Scope of Features at different level

Question

Sorry for posting another "Broad" question in the community but I really want to know

"What are the Scope of features at Web Application level, Site Collection Level and Site Level?"

What I know is that Scope of Features generally refers to the "Effective locations up to which a feature would be affecting a site."

What I mean to say is: If I activate a feature of a site, that feature will be affecting only up to that Site Level but not to any other sites (excluding sub sites), or site collections, and so on. But once a feature is activated at Web application level, it will take effect for all the site collections and sites and sub sites under it.

But still I have been asked to know to get a brief idea about Scope and the question in Blockquote. Is it like things what I know is wrong or am I missing something? Even if is, then do post the correct answer. And if you think, there is anything else you can add, Then please do it! Because without understanding the Scope, I couldn't proceed to any of the SharePoint Tasks and Projects.

This is the link which I referred to for this information:

Also, at site collection level, we have both the options which are 1)Manage Site Features 2)Manage Site Collection Features. So, what's the relation between those two?

Answer 1

Features scopes are defined as

Farm Level

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• A farm level feature, as the name suggests, is something that affects the whole farm, for example provisioning a custom timer job or deploying a Business Connectivity Services model.
• Farm Scoped feature can be activated at the Farm level.
• It can contain number of element like application logic etc which can be applicable anywhere within deployment. It contacts links to /_layouts pages and files, /_admin pages etc.
• It can be activated by STSADM command like ” stsadm “o installfeature “name FeatureFolderName
• Alternatively open Manage Farm Features from Central Administrator Central Administrator -> Operations -> Manage Application Features and click activate. Farm scope feature will be activated automatically once it is installed on server.

Web Application Level:

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• A web application feature can be activated so that it only affects a single web application, and a typical example is a feature that modifies the web.config file.
• Web Application Scoped feature can be activated at the Web application level.
• It can contains item like administrative web application links, delegate control registrations, document forms registration etc.
• It can be activated by STSADM command like ” stsadm “o installfeature “name FeatureFolderName “url http://sharepointserver
• Alternatively open Manage Web Application Features from Central Administrator Central Administrator -> Application Management -> Manage Application Features and click activate.

Site Level:

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• A site scoped feature can be activated so that it only affects a site collection, an example being the deployment of a master page to the master pages catalogue.
• Site Collection Scoped feature can be activated at the site collection level.
• It can contains item that can apply to Site Collection as a whole like content types that are shared across the site collection, as well as items that can be activated per site for e.g. List Instances, Event Receivers, Custom Actions etc
• It can be activated by STSADM command like ” stsadm “o installfeature “name FeatureFolderName “url http://sharepointserver/site/sitecollectionname
• Alternatively open site features page by site actions -> site settings -> modify all site settings ->site features and click activate.

Web Level:

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• Finally, a web scoped feature can be activated for a single site, for instance setting the default master page for that site.
• Web Site Scoped feature can be activated at individual Web site level.
• List Instances, Event Receivers, Custom Actions etc are the custom elements for Website scope features.
• It can be activated by STSADM command like ” stsadm “o installfeature “name FeatureFolderName “url http://sharepointserver/site/subsite
• Alternatively open site features page by site actions -> site settings -> modify all site settings ->site features and click activate.

References

• Understanding Features and Feature Scope
• Using Features and Solutions to Deploy your SharePoint Customizations

Answer 2

What you have understood is correct.. Scope defines the range of area where your feature will effects on getting activated. If you activate at parent level(web app) it will be available at child site( site collection and subsites ). ..while if you define just a site as a scope..it will be just that site and no other site.