I just had to get this off my chest-- something I forgot to say about Closed Web Parts gallery

Okay look, in chapter 4, I talk about, and demonstrate, using the closed web part gallery.

But there's something I forgot to say, and it is driving me nuts.

The closed web parts gallery is page specific. It makes sense. If you close a web part on a page, sharepoint will remember it in case you change your mind.

It is not site wide, it is not site collection wide. If you try to be clever and close a web part on page one, thinking it would go to the closed web part gallery and be available on page two, you would be sorely mistaken. See, that's what exporting and the site collection web part gallery are for.

Further, the closed web part gallery is page view version specific. In otherwords, and this makes sense if you think about it, if you have a web part on a page's shared version, it will be on your personal version of the page. Then if you edit your personal version, and in doing so close the web part, it will show up in the closed web part gallery for that version of the page, only.

If you go back to the shared version of the page, the web part is still there. And if you check the galleries, you'll see that its not on that version's closed web parts.

Something else to keep in mind is if you have many, many closed web parts associated with a page or page version, it might load more slowly. So if slow page loads have begun to plague your home page, check to see how many closed web parts might be lurking in your (or the user's) closed web parts gallery. Consider that when configuring the web parts, you might want to allow delete (which deletes the web part from the users' personal version of the web part page), but not close-- just in case.

I really wish I'd remember to put this in. I just hit send, then remembered.

Sigh, so much minutae, so little time...