Access SharePoint document libraries from Office

Problem: You can't save a word document to a SharePoint 2010 document library directly from word.  This applies to all products in the office suite and saving to SP2010 & MOSS from Windows Server 2008.  I was getting the error "You can't open this location using this program." when pointing the document to a SharePoint library.

Note: This only applies if your OS is Windows 2008 Server.

Initial Hypothesis: This only affects Windows 2008 Server users.  So it's really just developers looking at saving to SharePoint from the Windows 2008 Server environment, you would also need Office installed.  The issue is with the restricted access the Windows 2008 server allows by default.

Resolution:
Open Server Manager > Features > Add the "Desktop Experience" feature.  Andrew Woodward has a post on the issue for more information.
http://www.21apps.com/sharepoint/windows-server-2008-developing-sharepoint-cant-connect-from-office-clients/

AD account password out of sync with the managed service account within SharePoint

Problem: I am trying to start services on a server, when I start the Search Foundation service I get the following error: "The password for the account ...\..., as currently stored in SharePoint, is not the same as the current password for the account within Active Directory.  To fix this with Powershell, run Set-SPManagedAccount -UseExistingPassword."

Initial Hypothesis: The password for the account I am using to run the service using has been changed in AD, this does not match the password stored in the SharePoint.

Resolution: Reset the AD Password



Ensure SharePoint is using the correct pswd i.e. chnage the store managed account password as shown below using the Set-SPManagedAccount cmd.



SharePoint Online Beta primer for developers

Overview: The development API is based on SharePoint 2010 server side object model so it's robust, flexible subset of SharePoint 2010 on-premises editions.

• You obviously can configuration SharePoint Online using your browser, or SharePoint Designer 2010·
• You can use VS 2010 to write custom code and this is what i am interested in.
• My understanding is that SharePoint developers should have an easy path to SharePoint Online development.
• For a test environment you will have the same API that is available as a sandboxed solution on the on premises version depending on licencing selected.
• Your local SharePoint 2010 development environment is where you will write code that will be uploaded to SharePoint online via a solution package.
• You will be able to intelletrace (VS universal and debugging) on the uploaded code in production.
• Development teams will find it alot easier to develop locally and then deploy the finalised code.
• Custom code can either be deployed in a sandbox solutions or a custom application can be written that will make use of the Client Object Models (Silverlight, .Net framework or ECMA Script)
• Sandbox custom code is deployed through SharePoint solutions (wsp packages)
• You won't have access to deploy Full trust proxies so this means functionality that you usually write as FullTrustProxies will not be available. A common example is logging to the ULS. Similarly you won't be able to log to your own custom logging system unless you offer an accessible interface that can be called from the sandboxed code.

This post is based on the SharePoint Online Developer Overview beta documentation.

Update: 25/02/2011 - Steve Fox wrote this recently for SharePointPro Connections, "What Will it Be Like to Develop for SharePoint Online?"

Virtualising SharePoint 2010

Overview:  I was reading Michael Noel's article on "Going Virtual with SharePoint 2010", it is a good read and is very useful in pointing out how to virtualise.  My key point here would be don't virtualise SQL Server you just won't get the IOPS to make it worthwhile.

Nearly 2 years ago I was speaking to the lead architect for a big FTSE 100 enterprise who heavily use SharePoint 2007 at the time.  His key message was don't virtualise the WFE's, I disagreed with him which apparently wasn't a good idea but outside of his single point his claims were not worth accepting.  His key point was you will get a 10-15% (a guess) performance increase using physical over VMWare on the same hardware.  Michael Noel states "Generally, the virtualization overhead required to run virtual servers is only 5 percent".  I can't see any discernable degradation but there will be some performance hit by using a hypervisor.  His farm was rather large but I feel he just didn't trust virtualisation.  Today it's pretty main stream to put you WFE's and application servers on a VM platform.  Especially if it's done correctly as outlined in Michael's article the minor pass thru resource lost is easily made up for with flexibility that VM's offer you namely:

• Hardware become cheaper you can easily up size you VM's on new hardware with more resources as time move on, you don't need to add more servers to the farm.  I have had several clients start with a part of there business using SharePoint, it's much easier to setup a resilient infrastructure that can be moved over servers using VMotion and upgrade the hardware. 
• Additional servers are easy to add to the farm as you simply add a new VM onto your hardware.  This is pretty minor but you don't need to do purchasing and the hard yards associate with hardware additions.  If the company has the resources (CPU, memory and disk) it simple to request more VMs or additional resources to existing VM's.  With the cost of hardware halving every 18 months it's a no brainer if your organisation can move to virtualised servers.
• Disaster recovery is only improved, you may have a bit backup for DR but being able to pull down machines and move them is always useful.

Preferences:

I use HyperV at home as I have only 2 servers and my technet licences give it to me for free.  I merely spin up machines and install the roles I require.  I even VM my AD & SQL box for development. 

On production environments it is HyperV or VMWare for me. It comes down to you engineers experience and preference.  If it is a greenfield project and licencing costs are not a concern I lead my clients to VMWare as I know it better and know it performs and is maintainable.  Saying that I have setup farms using HyperV, this is generally for smaller institutions and it works brilliantly.

Tip: Separate physical network cards for each VM & don't put SQL on a VM.

Tip: Follow Michael Noel's article when virtualising your SharePoint farm and get a virtualisation expert to help you do the setup.

References:
http://www.sharepointproconnections.com/article/sharepoint/Going-Virtual-with-SharePoint-2010.aspx
http://blog.sharepointsite.co.uk/2010/12/sharepoint-2010-boundries-and.html

How is SharePoint selling - a consultancy services roadmap

Overview: SharePoint is being taken up very quickly but it's a difficult market to measure.  A figure I heard at a conference a few months ago is that for every $1 spent on licencing generates $6 in consultancy.  I don't know this ratio was determined but if the number of licences being sold is on the up, it follows there will be a great deal of consulting services needed.

Most organisations I have dealt with use SharePoint to a very limited extent.  It has a lot more to offer than clients are taking up.  Intranets, file server replacement and collaboration are the main impetus for using SharePoint.  My feeling especially with SharePoint 2010 will be a shift toward better integration and using SP as a development platform.  Office 365 plays into this consultancy business also.  The main issue will be with setup/on site installations taking a hit however there still will be a need on site installations but more companies will choose SharePoint as a service and this is only a positive that results in more people taking to the product.

The companies affected will be the hosting companies as they will loose a lot of there sales, Azure will also affect them.  They have been loyal customers of MS for years and unless they change their offering to be more consultancy service based they will take a huge hit.

Anyway some quotes to show how SharePoint is selling:

"SharePoint licenses have surpassed the 100-million mark and more than 17,000 customers use SharePoint." Microsoft Technet 9 Feb 2011.

"Microsoft’s fastest selling server based product" is a phrase often banded about not sure what this metric is but it sounds good.

References:
http://blogs.technet.com/b/office_sustained_engineering/archive/2011/02/09/1office-2010-and-sharepoint-2010-momentum-amp-service-pack-1-update.aspx

Mapping internal users (LDAP) to the cloud

Overview: Steve Plank has a great video on "How ADFS and the Microsoft Federation Gateway work together up in the Office 365 Cloud". 

To get your internal ADFS users to authenticate in the Microsoft cloud (Azure and Office 365), you do need ADFS 2.0.  The claims based authentication that can be setup in SharePoint 2010 is how Office 365 and AZURE will authenticate AD users. 

You users will access SP2010/MS Online365/AZURE Web application using their browser.  The end application sends the browser a response redirecting them to the MS Federation Gateway (MFG)/App Fabric/STS web service (SP2010 on site editions), this in turn passes the users browser onto ADFS.

ADFS generates the user a SAML token and the are redirected to the MFG, MFG in turn generates it's own SAML token containing it's claims and the browser is redirect back to the originally requested web application.

For a user trying to access SharePoint Online from their internal network, you can see the user makes several requests to different points along the chain however the key result being the user get securely authenticated against you internal Active Directory (AD).
Steve Planks video is easier to follow than this post but it's worth understanding the process as it applies to Azure, SharePoint claims based authentication and Office 365.  This coupled with custom LDAP providers results in a consistent manner to handle authentication in the cloud using you internal LDAP directory.

Below is an animation describing the process whereby a user is authenticated on their internal network and then they use SharePoint Online (Office 365).

More Info:
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/plankytronixx/archive/2011/01/25/whiteboard-video-how-adfs-and-the-microsoft-federation-gateway-work-together-up-in-the-office-365-cloud.aspx?wa=wsignin1.0

Settingup ADFS for SharePoint Reference:

 

UK Cloud User Group

Yesterday I attended the 2nd Cloud Evening meeting it was terrific - this event focused on Microsoft's offering.  Specifically the latest version of Azure (1.4 I think) and it looks impressive.  Previously, I felt limited by Azure however, I think Azure SQL is a good option for storing application data especially when Office 365 is released or to extend SharePoint 2010. 

Both Mark Rendle and Planky (Steve Plank) gave good presentations.  I came away with tons of information and I'm pleased I went along.  Planky's blog is definitely worth following.  The security around Azure and Office 365 is fairly complex but considering the integration with LDAP providers and the security considerations it is well thought out and tooled.

Additional Info:
http://cloudeve.ning.com/