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How I'm Learning SharePoint

The fact that I'm learning SharePoint development (again) might seem like an about turn, seeing as though I didn't have much good to say about it a couple of years back when I first delved in.

But back then I was using SharePoint 2007, which by all accounts, was a dog. In comparison SharePoint 2010 is a dream to work with. Dare I say it, it's almost enjoyable.

My adventures with SharePoint back then were short-lived. Although it was enough to give me a good grounding and understanding of what's involved, but not so much to mean I don't have to re-learn lots of the finer detail of it from scratch again this time round.

So, I already have an understanding of what SharePoint is and what the key design elements are. But I still want to learn it all over again - from scratch - and here's how I'm doing that.

Learning

I've always been a believer in learning by messing. "Messy play" if you will. Dig in and get your hands dirty. It's how I've learnt most of what I know about the technologies I currently use. I've never been on a formal training course or to any conference lectures or read many books.

In the past I've been asked by Lotus Notes developers to recommend books to learn web development. I always just said get in there and mess with it and have never recommended any books.

However, with SharePoint this approach doesn't seem as applicable (I've tried in the past to learn SharePoint by playing with it and it gets you nowhere fast).

I've gone against my own advice and turned back to books. Albeit a more modern approach, which you can see in the photo below, where I have an iPad next to my keyboard, running the Kindle app and within easy reach for a left-handed flip of the page every now and then.

2012-04-27 12.30.35

I'm working my way through the Microsoft SharePoint 2010 Developer Reference and am about 26% of the way through it. It's a good book and I'd recommend it based on what I've read so far.

As I work through the book I'm also following along from inside Visual Studio, using the downloadable source code that accompanies the book.

The book assumes some working knowledge of ASP.NET (in particular "classic" WebForms), which, thankfully, I have and without which the book wouldn't make as much sense as it is doing. If you're going to learn SharePoint and have no experience of ASP.NET and or IIS then you may well struggle a little.

If you're coming to SharePoint straight from a pure Lotus Notes development angle, with little web development knowledge, then I'm not sure how well you'll do. There are many parallels between the Notes paradigms and those used in SharePoint which make the transition between the two relatively easy, but there's no escaping the fact it's a pure web platform you're moving to.

At the same time as reading the above book I'm also reading Programming C# 4.0 (even though SharePoint 2010 supports a lesser version of C#, it's still a relevant read). I'm reading this book on my Kindle, while away from the desk.

I bought a Kindle Touch last week on impulse while in Tesco and I'm so glad I did. I'd always assumed it would be superfluous, seeing as though I have an iPad, but the Kindle is different enough to allow it a worthy place in our house.

It's entirely feasible that you could have been a Notes/Domino (client/web) developer for 10+ years and have little idea what a class is. Let alone an interface or a delegate or what it means to extend  classes. If this is the case you're in for a rude awakening. Although the above C# book is good in that it takes things easy and assumes little prior coding experience.

Luckily for me I'm not in that position as I've delved in to other technologies outside of Domino enough times to have needed to learn about the fundamentals of programming. Despite this I'm still reading back through the whole of the Programming C# book merely as a refresher course.

Taking it Further

As well as the two books mentioned above, I have bought a handful of other SharePoint books to work through as well as an exam study-guide, using which I plan to become a Microsoft certified SharePoint developer.

Here are the SharePoint books I've added to my Kindle app so far:

Yeah, I know. I got a bit carried away. O'Reilly had a 50% off for a day deal going on. All in, when including purchasing Visual Studio 2010 Pro and a Kindle and all the above books it's been a heavy investment so far. You can see I'm not taking the idea lightly.

Ultimately my challenge is - as with learning anything new - to do something interesting and useful with the new-found knowledge. Reading is one thing; doing is another. I'm going to create an actual working site in SharePoint. That is probably the point at which it will become interesting for you guys to follow along.

Comments

  1. Looking forward to your no nonsense views on SP development

      • avatar
      • Jake Howlett
      • Tue 1 May 2012 06:08 AM

      Don't expect them all to be negative though! So far I've been pleasantly surprised by how much I'm liking development with SP2010. Maybe that will all change when I actually try and do something outside the ordinary (as it did when I tried with SP2007)...

      Show the rest of this thread

    • avatar
    • Ulf
    • Tue 1 May 2012 01:24 PM

    Take a look at this page as well, lot of learning resources from Microsoft:

    http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepoint/aa905692

    • avatar
    • axel
    • Tue 1 May 2012 02:42 PM

    Looks like if you have enough books, but if you like even more, manning has an special offer for each book (ebook or not) until may 2nd:

    37% off orders under $50--use code a2637

    42% off orders over $50--use code a2642

    50% off orders over $100--use code a2650

    Offer applies to your entire purchase--eBook, pBook, or MEAP. Expires May 2. Only at manning.com

    • avatar
    • DG
    • Wed 2 May 2012 04:21 AM

    Sounds great as ever Jake, do keep posting. By the way have you installed 2010? I'd be interested to hear your set up or thoughts (single server?) as we'll be starting to learn 2010 shortly, and I'll need to plan the best environment.

      • avatar
      • Jake Howlett
      • Wed 2 May 2012 05:40 AM

      Yep, 2010 on Windows 7 (x64) laptop. Here's the setup guide (follow it TO THE LETTER)

      http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee554869.aspx

    • avatar
    • Andrew Vevers
    • Sat 12 May 2012 07:10 PM

    Hi Jake

    You might find this of interest - an article I wrote last year:

    http://sharepointmagazine.net/artic.. ..-leaving-lotus-notes-and-moving-to-microsoft-sharepoint

    It's not a dev article, but offers a few comparisons between Lotus Notes and SharePoint.

    You might also find InfoPath 2010 an interesting form development IDE. It integrates quite nicely with SharePoint 2010 (still some issues with its code-behind model, but better than SharePoint 2007) and is the closest match to Notes from a RAD development point of view (although SharePoint is much more RAD than 2007!)

    A quick list of programs/utilities that will likely make your SharePoint 2010 development time easier:

    - SharePoint 2010 Manager (a great SharePoint farm explorer) - http://spm.codeplex.com/

    - CKS dev tools (excellent Visual Studio SharePoint 2010 extensions) - http://cksdev.codeplex.com/

    - PowerGUI - great PowerShell IDE (and PowerShell *is* a requirement for SharePoint developers) - http://powergui.org/index.jspa

    Just three to consider initially. There's more great stuff out there, but I like to recommend these.

    Andrew

      • avatar
      • Jake Howlett
      • Mon 14 May 2012 04:35 AM

      Thanks Andrew!

    • avatar
    • Lance
    • Sun 3 Jun 2012 08:09 AM

    Jake,

    Any chance you could categorize your .net/sharepoint articles so they could more easily be found?

    • avatar
    • Brandon
    • Thu 14 Jun 2012 11:33 AM

    Hi,

    I stumbled across this site while looking for information on learning sharepoint. I'm a college student about to enter the MIS program. I haven't received any database training yet but, as a stubborn DIYer, I would like to begin learning sharepoint now. The company I work for has offered to provide me with a dedicated server to play with so I figured I'd give it a shot.

    Unfortunately I have zero experience with servers or databases. I'm trying to find some guidance for people who TRULY qualify as database dummies. Do you have any knowledge on where to start? I understand this is a daunting task, but I have a lot of time on my hands. Any info you can offer would be greatly appreciated.

    Thanks!

    -Brandon

    • avatar
    • Mike
    • Sat 23 Mar 2013 12:43 PM

    i want to learn sharepoint 2010 on my own...i first just want to learn how to be a power user and then administration or development, but i have no $ to buy sharepoint 2010 or SQL server..i dont have $ to attend microsoft training classes either...any suggestions? thanks.

      • avatar
      • Jake Howlett
      • Sun 24 Mar 2013 01:53 AM

      Hi Mike. Do you have enough to buy a TechNet subscription? About $300.

      Or perhaps the bizspark programme by Microsoft...

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Written by Jake Howlett on Tue 1 May 2012

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CodeStore is all about web development. Concentrating on Lotus Domino, ASP.NET, Flex, SharePoint and all things internet.

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