SharePoint Daily for November 5, 2008

Top News Stories
The Sharepoint Sessions Revisited – Part Two – EMC Documentum and SharePoint (FastForward)
This is part two of a four part series on AIIM’s Automating Document-centric Processes – Is SharePoint Enough?” Seminar. In each case I will start with the title and quote the session description before going into my notes.

EPM Live Releases New Enterprise SharePoint Project Management Capabilities (MarketWatch)
EPM Live, the leading Enterprise SharePoint Project Management solution announced today that it has released new SharePoint-based Enterprise Productivity Management capabilities in their award winning software solution. The new capabilities in EPM Live will allow more efficient and effective project and work management with dynamic controls that extend the current capability of Microsoft Office SharePoint.

Microsoft Windows 7 Aims to Be What Vista Isn't (CMSWire)
Microsoft saw better days before the release of Vista — which many consider a disaster — but Microsoft is quickly trying to make amends with the development of Windows 7, commonly referred to as the operating system that Vista should have been. The Professional Developer’s Conference brought plenty of details about Microsoft’s latest operating system and we have explored the most important ones.

Are Best Practices Overrated? (WhatPC?)
Are best practice frameworks such as ITIL the basis for a sound IT strategy or do they give IT leaders undue confidence? David Neal investigates. For its advocates, the ITIL framework is the bedrock of a modern enterprise IT infrastructure, providing the blueprint for delivering a consistent service that remains in step with business goals.

Microsoft: Virtualise Your Way Out of the Credit Crunch (PC Pro)
Microsoft claims virtualisation will help keep companies afloat during the credit crunch. The company last week unveiled a beta version of Windows Server 2008 R2, which includes a new "live migration" tool, that allows companies to move virtual machines between servers without downtime.

Salesforce to Roll Web Hosting, With Force (InternetNews)
Salesforce.com chairman and CEO Marc Benioff plans to make the software as a service (SaaS) company even more prominent in the cloud. Speaking to a packed house at the company's Dreamforce 2008 conference today, he discussed tie-ins with other cloud players such as Facebook and Amazon.

Living With Windows 7 Pre-Beta (PC Magazine)
Ever since I got the "pre-beta" build of Windows 7 at the Professional Developer Conference, I've been running it on the machines I've been using the most. (Warning: I don't recommend this for most people). I've tried both the 64-bit and 32-bit versions, and found a number of new features I like, a few I'm not sure about yet, and many more that aren't implemented yet.

If Windows is a Dead End, What's Next? (InfoWorld)
The writing is on the wall. Despite a major push to sell the much-maligned Windows Vista, customers aren't buying. Nearly two years after Vista's release, Windows XP remains the standard desktop OS in business, and Microsoft has extended its availability three times (currently to August 2009) due to customer demand. Microsoft itself forecasts just 2 percent growth in Vista sales in early 2009, after lackluster sales in 2008. And that's after forcing customers to buy Vista to get XP "downgrades."

Windows 7 Leaks as Torrent (Yell Malta)
Windows 7 was announced at the end of last month, but on Pirate Bay, the new version of Windows is already up for download.

Around the Blogosphere
Visual Fusion Brings Location Intelligence to SharePoint (SharePoint Magazine)
Visual Fusion, from IDV Solutions, a Microsoft Gold ISV Partner, provides a platform for managing many types of geospatial content and for creating applications that display enterprise data and Web feeds on a Virtual Earth map.  Visual Fusion brings location intelligence to SharePoint, creating a platform to build highly visual composite applications.

Open Source Collaboration Software Maker Open-Xchange Secures $9 Million (TechCrunch)
Open-Xchange has closed a Series B round of venture funding to the tune of $9 million. The round was led by German venture firm eCAPITAL Entrepreneurial Partners AG and joined by BayBG and existing Munich-based investor BayTech Venture Capital (if you’re looking for a connection: the company has R&D operations in the country). Open-Xchange had raised a total of $8.8 million in a Series A financing round from angel investors and BayTech back in 2006.

Sessions and Speaking Topics for Joel Oleson for 2009 (SharePoint Joel's SharePoint Land)
I heard that one of Steve's best practices was to come up with four or so new sessions at the new year, and fully develop them out, so when anyone asked for him to submit sessions he would send them his four.  He'd also essentially make sure those were rock solid and had all the right stories and details flushed out to ensure awesome scores.  Each time he'd present them he'd add new jokes and new material.  Ok so I added that last detail, but I'm sure that's what happens.  So I'm adopting this practice.  Here are my four sessions for the year.  The demos, jokes, and even slides and diagrams will evolve as the year goes on, but this is what I expect to present on at the various SharePoint Conferences, Tech Eds, Connections, Roadshows, Best Practices, and any SharePoint or .NET User groups or code camps I visit.  If you can't tell, I'm actually open to going to the coolest biggest shows.

Getting Started With the BDC and Writing Back to Your Data Source (SharePoint Nick)
I’m going through the process of moving content from our support wiki over to main content pages on our web site as for some reason the wiki wasn’t getting spidered by Google.

Creating a Feedback or Contact Form for a SharePoint Website (Vincent Rothwell)
One of the normal requirements for a public website is some kind of feedback or contact form. Whilst this is not the most difficult thing to do, it's handy when you can create a fully accessible feedback form, with validation and the ability to update a list without having to write any code. ARF provides you with a free solution to this problem, without having to write any code.

BB13: SharePoint 2007 Creating SharePoint Applications with Visual Studio -- Sample Code (Chris Johnson)
Here are the code samples I demonstrated in my PDC Session last week as promised. You can watch the recorded session here: http://channel9.msdn.com/pdc2008/BB13/ (Silverlight streaming Video & slides + demo side by side).

2008-11-04 Today’s Tips for SharePoint End Users (EndUser SharePoint)
After reviewing 135 SharePoint posts today, I found these that might be of interest to SharePoint End Users. Please mouse over the five star rating system above to let me know if you found these references useful.

SharePoint Developer Bookmarklets Updated (Waldek Mastykarz)
SharePoint developer bookmarklets got updated: 87 bookmarklets to get you as quickly as possible to the most frequently used SharePoint functionality. Get the latest version now and save time for the cool stuff instead of clicking around.

Download SharePoint Guidance - November 2008 (SharePoint Buzz)
Microsoft has just released SharePoint Guidance for November 2008. This guidance helps architects and developers build SharePoint intranet applications. A reference implementation (RI) demonstrates solutions to common architectural, development and lifecycle management challenges.

Around Bamboo Nation
Marking the Contents of a SharePoint Document Library as Read-Only (SharePoint Blank)
A question came in yesterday in the form of a comment on an older blog entry concerning best practices for a SharePoint document library.  Paul asked, "Can I allow people to Read-only and not be able to check out a document?"  Given that I'm still learning SharePoint myself, I wasn't about to answer this question without first having gone through the necessary steps to verify that what I thought was the answer was indeed the correct answer.

Bamboo Welcomes Synesis International to the Partner Advantage Program (The Bamboo Team Blog)
Our new partner, Synesis International, joins us from Greenville, South Carolina.  Synesis is a Microsoft Certified partner and has been working with SharePoint since 2001.  They have worked extensively with both MOSS and WSS and also provide ERP, MES, Business Analytics, EDI, Bar Code, and Quality Control systems as well as experienced custom development capabilities.  Welcome to the Partner Advantage Program and we look forward to working with you.

Microsoft Updates
About site groups (Windows SharePoint Services)
rosoft Windows SharePoint Services uses site groups to manage security across a SharePoint site. Each user must be a member of at least one site group in order to view or access a SharePoint site. Each site group possesses corresponding rights. Rights are rules associated with the system as a whole, granted to local groups, global groups, and users. A right within Windows SharePoint Services may be actions that users can perform, such as Manage Lists. In addition, you can edit the rights assigned to a specific site group, create an additional site group, or delete an unused site group. You manage site groups in Windows SharePoint Services from SharePoint Central Administration or by using the command-line administration tool.

Create, edit, or delete a cross-site group (Windows SharePoint Services)
Create a cross-site group, Edit a cross-site group, Delete a cross-site group.

Enable or disable rights for a site group (Windows SharePoint Services)
On the Site Settings page for the Web site, in the Administration section, click Go to Site Administration.

SharePoint Events
November 3-7 and 10-14, Barcelona, Spain, Microsoft TechEd
November 5, Chicago, Illinois, The Chicago Microsoft SharePoint Business Strategies Group November Meetup
November 5, New York, New York, SharePoint User Group: New York City
November 6, Kansas City, Kansas, Office Developer User Group of Kansas City
November 10-13, Las Vegas, Nevada, SharePoint Connections Conference
November 10, Sydney, Australia, Sydney SharePoint User Group
November 11, St. Louis, Missouri, St. Louis Sharepoint Users Group
November 12, Bloomington, Minnesota, Minnesota SharePoint User Group
November 12, Colorado Springs, Colorado, Colorado Springs SharePoint User Group
November 13, Atlanta, Georgia, MOSSmosis Atlanta
November 13, Puget Sound, Washington, Puget Sound SharePoint Users Group
November 13, Reston, Virginia, SharePoint User Group of the District of Columbia
November 13, San Francisco, California, San Fransico SharePoint Users Group
November 15-16, Sydney, Australia, Office DevCon
November 18, Adelaide, Australia, Adelaide SharePoint Usergroup
November 18, Irving, Texas, DFW SharePoint Server Community
November 19, Iselin, New Jersey, NJ SharePoint User Group
November 19, Roanoke, Virginia, Roanoke Valley SharePoint Users Group
November 20, Bay of Plenty, New Zealand, Bay of Plenty User Group
November 20, Columbus, Ohio, Central Ohio SharePoint User Group
November 20, Jacksonville, Florida, Jacksonville Office Geeks
November 20, Louisville, Kentucky, Kentucky Sharepoint Users Group
November 20, Phoenix, Arizona, Arizona SharePoint Professionals Group
November 20, Virginia Beach, Virginia, Hampton Roads SQL Server and SharePoint User Group
November 26, Cleveland, Ohio, Cleveland SharePoint User Group
November 26, Melbourne, Australia, Microsoft Office System Special Interest Group

January 27-29, San Francisco, California, SPTechCon

February 2-4, San Diego, California, SharePoint Best Practices Conference

* Please contact Chris Dooley (chris.dooley@bamboosolutions.com) to include your event in our listing.

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