InfoPath and Form services - printed views and workflow fields

Like the title says I'm experimenting with an infopath form.

1) the form (web view) shows the banner of the site in addition to the form contents... any way to get rid of this? eg in print views - is there an easier way to specify printing (eg: from the banner rather than putting a PRINT button in the form?)

2) Where does [random fields that are part of an installed feature content type] come from when it appears to be applied to all lists in the site but not accessible from anywhere? Can I access these in form View (eg printed version) somehow? they aren't obviously visible in InfoPath - I suspect they are (maybe) applied to lists as the items appear to be associated with "Put this site column into existing group: Core Contact and calendar group" - does this mean that they are part of "people" - ie created/modified by? ...Anyway I ended up creating my own with getting:GetUserProfileByName and following the tedious process of creating rules that will populate hidden fields that I can show in the printed view once the form is submitted, but these fields seem to be "right" for what I want to do, so wondering if they can be used/reused... but if they are a feature... I'm not sure I should be borrowing... but I'm also not sure why this column from this feature (which is named acording to a specific list/feature of our site) is connected to EVERY list in the site collection...

3) is there a way to change the "Save/Cancel" buttons in WebForms to Submit? so its more obvious to the user that pressing Save removes the need to have a Submit button at the bottom of the form and they can just get used to filling the form and "Save"?

Thoughts and suggestions we

August 20th, 2015 7:25am

Okay, answering part of my own question:

#1)

Shareoint 2010 **LIST** do not natively support printing, however this might be a work around

http://infopathprinter.codeplex.com/

However **FORM LIBRARY** does support printing... (this was not obvious from the "differences" doco that I read)

#3)

Similarly with the Save/Cancel - there appears to be more control over these things using a FORM LIBRARY over a LIST... even if both are using InfoPath for designing the forms...

As for the #2 - I'm still struggling with this one- it seems like there are these three "lookup" columns that are applied to any new LIST that I create - however if you go into site or collection settings these colums don't appear in the site columns or groups anywhere... I THINK these are (at least 2 of the 3) appear to be from a "feature" installed in the SP collection, purely from the description tag in these columns (when I click on the item in the columns list in a LIST SETTINGS page), however the feature is not enabled in any other site (other than the subsite that the feature was, presumably, developed specifically for)...

ANY ideas on (a) how to figure out where these mystery columsn are coming from, and or if there is some kind of bug/issue with the way the feature was developed or deployed?

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August 21st, 2015 12:22am

Hi noJedi,

For this issue, I need to verify the things below with you:

  1. Are the fields displayed in the content type used for lists?
  2. Does this issue occur with all the list templates? Such as calendar, contact, etc.
  3. Which template did you use to create the new lists? Is the template a custom solution?

Could you please provide screenshots of the fields in the list?

Thanks,

Victoria

August 21st, 2015 2:38am

Hi Victoria,

1) if you mean do the fields show in SharePoint -> Site -> List -> List settings and in the list of columns, then yes.

they look like this:

Column (click to edit)               Type

Requestor            Lookup

if I click the heading ("to edit") I get a little more detail but the only clues are that the description hints that its related to another list (in another site in this collection)  and that the "Additional column settings" for this "lookup" are

Get information from: User Information List
The Manage Lists permission is required on this list or document library to enable or modify a relationship behavior. In this column: Name

Not sure where "user information list" might be... I can't find it easily in the site...

2) this happens with all lists - custom lists, datasheet list, announcements, contacts, group discussions but NOT for calendar, for some reason...

I've not tried EVERY other list template but maybe the first 8 all exhibit this behaviour (except calendar). 

3) the lists I've used that exhibit this feature are "custom list"... they all appear to have these fields - I'm not sure how to answer your questions "is the template a custom solution?" - is there some way I can determine

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August 21st, 2015 12:43pm

Hi noJedi,

From your description, it seems that the column is added to almost all new lists.

I recommend to check if there are any custom features deployed in site collection features or manage site features.

Please go to Site Settings > Site collection features / Manage site features. (You can compare the features with other sites to determine the custom features)

Thanks,

Victoria

August 23rd, 2015 11:26pm

Hmmm... okay but there is a minor omission in your advice.

"Manage site features" is a SITE COLLECTION thing not a site thing. so (I assume) I would need another collection to compare this to...? (we only have one collection).

Additionally this only tells me if the features are active or not... I'm assuming that to get to the bottom of this I will need to find the source for the custom features (and therefore might be out of luck - as I'm not sure we have all the source) to determine where these fields are originating from if I'm guessing right based on your advice...?

if the above is right/close then I have 2 questions from that:

1) can I simply create a new collection (on the test server) and use that to judge a "clean" setup?
2) if this collection is on 2013 but in compatability mode will creating a new site collection be in 2013 mode and therefore will this be useful/comparable ?

************************************UPDATE************************************

News to me is that (in test at least) I can create new COLLECTION and all the site features are off except for Three State Workflow - AND I can create it in 2010 mode... that was a nice surprise!

Then from comparing the lists as you suggested I couldn't see differences, but by looking at everything and the names involved I have been able to narrow the list down and (I think) identify the component(s) that are doing the "lookups" - I will need to hunt around for code to figure out exactly what's going on, but this is what I think is happening:

there are two features -

  1. one that adds site columns to the Site...
  2. the second one either modifies or applies it to the base LIST template - in this new collection instead of these fields being called "Requestor name" "Requestor email" and so on, they appear to be getting called "Creator name" "Creator email"... which is a bit odd, but they are lookups and they seem to have all the other similar properties...

they dont' seem to be applied to EXISTING lists, so this is why I'm guessing a tempate is modified somewhere...

I'm guessing a LOT of this... and I probably need the code to know if these "common sounding" fields are actually reuseable or not...

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August 24th, 2015 2:48pm

Hi noJedi,

Manage site features is a site thing, you can compare this with a site. But Site collection features is a site collection thing, then you can compare with another site collection.

You can create a site collection in the test server for comparison and please also create site collections in same mode.

As you said, the list templates may be modified. So you still need to check the list definitions.

Thanks,

Victoria

August 25th, 2015 12:26pm

thankjs for clearing up the collection features vs site features thing, I "see it now" - didn't realize they were separate/different things.

how do you manage/review list definitions? how is htis done/what tools will be useful?

...I feel like I'm crossing many lines "sharepoint management/administration/development" now (still haven't found the code for the feature(s) either - we may not have it I guess...)

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August 26th, 2015 8:07am

Hi noJedi,

I recommend to use PowerShell to get all the activated features in the site and then you can paste the screenshot here.

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/josrod/archive/2013/01/04/powershell-to-list-activated-features-for-a-site-and-web.aspx

Thanks,

Victoria

August 26th, 2015 10:50pm

Hi Victoria... I don't suppose there is one of these lists for a bog standard install of SP for me to compare this against?

This is the results from the COLLECTION level (I assume "Hidden"=true means not active?):

Title                                                                 Hidden
-----                                                                 ------
Document Routing Resources                                              True
Publishing Prerequisites                                                True
SharePoint Server Publishing Infrastructure                            False
Enhanced Theming                                                        True
Ratings                                                                 True
Risk Register List Definition                                          False
PerformancePoint Datasource Content Type definition                     True
Web Part Adder default groups                                           True
Author Department Field and Toolroom Request Sitecolumn Feature        False
SharePoint Server Enterprise Site Collection features                  False
Standard Content Type Definitions                                       True
Collect Signatures Workflow - SharePoint 2010                           True
Risk Management System Meta Data                                       False
Staff_Notices feature                                                  False
In Place Records Management                                            False
Collect Signatures Workflow - SharePoint 2013  (en-US)                  True
Portal Navigation                                                       True
Disposition Approval Workflow                                          False
Collect Signatures Workflow                                             True
Standard Column Definitions                                             True
Publishing Workflow - SharePoint 2013  (en-US)                          True
Visio Web Access                                                        True
Microsoft Office Server workflows                                       True
BizApps Site Templates                                                  True
PerformancePoint Monitoring                                             True
SharePoint Server Standard Site Collection features                    False
Portal Layouts Feature                                                  True
Workflows                                                              False
Three-state workflow                                                   False
Routing Workflows - SharePoint 2010                                     True
Page Layouts and Master Pages Pack                                      True
Publishing Resources                                                    True
Routing Workflows - SharePoint 2013  (en-US)                            True
PerformancePoint Content Type Definition                                True
Web Analytics Web Part                                                  True
Business Branding 2010                                                 False
Excel Services Application Web Part Site Feature                        True
Search Server Web Parts and Support Files                              False
SharePoint Portal Server Business Appications Content Type Definition   True
Library and Folder Based Retention                                     False
Record Resources                                                        True
Basic Web Parts                                                         True
PerformancePoint Services Site Collection Features                     False
Enterprise Wiki Layouts                                                 True
InfoPath Forms Services support                                         True
Open Documents in Client Applications by Default                       False
Document ID Service                                                    False
SPS Biz Apps Field Definition                                           True
Chart Web Part                                                          True
Content Type Syndication Hub                                           False
SharePoint Portal Server Local Site Directory Capture Control           True
Excel Services Application View Site Feature                            True
$Resources:AccsrvWss,SolutionGalleryFeatureTitle;                       True
Asset Library                                                           True
Routing Workflows                                                       True
Toolroom Request Tracking                                              False
Translation Management Workflow                                         True
Publishing Approval Workflow                                           False
Business RSS Feeds                                                     False
Document Sets                                                          False

this is the site in question...

Title                                                   Hidden
-----                                                   ------
Wiki Page Library                                         True
Translation Management Library                            True
SharePoint Portal Server Status Indicator List template   True
Issues Lists                                              True
Metadata Navigation and Filtering                        False
SharePoint Server Publishing                             False
$Resources:core,GbwFeatureWhereaboutsTitle;               True
SharePoint Server Enterprise Site features               False
Workflow History Lists                                    True
SharePoint Portal Server Report Library                   True
Circulation List                                          True
No-code Workflow Libraries                                True
Phone Call Memo List                                      True
Holidays List                                             True
Surveys Lists                                             True
Hold                                                     False
Related Links scope settings page                         True
Grid Lists                                                True
Resources List                                            True
Publishing                                                True
Gantt Chart Tasks Lists                                   True
Slide Library                                             True
Links Lists                                               True
Mobility Shortcut URL                                     True
Microsoft IME Dictionary List                             True
WorkflowProcessList Feature                               True
Tasks Lists                                               True
Team Collaboration Lists                                 False
SharePoint Server Standard Site features                 False
Group Work Lists                                         False
GroupBoardWebParts                                        True
Group Work Provisioning                                   True
Time Card List                                            True
Announcements Lists                                       True
Offline Synchronization for External Lists               False
E-mail Integration with Content Organizer                False
Picture Libraries                                         True
Contacts Lists                                            True
Custom Lists                                              True
Document Libraries                                        True
Discussion Lists                                          True
Data Source Libraries                                     True
Data Connections Feature                                  True
External Lists                                            True
Events Lists                                              True
XML Form Libraries                                        True

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September 3rd, 2015 1:22am

Hi noJedi,

I found some custom features in your Site collection features:  Risk Register List Definition, Author Department Field and Toolroom Request Sitecolumn Feature, Risk Management System Meta Data, Staff_Notices feature, Toolroom Request Tracking.

You can check these features with your site designers to see if any feature will create columns for use in lists.

The feature listed are all activated. Hidden means the feature does not display in the UI.

Thanks,

Victoria

September 3rd, 2015 2:27am

Thanks.

I think the answer is that I need to either find the original source code for the features installed, or accept these "unused" features as part of our site and move new developments to a new better documented approach.

Unfortunately our site designers are all moved on, so much of this we are deconstructing from your assistance.

Thanks very much for your

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September 9th, 2015 10:38pm

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