Blank UpdatePanel in UserControl

Scenario

• Editing a UserControl in VS 2008 with html <style> tags in the UserControl

Issue

• The Designer window is empty as if the updatepanel is invisible (visible=false)

Resolution

• Place the Style tags at the bottom of the usercontrol, below any UpdatePanels
• This is a known bug

Personalization and Audience Targeting Reset Page Content Bug

Scenario

• Personalization and Web Part Audience Targeting are both enabled on a MOSS 2007 page.
• Some web parts are audience trimmed for a particular user
• That user personalizes the page
• The user selects "Reset Page Content" from the User Welcome Menu
• Or they select "Reset Web Part Content" from the Web Part's "Edit" menu

Issue

• The audience trimmed web parts are incorrectly shown to the user
• This may be a security issue if the audience targeted web part has confidential information on it
• After refreshing the page, the page displays correctly

Resolution

• I developed the following simple workaround

Workaround

• Add the following usercontrol (2 files) to the 12 Hive\Template\ControlTemplates folder
• PersonalizationResetPageContentRefreshBugFix.ascx

<%@ Control Language="VB" AutoEventWireup="false" CodeFile="PersonalizationResetPageContentRefreshBugFix.ascx.vb" Inherits="UserControls_PersonalizationResetPageContentRefreshBugFix" %>

• PersonalizationResetPageContentRefreshBugFix.ascx.vb

Partial Class UserControls_PersonalizationResetPageContentRefreshBugFix
    Inherits System.Web.UI.UserControl

    Protected Sub Page_PreRender(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles Me.PreRender
        Dim strPageRestore As String = Request.Form.Get("MSOWebPartPage_RestorePageDefault")
        Dim strPartRestore As String = Request.Form.Get("MSO_RestoreSettings")
        If Not String.IsNullOrEmpty(strPageRestore) OrElse _
                Not String.IsNullOrEmpty(strPartRestore) Then
            'Force a client side redirect and end response so no untargeted info goes to client.
            Response.Redirect(Page.Request.Url.AbsoluteUri, True)
            'Response Ends
        End If
    End Sub
End Class

• Add the following lines to each master page where personalization and audiences are used
• The following line goes with the other Register tags at the top of the master page

<%@ Register TagPrefix="wssuc" TagName="PersonalizationResetBugFix" src="~/_controltemplates/PersonalizationResetPageContentRefreshBugFix.ascx" %>

• The following line goes within the BODY/FORM section

<wssuc:PersonalizationResetBugFix id="IdPersonalizationResetBugFix" runat="server" EnableViewState="false"/>

Error enabling Publishing Feature - WebAdminPageBase.OnLoad File Not Found

Scenario

• Enabling the Publishing Feature on a new Team Site
• Accessing the site via a url not mapped in the Alternate Access Mappings list

Issue

• Encountered the WebAdminPageBase.OnLoad "File Not Found" error

Resolution

• Add the Alternate Access Mapping for the url you are trying to use

MS SharePoint "so-called" Support

Some of my open/past SharePoint support issues.  Note that I always post my MS Support Tickets to the MS newsgroups with an issue to foster community participation and help others.

Open (Or given up on) Issues

• None at this time.

Issues Resolved by Me

• LdapRoleProvider GetRolesForUser bug
• Personalization and Audience Targeting Reset Page Content Bug

Issues Resolved by Community

• stsadm createssp Provisioning failed
• Could not find stored procedure proc_ar_BumpCacheInvalidationCounter

Issues Resolved by MS

• You think there'd be one. :-(

Domain Username not resolving - People Picker

Scenario

• You attempt to specify a domain user in any People Picker field within SharePoint 2007 / 3.0
• AD domain users have resolved before.
• The application service is running under a local machine account

Issue

• The username will not resolve.  Instead you get the squiggly red underline.

Resolution

• Workaround: Change the Service Account to a domain user account

I do not know why a local account would exhibit this behaviour nor why this would randomly stop working.  After changing to a domain account temporarily you can change back to a local account, but the issue will occur again.  My guess is that it's environment specific, such as a temporary loss of AD connectivity, which would explain the intermittant occurances.

SPUtility.SendEmail

Issues with SPUtility.SendEmail.

• SPUtility.SendEmail subject parameter cannot contain a comma "," character.
• If it does, the email will be delayed by several hours.
• To workaround, use: strSubject.Replace(",", " ") for the subject parameter
• I am not sure if this is an smtp issue or a SPUtility issue.
• The function will return "True" indicating a successful send even if there is a comma.
• The body text parameter must have a new line character at least every 2048 characters.
• If not, the email body will be truncated at 2048 chars.
• For example, when using an HTML formatted body, you may have all your encoding on one line within the body string/stringbuilder parameter. You will need to insert crlf chars every 2048 characters or less.