And we’re back! Welcome to Day Four of the Microsoft SharePoint Conference 2011.
I wanted to be sure to complete my session highlight notes. But after a short time to reflect, we can discuss the “big picture”. There was no single unifying theme, but the three biggest messages:
- SQL 2012 “Denali” adds some great BI functions when integrated into SharePoint – especially PowerView, the self-service function, PowerPivot, and SSRS Alerts. It also makes great strides in foundational architecture with “Always On” mode.
- Project Server 2010 has never been stronger, and will only get closer to SharePoint as it matures. If you already know SharePoint, why not use the best-of-breed EPM solution that you already know.
- You can expect a public preview of the next version of SharePoint late next year, around the November 2012 SharePoint Conference in Las Vegas. Message – get ready now. We can make lots of predictions about the upgrade paths, but here’s what to do now. Get upgraded, get your good content into SharePoint, and get the bad, old stuff out to archive. Now. You have a long runway to prepare, and will be well positioned for a simple upgrade in the next 12-18 months. It’s always easier moving from SharePoint “Now” to SharePoint “Next”.
You’ll be hearing more about the conference at KMA’s two live events in Waltham and Boston, November 18 & 29, 2011. More details at http://www.kma-llc.net
The biggest of big pictures was clearly FPWeb.net and their two story booth (no I don’t have a photo!). There were great stories on a smaller scale – Owen Allen and his on-the-fly promotion for SharePoint Directions (below).
Game show time at the Quest booth.
The freeze mob - (Yes, I’m in it.)
Disneyland.
Hanging out with the SharePoint Ninja.
Joey Patterson and his amazing haul of 15+ free autographed books. In short, a great chance to catch up with new technologies, new solutions, new friends and old ones.
Session Highlights
Here are highlights from a few sessions I visited:
Cloud Packing – Preparing for Migration to the Cloud
James Petrosky & Kimmo Forss, Microsoft
- Prune what you don’t need, keep “cassette tapes” but you don’t need them on your trip to cloud. When you pack to move, don't just take everything "in case we need it". Not everything belongs in SharePoint.
- Remove all rights from the file. If no one screams within 15 days, you can probably get rid of it. But there’s no substitute for human judgment in pruning content to prepare a move to Office365.
- Finding the owner is always a challenge for older content
- Jim showed a really interesting content analysis tool for #SharePointOnline migrations being developed by Microsoft.- it allows you to pull the data into PerformancePoint for more analysis.
- Make sure the processes you implement match *today's* processes - not what was implemented the last time\
- Office 365 migrations – remember, tools (alone) don’t build houses. It’s best to get the metadata onto the documents or into a manifest in advance of a cloud move – you can’t run server based auto-classifier on Office 365.
Upgrading Custom Code
Becky Isserman guided a large crowd festooned with free mustachesthrough upgrade tips for custom code.
- Content Editor Web Part upgrades remove all embedded code during upgrade to SP1.
- Conversion to client object model code is a manual process – tip, the Silverlight Client Object Model lives in 14 Hive TEMPLATE\Layouts\ClientBin.
- For sandbox solutions , Visual Studio Power Tools have a virtual visual web part for sandbox solutions – you can download it from http://t.co/9uWktkp7
- Don’t upgrade branding – redo to take advantage of the new master pages and renderers.
- Web parts and workflows (if you change two DLLs) upgrade well
See you next year in Las Vegas (Or in DC, Denver, Florida, Seattle, San Francisco, Phoenix, Atlanta, San Diego, Boston, Orlando, or NY before that!)
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