Introduction

Thank you for using SPGo!

SPGo is a Visual Studio Code extension that makes it easier to build SharePoint web and branding solutions. The goal of this documentation is to make it easier to use SPGo.

SPGo allows you and your team to develop SharePoint web solutions from your local PC using the power of Visual Studio Code. Build SharePoint sites and customizations source-control first with all of the power of a top-tier IDE. Produce cleaner code, deliver faster.

TL;DR, a Video!

SPGo configuration in Visual Studio Code, by David Warner of Warner Digital

First things First

When you build SharePoint customizations using SPGo, all files are stored locally. This is for two primary reasons:

  1. We believe in building solutions source-code first and that all source code should live in an SCM tool.
  2. Many high or medium-latency situations can cause a poor developer experience when interacting directly with the server for file customization.

This is in alignment with how most enterprise software is built, but can be at odds with how developers, especially those familiar with SharePoint Designer, are used to working.

Getting Started

To get started using SPGo, you must first create a folder on your local PC to hold your custom files and folders for this project.

Once you have created a local folder, open this folder in Visual Studio Code and press Ctrl+Shift+p (Windows) Cmd+Shift+p (Mac) or open the Command Pallet and type >SPGo: Configure Workspace to bring up the SPGo Configuration Wizard. Upon successful configuration, a new file will be created in the root of your project folder called spgo.json and customizations within the sourceDirectory will be published to SharePoint.

Example default spgo.json file:

{
    "sourceDirectory": "src",
    "sharePointSiteUrl": "https://tenant.sharepoint.com/sites/MyProject",
    "publishingScope": "SaveOnly",
    "authenticationType": "Digest"
}

note: for more on the publishingScope property and how to control when a file is synchronized with SharePoint, please see documentation here

You are now ready to start building SharePoint solutions with SPGo.

Working with a New SharePoint Site

As you create files and folders inside your src directory, they will be synchronized with SharePoint, either when you save the files, or when you issue the SPGo> Publish Workspace command. See this page for more details on publishing files.

Working with an existing SharePoint Site

To work with a SharePoint site where custom files and content has been deployed, you will want to first synchronize all existing custom files (html, css, JavaScript, etc.) to your local workspace. This can be done a folder at a time using the SPGo> Retrieve folder command, or multiple folders using the SPGo> Retrieve Folder command.

To use the SPGo: Retrieve Folder command, you must also specify an array of remote folders with the property name remoteFolders, inside your spgo.json configuration file which is located at the root of your local workspace.

Example spgo.json file which will retrieve all files and folders from the SiteAssets folder, all files directly under the /_catalogs/wp/ folder and all pages with the file extension .master under the /_catalogs/masterpage/ folder:

{
    "sourceDirectory": "src",
    "sharePointSiteUrl": "https://tenant.sharepoint.com/sites/MyProject",
    "publishingScope": "SaveOnly",
    "authenticationType": "Digest",
    "remoteFolders": [
        "/SiteAssets/**/*",
        "/_catalogs/wp/",
        "/_catalogs/masterpage/*.master"
    ]
}

note: SPGo uses Glob notation for all file download functions