Smart Tricks to Follow While Working With Modern SharePoint Sites

In this blog, you will learn about smart tricks to follow while working with Modern SharePoint Sites.

Introduction 

 

Hi guys, I would like to show you a few special short cuts and smart tricks to save time and improve your performance while working with the Modern SharePoint Environment both Online and On-Prem 2019.

1. Always work with SP Admin Centre by directly going to the Modern Admin Center:- https://<TenantName>-admin.sharepoint.com/_layouts/15/online/AdminHome.aspx#/siteManagement to do lots of simple operations on your Modern Sites like Registering/Unregistering as a Hub, Association/De-Association to a Hub, Quick Renaming, URL Renaming, Site Owners changes, Title, Description changes, etc.
   
   
2. Whenever you want to have a Global Header Navigation on a Modern Site it can't be programmatically built through PowerShell or through Quick Launch available under Site Settings. Just Register it as a Hub and you have Edit options to start adding your URLs with respective Headings OR direct Headings without any URLs.
   
   
3. If your changes on the Navigation tabs don’t get reflected just delete those and re-create fresh tabs to have them reflected. Some default Navigation tabs can’t be renamed and reused with your custom Headings and URLs, hence its better delete and create fresh tabs.
   
   
4. Always use a Communication site to get registered as a Hub site, as there are a lot of default options such as SiteFooter enabled to have it customized.
   
   
5. We also have Quick Launch to have the 2^nd level Navigation set up to be implemented on the Modern Communication Site or a Hub site. While a Modern Team Site has a Quick Launch but can only be reflected as a Left Navigation menu in appearance.
   
   
6. Always apply a good Custom Theme to avoid the default available Custom Themes on Modern SP Online sites.
   
   
7. For SP On Prem2019 Modern Sites just go with the Custom Color Palette concept which is described clearly over here.
   
   
8. To implement Security Trimming just go with the Modern News WP OR go with a Hub Site collection with Multiple Classic Subsites which has default Security Trimming Feature enabled. As per the Roadmap we are yet to have the Security Trimming options available on the Modern WPs like Quick Links & Content Highlight WP.
   
   
9. Before working with the Modern WebParts, please try to have an overview by checking the below blogs as per your different purposes:
   
   https://www.c-sharpcorner.com/blogs/highlights-of-modern-sharepoint-web-parts-part-1
   https://www.c-sharpcorner.com/blogs/highlights-of-modern-sharepoint-web-parts-part-2
   
   
10. For a Complete Overview of all the Modern Sites Concepts please refer here before proceeding and developments.
    
    For further concepts like Shared Calendar Development refer here.
    
    Meta Data Driven Term Store Managed Navigation implementation on the Modern Sites refer here.
    
    
11. There are various ways of Modern Sites Customizations. Please check here.
    
    Those who are comfortable working with JSON go with Site Designs and Site Scripts but it has limitations on the Site Page Layouts for which we need to go with PnP PowerShell Schema.
    
    There is no Save as a Template option for the Modern Sites, therefore go with this cloning process for copying and reusing the Structure, Layouts, Positioning, Navigations, SiteFooters, etc. It's the same as it is on a New Modern Site, but without content.
    
    
12. For Content Restoration just go with the ShareGate Migration and if it’s still complicated go ahead with Metallogix Migration.
    
    
13. For enabling New Experience on your Lists/Libraries go with List Settings>> Advanced Settings>> Enable New Experience in order to make use of the PowerApps, Power Automaton integrations and customize on them further.
    
    Please check out the below links to be more familiar with the above concepts.
    
    https://www.c-sharpcorner.com/blogs/best-practices-for-powerapps
    https://www.c-sharpcorner.com/blogs/smart-way-to-learn-powerapps-ms-flows-related-concepts2
    https://www.c-sharpcorner.com/blogs/ms-flow-creation-simple-steps-to-follow
    
    
14. Hybrid Experience set up is a very good process. Follow the below steps to have it implemented in the given order.
    
    
    Provisioning Azure VM
    
    
    Sign in to the Azure portal here.
    Create a Virtual Machine[VM] Image with SharePoint 2019 Server.
    SharePoint 2019 Azure VMs & Installing SQL Server Edition 2019
    
    
    Please follow here to complete the SharePoint Server 2019 Configuration successfully.
    Note
    Install SQL Server 2016/2019 On-Premises Developer Edition in the above process.
    
    
    Creating DNS in the Azure VM
    
    
    Follow the steps for this process in this link.
    Note
    Office Portal Domain name should be taken as it is for the Domain Name Creation for exact synching with the existing SP Online Domain User Accounts. Here we created the Domain as “Cambaycs.com”.
    
    
    Creating Web Apps & Site Collections
    
    
    - During the time of Running the Farm Configuration Wizard get the Central Admin URL.
    - Login to the Central Admin.
    - Select Create Web Apps and start creating as per the requirement.
    - Select Create Site Collections and use Communication Site Template as we are working for Modern Experience.
    - Assign User/Group Permissions for establishing the Permission management.
     
    Create Service Applications
    
    
    List of Service Applications to be created for Hybrid:
    
    
    User Profile
    App Management
    Profile Synchronization
    Manage Meta Data
    To Search Service Application, follow here.
    For a more customized Search Results creation and configuration, please follow the steps over here.
    Proxies for the above Service Applications created will also be automatically reflected.
    Active Directory Synchronizations & Windows AD to Azure AD Synchronization & Pass-through Authentication and SSO
    
    
    For this process completely go through here before starting.
    Follow the steps mentioned in the YouTube Video without any deviation to achieve a Seamless Single Sign On for the SharePoint Hybrid Environment.
     
    Prerequisites for Hybrid Configuration Wizard
    
    
    Make sure all the above Service Applications are set up and are running in the SP On-Prem Environment.
     
    Run the Hybrid Configuration Wizard
    
    
    To run the Hybrid Configuration Wizard please follow this link here, and tune the steps by doing the necessary changes as per the requirements.
     
    Start working and verifying on both the SP Online and SP On-Prem and experience the Hybrid Environment especially in the following concepts,
    SSO Verification
    User Profile Synch
    Term Store Management Updation
    Search Results across all the default Scopes and customizations including custom Refiners
    
    
    We can use different Persona User Accounts with different Permission levels in both the Environments OR only a particular Environment for testing different Hybrid User scenarios.
    
    
15. We can implement the Hybrid Usage in order to achieve the below following primary Use Cases,
    
    Use Case #1 – Seamless Navigation across On-Prem SP and SPO
    
    
    Both the scenarios for Seamless Navigation across On-Prem SP and SPO and vice versa are to be successful.
    
    Use Case #2 – Integrated Search Experience between On-Prem and SPO
     
    Now try checking the Search Service in both the available environments. Try searching for some Documents, say: Legal under the given Search page. You need to see both kinds of mixed Search results from SPO[labeled as SharePoint Online] and SP On Prem[labeled as SharePoint On-Premise] which can be customized and added in the Search Experience page. You can click the links to navigate to their respective path. We can also select further options like SharePoint On-Premise to narrow down all the On-Prem based Search results only. Similarly, we can select the SharePoint Online tab to filter down all the Online based Search results only. We can also achieve People-based Search to drill down to their respective Delve profiles. After clicking View Profile it leads to the selected User-specific Delve Profile.
     
    Note
    Both SP Online and On-Prem people-based Search results will drive to only the Delve section as shown above.
    Only make use of Documents with different Contents for Test Library Uploads so as not to have any Count mismatch while you are using Hybrid Search Experience. If otherwise goto Search Results Web part and set it to Show Duplicates to avoid Count mismatch problem.
    Hence both the scenarios for Seamless Navigation across On-Prem SP and SPO Integrated Search Experience between On-Prem and SPO are to be successful as per the User Case 2 requirement.
    
    Use Case #3 – Inherited Metadata Driven Capability and Metadata Service
     
    When we try to use the Search Centre Page with some Search keywords we achieved the Meta Data driven Refiners which have been created using the required content types that can be used for our Document Management. When we try to do some changes by adding/updating/deleting term sets in the Term Store Group in the SP Online it gets automatically reflected on the Hybrid associated SP-On Premises Site space containing the similar Term Store Group.
     
    Note
    The above scenario, when tried in vice-versa, doesn’t get reflected as it’s not supported by Microsoft for the Hybrid Environment.
    When we try to add a New Group which is not Hybrid configured will also not get reflected on the SharePoint On-Prem space.
    It’s due to the successful Hybrid Set up established between both the sites from both the environments.
    The Timer Job Taxonomy Groups Replication available in On-Prem under Timer Jobs in the Central Admin Menu is responsible for this updating which runs once in a day and can be manually run for faster reflection of the Metadata driven Managed Term Set changes either way.