SharePoint 2013 – All about App Catalog

Apps for SharePoint is a new buzz word for all SharePoint Developers Since the Apps are going to be prominent in SharePoint 2013 Microsoft has launched a special site for them known as App Catalog.

By Definition – The App Catalog site is a special site collection on a web application. Because each web application can have an App Catalog site, a farm can have more than one App Catalog sites.

When you create an App Catalog site, you get two libraries for apps:

Apps for SharePoint

Apps for Office

Because an App Catalog is scoped to a web application, all apps that you want to make available for a web application have to be in the App Catalog site collection for that web application. You create the App Catalog site collection from SharePoint Central Administration or from Admin site in Office 365 Preview. I am using Office 365 preview for this example but the steps to create an App Catalog shouldn’t be much different.

Create a App Catalog -
1. Click on “Admin” in the Suite links (blue bar) on the top to go to the Admin Center.
2. Click on “Apps” towards left.

3. Click on “App Catalog” to Create a new “App Catalog” site.

4. Next On Create a new Catalog page enter the details of the new site.

5. Once created Open the App Catalog site. You would notice few options on the left to Manage the Apps

Lets look at them One by one.

App Request – Users who do not have access to purchase Apps can add a new App Request for Admins to approve or consider. Users request an app for SharePoint from the SharePoint Store, request specific number of licenses and provide a justification for the purchase of the app for SharePoint via the Submitted request.

Apps for Office - A library where administrator installs Apps for Office.

Apps for SharePoint - This is a library where Apps that can be used in the site collection stays. Administrator or user that is a member of the site Owners or Designers group for the App Catalog site will upload the App in this library.

Apps for SharePoint is a library so Admins can provide permissions to individual Apps to restrict the use of those Apps by certain users or groups.