SharePoint 2013 Apps

1. SharePoint 2013: App or Not to App
Walkthrough of SharePoint 2013 Apps
-- why you should use apps over farm solutions

2. Session Evaluations
• Schedule and evaluate each session you attend via our mobile
app that can be used across devices at
http://spsaturday.cloudapp.net
• You will be able to evaluate a session 25 minutes before the
scheduled end time
• Evaluations are stored anonymously and your feedback is
appreciated
• The app will be the only method available to submit session
evaluations for the event and we hope you find it intuitive and
convenient

3. Room Survey
• Have seen SharePoint 2013?
• Installed on-prem Or O365?
• Currently a C# developer?
• Know Web-Dev Technologies (HTML5, CSS3, JS, jQuery)?
• Used JS-CSOM for SharePoint 2010?

4. Agenda
•
•
•
•
Introduction to SharePoint 2013 apps
Deployment options and design patterns
Technologies used in app development
Building a SharePoint-hosted app

5. setting the scene
Introducing the new SharePoint app
framework

6. Introducing apps
In SharePoint 2013 everything is an app …
In strict sense: “Apps are self-contained pieces of functionality
that extend the capabilities of a SharePoint site.”

7. Isolation: App web vs Host web
• Apps live in their own isolated environment; the “app web”
• The site in which they function is called the “host web”
APP UID
Host Web GUID

8. Packaging and deployment options

9. SharePoint 2013 app development

10. Demo

11. Getting started with development
• Local development
• Has to be on Windows Server 2008 R2 (or later)
• Memory reqs have gone up – TechNet recommends at least 24 GB
• Extra configuration needed for app development
• Visual Studio 2012
• Remote development
• Sign up for Office 365 - $3/month
• Possible to use NAPA – app for building apps

12. SharePoint App UX
• Immersive App - app is shown full screen with in a
separate page
• Part - App is shown as a part on the SharePoint
page – similar experience to web part
• UI Custom Actions – possible to make the App
available through ribbon or menu actions for
documents and items
See Apps for SharePoint UX design guidelines

13. Demo

15. Basic SharePoint App architecture
• Code runs “Off SharePoint Box”
• Declarative Hooks into
SharePoint
• AppWeb Host in SharePoint

16. Apps – three possible approaches
Cloud-based
Apps
Get remote
events from
SharePoint
Use CSOM/REST
+
OAuth to work
with SPS
Developer-Hosted App
“Bring your own server hosting
infrastructure”
Developers will need to isolate
tenants
Azure AutoProvisioned App
Windows Azure + SQL Azure
provisioned invisibly as apps
are installed
SharePoint-hosted App
Provision an isolated sub web
on a parent web
• Reuse web elements
(lists, files, out-of-box web
parts)
• No server code allowed;
use client JavaScript for
logic, UX
SharePoint
Web
Your Hosted
Site
SharePoint
Web
Azure
Parent
Web
App Web

17. Hosting: cloud vs SharePoint
Cloud Hosted Apps
SharePoint Hosted Apps
Possible hosting model for almost all types
of apps
Good for smaller apps
Choose your own infrastructure &
technology
SharePoint based; no server-side code
May require your own hosting
Automatically hosted in SharePoint
May require your own handling of
multitenancy & permission management
Inherent multitenancy & isolation

18. App identity
• Challenge with SPS2010
• Farm solutions
• Full Access to Almost Everything
• Risk of RunWithElevatedPrivileges
• Memory Leaks – SPWeb.Dispose() not used well
• Sandbox solutions
• no RunWithElevatedPrivileges
• always under user context
• In SharePoint 2013 Apps have their own identity & permissions
• Installing user either grants or denies permissions to host web
• Permission is explicitly given for a specific scope
• App identity is passed around using oAuth tokens

19. App scopes
•
•
•
•
•
SPSite – site collection
SPWeb – site
SPList
Tenancy
Other scopes (and rights) for performing search queries,
accessing taxonomy data, user profiles, etc...
• Potentially other services like Lync, Exchange

20. App rights
• Default rights : Read, Write, Manage and Full Control
• Not possible to customize
• Apps are granted permissions to a scope and all children of
the scope
• Visual Stuio Assists with defining these:
• Defined in declarative XML

21. Access Control Service (ACS)
• ACS required with oAuth implementation in SharePoint
2013
• How is the ACS server configured as the authentication
server?
• Automatically done for sites in Office 365 Preview
• On-premise farms, a trust to ACS must be configured. Possible to
avoid when using Server-to-server (S2S) trust

22. Demo

24. SharePoint 2013 REST API and CSOM
• Apps connect to SharePoint using
• SharePoint 2013 Client Side Object Model (CSOM)
• SharePoint 2013 REST API
• Javascript cross-domain library (SP.RequestExecutor.js)
• Main investments in 2013
• Client.svc is extended with REST capabilities
• Easier for javascript and non .NET code
• Implemented in accordance with oData protocol
• Programming style is largely unchanged
• New APIs for SharePoint Server functionality
• User Profiles, Search, Taxonomy, Feeds, ....

25. REST URLs in SharePoint 2013
• CSOM URLs can go through _api folder
• Replace
http://sharepoint/_vti_bin/client.svc/web
• With
http://sharepoint/_api/web
• Example REST URLs targeting SharePoint sites
• _api/web/lists
• _api/web/lists/List1
• _api/web/?$select=title,id
• /_api/web/lists/getByTitle('Consultants')/Items
• ....

26. ATOM XML vs JSON
• Response data format selected with ACCEPT header
• XML can be easier to deal with from managed code
• JSON easier to deal with using Javascript
• To get JSON response use “application/json”
http://sharepoint/_vti_bin/client.svc/web

27. Demo
Exploring SPS 2013 REST API

29. SharePoint Hosted App
• App components are SharePoint components
• SharePoint list, site columns, content types
• CSOM and REST API
• Client web part
• Key Developer skills
• HTML5, CSS, Javascript
• Jquery, ASP.NET AJAX
• CSOM and REST API
• Silverlight

30. SharePoint Hosted App
• Installation of App creates child site in target site
• App can add declarative items to App Web
• App Web <-> Host Web communication: CSOM/REST or
Javascript cross-domain library
• Full client-side extension – no server-side code
•
•
Custom Actions
Client-side web parts
•
•
•
•
Lists
Site Pages
CSS files
Javascript files

31. Demo
Building a SharePoint Hosted App

33. Housekeeping
• Follow SharePoint Saturday St. Louis on Twitter
@spsstlouis and hashtag #spsstl
• Play “Sponsor Bingo” to register for your chance to
win one of the many great giveaways at the end of
the day
• Schedule and evaluate each session you attend via
our mobile app that can be used across devices at
http://spsaturday.cloudapp.net

34. Thanks to Our Sponsors!