Security and Compliance Guidance with SharePoint
March 29, 2012
Maintaining security standards and governance compliance in the enterprise is not always easy when trying to minimize risks and maximize access. Mike Fleck addresses the issue in, “SharePoint, Security, and Compliance.” Fleck explains:
“One thing I think that the SharePoint community can easily agree on is that adequately securing SharePoint implementations and meeting compliance obligations are good things. The many capabilities and advantages that SharePoint brings to the enterprise are well documented…Security and compliance are closely related topics. Compliance regulations dictate numerous security controls. Having a strong security posture makes meeting compliance requirements (and proving compliance to auditors) far easier.”
Fleck’s article is the first in a series on security and compliance as related to the collaboration platform. SharePoint architects and administrators may benefit from the read. Some guidance might help as you look to prioritize high level concerns and pertinent questions for increased SharePoint security and compliance.
While information creation and SharePoint adoption continue to grow, you may find the platform is not the complete out-of-the-box solution for enterprise security and compliance needs. If you need a bit of help with it you might check into Mindbreeze and their dynamic search technologies that bring together security, mobility, and information pairing.
Fabasoft Mindbreeze exceeds relevant international standards, including ISO 27001, ISO 20000, ISO 9001, and SAS 70 Typ II. Here you can read more about Mindbreeze certifications:
“Fabasoft has received ISO 20000 certification for the IT services Folio Cloud and Folio SaaS. This furthers the Austrian company’s strategy of implementing international standards, with it already being ISO 9001 and 27001 certified. Fabasoft is one of just twelve companies in Austria with ISO 20000 certification.”
With strict compliance standards, certified security, and regular external audits, Mindbreeze can maximize your information assets with security reliability.
Philip West, March 29, 2012
Sponsored by Pandia.com
Considerations for SharePoint Career Development
March 28, 2012
Over at the ShareMuch Blog, Yaroslav Pentsarskyy looks at SharePoint career development in, “How Come Joe-the-SharePoint-Guy Doesn’t Know? SharePoint Career Evolution.” As SharePoint continues to expand and develop, IT employees have to keep up with continuing education and an evolving skill set. Pentsarskyy shares his subjective suggestion:
1. Pick your discipline area (Infrastructure, Technical BA, Developer, User Interface Developer etc.). Something you`re prepared to be an expert in;
2. Be clear on deliverables you are going to have to produce as a part of your area focus (Design Document? DR plan? Code? Governance Plan? etc.). Deliverables will outline your role on projects (usually your title is too vague, everyone wants to know what you`re actually going to produce);
3. Pick a few but not too many product areas (BI, Collab, Publishing etc) and be good at those.
Pentsarskyy warns that trying to keep up with everything may leave you as an expert in nothing. Honing in on a development area may be beneficial to many IT employees that feel stretched too thin across growing collaboration products.
SharePoint is a ubiquitous platform that continues to grow. To add rich value to your system while also providing an easier experience for your users, consider an intuitive solution like Fabasoft Mindbreeze.
Their out-of-the-box solution gives you information pairing, mobility, and a more powerful search in a user-centered environment:
“Fabasoft Mindbreeze Enterprise understands you, or more precisely understands exactly what the most important information is for you at any given moment. It’s a center of excellence and simultaneously your personal assistant for all questions. The information pairing technology brings enterprise and Cloud together.”
Consider the full suite of products and solutions at Fabasoft Mindbreeze.
Philip West, March 28, 2012
Sponsored by Pandia.com
Overcoming Perceived SharePoint Barriers with Mindbreeze
March 26, 2012
Over at the AIIM.org SharePoint Experts Blog, Rich Blank confronts the tensions between SharePoint adoption, social technologies, and business goals in, “Is SharePoint an Obstacle in Your Organization.”
Blank summarizes:
“Bottom line is that SharePoint is not the obstacle. SharePoint has simply forced organizations to focus on real underlying information management, governance, compliance, service delivery, and cultural change issues at scale. In fact, if you view things holistically, the vast Microsoft ecosystem provides all the capabilities, security, and compliance required for effective communication, collaboration, news/information, team sites, communities, social, search, ECM at an attractive total cost of ownership.”
Blank suggests that organizations can focus on delivering collaboration as a service in order to introduce capabilities to users. He also warns against rushing into the hype of social business without carefully considering the overall architectural vision and basic information management principles.
This is not the first discussion on SharePoint out-of-the-box capabilities not meeting collaboration expectations in the organization. One way to make your SharePoint system accessible and more powerful is by integrating a third party solution. We like the feedback we’ve heard from customers of Fabasoft Mindbreeze. Mobility and Cloud search capabilities are just some of the Mindbreeze benefits. With information pairing, Mindbreeze allows you to connect valuable business knowledge with the right people:
“It sounds easy at first glance but it’s technologically highly complex. 6 years of research and development work later, Fabasoft Mindbreeze has the answer: Information pairing. This involves the boundless networking of company relevant information within an enterprise or organization and placing it in the Cloud. In my opinion acting in this way in all business issues is reliable, dynamic and profitable – the basis for competitive advantage.”
Read more about the full suite of solutions at http://www.mindbreeze.com/.
Philip West, March 26, 2012
Sponsored by Pandia.com
Navigating SharePoint Trials
March 22, 2012
SharePoint has almost become a corporate mandate, but how can you tell if and how SharePoint will work for your organization? Many companies want to run a trial to see if SharePoint is a good fit. CMSWire covers some SharePoint trial options in, “Office365 or SharePoint Foundation – What’s the Best SharePoint Trial?”
Chris Wright covers some of the major pros and cons:
But the world is slowly changing. The Cloud is now everywhere, and many enterprise applications and services are happily migrating. SharePoint is one of them, included as part of Microsoft’s wider Office365 offering. SharePoint Online, available as a free trial for 30 days, is now another way to investigate the world of SharePoint. However it is important to realize that Online differs from Foundation, and indeed all the locally installed versions, in a number of significant ways. So for the new users wanting to evaluate SharePoint, which is best — SharePoint Foundation or SharePoint Online?
But what happens if a trial is run and SharePoint is not a great fit? The internet is full of content generated by SharePoint developers and users who give practical advice for customizing SharePoint to more effectively meet certain needs. If you determine that your organization cannot invest added time and money in customization, there is another option, third party solutions.
Fabasoft Mindbreeze is a strong enterprise search suite that is already tailored to the needs of end users and developers, cutting out the customization step and allowing more intuitive interfacing with all users.
Fabasoft Mindbreeze is more than a search:
Fabasoft Mindbreeze Enterprise understands you, or to be more precise, understands what the most important information is for you at any precise moment in time. It is the center of excellence for your knowledge and simultaneously your personal assistant for all questions. The information pairing technology brings enterprise and Cloud data together.
Read more about their offerings and see if Fabasoft Mindbreeze might be an asset to your organization.
Emily Rae Aldridge, March 22, 2012
Sponsored by Pandia.com
To Cloud or Not to Cloud, That is the Question
March 12, 2012
Less than a year ago Microsoft launched Office 365, allowing Cloud access to a comprehensive set of software, including SharePoint Online. And while many businesses saw migrating Exchange email services to the Cloud as a no-brainer, the same positive perception has not be given to SharePoint Online. Chris McNulty gets into the details in, “The SharePoint Decision: Do We Choose Cloud or On-Premises?”
When examining the cold hard facts about SharePoint Cloud functionality, McNulty has the following to say:
People would be blown away by the depth of functionality Microsoft made available in the cloud. I mean it – there would be wild celebrations and stampedes in the street! But that’s not the perception of Office 365-based SharePoint. Instead, there’s a lot of needless focus on what’s left out.’ (SharePoint Online does lack a few features relative to on-premises SharePoint.)
While SharePoint Online shows a lot of promise and continued improvement, it is noted that it still lags behind the full functionality of an on-site SharePoint installation. However, some third-party solutions are available that are much more agile, and therefore already display greater Cloud functionality.
Check out Fabasoft Mindbreeze and their enterprise solution, which is fully functional as an on-site installation or on the Cloud.
Fabasoft Mindbreeze Enterprise and the Cloud fit together perfectly. The Cloud makes your business mobile; Mindbreeze finds its way in the Cloud. This intelligent search is available as a Cloud service. This means that, if you so desire, Fabasoft Mindbreeze can run without any installation whatsoever – we operate the search engine for you. All the data that you manage in the Cloud is made searchable by Fabasoft Mindbreeze.
While SharePoint gets better with each new release, third-party solutions have the advantage of being more agile and being updated more frequently. See if Fabasoft Mindbreeze can replace or supplement your current enterprise infrastructure, improving its performance in the Cloud.
Emily Rae Aldridge, March 12, 2012
Sponsored by Pandia.com
Librarian Solutions to SharePoint Problems
March 6, 2012
When time and money is spent on a SharePoint implementation, it makes sense that companies would require that their employees jump on board and start using the application. However, this has led to an epidemic of frightened and frustrated employees, and an overflowing of training and tips on the internet. Lorette S. J. Weldon addresses this issue and uses her library science training to craft a solution in, “Help with SharePoint is on the way in The Adventures of SharePoint Reading Bee© Animated Series.”
Weldon states her motivation for developing a unique training tool:
To maintain Weiser’s belief of being sufficiently trained in order to be free to use the technology, for example, SharePoint, for the job, I have created The Adventures of SharePoint Reading Bee Animated Series. Librarians and information professionals are free to suggest ideas for future episodes ‘anonymously’. This animated series is a free service trying to meet the business needs of setting up SharePoint to perform needed tasks from within the office environment . . . librarians have been increasingly asking me to find out how Microsoft SharePoint can help them. The Adventures of SharePoint Reading Bee will try to help break it down for the non-programmer in answers that do not require coding. The SharePoint versions to be covered will be 2007 and 2010.
We commend the innovative approach to SharePoint training. The key is the user focus, without the need for programming and coding. But the major drawback of SharePoint is a fundamental one, something that cannot be overcome with training, the obtrusiveness of the program. Weldon herself laments that SharePoint does not run seamlessly in the background. However, some third-party enterprise solutions do just that.
We like Fabasoft Mindbreeze and their suite of enterprise solutions.
Fabasoft Mindbreeze Enterprise understands you, or to be more precise, understands what the most important information is for you at any precise moment in time. It is the center of excellence for your knowledge and simultaneously your personal assistant for all questions. The information pairing technology brings enterprise and Cloud data together.
If SharePoint is a struggle for your employees, explore training options such as those offered by Weldon or consider adding an intuitive third-party solution like Fabasoft Mindbreeze.
Emily Rae Aldridge, March 6, 2012
Sponsored by Pandia.com
SharePoint, Training Not Required?
February 24, 2012
Lorette S. J. Weldon, a librarian, offers a unique approach to conquering SharePoint in her piece, “SharePoint, Training Not Required.” Weldon argues that many of the skills and tools used by information professionals transfer well to the SharePoint environment, therefore, intense training is not required if some analogies are made.
Weldon observes:
Through my study last year, I found out that librarians were using SharePoint in the corporate, government, and non-profit sectors . . . Microsoft embedded social media tools within the SharePoint platform. World-wide librarians have been customizing SharePoint by using their social networking skills from MySpace, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc. It is a ‘plug and play’ social media tool for the office. It has helped to embed the researching skills of the librarians within the normal business flow of their sectors.
Weldon makes a unique observation about the connection between librarians’ skills and their ability to navigate SharePoint. However, a chorus of opinion does exist amongst those who are not trained information professionals and cannot successfully navigate SharePoint. For those individuals who are muddling through, a smart third party solution like Fabasoft Mindbreeze may be worth a second look.
Read more about their quality, usability, and style:
The Fabasoft Mindbreeze Enterprise user interface is based on Web 2.0 technology and combines simplicity with elegance. The operation is self-explanatory. Work just as you are used to. Access your data from anywhere. Also on smartphones and tablets. Elegant design, easy operation. With you wherever you are. Find and access your enterprise and cloud information straight away.
Until we are all trained information professionals, work with Fabasoft Mindbreeze to improve the quality of your SharePoint experience.
Emily Rae Aldridge, February 24, 2012
Sponsored by Pandia.com
Five Fundamentals to Remember for your SharePoint Intranet Development
February 20, 2012
If you are considering a SharePoint intranet deployment in your organization, you may want to read James Robertson’s, “Don’t Ask Staff What Features They Want on a New SharePoint Intranet.” Robertson points out that staff may often be unfamiliar with SharePoint capabilities and unsure how to articulate what functions they need in the farm to enable new ways of working. Instead, Robertson provides five fundamental approaches for determining your new SharePoint intranet functionalities, one being how to understand staff needs through an effective intranet needs analysis.
Other fundamentals to remember include understanding the patterns of work in your organization, developing a common definition of what SharePoint is among all stakeholders, using other organization’s intranets as a guide for what works (and what does not), and starting with a simple, easy to navigate intranet.
And the take away point for your intranet planning,
Most of all, don’t fall into the trap of starting with SharePoint features, and working back to the project scope. Even with the best will the world, it’s easy to get caught up in technology discussions and decisions, losing sight of the overall objectives and outcomes.
Robertson’s points are all sound advice for embarking into the next phases or your organization’s development in the enterprise search environment. Asking the right questions will help ensure that limited project resources are spent on the key aspects rather than unnecessary functionalities that will only complicate the system.
A third party solution, like Fabasoft Mindbreeze, can also help you connect the dots in your SharePoint adoption. The Fabasoft Folio Connector integrates all your business information from the intranet, Cloud, internet, and knowledge portals in the corporate-wide search, while maintaining your strict access rights. With Mindbreeze, users can easily search and reuse information from documents, contacts, projects, Wiki articles, conference agendas, and more.
Philip West, February 20, 2012
Sponsored by Pandia.com
Enterprise Search Giants Keep Focus on Cloud and Social Solutions
February 17, 2012
Sim Ahmed discusses IBM vs. Microsoft in enterprise search in his recent ComputerWorld article, “SharePoint is a ‘Document Coffin,’ says IBM.” The ‘document coffin’ comments from IBM happened at the Lotusphere 2012 conference where they announced a host of new features for their line of enterprise software in an effort to offer up some competitive edge against SharePoint and Google’s Apps for Businesses. IBM is no stranger to critiques for their lacking enterprise software as SharePoint adoption continues to increase.
So what does IBM have in store?
The theme of this year’s Lotusphere is business made social, and IBM has taken the opportunity to announce several social networking orientated changes to its line of enterprise software. IBM demoed new additions to its Connections community portal product, including the new Activity Stream feature which resembles status feeds on most popular social networks. The Activity Stream can pull in information from multiple apps and feeds, including third party applications by using the OpenSocial framework. Community managers can gain a better understanding of their users with built in metrics and sentiment tracking.
In addition, IBM showcased their much anticipated cloud-based document collaboration and editing software called IBM Docs. But critics have been quick to point out that any system can become a document graveyard without the right people and planning in place ahead of time.
No matter your system, you need the right solutions in place to facilitate findability and reusability of your business information. For an established Cloud solution, consider Fabasoft Mindbreeze. Here you can read and see the easy and powerful search features of Mindbreeze in Folio Cloud.
William Wallace explains,
Whether you need to find an e-mail, document, contact, team room or any other object, Mindbreeze searches your Cloud with speed and intelligence. Under Mindbreeze in Folio Cloud you can select the sources that you want to search quite simply via a menu box directly in the search screen. You can conveniently select the source(s) that are relevant for your search and also select restrictions based on the tick-box options.
Folio Cloud gives you search and collaboration capabilities and the most return for your enterprise search investments. Point your browser to Fabasoft Mindbreeze to find what works for you.
Philip West, February 17, 2012
Sponsored by Pandia.com
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
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