAL and ASP.Net Identity work together? Or do they work together at all? This webinar will cover the identity concepts and techniques available for using Microsoft’s Azure Active Directory in your application.    

Using TypeScript in a SharePoint 2013 AppPresented by Scot Hillier, Office 365 MVP TypeScript, it is a typed superset of JavaScript that compiles to pure JavaScript. The value of TypeScript is that it allows enterprise developers to create better JavaScript-intensive applications by introducing variable typing, classes, interfaces, and modules. TypeScript has been around for several years now trying to gain traction in the web development community with limited success. When the Angular team announced that their 2.0 version would be built on TypeScript, however, TypeScript’s profile jumped markedly. In this session, you’ll see how to use TypeScript in a SharePoint app. You’ll learn to set up TypeScript support, compile, and publish libraries. Along the way, you’ll also learn the basics of types, modules, class, and interfaces that make up the heart of TypeScript. Attendees will exit ready to get started using TypeScript in SharePoint apps.

Working with PowerPivot in Excel 2013Presented by Ted Pattison Excel 2013 includes PowerPivot which is a self-service BI tool for working with the data model inside an Excel workbook. This seminar teaches you how to use PowerPivot to create and design a data model which provides a solid foundation in a BI project for analysis and reporting. You will learn how to use Data Access Expression language (DAX) to write expressions to create calculated columns, calculated fields and KPIs. The seminar will also explain the purpose of dimensional hierarchies and show you how to create one inside a table in the data model. A zip file containing the slide deck and sample workbook is also available in the Member's section.

Self-service BI with SharePoint Server 2013 On-premisesPresented by Ted Pattison Once you have learned how to use all the fancy new self-service BI tools inside Excel 2013, the next step is to publish your BI dashboards and reports into a SharePoint site where it can be shared with other users. This seminar explains the architectural aspects of SharePoint 2013 and Excel Services which provide support for publishing an Excel workbook with a data model. You will learn about the extra value provided by PowerPivot for SharePoint and the PowerPivot Gallery. The seminar will also explain how SharePoint 2013 and Excel Services provide the ability to create Power View reports in the browser and it will discuss how this is different from working with the Power View add-in inside Excel 2013. The slide deck and sample workbook are also available in the Member's section.  

Managing Office 365 with PowerShellPresented by Matthew McDermott Office 365 has a comprehensive user interface to support your needs as an administrator, but what about repetitive tasks? In this session we’ll review how to setup and get connected to Office 365 so that you can use PowerShell to perform routine administrative tasks in Office 365. Once you understand the basics well address common configuration, user management, governance configuration and reporting scenarios that are simplified using PowerShell. We’ll cover some advanced topics as well like using REST and the Client Side Object Model to fill the gaps when the cmdlets fall short. If you are looking for an introduction to remote Office 365 administration this is your session.

Responsive Design and Device ChannelsThis module discusses how to implement a responsive design to optimize a SharePoint site for access by mobile devices as well as how a responsive design can be complimented through the use of device channels. Students will learn about the motivation, concepts and terminology involved with a responsive design and will also learn how to implement a responsive design using pure HTML, CSS, JavaScript and media queries. After introducing responsive design, the module then explains how device channels can be used as a tool to compliment or replace a responsive design created with pure HTML approach. The module concludes by explaining how page layouts can created which target specific device channels when outputting HTML, CSS and JavaScript which can add a powerful dimension when targeting modern types of devices such as tablets and mobile devices.

• Introduction to Responsive Design
• Understanding Media Queries
• Device Channel Configuration for Mobile
• Customizing Page Layouts with Device Channels

Perfect-World JavaScript Development in SharePoint 2013 and Office 365Presented by Dave Mann I don’t know about you, but I’m a little fed up with “real world” conference sessions. As if we somehow shouldn’t strive for perfection just because we’re in the “real world.” It seems like a cop-out; like we should settle for something less. This seminar will draw a line in the sand and say “not true!” We can write better (dare I say “perfect”?) code, to solve business problems we face every day. We’ll look at real problems and present real solutions that don’t settle for second-rate status. We’ll look at JavaScript as a first-class language and see how it can enhance our solutions and deliver the experience our end users are clamoring for.

Developing Office 365 Applications using the Office 365 APIsPresented by Ted Pattison It seems like only yesterday that Microsoft began advising SharePoint developers to move away from the classic Full Trust Solution model and to adopt the new SharePoint app model. Now Microsoft has recently announced an entirely new development platform based Office 365 applications and the Office 365 APIs which is separate and distinct from the SharePoint app model. The purpose of this webinar is to introduce you to the fundamental concepts and tools of Office 365 application development. The webinar will also compare and contrast Office 365 applications to SharePoint apps in terms of functionality and the types of applications that you can build. Along the way, you will learn how to implement an Office 365 application to authenticate against Azure Active Directory using OAuth2, OpenID Connect and the OWIN framework.

BBS2013: Building Business Solutions with SharePoint Designer in SharePoint 2013This 4-day course will teach you how to build powerful SharePoint 2013 business solutions without having to engage in any custom development. You will be amazed exactly how far you can take things with SharePoint 2013 just using the out-of-the-box features and functionality. This course has been specifically designed for business users using SharePoint 2013 in either the Office 365 environment or in an on-premises environment. You will complete all lab exercises for this course using the browser and SharePoint Designer 2013.    

Great SharePoint Adventure 2013 Workflow ModuleSharePoint 2013 dramatically changes the workflow architecture in the latest release. Workflow is now handled by Workflow Managers, both in on-premises and hosted deployments. In this module students will learn how to create custom workflows using SharePoint Designer 2013 and Visual Studio 2012 as well as some of the new capabilities introduced in SharePoint 2013 workflows: dynamic values, stages and remote web service calls.

Developing BI Solutions using SQL Server, SharePoint and ExcelThe current landscape of Microsoft’s Business Intelligence platform is complicated. Microsoft products such as Microsoft Excel and SQL Server Analysis Services have supported BI solutions based on the traditional multidimensional model for over a decade. However, the landscape for designing and implementing Business Intelligence solutions has shifted because Microsoft has redirected its high-level BI strategy to focus on the newer tabular model and its inherent self-service BI capabilities. Developing BI Solutions using SQL Server, SharePoint and Excel provides a thorough and intensive examination of Microsoft’s BI platform from the perspective of the BI developer and the system architect. You will learn how BI features work starting from the backend in SQL Server and SQL Server Analysis Services to the middle tier in SharePoint 2013 and Excel Services to the client tier in Excel 2013. You will find that the content and topics covered in this workshop are more comprehensive, more in-depth and more update-to-date than any other workshop or resources you can find which focuses on Microsoft's BI platform.

Working with Power Query in Excel 2013Have you heard about Power Query? It’s Microsoft’s new self-service BI tool which ETL (extract-transform-load) functionality to prepare datasets for analysis and reporting. This seminar will show you how to use Power Query to create, manage and load queries within an Excel workbook. You will also learn a few tricks how to use powerful data transformation operations such as merge, append, aggregate, transpose and pivot. Download the sample files used in the demos.

Getting Started with Self-Service BI using Excel 2013Have you started using all the cool, new self-service BI features in Excel 2013? This seminar will introduce you to the new data model support in Excel 2013 and get you up and running with the four self-service BI add-ins for Excel 2013 which includes Power Query, PowerPivot, Power View and Power Map. After examining how to create a BI project within the scope of an Excel workbook file, the seminar will then discuss how to use Excel 2013 together with SharePoint Server 2013, Excel Services and PowerPivot for SharePoint to publish BI dashboards and Power View reports which are accessible to other users through the browser.

SSA2013: SharePoint 2013 for Site AdministratorsThis class is designed for site administrators and site collection owners who need to learn the ins and outs of managing sites and site content in a SharePoint 2013 environment. The course begins by examining the responsibilities of a SharePoint site administrator where students will learn how to manage and configure site collections and the sites that they contain. The course also teaches students how to design lists and document libraries using advanced techniques involving the use of custom site columns and content types. Students will learn how to configure security in a SharePoint site collection by creating security groups and managing site membership. Students will also learn how to configure permissions to provide authorized access to sites, lists and document libraries. This course will also teach students how to work with advanced SharePoint 2013 features such as publishing, search and workflows. Students will learn to work with publishing sites and publishing features which include working with publishing pages, master pages and page layouts. Students will also learn how to configure SharePoint search settings as well as how to take advantage of the workflow support provided by SharePoint 2013.    

SEU2013: SharePoint 2013 for End UsersThis course is for anyone who has little to no experience with SharePoint from an end user perspective. It is a combination of our SBU2013: SharePoint 2013 for Business Users and SSA2013: SharePoint 2013 for Site Administrators classes. The lectures and lab exercises in this course will teach students how to become productive with SharePoint 2013 whether they will be working in private SharePoint 2013 environment on-premises or in the SharePoint Online environment provided by Office 365. More  

INFUSION-WF: Office 365 & SharePoint Deep Dive into Developing Custom WorkflowsWorkflow changed quite a bit in the SharePoint 2013 release from previous versions of SharePoint. The new workflow platform is implemented with a new product called Workflow Manager 1.0. In this seminar you will learn all the fundamentals for creating custom workflows in SharePoint 2013 using Workflow Manager 1.0 and Visual Studio 2013. After a fundamentals overview, we will move on to some advanced topics such as debugging of the workflows you are creating as well as how to perform common tasks in today’s business world. This includes learning how to create custom forms, leverage the new Workflow Services client APIs and how to create custom actions and activities for Visual Studio and SharePoint Designer authored workflows. Finally, we will move onto working with web services in your custom workflows. This capability can be considered one of the biggest improvements to the platform from previous versions of SharePoint. The ability to call custom web services opens your workflows up to unlimited options. To that effect, in this seminar you will learn how to read and write to anonymous web services and how to authenticate and interact with the SharePoint 2013 REST API when the provided activities don’t provide the necessary tools to complete the task. Finally you will also learn how to communicate with secured web services including third party OAuth secured services and how to deploy, and interact, with your own custom secured web services.

SBC2013: SharePoint Brand Camp 2013SharePoint Brand Camp 2013 is an intensive 4-day course for web designers and advanced SharePoint users that need to learn SharePoint-specific techniques to design web pages and brand websites in a SharePoint 2013 environment. You will also learn how to create and design custom master pages that work in Publishing sites as well as in Team sites. You will learn how to override and extend the core CSS styles that give SharePoint 2013 sites their standard look and feel. You will also learn how to customize the look and feel of publishing pages by creating custom page layouts.    

SBI2013: Building BI Solutions using Excel and SharePoint 2013Building BI Solutions with Excel and SharePoint 2013 is an intensive 3-day course for business analysts, expert Excel users and BI developers that want to learn about the fundamental concepts and tools used to create business solutions using the Business Intelligence (BI) features of Microsoft Excel 2013 and SharePoint Server 2013.    

SSC2013: SharePoint 2013 Administrator’s Survival CampThis intensive 5-day course has been designed to teach experienced IT Professionals the essential skills required to administer a SharePoint 2013 environment. You will learn how to create a new SharePoint Server 2013 farm and to configure it by adding service applications, Web applications, site collections and sites. The course also explains the benefits and details involved with creating tenancies and site subscriptions to manage and configure a set of site collections. This course will teach students how to create and configure service applications and Web application by writing PowerShell scripts in addition to showing how it can be done by hand using Central Administration.    

Learn how to create your first SharePoint App in AzureSharePoint MVP and Critical Path Training author / instructor Scot Hillier presents a brand new instructional video demonstrating how to quickly get started with Provided-hosted App Development and Azure hosting in the Office 365 environment. You’ll see Scot’s step-by-step demo on how to:

• Setup a free Office 365 Developer account
• Setup a new instance of SharePoint Online in Office 365
• Create a new Corporate Catalog in SharePoint Online
• Setup a new Windows Azure subscription
• Managing Active Directory in Azure to join your Office 365 and Azure administration
• Use Visual Studio to create a web app
• Debug an Azure-hosted web app
• Create an Azure Web Site
• Register a Provider-hosted app with SharePoint Online
• Publish your app to Azure
• Upload your app to your SharePoint Corporate Catalog
• Deploy your app with SharePoint Online

Watching this free half hour video, provided with no strings attached for the SharePoint, Azure and Office 365 communities. If you like what you see you should register for one of our upcoming developer classes featuring Scot, Andrew Connell, Ted Pattison and Paul Schaeflein.
 
 

WC-NCS2013: SharePoint 2013 No-Code Solutions for Office 365 and On-Premise WebcastThis 5-day webcast will teach you how to build powerful SharePoint 2013 business solutions without having to engage in any custom development. You will be amazed exactly how far you can take things with SharePoint 2013 just using the out-of-the-box features and functionality. This course has been specifically designed for business users using SharePoint 2013 in either the Office 365 environment or in an on-premises environment. You will complete all lab exercises for this course using the browser and SharePoint Designer 2013.    

GSA2013: Great SharePoint Adventure 2013This 5-day course explores the development opportunities with Microsoft’s SharePoint Server 2013 product. The first half of the class focuses on the core and free part of SharePoint Foundation 2013 (SPF2013) where students will learn how to development fundamental building blocks such as Features, solutions, pages, lists and workflows. In addition new topics such the new SharePoint App Model and the security (OAuth and S2S) for apps as well as Remote Event Receivers are covered and explained in great depth. The second half of the class address more enterprise development opportunities such as working with Business Connectivity Services, Enterprise Content Management, Web Content Management, search and other services specific to SharePoint Server 2013. Some non-SharePoint topics are also covered that are heavily leveraged within SharePoint such as OData, Office 365, OAuth, JavaScript, JavaScript templates and Windows Azure so those students with little to no experience in these areas will get an adequate ramp-up to be productive in SharePoint 2013. Throughout the course students will not only learn how to create robust project and solutions using the tools included in Visual Studio 2012 but they will also learn best practices about what and when you should and should not do.    

NCS2010: Creating No-Code SharePoint Designer Solutions for SharePoint 2010This intensive 4-day course demonstrates how to make the most out of Microsoft SharePoint Foundation 2010 (SPF2010 formerly known as Windows SharePoint Services or WSS 3.0) and SharePoint Server 2010 (SPS2010) without having to engage in any custom development. You will be shown how to create business solution using nothing more than the browser and Microsoft Office SharePoint Designer 2010 (SPD). The course is designed to give you hands-on experience with the most valuable functionality of SharePoint Server 2010. Only Module 5 -- InfoPath 2010 and Forms Services -- is currently available.

SAV2013: The Great SharePoint 2013 App-ventureThis 5-day course explores the techniques and strategies required to develop, test, debug and publish apps created using the new App Model introduced by SharePoint 2013. Students will learn about the strengths and weaknesses of each of the three app hosting models: SharePoint-hosted apps, provider-hosted apps, and autohosted apps. Students will also learn about developing apps for both for a SharePoint 2013 on-premises environment as well as for SharePoint Online in the Office 365 environment.    

SEU2010: SharePoint 2010 for End UsersThis course is for anyone who has little to no experience with SharePoint from an end user perspective. Attendees should have experience using a Web browser and interacting with Web-based systems. Some experience with Microsoft Office (any version) as well as experience with a previous version of SharePoint is a plus, but not required. Microsoft Office is necessary to complete several of the labs in the class.

WC-SPU2010: SharePoint 2010 for Power UsersNew to SharePoint? Know how to use a Web browser like Internet Explorer or FireFox? Then this class is for you! It is designed for people with little or zero SharePoint experience who need to get up to speed with SharePoint sites. Attendees will first start out learning the basics and getting an overview of the entire landscape of a SharePoint site. This begins with a tour of the Web-based interface and exploring the various types of lists and libraries available for collaboration such as Contacts, Tasks, Links, Calendar and document libraries. In addition this course is for those users who have the responsibility to manage and customize SharePoint sites and site collections up. In this course you will learn the differences between SharePoint site collections and sites and how to effectively leverage each one. Attendees of this course will also be introduced to SharePoint Features and how to leverage them to provide additional plug-in like functionality to SharePoint sites and site collections. Site collection administrators will also learn how to create and customize content within SharePoint sites using content pages, wiki pages, Web Parts lists and document libraries. Finally students will learn how to secure sites, lists, libraries and the content within lists and libraries using the permission and security infrastructure in SharePoint. In addition attendees will also learn how to create effectively manage search and leverage the new SharePoint metadata tagging capabilities. This course is for anyone who has little to no experience with SharePoint from an end user perspective. This includes users, power users, Web masters, site administrators, site collection administrators, project managers, information workers and business analysts. It is also for site collection administrators targets a wide range of users including site administrators, project managers, power users, Web masters and anyone else who will serve in the role of managing sites and site collections.

WC-SPA2013: Professional SharePoint 2013 for Administrators WebcastThis 5-day course has been designed to teach experienced IT Professionals the essential skills required to administrate a SharePoint 2013 environment. You will learn how to create a new SharePoint Server 2013 farm and to configure it by adding service applications, Web applications, site collections and sites. The course also explains the benefits and details involved with creating tenancies and site subscriptions to manage and configure a set of site collections. This course will teach students how to create and configure service applications and Web application by writing PowerShell scripts in addition to showing how it can be done by hand using Central Administration.    

WC-SPT2010: Developing Solutions with SharePoint 2010 WebcastThis 5-day course explores the development opportunities with Microsoft SharePoint 2010. The first half of the course focuses on Microsoft SharePoint Foundation 2010 (SPF2010, formerly known as Windows SharePoint Services or WSS 3.0) where you will learn how to develop fundamental SPF2010 building blocks such as Features, application pages, site pages, custom list types, site columns, content types, custom workflows and site definitions.

WC-SPT2013: Developing Solutions and Apps with SharePoint 2013 WebcastThis 5-day course explores the development opportunities with Microsoft’s SharePoint Server 2013 product. The first half of the class focuses on the core and free part of SharePoint Foundation 2013 (SPF2013) where students will learn how to development fundamental building blocks such as Features, solutions, pages, lists and workflows. In addition new topics such the new SharePoint App Model and the security (OAuth and S2S) for apps as well as Remote Event Receivers are covered and explained in great depth. The second half of the class address more enterprise development opportunities such as working with Business Connectivity Services, Enterprise Content Management, Web Content Management, search and other services specific to SharePoint Server 2013.    

SharePoint 2010 for Web Designers WebcastSharePoint 2010 for Web Designers is an intensive online course that teaches SharePoint-specific techniques to design Web pages and brand Websites in a SharePoint 2010 environment. You will learn how to override and extend the core CSS rules that give SharePoint 2010 sites their standard look and feel. You will also learn how to design, implement and deploy custom master pages that work equally well in Team Sites and Publishing Sites. The course provides extra coverage of branding topics specific to Publishing sites such as creating a site taxonomy, configuring navigation and designing page layouts. This course motivates the need for adding custom client-side behavior behind pages in SharePoint 2010 sites and demonstrates how to accomplish this by writing JavaScript code and by leveraging the jQuery libraries.