How do you brand a new users MySite in SharePoint Online / Office 365

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9.20K viewsJune 20, 2013Development Microsoft Azure Office 365Powershell SP2013 SPOnline

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Mark Jones1.19K June 20, 2013 0 Comments

We had a good chat around this today around how to brand a MySite at the time it is provisioned in SharePoint Online. The idea is … when the user accesses their MySite for the first time, we wanted to know if you could tap into some vent to swap the Master page to a branded version. Feature Stapling is the obvious option using On-Premise, but this isn’t allows in 365 ..

Matthias EinigHi guys!
MeMorning
Matthias EinigSo out of curiosity if someone has a solution 🙂
Matthias EinigBranding MySites in SharePoint Online? – Not possible automatically only by manual interaction, right?
Stefan Baueryou mean the my content section?
MeNot sure – I only have the cheapo version 🙁
Matthias EinigI mean applying a masterpage to a newly created MySite in SPO
what you would to with a feature stapling feature in on-premises
Mecan you staple in 0365 ?
Stefan Baueri don’t think so.
Medoesn’t that usually require a farm level Feature ?
Matthias Einigas you would have to staple to as webapp feature or farm feature -> no
Mewhich is a no no
Matthias Einigsandboxed solutions work only in SC or web
MeAren’t there some new events now ?
Matthias Einigso stapling is not an option
MeCan you hook them from a sandboxed or via remoting ?
Matthias Einigevents on the self service site creation process?
Thomy Goelleshave a look athttp://blogs.msdn.com/b/richard_dizeregas_blog/archive/2013/04/04/self-service-site-provisioning-using-apps-for-sharepoint-2013.aspx maybe some of the provisioning here can help
08:44
Matthias EinigInteresting Thomy! Thanks, though this seems to create a self service site creation mechanism and not hook into MySite creation, right?
have to read through it entirely though first
Thomy Goellesyeah, it is site provisioning via apps, but maybe the same magic can be applied to mysites
Matthias EinigIf I look into the O365 support forum I find this and herehttp://community.office365.com/en-us/forums/154/t/58396.aspx
where support basically says, nope, we have no idea, but there might be a custom solution out there which we are not allowed to tell you 😉
Hven’t found that one yet unfortunately
Also when I read through that onhttp://captainofsharepoint.wordpress.com/2012/07/24/sharepoint-online-limitations/ I come to the same conclusion
There is of course a way to do that manually, i.e. uploading the master page through CSOM and activating it as described here Matthias Einig09:20https://www.nothingbutsharepoint.com/sites/devwiki/articles/Pages/SharePoint-Online-Changing-Master-Page-through-CSOM.aspx
oopshttps://www.nothingbutsharepoint.com/sites/devwiki/articles/Pages/SharePoint-Online-Changing-Master-Page-through-CSOM.aspx
Stefan Bauergimme a sec
Matthias Einigbut that requires to know when a MySite has been created and start the process manually
1…2…3… 😉
08:49
Thomy Goellesis a tenant admin SC admin on all mysites?
Stefan Bauerhttp://www.sharemuch.com/2013/04/09/screencast-on-how-to-make-changes-to-current-sharepoint-masterpage-using-sharepoint-2013-app/
there is one good article how to change master page using an app.
Matthias EinigThe last linnk I posted has a code sample how to change the masterpage through CSOM
and on Chris O’Brians blog there is an article how to provision a masterpage through an app
still this doesn not solve the problem that when a user is creating his mysite, the branding actions need to be initiated manually
@thomy: not sure but I don’t think so that the tenant admin is SC admin in the mysites
Thomy Goellesso you have to get also the rights first
how do you know a mysite got created?
is there even a hook?
Matthias Einigprobably, would make more sense if it runs in the context of the user who is actually creating the mysite and will become SC Admin
don’t think so
08:54
Thomy Goellessry guys have to split, customer waiting, but I will catch on later! cu
08:57
MeMatt – just googled quite heavily
i was trying to workout if you could hook up the WebProvisioned event remotely
in 365
as you could get the to call back to some service in Azure
but I can’t find much at all
custom dev in 365 = ball ache
Matthias EinigYep, I googled in bing and googled in goolge with no helpful results 😉
wouldn’t have asked before beeing sure 🙂
but I am wondering how others are solving that
there are big SPO tenants who most likely have branding and require to solve that problem…
Meit seems like a very common question
that you would have though would have been resolved
Stefan Bauerthey don’t use it. I mean what you can do is to create a aspx page in the my profile and redirect all links that force the mysite creation the application page.
Memaybe there aren’t that many using 365!
As a dirty solution, can you add some code into the Master page preRender and swap it out ?
Matthias Einig@Mark don’t get what you mean
SPO is provisioning the MySite with the default site definition
Meyeah – you can’t add it to all
Matthias Einigso no custom masterpage or sandboxed solution is yet available
Methat wont work either
cripes!
Matthias Einigand you can’t expect users to upload the branding sanboxed solution manually and activate some features
very odd… I guess MS just doesn’t want us to brand SPO…
Stefan BauerI know a solution that might work.
Matthias Einigon-premises SP? 😉
Stefan Bauerno on O365
Matthias Einighaha, was just kidding -> shoot!
Stefan Bauerin the mysite you have the my.yourdomain.com which is a single site collection and you have the /personal/stefanbauer
for example
but the last thing we want to create with a branding
Matthias Einigexxactly
the mysite host is branded easily manually by uploading a solution and activating a feature
Stefan Bauerok now we brand the my.yourdomain.com first with a custom master page.
09:12
Stefan Bauerwe can smuggle in any kind of code in the custom master page.
MeStefan they are to different site collections though ?
the host one and the users content site
Stefan Bauerthey are many different site collection. Every use have one and one i global.
Matthias Einigexactly, so changed masterpage on the host does not allow us to make changes in the personal site collection
Stefan Bauerwell you can change it. It is not true that you cannot change to host Master Page
i did this several time.
Memmm not sure – they use independent Master pages
Matthias Einigeach site collection has its own masterpage galleryso the mysiste host has its own master page
and each personal site collection too
so I am not getting how I would be able to change the masterpage as soon as any user is creating his personali site colleciton the first time from the my site host
Stefan Baueryou need always go to the profile first before you can create the mycontent.
Matthias Einigtrue
Stefan Bauerso the master page of the profile replaces all links to the mycontent creation to a custom aspx page that is stored in the my profile.
Matthias Einigah, now I get it!
so you want to replace the ootb site provisioning mechanism with a custom one
Stefan Bauerthe aspx page need to make a simple ajax request to the original createion page in context of the user
you can check and monitor if the creation is done.
then pull the branding app from the app catalog somehow and activate it
in the mycontent
got it
?
Matthias EinigGot it.
translating a german saying “from the back through the chest into the eye…”
Stefan Bauerthe normal sp approach
Matthias Einighehe
09:23
Stefan Baueri think the feature stapling or provisioning handler do nothing different. All you need to do is to replace the creation page with a new custom creation page.
09:24
Stefan Bauerand now there is silent 😉
Mecan you disable auto provisioning of MySites in SharePoint Online ?
Stefan Baueryou can disable self site creation but then the user won’t get the mycontent page if he requests it.
Mewell I was thinking …
1.. Disable it
2.. Replace it with some kind of “Request your site Page”
3.. This calls back to a service outside
4.. Then powershell the mysite apply the branding, email the user
09:28
Matthias Einigsorry, was distracted 🙂
@Mark: I want to avoid a manual process
esp with a tenant with multiple thousand users…
🙂
Stefan Bauer@mark i think this only gets harder. someone needs to create a site, add the link to the profile, add the branding, make the user as SC admin
Meit wouldn’t be manual
you turn it off
create a page on the “main site”
which says “Create your MySite”
this calls out of 365 to your service
which calls back and creates it
customizes it
and then gives them the site
Matthias EinigReading powershell I thought more of a manual solution
but then it could run as an app like the provisioning solution mentioned above by Thomy
MeGreat discussion this Matthias
when its over we should paste is a discussion
something that;s highly needed is very tough to do
09:34
Meis it over ?
Matthias EinigReal world problem provide the best discussion topics right 🙂
Meyeah
Stefan Bauerit’s not over yet. might have another idea
Mehehe
GO Stefan
the ideas are flowing
Matthias Einigso let’s hear it!
Stefan Bauerisn’t there a way where you can define the template the ssc should use?
i mean you can use ssc outsite of mycontent too.
09:37
Matthias Einignot that I am aware of
but in SPO you can not provision a custom site template which can be used for a site colleciton, right?
so you would need to create the site collection without template
upload the template with a sanboxed solutoin
and then create the web.
Stefan Baueryeah you are right stupid idea. the first one was better
delete it from the log 😉
Matthias Einighaha
no, the internet never forgets! 🙂
Stefan Baueryeah i know.
Matthias EinigSo Mark, I would say we stop here for now. I will digg into it more and get back if I find a solution (or not)
Thanks to you all for your input!!!