SharePoint Integration

XLCubed have developed an option for tighter integration with SharePoint, allowing SharePoint to act as a repository for XLCubedWeb reports, so publication and report navigation is contained within SharePoint.

Installing

There are several steps to complete configuration, this requires XLCubedWeb to be already setup and configured. There are 2 ways to display the reports, as standalone pages redirecting the user to XLCubedWeb or by creating a "Container" page so the report is displayed within a standard SharePoint page.

Option 1:

Option 2:

Custom Handler

XLCubed Handler Assembly

The first stage is to install the custom handler for XLCubed Reports on the SharePoint server. You need to download and extract following file:

https://www.xlcubed.com/downloads/XLCubed.HandlerMapping.zip

Once installed this needs to be installed in the GAC, the easiest way is to use Windows Explorer to drag the file into the \windows\Assembly folder.

Windows Server 2012

To install an assembly to the GAC in 2012, you will need to run PowerShell as an Administrator and use the following commands (assuming the assembly has been extracted to "c:\xl3"):

Set-location "c:\xl3"
[System.Reflection.Assembly]::Load("System.EnterpriseServices, Version=4.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a")
$publish = New-Object System.EnterpriseServices.Internal.Publish
$publish.GacInstall("c:\xl3\xlcubed.handlermapping.dll")
iisreset

Register Handler with IIS

You now need to register the Assembly with IIS, this can be done by editing the SharePoint web.config, usually in:

\inetpub\wwwroot\wss\VirtualDirectories\80

in the

 <system.web>
    <compilation>
       <assemblies>

collection add the line:

       <add assembly="XLCubed.HandlerMapping, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=add6446b63d88928" />

in:

 <system.webServer>
    <modules>

Add the following:

     <add name="XLCubedModule" type="XLCubed.HandlerMapping.XLCubedModule, XLCubed.HandlerMapping, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=add6446b63d88928" />

Set icon file type

Download the following file: https://www.xlcubed.com/downloads/xlcubed.gif and copy it to the "Template\Images" folder, for example:

\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Web Server Extensions\14\Template\Images

or for SharePoint 2013 (the 14 folder exists, but use the 15 instead):

\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Web Server Extensions\15\Template\Images

Then edit "docicon.xml" in the "Template\Xml" folder (\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Web Server Extensions\14\Template\Xml) and add the following line to:

 <DocIcons>
   <ByExtension>

   <Mapping Key="xl3wbz" Value="xlcubed.gif"/>

And for Version 8 onwards the following additional extension:

   <Mapping Key="xl3abz" Value="xlcubed.gif"/>

Custom Report Page (Optional)

If you want to display the XLCubed Reports within the context of Sharepoint (Option 2 in the example screens), then you can do that by using creating a page containg a custom webpart.

WebPart installation

Follow the standard SharePoint Web Part guide.

Page creation

Create a page to display all XLCubed reports in, in this case we'll call it XLCubedReport.

Insert a "XLCubed Page Viewer" web part and edit it:

Set the height of the web part and change the "Chrome Type" to none:

Under "Custom Properties" set "Report URL" to the following (updating it to reflect the actual xlcubedweb location):

 http://servername/xlcubedweb/WebForm/ShowReport.aspx

After setting the properties you should see an XLCubed error message, this is fine it's showing that the page is able to find the server but hasn't been supplied with a report to display yet.

Configure redirect

The next step is to add the configuration items required for the custom handler installed previously. Open the SharePoint web.config, usually in:

 \inetpub\wwwroot\wss\VirtualDirectories\80 

To the section:

 <configuration>
    <appSettings>    

Add a new key:

   <add key="XLCubedReportURL" value="http://hvxl3-sp/SitePages/XLCubedReport.aspx?rep=%rep%&amp;embedded=SharePoint&amp;toolbar=true" />

If you are going for "Option 1" enter the XLCubedWeb server address:

 http://xlcubedservername/xlcubedweb/WebForm/ShowReport.aspx?rep=%rep%&embedded=SharePoint

If you have created a custom sharepoint page then use that instead:

 http://sharepointserver/SitePages/XLCubedReport.aspx?rep=%rep%&embedded=SharePoint

If you want to include a toolbar when display reports, you can add the following:

 &toolbar=true

Subsites

You can also use a relative path to keep navigation within the context of any sub-sites:

 ./XLCubedReport.aspx?rep=%rep%&embedded=SharePoint

With this kind of configuration a SharePoint XLCubed Report page would need to be created in the every location to which reports can be published (i.e. \sites\subsite\sitepages\xlcubedreport.aspx, \SitePages\XLCubedReport.aspx etc.)

Load-balanced SharePoint

If SharePoint is load balanced then the public address that users access will be different to the internal address, this can prevent the communication between XLCubed and SharePoint from working.

You can add an extra setting to the SharePoint web.config to give the public address:

   <add key="XLCubedPublicAddress" value="public.server.name"/>

Searching

To allow published reports to be indexed by SharePoint you need to register the report extension type with SharePoint and then add the file type to the list of files to be indexed.

The SharePoint crawler will index the contents of the Workbook as it was at publication time.

Register file extension

Add the following reg keys (updating the version of SharePoint if not 2010):

 [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Office Server\14.0\Search\Setup\ContentIndexCommon\Filters\Extension\.xl3wbz]
 @=hex(7):7b,00,32,00,30,00,45,00,38,00,32,00,33,00,43,00,32,00,2d,00,36,00,32,\
 00,46,00,33,00,2d,00,34,00,36,00,33,00,38,00,2d,00,39,00,36,00,42,00,44,00,\
 2d,00,39,00,30,00,46,00,34,00,46,00,36,00,37,00,38,00,34,00,45,00,42,00,43,\
 00,7d,00,00,00,00,00

 [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Shared Tools\Web Server Extensions\14.0\Search\Setup\ContentIndexCommon\Filters\Extension\.xl3wbz]
 @=hex(7):7b,00,32,00,30,00,45,00,38,00,32,00,33,00,43,00,32,00,2d,00,36,00,32,\
 00,46,00,33,00,2d,00,34,00,36,00,33,00,38,00,2d,00,39,00,36,00,42,00,44,00,\
 2d,00,39,00,30,00,46,00,34,00,46,00,36,00,37,00,38,00,34,00,45,00,42,00,43,\
 00,7d,00,00,00,00,00

You can download an exported reg file from the following link:

https://www.xlcubed.com/downloads/xlcubedsharepoint_regkey.zip

Add file types to be indexed

Go to the SharePoint Central Administration Website, under Application Management => Manage Service Applications => Search Service Application:

Under "Crawling", select "File Types" and click "New File Type":

enter "XL3WBZ" as the extension

Sharepoint on different server

If SharePoint is on a different server to XLCubedWeb and XLCubedWeb is using "Windows Authentication" then by default the User's credentials will not be passed from XLCubedWeb to Sharepoint, this will prevent the reports from displaying correctly (you'd get an invalid or no login credentials error when accessing the reports)

You could configure Kerberos, this would allow the credentials to be passed correctly (XLCubedWeb uses WebDav to access the reports) or enable the following setting on the XLCubedWeb server:

   <add key="UseAppPoolUserForSharepointDownload" value="false" />

With that setting enabled then any SharePoint access from XLCubedWeb will be done using the Application Pool identity, so set that to run as an account that has the required permissions in SharePoint

Published Connections, Queries and Favourite

To allow publishing of Connections, Sql Queries and Favourites you must create the following folder structure at the root of the SharePoint site, the users would need to connect at the root level to use this feature:

  /XLCubed
       /PublishedConnections
       /PublishedGrids
       /PublishedSQLQueries

Saving to SharePoint

With Version 8 you can add the ability to save any modified (and adhoc reports), displayed using the Page Viewer Web part, directly back to SharePoint. To do this ensure you are running the latest XLCubed Web part and add the following line to the XLCubedWeb Config:

  <add key="SharePointServerUrl" value="http://sharepointserver"/>

The "Save" option on the toolbar will now show the SharePoint structure and the file can be saved as usual.

This step is also needed if setting up scheduling for SharePoint based servers (Version 9 Requires)

Adhoc Reports

With Version 8 you can include links to the adhoc designers in SharePoint (both standard grids and Analytic Books). To do this create a new page containing the Page Viewer webpart and then link to:

 http://server/xlcubedweb/WebForm/Connect.aspx?toolbar=True&embedded=SharePoint

for Adhoc grids or for Analytics books use the following:

 http://server/xlcubedweb/WebForm/Connect.aspx?Mode=AnalyticsBook&toolbar=True&embedded=SharePoint

Mobile app access

With Version 8 the mobile app can access reports published directly to sharepoint, to do this ensure the web.config has the following settings ("SitePages" is optional and can be replaced with any sub folders to limit the reports that can be viewed):

  <add key="SharePointServerUrl" value="http://SharePointServer/SitePages"/>
  <add key="SharePointUseRepository" value="true"/>

For using this in the mobile app ensure the user registers the XLCubedWeb server, once connected they will see any reports published directly to SharePoint. Please note: Saving is limited to the "My Reports" folder and is saved directly to the XLCubedWeb server and not SharePoint

Using

Once setup the SharePoint integration allows users to publish XLCubed reports directly to SharePoint

Publishing

Enter the SharePoint server for the XLCubedWeb server address and check the "SharePoint" checkbox:

You can add any sub folders directly to the address you enter, for example:

 http://sharepoint/SitePages/Reports

Viewing

Any published reports will be displayed and viewed within SharePoint:

Customising

Adding a "Load to Excel" option

If you want to add an option to load a report directly into Excel you can define a Custom Action with a URL of:

 http://xlcubedserver/xlcubedweb/webform/showreport.aspx?rep={SiteUrl}{ItemUrl}&XL3ReportType=excelfixed

See Also

• SharePoint Web Part
• Accessing XLCubed Web reports from SharePoint and other portals