Can I activate the Sharepoint Server publishing Infrastructure feature at the site collection level within a sandbox solution?

Question

I have this code which works in a farm solution, but not in a sandbox solution.

Is it possible to do this with a sandbox solution?

The table in this link http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff798382.aspx doesnt give (me) the answer.

public class Feature1EventReceiver : SPFeatureReceiver
{
    public override void FeatureActivated(SPFeatureReceiverProperties properties)
    {
        SPSite siteCollection = properties.Feature.Parent as SPSite;
        if (siteCollection != null)
        {
            SPWeb topLevelSite = siteCollection.RootWeb;

            ActivateSharePointServerPublishingInfrastructureFeature(topLevelSite);
        }
    }

    private static void ActivateSharePointServerPublishingInfrastructureFeature(SPWeb topLevelSite)
    {
        // activating the Sharepoint Server publishing Infrastructure feature at the site collection
        string pubFeatureID = "F6924D36-2FA8-4f0b-B16D-06B7250180FA";
        Guid PublishingInfraFeatureID = new Guid(pubFeatureID);
        topLevelSite.Features.Add(PublishingInfraFeatureID, true, SPFeatureDefinitionScope.Site);
    }
}

Answer 1

According to MSDN, 'Yes': http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms456927.aspx

FYI, you can temporarily change your SharePoint.dll reference to this one to see if your code will compile:

C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Web Server Extensions\14\UserCode\assemblies\Microsoft.SharePoint.dll

Answer 2

I suspect that activating the publishing feature is trying to do something outside the given site collection, which sandbox solutions can not do.

I seem to remember there being some timer jobs that only get created when the first site collection that is a publishing site is added to a web application (something to do with content deployment i thought, its been a while, and it was 2007). The only timer job i can see in my current dev sharepoint farm that is missing when the web application is first created is "Enterprise Metadata site data update".

Answer 3

With suggestion of @Brian I followed this article - http://karinebosch.wordpress.com/2011/03/12/feature-activation-dependencies-in-visual-studio-2010/

1. Open the Feature Designer by double-clicking the feature in the Solution Explorer
2. Scroll down in the Feature Designer until you encounter the Feature Activation Dependencies section.
3. Click the + button to expand the Feature Activation Dependencies section.
4. Click the Add button. This opens a dialog where you can select a feature on which you want to add a dependency.
5. Add a custom dependency and added the following,

I also added this code to the FeatureActivated event to activate the site level publishing feature;

    public override void FeatureActivated(SPFeatureReceiverProperties properties)
    {
        SPSite siteCollection = properties.Feature.Parent as SPSite;
        if (siteCollection != null)
        {
            SPWeb topLevelSite = siteCollection.RootWeb;

            string webAppRelativePath = GetRelativePathToSite(topLevelSite);

            // Enumerate through each site and apply branding.
            foreach (SPWeb site in siteCollection.AllWebs)
            {
                string sharePointServerPublishing = "94c94ca6-b32f-4da9-a9e3-1f3d343d7ecb";
                Guid sharePointServerPublishingGuid = new Guid(sharePointServerPublishing);
                site.Features.Add(sharePointServerPublishingGuid, true);

                site.UIVersion = 4;
                site.Update();
            }
        }
    }

The sandbox solution has deployed successfully.