SharePoint 2010 Journal

SharePoint Errors

2010-12-15T00:14:00.000-08:00

Hi guys,

I'm starting a new blog titled SharePoint Errors. Basically this blog will only contain SharePoint error messages and how to resolve them.

Please visit it when you have time. Cheers.

http://sperrors.blogspot.com/

Cheers,
Tommy

SharePoint Performance Tuning 3 - Customizations

2010-08-02T08:08:00.000-07:00

INTRODUCTION

This is a series. The previous article can be found at http://sp2010journal.blogspot.com/2010/07/sharepoint-performance-tuning-2.html.

Now we've arrived at the customizations topic. Customisations obviously cover a broad range of topics. Therefore, in this particular article I want to discuss only the basic elements and some tips that we can do to increase performance.

SHAREPOINT CUSTOMISATIONS IN GENERAL

Disposing SPWeb and SPSite and other disposable objects
We've now read a lot about this. Ensure that you dispose SPWeb and SPSite and other disposable objects properly. In MOSS, the navigation provider for example, needs to be disposed after use. When we don't dispose these objects properly and only relying on Garbage Collector, we're exposed to the risk of having memory leaks. The more users access this particular part of the code, the more severe the impact is to your RAM.

Use reasonable-sized images and media files
Although when you're using SharePoint as Intranet it's usually reasonably quick (because it's local to the network and using network speed instead of WAN speed), it's still good to use and upload reasonably-sized images and media files. It will save you a lot of bandwidth.

Eg. Why would you upload 3000x2000 image if the general maximum resolution you use in your company is only 1024x768.

Also, when you're customising the UI of your SharePoint site, use GIFs where possible. Gradient colours don't normally work correctly on GIFs, they have to be JPEGs but JPEGs are generally larger than GIFs.

Applying general good coding practice
MS has released a page in MSDN detailing good Sharepoint coding practice. http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb687949(office.12).aspx.

There are things like:
- Disposing SPWeb and SPSite;
- Using SPQuery instead of SPList.Items;
- etc

Use cached resultsets
You can cache resultsets if you wish. I'll talk more about this later. Basically, instead of you keep re-iterating list items directly using SPList and SPQuery, you can save those SPListItem collection/resultsets using custom entity wrapper in cache technologies such as .NET Cache, Memcached, etc and only interacting with the cache.

Things like iterating all sites and sub-sites can be expensive, too. We can save a lot of database round-trip when we interact with cached resultsets instead of with SPWeb/SPSite directly.

SHAREPOINT CUSTOMISATIONS FOR INTERNET WEBSITE

You can use SharePoint as your internet website, too (ie. MOSS Publishing Site). And normally you will turn on anonymous access. The rule of thumb is, our website has to be quick and should load as fast as possible. The things that affect loading speed are:
- HTML source size;
- Image and media elements size;
- Script size (eg. Javascript that's referenced by your website);
- Other referenced file size (eg. CSS);
- Length of page scroll. The longer the page is regardless how small/plain it is in size will still take some time to render on user's browser.

With these things in mind, we can configure our MOSS site to be as "small" as possible:
- Hide CORE.JS from anonymous view. CORE.JS is only used to perform SP-related javascripted-tasks such as clicking on Site Actions displaying sub-menu drop-downs, etc. Anonymous user doesn't need to see this hence can be hidden. This will save you several hundred kilobytes!
- Avoid web-parts and use custom controls instead. Web parts spit out nasty and uneccessary HTML code. Not only they're not XHTML compliant, they're also adding few KBs to your overall HTML source size. If you have multiple web parts on your page, they can surely affect your overall HTML source size.
- Hide SharePoint-related CSS (such as CORE.CSS). This is used to style the SharePoint-related menus and controls. Anonymous users don't need to see this either. This can save you several KBs, too.

CONCLUSION

So I hope that this helps. If you come up with other suggestions please let us all know.

Cheers,
Tommy

SharePoint Performance Tuning 2 - SharePoint Configuration

2010-07-27T20:33:00.000-07:00

INTRODUCTION

This is a series. The previous article can be found at http://sp2010journal.blogspot.com/2010/07/sharepoint-performance-tuning-1.html.

The next step that we have to be aware of after the hardware and topology configurations is the SharePoint Configuration itself. Please share your thoughts, too.

SHAREPOINT CONFIGURATION

Using different user accounts for different services
ALWAYS use different user account for each SharePoint service. The reason is not so much for improving the performance but it's more for troubleshooting. If there are particular services that're running slowly or down, you can easily identify them. While if every SharePoint service is configured using the same user account, you will not be able to distinguish them.

Also, SharePoint automatically grants a particular account specific access to DB, file system, etc. If you use the same account everywhere then that account is exposed to security risk because it suddenly has access to everything.

In SharePoint 2007 the following services need a dedicated user account (please add more in comments if I'm missing anything):
- Account installing SP;
- Account to run SP service (ie. the Farm account);
- WSS search and content access account;
- MOSS search;
- User profile sync;
- SSP service;
- Excel service;
- SSO;
- APP POOL for each of the website application you created.

In SharePoint 2010 there are more! You'll need:
- AS ABOVE;
- APP POOL account for each service application you install;
- Service account for some of the additional services such as Lotus Note Connector, etc.

Please add to the list everyone.

Search crawl synchronization schedule configuration
Ensure that you specify "reasonable" sync search schedule. I've been to a client which search incremental crawl is specified to run every 5 mins and the full crawl is scheduled to run at 12pm every day. This causes bottleneck on the server especially the database server.

Define caching whenever possible
For content/pages that doesn't change much, you can put caching on. This will improve user experience. I will talk about this later when we arrive at the programming section.

Adhere to Microsoft recommendations on limits
There are limits that MS has specified in terms of the number of items in a list, no of sub-sites, etc. Ensure that we adhere to these figures.

Ensure AD authentication instead of SQL authentication to the databases
Ensure that we use AD authentication instead of SQL authentication when we're configuring SP (eg. creating sites, services, etc). Based on MS, AD authentication is faster and more secure.

For more information please go to http://technet.microsoft.com/en-au/library/dd335963(office.12).aspx and http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc263061(office.12).aspx.

Hope this helps and see you on the next article! :)

Tommy

SharePoint Performance Tuning 1 - Hardware Requirements and Server Topology

2010-07-27T20:11:00.000-07:00

INTRODUCTION

Hi everyone, in this opportunity I would like to share with you some of the tips that can help us tuning our SharePoint Farm performance. This is a series. Please also note that all of the articles mentioned in this series are purely based on my experience and some readings that I've done myself only. Therefore, please share your thoughts and opinions.

HARDWARE REQUIREMENTS

I have to admit that SharePoint consumes a lot of server resources. Therefore, the very first step to tune SP farm performance is by ensuring that we're using the appropriate hardware. There are basics that we can follow regarding hardware requirements:

64-bit compliant
Ensure that the hardware we'll be using are 64-bit compliant. In fact from this moment on I will not be installing SharePoint on hardware that's not 64-bit compliant. The reason is because 32-bit environment can only handle less than 4GB of RAM. Therefore, for scalability I will always use 64-bit compliant hardware.

Fast network cards
Since there may be huge traffic coming in/out the SharePoint servers, use gigabit NIC if possible.

Disk speed
SharePoint also does a lot of disk read/write through its content databases. Therefore, the faster your disk speed the better.

Plenty of RAM
I personally will always start with 4GB of RAM for the Sharepoint Server and 4GB of RAM for the database server. In fact for SP 2010, Microsoft suggests that you'll need 8GB for the Sharepoint server itself.

SharePoint is very RAM intensive. You'll expect at least 1.5GB of RAM usage on the database server itself. That's given that the database server only contains SP databases. If you use a shared DB server (ie. shared with other custom apps) then you'll probably need more RAM.

Minimum hardware requirements
Ensure that you adhere to Microsoft's minimum hardware requirements for installing SharePoint. I'm sure Microsoft has tested this themselves.

For more information please visit http://technet.microsoft.com/en-au/library/cc850692(office.12).aspx.

SERVER TOPOLOGY

The minimum topology you'll need will be 1 dedicated Sharepoint server and 1 dedicated database server. NEVER put database and Sharepoint on the same server!

The dedicated Sharepoint server can have all of Sharepoint features inside (eg. Central Admin, Indexing, Search, etc) and we can always scale this out into more servers when required. However, throughout my experience, the bottleneck is always on the database server. Therefore, you can imagine how slow it's going to be if the DB, OS, Sharepoint are all on the same server.

CONCLUSION
So, when we're about to deploy Sharepoint, ensure that we have kept this in mind. A lot of clients that I've been into think that "Oh...we can always expand later..let's just use this spare VM for it". But then in the end, upgrade can be painful and consuming so much time. Especially if SP has been running and the content database size has increased so much!

I'm actually writing this particular article during a client engagement which the client uses a 32-bit environment for their SP farm. They put DB and SP on the same server. The server itself can only have ~3.5GB of RAM max and the DB itself already consumes 1.7GB of RAM. This is a dedicated SP server by the way, therefore there's no other application using the DB nor the server. There are now issues with downloading documents that are more than 700kb in size because the server just can't hold them in the memory any more!

They're in the process of upgrading their farm but of course it will take time to do. With all of the after hour outages, etc. It wouldn't happen if they've been applying the basics I mentioned above. So yeah...plan this very first step well and we'll save a lot of time and costs in the future.

Manage User Profiles Not Displaying Any Results in RTM

2010-06-15T01:54:00.000-07:00

In 2007 when you click on Manage User Profiles it displays ALL user accounts by default.

In 2010 this isn't the case. When you click on Manage User Profiles it says "There are no results to display" and I was a bit surprised when I first saw this because I thought the import wasn't running successfully. I tried to change the View drop-down-list from Active Profiles to Profiles Missing from Import but nothing returned.

I then tried to type in some keywords and that's when the results were returned.

Is this behaviour by design or a bug?

Cheers,
Tommy

SharePoint 2010 RTM Still Requires SP_Farm to Run Profile Sync

2010-06-15T01:51:00.000-07:00

I normally install Sharepoint with the following configuration:
- Login using SP_Admin and install Sharepoint
- SP_Farm is used to run Farm service

In 2007 you can normally run Profile Sync with SP_Admin (account used to install Sharepoint) but in SP 2010 BETA this wasn't the case. You have to logout and re-log back in using SP_Farm in order to run the Profile Sync manually.

I was actually expecting SP_Admin to be able to run Profile Sync since it's a God-mode account but it wasn't the case. I've tried to add it to Farm Administrators Group and yet I still couldn't run it.

I'm not sure if this was done in purpose or just a left-over bug from BETA.

Cheers,
Tommy

SharePoint My Sites and Search Center, 404 Error Not Found

2010-06-15T01:33:00.000-07:00

When you're configuring My Sites make sure you put in /Pages/ in the Search Center site settings otherwise it will return you with 404 Not Found error.

For example, if the Search Center site is set to http://moss2010:31000/ then you specify the following:
http://moss2010:31000/Pages/

If it's set as a sub-site collection, eg http://testsite/sites/SearchCenter then you specify the following:
http://testsite/sites/SearchCenter/Pages/

Hope this helps,
Tommy

The Pitfalls of Sharepoint Projects - Part 3 - Everything Can Be Developed Using Sharepoint

2010-06-14T23:40:00.000-07:00

INTRODUCTION

This article is a series. The previous article can be found here http://sp2010journal.blogspot.com/2010/06/pitfalls-of-sharepoint-projects-part-2.html.

Another pitfall that we may encounter is an expectation that Sharepoint can do everything. Well, can it do everything? IT CAN but with how much customisations?

First of all, it's actually safe to say that Sharepoint is a custom application built on top of .NET framework in which you can pretty much build anything you want on top. However, Sharepoint has been developed and designed a specific way to serve a particular purpose so that it can perform its functions most efficiently.

Same with a mobile phone, I can use it to be a book marker, I can use it to hold my broken chair, I can use it to watch videos and browsing Facebook, etc. But it's performing most efficiently if it's used for calling and sending SMS.

Sharepoint is like that, too. You can always build custom feature receivers, page layouts, master pages, etc to achieve whatever you want, but it may take a lot of time to do. There may be other tools that can perform what you require a lot quicker and with minor modifications.

This has been a pitfall in Sharepoint engagement. Sure Sharepoint can automatically send flowers to someone you love on her birthday but you will need to develop custom lists, payment gateway processing, content types and fields, add-to-cart functionality, etc etc etc which an off-the-shelves shopping-cart application can just do straightaway.

HOW TO DEAL WITH THE SITUATION

So, what I can suggest is, do not just sell Sharepoint for the sake of it. But instead, find out what the client truly needs first and let Sharepoint be one of the technologies you can offer to achieve what's required (does this make sense?).

If they need to provide online shopping capability then why use Sharepoint. They can simply deploy a simple and cheap shopping cart application and let Sharepoint be the point of collaboration (eg. viewing sales reports, etc).

Cheers,
Tommy

The Pitfalls of Sharepoint Projects - Part 2 - Approach Shjarepoint Project by Phases

2010-06-14T23:20:00.000-07:00

INTRODUCTION

I was (and still am) discussing about the pitfalls that we may encounter during Sharepoint engagement. This is a series. The previous article can be found here http://sp2010journal.blogspot.com/2010/06/pitfalls-of-sharepoint-projects-part-1.html.

I also realise that a lot of the times people tend to quote for the whole project so that the final full cost can be identified. This is not a bad practice except the number at the end can be very huge and scary.

Clients are clients. They will always say, "Just give us the final number mate. We understand that this is only a quote and may change depending on the requirements but just give us the final number so that we can prepare the budget for it.". Then when we give back to them with $200K worth of development, I'm pretty sure that they'll be scared off.

When this happens, PM/BDM/whoever deals with the client will start to cut things off (ie. time required to achieve a particular functionality) off just for the sake of winning the tender.

I've ever had a situation where we (the developers) quoted 1000 hours and it's been cut-off to 300 hours. In the end, we ended up taking 1000 hrs anyway to finish off the task.

HOW TO DEAL WITH THE SITUATION

To deal with this particular scenario, always scope EVERYTHING (ie. every single piece of functionality) then break them down into phases. Prioritise the functionalities into the ones that need to be built first (ie. the must-haves) then to the least required.

Especially when writing quotes, client will appreciate this so much. They can start seeing what part of the requirements that take much time to develop. Trust me, a lot of the times they end-up de-prioritizing what's been an important priority in the first place.

And by approaching it this way, client at least can start using the system sooner. They can at least play around with it just to find that the system is very helpful and making their work more efficient. Once they've been more familiar with it, they'll start ask for more functionalities (hence more work for the server provider, hence more money and income).

Hope this helps,
Tommy

The Pitfalls of Sharepoint Projects - Part 1 - The Catch 22 "Design then plan or plan then design"

2010-06-14T23:06:00.000-07:00

INTRODUCTION

Hi everyone, in this particular opportunity I would like to share with you some of the pitfalls that we may encounter during our Sharepoint engagement. This is a series.

The very first part of this series is called The Catch 22 "Design then plan or plan then design". A lot of the times I notice that clients want to see what Sharepoint can do first before implementing it fully which is fair enough. But how many times this happens that the "prototype" model suddenly becomes production version?

I give you an example:

One of my clients asked me about the greatness of Sharepoint. I obviously could explain to them. The meeting went about 1-2 hours and the agenda of the meeting was really to just going through Sharepoint features one-by-one, from My Sites, lists, document libraries, versioning, InfoPath, User Profile, etc etc etc.

At the end of the meeting the client came to me and said, "Mate, that looks awesome! I think it can help us a lot. However, before we fully implement it, we have to first find out whether the product can really help the other employees out and make the business more efficient or not. So, why don't you create a prototype based on the requirements that I gave you, then we can go from there?".

Well, here I was building the prototype. Several sites and sub-sites have been created with just OOTB look-and-feel, some content types and fields have also been developed. They're all done through the UI because - let's face it - it's only a prototype!

The client then tried it out for few weeks and..... THEY LIKE IT!

I then came back to them and asked them to do a proper scoping and re-build the portal/Intranet (whatever you want to call it) properly. By this time client said to me, "Mate, we cannot lose content because people have been using it and they've uploaded documents, etc etc etc. If we have to re-build the portal from scratch and losing the content then we can't have that.".

So, in the end I had to work with the prototype and developed it from there which was a mess. Well, since it's only a prototype to try out functionalities, the site structure wasn't really thoroughly planned, the UI hasn't been properly developed, the content types and fields (meta-data) haven't really been thoroughly thought off, etc etc etc.

After all, the project costs client more money than if it's rebuilt from scratch.

HOW TO DEAL WITH THE SITUATION

Some of the things I can share/suggest are:
- Keep reminding the client that it's only a prototype and should not be used for day-to-day business use.
- Tell the client to not to work with the documents that are uploaded to it. They're all purely for testing out functionalities such as versionins, etc.
- Give them timeframe to test out functionalities, eg. 2 weeks. If the client needs an extension then be it but at least we (the service provider) are being pro-active and following up the client.
- Never let the prototype to creep out and grow itself bigger than Ben Hur. Keep communicating with the client and ask them whether they've been more familiar with Sharepoint or not.

In any project, planning should always come first before designing. Therefore, without a proper planning, Sharepoint projects can cost a lot of money. I shouldn't say that it (SP project) will fail but at least it will cost a lot more money than if it's properly planned.

Installing SharePoint 2010 RTM

2010-06-14T22:38:00.000-07:00

Hi everyone,

It's been ages since the last time I wrote my last blog article. I feel great now knowing that I have got time to start writing again.

So, Sharepoint 2010 RTM is finally out. The one in my VM is still the BETA version. So I decided to ditch my VM and rebuilt one with the RTM version.

I will also be using SQL Server 2008 instead of SQL Server 2005.

Installing Sharepoint 2010 is really just a matter of double-clicking on SETUP.EXE and follow the instructions. However, these SQL patches need to first be installed before you can proceed:
- SQL 2008 SP1 - http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=66ab3dbb-bf3e-4f46-9559-ccc6a4f9dc19&displaylang=en
- Cumulative Update Package 2 for SQL Server 2008 SP1 - KB970315 - http://support.microsoft.com/kb/970315

Once we've installed these patches, Sharepoint installation can then proceed.

One thing that I noticed as well now is, on BETA when I tried to install SP using SP_Admin, somehow this user is not added as SP Farm Administrator. This is now fixed in the RTM version so it's all good and ready to go.

Cheers,
Tommy

Desktop Applications, Technical and Business Skills Training

2010-06-13T20:20:00.000-07:00

Hi guys,

L7 Solutions is now opening a new Training division. They offer end-user training as well as technical and business skills training. The courses are ranging from desktop applications such as MS Office (Access, Excel, PowerPoint 2003, 2007 and 2010), ITIL, Prince2, etc.

For more information please visit L7 Solutions Training.

Desktop Applications Training
SharePoint Training
Perth ITIL Course
Perth WA Prince2 Course
MS Office (Access, Excel, PowerPoint, Word) 2003, 2007 and 2010 Training Course

Cheers,
Tommy

User Profile Configure Synchronization Connections Error - MOSS MA not found

2010-02-25T00:23:00.000-08:00

Hi everyone,

It's me again. I've just rebuilt my SP2010 Beta VM because of the error I had with the Search service.

Anyway, everything now works fine after the rebuild except I can't create a Sync Connection. When I checked the log I get the following error message:

MOSS MA not found

The resolution is to actually restart both Forefront Identity Manager Service and ForeFront Identity Manager Synchronization Service through Services in Administrative Tools (or services.msc in Run command).

Once you've restarted those two services, you can now create a new synchronization connection.

Hope this helps,
Tommy

Sharepoint 2010 BETA - My Sites

2010-02-12T00:01:00.000-08:00

Yo all,

Setting up My Sites ain't simple in Sharepoint 2010 BETA.

Please follow the instructions on this blog:
http://www.helloitsliam.com/archive/2010/01/18/sharepoint-2010-%E2%80%93-my-sites.aspx

Cheers,
Tommy

Sharepoint 2010 - External Lists and Content Types + Business Connectivity Service INTEGRATING SugarCRM + PHP + MySQL

2010-02-11T19:19:00.000-08:00

Hi everyone,

After attending a session at Sharepoint Saturday Perth regarding BCS and External Lists and Content Types, I was actually very-very interested in using it to connect to a non-Microsoft systems.

So far I notice that a lot of the integrations project are with other Microsoft apps such as MS CRM, Axapta, etc. But what about with a totally different system such as PHP + MySQL?

In this opportunity I want to share with you the walkthrough to represent MySQL data in Sharepoint using BCS and External Lists.

First of all let me introduce to you the PHP apps I want to integrate with: Sugar CRM. It's an open source Customer Relationship Management written in PHP and using MySQL as the database backend. See below:

So, it's now time for me to prepare for the integration. First of all I need to use Visual Studio 2010 to create the project. If you open Visual Studio and create new project, under Sharepoint -> 2010 you will see this project template: Business Data Connectivity Model.

Let's create the project. By default it will look like the following:

You will also see the BDC Explorer window:

- It has a feature that is deployed at Farm level.
- It also has the BDC entity model on it.

Now, it's time to do a bit of class renaming. By default you will get Entity1.cs and Entity1Service.cs. Entity1.cs is the entity that will be passed through/from BDC and Entity1Service.cs is the "business logic" class that BDC will use to read methods from. There are 2 methods by default: ReadList (used to display ALL items on External Lists) and ReadItem (used to display a particular item). You obviously can add more to this to perform CRUD operations.

Let's now rename Entity1.cs to SugarCRMContact.cs and Entity1Service.cs to SugarCRMContactService.cs. If we now go to the BDC Explorer window, I would actually expect Visual Studio to auto-rename the BDC Entity object but it actually doesn't. Therefore, we need to rename this as well. Let's rename Entity1 to SugarCRMContact. We will need to modify the return object as well.

I'm hoping that this automation will be fixed in the released version of VS 2010.

The project is available for download. Therefore, if you get lost/confused with this step, don't worry.

Once we've done all the renaming, it's now time to create the "repository"/data layer class to connect to MySQL. As we all know, it's always good to program with DDD/TDD (Domain-Driven-Design/Test Driven Development) methodology in mind so that our code is decoupled and not tight/dependent to each other. There are a lot of posts on the Internet about DDD/TDD so I won't discuss much about this.

Once I'm finished with my data layer class, it's now time to serve them in Sharepoint using BCS. If I now go back to my SugarCRMContactService.cs class, I can now do the following:
==
public static IEnumerable ReadList()

{
List bdcContacts = new List();
IContactRepository contactRepository = new DefaultContactRepository();
List contacts = contactRepository.GetContacts();

foreach (ContactEntity contact in contacts)
{
SugarCRMContact bdcContact = new SugarCRMContact();
bdcContact.ContactId = contact.ContactId.ToString();
bdcContact.FirstName = contact.FirstName;
bdcContact.LastName = contact.LastName;
bdcContacts.Add(bdcContact);
}
return bdcContacts;
}
==

Once we've done that, deploy your WSP to your farm and that's it! Sharepoint will automatically create the BDC entity for you. Go to Central Admin -> Application Management -> Manage Service Applications then click on Business Data Connectivity then you'll see the following:

Now we can start creating the External List for it. Open your site in Sharepoint Designer 2010, then go to External Content Types. You will automatically see your custom BDC entity. Double click on it and you'll be brought to this page:

On the top click Create List & Form. Give your list a name and that's it! If you now go back to your site and View All Site Content, you'll see your external list in there. When you click it...

There you go: MySQL data in Sharepoint.

Download the project here.

Note:
1. You will need to download SugarCRM (http://www.sugarcrm.com/) and WAMPServer. WAMPServer runs PHP + MySQL + Apache at the same time.
2. Add the following connection string in your Sharepoint site web.config:

<add key="ConnectionString" value="Server=localhost;Database=sugarcrm;User=root;Password=;" />

Sharepoint 2010 Lists, Lookups and Columns - KEWL!

2010-02-10T00:17:00.000-08:00

I have to say that I am impressed with the way Sharepoint 2010 handles lists, lookups and columns. It now has the concurrency ability whereby - if turned on/selected - if you perform a lookup on a data from another list and you try to delete that data, Sharepoint will not allow you to.

See below for screenshot:

Lookup field settings page

Error when trying to delete an item that's referenced by other list

Plus, you can now view multiple columns of the looked-up data (EXCELLENT!). See below:

So yeah..I have to say that I will definitely upgrade to SP2010 once the released version is available! :) It definitely eliminates a lot of problems that I (and other clients) are having at the moment with columns and content types.

Cheers,
Tommy

SharePoint 2010 Metadata and Taxonomy Management - Lookup on This Field Not Allowed

2010-02-10T00:08:00.000-08:00

In regards to Metadata and Taxonomy Management, when you create a "Managed Metadata" column on your list, it is actually a lookup field to the central Metadata repository.

You can't further perform a lookup on this field from another list.

Cheers,
Tommy

Upgrading Microsoft Office Sharepoint Server (MOSS) 2007 to Sharepoint 2010 BETA - Part 4 - Content Database Backup/Restore

2010-02-08T00:31:00.000-08:00

At this point of time I've given up trying to upgrade MOSS 2007 to Sharepoint 2010 BETA using in-place upgrade approach.

I now try it using Content Database backup/restore approach.

It's a very simple process that I was following:
- Create a new VM and install Sharepoint 2010 clean-fresh farm
- Install and deploy all custom WSPs that are currently deployed to MOSS 2007 farm
- Backup MOSS 2007 sites database
- Create a blank Sharepoint website in Sharepoint 2010 farm to restore content DB to
- Remove and take offline the existing content DB
- Restore and re-attach the MOSS 2007 content database

AND IT WORKED! WOOHOO!! The only error message I was getting in the log file was:
==
[STSADM] [SPContentDatabaseSequence] [ERROR] [2/8/2010 3:51:49 PM]: Found a missing feature Id = [c88c4ff1-dbf5-4649-ad9f-c6c426ebcbf5]

[STSADM] [SPContentDatabaseSequence] [ERROR] [2/8/2010 3:51:49 PM]: The feature with Id c88c4ff1-dbf5-4649-ad9f-c6c426ebcbf5 is referenced in the database, but is not installed on the current farm. The missing feature may cause upgrade to fail. Please install any solution which contains the feature and restart upgrade if necessary.

==

I think I must have missed a feature.

But anyway, at the point of writing this article, I can say that this will be the better approach of upgrading 2007 sites to Sharepoint 2010 compared to in-place upgrade.

Cheers,
Tommy

Upgrading Microsoft Office Sharepoint Server (MOSS) 2007 to Sharepoint 2010 BETA - Part 3 - Another Retry

2010-02-07T18:39:00.000-08:00

Hi everyone,

On my first post about upgrading:
http://sp2010journal.blogspot.com/2010/02/upgrading-microsoft-office-sharepoint.html

I mentioned that I tried to upgrade a MOSS instance that wasn't connected to AD. I have now changed this. I re-created my VM, connected that to AD, install MOSS 2007 then upgraded it to Sharepoint 2010 BETA.

The result is THE SAME.

The existing MOSS 2007 site wouldn't load. It totally broke. It still said HTTP 403 FORBIDDEN (as per my previous article).

New site works no problem at all.

The detailed error was still the same ie. the old MOSS 2007 database somehow couldn't be upgraded.
==
Server Error in '/' Application.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

There is a compatibility range mismatch between the Web server and database "WSS_CSNET_Content", and connections to the data have been blocked to due to this incompatibility. This can happen when a content database has not been upgraded to be within the compatibility range of the Web server, or if the database has been upgraded to a higher level than the web server. The Web server and the database must be upgraded to the same version and build level to return to compatibility range.

Description: An unhandled exception occurred during the execution of the current web request. Please review the stack trace for more information about the error and where it originated in the code.

Exception Details: Microsoft.SharePoint.Upgrade.SPUpgradeCompatibilityException: There is a compatibility range mismatch between the Web server and database "WSS_CSNET_Content", and connections to the data have been blocked to due to this incompatibility. This can happen when a content database has not been upgraded to be within the compatibility range of the Web server, or if the database has been upgraded to a higher level than the web server. The Web server and the database must be upgraded to the same version and build level to return to compatibility range.
Source Error:

An unhandled exception was generated during the execution of the current web request. Information regarding the origin and location of the exception can be identified using the exception stack trace below.

Stack Trace:

[SPUpgradeCompatibilityException: There is a compatibility range mismatch between the Web server and database "WSS_CSNET_Content", and connections to the data have been blocked to due to this incompatibility. This can happen when a content database has not been upgraded to be within the compatibility range of the Web server, or if the database has been upgraded to a higher level than the web server. The Web server and the database must be upgraded to the same version and build level to return to compatibility range.]

Microsoft.SharePoint.Administration.SPPersistedUpgradableObject.ValidateBackwardsCompatibility() +542
Microsoft.SharePoint.SPSite.PreinitializeServer(SPRequest request) +49
Microsoft.SharePoint.SPWeb.InitializeSPRequest() +258
Microsoft.SharePoint.WebControls.SPControl.EnsureSPWebRequest(SPWeb web) +365
Microsoft.SharePoint.WebControls.SPControl.SPWebEnsureSPControl(HttpContext context) +520
Microsoft.SharePoint.WebControls.UnsecuredLayoutsPageBase.OnPreInit(EventArgs e) +115
Microsoft.SharePoint.WebControls.LayoutsPageBase.OnPreInit(EventArgs e) +49
Microsoft.SharePoint.ApplicationPages.SettingsPage.OnPreInit(EventArgs e) +59
System.Web.UI.Page.PerformPreInit() +42
System.Web.UI.Page.ProcessRequestMain(Boolean includeStagesBeforeAsyncPoint, Boolean includeStagesAfterAsyncPoint) +1256
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Version Information: Microsoft .NET Framework Version:2.0.50727.4200; ASP.NET Version:2.0.50727.4016
==

On the next trial I will try to go down the content database attachment approach. I will install Sharepoint 2010 on a completely new VM, installing all features, create a brand new site collection, etc then attach the content database from MOSS 2007.

I'll let you know how I go,
Tommy

Upgrading Microsoft Office Sharepoint Server (MOSS) 2007 to Sharepoint 2010 BETA - Part 2 - What Did/Didn't Work

2010-02-06T16:49:00.000-08:00

I haven't done another upgrade at the moment but from what I've done before (please see the post here), I found the following things that worked and didn't (please read on my other article my current MOSS 2007 environment setup).

Worked
- DLLs are all working OK.
- Few changes are needed on web.config (which are - in my opinion - minor).
- Custom site templates working OK - that's if used for creating a new site collection.
- Features and feature receivers are all working OK - that's if used for creating a new site collection.

Didn't work
- Existing MOSS 2007 site couldn't load. Please see the error message I was getting on my previous post. I think it had something to do with the database that couldn't be upgraded.

I will now try other methods such as installing all my SP 2010 features, etc on a new farm then restoring MOSS 2007 content database into it. I want to see how that goes.

Cheers,
Tommy

CompleteSharepoint.NET is SP2010 Compatible!

2010-02-05T00:25:00.000-08:00

First of all, if you haven't known, CompleteSharepoint.NET is a content management system built on top of Windows Sharepoint Services 3.0. I just tested it (with few tweaks) and it actually also works for Sharepoint 2010!

Go to http://www.completesharepoint.net/
To download: http://www.codeplex.com/completesharepoint

See below:

The tweaks you need to make:
1. Open C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Web Server Extensions\14\TEMPLATE\CONTROLTEMPLATES\CompleteSharepoint20 and remove ScriptManager.
2. Add the following in web.config right before :
<add name="PublishingPageUrlHandlerModule" type="CompleteSharepoint.NET.Web.PublishingPageUrlHandlerModule,CompleteSharepoint.NET.Web, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=9911d32a5d039082" />

And that's it!

Cheers,
Tommy

Upgrading Microsoft Office Sharepoint Server (MOSS) 2007 to Sharepoint 2010 BETA - Part 1

2010-02-05T00:17:00.000-08:00

Yo everyone,

I now want to upgrade my MOSS 2007 instance with Sharepoint 2010 BETA. I of course do it on a VM :) Within my MOSS 2007 instance I've got the following running:
- Custom site template of CompleteSharepoint.NET (Content Management System Built on-top-of Windows Sharepoint Services 3.0)
- Custom field types and field controls
- Custom feature receivers
- Custom ASP.NET controls
- Custom Site Actions menu
- Custom content types and columns
- Custom administration pages
- Custom master pages and page layouts
- Custom list template and list instance
- Gary Lapointe's custom STSADM commands
- Central Admin runs at http://machine:9000/
- SSP runs at http://machine:9001/
- MySites runs at http://machine:9002/
- My MOSS 2007 farm is NOT RUNNING ON ACTIVE DIRECTORY! The users are pulled out from local machine.

SQL Server is also running from the same VM as MOSS 2007.

So...here it is....I'll paste some screenshots as I go through.

BEFORE: Solutions

BEFORE: Sharepoint site as it stands

BEFORE: Extracting SP2010 Beta executables

I then installed all the pre-requisites as per my article:
http://sp2010journal.blogspot.com/2010/01/installing-sharepoint-2010.html

Pre-requisites installed OK

That's what it said before installing....

Installed successfully..now it runs the configuration wizard

Clicking Next before went straight to this screen

WOW..new screen...I choose to preserve the look and feel

EXCITING...EXCITING...

Opening Central Admin...and...BANG....ERROR

OK let me fixed that.

That's the reason why it broke

So then I removed that line from Central Admin's web.config and:

Still breaks...fine...I'll fix that

I change the navigation provider to: CurrentNavSiteMapProvider and.........

VOILA!!!

I said I had 3 errors. When I opened the log file mentioned at the bottom of the screen I could see errors related to User Profile. It might be caused by my MOSS 2007 wasn't running on AD?
--
[OWSTIMER] [UserProfileSharedResourceProvider12Sequence] [ERROR] [2/5/2010 1:47:40 PM]: Action 14.0.1.0 of Microsoft.Office.Server.Upgrade.UserProfileSharedResourceProvider12Sequence failed.

[OWSTIMER] [UserProfileSharedResourceProvider12Sequence] [ERROR] [2/5/2010 1:47:40 PM]: Inner Exception: There are no online service instances for this application.

[OWSTIMER] [UserProfileSharedResourceProvider12Sequence] [ERROR] [2/5/2010 1:47:40 PM]: at Microsoft.SharePoint.SPConnectedServiceApplication.get_ApplicationAddresses()

at Microsoft.SharePoint.SPServiceLoadBalancer.d__0.MoveNext()

at Microsoft.SharePoint.SPRoundRobinServiceLoadBalancer.GetEndpoints(IEnumerable`1 applicationAddresses)

at Microsoft.SharePoint.SPRoundRobinServiceLoadBalancer.BeginOperation()

at Microsoft.Office.Server.UserProfiles.MossClientBase`1.get_Channel()

at Microsoft.Office.Server.UserProfiles.MossClientBase`1.ExecuteOnChannel(String operationName, CodeBlock codeBlock)

atMicrosoft.Office.Server.UserProfiles.ProfilePropertyServiceClient.ExecuteOnChannel(String operationName, CodeBlock codeBlock)

[OWSTIMER] [UserProfileSharedResourceProvider12Sequence] [ERROR] [2/5/2010 1:47:40 PM]: Exception: There are no online service instances for this application.

[OWSTIMER] [UserProfileSharedResourceProvider12Sequence] [ERROR] [2/5/2010 1:47:40 PM]: at Microsoft.Office.Server.UserProfiles.ProfilePropertyServiceClient.ExecuteOnChannel(String operationName, CodeBlock codeBlock)

at Microsoft.Office.Server.UserProfiles.ProfilePropertyServiceClient.GetProfileProperties()

at
Microsoft.Office.Server.Administration.UserProfileApplicationProxy.RefreshProperties(Guid applicationID)at Microsoft.Office.Server.Utilities.SPAsyncCache`2.GetValueNow(K key)

at Microsoft.Office.Server.Utilities.SPAsyncCache`2.GetValue(K key, Boolean asynchronous)

at Microsoft.Office.Server.Administration.UserProfileApplicationProxy.InitializePropertyCache()
at Microsoft.Office.Server.Administration.UserProfileApplicationProxy.Provision()
at Microsoft.Office.Server.Upgrade.ExtractUserProfileApplication.Upgrade()
at Microsoft.SharePoint.Upgrade.SPActionSequence.Upgrade()
[OWSTIMER] [ExtractUserProfileApplication (14.0.1.0)] [DEBUG] [2/5/2010 1:47:40 PM]: Begin Rollback()
[OWSTIMER] [ExtractUserProfileApplication (14.0.1.0)] [DEBUG] [2/5/2010 1:47:40 PM]: End Rollback()
[OWSTIMER] [ExtractUserProfileApplication (14.0.1.0)] [DEBUG] [2/5/2010 1:47:40 PM]: Begin Dispose()
[OWSTIMER] [ExtractUserProfileApplication (14.0.1.0)] [DEBUG] [2/5/2010 1:47:40 PM]: End Dispose()
[OWSTIMER] [ExtractUserProfileApplication (14.0.1.0)] [DEBUG] [2/5/2010 1:47:40 PM]: SQL Query Count=998
[OWSTIMER] [ExtractUserProfileApplication (14.0.1.0)] [DEBUG] [2/5/2010 1:47:40 PM]: SPRequest Objects=0
[OWSTIMER] [ExtractUserProfileApplication (14.0.1.0)] [DEBUG] [2/5/2010 1:47:40 PM]: Execution Time=48390.3856495728
[OWSTIMER] [SPUpgradeSession] [ERROR] [2/5/2010 1:47:40 PM]: Upgrade [SharedResourceProvider12 Name=Default SSP] failed.
[OWSTIMER] [SPUpgradeSession] [ERROR] [2/5/2010 1:47:40 PM]: Inner Exception: There are no online service instances for this application.
[OWSTIMER] [SPUpgradeSession] [ERROR] [2/5/2010 1:47:40 PM]: at Microsoft.Office.Server.UserProfiles.ProfilePropertyServiceClient.ExecuteOnChannel(String operationName, CodeBlock codeBlock)
at Microsoft.Office.Server.UserProfiles.ProfilePropertyServiceClient.GetProfileProperties()
at Microsoft.Office.Server.Administration.UserProfileApplicationProxy.RefreshProperties(Guid applicationID)
at Microsoft.Office.Server.Utilities.SPAsyncCache`2.GetValueNow(K key)
at Microsoft.Office.Server.Utilities.SPAsyncCache`2.GetValue(K key, Boolean asynchronous)
at Microsoft.Office.Server.Administration.UserProfileApplicationProxy.InitializePropertyCache()
at Microsoft.Office.Server.Administration.UserProfileApplicationProxy.Provision()
at Microsoft.Office.Server.Upgrade.ExtractUserProfileApplication.Upgrade()
at Microsoft.SharePoint.Upgrade.SPActionSequence.Upgrade()
[OWSTIMER] [SPUpgradeSession] [ERROR] [2/5/2010 1:47:40 PM]: Exception: Action 14.0.1.0 of Microsoft.Office.Server.Upgrade.UserProfileSharedResourceProvider12Sequence failed.
[OWSTIMER] [SPUpgradeSession] [ERROR] [2/5/2010 1:47:40 PM]: at Microsoft.SharePoint.Upgrade.SPActionSequence.Upgrade()
at Microsoft.SharePoint.Upgrade.SPUpgradeSession.Upgrade(Object o, Boolean bRecurse)
[OWSTIMER] [SPUpgradeSession] [DEBUG] [2/5/2010 1:47:40 PM]: Elapsed time upgrading [SharedResourceProvider12 Name=Default SSP]: 00:01:05.
[OWSTIMER] [SPManager] [INFO] [2/5/2010 1:47:40 PM]: Resetting the status of PersistedUpgradableObject: SharedResourceProvider12 Name=Default SSP to Online.
[OWSTIMER] [SPUpgradeSession] [ERROR] [2/5/2010 1:47:40 PM]: Upgrade Timer job is exiting due to exception: Microsoft.SharePoint.Upgrade.SPUpgradeException: Action 14.0.1.0 of Microsoft.Office.Server.Upgrade.UserProfileSharedResourceProvider12Sequence failed. ---> Microsoft.Office.Server.UserProfiles.UserProfileException: There are no online service instances for this application. ---> Microsoft.SharePoint.SPException: There are no online service instances for this application.
at Microsoft.SharePoint.SPConnectedServiceApplication.get_ApplicationAddresses()
at Microsoft.SharePoint.SPServiceLoadBalancer.d__0.MoveNext()
at Microsoft.SharePoint.SPRoundRobinServiceLoadBalancer.GetEndpoints(IEnumerable`1 applicationAddresses)
at Microsoft.SharePoint.SPRoundRobinServiceLoadBalancer.BeginOperation()
at Microsoft.Office.Server.UserProfiles.MossClientBase`1.get_Channel()
at Microsoft.Office.Server.UserProfiles.MossClientBase`1.ExecuteOnChannel(String operationName, CodeBlock codeBlock)
at Microsoft.Office.Server.UserProfiles.ProfilePropertyServiceClient.ExecuteOnChannel(String operationName, CodeBlock codeBlock)
--- End of inner exception stack trace ---
at Microsoft.Office.Server.UserProfiles.ProfilePropertyServiceClient.ExecuteOnChannel(String operationName, CodeBlock codeBlock)
at Microsoft.Office.Server.UserProfiles.ProfilePropertyServiceClient.GetProfileProperties()
at Microsoft.Office.Server.Administration.UserProfileApplicationProxy.RefreshProperties(Guid applicationID)
at Microsoft.Office.Server.Utilities.SPAsyncCache`2.GetValueNow(K key)
at Microsoft.Office.Server.Utilities.SPAsyncCache`2.GetValue(K key, Boolean asynchronous)
at Microsoft.Office.Server.Administration.UserProfileApplicationProxy.InitializePropertyCache()
at Microsoft.Office.Server.Administration.UserProfileApplicationProxy.Provision()
at Microsoft.Office.Server.Upgrade.ExtractUserProfileApplication.Upgrade()
at Microsoft.SharePoint.Upgrade.SPActionSequence.Upgrade()
--- End of inner exception stack trace ---
at Microsoft.SharePoint.Upgrade.SPActionSequence.Upgrade()
at Microsoft.SharePoint.Upgrade.SPUpgradeSession.Upgrade(Object o, Boolean bRecurse)
at Microsoft.SharePoint.Administration.SPPersistedUpgradableObject.Upgrade(Boolean recursively)
at Microsoft.SharePoint.Upgrade.SPUpgradeSession.ReflexiveUpgrade(Object o, Boolean bRecurse)
at Microsoft.SharePoint.Upgrade.SPUpgradeSession.Upgrade(Object o, Boolean bRecurse)
at Microsoft.SharePoint.Administration.SPUpgradeJobDefinition.Execute(Guid targetInstanceId)--

Well, let's open the CompleteSharepoint.NET site now, shall we? :)

I get web.config error. Well..let me fix that then.

I commented out that line and I then get the same SPUrl error as before. So I removed the SPUrl line as well and.....

Error...

After trialling and error, I found out that it has something to do with MOSS 2007 HTTPModule. It's this particular one:

I then commented that out and I got different error:

Fine I can fix that. It's actually the lines below:

<add verb="GET,HEAD,POST" path="*" type="Microsoft.SharePoint.ApplicationRuntime.SPHttpHandler, Microsoft.SharePoint, Version=14.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=71e9bce111e9429c" />
<add verb="OPTIONS,PROPFIND,PUT,LOCK,UNLOCK,MOVE,COPY,GETLIB,PROPPATCH,MKCOL,DELETE,(GETSOURCE),(HEADSOURCE),(POSTSOURCE)" path="*" type="Microsoft.SharePoint.ApplicationRuntime.SPHttpHandler, Microsoft.SharePoint, Version=12.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=71e9bce111e9429c" />

It seems that Sharepoint 2010 is not using tag any more. It uses the following instead:

<modules runAllManagedModulesForAllRequests="true">
<remove name="AnonymousIdentification" />
<remove name="FileAuthorization" />
<remove name="Profile" />
<remove name="WebDAVModule" />
<add name="SPRequestModule" preCondition="integratedMode" type="Microsoft.SharePoint.ApplicationRuntime.SPRequestModule, Microsoft.SharePoint, Version=14.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=71e9bce111e9429c" />
<add name="ScriptModule" preCondition="integratedMode" type="System.Web.Handlers.ScriptModule, System.Web.Extensions, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35" />
<add name="SharePoint14Module" preCondition="integratedMode" />
<add name="StateServiceModule" type="Microsoft.Office.Server.Administration.StateModule, Microsoft.Office.Server, Version=14.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=71e9bce111e9429c" />
<add name="PublishingHttpModule" type="Microsoft.SharePoint.Publishing.PublishingHttpModule, Microsoft.SharePoint.Publishing, Version=14.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=71e9bce111e9429c" />
<add name="PublishingPageUrlHandlerModule" type="CompleteSharepoint.NET.Web.PublishingPageUrlHandlerModule,CompleteSharepoint.NET.Web, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=9911d32a5d039082" />

</modules>

Anyway, it still failed. It now displayed the following:

I tried to hijack to go to /_layouts/settings.aspx and it still failed.

However, if I create a new site collection using my custom CompleteSharepoint.NET site template, IT WORKS! WOOOHOO!! So my CS.NET is working on SP2010! :)

See below:

Conclusion
I still can't get upgrade working. But I'll keep trying and let you know if it ever succeeded. I think the database couldn't somehow be upgraded successfully.

Cheers,
Tommy

Mastering Website Designing & Development

2010-02-02T05:17:00.000-08:00

Hi guys,

As we all know, Sharepoint is a website application. Therefore, any development related to it can be regarded as a web site development.

Just a short notice, just in case you want to learn more about designing and developing professional website, I developed another blog that contains a lot of information about my past-current experience being a professional website developer.

You will find a lot of useful information on how to gather requirements, planning a website, etc etc etc.

Please visit the blog at http://prowebdevelopment.blogspot.com/.

Thanks for your time.

Regards,
Tommy

Sharepoint Designer 2010 BETA Reusable Workflow

2010-02-02T01:03:00.000-08:00

I just played around with Reusable Workflow functionality in Sharepoint Designer 2010. It's very-very cool I have to say. I really can see the potential with this functionality if all of the bugs are fixed.

Basically what you can do with this is, you can create a Reusable Workflow on a particular site, export it as WSP, restore it into Visual Studio then deploy it to another Sharepoint site.

So in theory, you don't have to re-create the workflow (unlike MOSS and SP Designer 2007).

However, I've found some limitations:
- If you create an IF condition and uses "Current Item" value for checking the value against, there is only a set of limited fields that you can check against: Content Type, Created, Created By, ID, Modified, Modified By and Title.
- It's still buggy. Workflow that has "Collect Data from User" task doesn't work properly. I personally uses this functionality heavily.

Collect Data from User Bugs
Below is the list of bugs I found:
- By default if you're using the default Tasks list, the workflow will simply stop and crash. There was an error message in the workflow history. The workaround for this will be to create a new task list.
- You will not get the nice "collect data" page on the destination site. Somehow it redirects you to the "View Item" (DispForm.aspx) page.

General Bugs
- By default when you first load WSP into Visual Studio, if you open Elements.xml, VS/Sharepoint appends Instantiation URL which if you deploy it to the destination site will create an error when you try to start the workflow manually. The error was: "The workflow template has specified no FormURN for this page".

Conclusion
For general simple workflow, this functionality has worked really great. It's just when you start trying to do a bit more complicated stuff (eg. collect data from user, etc), it isn't that functional. But I'm hopeful that this will be fixed and improved on the released version.

Cheers,
Tommy

Sharepoint 2010 Beta - What Can Be Improved - Part 9 - Microsoft Visual Studio Tools for Applications & InfoPath 2010 CRASH

2010-02-01T19:37:00.000-08:00

I created an InfoPath 2010 BETA form then attached an EventChanged event on a drop-down-list.

I did a bit of programming and I then tried to debug my code. Whenever VS hit a break-point or an error IT CRASHED! ARRGHGHGHGH....

See images below:

Before Debugging

During Debugging

Killing the Process

Resolution
When I hit F5, it opened a preview instance of the InfoPath form and created a new worker process INFOPATH.EXE. I had to kill it via Task Manager so that I could go back to the editing mode of Visual Studio.

I hope that this will be fixed on the released version.

Cheers,
Tommy

InfoPath Development in Sharepoint 2010 BETA - No Changes

2010-02-01T17:36:00.000-08:00

I tried to play around with InfoPath 2010 last night and to be honest, I didn't see anything different from Office 2007. At this stage all I can say is, there is no improvement just yet in terms of InfoPath development.

I'll try to play around more and post more updates on this article.

Cheers,
Tommy

Sharepoint 2010 Beta - What Can Be Improved - Part 8 - Save and Restore Site to/from WSP Does't Work Properly

2010-01-29T23:27:00.000-08:00

I tried to save a site as WSP and then when I restored it I get the following error:

This error was caused by a workflow that I attached to a list of which it has custom Collect Data from User task. I tried to collect 2 fields from a user:
- Manager Approval (choice with 2 values: Approve and Reject)
- Manager Comment (multi-text field)
I then opened the WSP and open ElementsFields.xml. I found out that somehow Sharepoint appended the following for the Approval field:

<Field Name="FieldName_C830E315_F175_4656_8A4A_F7162BAB4141_" Format="Dropdown" Type="Choice" BaseType="Text" DisplayName="Manager Approval" Description="" Direction="None" ID="{60ad5230-f828-4831-9d73-3563655b8a01}" SourceID="{af99aa24-3ce2-458a-a028-ee9e28c98709}" StaticName="FieldName_C830E315_F175_4656_8A4A_F7162BAB4141_" Overwrite="TRUE">
<CHOICES>
<CHOICE DisplayName="Approve">Approve</CHOICE>
<CHOICE DisplayName="Reject">Reject</CHOICE>
</CHOICES>
</Field>

On a choice field there is no DisplayName attribute and that's what failed it.

I hope that this will be fixed on the released version.

Cheers,
Tommy

Sharepoint 2010 Beta - What Can Be Improved - Part 7 - Save List as Template Including Content DOESN'T WORK

2010-01-28T23:39:00.000-08:00

I tried to save a custom list as a list template (STP) and ticked "Include Content".

When I restored the list template on an another site collection, the content wasn't there at all.

Cheers,
Tommy

Office 2010 BETA is not Sharepoint 2010 BETA compatible!?!?

2010-01-28T22:38:00.000-08:00

I've recently installed Office 2010 BETA and now when I tried to create a new document via Sharepoint, below is what I get:

Hm....has anyone had this problem before?

Cheers,
Tommy

Disable Approval on Publishing Site Template

2010-01-28T19:53:00.000-08:00

In MOSS 2007/2010, when you create a root site collection you can select the OOTB Publishing Site template. By default it enables approval workflow on the Pages list.

In MOSS 2007 we also have Collaboration Portal site template which we don't have on Sharepoint 2010. This template is a publishing template except it doesn't enable Approval Workflow on the Pages list.

I personally like to use the Collaboration Portal template for Intranet or simple Internet site because it has versioning turned on but not the approval workflow. I think Approval Workflow is a bit too over the top for an Intranet and simple Internet site.

There is this flag that can be set within ONET.XML to disable Approval Workflow:
<Property Key="SimplePublishing" Value="true" />

If you set that property to "false", Sharepoint will enable approval worklow, "true" otherwise.

Therefore, in Sharepoint 2010 if you want to use Publishing Site template for Intranet instead of Enterprise Wiki, you can grab the original files from BLANKINTERNET site template, add it to your Visual Studio 2010 project and then change the ONET.XML as above. That will disable the Approval Workflow.

Hope this helps,
Tommy

Sharepoint 2010 Beta - What Can Be Improved - Part 6 - Sharepoint Designer 2010 Beta Workflow Doesn't Work Correctly

2010-01-28T00:20:00.000-08:00

It simply....FAILED!

I created a test document library called Test Document Library.

I then created a SP workflow and associated with the list. I uploaded a new document, the workflow didn't trigger. Fine, it might be because I haven't set the "Start workflow automatically when an item is created".

So I went back to SP Designer and ticked it:

I then re-published the workflow.

This time I uploaded another new document...and...FAILED....it still didn't trigger! On Workflow Settings the workflow was upgraded successfully but somehow that tickbox didn't do anything!?!? Any ideas?

Hopefully this is fixed on the released version.

Cheers,
Tommy

Sharepoint 2010 - Clever - Has Re-Ghost Page Functionality

2010-01-27T22:38:00.000-08:00

Microsoft has done a good job adding the functionality to re-ghost a modified page/file. Go to the URL below:

http://yoursharepointsiteurl/_layouts/reghost.aspx

Or alternatively you can access it from Sharepoint Designer 2010. Click on the site then on the ribbon click Reset to Template.

Cheers,
Tommy

Upgrade Add-In for Sharepoint Visual Studio 2010 Project Template

2010-01-27T19:13:00.000-08:00

Hi everyone,

On my previous post:
http://sp2010journal.blogspot.com/2010/01/sharepoint-2010-beta-what-can-be_26.html

I mentioned about how the deployment step configuration on Sharepoint VS 2010 BETA project template does not allow you to upgrade your solution.

Well, I've managed to develop the add-in based on Microsoft's article. Really, to be honest, I ripped their code completely out of this article:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee256698(VS.100).aspx

So it's a full credit to Microsoft. I only did this because MS doesn't have any download link for that article.

Download it from http://vs2010spupgrade.codeplex.com/.

Below is the screenshot:

As you can see, there is a new deployment step called Upgrade.

Installation Instructions
1. Simply unzip.
2. Double-click on VSIX file to install.

Cheers,
Tommy

Sharepoint 2010 List, Content Types and Columns - What's the Verdict?

2010-01-27T06:53:00.000-08:00

We all know that content types, columns and list are the core or the "heart" of Sharepoint. I bet that there will be at least one content type or column that we need to create on every Sharepoint project we do.

I had a lot of problems before with MOSS 2007 especially when attaching a custom site content type on a list. When I tried to upgrade the site content type (ie. adding a field, etc), the content type attached on a list somehow is not updated. Yes we've got the "Update all content types inheriting from this type" but it never worked correctly. And worse, the list content type may get corrupted because of this!

When SP 2010 was first rumoured, I heard that the list content type is no longer a copy of the original. Therefore, any updates to the site content type will be guaranteed passed to ALL child content types attached to any list within the site/sub-sites.

Therefore, below is the list of tests I did (TITLE - EXPECTED RESULTS - ACTUAL RESULTS):
1. Deploy a content type feature using WSP - no error - no error.
2. Activate feature in site collection - content type is displayed in site content types - content type is displayed in site content type.
3. Adding site content type to a list - content type is added to the list together with the custom fields - content type is added to the list successfully together with the custom fields.
4. Adding a field to the site content type through Sharepoint GUI - field is added to ALL lists that are using that content type - ALL lists that are using that content type have the new field added successfully.
5. Modifying ContentTypes.xml feature manifest file in Visual Studio 2010 and adding a new field then re-deploy/upgrade the WSP - new field is NOT yet added until feature is de-activated and re-activated - new field does NOT appear just yet.
6. De-activating and re-activating content type feature - new field is added to the site content type and ALL lists inheriting from that content type - field is added ONLY on site content type, lists that inherit from it DO NOT have the new field!
7. Editing the list settings and add the new site column manually - site column is added to the content type successfully - received an error like below but the site columns is actually added successfully.

Unlike MOSS 2007, when I then tried to edit the properties of the newly added field after I received the above message, I could. In MOSS 2007 I simply couldn't. The field is somehow corrupted.

Conclusion
Comparing to MOSS 2007, as far as content types and fields are concerned, there are a bit of improvements. At least I can now assure myself that content types and fields will not break as a result of feature deactivating/reactivating even if there are new fields added to it through either Sharepoint directly or Visual Studio WSP.

However, in terms of creating a copy of the content type on the list, it's still the same. If you mouse over on the list content type you'll be able to see your original content type ID + 00 + new GUID (ie. a copy of the content type). See below:

I will keep continuing my investigation and I'll write further blog posts on this.

Cheers,
Tommy

Sharepoint 2010 Beta - What Can Be Improved - Part 5 - Adding Assemblies to WSP

2010-01-26T21:15:00.000-08:00

I have to say that the Sharepoint project template in Visual Studio 2010 is COOOOOOOOLLLL!

Adding assemblies have now been made so easy by it! You just need to open Package.package file then click on Advanced. On this screen you can then start adding assemblies from your other project or external/third party assemblies.

I found that there is a small bug with this tool. When you edit an added assembly and click on "Click here to add new item" underneath "Safe Controls:", the OK button is suddenly disabled.

The "Click here to add new item" underneath "Class Resources" is actually working fine.

Hopefully this will be fixed on the released version.

But I have to say this is a cool feature! You can deploy the DLL to either GAC or WebApplication level (ie. IIS BIN directory of your Sharepoint site).

Cheers,
Tommy

Sharepoint 2010 Beta - What Can Be Improved - Part 4 - Sharepoint 2010 IntelliSense

2010-01-26T19:53:00.000-08:00

In Visual Studio 2010 I originally hoped that the IntelliSense is completed for the Sharepoint project since the template is now built in, but it actually isn't.

One example is, when you edit ONET.XML file, the IntelliSense can't produce the tags for it.

I hope this will be improved in the released version.

Cheers,
Tommy

Custom Site Template - Be careful otherwise "A list, survey, discussion board, or document library with the specified title already exists in this Web site. Please choose another title."

2010-01-26T19:31:00.000-08:00

When creating a custom site template we will normally need to create our own webtemp file. Within the webtemp file we will need to specify the ID for our custom site template and that ID (based on Microsoft's recommendation) needs to be bigger than 10000.

Tracking these IDs aren't that easy either especially when we need to develop several custom site templates for different clients ie. how do we know if we've used a particular ID?

Some people suggest to use current date and time as the ID. This has worked well for me except if it's too long! It can definitely take current date (eg. 270110) but it can't take date+time (eg. 2701102330) because it's too long.

When it's too long we'll get the following error when trying to create a site collection using that custom site template:
A list, survey, discussion board, or document library with the specified title already exists in this Web site. Please choose another title.

Hope this helps,
Tommy

Sharepoint 2010 Beta - What Can Be Improved - Part 3 - Visual Studio 2010 Custom Deployment Steps Bugs

2010-01-26T18:02:00.000-08:00

Please read my previous post:
http://sp2010journal.blogspot.com/2010/01/sharepoint-2010-beta-what-can-be_26.html

On that post I mentioned about the custom deployment steps that are executed through code behind/DLL. I noticed that the behaviour of the executed custom deployment code is different from the stsadm command.

In this particular task I tried to create a custom site definition and deploy it through Visual Studio 2010. What I did was creating a new IIS Sharepoint web application and that was it. I haven't created my root site collection yet because I wanted to use my custom site template.

I then tried to deploy my custom site template from Visual Studio 2010 and it failed!

The custom deployment code somehow needs the site collection to exist before you can deploy any of your custom WSP. While stsadm on the other hand - as long as you've created an IIS Sharepoint application website - you can still run -o addsolution and -o deploysolution.

The workaround for this will be for me to create a temporary/blank site collection, deploy my WSP that contains the custom site template from Visual Studio then delete the site collection and re-create it using the custom site template.

Hopefully this issue can be resolved in the released version.

Cheers,
Tommy

Sharepoint 2010 Beta - What Can Be Improved - Part 2 - Visual Studio 2010 Custom Deployment Steps

2010-01-26T06:17:00.000-08:00

In Visual Studio 2010 you can actually modify the deployment configuration and steps. By default you will get the following:
- Default
- No Activation

Default
With the default one, when you do "Right Click -> Deploy" VS will then retract your solution, re-deploy your latest solution and re-activate the features.

No Activation
With this option it will do as Default except it won't activate the features.

You can also create your own deployment step. However, the list of steps are quiet limited. You can only choose from the following:
- Run Pre-Deployment commands
- Recycle IIS Application Pool
- Retract solution
- Add solution
- Activate features
- Run post-deployment commands

It would be nice to have an "Upgrade" option. The reason is because, with content types and columns especially, since they're the core of Sharepoint development project, if you try to retract, re-add solution then re-activate the feature that deploys content types and features, it may break your Sharepoint site completely.

Plus, if you have a feature that creates content (eg. pages and sites) programatically, you obviously will not want it to be activated twice.

I tried to also open the .csproj file with the hope that I can somehow "hack" it but it actually calls a class with namespace:

<DeploymentConfiguration Name="Upgrade Solution">
<DeploymentSteps>Microsoft.VisualStudio.SharePoint.PreDeploymentCommand;Microsoft.VisualStudio.SharePoint.RecycleApplicationPool;Microsoft.VisualStudio.SharePoint.RetractSolution;Microsoft.VisualStudio.SharePoint.AddSolution;Microsoft.VisualStudio.SharePoint.PostDeploymentCommand</DeploymentSteps>
<RetractionSteps>Microsoft.VisualStudio.SharePoint.RecycleApplicationPool;Microsoft.VisualStudio.SharePoint.RetractSolution</RetractionSteps>
</DeploymentConfiguration>

Therefore, at this stage I still don't know how to add my own "Upgrade" deployment step.

Hopefully this will be fixed in the released version of VS 2010.

** UPDATE **
This article actually mentions what I want to exactly do:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee256698(VS.100).aspx

I'll try that soon and let you know how it goes.

Cheers,
Tommy

ElementFile vs ElementManifest

2010-01-25T00:24:00.000-08:00

I just noticed that when you add a linking Module in your VS 2010 for your custom Feature project, and when you add a file into the module, VS 2010 automatically marks it as a ElementFile.

When I tried to develop custom content types and fields, I needed to add 2 XML files into the module (eg. ContentTypes.xml and Fields.xml) and they have to be marked as ElementManifest instead of ElementFile. If I don't do this, the custom content types and fields won't be loaded in Sharepoint at all.

To do that, edit your Module .spdata file and modify the content manually:

<ProjectItem Type="Microsoft.VisualStudio.SharePoint.Module" SupportedTrustLevels="All" SupportedDeploymentScopes="Web, Site" xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/VisualStudio/2010/SharePointTools/SharePointProjectItemModel">
<Files>

<ProjectItemFile Source="Fields.xml" Target="FeatureSP2010TestContentTypes\" Type="ElementManifest" />

<ProjectItemFile Source="ContentTypes.xml" Target="FeatureSP2010TestContentTypes\" Type="ElementFile" />

</Files>
</ProjectItem>

Hope this helps,
Tommy

How to Change From Sandboxed Solution to Farm Solution

2010-01-24T23:50:00.000-08:00

PLEASE FOLLOW YUBIN's COMMENT BELOW. THANKS FOR YOUR HELP YUBIN.

I've arrived at a stage where I wanted to create my own custom Sharepoint solution using Visual Studio 2010.

When I created a new blank Sharepoint project it asked me whether I want to deploy the solution as a Sandboxed Solution or a Farm Solution.

I first selected Sandboxed Solution but then I found out that I couldn't build and package my solution when I had a Sharepoint Mapped Folder within it.

Therefore, I needed to change the type of the deployment to Farm Solution. I looked everywhere (from Project Properties, Solution Properties, etc) and I couldn't find the setting for it.

I tried to re-create the project and now selected Farm Solution as the deployment type and I then tried to compare the project properties manually. This included opening the .csproj file in Notepad and compared between the two apple-by-apple.

I noticed the following missing tag within the project file (.csproj) that was deployed as Sandboxed solution:

<SandboxedSolution>False</SandboxedSolution>

I added that tag to my .csproj and now my Sandboxed Solution project suddenly became Farm Solution project.

Hope this helps,
Tommy

Sharepoint 2010 Beta - What Can Be Improved - Part 1

2010-01-24T17:56:00.000-08:00

So far I've found the following bugs (or things that can be improved in later releases):
- Administration breadcrumb is all over the place. It's really-really hard to navigate to where I was before without going back to the main Central Admin screen. Especially when I was in a particular Service Application page, the breadcrumb didn't trail correctly. It only displayed Central Administration > Current Page.

- User Profile Sync page didn't display information correctly. I have started my sync process but the page keeps saying: "Idle - Completed in 0h 0m 0s". And even worse I still saw the link saying "Start Profile Synchronization". As a user I thought there must be something wrong with the process. I clicked on the link again and now it gave me popup error message saying User Profile sync is still running bla bla bla.

- As mentioned on various blogs, when you first started the User Profile Sync service it keeps saying "Starting" until you visit the Monitoring - Job Status page and waited until the process is finished, that's when Service page will say "Started". See http://blogs.msdn.com/opal/archive/2009/11/19/user-profile-sync-setup-in-sharepoint-server-2010-beta.aspx.

- It couldn't crawl AD unless I'm using the service account to login to the farm. I was trying to login using the account that I used to install Sharepoint (SEGORO\sp_admin) - which I assumed it would be the "God" mode account - which it was in MOSS 2007 - and it still failed. I had to use SEGORO\sp_farm instead.

- It would be handy if stsadm (and other Sharepoint-related commands) command can be added to Environment Variables automatically upon installing Sharepoint since we (the SP developers) will be using these so much.

That's what I've found so far, I'll keep posting the bugs I found on SP 2010 Beta.

User Profile "The query returns nothing" Error

2010-01-24T17:48:00.000-08:00

It's time for me to configure the User Profile Synchronization service. I started with configuring the connection. It can somehow crawled and displayed my OU structure but when I click OK it returns to the connection listing page with the following error message:

"The query returns nothing"

I then research in Google and found the following article:
http://www.khamis.net/blog/Lists/Posts/Post.aspx?ID=19

I looked in Event Viewer and I found out that the account I was using to crawl AD didn't have access. At this stage I was using SEGORO\sp_admin (account used to install SP 2010 Beta).

I then logged off and re-logged back in using SEGORO\sp_farm (account used to run services). When I tried to re-create the connection it worked.

Hope this helps,
Tommy

Configuring Sharepoint 2010 Part 3

2010-01-21T05:57:00.000-08:00

I've just deleted my SP 2010 VM and re-created it. This time I won't choose the wizard but instead I'll try to configure each service manually.

As before, after the SP 2010 was completed, Central Admin page first opened with the selection of either use the wizard or configuring the service manually. I then chose the second one.

At this point, the only services activated were:
- Central Administration
- Microsoft Sharepoint Foundation Incoming Email
- Microsoft Sharepoint Foundation Web Application
- Microsoft Sharepoint Foundation Workflow Timer Service

I will now attempt to activate each service starting from the very top.

What I found as a major difference between SP 2010 and SP 2007 is the Service Applications. In MOSS 2007 you have Shared Services Provider but now it's replaced with Service Applications in 2010.

Unlike Shared Services Provider, in Service Applications you have to create the service manually one-by-one. In SSP, as soon as you open the administration page, you can straight away see User Profiles, Search, Excel, Audience and BDC headers but in Service Applications you have to create each of these services manually.

Once I was done with these services, I could finally create the web application and root site collection.

I'll keep continuing my investigation.

Cheers,
Tommy

Configuring Sharepoint 2010 Part 2

2010-01-17T06:08:00.000-08:00

I then chose to use the wizard. With the wizard it seemed that Sharepoint will attempt to use only one account for all of the services. I used WINSERVER2008\spt_service for all of them. I assume you'll be able to change the service account for each service manually later on.

Once I finished the wizard there were some other services that need activation:
- Document conversion launcher service
- Document conversion load balancer service
- Sharepoint Foundation Help Search
- User profile synchronization service
- Lotus Notes connector

I could then activate each service except User Profile Synchronization Service. Somehow it asked me for User Profile Application which I haven't created.

At this point performance degraded so much! I think I now know why we need more than 1GB of RAM for it. Each Sharepoint service that we activate consumes resources and with Sharepoint 2010, there are a lot more services that are activated compared to MOSS 2007.

There are two main services that consume most of my CPU:
- SQL Server
- Microsoft Sharepoint Foundation User Code Service

When the User Code Service is on - together with SQL Server - it consumed ~80% of my CPU most of the time. Since my VM only has 1GB of RAM, it made it to a non-workable state. Even moving a mouse was really-really slow.

I then managed to turn off the User Code Service and at this point CPU consumption was around 18-70%. It hit 18% and 70% quiet rarely, it normally stayed on 40-55%.

That's all for me for today, it's already 10:50PM. Please stay tuned, I'll continue my investigation tomorrow!

Cheers and until next time,
Tommy

Configuring Sharepoint 2010

2010-01-16T20:00:00.000-08:00

The install finished successfully (thank God!). Now I arrive at the stage where I need to configure Sharepoint 2010.

Below were the steps I took:

1. I selected "Create a new server farm".

2. I specified the database server as WINSERVER2008 (VM machine name).

3. I then specified WINSERVER2008\SPT_Farm as the database access account and I encountered the following error message:

The specified user WINSERVER2008\SPT_Farm is a local account. Local accounts should only be used in stand alone mode.

I then came accross this article that can bypass that message:

http://sharepoint.microsoft.com/blogs/fromthefield/Lists/Posts/Post.aspx?ID=112

When I tried to run the PowerShell command as mentioned in that post, I get the following error message:

New-SPConfigurationDatabase : SQL server at WINSERVER2008 has an unsupported ve
rsion 9.0.4035.0. The minimum required SQL server versions are SQL Server 2005
SP3 CU3, version number: 9.00.4220.00, downloadable from "http://support.micros
oft.com/kb/967909", or SQL Server 2008 SP1 CU2, version number 10.00.2714.00, d
ownloadable from http://support.microsoft.com/kb/970315.
At line:1 char:28
+ new-spconfigurationdatabase <<<< + CategoryInfo : InvalidData: (Microsoft.Share...urationDatabase: SPCmdletNewSPConfigurationDatabase) [New-SPConfigurationDatabase], SPCmdle tException + FullyQualifiedErrorId : Microsoft.SharePoint.PowerShell.SPCmdletNewSPCon figurationDatabase

I then went to the KB article as mentioned above:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/967909

After I installed 3 SQL patches, the install finished successfully.

Now I arrive at the SP2010 Central Admin site! WOOHOO!

At this point RAM consumption is 801-931MB and please note that I have SQL 2005 Developer Edition running on the same VM.

To be continued...

Sharepoint 2010 BETA does NOT need 8GB of RAM

2010-01-16T19:57:00.000-08:00

When SP2010 first came out everyone said that you'll need at least 4GB of RAM. Since I don't have that luxury just yet (my new laptop hasn't come yet at the time of writing this article), I can only give 1GB of RAM to my VM.

Guess what... Sharepoint 2010 installed successfully on VM with 1GB of RAM.

Cheers,
Tommy

Installing Sharepoint 2010

2010-01-16T07:19:00.000-08:00

At this time of writing: Saturday, 16 Jan 2010 11:25pm I actually haven't got my new laptop yet! Because I was away to overseas for holiday for about a month, the laptop was still held at custom. Anyway, it will be delivered on the coming Tuesday.

Therefore, at the moment I try to install Sharepoint 2010 using my 3GB-RAM laptop running VMWare with 1GB RAM. I want to prove if the 4GB-RAM-at-least requirement is actually valid.

My current old laptop has the following configurations:
- Intel Core Duo T9300 @ 2.50GHZ
- 3GB RAM
- 320GB 5400 RPM hard drive
- 320GB 5400 RPM External hard drive 3.5" (VM hard disks are on this drive)

I can only dedicate 1GB of RAM to the VM because I've already got MOSS 2007, VS 2005, 2008, SQL, other dev tools, etc running on the host machine and they already consume almost 2GB of RAM.

---
I started the installation by visiting my best friend: Google.

I then came across the following article:
http://mosshowto.blogspot.com/2009/11/installing-sharepoint-2010-windows-2008.html

Based on the article above, below were the steps I took:
1. Installing and configuring Windows Server 2008 x64 on my VMWare virtual machine as per the article.
2. Installing IIS, .NET 3.5, etc through Add/Remove Roles and Features.
3. Running Windows update.
4. Installing SQL Server 2005 x64 then the SP3.

--
5. I stop at this point and backup my VM just in case something wrong happens during the SP2010 installation process.
--

6. I decided to go down the path of not using AD. I created 2 local accounts: WINSERVER2008\SPT_Admin and WINSERVER2008\SPT_Farm. I added these two accounts as local admin of the VM and to SQL 2005 with the following roles: dbcreator and securityadmin. I then logged in as WINSERVER2008\SPT_Admin to install sP2010.

7. As per the article, I installed the Geneva framework then the Sync framework.

8. I then installed the WCF fix (as per article, too) but it failed saying: The update does not apply to your system. I think it's because my Win Server 2008 version was not the R2 version. Therefore, I installed the patch for Win Server 2008 SP2 from http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc262485(office.14).aspx (Determine hardware and software requirements article) instead.

--
I'm now ready to install SP2010.
--

9. I double-clicked on the executable and install the SP2010 software pre-requisites first.

10. There were some errors I needed to fix. They were all related to missing components. The missing components I encountered were:
- SQL 2008 Native Client (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=123718&clcid=0x409)
- PowerShell V2 CTP3 (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=c913aeab-d7b4-4bb1-a958-ee6d7fe307bc)
- MSChart (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=130F7986-BF49-4FE5-9CA8-910AE6EA442C&displaylang=en)
- Filter Pack (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=60C92A37-719C-4077-B5C6-CAC34F4227CC&displaylang=en)
- SQL 2008 Analysis Service ADOMD.NET (http://download.microsoft.com/download/A/D/0/AD021EF1-9CBC-4D11-AB51-6A65019D4706/SQLSERVER2008_ASADOMD10.msi)

I then re-ran the pre-requisites install and it all went good.

11. I clicked on the installation link and it installed SP2010 correctly. The beta key can be obtained from http://www.whatsthepointofsharing.com/?p=586. Please note that my VM is still running 1GB of RAM and it has no problem installing SP2010.

Preparing the Environment

2010-01-16T04:46:00.000-08:00

Hi everyone,

I finally have the opportunity to prepare the environment to install SP2010.

Below is my environment configuration:
1. Host machine is running Windows 7 x64 (coz I love Windows 7, I still think that it's the best operating system MS has ever released thus far).
2. I only install MS Office and VMWare on the host operating system so that my host system is clean.
3. I then create 2 virtual machines: 1 for general development with MOSS 2007, VS2008, etc on and another one for playing around with SP2010.

I will now focus on the one that I'm going to use for trying out SP2010. I install Windows Server 2008 x64 as it's the default operating system that SP2010 can run on.

Until next time,
Tommy

About CompleteSharepoint.NET

2009-11-26T23:03:00.001-08:00

In this opportunity I would like to thank everyone who has tried my CMS built-on-top of Windows Sharepoint Services 3.0 - CompleteSharepoint.NET.

Many people are enquiring me about why I haven't made further updates to it. First of all, I have to be honest that I've been extremely busy lately. But more than that, I want to wait until SP2010 is coming out and I want to experience the upgrade process, etc.

Therefore, please stay tuned. I promise you - the SharePoint leaders and users - that I will definitely make updates to it.

Thanks very much for having a great SharePoint community around the world.

Cheers,
Tommy

Welcoming SharePoint 2010

2009-11-26T22:38:00.000-08:00

Hi everyone,

First of all this blog will contain posts regarding my journey and experience with SharePoint 2010. I also wrote many articles regarding WSS 3.0 and MOSS 2007 on my other blog http://vspug.com/tommysegoro. I hope that you enjoy reading my blog.

OKAY...so..there's the hype: "The" SharePoint 2010 is finally out! To be honest, I'm one of the people who are quiet left out. Some of my friends have already had the opportunity to see or even develop on it.

But anyway, when there is a will there is a way, isn't it? And I always believe that it's never too late to learn anything really. So, first thing's first, I have to prepare myself for "The" SharePoint 2010. From what I heard, it's actually an "obese" application...a beast...a monster...a "thing" that eats a lot of resources.

I'm currently given (or lent to be exact) a Dell XPS M1330 with the following configurations:
- 320GB 5400RPM hard drive
- 3GB of RAM
- Intel Core T9300 processor

So, there is no chance - not on earth nor in heaven or hell - for me to be able to accomodate that monster with the environment I currently have.

Therefore, I pleased myself (I just bought this yesterday by the way) with Dell Studio XPS 15.6" with the following configurations:
- 6GB DDR 1333RAM (2GB + 4GB)
- Intel I7 820QM
- 500GB 7200RPM hard disk

I'm planning to buy an external 64GB solid state drive to put my VM on and an extra 4GB RAM stick to make it 8GB RAM then I can sell the 2GB RAM stick.

I think it should do well.

Until then, I really can't post anything about SP 2010, can I? :)

Please stay tuned and share your experience.

Cheers,
Tommy Segoro