Creating sites of custom templates with SharePoint Designer workflow
by Yaroslav Pentsarskyy
Here is the scenario: You need to create a sub-site based on user filling out a SharePoint out of the box list form that will define the sub-site. In my recent scenario I had a list where user created item defining a “client”. For each of those clients I needed to create a sub-site that obviously inherited certain template that I defined by
saving my site as a template.
The problem here is that by default SharePoint Designer doesn`t allow to create a site; this type of action just doesn’t exist in default installation of this tool. If I had to create a workflow like this using Visual Studio – depending on the rest of the details it would have taken me from about 2 to 4 days. My goal is to show you how you can achieve this within less than few hours using SharePoint Designer.
The solution is:
1. Download SharePoint designer extended activities from
http://spdactivities.codeplex.com/
2. Install activities as instructed on CodePlex site.
3. Create a new workflow from SharePoint designer on a desired SharePoint list or library.
4. Create a step within your workflow logic as follows:
4.1 Specify site URL
4.2 Specify the title of the site.
4.3 Define which template the site will be using by the following steps Open your site with Internet explorer 8 (that has
IE Dev toolbar installed).
Click Site Actions ->Create -> Sites and Workspaces. Once you see a list of all of the available template categories and templates – select the one you`d like to base your site off and click F12 to launch your
IE Developer Toolbar. Mark the template you wish to use in your workflow and IE Dev Tooplbar will bring up a piece of HTML that hides the template ID. You will need to copy down the template ID to your SharePoint Designer activity. Here is how template ID will appear in Dev toolbar once template is picked from the drop down list:
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5. Finalize and deploy your workflow. This quite a common scenario makes things you thought are possible only with custom Visual Studio workflow – doable within hours in SPD. If in doubt, drop me a note.
Feel free to drop me a note in case you have question; visit my blog at www.sharemuch.com
Yaroslav Pentsarskyy
