Speaking at the New Zealand Community SharePoint Conference 2009

New Zealand SharePoint Community Conference
 
I’ll be traveling halfway around the world next week to speak at the New Zealand Community SharePoint Conference in Wellington, New Zealand.  I’m really looking forward to the trip, even if it is the middle of winter in New Zealand right now.  My wife and I plan to stay in New Zealand for a week after the conference ends to do some sightseeing.  I just got a new Digital SLR camera that I’m hoping to try out so you may even see some pictures if you stay tuned.
 
Abstracts for my talks are listed below.  If you happen to be anywhere near Wellington next week stop in and join us.  There’s going to be a lot of good content. I hope to see you there and hope you’ll find my talks useful.  You can register using the following link:
 
 
Anonymous Access: Everything you always wanted to know, but didn’t know to ask
Enabling Anonymous Access in SharePoint isn’t just a matter of flipping a switch in IIS manager.  Anonymous Access must be enabled in IIS and then configured in SharePoint.  But there are also situations where this basic configuration isn’t sufficient.  In this talk we’ll review how to enable and configure anonymous access for SharePoint web sites, lists, and libraries.  Then we’ll turn our attention to strategies that can be used overcome specific problems with SharePoint anonymous access.  We’ll demonstrate solutions and workarounds for questions like:
  1. How do you require authentication for some items while maintaining anonymous access for the rest?
  2. What content from a personal MySite can be accessed via anonymous access?
  3. How do you enable anonymous responses to a discussion list?
  4. Can BLOGS and Wiki sites be used in an anonymous access site collection?
 
Migrating ASP.NET Apps: Four ways to convert them to SharePoint
The establishment of a new SharePoint Portal frequently involves the temporary or permanent migration of an existing ASP.NET application to the new SharePoint environment.  There are at least four different ways that this can be accomplished.  Choosing the correct method is a matter of balancing the amount of effort involved against the resulting functionality and performance.  In this talk we’ll demonstrate the following four approaches and discuss the strengths and weaknesses of each approach.
  1. Using a Page Viewer web part to display the existing website from inside SharePoint.
  2. Configuring the ASP.NET website to run from a Virtual Directory inside the SharePoint Web Application 
  3. Converting the existing ASP.NET web pages and code beside files to run inside a SharePoint web site. 
  4. Refactoring the ASP.NET web site as a set of Web Parts in the SharePoint site.

FREE Intro to SharePoint Development Training

FREE is GOOD Right?
I just noticed that my last several posts have all been about FREE offers.  First it was the announcement that SharePoint Designer could be downloaded for free starting April 2. Then it was an offer to try out a free online seminar to see if you wanted to attend an online conference.  In these tough economic times free is always good right?
 
This time its a FREE online training class to provide you with an Intro to SharePoint development.  The class also gives you a chance to try out Mindsharp’s virtual lab environment. Our online classes provide each student with an online VMware session running SharePoint where they can do configuration and development just like we do in our live classes. Why not give it a try?  After all, what have you got to lose, its FREE?
 
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SP2 is coming

In all the excitement about the establishment of a name and broad dates for release of the next version of SharePoint it would be easy to overlook the upcoming release of a mere service pack.  But don’t miss out on the release of this one.  Each time Microsoft has released a service pack or update for SharePoint there has been a marked improvement in functionality and stability.  SP2 will be no exception and the Office Service Pack team just announced that the it will be available on April 28th.  A short list of anticipated improvements for your SharePoint server is quoted from the release announcement below.  You’ll want to read the release announcement to look at all the changes in store for the whole office platform.  You can read the whole announcement here.  In two weeks I’ll add a link pointing to where you can download the Service Packs for WSS and MOSS.

Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 SP2 and Microsoft Office SharePoint Server SP2 include fixes and enhancements designed to improve performance, availability, and stability in your server farms. SP2 provides the groundwork for future major releases of SharePoint Products and Technologies.

  • An STSADM command line that scans your server farm to establish whether it is ready for upgrade to the next version of SharePoint and provides feedback and best practice recommendations on your current environment.
  • SP2 offers support for a broader range of Web browsers.
  • Substantial improvements to Forms-based authentication.

Windows Server 2008 SP2 and Windows Server R2 will be supported on their release.

Enterprise Content Management (ECM)

  • The performance and stability of content deployment and variations feature has been improved.
  • A new tool has been added to the STSADM command-line utility that enables a SharePoint administrator to scan sites that use the variations feature for errors.

WSS SP2 Download Get It Here!

MOSS SP2 Download Get It Here!

It’s OFFICIAL, SharePoint Server 2010!

SharePoint Server 2010!
The first official comment on a prospective ship date for the next version of SharePoint was released by Microsoft today.  In an interview with Chris Capossela, senior vice president of Microsoft’s Information Worker Product Management Group, it was announced that the next wave of Office products currently known as Office 14 by most people will be released starting in the second half of 2009.  The first product to be released will be Exchange 2010 which enters public beta today. You can get the Exchange 2010 beta here.  According to Chris the SharePoint Server 2010 beta will be available for tech review in the third quarter of 2009 and will release to manufacturing during the first half of 2010.  you can read the article in its entirety here.

FREE SSWUG.ORG Community Event!

Recently I Bloged about the upcoming SSWUG SharePoint Virtual Conference where I will be presenting 3 talks.  I even provided a VIP discount code that will save you $10 off the cost of the conference.  VIP code: SPVPSTSP09
 
But maybe you’re not sold on the idea of attending a virtual conference.  Maybe you don’t want to pay even a discounted price just to find out you don’t like the virtual format.  Well here’s your chance.  The SSWUG is sponsoring a Free, yes I said FREE, virtual community event using the same conferencing features that they will use for the spring SharePoint conference.  The event will be held on Friday, April 17, 2009 from 9AM to noon Eastern time. So here’s your chance to try out Online Virtual Conferencing and see if it fits your needs.  Register for the Spring Community event at this address: https://www.vconferenceonline.com/shows/spring09/sql/s09event.asp
 

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