SharePoint - Branch deployment and WAN optimization

One of the choices you will have to make when setting up a SharePoint architecture where you have geopgraphically dispersed locations is  the decision between a "centralized farm setup" or "multiple farms setups" in different geopgraphic locations. If you choose for multiple farm setups you might want to take look at georeplication. I already talked about georeplication in SharePoint a couple of weeks ago but sometimes it is just more cost efficient to do a central deployment.  This will however imply that you will have sufficient network bandwidth so that you end-users in remote locations can still work efficiently.

So when you are faced with limited bandwith you want to use it as efficiently as possible. There are some different solutions out there to do network acceleration for SharePoint:

• Citrix Wanscaler  and Netscaler - WAN optimization of MOSS Trafic with Citrix Netscaler and WANScaler . This is a new product offering which Citrix acquired earlier from Orbital Data.
• Packeteer (Tacit) -  http://www.packeteer.com/products
• IOra - http://www.iora.com/products/sharepoint.asp
• Certeon - http://www.certeon.com  - has some interesting technology which understands patterns of packets from specific applications such as SharePoint.
• Cisco - check out their white paper - Cisco WAAS Software 4.0 optimizations for SharePoint (written for SPS2003 but the same principles will apply)
• F5  - http://www.f5.com - traditionally aimed at AFEs (application front end) to boost performance but now it will move into the WAN optimization area as well, where it will encounter traditional players such as Riverbed and Silver Peak

 

Other links:

• Microsoft SharePoint could be a challenge for WAN optimization.
• WAN optimization market overview
• WAN optimization and acceleration appliances tackle SSL trafic
• The next three big WAN optimization targets

 

Technorati tags: sharepoint+2007, moss+2007, moss, sharepoint, architecture, network, wan, microsoft

Creating a SharePoint state machine workflow

Most examples that you find on the web about SharePoint workflow development seem to use the sequential workflow type. Here's an example of a state machine workflow:

• Creating a MOSS state machine workflow - Part 1 of 4 : Concepts and planning
• Creating a MOSS state machine workflow - Part 2 of 4: Creating InfoPath forms
• Update to Creating a MOSS state machine workflow  Part 2 : Initiation and Association Form Trap
• Creating a MOSS state machine  workflow - Part 3 of 4 : workflow development

Happy SharePoint-ing ...

Porting SharePoint Designer Workflow to Visual Studio

Interesting post - Porting SharePoint Designer Workflows to Visual Studio. Has anyone tried this out?

Technorati tags: workflow, sharepoint+designer, sharepoint, moss+2007, moss, sharepoint+2007, visual+studio, microsoft

Integrating Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 and Dynamics AX

I recently took a look at how you can integrate MOSS 2007 and Dynamicx AX - here's a collection of links which might be of interest:

• Microsoft Dynamics Developer Center (MSDN)
• Using Dundas webparts and Enterprise Portal
• Axapta and SQL Server Reporting Services Integration (Partnersource)
• Microsoft Dynamics AX 4.0 SP1 - Role Based Business Intelligence (Partnersource)
• Microsoft Dynamics Snap for Dynamics AX (Codeplex) - Wave 2.0 Prerelease - This codeplex project contains the pre-release versions of Business Data Lookup, Customer Journal , Custom Report Generator, Timesheet Management and Vacation Management snaps. These snaps increase the productivity of information workers by allowing them to access and input relevant data where and when they need.
• Integrating Line of Business Applications with SharePoint (Jeremy Palmer - Microsoft) - this is one of the places where I actually found some information about using Business Data Catalog to integrate Dynamics with MOSS. I expected more info like this - if you have some examples about integrating SharePoint Server 2007 and Axapta using BDC - leave a comment on this blog.

Have fun ...

Technorati tags: sharepoint, moss+2007, moss, sharepoint+2007, dynamics, axapta

Accessibility and MOSS 2007 - the story continues

A while ago, I already stated that building a WCAG compliant site on SharePoint Server 2007 is not an easy endevaour . Fortunately,  there is some good news, Microsoft is currently working together with HiSoftWare on a "Accessibility Kit for SharePoint". For more info take a look at the AKS Portal as well as Lawrence his post - Pre-Announcing the Accessibility Kit for SharePoint.

Technorati tags: sharepoint, wcag, accessibility, moss+2007, sharepoint+2007

Want to develop with SharePoint ... really?

I think that the recent flamings ( for an example take a look here) of SharePoint show you the success of this product.

I have been doing SharePoint development for over 7 years now and I must say that I'm impressed with the improvement since SPS2001.  But I must also confess that I think that the learning curve is quite steep. So what happens, those that don't make it, start to whine...

Come on whineres , listen to Eric (Flame and ye shall be flamed in return ), Tony ( I don't care if you don't want to develop on SharePoint, and neither does your boss ... ) and Bob  - take the blue pill.

Technorati tags: sharepoint, microsoft, trivia

MSDN Evening - Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 and Employee Portal in Microsoft Dynamics NAV

I just registered for a free MSDN evening about how you can integrate your Dynamics NAV solutions with MOSS 2007 using Business Data Catalog, E-Forms, Search and Workflow.

P.S. Hey Tom, exploring integration between Dynamics AX and MOSS 2007 would be also be interesting ... :)

Technorati tags: sharepoint, sharepoint+2007, moss+2007, moss, dynamics, microsoft

Great Halo3 videos on YouTube

ROTFLOL

• 10 ways to tell if you're a NOOB in Halo
• Halo Grid
• Halo FUN song

Technorati tags: Halo3, trivia, fun

Is God a farmer, gardener, architect or IT Guy?

I picked this joke up from an interesting discussion about SOA - Should IT deliberately create chaos:

A farmer, an architect, a gardener and an IT guy are talking about which is the oldest profession. Now these chaps are bible literalists so they think the Garden of Eden was the start of everything.

The farmer says "Mine is the oldest profession as Adam had to tend all the animals and get all the fruit from the trees, if he wasn't a farmer he would have starved."

The gardener jumped in saying "yes but someone had to design the garden of Eden and put all the plants in place, so God must be a gardener"

"No, no" said the architect "First God had to create order and structure out of the chaos and build the universe so he must have been an architect"

"Ahhh" said the IT guy "but where did you think the chaos came from?"

Technorati tags: architecture, soa, trivia

Trivia - Longest classname in SharePoint object model

I stumbled on this one when looking at the SharePoint publishing controls - SPSimpleFormattingEncodedResourceExpressionBuilder. Do you know of a SharePoint class with a longer name?

Technorati tags: sharepoint+2007, moss+2007, moss, trivia

Tip - Running Internet Explorer 7.0 with addons disabled

Sometimes you want to use Internet Explorer without any addons - to do this go to command prompt and use the next command "iexplore.exe -extoff"

 

Technorati tags: internet+explorer, IE7, microsoft

Slides september BIWUG meeting available

The  slidedecks are now available on the BIWUG site:

• Guidelines and best practices for a succesfull SharePoint deployment
• Preview Microsoft Office PerformancePoint Server

If you missed a meeting, take a look at the overview of all previous presentations.

Technorati tags: sharepoint, biwug, performancepoint, microsoft, moss+2007, moss

Calculated fields in Windows SharePoint Services - common formulas

A question I got a couple of weeks ago - where can I find some examples of formulas used in SharePoint calculated fields? Well, here you go - Examples of common formulas - Windows SharePoint Services.

Technorati tags: sharepoint+2007, wssv3, microsoft, sharepoint

Reawarded MVP Windows SharePoint Services

I just got word that I got reawarded for another year as Microsoft MVP Windows SharePoint Services. For more info about the MVP Program, take a look at the MVP Executive Summary

Ultimate paintball gun

Check this out ... I want one of these next time that I try to score a paintball headshot ...

 

http://rap4.com/paintball/os/tippmann-phantom-grenade-launcher-long-p-3513.html

 

Technorati tags: fun, paintball, weapon

Service Pack 3 available for SharePoint Portal Server 2003

SP3 is basically a roll up of all fixes since the release of SPS - for a complete description of the fixes - see Description of SharePoint Portal Server 2003 SP3

Download SharePoint Portal Server 2003 SP3

 

Technorati tags: microsoft, sps+2003, sharepoint, service+pack, sp3

Tafiti with Halo3 skin

Apparently they updated the skin of the Tafiti search experience (built using Silverlight) with a Halo3 theme.

 

PS Unfortunately I can't see it myself since I have a newer version of Silverlight installed and Tafiti needs the 1.0 version.

Technorati tags: silverlight, tafiti, search, halo3, xbox360

SharePoint at Dolmen

Nice picture :-) ....

Technorati tags: sharepoint, moss+2007, microsoft, dolmen, moss

Blog post series about the SharePoint Content Deployment API and framework

Nice series from Stefan about the Content Migration API (formerly known as PRIME) for SharePoint (both WSS 3.0 and MOSS 2007). As suggested previously in a posting, you can actually use this framework to start writing your own SharePoint GeoReplication Solution.

• Deep Dive Into the SharePoint Content Deployment and Migration API - Part 1
• Deep Dive into the SharePoint Content Deployment and Migration API - Part 2
• Deep Dive into the SharePoint Content Deployment and Migration API - Part 3
• Deep Dive into the SharePoint Content Deployment and Migration API - Part 4

Technorati tags: sharepoint+2007, sharepoint, moss+2007, wssv3, microsoft

Ten things you should know about SharePoint master pages

Here are some random interesting notes about master pages in SharePoint Server 2007 and Windows SharePoint Services 3.0:

1. The first thing you should know about how master pages work in SharePoint is how the "default.master" is used. Default.master is found in the 12 Hive underneath TEMPLATE\GLOBAL\default.master. An instance of this file is created everytime a new site is created in SharePoint.
2. Content pages are referring to a master page using 2 different types of tokens: dynamic tokens and static tokens. About dynamic tokens: developers can modify variables in code that change the location of the master page - by changing the MasterUrl (~masterurl/default.master) or CustomMasterurl (~masterurl/custom.master) property. Static tokens point to a certain location where you master page should be found - ~site/custom.master - points to the master page gallery of the current website. ~sitecollection/custom.master - points to the master page gallery of the current site collection. For more info take a look at Customizing master pages in Windows SharePoint Services.
3. Administration pages such as  viewlsts.aspx, create.aspx etc ...  use  a different masterpage called application.master which resides in the _layouts folder and so therefore occurs once per installation of SharePoint. So, you will not be able to modify this one on a per site basis
4. When you need to create a new master page, start off from one of the minimal master pages - remember though that  there is a difference  between the master pages for publishing sites and collaboration sites (they have different placeholders- use the Minimal or Base Master Pages guide from Heather Solomon or  How to: Create a minimal master page)
5. There are a number of ways you can add your own master pages to MOSS - the most modular and flexible approach is by using feature. The nice thing here is that you can create a feature callout event which allows you to change the SPWeb.MasterUrl property from default.master to your custom master page. 
6. The master page for a Meeting Workspace is a little different then the one for other WSS sites - it uses 3 special controls which are used to display the tab controls.
7. Did you know that you can link a master page to a specific site definition? You can do this by specify the MasterUrl property of the Configuration node in ONET.XML  e.g. <Configuration ID="1" Name="Blank" MasterUrl="_catalogs/masterpage/custom.master">. Remember that you will also need to provision the master page at site creation by using the Modules section in ONET.XML -  <Module Name="CustomMasterPage" List="116" Url="_catalogs/masterpage" RootWebOnly="FALSE"> <File Url="custom.master" Type="GhostableInLibrary" IgnoreIfAlreadyExists="TRUE" /> </Module>
8. Be carefull of using inline code blocks in master pages. The code blocks will work fine as long as your masterpage does not get customized. Once it gets customized (e.g. by using SharePoint Designer) it will run in safemode which does not allow inline code. You can override this setting by altering the web.config and adding an extra PageParserPath - <PageParserPath VirtualPath="/sitedirectory/marketing/_catalog/masterpage/*" IncludeSubFolders="true" CompilationMode="Always" AllowServerSideScript="true" />
9. Have you seen the mysterious SharePoint DelegateControl in a lot of master pages? These define regions in your master page for which you can substitute the content with your own controls. You can replace what is shown in a delegate control by define a Control element within a feature for more info take a look at Use your ASP.NET webcontrol in MOSS 2007 with SharePoint delegate control.
10. There is a feature for WSS 3.0 which you can download from CodePlex to manage your Master Page as well - take a look at Stramit SharePoint 2007 Master Picker.
    

Some extra white papers and reference material

• Customizing and Branding Web Content Management-Enabled SharePoint Sites (Part 1 of 3): Understanding Web Content Management and the Default Features - This article discusses topics that you should understand before you use Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 to create sites that support Web content management (WCM) and gives a general overview of the various artifacts that are available in the product. (11 printed pages)
• Customizing and Branding Web Content Management-Enabled SharePoint Sites (Part 2 of 3): Extending WCM - This article explains the structure of master pages, the steps to create a custom master page, the underlying mechanisms of navigation in WCM-enabled sites, the creation of custom field controls, and how to customize the Page Editing toolbar.
• Customizing and Branding Web Content Management-Enabled SharePoint Sites (Part 3 of 3): Creating and Configuring WCM-Enabled Sites - This article examines the Web content management (WCM) features of Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 from an administrative perspective: creating a Publishing Portal site, configuring a site for anonymous access and forms authentication, and using site variations. (9 printed pages)
• ASP.NET Master Pages Overview  
• Building tylerbutler.com, Part 1: Planning and Basic Branding
• Building tylerbutler.com, Part 2: Building Content Types and Page Layouts
• Building tylerbutler.com, Part 3: Customizing Content Query Styles
• MOSS2007 - Rebuild Corporate Website
• MOSS2007 – Rebuild Corporate Website (Part 2)
• MOSS2007 – Rebuild Corporate Website (Part 3)
• MOSS2007 – Rebuild Corporate Website (Part 4)
• Customizing the Look and Feel of Microsoft Office SharePoint Server (MOSS) 2007 - Custom Chrome / Branding
• How to: Create a Minimal Master Page 
• How to Create and Store Master Pages on the Server for Use with Site Collections
• Create a Feature: Master Pages for Site Collections
• CSS Options with Master Pages
• Customizing Sharepoint 2007: Customizing using SharePoint Designer 2007

Technorati tags: sharepoint, sharepoint+2007, moss+2007, moss, microsoft, wss3, wssv3, masterpage