For those of you that know me, I spend my days immersed in everything Collab365-related (including this site). I’ve actually just finished an intense 6 week dev cycle for MicroJobs and now I’ve moved my attention to find ways to make it easier for us to manage it.
Specifically, I want to build a MicroJobs Dashboard in our Office 365 Tenant.
This management dashboard needs to do things like :
- Approve new Freelancers
- Monitor the orders and sales
- Manage disputes, and a whole load more!
- Manage the Collab365 Teams tasks
Now the next question in my mind … I want it in SharePoint online but how do we build it?
Due to the massive amount of time I spend in the community, I keep my finger on the pulse and I know that the SharePoint Framework is something I needed to master, so what are my options?
I’ve come from a full farm solutions / features background. I am very comfortable with WSP’s but this isn’t going to cut it in Office 365.
So, given I know what I know, I had questions in my mind such as :
- How do I set up a development environment?
- What tools do I need?
- How do I deploy and test my stuff and to where?
- How do I debug it?
- How do I develop Web Parts using the modern UI into SharePoint?
- How to create scheduled tasks?
- How to secure it and manage the authentication between MicroJobs and SharePoint?
Now, if I take a guess, these are all questions that every new SPFx developer will have on their mind.
Once you start to scratch the surface in each topic, this usually leads you down the path of even more learning. Every topic seems to require me to have a 100 browser tabs open so that I can do lots of reading and investigation.
Before you know it, you burn a couple of days just creating your development environment. (Did you know an SPFx “hello world” project has nearly 6000 files and weighs in at 400 Mb!)
The self-learning approach sucks for these reasons:
- I don’t know the whole picture before I dive in, so there’s going to be a LOT of mistakes made.
- I don’t know where to look for the information.
- There’s repetition and cross over in the posts + the quality varies dramatically.
- I also don’t like reading books to learn development stuff as they’re static and I learn tech stuff best by watching and doing.
- I have no support or anyone to ask.
- It takes way too much time.
So I decided to sign up for Andrew Connell’s “Mastering SharePoint Framework” training. After all he is the “king of SPFx” and lives and breathes this stuff. I remember watching him present at a SharePoint Conference and he’s one of those guys that could teach rocket science to a bunch of kids.
Let’s get into the course:
In Andrew’s course he teaches the following areas (there’s more, but this is just what I was concentrating on):
- The history so far – This is a good recap and also makes you realise how many different approaches MS have taken to get to SPFx.
- Overview of SPFx – What it is and why it was so desperately needed.
- Building your dev env – How to install all of the stuff such as:
- NPM,
- Webpack,
- Gulp,
- Node,
- Yeoman,
- VSCode,
- Typescript
- How to dev Client-side WebParts the “modern way” including property panes
- How and when to use other libraries such as AnglularJS, Office UI Fabric, React, Knockout, JQuery
- Logging and Debugging – essential for bug fixing.
- How to package and deploy to your production tenant.
- Version Management – can be a total mess if this isn’t handled properly.
- Branding and Design – Take your control of themes and CSS
- How to use the SharePoint API to go get your data!
- Testing an SPFx solution
- Localising it (so it’s multilingual)
Number 3 alone is something that would literally take you days to work out by reading blog post after blog post. Following AC’s lessons, I literally sat at my desk, mimicked what he did and voila I had all the goodies. This part took me < 60 minutes as I speed watched some of the history.
In addition to having them installed, I also know what problem each one is going to solve. (yesterday, I knew nothing about Node, MPB, Webpack, Gulp and Yeoman). I don’t know them in-depth and nor do I want to unless I hit a problem. If I do, I will dig deeper. In other words, to steal an aircraft analogy, they’re all black boxed to me until one of them crashes and I need to investigate.
Am I going straight in and building my MicroJobs dashboard? Hell, NO!
Before I get stuck into building the “MicroJobs dashboard” I know (based on many experiences) that I needed to pick something that was simple (but robust) enough to build in a few hours, but not the actual “thing”.
Why?
This is because my first stab at something new is never production quality. It usually works, but I learn better ways to do it as climb my learning curve. I will almost certainly to do it in a better way next time. You also get bogged down on the business requirements which distracts from the purpose of this, which is to learn.
So when you take Andrew’s training, pick something fun and easy to build. Who knows that little idea might flourish into a nice little util you can sell 🙂
Still with me?
Here are the steps you should take to learn the SharePoint Framework:
- Think of something simple you want to build with SPFx
- >> Purchase Andrew’s SPFx course page + our bonuses (This is about what you can earn in 2 days as an SPFx contractor).
- Set aside 3 hours per night for a week OR like I prefer just book out a weekend and nail it.
- When he teaches you something, implement it immediately. Don’t watch the entire thing in one go.
- Ask questions in Andrew’s forums.
Now the big question … is $750 for the Ultimate Bundle too much?
Based on who is buying and what you’re doing as a career this can be justified very easily:
- If you head up a team of developers, then I bet everyone of your devs is charged internally at 500$. If you ask them all to go learn it the non guided way, you’re going to have mistakes, bugs and have to say goodbye to 3 weeks just waiting for them to get up to the same level that Andrew could take them in 2 full days. (4500$ vs 750$)
- If you’re a permanent developer SPFx is THE thing to know. It’s going to light up your C.V. and make you far more employable. If you can’t get your employer to pay, then pay for it yourself and this will be the biggest asset on your C.V.
- Maybe “you don’t have time?” I am writing this on a Sunday instead of watching Netflix. I will stop to watch Lewis Hamilton (hopefully) win his 5th World title, but there’s always time to spare on your own personal development.
- If you’re a contractor, this could very easily be the skill that allows you clinch that next role!
- We’re now in pilot live on MicroJobs so when you’ve become an expert why not help others by offering a MicroJob, or, if you know something else really well, consider offering it to help cover those costs!
If you need proof, SPFx is in demand: Check these jobs on indeed.
So that leads me to a final Call To Action.
Get your notepad ready to take some serious notes, set aside some time and “Master the SharePoint Framework“.