LESSONS LEARNED IN THE PAST 11 YEARS OF IMPLEMENTING SHAREPOINT (AND COUNTING) Ishai Sagi Extelligent Design ()

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LESSONS LEARNED IN THE PAST 11 YEARS OF IMPLEMENTING

SHAREPOINT (AND COUNTING)

Ishai Sagi

Extelligent Design (www.exd.com.au)

WHO AM I?• Director and Solution Architect at Extelligent Design (

www.exd.com.au)• SharePoint MVP since 2007• Author of “SharePoint How To” 2007 and 2010 books• Co-Manage the Canberra User Group• Speaker: Australia, Singapore, Germany, Canada• Blog: www.sharepoint-tips.com• Twitter: @ishaisagi• What’s with the hair?

AGENDA• History of SharePoint (2001-2010)

• What we learned in 2001

• What we learned in 2003

• What we learned in 2007

• What we learned in 2010

• Summary of Lessons Learnt• My View : Using SharePoint as an

Organic, Evolution-driven Information Management System - Empower Your Users

SHAREPOINT 2001 – IT BEGINS• SharePoint Team Services part of

office, not part of portal• Hierarchical Database (like the file

system)• 100% dashboard, 0% collaboration• Introduction of Web Parts (renamed

from “nuggets” in outlook dashboard)

SHAREPOINT 2001 – SOME ISSUES• No one knows how it should be used –

theories abound• Disconnected from other Microsoft

products (no visual studio development, no connection to CMS or STS) except for office (WebDav)

• Competed with Microsoft Content Management Server

• Not running .NET

SHAREPOINT 2001 STORY – IMPLEMENTING 1ST TIME• Implementing beta• Lesson learnt…

SHAREPOINT 2001 STORY – RECORD MANAGEMENT• Developed late 2001• Bought by one client• Served to show how fragile the

foundation was• Highlighted issues with what

methodology should be used – use the portal’s interface, or develop your own and use the portal as database?

SHAREPOINT 2001 LESSONS LEARNT• People think of time saved to themselves, not to the

company• People are less likely to open their portal than they are

to open their emails. • Tasks management must be email integrated, with

workflows.• Document management system must be robust,

backup and restore must be granular.• Every client wants something different from the

same system• Some projects should not use SharePoint…

SHAREPOINT 2003 – BECOMING WORKABLE• SharePoint Team Services (renamed WSS) as

the basis• Visual Studio development• Web Parts are .NET, but not part of the .NET

framework. • No workflows yet (except 3rd party)

• WSS brought a focus shift to team collaboration

• Introduction of user profiles

SHAREPOINT 2003 – NOT THERE YET• Limited in big team collaboration

(taxonomies not scaling)• Permissions – lost the ability to deny

access. No document level permission. Difference in how permissions worked in SPS and WSS.

• SPS have “Areas” – which were not 100% WSS.

• Still competing with CMS

SHAREPOINT 2003 PROJECT STORY• Building a migration application to

migrate 2001 to 2003

SHAREPOINT 2003 – LESSONS LEARNT• Upgrade and migrate are completely

different things• Analysis of how you should use the new

system is more important than analysis of how your current system works

• Installing latest patches onto SharePoint, .NET and Windows can be critical.

SHAREPOINT 2007 – SYNERGY!• One product to rule them all- everything is

standardized on WSS, replaces CMS.• Better taxonomy management (content types

and site columns)• Introduction of Business data catalogue• Introduction of Page Layouts and Master

Pages• Workflow development as part of the

Windows Workflow Foundation

SHAREPOINT 2007 EVEN BETTER• Support the .NET Web Parts• Federated Search (as part of a service

pack)• Item level security comes back• SharePoint Designer replaces FrontPage

and adds power user workflow designer, editing content in a client application.

SHAREPOINT 2007 PROJECT STORY• Building intranets for two government agencies• Analysing existing applications to be migrated reveals

interesting results• Training end users, developers and Infrastructure

experts at the beginning of project• Corporate Directory is the #1 requirement of any

intranet• Expectations of performance from the platform

sometimes exceed infrastructure capabilities• Used 3rd party applications to migrate, and to

enhance

SHAREPOINT 2007 LESSONS LEARNT• Implement disaster recovery strategy

before going live• You cannot have enough training• Geo location aware platform is missing• Active Directory needs cleaning, and

maintenance for a proper Corporate Directory

SHAREPOINT 2010 – “ENTERPRISE-Y”• Adds enterprise level taxonomy• Adds better integration with external

databases (as long as they are simple)• Adds better search (built in, and the

optional FaST)• Adds standard development tools

(Visual Studio 2010)

SHAREPOINT 2010 PROJECT STORY• Implementing SharePoint 2010 as an extranet for a

school• Training too late = requirements change too late• Agreement on project flexibility at beginning assures

success at the end• Using 3rd party applications to augment the out of

the box functionality• List project tasks into three categories:

• Must

• Should

• Would

SHAREPOINT 2010 LESSONS LEARNT• SharePoint projects plays nice with

Agile• Start small, grow only as fast as you

can• Making life easier on end users is more

important than anything

SUMMARY OF LESSONS LEARNT• Implement backup and disaster recovery right after installing• The importance of pre-training When implementing SharePoint

for the first time• Migrate, don’t Upgrade• Start with small objectives, plan for scalability and progress• Building Solutions In SharePoint or Purchasing 3rd party

Solutions• Use email integration as best you can (Colligo & OnePlaceMail)• End users should always come first – train them and provide

them with easy tools and interfaces to ensure project success

USING SHAREPOINT AS AN “EVOLUTIONARY COLLABORATION SYSTEM”• The legacy of Access

Databases• SharePoint Lists to the rescue• Survival of the fittest

application

• See http://www.informit.com/articles/article.aspx?p=1355235

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