Quick steps to making SharePoint 2007 cross-browser sexy

Question

Most of the time when starting a new SharePoint intranet project, I get the comment "oh, looks like SharePoint". This is never said in a positive and excited manner!

The default looks and themes are out of style and there are often many clicks to do anything. Something AJAXy like Einar's demo here would be great to bolt in but the solution needs to be MS supported.

What are some quick steps to making SharePoint 2007 look and feel slick on IE and Firefox?

Answer 1

jQuery is your friend and should be your best buddy when it comes to spicing up a UI (especially SharePoint). Be sure to check out the entire jQuery for Everyone series on End User SharePoint.

Also check out the series on converting a free CSS template (Jet30) to SharePoint. Very awesome work!

(sorry, link tool not working for me right now)

• jQuery for Everyone Series

• Jet30 for SharePoint

Answer 2

Alex:

Some of the jQuery effects are quick to implement and can give some sizzle. jQuery is cross-browser, so little risk there.

I also have a stock set of CSS which I can drop into a master page and customize very fast, letting me reskin SharePoint in about an hour so that people don't even realize it's SharePoint anymore. Just changing some colors and fonts lets you stamp "New and Improved" on it and get away with it.

M.

Answer 3

I have been building some webparts with a developer that heavily intergrates Jquery into Sharepoint creating sexy little image sliders connecting to image libraries etc...

I specialise in the look and feel of sharepoint so feel free to ask me anything, I am always willing to help.

Sam