Tips to upgrade Quest webpart on SharePoint 2013

Quest webpart for SharePoint has been renamed as Quick Apps for SharePoint. You can unleash the full potential of SharePoint 2013 and 2010—without relying on expensive development resources for every customization and enhancement. 

The new version 6.1 supporting SharePoint 2013  has added the following two new webparts.

• qDynamicLayout  - allows you to create a customized layout by placing multiple Web Parts and HTML elements on one page
• qManagement  - allows you to view and manage your web parts in one location

The new version 6.1 supporting SharePoint 2013 has also removed added the following two webparts. 

• qChartView
• qSIChartView

The first tip is you need to generate the reports where the two removed qChartView and qSIChartView webparts are used. Users should removed them from the pages before the upgrade. Otherwise, you will get error webaprt on SharePoint 2013. You could modify the powerhsell to report the pages contain these two webpart easily on 2010 and report error webpart pages on 2013. Please note you should report and removed the closed qChartView and qSIChartView webparts also.

The second tip is you need to disable Quest site collection feature on SharePoint 2010 before content migration. After you disable Quest site collection feature, all the Quest webpart .dwp files will be removed from webpart gallery. If you did not disable Quest site collection feature on SharePoint 2010, the site migrated with Quest webpart will have two categories old "Quest Web Parts" and new "Quick Apps for SharePoint" in stead of just new one "Quick Apps for SharePoint" category. In addition, all webparts inside old "Quest Web Parts"category are missing icons. There will be only two new webparts qDynamicLayout and qManagement webparts inside new  2013 "Quick Apps for SharePoint" as in the following screen shots.

 

If you create a new site and enable Quest webpart site collection feature, you will find all the webparts are inside only one "Quick Apps for SharePoint" category as in the following screen shot.

The third tip is if you forgot to disable Quest site collection feature on SharePoint 2010 before content migration, you could delete ALL Quest webparts from webpart gallery on 2013 and then activate Quick Apps for SharePoint site collection feature. This way, you will be able to avoid old "Quest Web Parts"category to be displayed issue as described before.

In general, when we upgrade webparts or master pages, the best practice is to disable features associated to them and remove the master pages and webparts from gallery from source before we detach the content database to destination new version. We found if we do not remove the customized  master page on SharePoint 2010 and it could not be removed after upgraded to SharePoint 2013. We might need to deal with orphan webparts and master pages.