Visual Studio to add a Geolocation Site Column in SharePoint 2013

There is a new field type named Geolocation in SharePoint 2013, which allows us to easily integrate location and map functionality into SharePoint lists.

However this field is not available for the end user to choose in Create Column window. It must be added through code. PowerShell is one option. Here I use a Site Column and a Content Type and then use an Element to bind it to the pages library.

Site Column:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>

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

  <Field

       ID="{9218A4E1-12F1-40B7-B7AD-9A048B6CB6DF}"

       Name="MyLocation"

       DisplayName="My Location"

       StaticName="MyLocation"

       Type ="Geolocation"

       Required="TRUE"

       Group="My Site Columns">

  </Field>

</Elements>

Content Type:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>

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

  <!-- Parent ContentType: Article Page (0x010100C568DB52D9D0A14D9B2FDCC96666E9F2007948130EC3DB064584E219954237AF3900242457EFB8B24247815D688C526CD44D) -->

  <ContentType ID="0x010100C568DB52D9D0A14D9B2FDCC96666E9F2007948130EC3DB064584E219954237AF3900242457EFB8B24247815D688C526CD44D00D2536686E7AA47789656CD7F6E8C9A35" Name="MyContentType" Group="Custom Content Types" Description="My Content Type" Inherits="TRUE" Version="0">

    <FieldRefs>

      <FieldRef ID="{9218A4E1-12F1-40B7-B7AD-9A048B6CB6DF}" DisplayName="My Location" Required="TRUE" Name="MyLocation" />

    </FieldRefs>

  </ContentType>

</Elements>

Content Type binding to the Pages library:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>

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

  <ContentTypeBinding

   ContentTypeId="0x010100C568DB52D9D0A14D9B2FDCC96666E9F2007948130EC3DB064584E219954237AF3900242457EFB8B24247815D688C526CD44D00D2536686E7AA47789656CD7F6E8C9A35"

   ListUrl="$Resources:osrvcore,List_Pages_UrlName;"/>

</Elements>

First, deploy above elements with a feature and then, create a page using “MyContentType” content type. Then select the Edit Properties option of the created Page item.

My location filed will be displayed in the edit properties window as follows. In there we have two options to provide the location details.

That is either by specifying the location coordinates (Longitude and Latitude) or by using the current location (my location). Selecting current location option will make a client-side call to determine location based on the IP information of the device making the call. It does not require GPS.

Once the list item is saved, we can see a globe symbol for the location and by clicking on it, we can see the Bing map view for the location with scroll and zoom features.

In addition there is a new view template provided for creating custom Map Views for the lists.

Note: Geolocation needs connection to the Bing Maps service. This requires us to register and request an API key from http://bingmapsportal.com. Even though Geolocation will work without this, there will be a message shown about Bing Maps key across the center of the map.  Once we get a key, we can apply it in PowerShell with the following command and it needs to be done once for the farm:

     Set-SPBingMapsKey -BingKey $yourKey

More information on Geolocation field in MDSN is here.