Overview of the Training Management Application

The Training Management application allows employees to see the available training courses, register for them, and see the status of their pending registrations. Managers have the same abilities as employees, and they can also approve or reject registration requests from their employees. The application communicates with two external systems. One is a human resources system that determines the employee's manager and cost center. The other is a billing system. This system deducts the cost of a course from the cost center if the manager approves the registration.

There is a manager dashboard and a training dashboard. Both managers and employees can see the manager dashboard, but their views differ. Only managers see the registration approval requests and only managers have direct reports. The training dashboard lists the available courses and the status of the employee's registration requests.

The following procedures give a brief overview of the Training Management application. The first procedure demonstrates how to create a course. The second procedure demonstrates how to rate a course's difficulty. The third procedure demonstrates how an employee registers for a course. The fourth procedure demonstrates how a manager approves or rejects a course.

The Training Management application has two users. One is the manager, who is named spgmanager. The other is the employee, who is named spgemployee. You created these users during the installation procedure. (For more information, see Installing the Training Management Application.) Because both the manager and the employee have read-only permissions, you must sign in with administrative privileges to create a course.

To create a new course

1. Open the Web browser and enter the URL of the SharePoint location. You must log on with administrative privileges. Make sure the Training tab is selected.

2. Under Training Courses, click Add new item.

3. The form to add a new training course appears. Figure 1 illustrates the form.

   

   Figure 1
   Form to add a new course

4. Fill out the form. The code must be eight characters long. The enrollment deadline must be the same as or after the current date. The start date must be the same as or after the enrollment deadline. The end date must be the same as or after the start date. The cost must be less than $5,000.00. This is the amount in the training budget.

5. Click OK. The course appears in the list of training courses.

For information about the implementation of adding a new course, see the Create a New Course Use Case. This use case includes information on topics such as implementing content types, event receivers, and lists.

The next procedure demonstrates how to select the difficulty level for a course.

To select a course's difficulty level

1. In the list of training courses, click a course.

2. In the drop-down box, click Edit Item.

3. Click some of the grayed-out squares next to Difficulty Level. The green/gray squares are an example of a custom field. For more information about custom fields, see Using Custom Field Types and Field Controls. Figure 2 illustrates an example of the custom field.

   

   Figure 2
   Setting the difficulty level

The next procedure demonstrates how an employee registers for a course.

To register for a course

1. Click the **Welcome user name **drop-down box at the top of the Web page. Click Sign in as Different User. Sign in as spgemployee. The training dashboard appears by selecting the My Training link in the Quick Launch. The dashboard uses standard SharePoint List View Web Parts. For an explanation of when to use SharePoint Web Parts and when to use custom Web Parts, see Using Standard and Custom Web Parts in this guidance. For an explanation of the implementation of the training dashboard, see View the Training Dashboard Use Case.

2. Click the training course. In the drop-down box, click Register for Course. This is an example of a custom action. For an explanation of how to implement custom actions, see Extending SharePoint List UIs and the Register for a Course Use Case.

3. A registration page appears. Figure 3 illustrates an example of the registration page.

   

   Figure 3
   Registration page

4. Click Register for Course. A confirmation page appears.

5. In the Quick Launch, click My Training. This displays the employee view of the dashboard, as illustrated in Figure 4.

   

   Figure 4
   Training dashboard

6. Under My Registrations, you should see the name of the course with a status of Pending. The status is controlled by the registration workflow. For more information about the workflow, see Registration Workflow Implementation.

For information about the implementation of registering for a course, see the Register for a Course Use Case.

The last procedure demonstrates how a manager approves a course registration.

To approve a course

1. Click the Welcome spgemployee drop-down box at the top of the Web page. Click Sign in as Different User. Sign in as spgmanager.

2. Make sure the Training tab is selected. In the Quick Launch, click Manager Dashboard. Under Registration Approval Tasks, the manager dashboard lists a pending task. Employees cannot see the list of registration approval tasks. This is because custom permission levels control what managers and employees can see. For information about the Training Management application's security model, see Implementing Security. It also shows the amount of money in the training budget and the manager's direct reports. The budget and direct reports views use custom Web Parts. For an explanation of when to use SharePoint Web Parts and when to use custom Web Parts, see Using Standard and Custom Web Parts. For an explanation of how to implement custom Web Parts, see the View the Manager Dashboard Use Case. Figure 5 illustrates an example of the manager dashboard.

   

   Figure 5
   Manager dashboard

3. Click the task. A form appears that allows you to accept or reject the request. In the drop-down box, click Approved. Click Submit.

4. The manager dashboard shows no more tasks listed under Registration Approval Tasks and the training budget is updated.

5. Log on again as spgemployee. Click the My Training link in the Quick Launch. The status of the registration in the My Registrations Web Part is now Approved. The status is controlled by the registration workflow. For more information about the workflow, see the Registration Workflow Implementation.

For information about the implementation of the manager dashboard, see the View the Manager Dashboard Use Case. The approval process uses a workflow. For information about implementing the workflow, see Registration Workflow Implementation.

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