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• SharePoint 2007 Development in Darwin (15-20 of February)
• Hands On Days in Melbourne – For early adopters and Microsoft customers
  • IT Professionals (25^th of Feb)
  • Developers (26^th of Feb)
• SharePoint 2010 Executive Briefing in Brisbane (1^st of March)
• SharePoint 2010 for Developers in Brisbane (1^st of March)
• SharePoint 2010 for IT Professionals in Brisbane (1^st of March)
• SharePoint 2010 Executive Briefing in Melbourne (2^nd of March)
• SharePoint 2010 for IT Professionals in Melbourne (1^st of March)
• SharePoint 2010 for Developers in Melbourne (2^nd of March)
• SharePoint 2010 Executive Briefing in Melbourne (3rd  of March)
• Hands On Days in Sydney – For early adopter and Microsoft customers
  • IT Professionals (8^th of March)
  • Developers (9^th of March)
• Ignite SharePoint 2010 IT PRO Training for Microsoft Partners in Melbourne (16 and 17 of March)
• Ignite SharePoint 2010 IT PRO Training for Microsoft Partners in Sydney (23^rd and 24^th of March)
• Ignite SharePoint 2010 IT PRO Training for Microsoft Partners in Canberra (25^th and 26^th of March)
• Hands On Days in Canberra – For early adopters and Microsoft customers
  • IT Professionals (30^th of March)
  • Developers (31^h of March)
• Hands On Days in Canberra – For early adopters and Microsoft customers
  • IT Professionals (7^th of April)
  • Developers (8t^h of April)
• SharePoint 2010 Readiness Summit – Developer Track Melbourne (5 Days in April)
• SharePoint 2010 Readiness Summit – IT Professional Track Melbourne (5 Days in April)
• SharePoint 2010 Readiness Summit– Developer Track Sydney (5 Days in May)
• SharePoint 2010 Readiness Summit– IT Professional Track Sydney (5 Days in May)
• A couple more SharePoint courses coming in Darwin (stay tuned in April time frame for 5 days)
• Other Hands On Days for SharePoint 2010 Adelaide and Perth to follow stay tuned in April and May
• Microsoft Certified Masters SharePoint 2010 Instructors and Upgrade ALPHA in Redmond (19^th of May to 28^th of May)
  
• SharePoint 2010 Readiness Summit – Developer Track Brisbane (5 Days in June)
• SharePoint 2010 Readiness Summit – Summit – IT Professional Track Brisbane (5 Days in June)

Learn more and register at www.handsonday.com

Before I get into the actual steps, here are some basics: For email enabled libraries to work in SharePoint, you need at least one server in your SharePoint Farm to host the SMTP service (on Windows 2008 and above this service is still administrated through IIS 6.0 Manager) this service stores routed email in a drop folder from where SharePoint timer job picks it up periodically and puts it in the document library linked to an email alias (the LibName part in LibName@companyname.com). The timer jobs run on all severs connected to the Farm but only the server where the mail is forwarded to will actually process it. When Distributed Lists management is turned on SharePoint will create Contacts for all incoming email library under the selected organisational unit.

Here are some quick sanitised steps that I documented for the customer:

1. Create an Organisational Unit under you domain called SPMail, for example the one I created has an LDAP Path: OU= SPMail,OU=Melbourne,DC=COMPANYNAME,DC=COM
   1. On Windows Server 2008 and above ADSI Edit is preinstalled and one of best tool to find the LDAP Paths
2. On the newly created OU setup Delegate rights with Full Control for the Central Administration\Timer Service Account: DOMAIN\ServiceAccountName
   1. Full Control is not Necessary, you can get by Read, Write
3. On your DNS Server add a new MX record, to a new subdomain like SPMAIL such that your entry looks like SPMAIL.COMPANYNAME.COM with Mail Server Priority set to 20 and DNS pointing to the SharePoint box (for example SPAPP.COMPANYNAME.COM) in your farm with the SMTP service running locally.
4. Open up Exchange 2007 Management console and under Hub Transport create a new Send Connector called SharePoint Mail
   1. Use the following for the Address Space value: SPMAIL.COMPANYNAME.COM
   2. Under Smart Host Routing setting select: Use DNS for MX Records
      
5. Install and setup the SMTP service on SPAPP.COMPANYNAME.COM for domain: SPMAIL.COMPANYNAME.COM with the drop folder set to its default value
6. Finally setup the Incoming Email settings under operations in Central Administration (<CA SITE>/_admin/IncomingEmail.aspx)

For testing simply enable email on Shared Document library under the Central Admin Site. This can be done by going to list settings and the clicking on the Incoming Email Settings link.

Library: <CA SITE>/Shared%20Documents/Forms/AllItems.aspx

Email Alias: SharedDocuments@SPMAIL.COMPANYNAME.COM

Verify that a new Contact is created in AD and Exchange and then send an email using you email client to verify if emails are being routed to the library.

There are three places within SharePoint where end users can change search visibility setting or exclude content for search.

1. Change Visibility for a Web site: In the Site Settings page, site owners can click the Search Visibility link to go to the Search Visibility page SharePoint. In the Indexing Site Content group, selecting the No option to will exclude all content within the site. The crawler will in turn simply skip the site and not include any of its content in the index.
2. Exclude Site Columns: In the Site Settings page, site owners can click the Searchable Columns link to go to the Search Settings for Fields page in SharePoint. This page will enumerate all the site columns defined at the current site level. Selecting the NoCrawl check box for the site columns will exclude them from future crawls.
3. Exclude Lists: The last option for excluding content exists at the level of the SharePoint list settings. It enables list owners to exclude the list and all the content within it from crawls. In the settings page of the list, click the Advanced Settings link. Selecting the No option under Search Available for crawl tells the crawler to exclude the specific list from a crawl.

Also if there are certain pages or entire site content that site designers don’t want to be crawled, simply putting the no index directive in the head section of the master page or layout page’s mark-up will stop the SharePoint crawler from crawling the pages:

 <META NAME=” ROBOTS” CONTENT=” NOHTMLINDEX”/>

1. Simply select the text or mark-up inside the data view web part and then
2. Click on Conditional Formatting option in the Task Panes menu
3. In the Condition Criteria dialog box select Advanced and in the Advanced Condition dialog box change Select a function category to All
4. Find and insert the IfHasRights() function by double clicking on the Select a function list
5. Use a single Permission Mask for example 4 IfHasRights(4) to only make the mark-up or text visible when the user has edit rights on the page\item

Following is a list of Permission Masks for the build in permissions

• ViewListItems – 1
• AddListItems – 2
• EditListItems – 4
• DeleteListItems – 8
• ApproveItems – 16
• OpenItems – 32
• ViewVersions – 64
• DeleteVersions – 128
• CancelCheckout – 256
• PersonalViews – 512
• ManageLists – 2048
• ViewFormPages – 4096
• Open – 65536
• ViewPages – 131072
• AddAndCustomizePages – 262144
• ApplyThemeAndBorder – 524288
• ApplyStyleSheets – 1048576
• ViewUsageData – 2097152
• CreateSSCSite – 4194314
• ManageSubwebs – 8388608
• CreateGroups – 16777216
• ManagePermissions – 33554432
• BrowseDirectories – 67108864
• BrowseUserInfo – 134217728
• AddDelPrivateWebParts – 268435456
• UpdatePersonalWebParts – 536870912
• ManageWeb – 1073741824
• UseRemoteAPIs – 137438953472
• ManageAlerts – 274877906944
• CreateAlerts – 549755813888
• EditMyUserInfo – 1099511627776
• EnumeratePermissions – 4611686018427387904
• FullMask – 9223372036854775807

<SharePoint:SPSecurityTrimmedControl ID=”SPSecurityTrimmedControlName″ PermissionsString=”BrowseDirectories” runat=”server”>

The markup that needs to be security trimmed goes here.

 </SharePoint:SPSecurityTrimmedControl>

Here are the permissions you can use, you can add multiple using commas:

 Here is an example, This can be done in Code:

 SPQuery.ViewAttributes += ” Scope=\”Recursive\”";

 Or as part of the CAML Query Markup

    <FieldRef Name=’ID’ /> 

</ViewFields> 

<QueryOptions> 

   <ViewAttributes Scope=’Recursive’ /> 

   <OptimizeFor>FolderUrls</OptimizeFor> 

</QueryOptions>

Other query options are:

<QueryOptions>
   <IncludeMandatoryColumns>True</IncludeMandatoryColumns>
   <DateInUtc>True</DateInUtc>
   <IncludeAttachmentUrls>True</IncludeAttachmentUrls>
   <IncludePermissions>True</IncludePermissions>
   <ExpandUserField>True</ExpandUserField>
   <Folder>Name Of the Folder Here/</Folder>
</QueryOptions>

1. Setup two domain accounts for SSRS – one for the SSRS Windows Service and the other for the App Pool running the SSRS Web Services
2. Install SQL Server 2008 with all required advanced services, Analysis, Integration and off course SSRS
3. SSRS should be installed but not configured at install time
4. Install WSS 3.0 SP2 or MOSS 2007 SP2
5. Run Reporting Services Configuration Tool and choose Integration Mode when prompted
6. Install Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Reporting Services Add-in for Microsoft SharePoint Technologies on all SP boxes starting with the one that hosts Central Administration Site
   1. http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=58edd0e4-255b-4361-bd1e-e530d5aab78f&displaylang=en

Make sure of the following things to avoid grief:

• SharePoint Object Model is available on the SSRS installation box, not a problem if everything is on the same box but something to be careful of in a multi-server farm.
• Remember Integrated mode only works for SharePoint Web Applications on the Default Zone and will not work with Web Apps with Anonymous access enabled
• In Multiple Farm environments the copyappbincontent stsadm command must also be executed on each WFE
• Make sure when using Kerberos, the DNS entry for the Web Application URL must be an A record, not CNAME

After a gruelling three weeks of SharePoint expert training and intense peer discussions, three difficult written exams, a tough but fair Qualification lab and countless sodas and sleepless nights, I am very pleased to announce, that I’m now a Microsoft Certified Master for SharePoint 2007!

I was originally supposed to attend the beta rotation (R2) back in April but as luck would have it I could not attend R2 and boy was I glad to start on 1^st of June, 2009!  First of all the weather in Redmond was fantastic by all accounts, it only rained once or twice while I was there. Microsoft jokingly calls weeks like these the recruitment weeks. Secondly the training format, the qualification lab and venue improved tremendously compared to the last two rotations.  The Master Program folks seek exhaustive feedback and based on the improvements to the program on per rotation basis, you can tell that they take this feedback seriously.

My journey with the program started when I applied for it last year in November, 2008; lucky for me it was not too hard to get a buy in from my employer Stargate Global Consulting, they have a vision to build a Centre of Excellence for SharePoint in Australia, and, having MCMs on board played into that vision. Part of the application process is submission of engagement briefs, sanitised copies of technical documents authored in the past and possibly an interview (I did not get one but have been told by other candidates how hard it was).  I got the green light from the SharePoint MCM Program Managers in January, 2009 along with a list of pre-reading material and invitation emails (more on this later). I did not know at the time but the selection criteria is right up there, we have been told for every candidate selected in the last rotation four to five applicants were refused.

I did not pay much attention to Pre-read list as I had read most of the material over the last few years, big mistake as I was to learn later – most of the documents and articles on the pre-reading list have been updated over the last year.  I focused more on the logistics side. Based on the advice of former MCM Candidates, I flew in a couple of days early and shared a flat with two really personable and knowledgeable Microsoft Consulting Services folks – or as we now like to call ourselves ‘The Three Amigos’. The off campus housing and learning experience was great, although you are the foremost resource responsible for your own learning, the support from peers cannot be denied and one of the best things about MCM.

June the 1^st was an early start like all other days of the program, the program kicked off at 7:45 AM on the dot at Building 40, breakfast was served and the seats had name tags along with MCM Folders and log on instructions to the fabulous blade servers. MCM collateral was also neatly stacked at the back of the room for our collection. From the introductions alone it became quite obvious the deep skill set and expertise on parade in the room.  We had a good balance of architects, consultants, support engineers and folks from both Microsoft Consulting Services and Microsoft Partners; almost all the 17 candidates had at least 3 to 8 years experience with the SharePoint technology and products among other things. The best thing about all of us was our eager attitude towards learning. We were all here to learn “what we don’t know that we don’t know”.

We were also introduced to our trainer for the day; we had over 12 through the three weeks, each undoubtedly an expert in his or her area. The training days were busy – early starts and late finishes was the norm. A full day of presentations and discussions (45 minute lunch break inclusive) was followed mostly by lab work and lots of reading over the weekends. You had little time for anything else other then eating or sleeping.  Any free minutes we had were put to use by mini SharePoint Trivia sessions, I learnt a lot of things from this valuable exercise. This is where the true benefit of peers becomes apparent; I also can’t count the number of times I was assisted by my fellow MCM candidates during the course of the labs.

Not going into too much detail from a ‘What was covered Perspective’.  Week one focused largely on the architectural and design side of SharePoint, week two dived into the features available within the product and week three focused on the custom development side of things. Although not all SharePoint areas were covered as that would have been a herculean task given the nature of the product and the constant flux of improvements with service packs and updates. In my personal opinion program manager had done a great job, the course was very well structured. The material was highly relevant and can be largely applied to our daily work. 

The three written exams I mentioned earlier took place after each week of training, it’s important to understand that you are not taught to the test, so don’t be surprised if you are thrown an odd ball question, it probably is testing your concepts – both your existing experience and the pre-reading list play an important role here.

As the old adage goes ‘All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy’ this was true too in the case of the MCM Program, James (Program Manager) mixed it all up with visits by the product team, candidate dinners, the traditional Go-Karting run off against the OCS MCM folks (we won the 1^st and 3^rd positions), company store visit etc. I must add that James did a great job in keeping us motivated, especially by week three where we all needed it badly. My personal favourite was the visit to the Home of the Future, it was quite inspiring. I came out buzzing with ideas for services in the cloud that will be required in the not so distant future.

The grand finale of the program is the much dreaded Qualification lab. The tireless lab work and studying for the exams in the preceding weeks did not prepare me for what I was to experience in the Qualification lab. The lab preparation and the blade server setup were excellent.  I remember how pleased I was to get the tasks under my belt, even let a little shout of joy out just before the last minute warning. I had not realised it in the course of the day but the sheer amount of scenarios and work that needed to be performed had almost drained me.  It hit me when I tried to get up from my seat and just fell back without warning. This was probably one of the most memorable days of the whole program.

It’s true, as it’s been iterated on number of blogs before, MCM is not for the faint hearted, and you will need all the stamina in the world and passion to succeed. Quite frankly MCM is the best product training you can have.  The recognition and respect for achieving this status is unparalleled in the Microsoft eco system. I would challenge all seasoned SharePoint professionals to consider the MCM Program; do you have what it takes to be a Master?

When the beta came out back in 2006 I played with Publish to Blog functionality within Word 2007 to publish to WSS 3.0 based blogs, but hardly anything after that. To my surprise it’s quite easy to setup Word 2007 to publish content as blog posts with visual content like images to Word Press. Therefore my first post with Word 2007 will discuss just that, publishing Blogs with Word 2007. A quick how to guide followed by a technical synopsis.

Here’s how to setup Microsoft Word 2007 for Easy Blog Publishing:    

Inside Word 2007 click on the Office Button and select Publish, one of the options there will be Blog. Click on the Blog Tab.

This switches the word editor in blogger view with its own set of ribbons.

To start publishing you have to Word your blog location and connection details, you do this by clicking the Manage Accounts button on the Blog Post ribbon.

This open up the Blog Accounts dialog, simply click on new button to add information about your blog.

Word 2007 has got basic setup information for most popular blog sites, Word Press is one of them, if one does not exist then there is a option to choose Other. In this case we will select Word Press.

The most important piece of information is your blog address, in this example we use raiumair.wordpress.com followed by the xmlrpc.php page name. You will also need to enter your blog site’s User Name and Password. Click the OK button to complete the process. For word press there is no need to set any extra Picture Options, the default settings work perfectly fine. For other provider you might need to set up a 3^rd Party FTP store for images.

If all goes well you will be prompted by a successful account registration prompt. Click Ok to continue to writing the blog post. (This might not work behind certain firewalls or content blockers).

Once happy with the content you can either publish a draft copy or publishing it directly to the blog using the Publish button on the Blog Post ribbon.

The Insert Category and Open Existing are other cool features. Insert category allows tagging the blog post with existing categories (pulled from your blog) or new ones. Open Existing allows editing of published blog posts.

Technical Synopsis:

Behind the scenes Word 2007 uses the MetaWeblog API to work with the blog providers like Word Press as in the case above (created by Dave Winer some 5 years back, it is a popular way to interact with blogs, more information here http://xmlrpc.com/metaWeblogApi) . The same MetaWeblog API is also exposed in SharePoint (WSS 3.0 and above) by using a unique Web service implemented in a file called Metaweblog.aspx. Use of the ASP.NET page to work to as a web service allows SharePoint servers to be compatible with various other blogging tools who expect the API to be available through an .ASPX page including Word 2007. I have also used the same technique to generate public site SiteMap.xml definitions for search engines. A live in use example is the Stargate Global Consulting site here: http://www.stargateglobalconsulting.com.au/SiteMapGenerator.aspx

Final Word

Given the availability of Word 2007 on most desktops and the ease of authoring minus any learning curve surely makes Word 2007 a great option for writing blogs. All in all I found Word 2007 has certainly simplified for me the blog authoring process.

 You can download it at  http://www.microsoft.com/spd. 

Through MOSSIG and Stargate Global Consulting we thought this was a good reason to offer a free introduction training for Stargate Designer, you can sign up for this 2 hour workshop here.

Each workshop will be limited to 12 people, so sign up quickly!

One of the participants in the training asked if there was a way to find out what site template was originally used to create\provision a particular SharePoint site, remembering not seeing any web parts or features that help do this. I whacked up a quick little web part nicely named the Site Template Web Part. It’s also available as a downloadable WSP package for easy deployment.

Here’s the working code example:

foreach(SPWebTemplate webTemplate in
SPContext.Current.Web.GetAvailableWebTemplates((uint)SPContext.Current.Web.Locale.LCID))

{

if (webTemplate.Name.Contains(SPContext.Current.Web.WebTemplate+“#”+SPContext.Current.Web.WebTemplateId))

{

displayMarkup = string.Format(this.DisplayHTML, webTemplate.Title, SPContext.Current.Web.WebTemplate, SPContext.Current.Web.WebTemplateId);

}

}

Download the WSP and source from here:

Check it out at: http://quince.infragistics.com/

http://www.stargateglobalconsulting.com

Apparently a lot of investment from VC’s is taking place in this area and Silicon Valley is spearheading the cause with a large number of start ups, most big internet companies and many ex dotcom boom CEOs are already leading the charge.

What’s relevant for most software developers is to learn the tool set for the future, cloud computing, mobile devices and understanding of multiple disciplines outside the software engineering realms is what will help them be the first in riding this new wave.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4831440850220717845

The program’s website has always been a great source of information, but this morning there’s another source for you.  A blog for the program that has been kicked off by the program director, Per Farny.

Keep an eye on this resource for breaking news about these incredible, intense training programs.  I am privileged to be attending the first pubic rotation for the SharePoint MCM in March.

Well I don’t have to wonder too much, a list of all current exams and certified professionals is available at http://www.microsoft.com/learning/mcp/certified.mspx

The number I am following at the moment is 3, that’s the number of Microsoft Certified Master: Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 masters worldwide, hopefully that will change soon if I have anything to do about it.

1.     Lost about 11 KGs already, whohooo got a personal trainer and as you can tell she kicks ass.

2.      Have been playing Golf or driving a bucket load at least once a day every week, not so much head way into swimming yet – went twice only.

3.     Glad to report that I have been accepted into the Program for the very first public rotation for SP MCMP in March. Quite excited! Stay tuned, a lot more blog posts coming up around this area.

4.     Discussed Ideas for a Office 14 within my team at SGC but nothing tangible as yet, waiting for the Office 14 beta bits to show up in April 09. Have only heard rumours about the new features.

5.   Started looking into Office Communication Server including the API and Project Server. Other products to follow.

6.   Started with lesson 1 on a Arabic for Dummies book – really no progress made other then the fact Sofa and a bunch of other words are derived from Arabic.

Orignal: http://www.sharepointblogs.com/mattg/archive/2008/05/12/sharepoint-licensing-a-common-question-i-get-asked.aspx

SharePoint licensing is available in 8 models (if you count all flavours of SharePoint).

WSS – licensed as part of the Windows OS on which it runs, no additional licensing is required unless you use SQL standard/enterprise. A single server solution (using SQL Embedded) requires only the Windows Server license ($1000 per server assuming Win2k3 R2 Standard Edition) and CAL’s (user/device for each user, $40 each assuming purchased in 20 Cal packs). The option of external users can be covered under the Windows External connector license ($2000 per server), this negates the need for CAL’s for external (non-employee) users. It is worth noting that other servers supporting the WSS implementation may require licensing (such as AD or SQL servers) but this depends entirely on the solution.

MOSS Standard – Uses server/CAL licensing model. Each server in the farm (running MOSS) requires a server licence ($4500 per server, note: there is no price difference on Standard vs Enterprise MOSS on the server, the cost is weighted on the CAL). Each user/device requires a CAL ($100 per user/device), this is often included as part of the “Core CAL” in EA’s. As it is unlikely that MOSS will be deployed without separate SQL (SQL Standard or SQL Enterprise) additional licenses for SQL will be required (see SQL licensing below). All Windows Servers used in delivering the solution require licensing (both server and CAL).This can be used for Internal Intranets, Portals, collaboration and BI platforms (etc) and for authenticated access extranets, it cannot be used for public facing (anonymous access) web sites.

MOSS Enterprise – Uses server/CAL licensing model. Each server in the farm (running MOSS) requires a server licence ($4500 per server, note: there is no price difference on Standard vs Enterprise MOSS on the server, the cost is weighted on the CAL). Each user/device requires an Enterprise CAL ($75 per user/device), this is in addition to the “Standard” CAL, the CAL cost for Enterprise MOSS could therefore be taken as $175 . As it is unlikely that MOSS will be deployed without separate SQL (SQL Standard or SQL Enterprise) additional licenses for SQL will be required (see SQL licensing below). All Windows Servers used in delivering the solution require licensing (both server and CAL).This can be used for Internal Intranets, Portals, collaboration and BI platforms (etc) and for authenticated access extranets, it cannot be used for public facing (anonymous access) web sites.

MOSS FIS – The MOSSFIS (MOSS For Internet Sites, pronounced MOSSFIZZ) is a server only (no CAL) license for MOSS ($41,000 per server in the farm running MOSS). As it is unlikely that MOSS will be deployed without separate SQL (SQL Standard or SQL Enterprise) additional licenses for SQL will be required (see SQL licensing below). All Windows Servers used in delivering the solution require licensing (both server and CAL).MOSS FIS can be used for public facing (i.e. anonymous access) web sites and for authenticated extranets, it cannot be used for internal only systems (i.e. Internal Intranets, Portals, collaboration and BI platforms, etc).

IFS – InfoPath Forms Server, uses server/CAL licensing model. Each server in the farm (running IFS) requires a server licence ($4500 per server). Each user/device requires a CAL ($55 per user/device). As it is unlikely that IFS will be deployed without separate SQL (SQL Standard or SQL Enterprise) additional licenses for SQL will be required (see SQL licensing below). All Windows Servers used in delivering the solution require licensing (both server and CAL).This can be used for Internal forms (surfaced on Intranets and via LOB systems, etc) and for authenticated access extranets, it cannot be used for public facing (anonymous access) web sites.
IFS FIS – The IFS FIS (IFS For Internet Sites) is a server only (no CAL) license for IFS ($22,000 per server in the farm running IFS). As it is unlikely that IFS will be deployed without separate SQL (SQL Standard or SQL Enterprise) additional licenses for SQL will be required (see SQL licensing below). All Windows Servers used in delivering the solution require licensing (both server and CAL).IFS FIS can be used for public facing (i.e. anonymous access) web sites and for authenticated extranets, it cannot be used for Internal only forms (surfaced on Intranets and via LOB systems, etc).

MOSS Search Standard – The MOSS for Search Standard Edition (MOSS with only search functionality, no ECM, WCM or BI – being replaced with Search Server, see: http://www.microsoft.com/enterprisesearch/) is a server only (no CAL) license for MOSS SSE ($8,000 per server in the farm running MOSS SSE). As it is unlikely that MOSS will be deployed without separate SQL (SQL Standard or SQL Enterprise) additional licenses for SQL will be required (see SQL licensing below). All Windows Servers used in delivering the solution require licensing (both server and CAL).

MOSS Search Enterprise – The MOSS for Search Enterprise Edition (MOSS with only search functionality, no ECM, WCM or BI – being replaced with Search Server, see: http://www.microsoft.com/enterprisesearch/) is a server only (no CAL) license for MOSS SEE ($58,000 per server in the farm running MOSS SEE). As it is unlikely that MOSS will be deployed without separate SQL (SQL Standard or SQL Enterprise) additional licenses for SQL will be required (see SQL licensing below). All Windows Servers used in delivering the solution require licensing (both server and CAL).

SQL Server – SQL is required for SharePoint (all flavours). WSS will install SQL Embedded by default (although can use SQL Standard or Enterprise). Due the size (in terms of user bases and content storage requirements) of most MOSS implementations either SQL standard or SQL Enterprise is required. With SQL 2005 a 2 node cluster can be created on Standard Edition reducing the requirement for SQL Enterprise in many instances. SQL can be licensed in 2 ways, server/CAL or CPU. Assuming Standard Edition, the Server licence (for each server running SQL, or in a clustered scenario each active node) is around $1000 per server, with CAL’s at around $170. The CPU (sockets, not cores) licence is around $6000/CPU (so a server with 2 quad cores would require 2 CPU licences). The Windows Servers on which SQL is running also require licensing.
Windows Server – A server licence for each windows server – don’t forget “peripheral” systems, one’s that are often missed are ISA and AD… A windows CAL is needed by each user/device accessing the “system”. Windows Server 2003 R2 Standard will cost $1000 with CAL’s at $40 per user/device assuming purchased in 20 CAL packs…

To do one all you need is to open the command line and use the shutdown command. The /r switch is to trigger a Reset after shutdown and /m is the name of the remote server

CMD> Shutdown /r /m \\<Server Name>

You can download the Run As Shell Utility for Vista and Windows Server 2008 from:

http://download.sysinternals.com/Files/Shellrunas.zip

I will be there representing MOSSIG (www.mossig.net) See you there!

http://www.officelabs.com/Pages/Default.aspx

Quite odd as he had site owner rights. Not wanting to redo the tedious workflow design again (I hope there is a way to save workflows from the workflow dialog via Ctrl-C in vNext) he asked me have a look and lucky for him, it was not too hard to figure out what might be going wrong. In 5 minutes he was up and running.

The solution is pretty simple, as we know all SPD workflows are saved at the root of the web they are created under. These workflows live in a special folder called drum roll… ‘workflows’ – it turns out this object under some scenarios won’t inherit permission from the parent site.

How can one fix that?

·         First open up the site in another instance of SharePoint Designer.

·         Then as the image shows – right click on the workflow object and select ‘Properties’.

·         Once the properties dialog box , click on the ‘Security’ tab and click on the ‘’ link at the bottom. This opens the object using the SharePoint web UI.

·         You should be able to add and remove users. Or simply toggling Inheritance on.

• Voila, go back to the old SPD Instance and hit Publish!

Simply and effective.

To read more, please click the link below: 

http://raiumair.wordpress.com/2007/03/04/of-information-management-consulting-and-sharepoint/

In my experience there are two places one should check:

a) Web parts are treated as any other file in SharePoint and can inherit permissions or have unique item level permissions. Web parts are only visible to users who  have at least read only access to the .webpart or .dwp files in the web parts gallery for the web parts.  Check for change of permissions, including recent removal of  OOTB groups or all authenticated users group (NTAUTHORITY). Also  sometimes SharePoint does not copy (or inherits) top level permissions to the web parts gallery and the _catalog folders so rechecking and manually adding accounts might be required. This is also how you can control the availability of web parts per user or group basis.

b) The second is the use of audiences for web parts, web parts go missing if audiences hace been set for the web parts and they are reset or have not been compiled or one does a restore of a site in a new domain or new SP Farm where the audiences are no longer available.

Note: All other hanky panky like deletion of web part dlls from the web server or removal of safe control entries from the web.config will show an appropriate error message and should not do a houdini.    

Web Parts generally should show error messages within the web part. While event handlers will need to show the errors in a log perhaps. There is also another way, an easy way to show these type of errors.OOTB the WSS API provides a sleek one liner to handle things that go wrong in custom SharePoint components and show the system error page with our custom message.

The one liner:

SPUtility.TransferToErrorPage()

You can even pass a link so the user has a choice to come back to the active\home page of the site and start again.

I worked with the document converters on a recent project (well almost 4 months old now) and have a few things to share around the Word to Web Page conversion functionality in MOSS. On the whole I found DCs as a fast way to publish content but the experience has left a few things to be desired. BTW the customer was statisfied with the results, they had a large bunch of word manuls that they were able to WCMise!

Lessons Learnt

• Document Converters are a reasonable way to convert large corpuses of pre written offline content in Word format to web based publishing pages – page layouts and styles to a certain degree can be controlled.
• For document converters to work documents need to be uploaded into conversion functionality enabled document libraries. The documents can then be converted and published into separate sites and even site collections.
• Any practical use of Document Converts, specially when converting large volumes of documents warrents the use of a programmed custom utility with ability to call conversions automatically. If not then the manual content publishing speed (multiple clicks) is not very different to manually copying and pasting content from word documents into page content fields (in some cases even wrose).
• Document Converters for Word only work with the new Office format i.e. Word 2007 and cannot convert older formats, period.
• Word to Page DC can mysteriously (Undocumented) pick up meta data if the same content type is being used to store the documents and pages (highly unlikely but possible if changes are made at the item level content type).
• Document Converters do not support images or bullet point conversions instead have an empty image placeholder and fake (some Unicode symbol) big black points for bullet points. Do not expect full fidelity between Word mark-up and HTML mark-up and mostly be ready to clean up the unusual Office style tags after conversion.
• One thing that we discovered the hard way and what I think rhymes with a hug is the fact that Document Converted Publishing Pages are linked back to the original source – which is a good thing (although I did not find a way to unlink them via the web UI). This works well when you change the source document and refresh the target page (explictly) But to my surprise for some unknwon reason the damn connections are hard coded rather then being relative to the site collection. So if you change host names, restore your site collection in a new domain you end with ‘Unknown Errors’ for all converted pages. 
• A good way is to have metadata like Page Layouts and Sites and asscoiated with the source document library and the custom utility can pick this up and pass the parameters to the convertors. Also a utility to clean unwanted local style elements is a must as the style functionality within MOSS does not work or I have been unable to make it work as advertised.

My friend Joshua noticed it on one of his newly created site collections and brought it to my attention. I am still perplexed as to what caused this in the first place.

But what most people don’t know (at least I din’t  know until Ishai showed me earlier in the year) is how to get to the internal folders with ease, there are a number of ways and the one stated below works well for copying config \ resource files next to the actual Dlls.

Recently a couple of people asked me if\how this could be done so here is the tip:

Start -> Run -> C:\windows\assembly\gac_msil

This should bring up the internal folders in the Global Assembly Cache and you can easily drag drop items in there.

You can download it from:

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=AD59175C-AD6A-4027-8C2F-DB25322F791B&displaylang=en

But before you can upgrade MOSS 2007 to SP1 you need to upgrade WSS 3.0 to SP1 too!

You can download it from:

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=4191A531-A2E9-45E4-B71E-5B0B17108BD2&displaylang=en

And if you are annoyed by SharePoint Desinger freezing mid flight then also donwload the SP1 for SP from:

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=B57C805D-2821-4625-A6F1-80725267F887&displayLang=en

In the past I have taken MS guidelines, best practices, hardware vendor advice and tons of experience from past projects to churn out quantative numbers and SharePoint infrastructure recommendations. Seems it just got a bit easier! I can see this tool being very handy in presales and technical review sessions with clients. Typical business scenarios addressed by the tool:

• I don’t know if I need 10 Servers or 1 server to meet the needs of my large law firm of 1000 users.
• Should I buy 10 Server CALs or 5?  I know I need something to get started, but not sure where to start.
• I’m confused by the capacity planning documentation; I wish I just had a tool I could put in a few inputs to get me started.
• I’ve used the HP capacity planning tool and I have a pretty good idea of what I want to do, but I would like a more platform agnostic view.
• My deployment is blocked until I can figure out what kind of topology I should be running to get basic high availability

This tool is in beta and will be released at a later stage. I am testing it at the moment via the connect program and will provide feedback on initial tests. https://connect.microsoft.com/site/sitehome.aspx?SiteID=14

How many times an end user might have gone.. Oh I wish if I could check for a valid email or I wish there was a way to add a given title only once to the list. Well not for long. 

I have decided to write three production quality custom field type features and make them available for free. One week, one feature at a time.

Week 1: Custom Validation Field – the idea here is to allow users to have user friendly field type (as simple as the build in single text field) where users can enter regular expressions and custom error messages to setup the custom field via the web browser.

Week 2 extends from week 1: Unique Value Field - the idea here is to allow users to have user friendly field type (as simple as the build in single text field) where users can enable checking for unique values with the optional ability to keep the deafulty Title field in sync with the custom fields value.

Week 3 concludes the three weeks: Surprise Field Type – this one’s a bit more innovative and I rather keep it a little secret,  want to prove the concept before I let the cat out of the bag.

If you have used any of the OOTB publishing layout pages then you would have noticed ‘EditControlPanel’ control. This is used to display meta data fields that need to be updated when in in page edit mode, i.e  when filling in the page content fields. You can also add text and images to help users out with content authoring. Now what ever you put between the opening and closing tags only gets displayed when the page is in edit mode and not in the preview or display mode.

But how can you invert the condition? For example show page fields only in display mode and not the edit mode? Well the answer is real simple just use the EditModePanel control again, it turns out that the control supports  an additional property called ‘PageDisplayMode’, via which you can control what gets displayed when, by default the elements value is set to Edit.

To Hide Content in Display Mode

<PublishingWebControls:EditModePanel runat=server id="EditModePanel1">
<CONENT GOES HERE>
</PublishingWebControls:EditModePanel>

To Hide Content in Edit Mode 

<PublishingWebControls:EditModePanel runat=server id="EditModePanel2" PageDisplayMode="Display">
<CONENT GOES HERE>
</PublishingWebControls:EditModePanel>


With a high calibre speaker program including Tracey Fellows, Managing Director Microsoft Australia, and Peter Roberts, Managing Editor of BRW as opening Keynotes; as well as presentations from clients like Lend Lease, Transfield, NRMA, and NIB, presentations will cover a range of industry hot topics.

I will be presenting day 1 of the conference on ‘Social Networking in the Enterprise’… for more details visit http://impact07.uniqueworld.net

I myself have been guilty in the past of this practice, but today I found a quick and easy way to log errors using the build in logging functionally.

Here’s the one liner, I am sure you will love it:

catch(Exception Ex)
{
Microsoft.Office.Server.Diagnostics.PortalLog.LogString("Exception Occurred: {0} || {1}", Ex.Message, Ex.StackTrace);
}

Tip to self: Use <Code> blocks to encapsulate code for proper rendering, finally figured how this worked in Word Press.

You can find STSADM installed in the BIN directory on all web front end servers deep in the 12 hive. The ’12 hive’ is located by default on (System Drive):\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\web server extensions\12\BIN. 

The first thing I do (when I get my hands on a SharePoint box) is add the 12 hive onto the servers PATH (via Computer > Properties > Advanced > Environmental Variables > Path). As I always keep forgetting the 200 or so commands in there entirety, I am posting them here as a reference, detailed documentation is available on TechNet.

Note: You can copy paste commands directly on to the command line but you will have to rewrite the ‘-’ character in most cases (some dodgy conversion). If a command does not work with C:\stsadm -o utility name then use the full executable name for example  C:\>stsadm.exe -o. Not all commands may work. WSS, Standard and Enterprise flavours of SharePoint have different commands.Also some commands are entirely specific to your environment setup.

1. stsadm -o activatefeature {-filename <relative path to Feature.xml> | -name <feature folder> | -id <feature Id>} [-url <url>] [-force]
2. stsadm -o activateformtemplate -url <URL to the site collection> [-formid <form template ID>] [-filename <path to form template file>]
3. stsadm -o addalternatedomain -url <protocol://existing.WebApplication.URLdomain> -incomingurl <protocol://incoming.url.domain> -urlzone <default, extranet, internet, intranet, custom> -resourcename <non-web application resource name>
4. stsadm -o addcontentdb -url <url> -databasename <database name> [-databaseserver <database server name>] [-databaseuser <database username>] [-databasepassword <database password>] [-sitewarning <site warning count>] [-sitemax <site max count>]
5. stsadm -o adddataconnectionfile -filename <path to file to add> [-webaccessible <bool>] [-overwrite <bool>] [-category <bool>]
6. stsadm -o add-ecsfiletrustedlocation -Ssp <SSP name> -Location <URL|UNC> -LocationType SharePoint|Unc|Http -IncludeChildren True|False [-SessionTimeout <time in seconds>] [-ShortSessionTimeout <time in seconds>] [-MaxRequestDuration <time in seconds>] [-MaxWorkbookSize <file size in Mbytes>] [-MaxChartSize <size in Mbytes>] [-VolatileFunctionCacheLifetime <time in seconds>] [-DefaultWorkbookCalcMode File|Manual|Auto|AutoDataTables] [-AllowExternalData None|Dcl|DclAndEmbedded] [-WarnOnDataRefresh True|False] [-StopOpenOnRefreshFailure True|False] [-PeriodicCacheLifetime <time in seconds>] [-ManualCacheLifetime <time in seconds>] [-MaxConcurrentRequestsPerSession <number of requests>] [-AllowUdfs True|False] [-Description <descriptive text>]
7. stsadm -o add-ecssafedataprovider -Ssp <SSP name> -ID <data provider id> -Type Oledb|Odbc|OdbcDsn [-Description <descriptive text>]
8. stsadm -o add-ecstrusteddataconnectionlibrary -Ssp <SSP name> -Location <URL> [-Description <descriptive text>]
9. stsadm -o add-ecsuserdefinedfunction -Ssp <SSP name> -Assembly <strong name|file path> -AssemblyLocation GAC|File [-Enable True|False] [-Description <descriptive text>]
10. stsadm -o addexemptuseragent -name <user-agent to receive InfoPath files instead of a Web page>
11. stsadm -o addpath -url <url> -type <explicitinclusion/wildcardinclusion>
12. stsadm -o addpermissionpolicy -url <url> -userlogin <login name> -permissionlevel <permission policy level> [-zone <URL zone>] [-username <display name>]
13. stsadm -o addsolution -filename <Solution filename> [-lcid <language>]
14. stsadm -o addtemplate -filename <template filename> -title <template title> [-description <template description>]
15. stsadm -o adduser -url <url> -userlogin <DOMAIN\user> -useremail <someone@example.com> -role <role name> / -group <group name> -username <display name> [-siteadmin]
16. stsadm -o addwppack  -filename <Web Part Package filename> [-lcid <language>] [-url <url>] [-globalinstall] [-force] [-nodeploy]
17. stsadm -o addwppack  -name <name of Web Part Package> [-lcid <language>] [-url <url>] [-globalinstall] [-force]
18. stsadm -o addzoneurl -url <protocol://existing.WebApplication.URLdomain> -urlzone <default, extranet, internet, intranet, custom> -zonemappedurl <protocol://outgoing.url.domain> -resourcename <non-web application resource name>
19. stsadm -o allowuserformwebserviceproxy -url <Url of the web application> -enable <true to enable, false to disable>
20. stsadm -o allowwebserviceproxy -url <Url of the web application> -enable <true to enable, false to disable>
21. stsadm -o associatewebapp -title <SSP name> [-default | -parent] -url <Web application 1 url,Web application 2 url> [-all]
22. stsadm -o authentication -url <url> -type <windows/forms/websso> [-usebasic (valid only in windows authentication mode)] [-usewindowsintegrated (valid only in windows authentication mode)] [-exclusivelyusentlm (valid only in windows authentication mode)] [-membershipprovider <membership provider name>] [-rolemanager <role manager name>] [-enableclientintegration] [-allowanonymous]
23. stsadm -o backup -url <url> -filename <filename> [-overwrite]
24. stsadm -o backup -directory <UNC path> -backupmethod <full | differential> [-item <created path from tree>] [-percentage <integer between 1 and 100>] [-backupthreads <integer between 1 and 10>] [-showtree] [-quiet]
25. stsadm -o backuphistory -directory <UNC path> [-backup] [-restore]
26. stsadm -o binddrservice -servicename <data retrieval service name> -setting <data retrieval services setting>
27. stsadm -o blockedfilelist -extension <extension> -add [-url <url>]
28. stsadm -o blockedfilelist -extension <extension> -delete [-url <url>]
29. stsadm -o canceldeployment -id <id>
30. stsadm -o changepermissionpolicy -url <url> -userlogin <DOMAIN\name> [-zone <URL zone>] [-username <display name>] [{ -add | -delete } -permissionlevel <permission policy level>]
31. stsadm -o copyappbincontent
32. stsadm -o createadminvs [-admapidname <app pool name>] [-admapidtype <configurableid/NetworkService>] [-admapidlogin <DOMAIN\name>] [-admapidpwd <app pool password>]
33. stsadm -o createcmsmigrationprofile -profilename <profile name> [-description <description>] [-connectionstring <connection string>] -databaseserver <server>  -databasename <name>  -databaseuser <username>  [-databasepassword <password>] [-auth windowsauth|sqlauth] -destination <url> [-rootchannel <channelname>] [-destinationlocale <LCID>] [-migrateresources onlyused|all] [-migrateacls yes|no] [-emailto <address1;address2>] [-emailon success|failure|none|both] [-keeptemporaryfiles Never|Always|Failure] [-enableeventreceivers yes|no]
34. stsadm -o creategroup -url <url> -name <group name> -description <description> -ownerlogin <DOMAIN\name or group name> [-type member|visitor|owner]
35. stsadm -o createsite -url <url> -owneremail <someone@example.com> [-ownerlogin <DOMAIN\name>] [-ownername <display name>] [-secondaryemail <someone@example.com>] [-secondarylogin <DOMAIN\name>] [-secondaryname <display name>] [-lcid <language>] [-sitetemplate <site template>] [-title <site title>] [-description <site description>] [-hostheaderwebapplicationurl <web application url>] [-quota <quota template>]
36. stsadm -o createsiteinnewdb -url <url> -owneremail <someone@example.com> [-ownerlogin <DOMAIN\name>] [-ownername <display name>] [-secondaryemail <someone@example.com>] [-secondarylogin <DOMAIN\name>] [-secondaryname <display name>] [-lcid <language>] [-sitetemplate <site template>] [-title <site title>] [-description <site description>] [-hostheaderwebapplicationurl <web application url>] [-quota <quota template>] [-databaseuser <database username>] [-databasepassword <database password>] [-databaseserver <database server name>] [-databasename <database name>]
37. stsadm -o createssp -title <SSP name> -url <Web application url> -mysiteurl <MySite Web application url> -ssplogin <username> -indexserver <index server> -indexlocation <index file path> [-ssppassword <password>] [-sspdatabaseserver <SSP database server>] [-sspdatabasename <SSP database name>] [-sspsqlauthlogin <SQL username>] [-sspsqlauthpassword <SQL password>] [-searchdatabaseserver <search database server>] [-searchdatabasename <search database name>] [-searchsqlauthlogin <SQL username>] [-searchsqlauthpassword <SQL password>] [-ssl <yes|no>]
38. stsadm -o createweb -url <url> [-lcid <language>] [-sitetemplate <site template>] [-title <site title>] [-description <site description>] [-convert] [-unique]
39. stsadm -o databaserepair -url <url> -databasename <database name> [-deletecorruption]
40. stsadm -o deactivatefeature {-filename <relative path to Feature.xml> | -name <feature folder> | -id <feature Id>} [-url <url>] [-force]
41. stsadm -o deactivateformtemplate -url <URL to the site collection> [-formid <form template ID>] [-filename <path to form template file>]
42. stsadm -o deleteadminvs
43. stsadm -o deletealternatedomain -url <ignored> -incomingurl <protocol://incoming.url.domain>
44. stsadm -o deletecmsmigrationprofile -profilename <profile name>
45. stsadm -o deleteconfigdb
46. stsadm -o deletecontentdb -url <url> -databasename <database name> [-databaseserver <database server name>]
47. stsadm -o deletegroup -url <url> -name <group name>
48. stsadm -o deletepath -url <url>
49. stsadm -o deletepermissionpolicy -url <url> -userlogin <login name> [-zone <URL zone>]
50. stsadm -o deletesite -url <url> -deleteadaccounts <true/false>
51. stsadm -o deletesolution -name <Solution name> [-override] [-lcid <language>]
52. stsadm -o deletessp -title <SSP name> [-deletedatabases]
53. stsadm -o deletessptimerjob -title <SSP Name> -jobid <SSP Timer Job Id>
54. stsadm -o deletetemplate -title <template title> [-lcid <language>]
55. stsadm -o deleteuser -url <url> -userlogin <DOMAIN\name> [-group <group>]
56. stsadm -o deleteweb -url <url>
57. stsadm -o deletewppack -name <name of Web Part Package> [-lcid <language>] [-url <url>]
58. stsadm -o deletezoneurl -url <protocol://existing.WebApplication.URLdomain> -urlzone <default, extranet, internet, intranet, custom> -resourcename <non-web application resource name>
59. stsadm -o deploysolution -name <Solution name> [-url <virtual server url>] [-allcontenturls] [-time <time to deploy at>] [-immediate] [-local] [-allowgacdeployment] [-allowcaspolicies] [-lcid <language>] [-force]
60. stsadm -o deploywppack -name <Web Part Package name> [-url <virtual server url>] [-time <time to deploy at>] [-immediate] [-local] [-lcid <language>] [-globalinstall] [-force]
61. stsadm -o disablessc -url <url>
62. stsadm -o displaysolution -name <Solution name>
63. stsadm -o editcmsmigrationprofile -profilename <profile name> [-description <description>] [-connectionstring <connection string>] [-databaseserver <server>] [-databasename <name>] [-databaseuser <username>] [-databasepassword <password>] [-auth sqlauth|windowsauth] [-emailto <address1;address2>] [-emailon success|failure|none|both] [-excludeschema ] [-keeptemporaryfiles Never|Always|Failure] [-enableeventreceivers yes|no]
64. stsadm -o editcontentdeploymentpath -pathname <path name> [-keeptemporaryfiles Never|Always|Failure] [-enableeventreceivers yes|no] [-enablecompression yes|no]
65. stsadm -o editssp -title <SSP name> [-newtitle <new SSP name>] [-sspadminsite <administration site url>] [-ssplogin <username>] [-ssppassword <password>] [-indexserver <index server>] [-indexlocation <index file path>] [-setaccounts <process accounts (domain\username)>] [-ssl <yes|no>]
66. stsadm -o email -outsmtpserver <SMTP server> -fromaddress <someone@example.com> -replytoaddress <someone@example.com> -codepage <codepage> [-url <url>]
67. stsadm -o enablecmsurlredirect -profilename <profile name> -off
68. stsadm -o enablessc -url <url> [-requiresecondarycontact]
69. stsadm -o enumalternatedomains -url <protocol://existing.WebApplication.URLdomain> -resourcename <non-web application resource name>
70. stsadm -o enumcontentdbs -url <url>
71. stsadm -o enumdataconnectionfiledependants -filename <filename for which to enumerate dependants>
72. stsadm -o enumdataconnectionfiles [-mode <a | u | all | unreferenced>]
73. stsadm -o enumdeployments
74. stsadm -o enumexemptuseragents
75. stsadm -o enumformtemplates
76. stsadm -o enumgroups -url <url>
77. stsadm -o enumroles -url <url>
78. stsadm -o enumservices
79. stsadm -o enumsites -url <virtual server url> -showlocks -redirectedsites
80. stsadm -o enumsolutions
81. stsadm -o enumssp -title <SSP name> [-default | -parent | -all]
82. stsadm -o enumssptimerjobs -title <SSP Name>
83. stsadm -o enumsubwebs -url <url>
84. stsadm -o enumtemplates [-lcid <language>]
85. stsadm -o enumusers -url <url>
86. stsadm -o enumwppacks [-name <name of Web Part Package>] [-url <virtual server url>] [-farm]
87. stsadm -o enumzoneurls -url <protocol://existing.WebApplication.URLdomain> -resourcename <non-web application resource name>
88. stsadm -o execadmsvcjobs
89. stsadm -o export -url <URL to be exported> -filename <export file name> [-overwrite] [-includeusersecurity] [-haltonwarning] [-haltonfatalerror] [-nologfile] [-versions <1-4> 1= Last major version for files and list items (default), 2= The current version, either the last major or the last minor, 3= Last major and last minor version for files and list items, 4= All versions for files and list items] [-cabsize <integer from 1-1024 megabytes> (default: 25)] [-nofilecompression] [-quiet]
90. stsadm -o extendvs -url <url> -ownerlogin <domain\name> -owneremail <someone@example.com> [-exclusivelyusentlm] [-ownername <display name>] [-databaseuser <database user>] [-databaseserver <database server>] [-databasename <database name>] [-databasepassword <database user password>] [-lcid <language>] [-sitetemplate <site template>] [-donotcreatesite] [-description <iis web site name>] [-sethostheader] [-apidname <app pool name>] [-apidtype <configurableid/NetworkService>] [-apidlogin <DOMAIN\name>] [-apidpwd <app pool password>] [-allowanonymous]
91. stsadm -o extendvsinwebfarm -url <url> -vsname <web application name> [-exclusivelyusentlm] [-apidname <app pool name>] [-apidtype <configurableid/NetworkService>] [-apidlogin <DOMAIN\name>] [-apidpwd <app pool password>] [-allowanonymous]
92. stsadm -o forcedeleteweb -url <url>
93. stsadm -o formtemplatequiescestatus [-formid <form template ID>] [-filename <path to form template file>]
94. stsadm -o getadminport
95. stsadm -o getdataconnectionfileproperty -filename <filename of the data connection file> -pn <property name>
96. stsadm -o getformsserviceproperty -pn <option name>
97. stsadm -o getformtemplateproperty [-formid <form template ID>] [-filename <path to form template file>] -pn <property name>
98. stsadm -o getproperty -propertyname <property name> [-url <url>] (SharePoint cluster properties: avallowdownload, avcleaningenabled, avdownloadscanenabled, avnumberofthreads, avtimeout, avuploadscanenabled, command-line-upgrade-running, database-command-timeout, database-connection-timeout, data-retrieval-services-enabled, data-retrieval-services-oledb-providers, data-retrieval-services-response-size, data-retrieval-services-timeout, data-retrieval-services-update, data-source-controls-enabled, dead-site-auto-delete, dead-site-notify-after, dead-site-num-notifications, defaultcontentdb-password, defaultcontentdb-server, defaultcontentdb-user, delete-web-send-email, irmaddinsenabled, irmrmscertserver, irmrmsenabled, irmrmsusead, job-ceip-datacollection, job-config-refresh, job-database-statistics, job-dead-site-delete, job-usage-analysis, job-watson-trigger, large-file-chunk-size, token-timeout, workflow-cpu-throttle, workflow-eventdelivery-batchsize, workflow-eventdelivery-throttle, workflow-eventdelivery-timeout, workflow-timerjob-cpu-throttle, workitem-eventdelivery-batchsize, workitem-eventdelivery-throttle; SharePoint virtual server properties: alerts-enabled, alerts-limited, alerts-maximum, change-log-expiration-enabled, change-log-retention-period, data-retrieval-services-enabled, data-retrieval-services-inherit, data-retrieval-services-oledb-providers, data-retrieval-services-response-size, data-retrieval-services-timeout, data-retrieval-services-update, data-source-controls-enabled, days-to-show-new-icon, dead-site-auto-delete, dead-site-notify-after, dead-site-num-notifications, defaultquotatemplate, defaulttimezone, delete-web-send-email, job-change-log-expiration, job-dead-site-delete, job-diskquota-warning, job-immediate-alerts, job-recycle-bin-cleanup, job-usage-analysis, job-workflow, job-workflow-autoclean, job-workflow-failover, max-file-post-size, peoplepicker-activedirectorysearchtimeout, peoplepicker-distributionlistsearchdomains, peoplepicker-nowindowsaccountsfornonwindowsauthenticationmode, peoplepicker-onlysearchwithinsitecollection, peoplepicker-searchadcustomquery, peoplepicker-searchadforests, presenceenabled, recycle-bin-cleanup-enabled, recycle-bin-enabled, recycle-bin-retention-period, second-stage-recycle-bin-quota, send-ad-email)
99. stsadm -o getsitedirectoryscanschedule
100. stsadm -o getsitelock -url <url>
101. stsadm -o geturlzone -url <protocol://incoming.url.domain>
102. stsadm -o import -url <URL to import to> -filename <import file name> [-includeusersecurity] [-haltonwarning] [-haltonfatalerror] [-nologfile] [-updateversions <1-3> 1= Add new versions to the current file (default), 2= Overwrite the file and all its versions (delete then insert),3= Ignore the file if it exists on the destination] [-nofilecompression] [-quiet]
103. stsadm -o installfeature {-filename <relative path to Feature.xml from system feature directory> | -name <feature folder>} [-force]
104. stsadm -o listlogginglevels [-showhidden]
105. stsadm -o listregisteredsecuritytrimmers -ssp <ssp name>
106. stsadm -o localupgradestatus
107. stsadm -o managepermissionpolicylevel -url <url> -name <permission policy level name> [{ -add | -delete }] [-description <description>] [-siteadmin <true | false>] [-siteauditor <true | false>] [-grantpermissions <comma-separated list of permissions>] [-denypermissions <comma-separated list of permissions>]
108. stsadm -o migrateuser -oldlogin <DOMAIN\name> -newlogin <DOMAIN\name> [-ignoresidhistory]
109. stsadm -o osearch [-action <list|start|stop>] required parameters for ‘start’ (if not  already set): role, farmcontactemail, service credentials [-f (suppress prompts)] [-role <Index|Query|IndexQuery>] [-farmcontactemail <email>] [-farmperformancelevel <Reduced|PartlyReduced|Maximum>] [-farmserviceaccount <DOMAIN\name> (service credentials)] [-farmservicepassword <password>] [-defaultindexlocation <directory>] [-propagationlocation <directory>]
110. stsadm -o osearchdiacriticsensitive -ssp <ssp name> [-setstatus <True|False>] [-noreset] [-force]
111. stsadm -o preparetomove {-ContentDB <DatabaseServer:DatabaseName> | -Site <URL>} [-OldContentDB <uniqueidentifier>] [-undo]
112. stsadm -o profilechangelog -title <SSP Name> -daysofhistory <number of days> -generateanniversaries
113. stsadm -o profiledeletehandler -type <Full Assembly Path>
114. stsadm -o provisionservice -action <start/stop> -servicetype <servicetype (namespace or assembly qualified name if not SharePoint service)> [-servicename <servicename>]
115. stsadm -o quiescefarm -maxduration <duration in minutes>
116. stsadm -o quiescefarmstatus
117. stsadm -o quiesceformtemplate [-formid <form template ID>] [-filename <path to form template file>] -maxduration <time in minutes>
118. stsadm -o reconvertallformtemplates
119. stsadm -o refreshdms -url <url>
120. stsadm -o refreshsitedms -url <url>
121. stsadm -o registersecuritytrimmer -ssp <ssp name> -id <0 – 2147483647> -typename <assembly qualified TypeName of ISecurityTrimmer implementation> -rulepath <crawl rule URL> [-configprops <name value pairs delimited by '~'>]
122. stsadm -o registerwsswriter
123. stsadm -o removedataconnectionfile -filename <filename to remove>
124. stsadm -o removedrservice -servicename <data retrieval service name> -setting <data retrieval services setting>
125. stsadm -o remove-ecsfiletrustedlocation -Ssp <SSP name> -Location <URL|UNC> -LocationType SharePoint|Unc|Http
126. stsadm -o remove-ecssafedataprovider -Ssp <SSP name> -ID <data provider id> -Type Oledb|Odbc|OdbcDsn
127. stsadm -o remove-ecstrusteddataconnectionlibrary -Ssp <SSP name> -Location <URL>
128. stsadm -o remove-ecsuserdefinedfunction -Ssp <SSP name> -Assembly <strong name|file path> -AssemblyLocation GAC|File
129. stsadm -o removeexemptuseragent -name <user-agent to receive InfoPath files instead of a Web page>
130. stsadm -o removeformtemplate [-formid <form template ID>] [-filename <path to form template file>]
131. stsadm -o removesolutiondeploymentlock [-server <server> [-allservers]
132. stsadm -o renameserver -oldservername <oldServerName> -newservername <newServerName>
133. stsadm -o renameweb -url <url> -newname <new subsite name>
134. stsadm -o restore -url <url> -filename <filename> [-hostheaderwebapplicationurl <web application url>] [-overwrite]
135. stsadm -o restore -directory <UNC path> -restoremethod <overwrite | new> [-backupid <Id from backuphistory, see stsadm -help backuphistory>] [-item <created path from tree>] [-percentage <integer between 1 and 100>] [-showtree] [-suppressprompt] [-username <username>] [-password <password>] [-newdatabaseserver <new database server name>] [-quiet]
136. stsadm -o restoressp -title <SSP name> -url <Web application url> -ssplogin <username> -mysiteurl <MySite Web application url> -indexserver <index server> -indexlocation <index file path> [-keepindex] -sspdatabaseserver <SSP database server> -sspdatabasename <SSP database name> [-ssppassword <password>] [-sspsqlauthlogin <SQL username>] [-sspsqlauthpassword <SQL password>] [-searchdatabaseserver <search database server>] [-searchdatabasename <search database name>] [-searchsqlauthlogin <SQL username>] [-searchsqlauthpassword <SQL password>] [-ssl <yes|no>]
137. stsadm -o retractsolution -name <Solution name> [-url <virtual server url>] [-allcontenturls] [-time <time to remove at>] [-immediate] [-local] [-lcid <language>]
138. stsadm -o retractwppack -name <Web Part Package name> [-url <virtual server url>] [-time <time to retract at>] [-immediate] [-local] [-lcid <language>]
139. stsadm -o runcmsmigrationprofile -profilename <profile name> [-skipanalyzer ] [-onlyanalyzer ] [-startover ] [-migratesincetime <DateTime string>] [-migrationfolder <path>] [-exportonly ] [-importonly ] [-htmldiff <path>]
140. stsadm -o runcontentdeploymentjob -jobname <name> [-wait yes|no] [-deploysincetime <datetime>] (<datetime> as “MM/DD/YY HH:MM:SS”)
141. stsadm -o scanforfeatures [-solutionid <Id of Solution>] [-displayonly]
142. stsadm -o setadminport -port <port> [-ssl] [-admapcreatenew] [-admapidname <app pool name>]
143. stsadm -o setapppassword -password <password>
144. stsadm -o setbulkworkflowtaskprocessingschedule -schedule <recurrence string>
145. stsadm -o setconfigdb [-connect] -databaseserver <database server> [-databaseuser <database user>] [-databasepassword <database user password>] [-databasename <database name>] [-exclusivelyusentlm] [-farmuser] [-farmpassword] [-adcreation] [-addomain <Active Directory domain>] [-adou <Active Directory OU>]
146. stsadm -o setcontentdeploymentjobschedule -jobname <name> -schedule <schedule> (Schedule Parameter Examples: “every 5 minutes between 0 and 59″, “hourly between 0 and 59″, “daily at 15:00:00″, “weekly between Fri 22:00:00 and Sun 06:00:00″, “monthly at 15 15:00:00″, “yearly at Jan 1 15:00:00″)
147. stsadm -o setdataconnectionfileproperty -filename <filename of the data connection file> -pn <property name> -pv <property value>
148. stsadm -o setdefaultssp -title <SSP name>
149. stsadm -o set-ecsexternaldata -Ssp <SSP name> [-ConnectionLifetime <time in seconds>] [-UnattendedServiceAccountName <account name>] [-UnattendedServiceAccountPassword <account password>]
150. stsadm -o set-ecsloadbalancing -Ssp <SSP name> [-Scheme WorkbookUrl|RoundRobin|Local] [-RetryInterval <time in seconds>]
151. stsadm -o set-ecsmemoryutilization -Ssp <SSP name> [-MaxPrivateBytes <memory in MBytes>] [-MemoryCacheThreshold <percentage>] [-MaxUnusedObjectAge <time in minutes>]
152. stsadm -o set-ecssecurity -Ssp <SSP name> [-FileAccessMethod UseImpersonation|UseFileAccessAccount] [-AccessModel Delegation|TrustedSubsystem] [-RequireEncryptedUserConnection False|True] [-AllowCrossDomainAccess True|False]
153. stsadm -o set-ecssessionmanagement -Ssp <SSP name> [-MaxSessionsPerUser <number of sessions>]
154. stsadm -o set-ecsworkbookcache -Ssp <SSP name> [-Location <local or UNC path>] [-MaxCacheSize <storage in Mbytes>] [-EnableCachingOfUnusedFiles True|False]
155. stsadm -o setformsserviceproperty -pn <option name> -pv <option value>
156. stsadm -o setformtemplateproperty [-formid <form template ID>] [-filename <path to form template file>] -pn <property name> -pv <property value>
157. stsadm -o setholdschedule -schedule <recurrence string>
158. stsadm -o setlogginglevel [-category < [CategoryName | Manager:CategoryName [;...]] >] {-default | -tracelevel  < None;  Unexpected; Monitorable; High; Medium; Verbose> [-windowslogginglevel < None;  ErrorServiceUnavailable;  ErrorSecurityBreach;  ErrorCritical;  Error;  Warning;  FailureAudit; SuccessAudit;  Information;  Success>] }
159. stsadm -o setpolicyschedule -schedule <recurrence string>
160. stsadm -o setproperty -propertyname <property name> -propertyvalue <property value> [-url <url>] (SharePoint cluster properties:, avallowdownload, avcleaningenabled, avdownloadscanenabled, avnumberofthreads, avtimeout, avuploadscanenabled, command-line-upgrade-running, database-command-timeout, database-connection-timeout, data-retrieval-services-enabled, data-retrieval-services-oledb-providers, data-retrieval-services-response-size, data-retrieval-services-timeout, data-retrieval-services-update, data-source-controls-enabled, dead-site-auto-delete, dead-site-notify-after, dead-site-num-notifications, defaultcontentdb-password, defaultcontentdb-server, defaultcontentdb-user, delete-web-send-email, irmaddinsenabled, irmrmscertserver, irmrmsenabled, irmrmsusead, job-ceip-datacollection, job-config-refresh, job-database-statistics, job-dead-site-delete, job-usage-analysis, job-watson-trigger, large-file-chunk-size, token-timeout, workflow-cpu-throttle, workflow-eventdelivery-batchsize, workflow-eventdelivery-throttle, workflow-eventdelivery-timeout, workflow-timerjob-cpu-throttle, workitem-eventdelivery-batchsize, workitem-eventdelivery-throttle; SharePoint virtual server properties:, alerts-enabled, alerts-limited, alerts-maximum, change-log-expiration-enabled, change-log-retention-period, data-retrieval-services-enabled, data-retrieval-services-inherit, data-retrieval-services-oledb-providers, data-retrieval-services-response-size, data-retrieval-services-timeout, data-retrieval-services-update, data-source-controls-enabled, days-to-show-new-icon, dead-site-auto-delete, dead-site-notify-after, dead-site-num-notifications, defaultquotatemplate, defaulttimezone, delete-web-send-email, job-change-log-expiration, job-dead-site-delete, job-diskquota-warning, job-immediate-alerts, job-recycle-bin-cleanup, job-usage-analysis, job-workflow, job-workflow-autoclean, job-workflow-failover, max-file-post-size, peoplepicker-activedirectorysearchtimeout, peoplepicker-distributionlistsearchdomains, peoplepicker-nowindowsaccountsfornonwindowsauthenticationmode, peoplepicker-onlysearchwithinsitecollection, peoplepicker-searchadcustomquery, peoplepicker-searchadforests, presenceenabled, recycle-bin-cleanup-enabled, recycle-bin-enabled, recycle-bin-retention-period, second-stage-recycle-bin-quota, send-ad-email)
161. stsadm -o setrecordsrepositoryschedule -schedule <recurrence string>
162. stsadm -o setsearchandprocessschedule -schedule <recurrence string>
163. stsadm -o setsharedwebserviceauthn -ntlm | -negotiate
164. stsadm -o setsitedirectoryscanschedule -schedule <recurrence string> (Schedule parameter examples: “every 5 minutes between 0 and 59″, “hourly between 0 and 59″, “daily at 15:00:00″, “weekly between Fri 22:00:00 and Sun 06:00:00″, “monthly at 15 15:00:00″, “yearly at Jan 1 15:00:00″)
165. stsadm -o setsitelock -url <url> -lock <none | noadditions | readonly | noaccess>
166. stsadm -o setsspport -httpport <HTTP port number> -httpsport <HTTPS port number>
167. stsadm -o setworkflowconfig -url <url> {-emailtonopermissionparticipants <enable|disable> | -externalparticipants <enable|disable> | -userdefinedworkflows <enable|disable>}
168. stsadm -o siteowner -url <url> [-ownerlogin <DOMAIN\name>] [-secondarylogin <DOMAIN\name>]
169. stsadm -o spsearch [-action <list | start | stop | attachcontentdatabase | detachcontentdatabase | fullcrawlstart | fullcrawlstop>] [-f (suppress prompts)] [-farmperformancelevel <Reduced | PartlyReduced | Maximum>] [-farmserviceaccount <DOMAIN\name> (service credentials)] [-farmservicepassword <password>] [-farmcontentaccessaccount <DOMAIN\name>] [-farmcontentaccesspassword <password>] [-indexlocation <new index location>] [-databaseserver <server\instance> (default: josebda-moss)] [-databasename <database name> (default: SharePoint_WSS_Search)] [-sqlauthlogin <SQL authenticated database user>] [-sqlauthpassword <password>] -action list -action stop [-f (suppress prompts)] -action start -farmserviceaccount <DOMAIN\name> (service credentials) [-farmservicepassword <password>] -action attachcontentdatabase [-databaseserver <server\instance> (default: josebda-moss)] -databasename <content database name> [-searchserver <search server name> (default: josebda-moss)] -action detachcontentdatabase [-databaseserver <server\instance> (default: josebda-moss)] -databasename <content database name> [-f (suppress prompts)] -action fullcrawlstart -action fullcrawlstop
170. stsadm -o spsearchdiacriticsensitive [-setstatus <True|False>] [-noreset] [-force]
171. stsadm -o sync {-ExcludeWebApps <web applications> | -SyncTiming <schedule(M/H/D:value)> | -SweepTiming <schedule(M/H/D:value)> | -ListOldDatabases <days> | -DeleteOldDatabases <days>}
172. stsadm -o syncsolution -name <Solution name>] [-lcid <language>] [-alllcids]
173. stsadm -o syncsolution -allsolutions
174. stsadm -o unextendvs -url <url> [-deletecontent] [-deleteiissites]
175. stsadm -o uninstallfeature {-filename <relative path to Feature.xml> | -name <feature folder> | -id <feature Id>} [-force]
176. stsadm -o unquiescefarm
177. stsadm -o unquiesceformtemplate [-formid <form template ID>] [-filename <path to form template file>]
178. stsadm -o unregistersecuritytrimmer -ssp <ssp name> -id <0 – 2147483647>
179. stsadm -o unregisterwsswriter
180. stsadm -o updateaccountpassword -userlogin <DOMAIN\name> -password <password> [-noadmin]
181. stsadm -o updatealerttemplates -url <url> [-filename <filename>] [-lcid <language>
182. stsadm -o updatefarmcredentials [-identitytype <configurableid/NetworkService>] [-userlogin <DOMAIN\name>] [-password <password>] [-local [-keyonly]]
183. stsadm -o upgrade {-inplace | -sidebyside} [-url <url>] [-forceupgrade] [-quiet] [-farmuser <farm user>] [-farmpassword <farm user password>] [-reghost] [-sitelistpath <sites xml file>]
184. stsadm -o upgradeformtemplate -filename <path to form template file> [-upgradetype <upgrade type>]
185. stsadm -o upgradesolution -name <Solution name> -filename <upgrade filename> [-time <time to upgrade at>] [-immediate] [-local] [-allowgacdeployment] [-allowcaspolicies] [-lcid <language>]
186. stsadm -o upgradetargetwebapplication -url <URL to upgrade> -relocationurl <new URL for non-upgraded content> -apidname <new app pool name> [-apidtype <configurableid/NetworkService>] [-apidlogin <DOMAIN\name>] [-apidpwd <app pool password>] [-exclusivelyusentlm]
187. stsadm -o uploadformtemplate -filename <path to form template file>
188. stsadm -o userrole -url <url> -userlogin <DOMAIN\name> -role <role name> [-add] [-delete]
189. stsadm -o verifyformtemplate -filename <path to form template file>
190. … 

The buck does not stop here. You can also extend STSADM and write your own custom commands. Clever scripting can also be a real alternative, where the output from one command is used as the input to another command, add loops and conditions to the equation and voila instant atomisation!

As you might guess, stake holders in any enterprise other then end users will usually have a corporate view rather then an invdivisual prespective, they tend to have different requirements then to the end users. This might be obvious but realizing and aligning these difference is the key to any successfull SharePoint (SharePoint Solution) roll out. After all it’s the end users who will adopt the new system\change.

So who is a End User? In an ideal world with all things being equal the end users don’t want to care and shouldn’t have to care. They simply want to get their work done. What is there work? What’s the typical day in an Information Workers life? I will cover user focused roll outs in my next post.

I believe vendor certs are useful for people practicing on products and technologies from that vendor, in my case SharePoint hence Microsoft. Why I say this?

You will agree that the level of study one has to do to pass an exam (to be certified) increases one’s product\concept knowledge. I believe certs add the dimension of breadth to your skill set while practise (exp, on the job learning) adds depth.

When I say breadth it means that you appreciate the richness of the product\technology and are proactive in approach then just responding to a problem. This helps while architecting solutions, you look at the bigger picture, rather then just being a brilliant code monkey. Most of the time certs teach you what you didn’t know – which basically translates to a lot more moments where you say “That’s out of the box, hence we can reuse that!” They save you from tunnel vision and keep on the begginers mind. You can probably get the same effect with a large number of years of experience but I would like to argue that the cert approach can be a catalyst.

Discussing certs with a number of people in the past has brought in some interesting observations. I have heard comments like: I hired a X individual with Y certs but he or she was useless. Uhun? Can you please clarify that statement: Well, the individual was not able to do his or her work, did not have initiative or required hand holding. I see!

Microsoft exams are no guarantee or for that matter no validation or skill assessment system can guarantee the productivity of a person but to a great level they can show knowledge that a person is perceived to know. I have only met a couple of indivisuals who don’t look favourly at the value of certs and are actually certified. 

I have given about 8 exams recently and I found  the MS cert system has some inert problems. In the exams some questions were misleading or had obvious answers or build on each other – get all wrong or get all right scenario. I think most people will agree that Microsoft needs to make their tests far more task\case based and visual,  not just MCQ driven.

I would love to hear from the community, what they think about certs. Why I am so curious? It is because I hold a bakers dozen of Microsoft certs, mostly one build on top the other and want to associate value to the certs. 

On a personal note I would encourage everyone to go sit an exam, I find that the preparation and writing of an exam is always a great learning experience. So far I have been able to skill up for these certifications: 

• Microsoft Certified Trainer - MCT
• Microsoft Certified Professional Developer: Enterprise Applications Developer -MCPD EAD
• MCTS: .NET Framework 2.0 Distributed Applications
• MCTS: .NET Framework 2.0 Web Applications
• MCTS: .NET Framework 2.0 Windows Applications
• MCTS: Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007: Configuration – Charter Member
• MCTS: Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services 3.0: Configuration – Charter Member
• MCTS: Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services 3.0: Application Development – Charter Member
• MCTS: Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 Application Development - Charter Member
• Microsoft Certified Solution Developer For Microsoft .NET - MCSD.NET
• Microsoft Certified Application Developer  - MCAD
• Microsoft Certified Professional -MCP

MCTS = Microsoft Certified Technology Specialist

We had a very successful user group with over 30 attendees in Melbourne last night. Tim Wragg regaled us about MOSSIG history and re-introduced my self to the members, I talked about the merger between Melbourne SharePoint User Group with MOSSIG back in April. Combined our member base (ok, mailing list) is now a whopping 530.  

As usuall we had a business preso followed by a technical presentation. Firstly we had Jonathan Lewis (IT Manager, Microsoft Australia) present on the SharePoint 2007 deployment within Microsoft. We got a sneak peak at MSW (Microsoft’s Intranet) as well as ITWeb and HRWeb (or rahter Andrew Lowson’s HRWeb as Jonathan was using Andrews PC for demos.).

The second speaker was my collegue Joshua Tan (Consultant, Unique World) who presented an overview of Project Server 2007 and its new features. His presentation had a record number of audience questions, at least one per attendee, which Joshua answered and mastered on the spot to great applause.
 
Congratulations to the MOSSIG board and thanks again to the speakers and offcourse the attendees for showing up in great numbers.

A taxonomy helps to define and control the way a Web site is organized, what things are named, and how people find information. In short, a taxonomy makes it easier to organize and find things on a Web site. 

To date most of the taxonomy advice that I give my clients comes from discussions with  an SME or the business and it’s current practices. But last night I found a really useful resource http://www.taxonomywarehouse.com/ which I intend to put to use for all new projects.

The concept is that you create a Quota template by using UI elements in Central Administration, the template collection is available as a drop down list when ever you are provisioning a new Site Collection on the New Site Collection page. Adding and removing quotas can also be done any time after the site is created.

So far so good, today my colleague Joshua (Joshua Tan) relayed the requirements of a current project where the customer wanted to keep the users informed of thier quota use and I put on my code churn cap. To restate, the problem is how to communicate quota usage to users so they know if they have space remaining on thier MySites or any other Site for that matter.

Showing the user the amount of quota left/used should not be too hard? I asked my self and it turned out to be easier then I thought! In less then 30 minutes I had a basic working prototype. Given below are glory shots of the Site Quota web part in action. You can always add additional details like the amount of disk space available and maybe other improvements which I have listed at the end.

Site Quota web part on the site’s Home page with 250 MB Maximum Disk Space

Site Quota web part by itself – gradient starts from green and grows to a fire engine red

Here is the code I wrote with the usefull parts highlighed.  It is provided as-is, use at your own risk: 

using System;
using System.Runtime.InteropServices;
using System.Web.UI;
using System.Web.UI.WebControls.WebParts;
using System.Xml.Serialization;

using Microsoft.SharePoint;
using Microsoft.SharePoint.WebControls;
using Microsoft.SharePoint.WebPartPages;

namespace SiteQuotaWebPart
{
    [Guid("eed45f6b-40ab-45d7-b148-41697a307a79")]
    public class SiteQuotaWebPart : System.Web.UI.WebControls.WebParts.WebPart
    {
        private int quotaUse = 0;
        private void CalculateQuotaUse()
        {
            SPSite siteCollection = SPContext.Current.Site;
            SPSecurity.RunWithElevatedPrivileges(delegate()
            {
                using (SPSite elevatedSiteCollection = new SPSite(siteCollection.ID))
                {
                    this.quotaUse = Convert.ToInt32(elevatedSiteCollection.Usage.Storage * 100 / elevatedSiteCollection.Quota.StorageMaximumLevel);
                }
            });
        }
        protected override void Render(HtmlTextWriter writer)
        {
            this.CalculateQuotaUse();
            writer.Write(“<style type=’text/css’>.QG {background-image: url(‘http://moss/QuotaGradient.png’);}</style>”);
            writer.Write(“<p><br><center><table style=’width:” + this.quotaUse * 2 + “px’ class=’QG’ cellspacing=’0′ cellpadding=’0′><tr><td> </td></tr></table></p>”);
            writer.Write(“<p><span class=’ms-pageinformationheader’>Quota Used: ” + this.quotaUse + “%</span></p></center>”);
        }
    }
}

A number of improvements come to mind and will be added in the final production release:

• Show disk space used in megabytes
•  Show total disk space in megabytes
• Allow web part configuration to change the formatting of HTML
• Allow arbitury values for Sites or Site Collection where Quotas can’t be enforced or don’t exist
• Email notification to the owner of a site (not a site collection) when site uses more then alloted quota (the email should be generated only once regardless of how many instances of the Quota Web Part Exist)
• Package the gradient image resource in the Web Part Assembly for ease of deployment
• The webpart can be packed as a feature.
• Error handling…

All file based logs can be read by text editors and can be parsed by using popular log parsing tools (Log Parser 2.2 from Microsoft or Funnel Web). It will also be a good idea to read the IIS Logs which are generally saved at  (System Drive):\WINDOWS\system32\LogFiles

 a)      Diagnostics Logs

·         Event Throttling Logs – These end up going to the Windows Event Log and can be viewed in the Event Viewer. They show Errors and Warnings.

·         Trace Logs – These show detailed line by line tracing infomration emitted during a web request or service execution. They end up being stored at a known location on the front-end server. Default Location: (System Drive):\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Web Server Extensions\12\LOGS\ 

b)      Audit Logs – They end up in the associated Content Database tables and can be viewed at Site Collection Level as well as Site Level using the web browser. WSS 3.0 and MOSS 2007 use different pages to show Audit Log Reports.

 c)       Usage Logs – They get stored locally on the front-end servers and get processed both locally and at farm level via SSP (this is based on the setup as I understand the results from the local processing are merged by SSP) and can be viewed at both the Site Level and Site Collection Level. Default Location: (System Drive):\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Web Server Extensions\12\Logs

 d)      Search\Query Logs – These are saved in the associated SSP database but can be viewed at SSP level via the Web Browser and in MOSS at Site Collection Level by going to the settings page.

e)      Information Management Logs – Stored in the associated Content Database and can be can be viewed at the Site Collection Level.

 f)       Content and Structure Logs – This option is only available after one enables the publication feature. This store is saved in the Content Database associated with the Site Collection and can be viewed at Site Collection level by going to the settings page.

Short answer:

It depends…

Some reading to whet your appetite:

With the eminent pervasion of SharePoint as the mainstream web application development platform at most Microsoft shops, it’s more then essential now to get the SharePoint infrastructure right. Ideally it should be an abstraction for developers and business users and needless to say forward thinking and able to meet all the ‘abilities’.

Here is a quick list of Best Practices that I have discovered along the way, the white paper will detail the reasoning arguments and background on each point as well will include capacity and performance planning guidelines.

a)      Start with a single farm (note: not a single box), this could be small, medium or large based on the outcome from capacity planning.

b)      Multiple farms should be a big no, unless you have to cater for drastically different SLAs

c)      Each application should be based in an individual Site Collection and have it’s own unique Content Database.

d)      Try to discourage more then 6 web applications in a single farm (as they are replicated onto all front-end servers) by factoring logical grouping i.e. Collaboration, Portal, Intranet, Extranet and so on.

e)      Have Site Collections live under the respective logically grouped web applications.

f)       Use host headers and not IP addresses when naming site collections.

g)      Factor in one site per content database per category if content size is expected to be large (more then 4 GB).

Long answer:

Well please be on the look out for the white paper when it’s out.

1. A Matter of Degree: http://amatterofdegree.typepad.com/a_matter_of_degree/2006/10/my_least_favori.html

2. More recently from Jag, one of my Colleagues at UW:  http://itfootprint.wordpress.com/2007/04/23/usability-issue-with-sharepoint-2007/

The reason Microsoft does not have a better usability story for site deletions is because there is really nothing else to show, except in a better way force the browser window to close.  Here’s why, let’s take two simple Scenarios:

-          User deletes the root site in the site collection  - in this case SharePoint wont know where to redirect you as there might be no other site collections.

-          User deletes a sub site – in this case Sharepoint can’t be sure if you have access to the root site.

As an admin user I expect to be redirected to the root ‘Sites Settings’ page or the ‘Sites and Workspaces’ page on the root site.

So how to achieve this you ask? It will be nice if one of the three things happened:

1.       In case of deleting a Site Collection… the user is shown a JavaScript prompt giving  the user a choice that the browser will now be closed by pressing OK or remain open by pressing CANCEL.

2.       In case of a sub site in the site collection the user is shown a being forwarded to the root site message on the page as text and redirected in a few seconds, this can also be shown as a prompt.

3.       The delete web page got really smart and checked to see what site sort of site the user is deleting and redirect to the ‘Sites and Workspaces’ page of a site one level up – only in case if the user has access, other wise close the browser.

To learn how the delete site page can be modified to support one of the three approaches, ask me how.

I have heard among Orcas’ high points are: LINQ integrated query building using either C# or Visual Basic for objects, databases and XML data; improved unit and load test capabilities; AJAX-style Web client design; Jscript IntelliSense support; full integration of Visual Studio Tools for Office (VSTO) with Visual Studio; and support for deployment of runtimes to multiple versions of the .NET Framework.

This release will also feature the ADO.NET Entity Framwork  which will allow us to program against relational data as entities and for Office Developers VBA-VSTO integration takes a step forward as developers are now able to access VSTO add-ins from VBA application code.

 What’s not clear and I am hoping will be after my test runs – any new support for Windows Workflow Foundation….

http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/vstudio/aa700831.aspx

• Check-In \Check-Out work fine on Document Library Pages but fail with an “Unknown Error” exception when actioned in a Document Library View (Web Part) out side the library pages.
• People and Group type Fields can bet set to allow people from only a certain SharePoint Group (in Forms) but in the Data Sheet view the same field will allow the selection from all users and groups in the portal.
• No build in way (I have come across) to show breadcrumbs on the welcome page of the site. Breadcrumbs would display on all other pages and can be controlled.
• Sometimes Site Templates would not show up on site creation pages although they are sitting nicely in the Site Templates Library – I believe this has to do with something in stp defination ‘CAML’ referring to elements that are now missing from the site collection i.e. site column, content type….

Today I spent a couple of hours to enhance the utility pack by adding the ‘Site Custom Properties’ module. This new feature allows adding, updating and removing associated properties within a web. 

Here is a glory shot of the new module: 

You can download the latest copy and even contribute to the project at CodePlex at (note it’s a work in progress) : http://www.codeplex.com/spstipsUtilityPack 

 A coding point to remember will be the bizarre web property removal behaviour:

Code like this:

Web.Properties.Remove(Key) ;
Web.Properites.Update();

won’t work as expected, instead I used something like

Web.Properties[Key] = null; 
Web.Properites.Update();

To solve the ‘Access Denied’ problem I found you need to elevate the permissions of the AppPool of the web application on which you are trying to activate the Publishing Infrastructure feature.

One way to achieve this is to temporarily change the AppPool of the web application…

1. Open IIS Admin.
2. Location the Web Site for your WSS web application.
3. Goto to the properties and select the ‘Home Directory’ tab.
4. Change the AppPool to be the same as Central Administration.
5. IISRESET
6. Activate the Publishing Infrastructure feature on your site.
7. Change to AppPool back to the original.
8. IISRESET.

This should allow you to enable the feature and use the publishing features within MOSS.

The javascript shows a dialog box to each new user on the site. The user sees the disclaimer text and is allowed to accept the policy, and go through or not accept it and the browser closes automatically. Incase the user accepts the poilicy the user won’t see the disclaimer popup for 365 days.

This little script here can be added into a CEWP in SharePoint:

<p align=”center”>DISCLAIMER GOES HERE</p>

<script type=”text/javascript” language=”javascript”>
var agreement = GetCookie();

//checks for cookie and displays disclaimer alert if new user
if(agreement==”")
{
var decision = confirm(“DISCLAIMER: GOES HERE \n\n Click Ok if you agree to the disclaimer or click Cancel to close this window. \n”);
if(decision == true)
{
//writes a cookie
var expiredays = 365;
var exdate=new Date()
exdate.setDate(exdate.getDate()+expiredays)
document.cookie=”DCWP”+ “=” +escape(“Agree To Disclaimer”)+
((expiredays==null) ? “” : “; expires=”+exdate.toGMTString())
}
else
{
//redirect
//window.location = “/NotAllowed.aspx”;

// or even better close the browser window
window.opener=’x';
window.close();
}
}

//gets the Cookie if it exists
function GetCookie()
{
if (document.cookie.length>0)
{
c_name = “DCWP”;
c_start=document.cookie.indexOf(c_name + “=”)
if (c_start!=-1)
{
c_start=c_start + c_name.length+1
c_end=document.cookie.indexOf(“;”,c_start)
if (c_end==-1) c_end=document.cookie.length
return agreement = unescape(document.cookie.substring(c_start,c_end))
}
}
return “”;
}

</script>

Only 500 seats are available so book your’s now. For more information and registeration please visit: http://www.microsoftsharepoint.com

Got news yesterday that I have passed the second beta exam and now am  a Microsoft Certified Technology Specialist in Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services 3.0: Application Development too. This time not really a surprise but still very good news indeed!

My three favourite parameters for WSS v2 and SPS2003 were:

To Correct or Remove Misbehaving Web Parts
http://server/default.aspx?Contents=1

To Open the Page in Web Part Design Mode
http://server/default.aspx?ToolPaneView=2

To Open the Search Web Part Zone
http://server/default.aspx?ToolPaneView=3

Now in WSS 3.0 and MOSS 2007 we have the much more practical approach of switching views. Enter the Site Actions Menu, using the menu options we can edit the page, browse to site settings, etc.. But what happens if the Site Actions menu is not visible on the page. Maybe it was missed in the look and feel or has been removed deliberately like I had to do recently for a client. Now why someone would need to remove it and how this can be achieved (in at least two ways) will be covered in a later post.

Here are my favourite parameters to date for WSS 3.0 and MOSS 2007:

To open the Design Bar – Usefull for pages in the Pages Library
http://server/default.aspx?DisplayMode=Design

To turn on Web Part Zone Editing 
http://server/default.aspx?ControlMode=Edit

Note: The Site Actions Menu is rights trimmed and that means not all users can see or use it. Users with limited access or read rights will not be able to make use of the URL\Query String parameters. The parameters are just an alternative to get to the editing\design controls rather then a security bypass.

Of the two SharePoint beta exams I gave last month. I just received news that I have passed the first one and now am officially a Microsoft Certified Technology Specialist in Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 Application Development.

This brings me ¼ nearer to my goal of scoring on all the 4 new SharePoint exams (one of the New Year resolutions).

1. TS: Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007: Application Development (became available on March 22, 2007)

http://www.microsoft.com/learning/exams/70-542.mspx - PASSED

2. TS: Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 : Application Development (will be available on March 28, 2007)

http://www.microsoft.com/learning/exams/70-541.mspx - PASSED (Post Updated)

3. TS: Office SharePoint Server 2007, Configuring (became available on January 8, 2007)

http://www.microsoft.com/learning/exams/70-631.mspx - PASSED (Post Updated)

4. TS: Windows SharePoint Services 3.0, Configuring (became available on January 8, 2007)

http://www.microsoft.com/learning/exams/70-630.mspx - PASSED (Post Updated)

Still waiting on results for the WSS one. I now have all intentions to sit the last two configuration ones (considered easier) as soon as I am back in Melbourne.

Also congragulations to the first MCTS:MOSS 2007 Guy. My wonderful colleague Ishai Sagi. Going by his claim I can be considered second!

We now live in the information age where most workers can be classified as Information or Knowledge Workers. Information Management practice at Unique World is all about supporting this breed of workers. Building Information Management Solutions is really not about technology. It’s all about improving the development and sharing of information within a business.

“People don’t want to buy a quarter-inch drill. They want a quarter-inch hole!”. — Theodore Levitt, the legendry Harvard Business School marketing professor.

As an Information Management consultant I get to interact on a daily basis with corporate and government customers from various horizontal and vertical segments of the market. In some engagements the management have already figured out what they want and only require our guidance and skills to implement solutions (using technology, principally SharePoint) but generally customers seek our input at the business level, advice to improve their Information Architecture and not surprisingly, use our services to enforce or if you like implement it with the help of technology (again principally SharePoint).

Let me share with you the three most frequently raised customer questions:

1. What options do we have to better manage our Information ?
2. How do other organisations solve these business problems?
3. Will implementing SharePoint solve our problems or how will SharePoint solve our problems?

I have observed that the answers to the first two questions, given the correct probing approach can mostly be answered by the customer themselves. Let me explain. These questions are usually raised at the first meeting with a high-level team (at the customer’s end) that has been set up to shepherd the implementation of SharePoint through the organization.

It begins by envisioning, asking questions about the ways in which they think staff interacts daily with information and it soon becomes apparent that they are defining the profiles of users that they do not fully understand, certainly not to the extent necessary to promote information usability. Only after the intent of our questions become clear, that it’s realized the answers are not known.

We all know that solving the business problem requires understanding the problem and breaking it into sizeable, easy to manage pieces so a solution can be applied. Something about small pieces can show results more rapidly?

In the quest to understand the important pieces\artefacts of information and there flow within the organisation, departments and with individuals. The earlier mentioned workshop leads into additional sessions, brain storming, white boarding and the likes. This in turn leads us to recommend past solutions to some similar IM problems. I am beginning to see patterns emerge (definitely, the topic of another post).

IM problems come in all shape and sizes, the problem could be centred around improving internal or external communication , publishing content, centralizing and standardizing information storage, managing of documents and records, information access, automating processes and improving collaboration.

Now you must be wondering how all this relates to the topic or to my blog. Well it’s quite simple, the answer to the third question lies with us, but we can only answer it based on the answers to the first two questions. As you can see that the first two questions are a prerequisite to the third.

Let me try to answer question number three.

As a Microsoft focused Information Management practise the foremost tool in our arsenal is SharePoint . SharePoint is the name given to a set of products and technologies vended by Microsoft. It’s the indented platform for building IM solutions on windows today. An important part to the answer is increasing customer awareness in SharePoint.

The way I understand, an organisation has an IM problem and is initially interested in SharePoint because of one or more of the below mentioned reasons:

• They have heard about SharePoint or seen a demo and are intrigued by it’s potential
• It’s known that it’s successfully being used at another company or government department
• Already own SharePoint product and technology licenses
• It has significant investments in the Microsoft platform (Windows, Office, .NET etc.)

So by asking the question the customer actually want’s to know if going the SharePoint way is really the optimum or feasible solution (given external factors to the problem like time, cost, resources and quality).

Once the problem is understood, based on the capabilities of SharePoint and perhaps also based on the external factors as mentioned above suggestions and recommendations are made. Some times it becomes apparent that there are gaps between the expectation and what can be delivered and this might require custom development (although I have a developer background in my view this should be the last resort) or perhaps is very labour intensive to solve the problem using the SharePoint platform to start with.

Just like the drill SharePoint can be viewed as a tool with functionality catered to solve only a set number of problems. Although perhaps it’s not as simple with the exciting advent of WSS 3.0 and MOSS , as now the drill has got proportions of a whole toolbox. Giving rise to the importance of understanding and translating the actual business problem so a right sized hole can be drilled. It has to start with the pain or opportunity at the customer.

This piece is in not intended to be exhaustive. Information Management is a broad topic and SharePoint is a huge platform. In this post I have only tried to inscribe some aspects that as I go are becoming clearer.

I would like to conclude today with an interesting question.

Data -> Information -> Knowledge -> Wisdom -> , Where do you think we are heading with this?

Upcoming Posts in this High Level Series

• SharePoint 2007, Why Enterprise Architects should care?
• Upgrading to MOSS 2007 – not an insert a CD affair!
• SharePoint, Minus the marketing schmooze
• IM Best Practices, Electronic Document Management using SharePoint
• Customer Expectations, What’s Next?
• If you pay peanuts you get monkeys!
• Don’t overlook the Power of Automation

Solution Development using Office SharePoint Servers 2007, Windows Workflow Foundation and InfoPath

Windows SharePoint Services 2007 and Office SharePoint Servers 2007 are the first Microsoft servers with native integration of the new Windows Workflow Foundation introduced with WinFX. This pure fashioned session teaches you how to create a full-blown solution based on Microsoft Office InfoPath 2007, InfoPath Forms Server together with Windows Workflow Foundation. Together we will design an InfoPath form, make it ready to be viewed in the browser and publish it to SharePoint. Then we will create a workflow using Visual Studio 2005 including custom workflow forms, which will be controlled by data contained in the submitted InfoPath forms. Last-but-not-least we will deploy this workflow to SharePoint server and test our solution to see the InfoPath form and the running Workflow in action.

About the Melbourne SharePoint User Group

The Melbourne SharePoint User Group meets every third Thursday of the month. Pizza and Beer is always on us and you will have a great chance to mingle with the other community members. 

I will post venue details soon. So if you live in Melbourne make sure you don’t miss this. Please sign up at http://sps.uniqueworld.net/melbourne for email notification and spread the word.

Microsoft has had some great demos around SharePoint Portal Server 2003. My favorite being the Contoso Portal (a hypothetical pharmaceutical company). What attracts most people’s eyes on the Contoso Portals’ home page is the Server Status web part. This web part uses a traffic light system to describe the status of various servers i.e. Email, File, Web, Print etc.  

At a glimpse the user can see the status of an entire farm, an invaluable tool for anyone who is having a bad IT day – unless off course it’s the SharePoint server which goes down.  As you can tell the server status web part is a useful little web part. So why talk about re-creating it? Have not the SharePoint team worked hard to extend the available ASP.NET 2.0 Web Part classes to incorporate the old Web Part classes? Yes they have and also guarantee that most pre MOSS \WSSv3 web parts will work on MOSS and WSS v3. Then what you ask?

Well it turns out that the server status web part of all things is a GIF image. It’s just eye candy, apparently they did not have enough time to write a real one. Nevertheless now we have taken the challenge to develop it, to complicate things just a bit further, let’s also make this our very first MOSS\WSS v3 web part.

Before we start developing the web part, lets jot down some expectations:

• A server should be reported as Healthy, Crook or Collapsed.
• A traffic light system is to be used to report the health (strangely very similar to the KPI notation).
• Display the current status of the web server at regular intervals, preferably without reloading the page.
• The number of servers should be configurable in the browser.
• The measure of health is to be configurable in the browser and should be based on CPU utilization and memory usage.
• The interval or refresh rate of the status is to be configurable in the browser too.

That’s it for today, Next to follow in The not so ‘Out of the Box’ Web Part mini series:

• Web Part 101 – Good Design
• I am a ASP.NET 2.0 Web Part
• The Magic .NET Class
• The Problem Piece, Should I Ajax
• Packaging it up, sending it Off

On this blog I will be sharing real life experiences learnt building information management solutions. My tools of trade are  Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 (MOSS), Windows Workflow Foundation (WF), and .NET 3.0.

I am always eager to hear from the community. If you would like me to post on something particular, please feel free to drop me a line.