My Practical Musings on AI, Data & Cloud

Tuesday, August 7, 2012

Sharepoint Tools to our rescue...

Frequently used SharePoint development, administration tools at a glance...
(Did I mention Free!)

1.	SharePoint CAML Builder Solution	CAML (Collaborative Application Markup Language) is an XML-based query language that helps you querying, building and customizing Web sites based on Windows SharePoint Services. The XML elements define various aspects of a WSS site. The tool will help you build, test and execute your CAML Queries.
2.	AutoSPInstaller	Automated SharePoint 2010 PowerShell-based installation script
3.	Export Version History to Excel	Add a function to list the action button, the ability to export history version of the item sheet to Excel from the specified date
4.	SharePoint 2010 PowerShell Scripts & Utilities	This project will host a collection of several PowerShell scripts/ modules. At present, this project has only one module for downloading SP2010 prerequisites, creating a new SP install package.
5.	SharePoint Labs	SPLabs is a set of labs, either VB.NET or C#, focused on SharePoint technologies. Each lab is in itself a tutorial to learn a specific area of SharePoint
6.	SharePoint Manager 2010	The SharePoint Manager 2010 is a SharePoint object model explorer. It enables you to browse every site on the local farm and view every property. It also enables you to change the properties
7.	SharePoint Property Bag Settings 2010	The Property Bag Settings can store any metadata as Key-Value pairs such as connection strings, server names, file paths, and other miscellaneous settings needed by your SharePoint application.
8.	SharePoint Rsync List	This program will synchronize files and directories from and unc/local/SharePoint to a SharePoint 2007 or 2010 server. Supports of to 2GB files and both manually and timer based syncs. Setting metadata on files is also supported.
9.	SharePoint 2010 Service Manager	The SharePoint Service manager lets you start and stop all the SharePoint 2010 services on your workstation.
10.	Site Directory for SharePoint 2010	SharePoint 2007 used to have a type of Site Called Site Directory which provided a directory of all sites that had been created. In SharePoint 2010, this feature has been dropped. This solution has been developed to fill the gap in SharePoint 2010. The solution follows the same basic principle of the Site Directory in SharePoint 2007 but adds some commonly requested features.
11.	Services – jQuery Library for SharePoint Web Services	This is a jQuery library which abstracts SharePoint’s Web Services and makes them easier to use. It also includes functions which use the various Web Service operations to provide more useful (and cool) capabilities. It works entirely client side and requires no server install.
12.	WSP Listener	Super easy installation of WSP files on different servers in your OTAP environments
13.	Fast for SharePoint & SharePoint 2010 Enterprise Search Query Tool	Tool to query FAST for SharePoint and SharePoint 2010 Enterprise Search. It utilizes the search web services to run your queries so you can test your queries remotely from your local machine. It shows your results, allows you to refine your query (FAST), and page your results.
14.	ULSViewer	ULSViewer allows users with access to ULS log files to view their logs in a more user friendly interface instead of using standard log file viewers. Logs opened can be filtered, sorted, highlighted, appended, etc. in order to single out the data that is important to the user. This information can be used to diagnose problems with machines running ULS services, or to monitor machines and the events they create. The ULSViewer tool runs on either 32 or 64 bit architectures of Microsoft Windows 2003 Server, Windows 2008 Server, Windows 2008 Server R2, Windows 7, Windows Vista, and Windows XP. Warning: The ULSViewer tool is an unsupported application that can be used to analyze ULS log files. Microsoft does not provide support for this tool. Use this tool at your own risk. Microsoft Product Support Services (PSS) cannot answer questions about the ULSViewer tool.
15.	List Properties Viewer	This feature adds the hyperlink List Properties to the List Settings page in the General Settings section.
16.	PowerPack SharePoint 2010 Management	This PowerPack extends PowerGUI with a set of folders, nodes and actions that allow you to manage SharePoint 2010. SharePoint 2010 is the first version of SharePoint that includes PowerShell cmdlets to manage, configure and monitor your SharePoint Farm. This Powerpack pulls some missing/buried functions from Central Admin into PowerGUI
17.	Farm Report	This tool can create a very high level report of your farm configuration. Download is available in 32-bit & 64 bit version.
18.	Fiddler	Fiddler is a Web Debugging Proxy which logs all HTTP(S) traffic between your computer and the Internet. Fiddler allows you to inspect traffic, set breakpoints, and "fiddle" with incoming or outgoing data. Fiddler includes a powerful event-based scripting subsystem, and can be extended using any .NET language. Fiddler is freeware and can debug traffic from virtually any application that supports a proxy, including Internet Explorer, Google Chrome, Apple Safari, Mozilla Firefox, Opera, and thousands more. You can also debug traffic from popular devices like Windows Phone, iPod/iPad, and others. To debug applications you've written in Java, .NET, or using WinHTTP, see this page.
19.	SharePoint Designer	SharePoint Designer 2010 is the tool of choice for the rapid development of SharePoint applications. Using SharePoint Designer, advanced users and developers alike can rapidly create SharePoint solutions in response to business needs. Advanced users can compose no-code solutions that encompass a variety of common scenarios, from collaborative sites and web publishing to Line-Of-Business data integration, business intelligence solutions, and human workflows, leveraging the building blocks available in SharePoint in an easy to use environment. In addition, developers can use SharePoint Designer 2010 to get a quick start on SharePoint development projects.
20.	SP deployment Wizard	This tool can be used for content deployment purpose in SharePoint 2010 environment. Content can be published at site collections level, webs, lists, folders, and list items (including files).
21.	Starter Master Pages	This is a clean, commented starting point for creating your own SharePoint 2010 branding. Starter Master Pages were known previously as Minimal Master Pages in SharePoint 2007. Good to go as initial start
22.	SP Alerts Controller	In MOSS 2007 and SharePoint Server 2010 we can’t look our alerts with List Name, we can look them with username. some cases we can recover the time loss ,to see alerts with the list name, at the same time we can see alerts with username like SharePoint Server 2010 or MOSS 2007 with this tool
23.	CAML Intellisense	CAML.NET intellisense is a Visual Studio 2010 plugin for writing SharePoint xml element files. This plugin provides intellisense in SharePoint xml schema files with description.
24.	SP Dispose Checker	SPDisposeCheck is a Visual Studio 2010 plugin or separate tool -0This tool helps to find objects in your code that is not properly disposed. But when using this tool in big projects there are some caveats – sometimes it reports incorrectly and without specifying code line, so the best choice is to use MSDN page about disposing objects and check of you have any doubts.
25.	SP Migration Tools	With the release of the new version, SharePoint is getting day by day more popular amongst organizations. It is just a matter of time until a decision is made to migrate from an older version of SharePoint or even from a different enterprise content management (EMC). The following third-party solutions will help SharePoint Administrators to migrate or consolidate content, Some of them are paid and evaluations are welcome!
26.	Power shell builder	A new tool that is my getting on my favorite list fast, power shell command builder. A great User Interface to build power shell commands in all Sharepoint versions

Monday, July 30, 2012

Migrating File store to SP2010 ECM considerations

Migration Considerations

During the planning process of a migration, decisions should be made early as to whether content is migrated directly into SharePoint 2010 "as - is" or whether this opportunity should be explored to make any changes to the information architecture, archiving, or look and feel and address the pain points. Since, making changes to any of these areas can complicate the migration process, some organizations choose to focus simply on migrating the content to SharePoint 2010, and then enhancing the other aspects of content are pushed to the later phases of the project. Simplifying the migration can help to reduce the coefficient of risk by substantially reducing the number of variables & at the same time reorganizing the content and make minor changes to the look and feel of may go a long way in driving adoption.

Other organizations choose to take the opportunity of the migration to organize their content in a better way at the same time as it is moved into SharePoint 2010. This may involve updating the information architecture, revamping security, implementing archiving, storage optimization and retention policies, or consolidating and reorganizing the content.

If the migration is a Sharepoint to sharepoint migration, adoption is less of an issue later, since the users are already used to a certain way of accessing files which is not drastically changeing after the upgrade process.

However, if this is a File server to SharePoint migration we need to be careful since the access and process of using the file has changed somewhat and there is a learning curve required by the end user to successfully use the document management features to be most productive.

From my experience, here's a list of supporting points to use the document management :

Document Library :

Document Library is a List template used to create a repository of documents to be accessed by the users. This is one of the parts of a site which has other tools available for collaboration. A document library is a specialized list with functionality tailored to managing
documents.
Document Workspace:
This should be used when there is a team that wants to collaborate on a few documents say < 5,000 or so. This serves the purpose without the overhead of maintenance and storage. A workspace is a specialized type of site with functionality tailored around either a single document (a document workspace) or a scheduled meeting (a meeting workspace).

Document Center:
This is a site template dedicated to manage a large volume of active & changing documents. Any time a document can be declared as a record by either moving it to a Record Center or declaring the document as a record in same document library using the in-place feature.The Document Center site template supports creating knowledge base archives. Typically, knowledge bases contain single versions of documents, and a site can scale to 10 million files. In a typical scenario, such as a technical support center for a large organization, 10,000 users might access the content, primarily to read it. A subset of 3,000 to 4,000 users might upload new content to the site

Record Center :
This is a site template specifically dedicated for managing large volume of records (documents that are not modified),Tens of millions of records in a single Records Center, Hundreds of millions of records in a distributed archive: This is an effective place for Hierarchy, Driven By Metadata

Here are some of the major features:

Document ID: Every document can be assigned a unique identifier, which stays with the document even when it's archived. This allows records to be easily referenced by an ID no matter where the document moves.
Multi-Stage Retention: Retention policies can have multiple stages, allowing you to specify the entire document life cycle as one policy (e.g. review Contracts every year, and delete after 7 years)
Per-Item Audit Reports: You can generate a customized audit report about an individual record.
Hierarchical File Plans: You can create deep, hierarchical folder structures and manage retention at each folder in the hierarchy (or inherit from parent folders).
File Plan Report: You can generate status reports showing the number of items in each stage of the file plan, along with a roll up of the retention policies on each node in the plan.

Taxonomy and Centralized Content Types: The archive will be a consumer of enterprise-wide taxonomies and content types, ensuring consistency and context transfer between the collaborative spaces and the archive. We'll be talking a lot more about our 2010 taxonomy investments in future posts.
Content Organizer: The records router can use meta data to route incoming documents to the right place in the hierarchical file plan. For instance, it enables you to automatically enforce rules on content that is submitted, like "If a Purchase Agreement is tagged with Project Alpha, send to the Alpha Contracts sub folder and apply that's folder retention policy to the item."
Virtual Folders: The file plan is a great way to manage a repository but often time isn't what you want to use to navigate and find the content you are looking for. The SharePoint 2010 Records Center makes use of a new feature called meta data based navigation, which allows you to expose key meta data as virtual folders: