SharePoint Dan

With SharePoint 2010, there’s a new functionality that allows for developers to create solutions that are scoped at the site collection level with a limited portion of the SharePoint API. Better yet they can deploy these solutions without bothering their IT Pro brethren. This is awesome! Course it bypasses some of the governance that you might have in place regarding solutions deployment. Course it is possible to turn them off or block certain ones.

There have been several great discussions by Sahil Malik, Jeremy Thake, Srini Sistla, Mike Watson and many others about the power of Sandboxed Solutions. All great points regarding their power – and trust me, in many ways it’s a game changer in delegating the ability to devs to write extensible code that can do more than what SharePoint Designer was ever meant for.

There are some considerations to think about however… and if you’re wondering, “Well what are they?” then I recommend hopping on over to MSDN to read more at:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee231562.aspx

A closing thought though… if you’re looking for complete freedom with your solutions and have the need to arch across site collections… then you need something that’s freeing and non-restricting. So for those of you that are studying for your SATs or GREs, you could use the analogy that Sandboxed Solutions are to Briefs as Farm Solutions are to Boxers.

Happy Developing!

For those of you that have known me for a while, you know that I absolutely deplore coffee. I’m not quite certain if it’s the tasty, the acidity, the smell, I’m not quite certain what it is but I deplore it.

Well, similar to wine, if you have bad wine, you basically never want to drink it ever again. If you drink good wine, you relish in the flavour and how it can have such vibrant taste.

In high school I would go and drink Irish Crème Cappuccinos at Starbucks, not because the taste was all that great but because it contained “Irish Crème”. Boy was that a mistake that stunted my growth and kept me from being the 6’8” man that I’d hoped to be.  Okay, just kidding, but seriously, I definitely am not much of a Cappuccino kind of guy. Why ruin the goodness of a shot of espresso with perfectly good crème and sugar that could be used in a baking process for something else?

For me I stumbled into the vibrant taste of coffee this past August. I decided I was going “cold turkey” with diet coke and was just going to switch back to purely water. This feeble attempt lasted for a few weeks before I was finding myself, while incredibly clear (drinking more water always tends to make things more clear) that I was falling asleep – maybe that’s a good thing? I was however finding that in the morning without caffeine I could be a grouch (though I’m sure that some of my closer friends had other names for it ).

So after conferring with myself, I decided I would give Starbucks drip coffee a chance. Besides there was a  Starbucks drip coffee machine downstairs in the building that I worked in that was complimentary to anyone that worked there. So I gave Pike Roast a try. Not too bad, but not something that grabbed me and made me say, “Oh you’re amazing.” The flip side was that the caffeine definitely was helping me to be a little more alert and the grouchiness was fading little by little. So I moved on to Bold and found that there was definitely a love affair in the making. The only caveat – it just didn’t have the right flavour to it. But how could I justify the cost I asked myself? Even as a Starbucks Gold card holder, it was still $2 a cup and required a stop by one of the several dispensaries in the area. Further more for days when I wasn’t feeling the Bold, I did have the alternative Café Americano but still, at $2 a cup without a second job, it was going to become financially burdensome to keep up this caffeinated habit.

Perhaps I should have known that I was destined to enjoy Coffee through the enticement of the Ray Charles Starbucks card that I’d received when I bought a copy of the Ray Charles album “Genius Loves Company” (what can I say, I’m the genius and coffee is the company? ). Which further makes me laugh since whenever I go to Starbucks and hand them this card they all look at it and wonder where I had gotten such a card – primarily since it’s coming up on being seven years old and not readily available. The other typical response is that it’s the coolest or cutest card they’ve ever seen. I even had one barista try to take it when it zero’d out so to speak… yeah that didn’t happen

Anywhere, where does that leave me? Besides having to beat people away from my Ray Charles Starbucks card? Well after a little market research looking at the Tassimo coffee pots as well as the Flavia and Keurig machines I did an analysis of requirements and alternatives. Not to say that I didn’t look at all the different coffee machines out there, but I was looking for something that would be low maintenance, single serving, easy to operate under the influence of next to zero sleep. At least those were the requirements. The alternatives of course were to become more disciplined at going to bed earlier, learn to live on uber-man schedule where I sleep thirty minutes every few hours or to take up something else and after all I’ve read about smoking it just didn’t seem like a good idea

So I bit the bullet and pulled the trigger and ordered a Keurig coffee machine and a box of samples of different Kona coffee k-cups. I’ve ended up sticking with Timothy’s Kona Blend Coffee as I’m a sucker for Kona coffee having actually liked the way it smelled as a kid growing up in Hawaii.

But that’s not to say that’s the only coffee k-cups that are magnificent… I’ve definitely found a delight with what is known as “Jet Fuel” from the Coffee People. It’s a strong, dark blend with a taste that is distinct – and free of carcinogens no less which makes it all the better. Plus after taking a some to work to share with colleagues, one of them definitely seemed to think that it made the peppermint mocha mix used as an additive in their coffee that it made the peppermint taste even stronger – can you go wrong with such goodness?

Perhaps, but that’s also why I have an alternative to the Café Americano – Timothy’s Espresso blend. While it’s not a one for one replacement it comes darn close from a taste perspective. And for those late nights where you’re looking for the taste, there’s good ole Timothy’s Espresso blend decaf – sure there’s a little caffeine, but nothing that a little Kerberos documentation won’t do to push you to dream land.

So where does that leave me in the morning? Typically thinking to myself, “Decisions, decisions…” especially with the influence of the Starbucks thermos, the Panera coffee cup and the Jet Fuel conveniently edging itself toward the Keurig machine. There are definitely mornings where I’m looking for comfort and not really the kick of an after burner through Jet Fuel which leads me to the Kona or another favorite, the Nantucket Blend. Either of which provides that nice and warm flavour with a gentle nudge that wraps its arms around you and reminds you that even though it’s a jungle out there, you’ve got your emotional blanket to take with you

Similar to other documents, Microsoft has released a second update this month pertaining to Upgrading to SharePoint 2010. Similar to other docs, no change log is included with the document – break out your compare documents to find out the differences.

The document is available in two flavours, doc and pdf and available here for download:

Upgrading to SharePoint 2010 – Version 3, Released 17 January 2001

In case you downloaded the Group Policy for Microsoft Office 2010 earlier this month, Microsoft has updated the documentation, still available in your favorite three flavours of doc, pdf and xps.

Group Policy for Microsoft Office 2010 Version 2, released on 17 January 2011

Unfortunately a change log page is not included within the document, thereby preventing us from knowing exactly what changed.

Back in June 2010, Microsoft released what was known as the Productivity Hub for SharePoint 2010. It was a site collection that Microsoft provided that could be extended out for end users to visit to acquire knowledge on how to use SharePoint.  Great resource if you were short on training components and looking for assistance but weren’t able to find their IT Pro (who was probably hiding somewhere no doubt, fearing for their lives). Further for those that are looking to engage and foster adoption of the Information Worker’s in your business, the productivity hub is key to gaining their buy in and helping them to truly dive into the SharePoint platform to make it their tool set.

The best part of the hub in my opinion is the ability to customize it and add additional modules that meet your organization or business unit’s needs to ensure that your implementation is actually serving them from a business perspective rather than just humming away as another file share replacement.

Well, like most technology solutions, there are updates and enhancements.  On 17 January 2011, Microsoft released such an update for the Productivity Hub for SharePoint 2010. So, if you’re looking to just download and implement with the content packs – fear not, it’s simply and easy by just heading over to the Microsoft Download Center at:

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/en/details.aspx?FamilyID=4aaa9862-e420-4331-8bc3-469d7bae0ff1

However, if you’re feeling crafty and are looking to customize this product, it’s available on CodePlex from the team that created it (thanks RedTech!) at:

http://productivityhub.codeplex.com/

The key enhancement to the Productivity hub in this case is that of the customization documentation to provide guidance when crafting the Hub for your implementation’s UX.

For those of you that are working with integrating SharePoint with other technologies or just plumb curious as to the interfaces and technical specifications to take into account while developing solutions, best check out the 186 MB of SharePoint Products and Technologies Protocol Documentation that was recently updated and re-released. The original documentation was released back in July 2010.

Quick access here:

Microsoft SharePoint Products and Technologies Protocol Documentation – (1/10/11 v1.11)

If you’re running Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 or SharePoint Server 2007 and not quite ready to migrate to SharePoint 2010 to leverage the Claims Authentication Provider, take heart, there’s still hope.

Back in May 2010, Microsoft released several documents and extensions to assist with configuring the SharePoint v3 (or v12 depending on how you look at it) platform to federate with AD FS 2.0 – allowing for claims authentication federation.

Requirements

• Windows Server 2008
• Windows Server 2008 R2
• Windows Identity Foundation
• Microsoft Federation Extensions for SharePoint 3.0

So how do I do this you ask?  Microsoft used to have a document out on Connect for this, but it’s now gone RTW.  The document is available here:

• Federated Document Collaboration Using Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 with AD FS 2.0
• Configuring SharePoint 2007 AAM applications with AD FS 2.0 (TechNet)
• Microsoft Federation Extensions for SharePoint 3.0 – Windows Identity Foundation (MSDN)

Couple things to make note of…

• Don’t install AD FS 2.0 on the same server as SharePoint.  This should be a no brainer similar to “do not use a basic install” of SharePoint on any server.
• To keep search and other capabilities operational, leave the default zone as Integrated/NTLM Auth. This allows your crawler to still operate in its regular fashion.
• The federation capability really should only be leveraged for extranet / internet situations and not for use for all zones of users. Sure it’s great that claims auth with WSS v3 is there and supported, but let’s not get too zealous just yet
• Get comfy with editing your web.config if you aren’t already so that you’re able to use the claims-based role and membership providers – if you’ve set this up for SharePoint 2010, then it should seem like old hat to you. Better yet, work with your developers to craft up a solution package that updates the web.config for you so that you’re not violating the laws of thermodynam… I mean good source control practices.
• Note that if you’re building this into a multi-server farm, the extension bits have to be installed across all servers – yes, that’s right, it’s not a solutions package and won’t copy across all the servers for you. That’s not to say that the web.config couldn’t be updated via solution package though per the previous bullet.

Just think of the applications though, you can keep your WSS v3 / MOSS 2007 farm operational and federate with the partner organizations that you’ve been looking to let into your system while building a transition path to move to SharePoint 2010 using Claims whole heartily. 

Last thoughts… how cool is it that you can actually have a better client integration environment with the extensions that weren’t available with the ADFS v1 authentication provider with Windows Server 2003 R2.

Wake Up Bits…

It’s Monday morning, 10 January 2011… do you know what your group policy objects are configured to that may potentially affect the end user experience between SharePoint 2010 and your Office 2010 client users?  If not, no need to sweat, Microsoft recently published a document on Group Policy for Microsoft Office 2010 (7 January 2011). It’s fairly well written, weighing in at a whopping 1.9 MB (303 pages) for the DOC file (where’s my light and low Cal docx edition???).

The document finely articulates the different capabilities of the Office system, describing the policy object settings and what their effects on the Office client family and SharePoint products and technologies are. Included in this document is information that pertains to the SharePoint Workspace product as well as the administrative templates that are associated with the product.

For instance, with regard to the Contact Card, there is an option to “Configure presence icon” with three options – Display All, Display some, Display None (page 161). While this might seem trivial, it’s definitely something to keep in mind when you’re working in an environment where you want to show presence and you have populated your SIP address or made it available to the User Profile Service for consumption.

So while knowing how the group policy objects within your Active Directory based domain are important, there are definitely individuals new to the SharePoint career that have been tasked with implementing SharePoint Foundation Server 2010 to begin assisting with a proof of concept, pilot or perhaps a full on collaboration system that has requirements that can’t justify the procurement of SharePoint Server 2010’s Standard or Enterprise licensing. Or perhaps you’re not a SharePoint Administrator / IT Pro at all and you’re looking for some additional documentation to help with planning and pushing forward with developing an implementation guide, then you’ll definitely want to pick up Microsoft’s updated “Getting Started with Microsoft SharePoint Foundation 2010” document (Originally Published November 2010, updated 7 January 2011).

The document provides great detail to assist in the planning phase of an SPF 2010 implementation and points out the key differences and features that have been removed from the Windows SharePoint Services version 3 platform.

Good morning, happy reading and good day!