Be wary when removing or replacing the My Site link
I've seen a recent trend where people are either removing or replacing the My Site link that's at the top of the page. Before doing this be sure that it is necessary because that link isn't really a link at all it's a server control; with functionality behind it. More than likely what you really want to do is style it, it can be style using CSS just like other server controls to match the look and feel of your site.
Besides security trimming, what other functionality does it have you ask? Well one of the coolest is it allows for personalization site skinning.
If you haven't heard of personalization sites here's a few topics you should read:
Back to personalization site skinning, just as a personalization site connect its navigation to My Site, personalization site skinning allows you to do that on a per page basis regardless of the site template used to create the site. Personalization site skinning is most valuable when you've already built a highly personalized page related to your site or portal and you want to connect it to users' My Sites in a form of shared navigation.
I'm going to step back from the topic and just show you what the control can do using the OOB portal homepage as an example; notice the changes in the navigation. Look at how once a site is skinned and pinned it becomes a part of the user's My Site navigation bar yet if you still went to the portal home page directly it look as it always does.
Figure 1: OOB portal homepage
Figure 2: Skinned and pinned portal homepage
Figure 3: My Site homepage
Give it a try on your own to get a better feel for it. Just add the MySiteView=1 query string parameter to your URL, chose pin when you hover over the navigation item and play with going back and forth between My Site and the skinned page. You can also do it for multiple pages.
So if you find this cool, then again be wary if you're planning to replace or remove the My Site control for your page because if you do you will lose this functionality.
Greg Mattox, Program Manager
