February seems to be the favored month for Search roadmap updates in Microsoft. On Feb 10, 2009 the Microsoft Unveils New Enterprise Search Road Map press release disclosed a detailed road map from Microsoft for its enterprise search products, including the introduction of FAST Search for SharePoint and FAST Search for Internet Business. Since then, FAST based search solutions are getting implemented in a lot of Microsoft customers; mainly for - powerful content processing with deep navigation, customisable relevance and visual best bets, advanced linguistics and its extreme scalability and performance.
Almost a year since that date, on Thursday, February 04 there was a Innovation on Linux and UNIX post on the Microsoft Enterprise Search Blog by Bjørn Olstad. A low key but significant update to our Enterprise Search roadmap. It has been reported widely in Tech websites and blogs (Microsoft to phase out its enterprise search offerings for Linux and Unix, Microsoft kills FAST's Linux and Unix search biz etc..)
Summarizing my understand of the updates for customers and partners implementing FAST based search solutions below:
1) Linux and Unix Support
- 2010 products will be the last to include a search core (FAST ESP 5.3 core) that runs on Linux and UNIX. All future cores will be Windows only
- FSIS and FSIA 2010 (check "Search solutions in Wave 2010" section below for the abbreviations) will be supported for 10 years from the date of release as per Microsoft's public support policy - 5 years mainstream + 5 years extended
- Will ensure interoperate with non-Windows systems on both the front- and back-end. Search solution will crawl and index information regardless of where it lives or what format it is in—on UNIX, Linux, or Windows systems
- Customer Upgrade Program is being introduced that will help customers evaluate Microsoft's hosted solutions and/or a Windows-based deployment
The reason for this decision is explained by Bjørn Olstad - focusing on Windows will enable significantly more innovation to customers per release.
2) FAST AdMomentum
- FAST AdMomentum, the search-based advertising solution, is being discontinued
3) New SKUs
More SKUs provide more choices and flexibility (and complexity in some cases) to customers. I have tried to summarize them below :-)
Search solutions in Wave 2010: basically 2 kinds – one set powered by FAST and another that are powered by SharePoint.
a) Powered by FAST - Here's the complete list along with the abbreviations …
- Search solutions for Business Productivity [i.e. for Intranet applications]
- Microsoft FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint (FS4SP)
- Microsoft FAST Search Server 2010 for Internal Applications (FSIA)
- Search solutions for Internet Sites [i.e. for Internet applications]
- Microsoft FAST Search Server 2010 for Internet Sites (FSIS)
- Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010 for Internet Sites, Enterprise (FIS-E) - includes rights to FS4SP for use outside the firewall
Check the Information on FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint post for what's new in FAST Search Server 2010.
b) Powered by SharePoint – this list remains the same. You can refer to my previous post – Search Technologies for SharePoint 2010 Products for more details.
- SharePoint Foundation 2010
- Search Server 2010 Express
- Search Server 2010
- SharePoint Server 2010
SharePoint versions in Wave 2010: FS4SP use rights are available in the Enterprise editions. Choices available now are ..
- Solutions for Business Productivity
- SharePoint + Standard CAL
- SharePoint + Enterprise CAL - includes rights to use FS4SP but FS4SP server licenses needs to be purchased separately. So, in order to get FAST Search capabilities, customers must purchase SharePoint Server, Standard CALs, Enterprise CALs, and FAST Search for SharePoint (FS4SP)
- Solutions for Internet Sites - 2 new SKUs have been introduced here
- SharePoint for Internet Sites, Standard (FIS-S)
- SharePoint for Internet Sites, Enterprise (FIS-E) - includes all the features in the SharePoint Enterprise CAL and includes rights to use FS4SP
4) Licensing Changes
- For Internet solutions, licensing will be in the server mode only. Queries per second (QPS), content size and permitted purpose licensing modes are being discontinued. This will significantly simplify the licensing
- There are changes in licensing model of other popular Add-ons like Recommendations
Need Help?
If you are a customer having licenses for SharePoint 2007 and/or FAST ESP, you might have queries on the upgrade options and/or step up options available to Wave 2010 product SKUs. Please contact the Microsoft representative for your account.
To provide guidance on how to develop for SharePoint 2010, a developer training kit has been provided for download on the Microsoft Download Center. Seeing its content, I would rate it as a must have resource for developers.
Download it from this link > SharePoint 2010 Beta Developer Training Kit
The SharePoint 2010 Beta Developer Training Kit provides developers with deep guidance on how to develop for SharePoint 2010. Through PowerPoint decks, Hands-On Labs, Source Code, and Instructor-Led Videos, the developer kit walks you through an array of important developer topics--including Developer Roadmap, Visual Studio tooling, Workflow, Business Connectivity Services, and much, much more.
It contains 14 presentations and links to ~40 videos. Here's the screenshot of landing page of the training kit:
Given below is the list of presentations provided with the training kit:
- BCS_SharePoint.pptx
- BI in SharePoint Server 2010.pptx
- Client Object Model.pptx
- Designing Lists and Schemas.pptx
- Enterprise Content Management.pptx
- Extending_Search.pptx
- LINQ2SharePoint.pptx
- Sandboxed Solutions.pptx
- Security and Claims based Authorization.pptx
- SharePoint 2010 Developer Roadmap.pptx
- SharePoint 2010 Services Architecture.pptx
- SharePoint 2010 Workflow.pptx
- SharePoint Development with VS10.pptx
- SharePoint UI Advancements.pptx
Also available is the Office 2010 Beta Developer Training Kit which includes a comprehensive set of technical content including hands-on labs, presentations, source code, and instructor-led videos, that are designed to help you learn how to develop for Office 2010 and SharePoint 2010.
What is PowerShell?
Windows PowerShell is roughly the modern (and very powerful) version of command line tool CMD.exe. It's powerful scripting environment for administration purposes and PowerShell scripting is becoming the preferred way to manage and automate administrative tasks.
If you are a newbie to PowerShell, then here’s the guide for learning Windows PowerShell from the ground up - Windows PowerShell Owner’s Manual. Cmdlets are Windows PowerShell commands, and are roughly equivalent to command-line tools. Cmdlets are PowerShell-specific which means that you can’t run a PowerShell cmdlet unless you are running Windows PowerShell.
PowerShell and SharePoint 2010
SharePoint 2010 product family is completely administrable through PowerShell scripts. You have Cmdlets for everything you can think of. I am not sure of the exact count but there are 300+ Cmdlets. Actually, some operations do not have any user interface, there is only PowerShell interface. This is very true for administrating FAST Search infrastructure.
All administrators and developers working with SharePoint 2010 should know PowerShell scripting. Sooner or later you will face it. Easiest way to launch the PowerShell console is by using the SharePoint 2010 Management Console.
A good learning resource is the Getting Started: Windows PowerShell for SharePoint 2010 Administrators video by Todd Klindt.
PowerShell Cmdlets Help For SharePoint 2010
Following help files are now available on the PowerShell cmdlets for SharePoint 2010 product family:
Windows PowerShell compiled Help for SharePoint Foundation 2010
Windows PowerShell compiled Help for SharePoint Server 2010
Windows PowerShell compiled Help for Office Web Apps
Windows PowerShell compiled Help for Project Server 2010
FAST Search Server for SharePoint 2010 Windows PowerShell Cmdlet Help
The Enterprise Search Evaluation Guides for SharePoint 2010 product family are now available from the Microsoft Download Center now.
Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010 Enterprise Search Evaluation Guide - describes the enterprise search features of SharePoint Server 2010 and familiarizes readers with how to implement enterprise search by using SharePoint Server 2010. This guide includes:
- Descriptions of the new and improved enterprise search features and technologies provided by SharePoint Server 2010.
- Details on the indexing and query architecture implemented by SharePoint Server 2010.
- Tours and walkthroughs of the main search features provided by SharePoint Server 2010.
Microsoft FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint Enterprise Search Evaluation Guide - describes the enterprise search features provided by FAST Search Server 2010 and is also designed to familiarize you with how to implement enterprise search by using FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint. This guide includes:
- Descriptions of the enterprise search features and technologies provided by FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint.
- Details of the additional features that FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint provides over and above SharePoint Server 2010.
- Details on the indexing and query architecture implemented by FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint.
- Tours and walkthroughs of the main search features provided by FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint.
The Search Technologies for SharePoint 2010 Products technical diagram compares the enterprise search capabilities in Microsoft SharePoint Foundation 2010, Microsoft Search Server 2010 and Microsoft Search Server Express 2010, Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010, and Microsoft FAST Search Server for SharePoint 2010.
Search Architectures for Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010 model describes the physical and logical architecture components of the search system
Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010 Beta is available for download now. You can download it from either of following links:
TechNet: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/evalcenter/ee388573.aspx
MSDN: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/evalcenter/ee390819.aspx
From the Microsoft Download Center
SharePoint Foundation 2010 Beta
Microsoft Office Web Apps (Beta) the new web-based tools that extend the Microsoft Office 2010 experience to your browser
Microsoft FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint Internet Sites Beta for use with SharePoint Server 2010 for Internet Sites, Enterprise Edition
As I mentioned in my earlier post - Search Technologies for SharePoint 2010 Products, FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint is the new search SKU in SharePoint 2010 product family. (download this technical diagram to see a comparison of search capabilities across 5 search options to choose from)
Planning and Architecture
The Planning and Architecture for FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint (Beta) document covers information about planning and architecture for FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint. It covers functional architecture, services and components and performance and capacity planning in detail. Following figure from the document shows the FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint system as part of an overall SharePoint deployment.
FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint solution consists of three main parts:
- FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint - The server infrastructure that provides processing, indexing and query capabilities, and the administration of these features.
- FAST Query Search Service Application (SSA) - The Query SSA provides the query Web front-end capabilities. You install and deploy this SSA on a SharePoint Web server, and it hosts query Web parts and SDK query integration capabilities for your search solution.
- FAST Search Connector (Content SSA) - The FAST Search Connector is a Search Service Application (SSA) that retrieves content for indexing from SharePoint farms and other content repositories. You install and deploy this SSA on a SharePoint application server.
Deployment and Configuration
For those looking forward to evaluating it, some more deployment related information on the product is now available. The Deployment and configuration of FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint (Beta) article describes how to install and configure Microsoft FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint as a stand-alone (single) or in a multiple server deployment. Sharing some of the stuff from the guide below:
Hardware Requirements - The following is the minimum and recommended hardware requirements to deploy FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint:
- Minimum: 4 GB RAM; 4 CPU cores, 2.0GHz CPU; 50 Gb disk
- Recommended: 16 GB RAM; 8 CPU cores, 2.0GHz CPU; 1 TB disk space on RAID across 6 spindles or more
Software Requirements - You should install FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint on a server that has a clean installation of one of the following OS:
- Windows Server 2008 SP2 x64
- Windows Server 2008 R2 x64
Other things to note is that FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint must be installed on a different server from Microsoft SharePoint Server. The server should not be used for anything other than FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint.
PowerShell cmdlets
Certain administrative operations in FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint can only be performed by using Windows PowerShell cmdlets or by using command line tools. Read about them here:
FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint Windows PowerShell Cmdlets Overview (Beta) - An overview of when to use which Windows PowerShell cmdlets in FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint
FAST Search Server for SharePoint 2010 Windows PowerShell Cmdlet Help (Beta) - When to use which Windows PowerShell cmdlets in the FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint functional areas
Monitoring
The article Monitoring for FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint (Beta) describes how to deploy and install the System Center Operations Manager (SCOM) 2007 with FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint.
Sharing some information which would be useful for anyone interested in developing Internet websites on SharePoint 2007.
Tune in and learn how you can use Microsoft SharePoint for Internet Business to help you build your public-facing portal. In this series, you will learn from experienced partners how to create secure, dynamic web presence with personalization, rich commerce capabilities, catalogue and content management, business analytics, and search capabilities for anytime, anywhere access by customers and business partners.
Click here for current schedule and registration
Direct links to webcasts …
Wednesday, November 4, 2009 1:00 P.M.–2:00 P.M. Pacific Time
Wednesday, November 11, 2009 1:00 P.M.–2:00 P.M. Pacific Time
Wednesday, November 18, 2009 1:00 P.M.–2:00 P.M. Pacific Time
Wednesday, December 2, 2009 1:00 P.M.–2:00 P.M. Pacific Time
Wednesday, December 9, 2009 1:00 P.M.–2:00 P.M. Pacific Time
Wednesday, January 13, 2010 1:00 P.M.–2:00 P.M. Pacific Time
Wednesday, January 27, 2010 1:00 P.M.–2:00 P.M. Pacific Time
Wednesday, February 10, 2010 1:00 P.M.–2:00 P.M. Pacific Time
Office Web Applications is a new web based productivity offering in Microsoft Office 2010 suite. You can watch the demo here: Demo of the Office Web Apps
Office Web Apps services include companions to Microsoft Word 2010, Microsoft Excel 2010, Microsoft PowerPoint 2010, and Microsoft OneNote 2010. These would be available on Windows Live at no cost to users as an ad-supported service (read: Office Web Apps Coming to Windows Live). For enterprise users, it can be hosted on SharePoint 2010 (SharePoint Foundation 2010 or the SharePoint Server 2010) either on-premise or online.
Office Web Applications are licensed with Office 2010 and need to be installed and enabled on top of SharePoint 2010. These applications are focused on offering access to Word 2010, PowerPoint 2010, Excel 2010, and OneNote 2010 documents through any browser across multiple platforms, lightweight creation and editing capabilities in standard formats. When enabled, it enhances experience of SharePoint user. For example,
- When user clicks on an Office document in a Document Library it will launch the Office Web App viewer
- When user clicks ‘New Document’ in a Document Library to create a new Office document but does not have the respective desktop application, Office Web Application will be launched to author the document
Browsers Supported
- Internet Explorer 7 and 8
- Firefox 3.5 on Windows, Mac and Linux
- Safari 4 on Mac
Read The Office Web Apps Love Your Browser for more details.
Silverlight integration
Office Web Applications works whether or not Silverlight is installed on the machine. With Silverlight, the user experience gets better. For example:
- Faster load performance
- Improved text fidelity, better text spacing, better rendering and zoom beyond 100%
- Text will respect ClearType tuner settings
- Improved accuracy of hit highlighting in Find
- Smoother PowerPoint animations and improved slide scaling
Read Under the Hood: Find in the Word Web App Viewer and The Office Web Apps Love Your Browser posts for more details.
Deploying Office Web Applications
Refer the Deploy Office Web Apps document available on the Microsoft Download Center. Deploying Office Web Apps involves three primary phases:
- Installing Office Web Apps by running setup (WCSetup.exe).
- Activating the Office Web Apps services.
- Activating the Office Web Apps feature on those site collections for which the Office Web Apps should be available.
PowerPoint Broadcast Slide Show feature
The functionality provided by the PowerPoint Web Application, also enables the PowerPoint Broadcast Slide Show feature. This is a new feature in Microsoft Office 2010 that enables presenters to broadcast a slide show from PowerPoint 2010 to remote viewers who watch in a Web browser. Broadcast Slide Show gives organizations options to provide broadcast slideshow services to users either as an internally-hosted service or as a service accessed over the Internet.
Broadcast Slide Show and Microsoft Live Meeting are complementary technologies, each providing a different level of functionality and end-user experience.
|
Capability |
Broadcast Slide Show |
Microsoft Live Meeting |
|
Client Software |
Included in Office PowerPoint 2010 |
LiveMeeting client |
|
Hosting |
Available with or without internally hosted server |
Internally hosted or through an externally hosted service |
|
Broadcast |
PowerPoint slide show only |
Any desktop application |
|
Purpose |
Just-in-time shared slideshows |
Broad communication and collaboration capabilities |
|
Use when… |
You want a low-infrastructure solution for impromptu slideshow broadcasts |
You want a complete Web conferencing solution with collaboration tools |
To learn more about deploying Broadcast Slide Show, refer to the Deploying Broadcast Slide Show document.
When compared to SharePoint 2007, one more search technology option - FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint has been added to SharePoint 2010 product family. Options now available are:
- Microsoft SharePoint Foundation 2010 search
- Microsoft Search Server 2010 Express
- Microsoft Search Server 2010
- Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010
- FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint
FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint provides the high-end search features (check the table below) and can search huge corpus of data extremely fast. It was not part of the Technical Preview but it will be available with public Beta. As of now, there is not much public documentation on it though :-(
The Search Technologies for SharePoint 2010 Products document compares and contrasts the above search technologies. The document covers each technology in brief along with topology options available. Copy-pasted below is the Search Capabilities comparison table from the document:
|
|
SharePoint Foundation 2010 |
Search Server 2010 Express |
Search Server 2010 |
SharePoint Server 2010 |
FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint |
|
Basic search |
ü |
ü |
ü |
ü |
ü |
|
Visual Best Bets
Keyword terms and synonyms defined by an administrator to enhance search results. For FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint only, a section of relevant information is displayed in addition to search results for a keyword term (for example, an image banner or HTML). |
|
Limited |
Limited |
Limited |
ü |
|
Scopes
Users can filter search results by using scopes. |
|
ü |
ü |
ü |
ü |
|
Search enhancements based on user context
Scopes Best Bets, visual Best Bets, and document promotions and demotions to a sub-group of employees. |
|
|
|
|
ü |
|
Custom properties
Manage which properties are indexed and how these are treated in search results. |
|
ü |
ü |
ü |
ü |
|
Property extraction
Extracts key information (people names, locations, company names) from unstructured text to use as additional managed properties. (Limited: title, author, and date only.) |
|
Limited |
Limited |
Limited |
ü |
|
Query federation
Federates results from multiple search sources. |
|
ü |
ü |
ü |
ü |
|
Query suggestions
Provides help with query formulation based on what the user types. |
|
ü |
ü |
ü |
ü |
|
Similar results
Generates a new search based on the selected search result. |
|
|
|
|
ü |
|
Sort results on managed properties or rank profiles
Sort results based on selected managed properties or by FAST Query Language (FQL) formula. |
|
|
|
|
ü |
|
Relevancy tuning by document or site promotions
Promote selected documents or sites as highly relevant results for a keyword. Demote documents or sites to give lower rank. (Limited: promote documents for a given site, not query specific.) |
|
Limited |
Limited |
Limited |
ü |
|
Shallow results refinement
Refine results using metadata associated with the top results. |
|
ü |
ü |
ü |
ü |
|
Deep results refinement
Refine results using metadata associated with all results. |
|
|
|
|
ü |
|
Previewers
Display inline previews of Word, PowerPoint, and Excel files. |
|
|
|
|
ü |
|
Windows 7 federation
Enterprise search results are available in Windows desktop search. |
|
ü |
ü |
ü |
ü |
|
People search
Search users to find people by name or expertise. |
|
|
|
ü |
ü |
|
Social search
Relevancy is improved by how people interact and relate with content by factoring in social tagging and the relationship of people to content and other people. |
|
|
|
ü |
ü |
|
Taxonomy integration
Takes advantage of user generated tags. Managed taxonomy influences search rankings and experience. |
|
|
|
ü |
ü |
|
Multi-tenant hosting
Data partitioning of crawled data based on tenants. |
|
|
|
ü |
|
|
Rich Web indexing support
Indexing of wide variety of Web content, including Flash. |
|
|
|
|
ü |
Item level scale table compares the index scalability:
|
|
Max Items that can be indexed |
|
Microsoft SharePoint Foundation 2010 search |
~ 10 million per search server |
|
Microsoft Search Server Express |
~ 300,000 with SQL Server Express, ~ 10 million with SQL Server |
|
Microsoft Search Server 2010 |
~ 100 million |
|
Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010 |
~ 100 million |
|
FAST Search Server 2010 for SharePoint |
500 million + |
HTH
A White Paper on SharePoint server and Office suite integration - Collaboration without compromise - SharePoint and Office 2010 is available from the SharePoint 2010 Benefits Overview page. This paper describes how the 2010, 2007, and 2003 versions of Office work together with the 2010, 2007, and 2003 versions of SharePoint technologies. Main focus though is on the integration features of the Microsoft Office 2010 with Microsoft SharePoint 2010.
The scenarios outlined in this paper show examples along with screenshots of how the SharePoint 2010 and Office 2010 applications integrate to deliver rich, intuitive, and easy-to-use capabilities to users. The scenarios cover the following value areas:
- Collaboration Without Compromise
- Bring Ideas to Life
- Anywhere Access
- The Practical IT Platform
If you are looking for a feature level comparison in a tabular format, you can refer to the appendices section at the end.
- Appendix A: Microsoft SharePoint 2010 with Different Versions of Microsoft Office (2010, 2007, 2003)
- Appendix B: Microsoft Office 2010 with Different Versions of Microsoft SharePoint (2010, 2007, 2003)
The paper concludes that to realize the best user experience with Office and SharePoint integration features, organizations should upgrade client programs to Office Professional Plus 2010 and server technologies to SharePoint 2010.
SharePoint Online subscriptions are purchased for a specific period of time. In case, your company does not renew it, subscriptions "expire". When a subscription expires, it will go through two phases before it is removed:
- Warning Phase - grace period after a subscription expires. When a subscription enters the warning phase, service administrators and users assigned to that subscription begin to receive warning notifications in the Microsoft Online Services Sign In application and My Company Portal
- Disabled Phase - data retention period starting from the day that the warning phase ends. During the disabled phase, user accounts assigned to that subscription are disabled and users are unable to access the service; however, service administrators assigned to that subscription can still access the service
Its important to understand this concept as it effects the data stored in the SharePoint sites and user access to the data. You can read the About Expiration of Subscriptions page for more details on the process.
Options available
You have 2 options in case the subscription expires:
- Renew expired subscription - your company can renew the expired subscription during both Warning and Disabled phases
- Export data - If you do not renew the expired subscription, the expired subscription will be removed after the disabled phase ends. So, you would need to export the data stored on SharePoint online sites
When you renew a subscription, you can choose to decrease the number of licenses of the subscription. However, if the total number of licenses in use exceeds the total number of paid licenses, in the Microsoft Online Services Administration Center the service administrator will see the Out of compliance warning for this subscription, and will see that the number of Total in use is greater than the number of Total licenses.
Saving SharePoint Online information
Microsoft SharePoint Online can contain many different types of information. The methods used to save the information will vary depending on the information type. Before starting the process of saving your company's SharePoint Online information, you should review the methods given in the About Saving SharePoint Online Information article and the issues associated with saving each type of information.
Save SharePoint Online Information article describes the procedures to save Microsoft SharePoint Online information from Microsoft Online Services to a set of local files. SharePoint Online administrators can view, download, and save all document library content in their organization’s SharePoint Online sites. Site owners can view, download, and save all document library content from sites for which they have administrator permissions. Four methods are available and discussed in this article:
- Use Windows Explorer
- Export to Office Excel
- Export to Office Access
- Export to Office Outlook
Convert from Trial to Paid Subscription
You can convert from a trial to a paid subscription by contacting the company from which you received your trial subscription. Please refer to Convert from Trial to Paid Subscription article for more details. Important points to note here are:
- If you decide not to convert from a trial to a paid subscription, you can export your data during the warning phase or disabled phase after your trial subscription expires
- You cannot recover data after the subscription is removed
- Any data not recovered by the end of the disabled phase will be permanently lost
Also refer to "Moving From Try to Buy" section in the Use Trial Subscriptions page in Microsoft Online Services Customer Portal Help website.
Since posting my last blog post - SharePoint 2010 documentation now available, I came across some more content available on Microsoft Download Center. Given below are the new resources I found:
SharePoint 2010: Developer Platform White Paper - An Introduction for ASP.NET Solution Architects by David Chapell. This white paper provides an overview of the SharePoint 2010 Developer Platform for ASP.NET developers
SharePoint 2010: Developer and IT Professional Learning Plan - This document provides information to help developers and IT professionals learn Microsoft SharePoint 2010
SharePoint 2010: Getting Started with Development on SharePoint 2010 Hands-on Labs in C# and Visual Basic - Use these 10 hands-on lab manuals for SharePoint 2010 to get started learning SharePoint 2010 development
SharePoint 2010: SharePoint Developer Platform Wall Poster - The SharePoint 2010 Developer Platform wall poster (PDF format) shows a view of the SharePoint 2010 developer tools, community ecosystem, execution environment, SharePoint Server 2010 workloads, and target application types. The poster is intended to be printed at 24 inches x 36 inches (61 centimeters x 91 centimeters).
Topologies for SharePoint Server 2010 - Describes common ways to build and scale farm topologies, including planning which servers to start services on
Hosting Environments for SharePoint 2010 Products - Summarizes the support for hosting environments and illustrates common hosting architectures
Microsoft Business Connectivity Services Model - Microsoft Business Connectivity Services enable users to interact with external data by using SharePoint lists and Microsoft Office 2010
Search Technologies for SharePoint 2010 Products - Compares and contrasts search technologies in SharePoint 2010 Products
Search Environment Planning for Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010 - This model describes primary architecture design decisions for search environments.
Search Architectures for Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010 - This model describes the physical and logical architecture components of the search system
Design Search Architectures for Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010 - This model describes the steps to determine a basic design for a SharePoint Server 2010 search architecture.
The SharePoint 2010 public Beta will be available in November 2009. You can start now by reading and knowing more about it as the SharePoint 2010 documentation and learning resources are now available on MSDN SharePoint Developer Center and TechNet's SharePoint Products TechCenter.
SharePoint 2010 post by Jeff Teper – Corporate Vice President, SharePoint Server, Microsoft on the Microsoft SharePoint Team Blog contains a nice summary of SharePoint 2010 features.
What's New information
You can start by reading the What's new in SharePoint Foundation 2010 (Windows SharePoint Services is now Microsoft SharePoint Foundation) and What's new in SharePoint Server 2010 pages in SharePoint Developer Center. Then read the What's New in SharePoint Server 2010 (Beta) page and What's New in SharePoint Foundation 2010 (Beta) in SharePoint Products TechCenter.
SharePoint Foundation Building Blocks provides a concise view of the primary underlying components of SharePoint Foundation.
For PerformancePoint Server 2007 developers, the place to start is What's new for PerformancePoint Services (SharePoint Server 2010) page.
Evaluation Guides
Models/Posters
Starting Development
Getting Started: How SharePoint 2010 Works module provides information on system requirements, which browsers are supported, and basic concepts of Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010
Setting Up the Development Environment for SharePoint Server article describes how to install a development environment with Microsoft SharePoint 2010 and Microsoft Visual Studio 2010.
Get Started Developing on SharePoint 2010 page has links to following 10 modules.
Upgrade Information
For information on upgrading current SharePoint 2007 installations, refer to SharePoint 2010 Upgrade Resource Center for guidance. There is lot of relevant information in Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010: Deprecated Types and Methods.
HTH
[Read the update to this post with more links here]
Analyst reports are a good reference point for customers evaluating products for their requirement. The Analyst Reports site on Microsoft PressPass is the place to look for analyst reports published by leading independent analyst firms on, or including, Microsoft.
Some recent SharePoint and FAST related reports available here are:
Magic Quadrant for Horizontal Portals (Gartner Research, Sept. 17, 2009)
Magic Quadrant for Information Access Technology (Gartner Research, Inc., Sept. 2, 2009)
The Forrester Wave: Collaboration Platforms, Q3 2009 (Forrester, August 6, 2009, .pdf file, 442 kb)
Magic Quadrant for Web Content Management (Gartner Research, Inc., Aug. 5, 2009)
HTH.
Part 3: Migration Process
Any Lotus Notes application has 3 parts to it:
- User Interfaces Pages or Forms – Lotus Notes Forms, Pages, Navigators, etc..
- Application Logic – Lotus Notes Scripts/Formulas in Action buttons, Agents etc..
- Data – Lotus Notes Documents
Given the architecture of Lotus Notes and APIs it provides, you can only migrate #3 i.e. the data out of its databases. That's the ground reality. So,
- If the application can be mapped to a List Template in SharePoint, you get all the user interface elements and features out of the box from SharePoint. Even if some list/library customization is required in SharePoint, the effort is small and manageable
- If application needs custom InfoPath form, ASP.NET form, Web Part(s) or complex workflows then those elements need to be custom developed and effort might be substantial
So, migration process and effort depends on whether a Lotus Notes application can be mapped to some out of the box or custom template in SharePoint or not.
Classifying Appplications
Classifying applications based on their complexity, features and integration requirements helps in:
- mapping each application to target solution
- evaluate and select migration tool (s)
- estimate effort required and prepare a project plan
As the Application Analysis Envisioning Process for Lotus Domino Applications guide mentions, dissecting the domino application and determining the baseline pattens will help you be successful in seeing the end-state solution that will replace the Domino Application. Some patterns mentioned in it are:
- Pattern 1 Document Management
- Pattern 2 Workflow
- Pattern 3 Connection to external data source
- Pattern 4 Connection to other notes application
- Pattern 5 Discussion databases
- Pattern 6 Team rooms
Based on your environment, you can identify more patterns and then use them to classify applications. One of the ways to classify them might be:
- Simple applications - can be mapped to standard SharePoint list/site templates
- Medium applications - applications without workflow - need custom list/site templates in SharePoint
- Complex applications - custom applications with workflow - need custom list/site templates and workflow development
- High Complexity applications - need extensive SharePoint application development
- Non-SharePoint apps - where SharePoint is not the right fit technically/strategically. They will get replaced by some existing .NET application, a LoB app or some standard package
Migration Tool Options
Microsoft Transporter Suite - Microsoft Transporter Suite is a set of interoperability and migration tools to migrate content from Lotus Domino servers or Generic POP/IMAP servers. For Lotus Domino the suite contains a set of tools for Directory and Free/Busy interoperability between Lotus Domino 6, 7 and 8 and Exchange Server 2007 and Windows Server 2003/2008 Active Directory. In addition for Lotus Domino the suite contains migration tools to migrate users, groups, personal address lists, mailboxes, personal mail archives, and applications from Lotus Domino 5, 6, 7 or 8 to Active Directory, Exchange Server 2007, and Windows SharePoint Services 3.0.
You can read the Microsoft Transporter Suite for Lotus Domino white paper for more details. The click-through flash demo - Microsoft Transporter Suite 2007 for Lotus Domino Demo: Application Data Migration shows how to use the Microsoft Transporter Suite 2007 for Lotus Domino to transfer application data to Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007.
A lot of migration tools are available from Microsoft partners. Some of these are:
It's difficult to make a recommendation on the tool to use. Microsoft's tool is free, rest of the tools have a license cost and support options which comes along with it.
I would advise you to first try out the Microsoft tool. If it does not suffice your requirement, download evaluation versions of the 3rd Party tools given above and test them on a sample set of your databases. Most vendors provide evaluation version and live demo or Live Meeting options. Appendix 3: Application Migration Tools Matrix in the Application Analysis Envisioning Process for Lotus Domino Applications guide provides a comparison table but most products have been upgraded since then.
There is tool specific content on some blogs also. For example, posts - Migrating Lotus Notes Applications to Microsoft SharePoint: Understanding Application Complexity and the Value of Consolidation and Automation and Thirteen ways to migrate a document to SharePoint on the Notes SharePoint Blog.
Some Tools do claim ability to migrate Lotus Notes Forms and code. Please do evaluate these claims using a trial version to see if the output meets your expectations or not.
IBM Lotus NotesSQL
IBM Lotus NotesSQL is the ODBC driver for Lotus Notes and Domino which allows ODBC-enabled data reporting tools, database tools, and application development tools to read, report, and update information that is stored in Domino databases (NSF files). You can use this driver to migrate data to Microsoft SQL databases in case the target solution is ASP.NET or a InfoPath based application with data in SQL database.
Tools to assist Co-existence
In case, co-existence of Lotus Notes and SharePoint environment is required for some time, there are tools available from Microsoft Partners which can help you in data integration.
Addition Resources for Reference
Application Templates for Windows SharePoint Services are out-of-box custom scenarios for the Windows SharePoint Services platform, tailored to address the needs and requirements of specific business processes or sets of tasks in organizations of any size.
Product Innovation Custom Application Comparison Demo shows a highly customized Lotus Domino application for processing new product ideas, compares that with the same application built on Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007, and highlights the ease of creating workflow and reports using Microsoft Office InfoPath 2007 and Excel Services.
Project Tracking Application Template Comparison Demo compares the out-of-the-box project tracking template applications from Lotus Domino and Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services 3.0, and shows how the integrated platform of SharePoint and Microsoft Office can create a more streamlined project management process.
Sales and Inventory Tracking Application Comparison Demo shows a custom suite of Lotus Domino applications developed for a sales organization, and compares that with a Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 sales and inventory tracking application with the same functionality, while highlighting the integrated capabilities of the Microsoft platform using SharePoint Server 2007, Microsoft SQL Server, and Microsoft Office InfoPath 2007.
