Fpweb.net SharePoint Blog

(Welcome to The Next Byte, a series on Microsoft SharePoint and SQL Server written by Don Conrad, a.k.a. “Don SQL”, the Fpweb.net SharePoint database wizard and expert in all things SQL-related. In this post Don examines new features in SQL Server 2012. Missed an installment of The Next Byte? Check out the complete Microsoft SharePoint and SQL Server series.)

and now… THE NEXT BYTE

SQL Server 2012 Topics to Discuss:

1. Which new features will have the biggest impact for SharePoint?
2. Why is the filetable so important?
3. What are the pricing considerations?

Microsoft recently released the newest version of its premier enterprise database management system, SQL Server 2012. This update contains many new and significant features from the current release, 2008 R2. Many of the features are notable improvements over 2008 R2 and there are so many that we couldn’t possibly do justice to them in one article.

In fact, we won’t even try. Instead we’ll focus some of the feature updates that will have the most impact on Microsoft SharePoint, since, after all, SharePoint hosting is what we do here at Fpweb.net.

SQL Server 2012 key features (in no particular order):

1. AlwaysOn
2. Contained databases
3. The FileTable feature (*not a datatype)
4. Core-based licensing

[Editor's Note: This information is provided as-is and is ONLY recommended for a testing environment. Never perform this setup in a SharePoint production environment without extensive prior planning and testing.]

Recently, I found myself in a situation that required me to move a SharePoint 2010 Web Application from Claims Based Authentication to Windows Based Authentication. Searching online for tips on how to do this yielded few results other than Microsoft says this cannot or should not be done. Well, I’m someone who has to prove this the hard way, so I tried anyways; and with a little help was actually successful. And if I’m being honest, it wasn’t even as large an undertaking as I thought it would be.

I’ll walk you through the process, but as stated above, please don’t perform this in a production environment.

[In Part 5 of his series on Document Management and Collaboration in Microsoft SharePoint, Matt Milsark focuses on co-authoring and Office Web Apps with SharePoint. Missed a post? Check out the previous article on SharePoint Major/Minor Version Control & Content Approval.]

SharePoint Co-Authoring and Office Web Apps

This is the last post (at least for now) in my ongoing series on document collaboration in SharePoint 2010. For this post, we’re going to take a look at co-authoring and Microsoft Office Web Apps. SharePoint’s co-authoring feature provides the ability for multiple persons to work on the same document simultaneously. This greatly decreases the life cycle of a document as many people can contribute their portion without waiting for someone else to finish.

In a time-crunch, co-authoring can also be used as a sort of quick editing tool; multiple people can review and perform group editing on a document.

Andy Milsark has already provided a quick look at co-authoring Word documents in a previous post. Please take the time to review his blog as well. As was mentioned in his post, co-authoring is a feature available in SharePoint 2010 and Office 2010. Unfortunately, you cannot use co-authoring in either SharePoint 2007 or Office 2007. You can, however, use co-authoring with SharePoint 2010 Foundation, SharePoint Server Standard, or SharePoint Server Enterprise editions.

The required technologies depend on what type of documents you want to co-author. For example, Word documents can be co-authored immediately after installing SharePoint, with no other add-ons needed.

A conversation about doing more with less

I found myself getting slightly annoyed the other day while talking with a friend. They run a small business and have yet to utilize social media to get the message across. They’re just a bit old fashioned and can’t be bothered to dive into this form of marketing. <Editor’s Note: Just to warn/relieve you, this post is not about social media; it’s about missed opportunities.>

I reasoned that Twitter and Facebook may seem trendy and self-indulgent to some, but what matters is that your customers are using it, and so are your competitors. It’s a free service – get on there and get your message out. Makes sense, right?

Time will tell if I win that battle, but it did remind me of a similar scratch-your-head scenario that still exists. Companies who still haven’t moved their SharePoint to a private cloud.

Now is the time

Recession. There’s your buzzword. Tossed throughout blog posts and newswires everywhere you look. Global economies are suffering and recessions are flaring up on every continent. And the blame is just as prevalent – tossed around at every politician and disaster in its path. But I’m not here to talk about how we got here; I’m just the guy trained in CPR and holding the life raft to get your business out alive.

I’m here to talk about moving your on-premise SharePoint infrastructure to the private cloud. Yes, it’s an economy only the Cloud could love. And that’s why you need to be…

Doing More with Less

I think we can all agree that whatever industry you’re in and whatever position you hold, you’ve been charged by your superiors or, for those at the top, your budget, to do more with less. The first time I heard this I looked down at the pencil in my hand and broke it in half. Bam! Two pencils. So I’m experienced at finding solutions. But sometimes the solution isn’t that simple; sometimes it takes more of a leap.

In this post, Lead SharePoint Engineer Andy Milsark provides a tip for SharePoint 2010. Looking for more? Check out our catalog of SharePoint Tips & Tricks

I recently finished a SharePoint 2010 claims authentication project and came across an issue with user information stored in the user information list. We are using ADFS 2.0 and using email address as the unique identifier and identity claim. When user accounts are created in the user information list when assigning them permissions through our custom claims provider, email address is saved as the display name and there is nothing saved under the “Work e-mail” field.

I was not able to click on “My Settings” and edit the fields because the User Profile service was provisioned. Even after I deleted the User Profile service, I could not edit these fields through the SharePoint UI as you can see below.

SharePoint Hosting provider Fpweb.net is once again teaming up with Innovative-e, Inc. to present a FREE webinar on “5 Risky SharePoint HR Temptations” on Wednesday, May 23rd at 2:00pm ET.

Join Chris Schwab, SharePoint Engineering Director for Fpweb.net, and Caroll Ford, Managing Partner and SharePoint Practice Owner for Innovative-e, Inc., for an in-depth look into the Human Resources “temptations” or mistakes that organizations make when it comes to understanding the roles necessary to successfully implement and maintain a SharePoint portal, as well as knowing what skills are essential to the various roles. Key topics in this FREE webinar include:

• Discussing the different roles that are required to successfully implement a SharePoint portal
• For each role, learning the appropriate technical and soft skills necessary to form a winning team
• Selecting the “right” people for a SharePoint team
• Understanding how SharePoint governance guidelines and policies interact with the team selection and success
• Managing a cross-functional team that consists of IT and business people who may report through different structures

Please register FREE to attend this featured SharePoint webinar.

[In Part 4 of his series on Document Management and Collaboration in Microsoft SharePoint, Matt Milsark focuses on Major/Minor SharePoint Versioning and Content approval. Missed a post? Check out the previous article on SharePoint 2010 Version Control.]

In the last post of this series, we looked at major versioning in SharePoint 2010. In this one, we’re going to look at including minor versioning, as well as the content approval process.

These features are useful if a document will go through several iterations before being published. For example, an employee handbook may have quite a few collaborators and editors. However, before being distributed or made available company-wide, an HR manager will need to approve its contents.

So let’s take a closer look at how versioning and content approval would work in this scenario.

[In Part 3 of his series on Document Management and Collaboration in Microsoft SharePoint, Matt Milsark introduces SharePoint Versioning. Missed the last post? Please read about SharePoint Document Check-In and Check-Out]

Version control is a critical feature for any enterprise-scale document collaboration platform. In SharePoint, the versioning feature automatically saves every version of a document. This allows multiple people to make changes to a document without the fear of overwriting a previous version. If necessary, you can always revert to a previous document versions.

Sometimes it’s necessary to revert if the most recent copy becomes corrupt or is inadvertently saved in a “messy” state. Versioning will also prevent the (disastrous yet all too familiar) scenario of “accidentally” saving over a live copy of a document. Compared to using a simple file share, the ‘roll-back’ versioning feature makes SharePoint a more reasonable and viable choice for storing critical corporate documents.

“It’s a Dog-Eat-Dog World.”

Besides lending some pretty revolting imagery, the term’s purpose is to warn that society is looking out for itself, so beware.

It’s rare for a stranger or a company to legitimately look out for your best interests and cater to your needs.

Frustratingly rare. We’re programmed to enter any economic exchange (whether it’s buying clothes from a department store or purchasing *shudder* car insurance, etc.) with the mindset that if we aren’t careful, we’ll be taken advantage of. And it’s not our fault, because this is usually the case.

They know they can’t make money without customers right?

I’ve talked about Why Customer Service Matters before, because it’s critical to me. Go ahead and read that link. I’ll wait… In that case, my experience with United Airlines (with whom I’ve been a loyal, almost exclusive, flyer for the past eight years for some reason) was horrible. And when I confronted them about it, I got the standard ‘sorry and see ya later’ response. And that’s not good enough.

SharePoint is a complex platform, so working with SharePoint often requires working with an array of non-SharePoint related software products, such as Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP). SharePoint leverages these technologies to add features and increase functionality- in this case SMTP for email delivery.

Sometimes SMTP can be a ‘pain point’ for SharePoint Administrators since it’s not directly related to SharePoint. But when you encounter email delivery problems in SharePoint, resolving the problem frequently involves SMTP troubleshooting. So where does one start in attempting to diagnose an SMTP error or a possible SMTP problem? On many occasions I’ve used Telnet for this purpose, and it has saved me a ton of time and effort. I will discuss the steps in detail in hopes that it can help someone else in similar circumstances.

We will essentially be using a well-known method of using Telnet to send an email, but utilizing it specifically to help diagnose SharePoint SMTP issues and uncover the root cause of any problems. Telnet is one of the best and most reliable tools for troubleshooting email problems in SharePoint because it saves time and narrows down the possible places that a problem may be occurring.