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Groove Advisor: The Groove Blog

Groove Advisor is for IT professionals, developers, and users of Groove 2007.

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Welcome to the Groove Advisor!
Readers probably know some of the Groove history, and know that Groove was acquired by Microsoft in 2005, and now ships with Office 2007. It probably comes as no surprise that one of our biggest post-acquisition challenges has been navigating Microsoft. You don't go from 170 heads to >70,000 heads without a joke or two about the Borg.

To make sense out of the system, I focused on three channels for feedback and outreach. First, we set up an email Distribution List for all those Groove questions. Anyone at Microsoft could drop a note to the DL and get a quick response from several seasoned Groovers. We had immediate insight into what was hurting or confusing our constituents, and could get them back on track with a well timed suggestion.

Second, I had a Groove workspace. Of course I did, I'm with the Groove Team, right? No doubt, any real product team has to eat its own dog food, but there are certainly distinct benefits of the Groove space that contributed to our success.
(Read the official top ten list here. Improve it here: feedback form).

The workspace was targeted at the team of worldwide Groove TSP's. We also had a number of MCS resources, as well as product management and program management. This was a small, tight knit community where I could be assured of direct and unvarnished feedback. Problems with the registration page? Confusing marketing material? This group was the first to report in, often with a solution in hand. I hope to have many of those members contribute here, too.

Third, we created the Grooveypedia. Using my favorite SharePoint feature, the Grooveypedia started as an internal library that was consumed and contributed to by engineering, marketing, and sales resources. The internal Grooveypedia is informative and informal. Look for a public version to spin up soon.

Now, after 6 years on the Groove team I have found that the most rewarding part of my job is talking with Groove customers, telling the Groove story, and hearing the questions and suggestions directly from them. Doesn't matter which "customer" - partner, field, SMB, Enterprise - it's in the conversations that I get the best insights into what works, what doesn't, and what we can do better (link to feedback form)

With this in mind we have created our fourth device for outreach and feedback, the Groove blog, Groove Advisor. Our hope is to extend the reach of community conversations and to connect the Groove team with all the powerful feedback from people like you. In return, we'll commit to providing you with fresh, useful information that will improve your Groove experience. Of course, if this is going to be a conversation, we'll need to hear from you (feedback form). Comment on topics you'd like to read about, things you find confusing, features you would like to see, and your hierarchy of needs. Give it to us straight, we can take it.

Coming Soon...
• How to find: links to some of the most important Groove info
• How to use: Groove and SharePoint together. When do I use Groove? When do I use SharePoint? Are they really better together?
• How to plan: for backup and restoring Groove accounts and workspaces


Link to this Article:
http://blogs.technet.com/groove/archive/2007/01/26/welcome-to-the-groove-advisor.aspx
Posted: Friday, January 26, 2007 11:58 AM by abbott

Comments

Robert Banghart said:

Hi Abbott:

After watching your your webcast ""How Microsoft IT Deployed Office Groove 2007" this morning I mentioned to Mike Gannotti how I really needed to dig into this application.

I'm really happy that you have decided to blog and I look forward to some great posts.

# January 30, 2007 10:54 PM

mrcidavies said:

Abbott,

Well done, to what I look forward to being a great resource for Groove evangalists.

Looking forward to a 'public' Grooveypedia and lots of 'insider' info.

Regards

# January 31, 2007 6:37 PM

joelcorra said:

We seem to have found a bug involving permissions between Groove and SharePoint 2007.  SharePoint 2007 now supports setting folder-level permissions within a Document Library.  However, when you access the Document Library through Groove, you get full access to all of the folders in the Document Library whether you have permission on the folders in the SharePoint Document Library or not.  Thus, by synchronizing a Document Library to a Groove Work Space, a user can use Groove to gain full access to folders for which they wouldn't have access in SharePoint.  We tested this, and were able to successfully delete a whole folder on which the user was explicitly denied permissions through SharePoint.  This seems to be a rather serious security flaw, as there isn't really any way to deny a user the ability to access a SharePoint Document Library through Groove.

Actually, this may be more of a SharePoint security issue, as I've also been able to access a folder for which I've been denied permissions by altering the URL; Groove just makes it much, much easier because the folders all show up and you don't have to already know the name of the folder.

# March 19, 2007 10:50 AM

richie3285 said:

We are a small software company, who, as well as using Groove extensively to collaborate internally, use Groove workspaces to share info and manage collaboration with new sites as we implement.  Once an implementation is complete, we revoke the Groove license from the site and can re-allocate it using the Groove.net license management website.

We also create workspaces for our User Conference Planning Committee.  Each member of the Committee is issued with a Groove license in January of each year, and licenses are revoked in September following the User Conference.  

One of the great strengths of Groove Virtual Office 3.1 is the ability for us to share / revoke / re-issue licenses from our 'pool' in this way.

Here's the question:  I have had a lot of trouble trying to figure out whether we will be able to continue with this practice of temporarily allocating our licenses to our sites or our Planning Committee members in Office Live Groove 2007.  Microsoft has given me (by telephone) two completely conflicting answers.  One answer is "Yes, as long as the person to whom you allocated a licence uninstalls the software, you can re-allocate it after 90 days".  The other answer is "No you cannot assign your licenses to anyone outside your organization."

If we cannot continue to work in this way then we are in big trouble, but we don't want to break the law!  Can anyone give me a definitive answer?

# November 2, 2007 10:53 AM
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