SharePoint 2013: Branding SharePoint 2013 My Sites with Feature Stapling

Hi,

Here is a quick guide for branding SharePoint 2013 My Sites using Feature Stapling.

Create a new SharePoint Solution.

Select "Farm solution" then provides the correct URL to your My Site Host then click Finish.

  

Step 1: Provisioning the custom master page

Add a new Module to the project.

As a starting point just copy the original my sites master page from "\15\TEMPLATE\FEATURES\MySiteMaster\mysite15.master" into the project and rename it "CustomMySite.master" and integrate your HTML/CSS design to it.

Edit the Elements.xml and copy this:

<Elements xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/sharepoint/">

  <Module Name="ML_MasterPages" List="116" Url="_catalogs/masterpage" Path="ML_MasterPages" RootWebOnly="TRUE">

    <File Url="CustomMySite.master" Type="GhostableInLibrary" />

  </Module>

</Elements>

You'll have to add the module to the feature you will create in step 2.

Step 2: Applying the custom master page to the site
We'll use an event receiver to apply the new master.

Add a new Feature with scope "Site" and name it "Site_ApplyCustomMasterPage";

Add an event receiver to the feature.

Add the following code:

namespace ClientName.MySitesBranding.Features.Site_ApplyCustomMasterPage

{

    using Microsoft.SharePoint;

    using Microsoft.SharePoint.Utilities;

    using System;

    using System.Runtime.InteropServices;

    using System.Security.Permissions;

    [Guid("{your Guid}")]

    public class Site_ApplyCustomMasterPageEventReceiver : SPFeatureReceiver

    {

        public override void FeatureActivated(SPFeatureReceiverProperties properties)

        {

            SPSite siteCollection = (SPSite)properties.Feature.Parent;

            string masterUrl = SPUrlUtility.CombineUrl(siteCollection.ServerRelativeUrl, "_catalogs/masterpage/CustomMySite.master");

            foreach (SPWeb web in siteCollection.AllWebs)

            {

                try

                {

                    web.MasterUrl = masterUrl;

                    web.CustomMasterUrl = masterUrl;

                    web.Update();

                }

                catch

                {

                    if (web != null)

                        web.Dispose();

                    throw;

                }

                if (web != null)

                    web.Dispose();

            }

        }

        public override void FeatureDeactivating(SPFeatureReceiverProperties properties)

        {

            SPSite siteCollection = (SPSite)properties.Feature.Parent;

            string masterUrl = SPUrlUtility.CombineUrl(siteCollection.ServerRelativeUrl, "_catalogs/masterpage/mysite15.master");

            foreach (SPWeb web in siteCollection.AllWebs)

            {

                try

                {

                    web.MasterUrl = masterUrl;

                    web.CustomMasterUrl = masterUrl;

                    web.Update();

                }

                catch

                {

                    if (web != null)

                        web.Dispose();

                    throw;

                }

                if (web != null)

                    web.Dispose();

            }

        }

    }

}

Step 3: Stapling the "apply mast page" feature to the personal site template

this action will hook your feature to any new personal site that will be created after staple is effective. If you need to apply the branding to existing personal write a PowerShell script that activates the feature for each

NOTE : As the MySiteHost (the "/my" root url) will usually already exist on the customer's target platform when they create their "User Profile Application Service" you'll have to manually activate the "ApplyCustomMasterPage" feature

on that site collection.

Create a new Feature with scope "Farm" and name it "Farm_MySiteStapler".

Then create a new empty Element name it "ML_ApplyCustomMasterPageStapler".

Add the following code

<Elements xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/sharepoint/">

  <FeatureSiteTemplateAssociation Id="{the Guid of the Site_ApplyCustomMasterPage feature}" TemplateName="SPSPERS#2" />

</Elements>

Note: that in SharePoint 2013 the Template to staple is "SPSPERS#2" whereas in SharePoint 2010 you had to staple "SPSPERS#0".

Add the module to the Stapler feature.

Your project should look like this:

At this point the branding will actually work for the root sites, if you wish to apply template to any sub site that will be created (such as Blogs,...) you need to follow step 4 to hook the WebProvisioned event.

Step 4 : Applying the master page to any sub site created under the my site

Add a new Event receiver "ER_MySite_ElementsWebProvisioned".

Selected the web event "a site was provisioned”.
Then enter the following code:

namespace ClientName.MySitesBranding.Receivers.ER_MySite_ElementsWebProvisioned

{

    using System;

    using Microsoft.SharePoint;

    public class ER_MySite_ElementsWebProvisioned : SPWebEventReceiver

    {

        public override void WebProvisioned(SPWebEventProperties properties)

        {

            SPWeb web = properties.Web;

            SPWeb rootWeb = web.Site.RootWeb;

            web.MasterUrl = rootWeb.MasterUrl;

            web.CustomMasterUrl = rootWeb.CustomMasterUrl;

            web.Update();

        }

    }

}

Now add the Event receiver to the "Site_ApplyCustomMasterPage" feature.

Your project should look like this:

Deploy your solution, activate the Farm feature and connect with a new user to his My Site check that the new master is applied. (Alternative is to delete your current My Site and connect to the site to force automatic re-creation)

Cheers

Suresh