Chris Parkes: A PC is not just for Christmas... : Mid Market

Insight Into FAST Search and SharePoint Roadmap

chrisp — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 12:33:34 GMT

The roadmap for SharePoint Search and FAST enterprise search integration got an update today. In summary:

FAST Search for SharePoint is a new search server adding FAST ESP capabilities into Microsoft Office SharePoint Portal Server (SharePoint "14")
ESP for SharePoint is high-end search for Microsoft Office SharePoint Server, available today.

You can find out more from the official SharePoint Team blog...

http://blogs.msdn.com/sharepoint/archive/2009/02/10/microsoft-unveils-new-enterprise-search-road-map.aspx

Parkesy

SharePoint and Search

chrisp — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 18:49:31 GMT

Here's another screencast I've recorded which shows some of the Microsoft Office SharePoint Server search capabilities including how to search across content including the business data catalog and people.

Microsoft Office SharePoint Server - Search

This recording is based on the Demo Showcase virtual images, a resource readily available to Microsoft Gold and Certified partners. Total running time is under four minutes :)

Parkesy

SharePoint, Business Process & Forms

chrisp — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 15:27:00 GMT

Here's a little screencast I've recorded showing a demonstration of some of the Microsoft Office SharePoint Server Forms Services capabilities together with InfoPath forms rendered through a browser and also including simple workflow creation and deployment through SharePoint Designer.

Microsoft Office SharePoint Server - Business Process & Forms

Based on the Demo Showcase virtual images, a resource readily available to Microsoft Gold and Certified partners, the demo lasts just a touch over ten minutes, I'd love to know what you think of it!

Parkesy

Need to Navigate Microsoft?

chrisp — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 14:04:24 GMT

Microsoft is a big company. Actually, Microsoft is a huge company! And one of the most common pieces of feedback I receive from partners and customers is that it's often hard to navigate Microsoft, to keep up with all of the changes and associated information disclosures etc. My response is generally along the lines of empathy, indeed ask anyone who works for Microsoft and you'll probably get that empathy from them too :)

Fortunately, Directions on Microsoft, an independent organisation dedicated exclusively to tracking Microsoft is on hand to help everyone see the bigger picture more clearly...

You can find some sample articles here including historical organisational charts and product roadmap information. My personal current favourite (published July 2008) is the Software Plus Services and Developers article. If every little helps, this could be of value...

Ciao for now :)

If You Know What it is, don't Turn Back

chrisp — Thu, 27 Sep 2007 17:00:10 GMT

A great thing happened yesterday...I saw a smorgasbord :)

I remember the first time I came across this, on a website at Microsoft. Most people would admit I have a fair handle on grammar but vocabulary...now there's something that's useful, like, mate. Now, every time I read a new word, I hit the Review tab shown at the top of the second screenshot below...

So, the "smorgasbord" bought to my mind utility companies and Star Trek films together in a symbiant circle, how bizarre! When I did research however, I learned the definition. I couldn't find it in the Thesaurus but you know what, it sounds like a feast to me!

Need to learn a new Word?

Find out more at the home of Office 2007...oh, and before you start to read the website, why not try using the ribbon bar with the tabs on at the top of the page :)

Parkesy

Have You Met the Partner Bot?

chrisp — Mon, 25 Jun 2007 19:20:53 GMT

You really really should if you haven't, Partner Bot is an Instant Messenger contact that can help to quickly signpost to information you need. Simply type in your question and Bot will bring back an instant response. By adding Partner Bot as a buddy in your Windows Live Messenger contacts, it will always be available whenever you're logged in.

You can use Partner Bot to help you get answers quickly, whether you’re in the office or mobile and to find partner resources, like blogs and marketing help, more easily. To add Partner Bot to your contacts, sign in to Windows Live Messenger, click on the 'Add a Contact' icon and add 'partnerbot@hotmail.com' into the Instant Messaging address!

Microsoft Office Word 2007 and OpenOffice.org 2.2.0 Mail Merge Comparison

chrisp — Wed, 09 May 2007 00:35:42 GMT

I was reading Hugh’s post and the comments around whether open source software meets shareholder and CEO needs, I love the cartoon that goes with it. George Ou has some interesting stats in this area too.

It’s a serious debate and as well as shareholders and CEO’s, there is a need to consider whether or not open source software is capable of delivering against business needs and the effects it can have on employee productivity and staff overheads.

Following the theme of the cartoon, I undertook a mini science project to see whether OpenOffice.org (OOo) 2.2.0 Writer could deliver similar levels of performance and capability to business users of Microsoft Office 2007 Word. This blog post is documentation of my findings.

Consider the following scenario... An organisation is running Microsoft SQL Server (quite possible given the industry unit share) to hold a database table full of its contacts/customers/suppliers/whatever. Unfortunately, the company has delivered a defective product to a specific region and need to issue a product recall. The company decides to act swiftly and chooses to use direct mail to its database of contacts.

I ran the two desktop applications side by side on a Core2 Duo box with 2Gb RAM and around 80Gb of free hard drive space and also had SQL Server 2005 running locally.

I chose the AdventureWorksDW sample database and the dimCustomer table to perform a mail merge to both applications as it contains the following fields. There are 18,414 records in the table in total.

I downloaded and used the sample “Apology for Defective Product” letter from Office online, a resource I find very handy at times!

To begin with in Word, it’s as simple as switching to the Mailings tab and selecting the Step by Step Mail Merge Wizard. The next few steps are pretty simple also, select the document type, the starting document and then browse for a data connection.

Initially, I chose to create a new data source and was presented with the wizard which I used to connect to the SQL Server. I then selected the table and gave it a friendly name to finish.

Following this, I used the Filter option to select all people within a specific geography range (the range was 280-655 inclusive to pick out 7,818 records listed as being with the United States. Here’s a sample of the records returned.

The match fields had been completed by the wizard and therefore, I was able to quickly insert an address block and a greeting line.

All of the letters were immediately available for preview as well as edit, print and email.

The entire process took just under ten minutes for me to complete.

I then began to run through the process in OOo 2.2.0.

The first thing I needed to do in OOo was to create an Address Data Source using the wizard, configure the settings, choose ODBC (as this is the only way to connect to SQL Server,) browse for an ODBC setting and organise my data sources. The first thing I noticed here was that this may not be the way an average user would tend to think when it came to creating a mail merge.

Next came the need to add a User DSN through Windows ODBC Data Source Administrator (point to note, this would have to be installed on every machine that would need to utilise this as a data connection,) by choosing SQL Server, entering the SQL Server details, connecting using Windows authentication, changing the default database and leaving the rest of the settings alone.

With my data source created, I was able to successfully test the data connection and my data source was ready for use in OOo.

Next up, I had to select it from the list, ensure the properties were correct, choose the table I was going to use, match the fields manually, no automated mapping was completed (even though the field names were identical to the address block names in some instances) and give the data source a name.

With my new data source complete I then used the Mail Merge Wizard to open the Apology for Defective product letter. Initially, it took the mail merge wizard 40 seconds to open the first screen.

I set the document type to be a letter, not an email and I created a new address block (whilst applying the surprisingly ten minute time consuming geography filter at this step also,) salutation line and checked the layout.

The processing time during the initial steps was significantly greater than using Microsoft Office Word 2007, often taking up to 30 seconds to move from one wizard step to the next. However, the Adjust layout step took a full 3 minutes to move to the next step. I’m also unsure why I had to rematch the fields having done so earlier.

Finally, I started the mail merge which took approximately twenty minutes to complete...

All in all, the whole process took just under fifty minutes, five times longer than it did using Microsoft Office Word 2007 although this was considerably longer on my first few attempts as I struggled to locate the functionality in OOo and how to put the whole thing together.

The conclusion... The time taken to complete essential tasks therefore is extremely important. If organisational end users were to be so unproductive then staffing overheads would considerably increase. Whereas Microsoft Word 2007 handled the process with the minimum of fuss and flexibility, using OOo actually felt like a development tool at times and a throw back to the days of Word 95.

I've included the comprehensive screen shots here with the aim of allowing anyone to recreate this experiment. Thankfully, this is a science project, not a business.

Sign the Open XML Petition Today

chrisp — Wed, 04 Apr 2007 16:05:20 GMT

If you only do one other thing today, sign this petition and help safeguard the future of OpenXML.

Many readers of this blog may be aware that Microsoft called for the standardisation of Open XML via ECMA International and this was approved as open standard in December 2006.

Of the 21 members to vote, IBM were the only objection to the approval. Again, this was the case when ECMA agreed to submit Open XML as a standard for ratification by ISO. Ignoring the fact that the vast majority of ISO members chose not to submit comments, during the one-month period for consideration of Open XML in ISO, IBM globally campaigned that Open XML was not even considered. (NB. Notes does not support Open XML.)

If you believe that Open XML provides choice for customers and partners worldwide, and that Microsoft have finally listened to their customers needs by opening up the pre-2003 binary document formats, and you think that this should be standardised, why not sign the petition?

If you would like to understand more about the comparison of OpenDocument and Office Open XML formats prior to signing this partition you could refer to this, balanced Wikipedia article. For more information about developing with Open XML, head on over to http://openxmldeveloper.org/.

Regards,
Chris Parkes

E-Commerce News: Web Services: What Everyone Needs to Know About SOA

chrisp — Thu, 25 Jan 2007 21:19:00 GMT

Here's an interesting thought...What if a Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) is not the future of all business applications? There's still much scepticism out there today as to what benefits SOA actually brings for every budget spent. In addition, for each vendor that lays claim to having SOA enabled software, their definitions seem to differ.

Personally, I'm contemplating how Software as a Service (as a whole) and disparate vendor enabled SOA's will all tie together, especially in the context of Web2.0 and particularly user identity.

I like this article as a primer and agree wholeheartedly with the fact that, "SOA should allow you to build dashboards of active Web services components and create applications on the fly that behave your way -- the way you want them to behave" but I feel it stops some way short of defining where any ROI comes from...

Link to E-Commerce News: Web Services: What Everyone Needs to Know About SOA

Search and Destroy!

chrisp — Mon, 22 Jan 2007 20:15:52 GMT

Including contributions from (amongst others) McAfee, SonicWALL, Computer Associates and Sophos, this article is a great primer to help you understand all you need to know about cleaning malware off your computer

"The main malware differentiator is visibility: whereas a virus wants to be seen, Trojans and Spyware want to stay hidden in order to deliver their payload."

Content includes:

Defining the Dangerous
Visibility Issues
Isolate, Identify, Clean
Policy and Process
5 Steps to Success

Author, journalist and consultant, Davey Winder has been writing about security issues for 16 years and is the current IT Security Journalist of the Year.

Ciao for now :)

Security in Windows Vista, 2007 Office and Exchange 2007

chrisp — Thu, 18 Jan 2007 20:15:32 GMT

"Office 2007 presents a radically different way of working, with employees no longer limited to the desktop and company information being disseminated far more effectively. A new way of working needs a new paradigm for security, and Windows Vista is designed to deliver it. Vista alone includes almost 200 entirely new security features."

So, if you want to know more about:

Security today: big bucks for organised criminals
Closing the vulnerabilities with Vista
Security features in Office 2007
Security and Compliance go hand in hand for Outlook and Exchange
2007 Security in a box

Then take a look at this article written by independent IT journalist Mary Branscombe where she finds out what’s in the box. Additionally, Mary will be hosting a web based meeting on January 30, looking further at these new desktop projects. Click here to register for the live event where you will be able to join in with Q&A!

Ciao for now :)

UK Customers, Raise Your Profile!

chrisp — Mon, 15 Jan 2007 20:45:24 GMT

The Microsoft UK Mid Market reference programme is a joint initiative between Microsoft and key customers aimed at showcasing innovative use of Microsoft technologies through Microsoft funded joint sales and marketing activities. The reference programme offers various marketing benefits:

• Case Study
• Customer Video
• Return on Investment Study
• Press and Analyst Relations
• Speaking at Events

Customers can expect to see brand awareness through promotion of case studies and videos via Microsoft.com, newsletters and events. Networking with thought leaders and like-minded organisations via events is another benefit. For more information and contact/application details, take a look here...

Ciao for now :)

Microsoft European SharePoint Conference 2007

chrisp — Mon, 15 Jan 2007 14:24:00 GMT

Nice to see Microsoft using it's own InfoPath Forms Services Technology to power the registration site for the Microsoft European SharePoint Conference 2007.

The first ever Microsoft European SharePoint Conference will be held in Berlin, February 12—14, 2007. At the event, Microsoft executives and Partners will deliver technical and strategic insights targeted at developer, IT professional and technical decision maker audiences. Fancy being there? Be quick to register, this is the only dedicated European SharePoint event planned for this calendar year so it is sure to be very popular!

The Demo Showcase & Office 2007 Launch (Part 2)

chrisp — Thu, 11 Jan 2007 18:56:00 GMT

There's another fantastic scenario contained with the Demo Showcase which expertly shows off the amazing conditional formatting and newly designed table capabilities of Microsoft Excel 2007.

In the scenario, we assume the character of Patricia Doyle, a Sales Manager with Contoso. Maybe the silicon chip inside her head is switched to overload (but) she don’t like downtime. So, the race is on with regards to just how fast we can get better results faster!

First of all, we're introduced to the concept of galleries and the use of the new live preview capabilities of Office 2007. We also get to understand the benefit of contextual menus and the fantastic charting options available.

By using the blandest of spreadsheets, we are quickly shown how to transform it into a professional looking spreadsheet containing automatically created totals, filters and funky new charts!

Finally, the scenario wraps with a spreadsheet containing data bars, business intelligence style icons and more... All in less than five minutes. So much for that downtime, shame we can't do anything about Mondays!!!

Ciao for now :)

The Demo Showcase & Office 2007 Launch (Part 1)

chrisp — Mon, 08 Jan 2007 21:13:00 GMT

One of the great things about the Demo Showcase is the Office 2007 content it contains. One of the scenarios let's you assume the role of Julia, the HR Manager at Contoso who needs to publish a HR newsletter on a regular basis. Now, to me, Julia looks more like someone who spends hours and hours in front of the mirror rather than in the Office. How does she manage to find time for this? Easy, she's obviously switched to the 2007 Microsoft Office System (now with workflow!)

In this example, Julia uses the new functionality included in the Ribbon to quickly format a plain looking document and transform it into a HR letter (this obviously then leaves plenty of time to later transform herself into the model pictured above!) She also uses the drop down gallery feature to insert and format graphics that need to be included.

So, the scenario shows how transforming such a bland looking document (pictured left) into the rather swanky looking newsletter (pictured right) is an extremely simple, few click process.

Give it a go if you need to know how...

So this is how it feels to leave early, this is how it feels to us all, this is how it feels when your work takes you no time at all.

Ciao for now :)