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SharePoint 2013 branding: Using the Design Manager, or going old school




May 7, 2013 —  (Page 3 of 4)
However, make no mistake: Design Manager does not remove the need to know SharePoint and how branding works with it. Once you have your converted master page, it will for the most part be static with no functionality. You must add this functionality using the Snippet Gallery, and while the Snippet Gallery does make the process easier than working with content placeholders, a basic understanding of what you are adding, where you adding it, and why is still needed.

The best piece of advice I can give you if you use the Design Manager for your branding projects is to build your HTML mockups around how SharePoint works. What I mean by this is to create a laid-out page structure around what will be required for a fully functional SharePoint site. Create divs for where your search box will be, your navigation, and your actual page content. This will make life easier when you add your snippets as you will know exactly where these snippets should be placed. Also realize that once you have an associated HTML file, the branding work is just starting. You will still need to move, add and cut code to have a functional SharePoint site.

Finally, when using the Design Manager, there are some caveats you should be aware of. First, accessing the Design Manager requires that you enable the publishing features on your site collection. So if you have SharePoint Foundation (or for some reason cannot enable the publishing features), you’re going to be forced to use SharePoint Designer 2013 for your branding. Also, be careful when using the Design Package feature. The idea behind Design Packages is a good one. It allows you to take your newly minted SharePoint brand and turn it into a .wsp that can be transferred anywhere without the need for Visual Studio.

However, there are some issues: The Design Manager was created around the idea that it would be used to brand the site the Design Manager is enabled on. So things like relative paths will not work with a design package unless you disassociate the HTML file from the master page prior to the packaging. There are duplication issues when you use a design package on a site that also has custom composed looks, and you can’t uninstall or deactivate a design package without causing problems to your site collection. Basically, while the Design Package feature is an interesting one, at this time it is no replacement for packaging up your branding solutions using Visual Studio.


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