EndUserSharePoint.com: Can I save a view and use it in another library?
The question of the day comes from Susan in Kansas:
I have document libraries (different ones) that I store videos for the different applications that I train on, i.e., Word, Excel, etc. I created a library to store my flash files and want to do this for other libraries. I have my view customized for my flash library just the way I want it and want to re-use this same view for additional video libraries. I couldn’t find a way to save the view (like site content) for use in other libraries. Is there a way to do this?
It does work with SharePoint Designer, but it is very much a “hack” and may be removed if an administrator attempts to reset to the site definition for the entire site. — Chris
This sounds like something that could be really useful. I’m curious to know if anyone else has found a solution. — Mark
Mark / Chris,
After seeing this question, I decided to look at what it would take to do this in SPD and came up with a (not too painfull) walkthrough:
http://www.sharepointblogs.com/dez/archive/2008/02/12/how-can-i-save-a-custom-view-and-reuse-it-in-another-document-library.aspx
After reading a user comment on the realistic “usability” of this method however, it almost seems unrealistic to go through the steps to try and do this in SPD since it’s much simpler to just create/duplicate the view(s) from within SharePoint itself.
Based on this, I was all set to look and see what I could come up with as a coded solution for this problem instead, but before I began I thought I’d at least try and search for something existing already that may have this functionality. After a rather quick search (first page of results – gotta love Google), I came accross this on CodePlex:
http://www.codeplex.com/sushi
From what I’ve been able to determine by playing with this app some, it works fine in Wss 3.0 (although originally written for SPS2003 I believe), and has the added ability to copy accross different site collections.
Using it is quite easy:
Choose the target site from a list of site collections that you drill down through, choose the target list or library, then drill back down through the list of site collections to find the source site, source list or library, source view, then do the copy.
Looks like this may be a great option in lieu of a “Save View as Template” option in SharePoint “Version – next”.
- Dink
Dink has found a couple possible solutions over on his blog… check it out here:
http://www.sharepointblogs.com/dez/archive/2008/02/12/how-can-i-save-a-custom-view-and-reuse-it-in-another-document-library.aspx
Mark