In Chapter 4, you learned that the first portion of a SharePoint site’s URL—for example, http://wideworldimporters or http://intranet.wideworldimporters.com—is known as the web application, and a web application can consist of one or more Site Collections; each Site Collection always has one top-level site and, optionally, one or more Subsites, also called child sites. If you are a SharePoint Server administrator, then by using the browser and the SharePoint 2010 Central Administration website, you can create web applications and Site Collections. Users with the Create Sites permissions can use the browser to create Subsites from the Site Actions menu. Such users can also use SharePoint Designer to create Subsites. You cannot create web applications or Site Collections by using SharePoint Designer.
To create a Subsite by using SharePoint Designer, choose one of the following options:
From the Backstage view, on the Sites tab, under New SharePoint Site, click New Blank Web Site, or under Site Templates, click Blank Site, Blog, or Team Site.
This will create Subsites beneath the current site. The Add Subsite To My Site option is only applicable if you are using SharePoint Server 2010.
From the Backstage view, on the Sites tab, under Site Templates, click More Templates to open the Site To Load Templates From dialog box. Here, you can specify a different site than the one currently open. The site templates from that site are then retrieved and displayed in the Backstage view, as shown in Figure 14-11.
Display the Site Settings page in the workspace, and then click New in the Subsites area title bar.
In the Navigation pane, click Subsites to display the Subsites gallery in the workspace, and then on the Subsites tab, click Subsite in the New group.
When using the last two options, the New dialog box opens and displays the site templates in the middle pane, as shown in Figure 14-12. The right pane displays a description of the site template selected from the middle pane. If the middle pane does not include any site templates, then in the Specify The location Of The New Web Site text box, type the URL of the Subsite, and then click in the middle pane. SharePoint Designer will communicate with the SharePoint server hosting your SharePoint site and then populate the middle pane from the information retrieved from it.
If you have a site open already in SharePoint Designer, then the new site will open in a new SharePoint Designer window.
Note
Whenever you create a site in SharePoint Designer, it only asks you for the URL of the site and the site template to use. It does not prompt you for any other site properties such as the title of the site or the permissions to use. The title of the site will be the name of the site template that was used to create the site. The site will inherit its permissions from its parent site, and the site will not appear as a link in the top navigation bar. Therefore, the first task you should complete once you create a site is to use the site settings page in SharePoint Designer to modify the title of the site and, if appropriate, its permissions. If you do not change the title immediately, then you could have many sites with the same name. This can be very confusing for users because it is the title of the site that is displayed in the browser’s UI. Also, if you plan to use the new site as a basis to create a solution or customization, which you will then use as a template for new or existing sites, then it is best practice to change the permissions of the site so that only you and other users who are helping develop the solution have access to the site.