Protected: SharePoint Search Can Be Visual
February 15, 2012
SharePoint Veteran Discusses Mistake Trends Among New Developers
February 15, 2012
In “5 Common Mistakes Made by New SharePoint Developers,” James Love discusses ways new solutions developers can avoid some common SharePoint mistakes. Love covers a number of important tenants developers should keep in mind when asked to develop a solution in the farm, including doing the right research, asking the right questions, and understanding best practices.
One way to avoid many mistakes is by first understanding and researching what the SharePoint platform can do. Love explains:
Let’s face it. SharePoint is big. Massive. Enormous. Possibly bloated, even. It can do one hell of a lot of things, and one of the things that trips up a developer when asked to do something in SharePoint, is that they might not realize that SharePoint already does part of what they need. So they end up reinventing the wheel. Sometimes reinventing the wheel means you end up with a bigger wheel, but also you will have to look after and support that wheel for when it breaks, and you may also have wasted a load of time making that bigger wheel. Sometimes though, the wheel that comes with SharePoint might be square shaped, and thus not do what is required, forcing one to reinvent it. Always find out if you can if SharePoint can already do something that you need it to, before embarking on development effort to build something.
It is definitely a worthy read for new developers and a good way to learn from someone who has been through the mistakes before.
Instead of reinventing a square wheel that doesn’t do what you need in SharePoint, consider a third party solution. We like Fabasoft Mindbreeze. Mindbreeze gives your users the search and navigation experience they need. Here you can read about the Fabasoft Mindbreeze InApp – Development Environment. The easy to use tutorials will help you learn how to work in the environment, such as integrating a custom data source. To avoid common mistakes in SharePoint, check out the full suite of solutions at Fabasoft Mindbreeze.
Philip West, February 15, 2012
Sponsored by Pandia.com
Protected: For Maximum SharePoint Development and Customization Option Invest a Bit of Research Time
February 14, 2012
Enterprise Cloud Services Look for Security and Compliance Solutions
February 14, 2012
Christian Verstraete of HP’s Manufacturing and Distributions Industries Worldwide, recently published, “3 Key Reasons for Enterprise Cloud Services.” He argues there is a place for the Enterprise Cloud alongside the private Cloud and public Cloud. Focus on business critical tasks, namely security, is needed for enterprise cloud services to really take-off.
Verstraete also addresses compliance issues as related to the U.S. Patriot Act. The controversial act was enacted by the U.S. Congress on October 26, 2001 at the request of then President George W. Bush in response to the September 11th terrorist attacks. The U.S. Patriot Act gives both domestic and international surveillance powers to the Justice Department for monitoring American citizens and others within its jurisdiction.
So why does this impact Cloud services? Many in the industry have pointed out that Microsoft may have to share information without notifying the owner, which some, like ZDNet, says affected European Cloud adoption. Verstraete explains these concerns for CIOs:
Another area of concern is how privacy data is managed. Google faces probes over privacy issues; Facebook makes headlines with moves that cause privacy concerns. Ok, these issues are not directly related with public clouds, but the moves concern many CIOs. They want to make absolutely sure they are compliant with legislation, and so are looking for cloud service providers that can guarantee that and are prepared to put it in their contracts.
Fabasoft Mindbreeze uses information pairing technologies to combine your on-site data with Cloud information while addressing security concerns, including those surrounding the Patriot Act. Here you can read about the Folio Cloud by Mindbreeze:
Folio Cloud is certified and tested according to the most important standards for security and reliability: ISO 9001, ISO 27001, ISO 20000 and SAS 70 Type II. The saving of data takes place in European data centers – the data remains in the European Union. Folio Cloud is based on Open Source software and is free from American owned software products. Access to European Cloud data by American authorities according to the ‘US Patriot Act’ is therefore ruled out.
Check out the full suite of solutions at Mindbreeze to find what works for you.
Philip West, February 14, 2012
Protected: Common SharePoint Security Mistakes Are Easy to Make
February 13, 2012
SharePoint 2010 Solutions for Incremental Crawl Problems
February 13, 2012
The blogosphere is full of fixes and solutions for SharePoint 2010 quirks and problems. Unfortunately, we know that many of these solutions come from the pain and suffering of others – others who have had to figure these things out because of something that SharePoint failed to do. The article, “Scheduled Incremental Crawls Suddenly Stopped Due to a Stale Timer Service in SharePoint 2010” is a perfect example.
The author describes the issue he had with the SharePoint 2010 timer service:
It is always fun to get back on site after a couple of days off work. SharePoint 2010 is like an annoying little critter, if you’re not there to cuddle with it, it will do the most strange things. I currently have a support case open regarding some issues with crawled properties (I hope that will be another story to tell another day) and went into the Search Service Application admin pages in Central Admin to check some things. When poking around I noticed that the incremental crawl hasn’t been run for a few days . . . I fired up an incremental crawl manually and that worked, waited for the next incremental crawl to start – and it didn’t. Also tried a full crawl manually – which worked fine, but the scheduled crawls never started.
Ultimately, the author found a solution and was able to get everything back up and running. We know that SharePoint is a strange beast (or annoying little critter as the author stated) and these types of issues are common. However, many organizations are turning to third party solutions to either improve their SharePoint installation or replace it completely. Many find that these third party solutions are more tailored to the end user and save frustration on the part of the SharePoint administrator. One solution receiving accolades is Fabasoft Mindbreeze.
When the solution won KM World Trendsetting Product of the Year for 2011, KM World had the following to say about the easy and efficiency of the solution:
Fabasoft Mindbreeze Appliance as a pre-packaged solution (hardware and software) offers a quick and easy way to enjoy a high-end enterprise search solution out-of-the-box. The product is ready to use within in a very short timeframe.
If you are tired of troubleshooting SharePoint issues on a micro level, explore the other third party solutions available, paying particular attention to Fabasoft Mindbreeze.
Emily Rae Aldridge, February 13, 2012
Sponsored by Pandia.com
Protected: Don’t Panic! Relax, SharePoint Is Easy with the Right Knowledge
February 11, 2012
Protected: Learn How To Fix the Most Common SharePoint Mistakes
February 10, 2012
When Disaster Strikes – Loss of a SharePoint Farm
February 10, 2012
Most SharePoint developers and administrators have nightmares about losing their content. Any number of things can go wrong when one deals with fragile electronic data storage and retrieval. Quite frankly, it is a miracle that data disasters do not strike more often. Our blog author, Paul, describes his terrifying account in “Five Things I Learned From Losing My SharePoint Farm.”
He recounts his thoughts and actions immediately after the loss:
I went home and made the first sensible decision of the evening. I went to bed. Partly I thought I should stay up and work on the problem but I was shattered and I wasn’t going to solve anything in the state I was in. When I woke up – at 5:00AM, screaming – I got to work and thankfully by midday I had the farm back in a working state and all the data accessible. During those painful hours I learned 5 valuable lessons that I thought were worth sharing for relative newcomers – like me – to SharePoint.
Paul goes on to suggest some practical solutions so that others do not suffer his same loss. Ideas include regular SQL backups and details documentation that is stored outside of the SharePoint installation itself, outside being the operative word there.
Many organizations are turning to smart third party solutions to help make the backup and restore process much simpler. Add automatic backup to the features of the Cloud and SharePoint administrator nightmares could be greatly reduce in frequency and severity.
One alternative that many organizations are turning to is Fabasoft Mindbreeze. Their comprehensive suite of solutions can stand alone or compliment an existing SharePoint infrastructure. Particular attention is given to their backup and restore options here.
Emily Rae Aldridge, February 10, 2012
Sponsored by Pandia.com
A Corner for Helpful SharePoint Info
February 10, 2012
Johnny’s RIA Corner publishes some valuable information, like “Fast Tips for FAST for SharePoint #2.” However, we have to say that the site wins the Hard-to-Read-SharePoint-Information Award. The inverted colors are really hard on the eyes, especially in articles with multi-colored code. Please, Johnny, consider fixing this trendy problem.
The article mentioned above shares a couple of query tips. The write up states:
When trying to query for a document that has a question mark (?) in its name or address as part of a FQL query, you may notice weird behavior from FAST. . . . Sending the query as is, will cause FAST to automatically evaluate the question mark as a wildcard character that will match any single character. Since this is not our desired result, we need to tell FAST not to use wildcards in our specific string.
The code changes for achieving this feat is included in the post.
Cynthia Murrell, February 10, 2012
Sponsored by Pandia.com
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