How To Install a Custom Site Template in MOSS 2007

Site templates come with two different file types: .stp and .wsp

Install your Custom Site Template

1. Go to Central Administration for your SharePoint installation
2. Site Admin > Site Settings
3. Galleries section > Click on Site Templates
4. Click on the Upload button in the document library’s menu bar (you can also upload multiple files, the same as any document library)
5. Browse to select file(s), click ok
6. Add descriptions if desired

Create a New Site and Apply your Custom Template

1. Go to Central Administration for your SharePoint Installation
2. Click on Site Actions > Create
3. In the Web Pages section, select Sites and Workspaces
4. Fill in your site information
5. In the Template Selection section > Click on the “Custom” tab
6. Select the custom template which you would like applied
7. Click on the Create button at the bottom of the page
8. C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\web server extensions\12\TEMPLATE\1033\XML
9. http://stpinspector.codeplex.com/
10. If you get an error – check event logs
1. on the server > start > administrative tools > event viewer
2. In the left hand pane, click on application
3. or C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\web server extensions\12\LOGS
   

   The Site Template .stp file is a CAB file containing the manifest.xml file. All you need to do is rename the STP file to have a .cab file extension and then extract the manifest.xml to view and edit the contents.

Features GUID List >

If You Get Errors

Check to make sure your server has all the latest updates.

1. On the server open internet explorer
2. In the menu bar, select Tools > Windows Updates
3. Install updates
4. Restart and continue as needed (NOTE: you may need to install additional optional updates or appropriate hot fixes which can be traced by the GUID – see Below)

Trace Your Manifest.xml Feature GUID’s

You can trace the GUID’s in the manifest to discover which features are missing on your installation and are referenced by the .stp’s manifest.xml template file. See the reference below for GUID’s.

Find out how to view and manually edit the Site Template (.STP) file >

If you find unknown GUID’s, you can try commenting them out by manually editing the .stp template file.

Note: The GUID 90cd055f-f21f-42c5-b3fe-bb67173583d4 refers to a hot fix feature S2SiteAdmin which can often be the cause of site creation with a custom template failures – Just install the hot fix Infrastructure Update for Microsoft Office Servers (KB951297)" or make sure your server has all the latest updates.

Go to Microsoft to download this update >

Once you have traced the Feature GUID you can check and see if your missing feature exists on the server by going to C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\web server extensions\12\TEMPLATE\FEATURES

If the feature is missing

Try to find which updates or hotfixes are associated with the feature and install.

If you have the feature but it is not installed or registering

You may not have done incremental updates. Some features, such as S2SiteAdmin are not installed properly if the incremental update path was not followed. For example, if you recently created a new development environment and did the updates all at once. In this case you may need to manually install the Features from the Command Prompt.

Manually Install S2SiteAdmin & Other Missing SharePoint Features >