Introduction:
When you create a list item (document, InfoPath form, custom list, etc.) you may want to help users facilitate a discussion about the item.
There are multiple ways to do this. One way is to create a Blog Post whenever a list item is created using a SharePoint Designer (SPD) workflow. A blog post was chosen because the SPD workflow could not completely create a Discussion item.
High Level Steps:
1. Create a Blog Site
2. Remove the unnecessary components of the site
3. Add your list (document library, InfoPath form library, custom list, etc.)
4. Use SPD to create a custom workflow that creates a record in the Blog's Post library
5. Populate a field in your list creating a link to the blog post
6. Consider setting alerts on the Blog Post list to inform users of a new discussion
1. Create a Blog Site
Follow published instructions for creating a blog site.
Be sure to consider the permissions and publishing requirements when doing this. The Blog, by default, is setup to only allow site owners. Consider removing the requirement of item approval for Blog posts.
2. Remove the unnecessary items from the Blog site
For example: pictures, other blogs (links list), etc. Also, review available documentation for removing administrative functionality for users who are not site owners.
3. Create your list
Follow your business requirements for creating a list (again, could be a document or a form library) collecting the necessary information.
Do consider creating a new column, perhaps called "View Discussion", of type hyperlink, that will host the hyperlink to the blog post. This field would be populated by the workflow created in the next step.
4. Use SPD to create a custom workflow
Using SharePoint designer, design and develop a workflow that creates a new item in the Post list. You'll need to likely create the text in one WF step, then create the post's list item.
You should probably include a link to the new list item in the blog post entry. Follow avaialble instructions for identifying the hyperlink information to the new item.
Consider including some information in the post that comes from the new list item. This will help users participate more easily in the discussion rather than having to click to the new list item and back and so on.
5. Populate a field in your list creating a link to the blog post
If you decided to create a "View Discussion" column in your custom list, you will want to populate this column. Use the String Builder to create a string like this (without the quotes):
http://www.someurl.info/blog/posts?postID=123, "View Discussion". You should, of course, review available documentation for using available variables for creating the URL (instead of
http://www.someurl.info/.../) and for identifying the post ID.
6. Consider setting alerts on the Blog Post list to inform users of a new discussion
Another consideration is to use the built-in functionality of SharePoint alerts to inform users that a new discussion has occurred.
If you followed the suggestion in step 4 of including a hyperlink to the new list item in the blog's post, your users will be alerted of the discusison, taken to the discussion page to (hopefully) participate and should they need to see the new list item they can click a hyperlink.