Now that the SharePoint Conference is under way, we can start talking about all of the cool things you will be able to do with the new version of SharePoint and its related products once it hits the streets sometime next year. First of all, let me start by saying that Steve Ballmer announced during the keynote this morning that the public beta for SharePoint 2010 will begin sometime in November. So keep your eyes and ears open for when you will be able to start downloading the bits and start your own explorations. For now, I’ll just tell you about some of the things that are coming our way to make working with and designing on SharePoint a bit more fun and cool. As with the current version, SharePoint Designer will still be a free product in its 2010 form. However, you will not be able to use it to customize your SharePoint 2007 farms, as it will only work with SharePoint 2010. So if you are going to be supporting both environments, you will need to use both tools. Don’t be discouraged, there are good reasons for this. In my upcoming posts I’m planning on discussing several of the key features and enhancements that are being made within SharePoint Designer 2010, such as a new interface, new security options, new management tools, new integration options and yes… new workflow features. In this post I’d like to focus on some of the enhancements that are being made to the workflow design options when using SharePoint Designer 2010.

You know how with Designer 2007, we can only create a workflow that is attached to a single list or library? Gone. You know how we have to get out Visio, or perhaps some other design tool, and draw out the logic flow of the workflow process (or at least you SHOULD be drawing out the logic flow of your workflow process), and then have that diagram close at hand as you start working your way through the Designer Workflow Wizard to create the actual workflow? Wouldn’t it be really cool if you could take that Visio drawing that you spent all that time creating and use it as a template for the workflow directly? Guess what. Would it be neat if you could create a workflow once, and then reuse that workflow again on another list? You got it. All these things, and more, are now possible with Designer 2010. When you create a new workflow using Designer you actually have three different types of workflows you can create. First, you still have the option to create a workflow that is specific to a list or library. Second, you can now create a Site workflow that is usable anywhere within the Site you are attaching it to. Third, we have the Reusable workflow that can be attached directly to a content type, or can be used by all content types. How cool is that?

It gets better. As I mentioned, there is now also integration between Visio 2010 and Designer 2010 such that you can map out your workflow logic in Visio using the new SharePoint Workflow Template, then export that design to a file and import that into SharePoint Designer where you complete the specific configuration options for the conditions and actions. I’ll be showing you how this is done in an upcoming post so be sure to check back here to see just how this is done. But that’s not all. You can also export a workflow you have created in Designer and import that into Visio and render it out as a diagram, modify the diagram, re-export/import and continue working with it. All this makes for a much more robust workflow design solution, and all still without having to write code.

Hey, have you ever wanted to modify those out-of-the-box workflows that Microsoft gave us? You can now. And yes, these can also be exported and diagramed out in Visio, just like your from scratch custom workflows. There are a number of new conditions and actions that are now included, out-of-the box, as well. Conditions such as, check list item permission or person is a valid SharePoint user. Some of the new actions include items such as lookup manager of a user, assign item for approval, replace list item permissions, or delete previous versions. You can also create an impersonation step, whereby that specific step of the workflow runs under the authority of the user that last edited the workflow itself, and not as the user who actually started the workflow on the item in the list. When you create a reusable workflow, you can specify new columns that the workflow will create in the list that it is is attached to using the Association Columns feature of the workflow creator. This allows you to have columns that are referenced within the workflow and be assured they will be included in the list where the workflow is being used.

We also still have the features that are near and dear to us, serial and parallel processing of actions, if/else branching, multi-step workflow design as well as task forms and initiation parameters. Although the Workflow Design wizard as you know it in Designer 2007 is gone, the addition of the Office Ribbon in Designer 2010 still gives us the control and context awareness for creating workflows and actually integrates more smoothly into the Designer work surface.

It seems that Microsoft did indeed listen to a number of the pain points we griped about with the current version and is making great strides to ease those pains in the new release. I, for one, am very excited about the improvements that are coming with the new version of SharePoint.