Price and value

“Price is what you pay. Value is what you get." (Warren Buffett)

TaxOnWeb down …

It is that time of the year again …those dreaded brown enveloppes with tax forms just arrived in our mailbox. Just out of curiosity I decided to take a look at TaxOnWeb.be where Belgian citizens can submit their taxes online – unfortunately no luck – the site is down.

A Web 2.0 solution for dying plants

“Homegrown Terra-rists” Ignite Video - The Botanicalls system and applications use networked open source hardware and software to allow plants to communicate with people on people’s terms - using the telephone, text messages or twitter.

Tags van Technorati: LOL,fun,web2.0

Exploring Identity LifeCycle Manager 2007 R2

Update: see section about release data

A common issue in organisations is how to effectively and efficiently manage identities of users since data about users is maintained in a number of different systems (HR systems, AD,CRM, etc …) and needs to be pushed to a number of target systems such as SharePoint, Exchange, etc … Identity LifeCycle Manager 2007 is a product which provides an integrated and comprehensive solution for managing the entire lifecycle of user identities and their associated credentials.

The next version of Microsoft Identity Lifecycle Manager, Microsoft® Identity Lifecycle Manager "2" (ILM "2") is scheduled for release in the first quarter of calendar year 2009.

While the initial release was planned for first quarter of calendar year 2009 – I just found this blog post – ILM 2 Release Date put back a whole year.

I’m at TEC 2009 in Las Vegas at the moment, and it was officially announced by Microsoft today that the release date for ILM 2 is now Q1 2010, as opposed to the previously publicised date of “any day now”. We should be getting an RC1 version in Q3 this year.

Reasons why I wanted to explore ILM R2 (instead of sticking with the current version) - (For a detailed description take a look at Understanding ILM2 white paper)

• It provides a SharePoint-based user interface that enables system architects and IT administrators to create rules governing users and groups using natural language descriptors and easy-to-use menu-driven controls.
• ILM “2” provides powerful self-service capabilities for Office end-users, rich administrative tools and enhanced automation for IT professionals and .NET and WS-* based extensibility for developers.
• ILM "2" will also include a simplified configuration of synchronization with heterogeneous identity stores through synchronization rules. This will enable customized solutions to be delivered more cost effectively in less time as they require less specialized application knowledge or programming skills.
• New features in ILM "2" make it possible for users to manage their own identity information. IT can use ILM "2" to set policies to require workflows such as approvals for or notifications of these user-generated changes. For example, IT may choose to delegate management of mobile phone numbers to end users. Users would be able to use the ILM "2" portal to update this information. This helps keep identity data such as mobile phone numbers up to date so that users can be easily contacted in the process of doing business.
• ILM "2" includes rich, visual workflow management based on the Windows Workflow Foundation, which enables IT to quickly define, automate and enforce identity management policies. IT can use the integrated workflow in the approval / rejection process for actions such as creating accounts, or delegating tasks. For further extensibility and customization, ILM "2" will ship with WS-* based APIs that enable customization at both the platform and solution level. ILM "2" consumes Windows Workflow Foundation (WF) workflows, enabling organizations to import and reuse existing WF-based workflows in ILM "2".

First thing to do is setting up a test environment to check it out - installation requirements for ILM R2 (I skipped the Exchange Server installation) – notice the 64-bit requirement…

• Windows Server 2008 64-bit Standard or Enterprise Editions
• Active Directory Certificate Services (Remember: that you will not be able to change your computer name or domain settings after you have installed Active Directory Certificate Services)
  
• SQL Server 2008 64-bit Standard or Enterprise Editions
• Web Server (Internet Information Server 7)
• Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 SP1 
• Microsoft .NET Framework 3.0
• Microsoft .NET 3.5 SP1 Framework
• Exchange 2007 SP1 Management Console (if provisioning Exchange Server 2007 mailboxes)
• Microsoft Exchange 2007 SP1
  Note: Only needed when using ILM “2” add-in for Office 2007

Tags van Technorati: identity+management,ILM2,ILM,ILM+2007,Identity+lifecycle+manager+2007,microsoft

Ferrari.com powered by SharePoint Server 2007

This looks really look – Ferrari.com – for some more public SharePoint Server websites check out Ian’s Top SharePoint WCM Web sites (with thumbnails)

PS Would have been even cooler if they had added some Silverlight stuff in there …

SharePoint Designer 2007 available as free download

From April 1st onwards SharePoint Designer (SPD) 2007 is available for free, customers with Software Assurance (SA) who bought SPD 2007 are entitled to Expression Web. An interesting statement in Q&A on SharePoint Designer 2007 licensing changes is the following

SharePoint Designer “v-next” will be available simultaneously with the release of the next version of SharePoint, and it will also be a free download.

Related resources:

• Video – SharePoint Designer 2007 (April 2009 announcement) with Tom Rizzo (Sr. Director of Product Management for SharePoint) and J.R. Arredondo (Sr. Product Manager for SharePoint Platform and Tools)
• Office SharePoint Designer 2007 Training (standalone edition)
• SharePoint Designer 2007 free download
• Letter to SharePoint Designer Customers
• Professional Microsoft Office SharePoint Designer 2007 (Wrox, Amazon) – excellent book and must read if you want to use SPD
• SharePoint Team Blog – SharePoint Designer available as a free download

Tags van Technorati: sharepoint,sharepoint+2007,sharepoint+designer+2007,spd+2007,microsoft

Try out Live Mesh

I must agree with Andrew – Get Hip to Mesh … it rocks  - I use it for synchronizing my Windows Live Writer Drafts folder on multiple computers – quite handy…

PS I haven’t tried Expanded Live Mesh for Mobile CTP but it definitely sounds cool as well.

Tags van Technorati: live+mesh,mesh,windows+live,blogging

SharePoint Server 2007, Office and Windows Server 2008

After 5 years of working with Windows Server 2003 and SharePoint using Windows Server 2008 is a little different – as well as the installation experience – for some interesting links – check out Installing SharePoint Server 2007 on Windows Server 2008.

If you are setting it up as a demo machine on to which you also install Office 2007 remember that you will need to add the Desktop Experience feature without  it you will not be able to  save documents directly from your Microsoft Office application to a SharePoint Document Library.

Tags van Technorati: sharepoint,sharepoint+2007,office+2007,windows+2008,moss+2007,moss,office,microsoft

BIWUG April 2009 – Change of agenda

Because of some unforeseen interference we needed to change our agenda. The session about System Center Operations Manager (SCOM) will be postponed to the next BIWUG session. Next week we will have a session from the guys of Ometa who will be talking about their experience with SharePoint and ERP integration and next a session about migrations with Tzunami. The BIWUG board apologizes for this last moment change – if you are interested you can still register.

Tags van Technorati: biwug,sharepoint,tzunami

Change keyboard layout during login on Windows 2008 Server to Dutch(Belgian)

The same trick as for Change keyboard layout during login on Windows 2003 Server apparently seems to work for Windows 2008 Server as well.

Tags van Technorati: windows+2008,w2008,keyboard,regional+settings

Running a 64-bit guest in 32-bit host

Just tried something new – I needed to setup a virtual image for a 64-bit Windows Server 2008 on my laptop which is still running 32-bit Windows XP as a guest host OS. Luckily VMWare Workstation 6.0 (or higher) to the rescue – which allows you to do just this. If you want to know if your hardware supports 64-bit, go to the VMWare Drivers & Tools section where you will find a processor check for 64-bit compatibility.

Then the next hurdle – you will need support for Intel Virtualization Technology. My portable a Lenovo T61 supports this but it is disabled by default. So you need to go into the BIOS and enable this – go to Config>CPU section in your BIOS Setup Utility to do this. Next power off your machine and boot it up again. Now it should work (a simple restart did not seem to do the trick)

PS To check if your Intel processor supports VT check out Compare the Intel Xeon Processor Family – you will see Intel Virtualization Technology listed next to Other Intel Technologies.

Tags van Technorati: vmware,64bit,virtualization

P.S. Thanks Cassy for pointing out the mistake …

Web 2.0: Please, but in your own time (and budget)?

I picked  up this title from an intriguing blogpost (in Dutch) -  Web 2.0: Graag, maar in eigen tijd ?! This posting will retake some quotes from this post (in italic) on to which I will add my own thoughts about this. I think this is an interesting topic so do add your own comment if you have another point of view.

“We need to share knowledge, innovate, bind talent and be open. So we need a platform to support this,… so' let’s define a publication protocol and add it to our quality handbook. Oh, and by the way on which project do I need to register these hours.”

This might sound familiar to you especially when you are working for a consulting firm which is typically generating revenue by charging customers by the hour. This means that if the organization you work for does not provide the room to invest in non-direct billable projects – basically investment projects – it probably will not have the ability to fully take advantage of the enablers of web 2.0 to innovate their business offerings. I look with admiration at Google’s 20% percent time rule and I’m wondering how many company are following this example especially now given the tight economic climate.

Related postings:

• Enterprise 2.0 and organization culture
• Knowledge is power! So why share your knowledge!?

Tags van Technorati: web2.0,work,corporate+culture

Sixth sense devices – Surface vNext

SharePoint and Enterprise 2.0 – The good, the bad and the ugly

Interesting post – SharePoint and Enterprise 2.0 – The good, the bad and the ugly – written with a lot more nuance then a number of other readings out there about SharePoint and Enterprise 2.0.

Related posts:

• The problem is bigger than SharePoint

Typealyzer – What personality is behind that blog?

Apparently the writing style of my blog reflects that I’m a guardian.

Guardians: The organizing and efficient type. They are especially attuned to setting goals and managing available resources to get the job done. Once they have made up their mind on something, it can be quite difficult to convince otherwise. They listen to hard facts and can have a hard time accepting new or innovative ways of doing things.
The Guardians are often happy working in highly structured work environments where everyone knows the rules of the job. They respect authority and are loyal team players.

Analyze your own blog at Typealyzer

Architects?

Kind of sad – if you read this – I guess this is just another case of overinflated expectations surrounding another personae in the software industry – Architect is a swear word.

BIWUG April 2009 - SharePoint, SCOM and Tzunami

Another BIWUG session is planned on april 7th  - here are some more details about the agenda:

• 18:30-18:45 Introduction
• 18:45-19:45 Using System Center Operations Manager (SCOM) to monitor a SharePoint environment:  System Center Operations Manager 2007 is THE end to end Monitoring Solution. In this session we will discuss what you, as SharePoint guys, find relevant to be monitored. System Center Operations Manager uses a SharePoint Monitoring toolkit for monitoring the SharePoint Environment. This toolkit consists of a set of System Center Operations Manager 2007 management packs designed to help IT pros monitor their WSS 3.0 and MOSS 2007 and 2007 SP1 environments. These newly released packs were engineered to take advantage of SCOM 2007’s features, including new and improved reporting, additional actions, new views, and integrate IIS and SQL health rollup for a better understanding of the system-level dependencies of the SharePoint environments.And last but not least: System Center Operations Manager can also emulate end user experience by monitoring a Web Application. We will show you how to monitor a Web Application, even if it is require credentials, and how to record a browser session. If you have a SharePoint environment and don’t have a monitoring solution at the moment then you can’t miss this session!  Speaker: Alexandre Verkinderen
• 20:00-21:00 - Tzunami for SharePoint migrations – More details to follow Speakers: Frank Cleynen and Silvana Carrasco Cordero

We forgot to give away the free Visual Studio 2008 copies last time  - an innocent hand picked some random numbers and so we have the following winners which we picked from the list of attendees from last session. If you don't show up to pick your copy we will draw another winner amongs the attendees.

The winners are:

• Francis Goeminne
• Tom Nys
• Steve Luys
• Rifat Rugovaj
• Ward Noppe

Don’t forget to register for this session.

Tags van Technorati: biwug,community,scom,sharepoint,moss+2007,moss,system+center,microsoft,sharepoint+2007

TechDays 2009 - Enhancing the SharePoint developer experience - Supporting links

There were a number of resources I mentionned in my talk which were not listed in the slidedeck. I promised to add them to my blog so here you go:

• Adding intellisense when editing XML files in WSS v3/MOSS 2007 (using the core schemas) and using CAML.Net Intellisense for SharePoint (using the extended schemas)
• SharePoint 2007 and WSS 3.0 Dispose Patterns by Example
• Caching in Office SharePoint Server 2007 - used by CBQ web part
• Right-click  a .WSP to add solution
• Test Driven development and SharePoint - The final conclusions (SharePoint Pod Show) - LOL

I'll put on some of the Powershell examples on my blog in the next days.

Tags van Technorati: sharepoint,caml,caml+2007,moss,moss+2007,TDD,sharepoint+podshow,fun

Changing the hyperlink color in a Powerpoint slide deck

Kind of frustrating that such a simple task as changing the color of a hyperlink in a Powerpoint 2007 can be so complex. Finally found it in this video - Powerpoint 2007 Demo: Change the color of hyperlink

So Navigate to the Design Tab, in the Themes section click on Colors and next click Create new Theme Colors in the collapsed menu. This will open a dialog window in which you can select the color for a Hyperlink and a Followed Hyperlink.

Tags van Technorati: microsoft,powerpoint+2007

My SharePoint developer toolkit

Every SharePoint developer should invest some time in building up his own toolkit to make the development experience a more fluid and efficient one. This is a preliminary list of SharePoint tools aimed at SharePoint developers. I will update this list quite regularly to keep it up to date with new releases. If you think there is something missing  in this toolkit - just leave a comment.

Build and Packaging Tools

• STSDEV
• AppPool Recycle Utility
• Solution Installer
• WSPBuilder
• AC's Project Utility
• Visual Studio Extensions for WSS (VSEWSS) 1.1 and VSEWSS 1.2 and VSEWSS 1.3 CTP Feb 2009

CAML/Search Tools

• U2U Query Builder
• YACQT
• Search Service Tool
• SharePoint Search Coder
• CAML.NET
• LINQ to SharePoint
• Search Community Toolkit
• CAML.NET Intellisense for SharePoint 

Visual Studio Optimisations

• AC's CodeRush Tools
• SPDevMod
• Imtech Fields Explorer for Visual Studio 2008

Content/Config Replication

• Content Deploy Wizard
• CMP Package Explorer
• Cross Site Configurator
• SPS Tips Utility Pack

SharePoint Extensions

• SP Features
• Smart Tools
• SP Config Store
• Enhanced CQWP

Testing Tools

• Test Data Population
• Imtech Test Content

Inspection Tools

• SharePoint Manager
• SharePoint Inspector
• SP Explorer Client (IE)

Governance/Manageabilty

• SP Governance Tools
• Reporting Framework
• MS Asset Inventory
• MS Monitoring Kit: Only usefull if you are also using System Center Operations Manager (SCOM)
• SP Admin Toolkit v3 (incl SPDiagnostics)

STSADM and Powershell Tools

• AC’s STSADM
• Imtech STSADM
• Gary LP’s STSADM
• STSADM Win
• SP Powershell Extensions

Planning/Design Tools

• MS Capacity Planning
• Visio Shapes

Other tools

• SP Logging Spy
• SPTraceView
• SharePoint Toolbox
• SharePoint SUSHI
• TraceInfo WebPart

.NET Essentials

• Fiddler
• Reflector
• Sysinternals
• IE Developer Toolbar

Tags van Technorati: microsoft,sharepoint,codeplex,sharepoint+2007,tools,community,moss,moss+2007,wss,wss3