Importing a Sharepoint website from a .wsp - List X does not exist

Question

I'm a total noob in Sharepoint Development, but I'm quite skilled in .NET.

I need to deploy a ready-to-go website from two .wsp files:

• App.wsp
• AppEmployeeService.wsp

I suppose that Lists and other structures should be already present in these .wsp archives.

I got a command-line guide on how to import that and deploy:

• iisreset

• Add-SPSolution -LiteralPath "C:\App.wsp"

• Install-SPSolution -Identity "App.wsp" -WebApplication
"http://10.1.1.140" –GACDeployment

• Add-SPSolution -LiteralPath "C:\AppEmployeeService.wsp"

• Install-SPSolution -Identity "AppEmployeeService.wsp" -GACDeployment

• Enable-SPFeature –Identity APP_APP_Feature –url
"http://10.1.1.140”

• Disable-SPFeature –Identity "APP_APP_Feature" –url
http://10.1.1.140 –force

• Enable-SPFeature –Identity "APP_APP_Feature" –url
http://10.1.1.140 –force

• iisreset 

But when I run Enable-SPFeature –Identity APP_APP_Feature –url "http://10.1.1.140"

I get an exception:

Enable-SPFeature: List 'Employees' does not exist at site with URL 'http://10.1.1.140'

How does it work? Shouldn't it create these lists during import?

Answer 1

Only if there is a feature built into the wsp to create the employee list when the feature is activated. If not, I would look for a template for the Employee list. If you just make a list called Employees, it might deploy, but more than likely will not work because of missing columns the custom solutions is looking for. I would look through the code and see what the solution is using the Employee list for. Create the Employee list, make a template out of it, and add the stp file for the template to your solution to build the list when the feature is activated (if a template does not already exist). You can check if the list exist in the feature before creating it.