Create Sitecore Ribbon Button using Sitecore PowerShell Extensions

Creating a custom Ribbon button in Sitecore using Sitecore PowerShell Extensions (SPE) involves several steps, which I'll guide you through below. The general process includes

• Create PowerShell Script Module and Add Integration Point
• Setup the PowerShell script Library and Add PowerShell script
• Configuring the Ribbon button and Sync
• Verify the button in the Ribbon

Here's how we can achieve that:

Pre-Requisites:

• Running Sitecore Instance
• PowerShell ISE to run PowerShell script

(Install compatible Sitecore.PowerShell.Extensions if it’s not there)

Step-1: Create PowerShell Script Module and Add Integration Point

1. Create PowerShell Script Module:
• Go to Content Editor.
• In the content tree, navigate to: System > Modules > PowerShell > Script Library.
• Right-click on Script Library and select Insert > PowerShell Script Module.

• Give it a name, such as CustomScriptsModule and click OK

2. Add Integration Point for Ribbon Button:
• Right-click on the CustomScriptsModule we just created. We see different options here, lets select  

Insert > Integration Point Libraries.

             

• Here we see different Integration points, Select Content Editor > Ribbon > Proceed.

Now we will see the Item created under the CustomeScriptModule that we created in previous step.

Step-2: Setup the PowerShell script Library and Add PowerShell script

1. Create PowerShell Script Library

• Right-click on the Developer Ribbon in newly created item (under the module) and choose Insert > PowerShell Script Library.
• Give any name like CustomeScriptLibrary

2. Add PowerShell script

• Right-click on the newly created PowerShell Script Library, and choose Insert > PowerShell Script.

• Provide a meaningful name to the script, the same name command button will be added to the Ribbon

• Elevate the session if required.

• Provide the login password if asked.

• Write the script: Now we can write PowerShell script that will be triggered by the Ribbon button. For instance, to show the item name when clicked, the script could look something like this:

# Get the current item

$item = Get-Item-Path .

# Show the item name in an alert

Show-Alert -Title $item.Name

Now we are done with the Script setup, its time to configure the Ribbon button.

Step-3: Configuring the Ribbon button

1. Module Activation:
• Go back to the module we created in previous step

/sitecore/system/Modules/PowerShell/Script Library/CustomeScriptModule

• In the Module Activation section, click on the checkbox

Enabled – enables the module for all integration points

2. Rebuild and Sync Library:

• Open the PowerShell ISE (Integrated Scripting Environment) from the Sitecore Desktop.
• Go to Settings and then Rebuild All
• Select Sync Library with Content Editor Ribbon. This will sync the new button with the Ribbon UI in Sitecore. Once the processing is done, we can verify the new button.

3. Configure Button Icon:
• Click on the button (command - TestCommand)
• CONFIGURE à Icon à set the icon

Step-4: Verify the button in the Ribbon

• Go to Developer Ribbon and we can see the new button created

• Click on this button will run the script we written. For this case it will return name of the selected item.

Example Use Cases:

While the above example shows how to display an item’s name when a button is clicked, we can also setup an interactive dialog that allows user input and adapt the PowerShell script to perform various tasks. Here are a few potential use cases:

• Create a New Language Version of an Item: We can write a script to create a language version of an item by using PowerShell commands.
• Delete Specific Language Versions: A script could delete items in specific languages by filtering by language and item path.
• Fetch Data from an API and Save to Item: We can create a script that calls an external API and updates Sitecore items with the fetched data.

Benefits:

• No C# Required: We can directly write PowerShell scripts without needing to setup any solution or write any C# code.
• No Core Database Changes: This method allows us to create Ribbon buttons without manually modifying the Core database.
• Flexible and Simple: The integration of Sitecore PowerShell Extensions provides a quick and simple way to add custom functionality to the Sitecore interface.