Points about Update Installation Wizard

Today, while I'm browsing/searching on SDN, I found a documentation around Update Installation Wizard tool. I have used this tool on most occasions (mainly doing upgrades) and thought of writing the important points here.

Document Link : http://sdn.sitecore.net/upload/sdn5/resources%20misc/tools/update%20installation%20wizard/update_installation_wizard_guide-a4.pdf#search=%22Sitecore%22

Update Package

• used to update sitecore solutions
• contains items, files and metadata about items or files to be added/deleted and changed
• contain information about the expected value of fields and has values for files, making it possible to identify potential conflicts
• extension ".update"
• CANNOT be installed using the Installation wizard that is available in the Sitecore Desktop

Accessing the Update installation wizard

http://<host_name>/sitecore/admin/UpdateinstallationWizard.aspx

Post Update Installation Steps

• rebuild the search indexes and the links database
• configuration files will be saves with a different name (Ex: web.config.sitecore_6.1.0_rev.090630)

Quick look at Sitecore XP 8

1. Sitecore admin login screen - /sitecore/login

Changes : Desktop/Content Editor/Page Editor selection NOT available

2. Sitecore Admin Homepage - Launch Pad

Changes : Speak Launch pad is the main control point in Sitecore XP 8

3. Sitecore Content Editor

4. Sitecore Desktop

 5. Sitecore Experience Editor (Previously : Page Editor)

6. Sitecore Control Panel

Standard Values for Language Versions

Today, one of my colleague asked me about standard values and how they work when creating different language versions. Following are just a small note on what I learn regarding that.

Standard values are language sensitive. i.e. if you have different language versions, you need to create language versions for standard value item also.
Items does not inherit standard value of "__Source" field from its data template standard value item

A good blog post on standard values,

http://www.sitecore.net/Learn/Blogs/Technical-Blogs/John-West-Sitecore-Blog/Posts/2013/01/All-About-Standard-Values-in-the-Sitecore-ASPNET-CMS.aspx
http://learnsitecore.cmsuniverse.net/en/Developers/Articles/2010/08/Standard-values-in-sitecore.aspx

Create Versions Action for Workflows

One of my recent work includes to support a complex workflow scenario.
While I am working on that, I got to know the following small but very useful module, "Create Versions Action" module. You can find it on sitecore marketplace.

https://marketplace.sitecore.net/Modules/Create_Versions_Action.aspx?sc_lang=en

What this module does is, it create a new workflow action. By using this action, we can create new language versions for existing workflow item. Also, it has given a option of selecting which languages that you need to create new version.

I found it very cool.. :-)

I also extend this and added new features. I will write a new blog post in near future about that.

Bye for now.

First Meetup of Sitecore User Group Sri Lanka ended Successfully!

After lot of preparation and hard work, we were able to do our first meetup on 12th November.

Over 12 developers participated for the event including developers from Codehouse Ltd, HSBC, Virtusa, Exilesoft, Calcey Technologies, CAAMS software development companies.

Presentation was done by Mr. Sen Guptha, Solution Architect, Sitecore International.
The presentation includes following points

• Introduction to Sitecore Company
• Growth of Sitecore Company
• Introduction to Sitecore - Page Editor, Content Editor, Desktop, etc
• Introduction to Sitecore Marketing suite - Marketing center, DMS, etc
• Sitecore Certification Programs
• Sitecore Resources - Marketplace, SDN, KnowledgeBase, etc

Presentation which took around 1 hour was followed by a Question and Answer session.

Q&A Session was highly successful with participants asking lot of question and clarifying their doubts from Mr. Sen Guptha.


After the presentation and Q&A session, it is time to relax and have some refreshments. Participants were discussed on how to progress with these meeting and how to promote the group so that more and more people with get the benifit from this group.

This event was powered by Codehouse Ltd, Sitecore Solution Partner.

Following are few snaps of the evnet

Looking forward to meet everyone on our December Meetup !

Until then, Ayubowan! (Good Bye) :-)

Sitecore User Group Sri Lanka - First Meeting

We are starting "Sitecore User Group Sri Lanka", aiming to grow and educate the sitecore community in Sri Lanka. This will be an open discussion forum dedicated to support growing sitecore community in Sri Lanka.

Sitecore was generous to provide an Exclusive Online Presentation for our first Meetup, 12th November, 2014. We are expecting around 10 - 15 participants for the first meetup.

This will be facilitated by Codehouse Ltd, a Certified Sitecore Partner.

Everyone is welcome! :-)

Issue with SEO Toolkit module and SBOS Accelerator Module running together

One of my recent investigations was about an issue caused by SBOS Accelerator module. After through investigation, it proved to be an issue caused by SEO Toolkit module. This post is about my findings.

Environment :

Sitecore 7.2 rev. 140526
Sitecore Search Engine Optimization -1.3.0 rev.130319
SBOS Accelerators Shared Source Module - 2.0 rev. 140422


Issue 1 : SEO Toolkit module issue
When we run the seo tool for a page, and then select the "Links" link in the results, it returns/displays the following error

when "Links .." link selected,

Issue 2 : SBOS module issue

When we select the "Enable personalization tracking" checkbox and save, and then return to the same place again, checkbox was displayed unselected/unchecked

Investigation/Solution :

1. When check into the sitecore error logs, following error was found 

Error Logs Message I:

Exception: System.Web.HttpUnhandledException
Message: Exception of type 'System.Web.HttpUnhandledException' was thrown.
Source: System.Web
   at System.Web.UI.Page.HandleError(Exception e)
   at System.Web.UI.Page.ProcessRequestMain(Boolean includeStagesBeforeAsyncPoint, Boolean includeStagesAfterAsyncPoint)
   at System.Web.UI.Page.ProcessRequest(Boolean includeStagesBeforeAsyncPoint, Boolean includeStagesAfterAsyncPoint)
   at System.Web.UI.Page.ProcessRequest()
   at System.Web.UI.Page.ProcessRequest(HttpContext context)
   at System.Web.HttpApplication.CallHandlerExecutionStep.System.Web.HttpApplication.IExecutionStep.Execute()
   at System.Web.HttpApplication.ExecuteStep(IExecutionStep step, Boolean& completedSynchronously)

Nested Exception

Exception: System.Web.HttpException
Message: The Controls collection cannot be modified because the control contains code blocks (i.e. <% ... %>).
Source: System.Web
   at System.Web.UI.ControlCollection.Add(Control child)
   at Sitecore.Layouts.PageContext.InsertSystemControls()
   at (Object , Object[] )
   at Sitecore.Pipelines.CorePipeline.Run(PipelineArgs args)
   at Sitecore.Layouts.PageContext.BuildControlTree(Object sender, EventArgs e)
   at System.Web.UI.Page.PerformPreInit()
   at System.Web.UI.Page.ProcessRequestMain(Boolean includeStagesBeforeAsyncPoint, Boolean includeStagesAfterAsyncPoint)
 

2. Checked our own control files. -> we could not find any place with <% .. %>

 3. Disabled SBOS Accelerators module (rename /App_Config/Include/Sitecore.SBOSAccelerators.config file to Sitecore.SBOSAccelerators.config.disabled)

 when clicked on the "Links" after running the SEO module, it again return the error.

4. But, this time, sitecore logs displayed a different error message

Error Logs Message II

Exception: System.Web.HttpRequestValidationException
Message: A potentially dangerous Request.Form value was detected from the client (<postData><links><link controlID=""a70"><![CDATA[http://chg....").
Source: System.Web
   at System.Web.HttpRequest.ValidateString(String value, String collectionKey, RequestValidationSource requestCollection)
   at System.Web.HttpRequest.ValidateHttpValueCollection(HttpValueCollection collection, RequestValidationSource requestCollection)
   at Sitecore.Pipelines.PreprocessRequest.SuppressFormValidation.Process(PreprocessRequestArgs args)
   at (Object , Object[] )
   at Sitecore.Pipelines.CorePipeline.Run(PipelineArgs args)
   at Sitecore.Nexus.Web.HttpModule. (Object , EventArgs )
   at System.Web.HttpApplication.SyncEventExecutionStep.System.Web.HttpApplication.IExecutionStep.Execute()
   at System.Web.HttpApplication.ExecuteStep(IExecutionStep step, Boolean& completedSynchronously)

6756 13:24:19 ERROR Application error.
Exception: System.Web.HttpRequestValidationException
Message: A potentially dangerous Request.Form value was detected from the client (<html id="...lang="en"><!--<![endif]--><hea...").
Source: System.Web
   at System.Web.HttpRequest.ValidateString(String value, String collectionKey, RequestValidationSource requestCollection)
   at System.Web.HttpRequest.ValidateHttpValueCollection(HttpValueCollection collection, RequestValidationSource requestCollection)
   at Sitecore.Pipelines.PreprocessRequest.SuppressFormValidation.Process(PreprocessRequestArgs args)
   at (Object , Object[] )
   at Sitecore.Pipelines.CorePipeline.Run(PipelineArgs args)
   at Sitecore.Nexus.Web.HttpModule. (Object , EventArgs )
   at System.Web.HttpApplication.SyncEventExecutionStep.System.Web.HttpApplication.IExecutionStep.Execute()
   at System.Web.HttpApplication.ExecuteStep(IExecutionStep step, Boolean& completedSynchronously)

5. To solve this issue, we add the following property to <httpRuntime ..> tag in web.config

<httpRuntime maxRequestLength="512000" executionTimeout="600" enableKernelOutputCache="false" relaxedUrlToFileSystemMapping="true" requestValidationMode="2.0" />

6. Then, SEO Toolkit module start to work fine.

7. Re-enabled the SBOS Accelerators module (rename /App_Config/Include/Sitecore.SBOSAccelerators.config.disabled to Sitecore.SBOSAccelerators.config)

8. SEO toolkit module stopped working again with the Error Logs Message I

9. Then, I looked into the control files in SEO module. In those files I found the <% .. %> code part.
/seotoolkit/ui/Extender.ascx, /seotoolkit/ui/Keyword.ascx, /seotoolkit/ui/SearchEngine.ascx

Fortunately, those files did not have any code behind files. So, I create a seperate library project and moved the <% .. %> code parts into that project. Then, point the seotoolkit .ascx files codebehind to those library .cs files.

All the things start to work properly. (Including the issue 2 - "Enable personalization tracking" checkbox).
Hope this help..