Bring back the missing list tools menu in list view with multiple webparts

In my latest project I added a web part to a list view and needed to have the list tools visible. I had to look for a fix to the disappearing list tools menu.

Yes you can bring it back by clicking the web part you want to focus on, but it will be hidden initially if there are more than one web part in the page.

I digged into the sp.ribbon.js and found the “WpClick” function. Knowing that this function is called upon click on a web part, it was only a matter of finding a way to call it by code when the page loaded.

The parameter passed to the function is a click-event and i found the missing parts regarding creating a dummy click event here: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/4848892/list-tools-tab-is-no-longer-available-after-adding-webpart-to-the-page

The code looks like this:

ExecuteOrDelayUntilScriptLoaded(init_defaultWP, "sp.ribbon.js");

function init_defaultWP(){
	setTimeout(function(){
		var defaultWP = document.getElementById("MSOZoneCell_WebPartWPQ1");
		WpClick({target:defaultWP,srcElement:defaultWP});
	},100);	
}

This code must be placed in the CEWP in the list view. Change the “WebPartWPQ1″ to whatever webpart you want to activate.

Add this code to a CEWP in the page.

You might also be interested in how to show the view selector that disappears as soon as you add another webpart to a list view

Alexander

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