What's new in SharePoint 15 (2013) and what you to prepare as a developer?

We are on good authority from multiple anonymous sources that the beta release of SharePoint 15 will drop next Monday July 16, 2012. It had been reported that Microsoft was looking for a summertime drop of the beta from the leaked road map, and it has hit the mark.

On July 11, 2012, Microsoft even has posted the details of a developer "FirstLook Clinic: What new in Sharepoint 15" course for SharePoint 15, which shows two types of hosted apps, the use of Agaves (HTML5 and JavaScript add-ons) to extend Office apps, and improvements in content management. The link was there for about two days and was removed on purpose by Microsoft now!

From the Microsoft developer “FirstLook Clinic: What new in Sharepoint 15” course, the executive summary of what we can learn are these features:

• SharePointmarketplace for Apps – New SPApp object on SPWeb level to to create an ecosystem for multitenant apps.
• Office Agaves, HTML add-ons for Office documents – Stronger integration with Office
• New enterprise services, including search from client-side object model - Enhanced enterprise services like managed metadata service 
• Workflow looping for Designer that is only available in Visual Stadio on 2010
• MinimaDownload Strategy
• OAuth2.0 Authentication
• Ability to integrate or platform for SharePoint education

From other resources including Microsoft class “10232A Design and Developing Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010 Applications” I toked this week and Microsoft “SharePoint 2010: 15 Technical Preview - Announcements and Resources” and and API published in February 2012, we might also expect the following major changes.

• .Net4.0 integration with SharePoint
• Workflow function 4.0
• HTML 5 with open source JQuery instead of Microsoft proprietary Ajax scripts
• ViewState is only supported on the legacy model due to culprit for not having testing and other things available
• Visual Studio 2012  

Most of the changes mentioned here will change our design and development decision. So we will discuss some of them in details.

The biggest advantage in .Net 4.0 is the MVC module. I heard SharePoint 15 will implement .Net 4.0 MVC to separate the module, controller, and view. This way, we have biggest advantage to utilize the HTML 5 and open source JQuery as view layer while utilize server controller components. As a result, you should try to avoid Microsoft proprietary Ajax script and separate your logic into web service or utility class.

In Workflow function 4.0, State machine workflows are deprecated in workflows foundation 4.0 runtime – replaced with a flowchart approach. As a result, you should not implement any State machine workflows at this time. If you are using third party state machine workflow from Nintex, K2, or AgilePoint, you might contact vendor.

HTML 5 has made its way to become standard and SharePoint 15 will leverage it with open source JQuery instead of Microsoft proprietary Ajax.  Try to avoid any Microsoft proprietary Ajax scripts.
  
Microsoft is giving up Silverlight component in the future reelases. As a result, if you are using Silverlight webparts, consider to replace any Sliverlight components.

ViewState is only supported on the legacy model in SharePoint 15 since it could not be unit tested. As a result, plan to disable the View state and use different method.

There are many new features on Visual Studio 2012. Some of them are significant than others. Here are some of them I’m looking for.

• Publish SharePoint solutions to remote SharePoint sites
• Increase SharePoint performance by using profiling tools
• Create sandboxed visual web parts
• Use Microsoft Fakes framework for Unit testing

You should plan to use Visual Studio 2012 and set up your unit tetsing code now and untilize future unit testing framework on .Net 4 framework.

With Microsoft $1.2 Billion Yammer Buy on June 25, we could expect much social functions in future SharePoint and be prepared to utilize social functions whence there are available. Window 2012 server and Window 8 technology will also impact SharePoint 15 development.

Some suggestions from other people to prepare for SharePoint 15 are also valued. We'll closely monitor the SharePoint 15 progress and post what we found.

For your information, Microsoft has put together some great resources to get you started. They are all in one convenient location - the SharePoint Server 2013 Resource Page. For example, check out:

·	SharePoint Server 2013 Deployment Guide
·	Microsoft Office Web Apps Server Preview
·	SharePoint Team Blog