The Person or Group column type enables users to choose a value from a list of users or groups (see Figure 22).
You can see an example of
this column type in the tasks list, where users who want to assign a
task to other users choose from the list of users to whom they want to
assign the task. The selected values appear as the names of the users
chosen when a user views a list item or a file’s properties, and the
name is a link to the chosen user’s properties page. As you can do with
Lookup columns, you can configure whether this column type allows
multiple selections (see Figure 23).
Allow Multiple Selections
The
Allow Multiple Selections configuration option lets you define whether
the column will allow users to choose more than one user in this column.
Allow Selection Of
The Allow Selection Of
configuration option defines whether the user will be able to choose
only people (other users) or also groups. If you want groups to be
selectable, you must change this option.
Choose From
In the Choose From
configuration option, you specify what users and groups appear to the
user to pick from. By default, this option is set to All Users, which
enables the user to choose from the list of all the users that
SharePoint recognizes, even users who do not have access to the current
site or list. The second option, SharePoint Group, limits the selection
to users in a specific security group in the current site or site
collection. This option is useful if you want to let users select from
a restricted list of users, in which case you should create a security
group and set the column to show only users from that group.
Show Field
In the Show
Field configuration setting, you define what will be displayed as the
selected value when a user views the list item or file properties. The
default is the name of the user who was selected, together with that
user’s presence information (whether that user is online or busy, for
example; this requires that special instant messaging software be
installed and configured on the user’s machine). You can change this
option to display other information about the selected user.
Hyperlink or Picture
The Hyperlink or Picture
column type enables users to enter data that will be displayed as
either a link or a picture when the value is viewed (see Figure 24).
You should choose this column type when you want users to freely type a
link to a web page (in SharePoint or otherwise) or to a picture.
The only setting to set on a
Hyperlink or Picture column type, Format URL As, determines how to
format the link that the user types when viewing the list item’s or
file’s properties. The first option is to format it as a hyperlink,
which displays the title that the user chose as a link to the page the
user chose. The second option is to format as a picture, which shows
the picture to which the user typed the link instead of showing the
link itself.
Regardless
of what settings you choose, the user interface looks the same: The
user is asked to enter a URL path and a title (refer to Figure 25). However, when you’re looking at list views and viewing the properties of a list item or file, the difference is apparent. As Figure 7.38
shows, the same information is shown in two columns of type Hyperlink
or Picture, one formatting the information as a link and the other
formatting the information as a picture.
