OFFICE BUSINESS

APPLICATIONS2.25.08

Todd Kitta

tkitta@mailctp.com

A LITTLE ABOUT ME Covenant Technology Partners Professional Windows Workflow

Foundation

AGENDA History of Office Development Explanation of OBAs Architecture of the Office System Development Experience OBA Patterns Demos

HISTORY OF OFFICE DEVELOPMENT VBA! Office Add-ins Automation

WHAT IS AN OBA? A Composite Application Use Office to bring everything together Use existing LOB investments to handle

the business

OBA EXAMPLES Integrating functionality into the Microsoft Office Outlook

calendar that links an appointment with a customer to an LOB billing system.

Integration with Outlook that associates a scheduled meeting with a sales opportunity recorded in a customer relationship management (CRM) application.

Employees reporting vacation time to an LOB human resources system through time reserved in the Outlook calendar.

Feedback on an interview with a prospective employee entered in Outlook that is automatically inserted in a human resources system.

Hosting a centralized budgeting spreadsheet using Excel Services and Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007.

Exposing customer data from a customer relationship management (CRM) system in a SharePoint site using the Business Data Catalog.

http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb614538.aspx

WHY OBAS? Familiar & ubiquitous UI Bringing LOB functionality to more

people Making processes less ad-hoc outside

LOBs Providing context to IWs Promoting collaboration around business

processes

COMPOSITE APPLICATION TIERS

•Business Documents•Analysis Tools

Presentation Tier

•Document Management•Collaboration

Productivity Tier

•Business Rules•Workflow

Application Tier

•Transactions•Reporting & Analysis of Data•Identity

Data Tier

OBA SUPPORTING SERVICES Workflow Business Data Catalog Search Fluent UI Open XML Website & Security Framework

APPLICATION TIER CAPABILTIES

•Client – Word, Excel•Server – SharePoint w/ Sites, Web Parts, etc.

Presentation Tier

•Lists•Document Libraries•Form Libraries

Productivity Tier

•LOB Systems•Workflow•Excel Services

Application Tier

•Web Services•BDC•SQL & SSAS

Data Tier

OBA CLIENT COMPONENTS Open XML Fluent UI (i.e. the Ribbon) Outlook Custom Form Regions Custom Document Information Panels InfoPath

CLIENT DEVELOPMENT Develop at the document level…

Document templates as well …or target the entire Office application

Add-in (creates a DLL which must be installed on the client)

Ribbon customizations

THE FLUENT UIForm Region Document-

level Actions Pane

Ribbon UI Customization

App-level Custom Task Pane

Excel X X X

Word X X X

Outlook X X X

PowerPoint

X X

InfoPath X

VISUAL STUDIO 2008 2008 Rocks!

Multi-targetingProject templates (Office, WPF,

WF, WCF)New language featuresA ton more…

Office client project templates SharePoint Workflow project

templates

VISUAL STUDIO 2008OFFICE DEVELOPMENT DEMO

OBA SERVER COMPONENTS Excel Services InfoPath Forms Server Workflow Web Parts Enterprise Search Content Management Business Data Catalog Business Intelligence

SHAREPOINT DEVELOPMENT Learn how to do it the right way…

Features Solutions

Visual Studio Extensions for SharePoint 1.1 Released just a couple weeks ago Only for VS2005 at the moment! Project Templates

Web Part, Team Site Definition, Blank Site Definition, List Definition, Empty SharePoint Project

Item Templates Web Part, Custom Field, List Definition (with optional

Event Receiver), Content Type (with optional Event Receiver), Module, List Instance, List Event Handler, Template

SharePoint SDK

SHAREPOINT DEVELOPMENT Develop on the server! Seriously, just develop on the server… No, really… do it.

SHAREPOINT WORKFLOWDEMO

OBA PATTERNSOBA Apps as

a Reach Channel

DocumentIntegration

Composite User

Interface

ComplementaryDocument Workflow

DiscoveryNavigation

CollaborativeSite

Application Generated Tasks and

Notifications

2007 Microsoft

Office System

PATTERN: OFFICE APPLICATIONS AS A REACH CHANNEL Extending LOB functionality to more

people Reducing duplication of effort Direct Integration Pattern

Supplementing LOB functionality w/ code Mediated Integration Pattern

Exposing functionality w/o code (e.g. BDC)

PATTERN: DOCUMENT GENERATION Only 30% of data lives in LOBs Can be done by…

Batch creating documentsCreating “intelligent” documents (using

Add-ins)Merging of business data into documents

(could use a custom task pane)

PATTERN: COMPLEMENTARY DOCUMENT WORKFLOW Handling document workflow outside

the LOBThe stuff that usually happens via email

LOB could publish documents to SharePoint library

Workflow may act as a variant on the “intelligent” document pattern

PATTERN: DISCOVERY NAVIGATION Users search for entities and take action Enabled by Business Data Catalog (BDC)

BUSINESS DATA CATALOG

BUSINESS DATA CATALOG

DEMO

PATTERN: COLLABORATIVE SITE Unstructured collaboration in SharePoint

Document librariesDiscussionsTask listsCalendarsProject management toolsMore…

PATTERN: COMPOSITE USER INTERFACE Brings together multiple LOB processes

into one “shell”Composite Client UI (Task Panes, Ribbon

Customization)Composite Web UI (Web Parts)Analytics (BDC, Excel Services,

PerformancePoint)

PATTERN: APPLICATION GENERATED TASKS AND NOTIFICATIONS

Tasks are generated in many systems – this is cumbersomePush vs. Pull modelSynchronization is an issue

Intelligent Tasks & NotificationsEmails requesting vacation time – context is

identified and user is able to act in Outlook Forms-based Tasks & Notification

Utilizes InfoPath in email or via Forms Server

OBA COMPETENCIES .NET BDC InfoPath Open XML SharePoint Workflow WCF & web services

WRAP UP OBAs Office Development

ClientServer

Patterns Call to action: an opportunity to

specialize!

QUESTIONS

RESOURCES Office Business Applications Developer

Portal http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/office/aa

905528.aspx OBA Central

https://www.obacentral.com/default.aspx Visual Studio Extensions for SharePoint

v1.1 http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/detail

s.aspx?FamilyID=3e1dcccd-1cca-433a-bb4d-97b96bf7ab63&displaylang=en

No VS2008 support until ~June ‘08! SharePoint 2007 SDK

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=6D94E307-67D9-41AC-B2D6-0074D6286FA9&displaylang=en