I’m over winter already. It is dark when I go home and today it was pretty dark when I came in. Can we fast forward to Spring?  :-)  – Dooley

Top News Stories
Project Managers, SharePoint Specialists in Demand: Survey (ComputerWorld)
There is a dearth of skilled Share-Point staffers in New Zealand, says Tom Derbyshire, manager for IT recruiting at Robert Walters. Commenting on the firm’s third-quarter market update, released late last month, Derbyshire says many organisations requiring SharePoint talent are training staff internally in the Microsoft collaboration technology, rather than hiring, as there are so few experienced SharePoint candidates on the market.

Is Microsoft too Big to Fail? (CIO)
An old baseball adage goes: Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, sometimes it rains. And so it goes for Microsoft, whose topsy-turvy history as an elite winner and a royal screw-up is laid out in a recent slideshow from ITWorld. For every Windows 95 and Xbox Kinect there’s a Vista and anti-trust allegation hell. Any company that’s been on the tech and business battlefield as long as Microsoft is not always going to be graceful and consistent. Failure is inevitable when you take risks — not that Microsoft takes many risks.

Microsoft Details Power Smart Windows 8 Development (Windows 8 Beta)
According to a recent post on Building Windows Blog, Pat Stemen, a program manager on Kernel team with Microsoft explains why battery life and power consumption continue to be some of the most important topics in the computing industry. Three goals were kept in mind while engineering Windows 8 power management: Let the hardware shine: Windows 8 was built in such a way that the power efficiency of the hardware platform shines through, regardless of whether the system is a SoC-based Windows tablet or an SLI-equipped gaming PC.

Why Windows Phone 7 Is Too Late (PCWorld)
Before smartphones were mainstream, Microsoft’s Windows Mobile was considered the OS for business smartphones. RIM’s Blackberry stole away its market by becoming a better communication hub. iPhone and Android have since buried Blackberry by extending a phone’s functionality with apps. Yet, as Microsoft touts Microsoft’s Windows Phone 7 as offering a full desktop-like experience, can the company again win over mobile business users?

Death of the Intranet: ‘The Times They are a-changin’ ‘ (CMSWire)
As a teenager this Bob Dylan track, released in 1964, seemed to me to capture the changes that were taking place on the political and social landscape. Over the last few months I have started to feel it is more like an anthem for doomed intranets. When your business is called Intranet Focus Ltd. raising the issue that intranets are doomed may seem like commercial suicide, but I think it is time for a dose of reality. There are many excellent intranets in the world, and when I see the outcomes of the Intranet Innovation Awards and the Nielsen Norman Intranet Design Annuals I envy the employees of the organizations that have been recognized for intranet excellence. Sadly probably the majority of the million or so intranets in the world stumble along with inadequate vision, support and resources.

How the Web Became Just Another Interface to the Cloud (ReadWriteCloud)
For years, everyone was talking about the convergence of interfaces. The Web, and as a result, the browser, were “clearly” about to take over as the major platforms and cloud computing emerged. Then, in March 2008, Steve Jobs unleashed the iOS followed by the mobile apps revolution. What seems to have happened next is maybe one of the most intriguing transitions in software history. While many companies are still stuck with the idea that “the browser is the ultimate interface”, lately, there’s a growing number of leading cloud computing companies that actually don’t have a Web interface or that focus heavily on client software running on multiple devices.

Mobile Computing Pushes Security into the Cloud (ITBusinessEdge)
As the number of endpoint devices that need to be secured thanks to the rise of mobile computing continues to expand, many IT organizations are quickly becoming overwhelmed. This growing sense of helplessness is driving organizations to rethink their approach to security by relying more on cloud security services. Naturally, none of this is lost on the major security vendors. For example, IBM today launched a cloud security service for mobile computing devices, called the IBM Hosted Mobile Device Security Management service, based on agent software that IBM specifically developed to manage security on smartphones and tablet PC devices.

 

Around the Blogosphere
Why Large Enterprise and Global SharePoint Deployments will not Work in the Cloud (AIIM)
“Everyone is going to want one of these,” Gary Dahl half-joking said.  Gary Dahl is an author and advertising executive, but more importantly, the inventor of the Pet Rock. A Cloud-based SharePoint Server 2010 enterprise-wide (i.e. Fortune 1000 sized company) and\or globally implemented deployment simply will not work.  It may be initially appealing, but without the organization’s Information Technology executives completely owning the environment and its governance, customization, and federation strategy it will be a long-term failure and future migration project (from the external cloud into an internally hosted Private Cloud).

SharePoint User Adoption Strategy: Team Member “Service Level Agreement” (Essentials of SharePoint)
User adoption of SharePoint solutions is a challenge for many organizations (and consultants). I’ve done conference presentations on the topic and Michael Sampson wrote an entire book (which is excellent, by the way). I often talk about what I guess I’d call “macro” adoption strategies – larger scale, company-wide initiatives. Recently, I’ve been working with clients on more “micro” strategies – specific strategies for individual teams that are almost like service level agreements (SLAs) for team members.

5 Best Practices for Working with Documents and SharePoint (EndUserSharePoint)
When you work with documents there are some best practices which will make yours and your colleague’s collaborative life a lot easier if you follow these simple guidelines. In this post I’ll try to explain what you better try to avoid when you work with documents and SharePoint. Whenever possible, I’ll also give you suggestions on what to do.

Global SharePoint Deployment – the “Why” (Social-Point)
Alright – Let’s talk “Global SharePoint Deployments”.  When setting out to create a global SharePoint deployment it’s important to understand what the drivers that push an organization to do this. The symptom they are either trying to fix or prevent is a slow user experience within SharePoint.  This begs the question, “why does distance impact the viewing of WEB Sites – more specifically, SharePoint Sites?“  The answer is one word: Physics.  It takes time and effort to travel thousands of miles even when you are just a stream of electrons.  This is compounded by the number of routers that the data needs to pass though.  Think of each router as a stop light on a road which helps to keep people safe, but adds time to your trip.  We call this latency  when we talk about the addition of time to a trip with a packet of data.  The routing protocols used on the Internet do a pretty good job of choosing the shortest path for your data to travel – but routers still exist along the way.

Find Me but Don’t Show Me (Matthew McDermott’s Blog)
I recently received a question from a client who has been working on improving the quality of their search results. They are crawling their non-Microsoft CMS with SharePoint and wanted to ensure that the Keywords that they entered in the CMS and were finally rendered in the Web pages, would be findable in the search center. The keywords were emitted as META tags in the page <meta name=”keywords” content=”Elephant,Giraffe,Lion” />. After crawling the content a search for “Elephant” failed to return the page.

Cloud Charting for Office 365 (The Bamboo Team Blog)
Using Bamboo’s Cloud Parts™ for SharePoint, you can customize Office365. The initial Cloud Parts release in Bamboo Labs consists of different charts. In this post, I will show how you can add a pie chart to your page.

 

SharePoint Job Listings*
Lead SharePoint Application Developer – St. Louis, Missouri
The Lead SharePoint Application Developer will help ensure that the projects move along quickly and do not fall behind established timelines. This individual assures that application resources are providing input regarding the requirements of the interface. There may be many testing and analyst resources and tasks that require coordination efforts in conjunction with the application teams. This individual coordinates the needs and requirements of business and application resources. The Lead SharePoint Application Developer leads in architecting topology and scalability of SharePoint Environment/Farm. Operational and day to day decision maker on the running of the SharePoint projects and development as it relates to system strategies and goals. Bachelor’s degree required with 3-5 years relevant experience.

Technical Analyst – With SQL and SharePoint – New York, New York
As a member of the Information Systems Department, the Technical Analyst will work closely with a team consisting of business analysts and programmers / developers to provide technical solutions for complex business requirements for multiple users and stakeholders. The Technical Analyst will be responsible for the preparation and documentation of technical requirements for new and existing applications. Tasks will include establishing and gathering system/technical requirements, performing system analysis, and adding technical information to functional specifications as required. This position will also provide technical information to the project team as needed.

 

Microsoft Updates
Deploying Branding Solutions for SharePoint 2010 Sites Using Sandboxed Solutions (MSDN)
The SharePoint development tools in Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 provide a simple and effective approach to packaging and deploying the files and code that are required to apply branding to Microsoft SharePoint 2010 sites using a sandboxed solution. This article describes a best practice for creating sandbox-compatible branding solutions by using custom master pages, cascading style sheets (CSS files), and images that can be deployed to SharePoint 2010 farms that are running either SharePoint Foundation 2010 or SharePoint Server 2010.

 

SharePoint Events*

• November 14, Online – Effectively Manage Enterprise Projects with Microsoft Project Server 2010
• November 14, Online – 5 Deadly Sins of SharePoint in The Enterprise
• November 14-15,  Stockholm – SharePoint & Exchange Forum 2011
• November 15, Online - Bamboo SharePoint Calendar and Scheduling Workshop
• November 15, Online – Executive Briefing – Empower Your Organization with SharePoint
• November 15, Online – Enterprise Information Management with SharePoint 2010: Secrets to Success
• November 16, Online – Bamboo SharePoint Community Central Webinar
• November 16, Online - Bamboo SharePoint Project Management Central Webinar
• November 16, Online - Bamboo SharePoint Administration Webinar
• November 16, Online – Best Practices & Lessons Learned for SharePoint 2010 Upgrade
• November 17, Online - Bamboo SharePoint Workflow Conductor Webinar
• November 17, Online - Bamboo Knowledge Management Webinar
• November 17, Online – 4 Ways to Overcome Limited SharePoint Expertise in the Enterprise
• November 17, Melville, New York – JPoint (jQuery + SharePoint): Hottest Buzz Ever!
• November 18, Online – 5 Steps to Effective SharePoint Adoption & Training
• November 22, Online - Bamboo SharePoint Lists Workshop
• November 29, Online - Bamboo SharePoint Project Management Central Webinar
• November 30, Online – Bamboo SharePoint Community Central Webinar
• November 30, Online – How to Build a Project Management Information System (PMIS)
• December 2, Honolulu, Hawaii – SharePoint Saturday
• December 3, Sandy, Utah – SharePoint Saturday
• December 7, Online – How to Build a Project Management Information System (PMIS)
• December 7, Online - Adding PowerShell To Your SharePoint Admin Tool Belt
• December 8, Melville, New York – Business Process Transformation: Taking SharePoint Beyond the Intranet
• December 10, Ft. Lauderdale, Florida – SharePoint Saturday
• December 10, Kansas City, Kansas, SharePoint Saturday
• December 13, Online – Executive Briefing – Empower Your Organization with SharePoint
• December 19, Online – How to Build a Project Management Information System (PMIS)
• January 7, Virginia Beach, Virginia – SharePoint Saturday
• January 10, Online – Executive Briefing – Empower Your Organization with SharePoint
• January 11, Online – How to Build a Project Management Information System (PMIS)
• January 21, Austin, Texas – SharePoint Saturday
• January 25, Online – How to Build a Project Management Information System (PMIS)
• February 26-29, San Francisco, California – SPTechCon
• February 27-29, Johannesburg, South Africa – Share Conference
• March 20-22, San Francisco, California - AIIM
• March 21, New Orleans, Louisiana – SharePoint Saturday
• April 23-26, Atlanta, Georgia – Share Conference

 

SharePoint Training*

• November 14-18, Calgary, AB, Canada - SharePoint 2010 Core Technologies – Mindsharp
• November 14-18, Online – SharePoint 2010 Core Technologies – Mindsharp
• November 14-18, Minneapolis, Minnesota – SharePoint Designer 2010 – Mindsharp
• November 14-18, Online – SharePoint Designer 2010 – Mindsharp
• November 15, Online – Project Management Central Application Administrative Training – Bamboo Solutions
• November 17, Online – Project Management Central End User Training – Bamboo Solutions
• November 18, Online – Using Claim Based Authentication in SharePoint 2010 – SusQtech
• November 22, Online – Bamboo Component Training – List Extenders – Bamboo Solutions
• November 24, Online – Bamboo Component Training – Administration Enhancers – Bamboo Solutions
• November 28-December 2, Online – SharePoint 2010 Web Content Management – Mindsharp
• November 28-29, Minneapolis, Minnesota – Introduction to InfoPath 2010 for Business Users – Mindsharp
• November 28-29, Online - Introduction to InfoPath 2010 for Business Users – Mindsharp
• November 28-December 2, Washington, DC – SharePoint Foundation 2010 Developer Course – Mindsharp
• November 28-December 2, Online – SharePoint Foundation 2010 Developer Course – Mindsharp
• November 29-December 1, Minneapolis, Minnesota – Introduction to InfoPath 2010 for Business Users – Mindsharp
• November 29-December 1, Online – Introduction to InfoPath 2010 for Business Users – Mindsharp
• November 29-December 1, Winchester, Virginia – Power User 2010 – SusQtech
• November 29-December 2, Dallas, Texas – InfoPath 2010 and SharePoint 2010 No-Code Workflow Deep Dive – SharePoint Solutions
• December 5-8, Minneapolis, Minnesota – SharePoint 2010 for Business Users – Mindsharp
• December 5-8, Online – SharePoint 2010 for Business Users – Mindsharp
• December 5-9, Huntsville, Alabama - SharePoint 2010 Core Technologies – Mindsharp
• December 5-9, Online – SharePoint 2010 Core Technologies – Mindsharp
• December 5-9, Washington, DC - SharePoint 2010 Advanced Administrator – Mindsharp
• December 5-9, Minneapolis, Minnesota – SharePoint Foundation 2010 Developer Course – Mindsharp
• December 5-9, Online – SharePoint Foundation 2010 Developer Course – Mindsharp
• December 5-9, Chicago, Illinois – SharePoint 2010 Administration & Architecture – SusQtech
• December 5-16, Chicago, Illinois – SharePoint 2010 Immersion – SusQtech
• December 6-7, Nashville, Tennessee – Introduction to SharePoint Foundation 2010 – SharePoint Solutions
• December 6-9, Nashville, Tennessee – Introduction to SharePoint Server 2010 – SharePoint Solutions
• December 6-9, Chicago, Illinois – Mission: Automation – Workflow and InfoPath – SharePoint Solutions
• December 7, Online – Knowledge Base Accelerator Application Administration – Bamboo Solutions
• December 8, Online – Bamboo Component Training – Collaboration Enablers II – Bamboo Solutions
• December 8-9, Reston, Virginia – Delivering SharePoint Success Mentoring Workshop – Innovative-e
• December 12, Online – Business Intelligence & Reporting – SusQtech
• December 12-16, Minneapolis, Minnesota – SharePoint 2010 Core Technologies – Mindsharp
• December 12-16, Online – SharePoint 2010 Core Technologies – Mindsharp
• December 12-16, Minneapolis, Minnesota – SharePoint Designer 2010 – Mindsharp
• December 12-16, Online – SharePoint Designer 2010 – Mindsharp
• December 13, Online – Bamboo Component Training – Collaboration Enablers I – Bamboo Solutions
• December 13-16, Washington, DC – SharePoint 2010 for Business Users – Mindsharp
• December 13-16, Online – SharePoint 2010 for Business Users – Mindsharp
• December 15, Online – Project Management Central End User Training – Bamboo Solutions
• December 16, Online – Business Connectivity Services for SharePoint 2010 – SusQtech
• December 19-20, Online – Introduction to InfoPath 2010 for Business Users – Mindsharp
• December 19-21, Minneapolis, Minnesota – Introduction to InfoPath 2010 for Business Users – Mindsharp
• December 19-21, Online – Introduction to InfoPath 2010 for Business Users – Mindsharp
• December 20, Online – Project Management Central Application Administrative Training – Bamboo Solutions
• December 27, Online – Bamboo Component Training – List Extenders – Bamboo Solutions
• December 29, Online – Bamboo Component Training – Administration Enhancers – Bamboo Solutions
• January 4, Online – Knowledge Base Accelerator Application Administration – Bamboo Solutions
• January 10, Online – Bamboo Component Training – Collaboration Enablers I – Bamboo Solutions
• January 10-13, Nashville, Tennessee – InfoPath 2010/SharePoint 2010 Workflow Deep Dive – SharePoint Solutions
• January 12, Online – Bamboo Component Training – Collaboration Enablers II – Bamboo Solutions
• January 16-20, Cleveland, Queensland, Australia – Developing Solutions with SharePoint Server 2010 – Intelligent Decisioning
• January 17, Online – Project Management Central Application Administrative Training – Bamboo Solutions
• January 17-18, Chicago, Illinois – Introduction to SharePoint Foundation 2010 – SharePoint Solutions
• January 17-20, Chicago, Illinois – Introduction to SharePoint Server 2010 – SharePoint Solutions
• January 19, Online – Project Management Central End User Training – Bamboo Solutions
• January 24-25, Nashville, Tennessee – Exploring SharePoint 2010 – New Features – SharePoint Solutions
• January 24-27, Nashville, Tennessee – Applying MOSS Core Features – SharePoint Solutions
• January 24-27, Nashville, Tennessee – SharePoint 2010 Upgrade and Planning – SharePoint Solutions
• February 1, Online – Knowledge Base Accelerator Application Administration – Bamboo Solutions
• February 13-17, Cleveland, Queensland, Australia – Professional SharePoint Server 2010 Administration – Intelligent Decisioning
• February 16, Online – Project Management Central End User Training – Bamboo Solutions
• February 21, Online – Project Management Central Application Administrative Training – Bamboo Solutions

* Please contact Chris Dooley (chris.dooley@bamboosolutions.com) to be included in SharePoint Daily™.

 

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