With most SharePoint development being done in VMs, it is useful to have a set of sysprepped base VMs that can be cloned at any time to create a new environment, whether it be for a new project, to test some tool or software, or whatever. Sysprep is a great tool for virtual domains because it will generate a new security ID (SID) for every server created from the sysprepped image to prevent conflicts between servers on the same domain.

Most of the software needed for development can be installed prior to running sysprep on the virtual machine,but SQL Server and SharePoint (at least the configuration of SharePoint) are generally exceptions. These apps typically must be installed post-sysprep in order for them to operate correctly, and this is an involved and tedious process. Fortunately with SQL Server 2008 R2, we now have SQL Server Sysprep, which will allow SQL Server to be installed and imaged, but not configured until a new VM is created from the base image. Woohoo!

So, the general steps are as follows:

1. Install a virtual machine with Windows Server 2008 R2, PowerShell 2.0 and all other desired client software (Visual Studio, Office, SharePoint Designer, etc…)
2. Install SQL Server 2008 R2 as a Prepared Image
3. Install SharePoint 2010 Prerequisites (http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc262485(office.14).aspx) either manually or using the Prerequisites Installer tool
4. Install SharePoint 2010 bits, but DO NOT run configuration wizard
5. Run Sysprep.exe to prepare server
6. Clone server
7. Boot clone and execute PowerShell script to perform the following actions:
   • Complete configuration of sysprepped SQL Server 2008 R2 database server
   • Configure SharePoint 2010 farm

Creating a cloneable SharePoint 2010 Development Environment with PowerShell, Windows Sysprep, and SQL Server 2008 R2 Sysprep – Overview

In previous versions of SharePoint it was impossible to add corners to a Web Part with just CSS (unless you were building sites for only the latest browsers). The best way was to style a container DIV on the Page Layout and put a Web Part Zone inside. Then, a Web Part in that zone would appear to have round corners. This method greatly reduces the flexibility of SharePoint because there can only be one Web part in each Zone for the effect to work.

Styling Web Parts in SharePoint 2010 has become much easier than in MOSS 2007. There are several reasons for this and I will highlight a few.

The addition of a style class on a cell that contains the entire Web Part gives a big advantage to adding styles. In MOSS this did not exist. This is helpful because now you can simply add a border, background image or color to the container cell with the class “s4-wpcell-plain” and it will be applied around and behind the body and header of the Web Part.

PointBridge Blogs – Office 2010 Wave

The backgrounds in SharePoint 2010 were designed to allow end users to change gradients by simply picking solid colors on the settings page. For example if you choose an orange background color the result is a fade from orange to lighter orange. The change can be very subtle but is an effective way to create an attractive site. This is a significant upgrade from older versions of SharePoint where, in order to change the branding, you would have had  to undertake the time-consuming task of editing all of the gradient images one by one.

PointBridge Blogs – Office 2010 Wave

Project Description
Starter Master Pages for SharePoint 2010 are a clean, commented starting point for creating your own SharePoint 2010 branding. Starter Master Pages were known previously as Minimal Master Pages in SharePoint 2007.
Project Details
In the tradition of those SharePoint branding folks that came before me, I have put together two minimal master pages that can be used to start a SharePoint 2010 Branding project. They contain only very minimal HTML styling in order to accommodate some of the specific needs of SharePoint 2010 and are commented throughout. I hope you find them useful as a good starting point for creating branded SharePoint sites. If you make improvements upon them that could be used to improve the Starter Master Page experience for others, please share the changes with me through the CodePlex site or through my blog comments.

Starter Master Pages for SharePoint 2010

I’m sure there are a lot of SharePointers out there who are excited about the 2010 release and as I have been working my way through the installation and configuration of this updated beast, I have also been providing you with posts along the way sharing my experiences.  Today isn’t any different, and in this two part series I will be providing you with a guide to upgrading your SharePoint 2007 content databases to SharePoint 2010.  There are already some great resources out there regarding upgrade options and preparation guidance including those from Microsoft on the TechNet Site and others which I will list at the end of this article. The prime focus of part 1 of this 2 part series will be to outline the many tools that are available to you at no cost, assisting and ensuring that your SharePoint  farm and SharePoint databases are up to scratch and ready for 2010.  The series will proceed as follows;

1. Upgrading your Content DB to SharePoint 2010 –The preupgradecheck
2. Upgrading your Content DB to SharePoint 2010 – Using the Database Attach method

Upgrading your Content DB to SharePoint 2010 – Part 1 – The preupgradecheck | SharePoint George

I’ve prepared a SPSEMEA Demo site that you can simply upload to your (http://[siteUrl]/_catalogs/wt) Site template gallery.

You can download the .stp from CodePlex

After you’ve uploaded the file to the Site template gallery you can create a subsite (English language) and from Custom you can select the uploaded template.

Below’s a brief overview where you can find tricks. How it’s done – check for Content Editor WebParts in that page (using a “PageView=Shared&ToolPaneView=2” parameters in url (more info here)). All the files containing code are in a document library Sys.

SPSEMEA Demo site and showcase | SharePoint

Simply put, this plug-and-play solution will add a “+” or “-” to every web part in a given web part zone, allowing users to click the web part title to control the visible state of the web part.  You can control the default state of each web part by setting the Chrome State on the web part.

Collapsible Web Parts in a Zone Using jQuery for SharePoint 2007 « SPUIGuy

This article is part of a series as I document my processes of discovery for creating jQuery solutions in SharePoint. To view the entire series, click the link at the bottom of this article to view all of the articles in the series. — Mark

I laid the groundwork for my jQuery investigations in a previous article. Now that I’ve done a little research, I’ve started building out a SharePoint Scripting Resource Center. The SSRC is at the top of the site collection, and set to “Read Only” access for all users of the site collection. I used a SharePoint wiki site to build the interface for the center.

In this article, I’ll walk through the process of creating a resource center. Follow along in your own SharePoint site and by the time you get done, you’ll be ready to start working on some jQuery with me.

Build a SharePoint Scripting Resource Center | EndUserSharePoint.com

During the course of a customization and branding effort in SharePoint you are likely to find that you want to style web parts to look different from (Dare I say better than?) the stylistic treatment default to SharePoint.

In my quest for finding a way to improve the look of web parts, I discovered Microsoft’s markup for web parts does not allow for much web part style manipulation, as there are not enough CSS hooks.  Nor could I modify the HTML inside a web part zone in order to wrap web parts with <div> tags for styling purposes—you can’t edit the contents of web part zone directly.  So I had to settle with wrapping <div> tags with classes around web part zones, which got me where I wanted to go somewhat, but it failed to allow me to apply treatments like background colors, borders, rounded corners, and drop shadows to individual web parts—I could only apply them to the wrapper around the web part zone.

Using jQuery to Wrap Web Parts and Achieve the Unachievable: The Packaged Solution | EndUserSharePoint.com

In One Line

Develop and centrally manage Sharepoint user interface customisations using jQuery within SharePoint & MOSS (2007 and 2010) and Project Server (2007 and 2010).

Project Description

ShUIE is an addition to Microsoft SharePoint that allows a developer to inject JavaScript and CSS fragments depending on the context of the page being displayed. JavaScript and CSS injected can be optionally minified, and jQuery is included to increase functionality.

Project History

ShUIE was created by Pcubed in Autumn 2005, for SharePoint v2, to enable the customisation of the SharePoint HTML without requiring us to touch the template files and to allow us to apply and maintain the customisations over many SharePoint sub webs without having to re-deploy or modify the site templates. In the SharePoint v2 version, we injected the JavaScript by modifying a Microsoft Sharepoint core JavaScript file.
In early November 2008 we created a version for SharePoint 2007. It uses a WebControl to "inject" JavaScript and Cascading Style Sheets into a page based on the context of the page. The customisations continue to be held centrally in a database, but now the ability to use a WebControl packaged as a feature means that we no longer modify any Microsoft file and still retain the ability to inject our customisations anywhere.
The latest version uses SharePoint’s property bag instead of a SQL database. It has been tested and is stable against SharePoint 2007, MOSS 2007, SharePoint 2010 and MOSS 2010.

ShUIE (SharePoint User Interface Extender)