WSS Contributor Permissions

Ok so you have set up your Site collection and you have a site that you want folks to be able to add items to say a calendar and an announcement web part but you don't want them to be able to modify the web part on the page itself. It's a simple set-up just not one explicitly defined in the general/basic books/sites out there. Here's the steps;

1. Create the site and select "use unique permission" rather than inherhit from parent.

2. Create the calendar list and the announcement list and place a view on your site default page.

NOTE: By doing steps 1 and 2 in order you have accomplished the following: the site has specific Owner, Member and Reader groups and the two lists are inheriting permissions from the site.

3. Edit the permissions of the lists(by doing this you break inheritance from the site) but you don't have to change any permissions, you just want to break inheritance so any changes you make on the site level do not propigate down to the lists.

4. Now at the site level modify the Member group to read only.

By doing these 4 steps you keep the ability for the Member to be able to add, edit or delete items in the list but they no longer can Modify the web part itself on the page.

Good luck and Happy SharePointing

SPS Naming Conventions

Site Names

In WSS Site Names may not contain the following characters: \ / : * ? " < > | # { } % & " ~ +

You cannot start a site name, subsite name, or a site group name with an underscore (_) character or with the period character (I recommend avoiding the (_) underscore in site names)

You cannot use the period character consecutively in the middle of a site name

You cannot use the period character at the end of a site name


File Names

Invalid characters: " # % & * : < > ? \ / { | } ~ 

Cannot be longer than 128 characters

You cannot use the period character consecutively in the middle of a file name

You cannot use the period character at the end of a file name

You cannot start a file name with the period character


Folder Names

You cannot use the following characters anywhere in a folder name or a server name: ~ # % & * { } \ : < > ? / | "

Cannot be longer than 128 characters

You cannot use the period character consecutively in the middle of a folder name

You cannot use the period character at the end of a folder name

You cannot start a folder name with the period character

Good WSS FAQ

For an excellent WSS resource pay a quick visit to http://wss.collutions.com/.

This one covers it all...
Introduction I
General II
Installation III
Administration IV
Basic Customization V
Interaction with Office VI
Tutorials VII
Documents and Web Sites
Articles
WSS v3 FAQ
STS (v1.0) FAQ

Theme Customization

For a fantastic to the point tutorial on creating custom themes check out this MSDN link;

http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa979310.aspx

Also, for the no bones UI FAQ, Heather Solomon is the place to go.

http://www.heathersolomon.com/blog/category/8.aspx

Excellent Developer Resource

If you don't mind the large poster sized charts, these free offerings from MindSharp are fantastic dev references.

https://www.mindsharp.com/Default.aspx?page=Login&destPage=RoadmapRequest

Comparison of features that are included in Windows SharePoint Services and in SharePoint Portal Server 2003

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb%3bEN-US%3b830320

http://www.microsoft.com/sharepoint/evaluationoverview.asp

Beginning SharePoint development

So you're wanting to create a custom web part? Well from one beginner to another let me walk you through the basics.

Environment:
You need to set up the proper development environment. While you can develop from a separate computer from the server that holds your SharePoint Portal, I will be showing you how to develop from the server itself. More experienced devs can chime in with best practice advice.
--Load Visual Studio 2005 (any version) on the SharePoint Portal server.
--Load Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 Tools: Visual Studio 2005 Extensions on the SharePoint Portal Server (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=19F21E5E-B715-4F0C-B959-8C6DCBDC1057&displaylang=en)

Now you're ready to go.

Procedure:
Here are just a few tutorial links for initial development... best way to learn is jump in and get wet.
(http://www.datasprings.com/Resources/ArticlesInformation/Sharepoint2007CustomWebParts/tabid/775/Default.aspx)
(http://www.intranetjournal.com/articles/200510/ij_10_10_05a.html)
(http://msdn.microsoft.com/msdnmag/issues/05/09/WebParts/default.aspx)
(http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=48B2C899-DB2C-4A93-AA95-AF4A37FA8AE8&displaylang=en)
(http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms564508.aspx)
(http://www.15seconds.com/issue/040218.htm)

Here are some language references (remember SharePoint is written in C#)
(http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/vcsharp/default.aspx)
(http://www.csharpfriends.com/)
(http://www.dotnetfun.com/)
(http://www.c-sharpcorner.com/)
(http://www.csharp-station.com/Default.aspx)
(http://www.codeproject.com/index.asp?cat=3)


Good Luck!