Archives
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Web Design Futures Today: WPF/E
This is really cool. The latest bits to be released of the Windows Presentation Framework are for WPF/E. If you do ASP.Net, this is definitely something you want to catch up on before it's released. What is it? From Scott Guthrie's blog:
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Watch what you burn: A Vista experience
So I come in to the office today and Thomas has a great story for me.
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SharePoint Bits and the Launch. Oh, and Zune!
The MS-Word on the street is that the Office 2007 Professional (but not Pro+ or higher) bits are now available to MSDN subscribers. Thursday is still the day that the floodgates open for the other "smart client" SKUs and the Microsoft Office SharePoint Server (MOSS) 2007 products.
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Great series on building a public website with MOSS 2007
Liam Cleary has a fantastic in-depth series running on rebuilding a corporate website with the new WCM features of Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007. We're talking deep practical dives into CSS, master pages, navigation, and content types. Highly recommended!
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Resolving the MOSS 2007 error: An item with the same key has already been added.
Problem
Starting a Parallel Approval workflow returns an error and produces an item in the Event Log: -
What to do when an Administrator can't approve MOSS 2007 postings
Problem
Can't Publish or Approve a MOSS 2007 Publishing Site. -
Object Reuse, David Chappell, and the Rule of the Least Common Denominator
David Chappell is speaking at next week's Toronto BizTalk User Group gathering. David is what you call an "industry luminary" with several well-read books and articles over the years, keynotes everywhere, and popular regular articles. His focus in recent times is on service-oriented architectures, principally Indigo, BPEL, and the Microsoft implementations, but the nice thing about David is that he's just as conversant with the J2EE / LAMP camp.
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Repairing a trashed Office 2007 B2TR installation, and dealing with Error 2711
The Issue
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"Develop Without Borders," and Parkdale Legal Clinic
At last night's TSPUG meeting, one of our new members was Kevin Smith of the Parkdale Legal Clinic here in Toronto. Kevin told us a pretty cool contest going on, I'd love to see someone take him up on it. I'll let Kevin describe what it's all about...
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Free MOSS 2007 Developer and Infrastructure Training
Courtesy MikeFitz:
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Flurry of press yesterday around today's B2TR Release
Here's the industry buzz. . .
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Hiring
If you're an experienced SharePoint developer living in south Ontario, I want you to come work with me. We have a great team and great clients, it's my favourite place to work yet.
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Toronto SharePoint User Group - Season 2
We'll be stoking up the campfire next Wednesday the 20th at the usual time and place. See TSPUG.COM for details and to RSVP your attendance.
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Microsoft Office SharePoint Server and Office System Beta 2 Technical Refresh Now Available
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Free Office 2007 Training
When SharePoint 2003 was released, the biggest gripe of its champions was the the near-total lack of documentation. With MOSS 2007 we're just on Beta 2 and Microsoft already has a wealth of developer documentation, online training, and Virtual Labs.
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Virtual PC goes free
Cool news for SharePoint developers who depend on virtualization to build solutions, or anyone who wants to get into the game. This just in from MSDN:
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Ken's blogging about SharePoint, and great HR
Whether you're a coffee shop or a systems integrator, it's all about the HR. The best thing about working at ei is the people. Seven of us (and I'm sure to be forgetting someone -- Ken, Dmitri, Luis, Thom, Rod, Ali, and myself) presented to a user group at one time or another this past year on topics across the MS spectrum (Toronto .Net User Group, Metro Toronto .Net User Group, BizTalk User Group, Toronto SharePoint User Group, Toronto CodeCamp, and elsewhere). Three of us (Rod, Luis and myself) are active in running three of the groups. And this is without any prodding from the company, we're all people who just like to do this stuff. I never quite sat down and thought about it before but wow, strange bunch.
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MOSS 2007 Beta 2 will be upgradeable to RTM
Good news for all those itching to get MOSS 2007 up and running -- Beta 2 will be upgradeable to RTM! This is a shift from earlier guidance, which recommended waiting until the Technical Refresh (end of summer/early fall).
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Eli's SharePoint 2007 Resources
Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007
[Google] [MSN Search] [Microsoft.com] -
Free SharePoint 2007 Book
TechEd 2006 was a SharePoint frenzy this year, drat my luck in not being able to fit it into the schedule. The good news is that many of the resources will be available even if you couldn't make it, and there are sites like Virtual TechEd and Bil Simser's June blog archive to help you live the experience without a plane ticket.
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Blinq, or "they finally caught up to GenericDB"
Polita Paulus has been hard at work updating her excellent work on the DataGrid and GridView controls for the new LINQ project.
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Web Deployment Project, MSBuild, and WAP Resources
WDP Snippets and UG Presentation
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Upcoming User Group appearances
I'll be at the Toronto .Net User Group on Thursday to talk about Web Deployment Projects and MSBuild. It should be a fun one, but perhaps in protest against Microsoft Canada's oppressive requirement to use in-house catering, you'll want to grab a sandwich at Tim's on your way in. There's actually a great set of fast food places next to the MS Canada building (south of Derry Road). But back to the topic, I'll be showing you how to automate your builds to generate different web.configs from development through testing and production, so you can be hooked into different data sources, or even use different resource files along the way. It may be the best kept secret in v2, come check it out.
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Thoughts on Scoble as he joins PodTech
It's the end of an era, and I expect the start of another. Somewhere around Saturday, Scoble confirmed he's joining John Furrier at a startup company called PodTech, effective July. Congratulations!
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The future of development on Microsoft servers
There's a question about the future floating around a private ASPInsiders list, I thought I'd post my response publicly and invite everyone to share their own thoughts. It's not often I can write about SharePoint, ASP.Net, and Lazy Programming all at once.
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SharePoint 2007 Gotchas: Errors and Guidance
Subtitled: "You mean you really want to install it?"
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WSS 2007 Beta 2
For those of you anxiously waiting to try out MOSS 2007, the version at the download site will get you SPS and WSS combined. A number of people have asked whether it's possible to install just WSS, and now it is! Thanks to the product team for compiling the elements.
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Office 2007 Public Beta Released Tuesday 9:00 PST
or, "Everything you know about Word is wrong."
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Toronto BizTalk User Group next Tuesday
Dmitri Safine is one of our fantastic team members at ei :: eidenai innovations, and he's doing a presentation on the BizTalk Rules Engine at the BizTalk Users Group in Toronto next Tuesday. He knows his stuff, it should be a great session. You can read more and register here:
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SharePoint 2007 Beta 2 Released Today!
Today BillG publicly announced MOSS B2 at WinHEC, along with Vista Beta 2 (wow, nice page!) and a slew of virtualization goodies. And with that, the servers in Redmond sprang to life and bits flew across the land.
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Cross Browser Support in SharePoint 2007
In this morning's session, one of the questions that BillG could have answered better was about cross-browser support. Simply put, it's not that strong in SPS / WSS 2003, and every admin with Mac or public clients to support wants to know what will be different.
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SharePoint Conference 2006
I'm writing today from the Meydenbauer Conference Center in sunny Bellevue, Washington. Bill Gates just gave the keynote, and as always he was fascinating, a few cool demos were shown, there was a touch of revisionist history, and it gave everyone an aspect to think about.
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Business Scorecards: Tonight in Toronto
Tonight's Toronto SharePoint Users Group meeting will feature the Business Scorecard Manager:
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Great article on Site Definitions
Ameet Phandis wrote a terrific article on writing custom site definitions that somehow slipped under the radar when it was published on ASPAlliance in January. In the article, Ameet copies an SPS definition (SPSTOC) as his starting point, most articles use STS to begin. Nice work!
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Toronto SharePoint Users Group Tonight!
Register at: http://www.tspug.com/
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The sort of day it's been...
I downloaded an alarm clock last night to wake me up this morning, and then my computer went to sleep. I guess I need to download something else to wake the computer.
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How I Work: Bill Gates (MS) vs. Marissa Meyer (Google)
In this fascinating series, a dozen people talk about how they organize their work. For Bill Gates, it's
- Three monitors to organize the desktop,
- Outlook and SharePoint,
- a Tablet PC with OneNote, and
- a whiteboard.
Be sure to check out Marissa Meyer, Google VP, Search Products and User Experience. Marissa spends one day a week (Saturday or Sunday) doing "e-mail for ten to 14 hours straight." Honestly, I didn't realize Google VPs personally moderated Google Groups, because really, what else could be so time-consuming?
Marissa uses GMail for 10-20 personal messages a day, but finds it comes up short for serious e-mail management where she relies on, um, PINE. Yes, PINE. Of meetings at Google, she notes that "We are a very laptop-friendly culture. It's not uncommon to walk into a meeting at Google where everyone has a laptop open." Unbelievable stuff, but I feel she's holding out on some productivity magic.
And sure enough. "To keep track of tasks, I have a little document called a task list. . . . It's just a list in a text file. . . . Using this, I can plan my day out the night before: 'These are the five high-priority things to focus on.' But at Google things can change pretty fast. This morning I had my list of what I thought I was going to do today, but now I'm doing entirely different things." Slow down Marissa, I can't keep up. This amazing futuristic world you live in seems too fantastic for mere words. But seriously, anytime you decide life's too short for 12 hour e-mail binges, 11 hour workdays, and people physically lined up at your door from 4:00 to 5:30 waiting to have critical questions answered, I can help you set up this thing called SharePoint. . .
But there's a lesson in them thar hills. Marissa is a bright person who does a great job - the Google user experience is wonderful. I'll assume she uses what works for her. Are they the best tools? Honestly, I don't know her world. I can only say that I have used those tools - every one - and if I still did, I'd average 67 hours of work per week (11x5 + [(14+10)/2]) too. Could she boost productivity by spending some up-front time building better aggregators and filters for her world? Probably. How? That would make a really good series.
- Three monitors to organize the desktop,
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The Amazon Link Generator and XHTML
While the source of my Amazon Link Generator has been XHTML since the beginning, I somehow didn't do the same for the code it generated (specifically the unary tag closing and alt attribute for images). Should be fixed now, if anyone sees further nits just let me know!
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MVP v2: There goes the neighbourhood
I'm pretty happy to write that I'm on the roster of SharePoint Portal Server MVPs. This is my second time in the program, the last was as an ASP.Net MVP. Since then I've shifted my primary focus from web development to knowledge systems, though I still enjoy web dev and get my fix on that end with continued involvement in the ASPInsiders.
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Looked at Eli's SharePoint Resources lately?
Here's a great feature idea for weblog articles - versioning. I went looking for a book link today on my resources page and SONNOVA, the article's been truncated at the Site Template list. Hmmm, I was just updating those the other day. . . ARGH! (These reactions have been heavily sanitized for family viewing.)
So maybe there's a way to recover rather than rebuild. In fact, maybe you can help. I wouldn't expect anyone to save a page of links but hey, maybe you have it cached (and have so far resisted temptation to click the link above). All versions include the phrase:
improved list of SharePoint Resources
A recent version would include the phrase:
New 2006-Mar!
This link explains how to find your MSIE cache folders, usually:
C:\Documents and Settings<i>username\Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files
From there it's up to your favourite text search utility. I like Total Commander for all thing file management you'll have your own. I located a version from January, can you do better? -
Mark your calendar for 01:02:03 04/05/06
As noted by good friend Blake (sans blog):
_well if yer workin the graveyard this week you'll be in for some sort of
Update: Yes, depending on your preferred method of writing dates, this once-in-a-calendar occasion will either occur this week (mm/dd/yy) or in May (dd/mm/yy). Being Canadian, I've marked the date for May. And if you're a hard-core high-order to low-order kinda person, then you already celebrated on either 01/02/03 04:05:06 or 06/05/04 03:02:01 instead, or will instead mark 07/06/05 04:03:02.01 on your calendar. Your mileage may vary, offer not valid to expatriates of Saskatchewan or employees of the Directorate of Time.
historical triva. at 2 min, 3 sec after 1am wed the time n date will be:
01:02:03 04/05/06
that one won't happen again till the emperor decides to change the
calendar on us.
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Site Definitions: Adding an XML Web Part to a configuration
Shane Young had a great post a few days ago on adding a preconfigured XML Web Part into a Site Definition. The pain is that all the examples in ONET.XML use the Image Viewer WP, so how do you figure out how to write the CAML for your own? And while Todd has posted about exporting his tricked out Content Editor Web Parts (CEWP) into reusable DWPs, I haven't seen exactly this trick from him (though I could have missed it).
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Hasselhoff-beat
Are there any Germans in the haus who can explain this one to me?
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Best practices for restorable data
The drive on my Toshiba Portege died last Friday. The good news is that I recently picked up a 400Gb external and most everything was backed up. As a replacement I bought the 7200RPM 80Gb Hitachi; the 60Gb version reviewed well and so far it's definitely a fast quiet unit. While most everything on the old drive was backed up, there are a few things I'll do different in the future.
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Next Wednesday: Scott Howlett presents AJAX in SharePoint!
The Toronto SharePoint User Group meeting is moving from tonight to next Wednesday, March 15. It will be a great one, Scott Howlett of iMason will be coming in to show off some really nifty tricks integrating AJAX with SharePoint. What's AJAX? It's how sites like Live.com, Google Maps and Netvibes work their drag 'n' drop and layered UI magic. Whether you're a developer or just want to see some really great SharePoint customization, come check it out.
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SharePoint Tricks
Putting a logo above the menubar on a WSS site
http://weblogs.asp.net/bsimser/archive/2005/12/19/433512.aspx -
Where did forms go in Word 12?
[If you landed here from a search, the short answer is "you need to turn on developer tools." Do this through File, Word Options, Views, and check the box next to Developer Tools. Now you'll have a Developer ribbon with an option to insert Word, ActiveX, or Web controls (aka "Content Controls"). The original post follows...]
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Web Deployment Projects: CodeCamp Presentation and Source
Since this presentation, there's been an update to Web Deployment Projects, read about it on ScottGu's blog.
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Unit Testing and SharePoint
Chris Chapman of iMason develops an NUnit base class for testing SharePoint applications.
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Eli's Resources for SharePoint Search
Start Here
A wonderful summary of SharePoint Search and Index, how it works, how it is configured, and how WSS and SPS search differ.
Reference- Managing External Content. Excerpted from the SharePoint Resoure Kit, this is an excellent reference on all aspects of search, not just the crawling of external content.
- Updates to Content Indexes and Content Sources: Differences between Full, Incremental, Incremental (Inclusive), and Adaptive Updates.
- Scoping and Configuring the Content Index for the Site Directory.
- The Gatherer Log.
- iFilters, Noise Word Files, and Thesaurus files.
Developing solutions with SharePoint Search and Index- Using SharePoint Search with MCMS 2002.
- Using SharePoint Search with Lotus Notes, with secure results.
- Using SharePoint Search with ASP.NET sites.
- Using SharePoint Search with ASP.NET sites, with noise filtering.
Events and Webcasts
DevConnections 2006: PAD303: Search and Indexing Configuration and Administration for SharePoint Portal Server
Optimising SharePoint Search
Mondosoft BehaviorTracking. A fantastic analysis tool to discover how your users search, enabling you to optimise Best Bets, Synonyms, and even your Site Taxonomy. It's not SharePoint specific, so you can also use it with your public website to figure out what customers are looking for, and how. Think on that, the marketing opportunities are endless. It's doesn't seem to be a bargain, but really is compared to what it would cost to develop, and I can think of scads cases where it would pay for itself within months.
Enhance with Web Parts
csegSearch by Carlos Segua Sanz. A Web Part that highlights search terms in the results and parses boolean (and/or) searches.
Cross-Site Search for WSS by CorasWorks. Requires free registration. Read Todd Bleeker's description.
People Finder Web Part by Mark Bower. Mark engineers the Content Editor Web Part to filter search results down to people, pretty cool.
Rip and Replace
If you really don't like the way SharePoint does Search, or want a search engine for WSS without the overhead of SPS, the market leaders are Mondosoft and Coveo. Both are excellent products with strong supporters.
MondoSearch.
Coveo Search.
The Future: Search in SharePoint 12 Office Server
PDC 2005 Video (OFF320).
PDC 2005 Slide deck (OFF320).
- Managing External Content. Excerpted from the SharePoint Resoure Kit, this is an excellent reference on all aspects of search, not just the crawling of external content.
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Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services Inside Out: Excerpts
MS Press has another SharePoint book, and like the Resource Kit they've posted a few chapters online for your convenience.
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Toronto SharePoint User Group: Wednesday, Feb 8
Optimise SharePoint Search with Mondosoft Analysis Tools
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Out-of-box vs. Modular
A number of companies with products for SharePoint were recently cited in a release from Kurt Delbene, the VP of Microsoft's Office Server group, including K2.net workflow (a product of SourceCode) and CorasWorks. Kurt's release highlights the great work done by third parties to make SharePoint a great solution in a variety of settings.
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Free CorasWorks training on February 28
CorasWorks holds free workshops in many cities (see the complete schedule), and Toronto is again on the list for February 28th.
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TSPUG December and January Recap
I'd like to thank a couple of people for helping out the Toronto SharePoint User Group these past two months. In December we were prize-less until John from CorasWorks (creators of some terrific SharePoint add-ins) dropped in and donated a $100 Amazon Gift Certificate to our monthly prize raffle. Thank-you John!
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Toronto Code Camp 2006: a stunning success
Thanks to a great pair of organizers (JL and Chris), a raft of sponsors, 30 volunteers (including Luis and Louella from EI), 17 others who came out to present, and over 200 developers, Saturday's Code Camp in downtown Toronto was a great experience for everyone involved!
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SharePoint Team Blogs
The SharePoint team has launched a new blog to discuss topics across the SharePoint Products and Technologies family. It started off with a summary of SharePoint's role in Microsoft's collaboration story, a pretty important story to understand if you're in the business. Today they added a good post with links of the role of Business Intelligence in SharePoint with links to a few great related resources like the Excel team's blog and a BI strategy announcements page.