Angus Logan : SharePoint Portal Server

Validating Sharepoint filenames on upload

anguslogan — Fri, 18 Nov 2005 02:39:00 GMT

This is Crazy! I was just talking with Joseph Mortimer @ Data#3 about building an application to clean file names before uploading to SharePoint. Funny!

Via Mads

Some characters are legal for FAT or NTFS files but illegal for files in Sharepoint documentlibraries. Using the regular upload UI for Sharepoint you'll encounter a rather unpleasant validation error when uploading a file with funky characters. Using the object model will give you a good ole' exception.

I've seen a lot of approaches to solving this problem, and implemented a couple myself. Last night I noticed a method on the SPEncode static class that enabled a clean approach to the problem:

private string CleanFileName(string dirtyFileName)

{

char[] dirtyChars = dirtyFileName.ToCharArray();

foreach (char c in dirtyChars)

{

if (!SPEncode.IsLegalCharInUrl(c))

{

dirtyFileName = dirtyFileName.Replace(c.ToString(), "");

}

return dirtyFileName; // now clean:-)

}

reating a Site Definition from an Existing Site Definition (Custom Templates)

anguslogan — Fri, 21 Oct 2005 03:09:00 GMT

Via Alex's Blog about SharePoint

I got a lot of questions of colleages regarding custom templates. Custom templates in SharePoint are...

CMSVNext and Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 - another braindump and a stroll through some blogs...

anguslogan — Thu, 22 Sep 2005 14:05:00 GMT

Via JOPX

One of the pillars of Microsoft's new ECM (Enterprise Content Management Offering) is web content management, previously Microsoft had its own server product for it, Microsoft Content Management Server. At PDC05, Microsoft finally revealed some technical details about the next version of CMS - here's a list of the things I noticed:
CMSVNext is built on top of Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 - a name mentionned was Office Web Content Management Server. One of the main goals of this new architecture was to take away the divide between functionality in SharePoint and CMS since customers basically require both

The equivalent of a channel in MCMS2002 will be a WSS3.0 web - there will be a special type of document library for webpages called "Pages library". This library will contain a page layout column which will contain the URL to the template. All the content will be stored in the fields in this page library. On a page request, a page will be assembled dynamically from the content in the different fields. You can use all the functionality of standard WSS libraries such as checkin, checkout, versioning,...

CMS Template = Page Layout column

CMS placeholder control = WSS field controls

CMSVNext will offer some extra WSS field controls e.g PublishingWebControls:AuthoringContainer with better support for table layout, server side spell checking, ...

A custom ASP.Net 2.0 navigation provider for CMSVNext, you just have to write your own navigation control and use the provider as a datasource

Membership providers to write your own authentication mechanisms

While MCMS2002 basically is a toolbox - it offered an API but you still had to write a lot of code. CMSVNext will offer more functionality out of the box and will require less custom code

Support for multilingual scenarios through a core website which will have multiple variations, with a certain replication mechanism built in... not a lot of details known about it yet

A migration tool for CMS2002 content will be provided, all the templates and custom code you will have to rewrite

Support for smart client authoring of webpages - extends on Document Conversion Services - this will allow you to plug in your own code to automatically generate webpages from different applications

Extra security added typically needed for CMS - e.g. a viewer role, which allows you to view pages but not to view the WSS UI (e.g. allitems.aspx), no remote API possible, no minor or historic versions visible

Define master pages on the level of the web - can be easily changed from within the SharePoint UI

Extra deployment options - OOB deployment through the UI

Better support for anonymous access

Extra caching options: ASP.Net caching, binary caching, use cache profiles,...

Can use the search of SharePoint

Built in summary pages available - Query by Content controls (e.g. all news postings), Summary links, TOC

Better OOB workflow through the same mechanism that WSS3.0 based on WWF - approval of webpages will be similar to approval of documents in document libraries.

Some interesting resources:
Web Content Management information from PDC (Braindump) - Angus Logan

MCMS v.Next - The curtain has been lifted at PDC - Stefan Gossner

Designing Your MCMS 2002 Solution for Reusability - Use best-practice design recommendations for Microsoft Content Management Server 2002 applications and Web sites to help you create your site in a way that prepares it for future versions of MCMS technology.

Posting from Arpan Shah about the confusion surrounding CMSVNext

OFF313 Web Content Management Application Development and Engine Extensibility - slide deck from PDC

[PDC05] What about MCMS? SharePoint, yes!

mscms
pdc05
sharepoint

A look at SharePoint Version 3 Features

anguslogan — Sun, 18 Sep 2005 22:08:00 GMT

Via Heather

Via Dustin:

UI / UX

WSS will have an entirely new user interface that includes better navigation controls and built-in breadcrumb trails.
Pages will derive from “master pages“, meaning that you could re-skin an entire SharePoint site by modifying just one template file
More professional out of the box themes
FrontPage can directly edit each site's CSS file(s)
Workflow built-in all over SharePoint, with tight integration with Outlook 12 tasks
Individual documents can have document-specific workflows
Item-level security on lists and libraries
FrontPage has evolved further into a SharePoint designer tool (I read that as: the only SharePoint designer tool), and apparently, ghosted/unghosted pages won't be a problem any longer
Recycle bin with user and administrator restore features for document libraries and list items
InfoPath forms can be filled out with only a browser when published as (to?) a SharePoint site (even with FireFox)
Customizable and extensible search (and search API), including “did you mean“-type search term corrections
Lists can be viewed on mobile devices

Integration

All lists and libraries have RSS feeds, and each list's feed can be customized to include whatever fields you'd like
Event list RSS feeds include iCal files as enclosures
Each site has a master “aggregating“ RSS feed
Outlook 12 can perform 2-way online/offline syncronization of the following list types:

Contacts
Events
Tasks
Discussion Lists
Document Libraries (!)

Discussion lists can create their own e-mail alias in Active Directory, allowing you to e-mail that alias to automatically archive that e-mail (and its attachments) to a SharePoint discussion list
ALL lists and libraries have version history capability, and only “diffs“ are stored (differences from one change to the next)
Access treats SharePoint sites as honest-to-goodness data sources

Developer-oriented news

Existing web parts will “just work“ in the new SharePoint web part page framework
Site definitions/templates will ship in the box for blogs and wikis (blogs can be built directly on your “My Site“!)
All lists and libraries will have synchronous event handlers (not sure how these work with other interfaces to SharePoint data, like OM, WEBDAV, SOAP, etc., if the event handler has to raise an exception)
List/library version history is exposed programmatically by way of the OM
Multiple “content types” (sets of metadata, or “metadata templates“, if you will) for document libraries and lists, that include view information, workflows, bound events.
FrontPage can edit workflows
Business Data Catalog (datasource catalog on steroids, apparently). This doesn't seem all that new to me, so I'll reserve commentary until more details emerge after the expected PDC sessions)

SharePoint vNext has security trimming (ie. context based display)

anguslogan — Thu, 15 Sep 2005 13:41:00 GMT

So if you don't have the rights to delete a document you won't be able to see the delete link/action.

SharePoint vNext will ship with XSD's

anguslogan — Thu, 15 Sep 2005 13:37:00 GMT

WOW! - There will be XSD's to validate all the XML documents - YAY

In Visual Studio 2005 you get some killer intellisense from the XSD's so editing the monster XML files shouldn't be too much of a drama anymore :)

SharePoint vNext has a built in scheduler

anguslogan — Thu, 15 Sep 2005 13:34:00 GMT

You Can use the SPSchedule object to setup some process to execute at a specified interval.

YAY! - Say good bye to scheduled *.vbs files or windows services.

SharePoint v3 to support ASP.NET 2.0 Web Parts

anguslogan — Thu, 15 Sep 2005 10:46:00 GMT

When v3 aka vNext ships you will be able to build your ASP.NET web parts and automagically use them.

WSS SP2 - shipping by end of month

anguslogan — Thu, 15 Sep 2005 10:43:00 GMT

Don't know if its true or not but it was in a PDC presentation... it must be true :)

Bring on the .NET 2.0 webparts using Son of SmartPart which is being built in Jan of U2U.

Office 12 brain dump from the Keynote

anguslogan — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 22:53:00 GMT

Office Keynote

Enterprise content management (all content in your organization)

Server Investments

Collab.

Portal

Content Management

Forms with Workflow

MCMS

We will be seeing a "new content management server" which will be built on the foundation of Windows SharePoint Services.

"I won't talk about all the cool stuff with MCMS :("

SharePoint

New tab called site "Site Actions" that lets you do things like "create page" etc etfc.

New high level chrome around the site ie. Search center.

Views are accessible from the document library on the top right hand site in a drop down list.

Create "content types" ie. an object oriented definition of the content in your site.

Type of information

Meta data

Behaviours of the content type (workflow / corporate policy)

The content types appear in the "New" menu ie. "New Spec" or "New …" almost suggests multiple document templates by Document Library.

Can create a random workflow for a specific document.

"Work offline in outlook" was in the document action pane.

Document libraries have RSS feeds.

Document libraries have "Open with database program"

SETTING ITEM LEVEL SECURITY - mentioned in passing but don’t know if true.

Workflow

Can dynamically create it.

Few OOTB workflows for Asia due to specific requirements.

Can attached a workflow to a document / document library or a type.

Lots of the forms are embedded as infopath forms.

Workflow tasks are emailed around as outlook tasks.

You can open then and close them and submit them.

Workflow appears in the document library in an additional column per document.

Front Page

FrontPage can be called "SharePoint Designer"

Call the "expression family" can be considered part of the SharePoint Designer suite.

Can define a workflow directly from Front Page

Does this workflow defined in FrontPage generate a WWF workflow? If so why not generate it from VS.NET.

Views

Access view

Gantt View

Can create personal/public views

MOBILE! - Make this list avail. As a mobile view.

Lists

Can create a new column called "Business data"

The type is defined and you can select the columns from the LOB apps.

LOB data is "jointed" with SharePoint data.

Can validate the LOB data on the SPS CRUD interface - if you get it wrong it gives you a picklist of data.

Example.

Use CRM to hold your contacts

Use SPS to get hold your data for ease of use / RAD and you can then draw on your LOB data.

InfoPath

The UI doesn't look much different

Have the ability to say "I want this form to be compatible with the Forms Server"

Design snippets will be a part of InfoPath ie. using parts of other forms.

A lot of the Infpath client doesn't look a lot different.

Publish it out to a network share or a webserver, or sharepoint site.

Demo'd infopath web forms using FireFox

When you browse to the file it created the form output as HTML.

You can also use it from a smartphone. Including validation using a WAP based phone

Importance of Infopath in the strategy.

Searching

MSFT are about to go live using vNext

Have a new "did you mean?" functionality in the search

Can customise the search results layout.

Alert me on the serach results?

Can filter by content type ie. from search results "Documents", "People" "Customers" or then pivot on things like "Job Title" for a person.

Web part for Colleagues and Peers

Get the Org Chart.

Excel

An excel calculation performed on the server.

Create a spreadsheet in excel and connect it to data.

Publish it to sharepoint

Can then be published as a web part.

Access

Had a massive Face lift (picture)

Can work with data stored on a sharepoint server.

Access can be used to update data in SharePoint.

You pick the server and the site and then the list and it gives you access to the CRUD facilities.

Preparing

Incorporate XML

Use Interop through web services

Use InfoPath forms

Use WSS as a foundation

All PDC attendees will get BETA1 in a couple of months.

SyncToy 1.0 Released and you can use it with SharePoint

anguslogan — Sun, 04 Sep 2005 19:03:00 GMT

John Hodgson mentioned this in his TechEd Presentation - and you can use this to sync file system folders with SharePoint web folders

Via Crig Pringle

James Kendrick writes that SyncToy 1.0 has been released. New features( since beta) include:

The ability to type in a UNC path;

Support for longer folder pair names and ability to widen the left pane to see those longer names;

The ability to support the maximum length for folder paths, and documentation was added to the help file about how to set up a share to be able to sync deep folder pairs;

Better handling of the difference in precision between NTFS and FAT timestamps;

More discoverable link to the help file for information on how to schedule SyncToy using the Windows XP Task Scheduler;

Support for 800x600 screen resolution;

Added a warning for users if the selected action will take some time to complete;

Added brief explanations of the actions in the user interface;

Improved behavior when choosing folders to include or exclude when there are large numbers of folders involved;

Improved support for accessibility modes.

More blogs about SharePoint.

Announcing the SharePoint Portal Server 2003 Discovery Kit

anguslogan — Thu, 25 Aug 2005 02:10:00 GMT

Via Ryan Rogers

The SharePoint Portal Server 2003 Discovery kit â€“ a set of 6 hands-on lab documents â€“ just went live on Microsoft.com at the following location:

SharePoint Portal Server 2003 Discovery Kit

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=03607516-cbec-4724-b4a4-aa7f09304ba5&displaylang=en

Please note that there is a lab focusing on how to use the SQL Reporting Pack! Hereâ€™s an excerpt from the download page:

Overview

The SharePoint Portal Server 2003 Discovery Kit includes a series of discovery labs that go beyond learning about a particular component of SharePoint Portal Server 2003 to understanding visional portal site solution, how to deploy Web applications that integrate tightly with the portal site environment, how to use SQL Server 2000 Reporting Services to track and analyze portal site usage, and lastly, how to customize the portal site user interface.

There are 6 labs in the SharePoint Portal Server 2003 Discovery Kit. The lab manuals includes a description of the business scenario that is addressed by the lab, the teaching objectives of the lab, step-by-step instructions, dependencies for each lab and the expected amount of time needed for the lab assuming a basic familiarity with Windows SharePoint Services and limited SharePoint Portal Server 2003 experience.

SharePoint Portal Server Discovery Kit

anguslogan — Sun, 14 Aug 2005 21:11:00 GMT

Via Arpan Shah

One of the pieces of feedback that I have received from partners and customers is that they don't immediately understand the value that SharePoint Portal Server provides over Windows SharePoint Services.

We have several whitepapers that address this topic but we always received feedback that it still wasn't crystal clear. To address this, we are releasing the SharePoint Portal Server Discovery Kit very shortly that is targetted at IT Pros.

It contains a:
1) very detailed build book to walk you through building a SPS server,
2) a whitepaper and
3) 6 self-paced labs with detailed explanation.

This allows you to "discover" SPS, if you will, in a short amount of time. The other benefit is that you don't have to build a separate server. If you already have SPS installed, you can use that. Based on the initial feedback we received, people really liked it... so if you're looking for something like this for yourself or for a customer, you'll see it very shortly.

Announcing The SharePoint Template Project

anguslogan — Sun, 14 Aug 2005 21:02:00 GMT

Via Greg Hughes

Bil Simser has taken the lead in creating a place for the community to create and share SharePoint templates. This is terrific - one of the more difficult things about getting people using SharePoint has always been the lack of templates and general resources available to get people started building the custom apps people dream of (but can't necessarily create themselves).

Link: The SharePoint Template Project on SourceForge

Now that we have the place to do this, all we need are participants. Microsoft recently released a set of 30 great site templates, and there are a few others out there as well, but this has the potential to be much bigger.

Bil's own words describe the SharePoint Template Project perfectly:

Not having custom solutions has been one of the larger gaps in SharePoint but demonstrates that you can accomplish a lot with just a little configuration and some creative thought. On numerous occasions I find myself in the newsgroups seeing people asking if they can build a Help Desk with SharePoint, or an Expense Tracking System, or a Call Board. The answer is of course yes. Always has been and always will. The problem however is that you don't get a lot of business solutions delivered without some work. Enter the SharePoint Template Project.

I created a new project site on SourceForge (yes, I'm not a big fan of GotDotNet and we haven't created my utopia of SharePointForge just yet) to accomodate this. The project provides an outlet for the SharePoint community to contribute and share list and site templates for the products under the Microsoft SharePoint technology banner (SharePoint Portal Server and Windows SharePoint Services).

These templates come in the form of binary .stp files or plain text xml schema files (along with any additional files like images, etc.). Users create the templates either using SharePoint itself (saving them in .stp format) or with whatever xml/text editor they prefer. The templates are uploaded to a SharePoint server and used as a boilerplate by SharePoint during site creation.

Templates in this project will be created by the community and packaged in a common installer format (MSI) so that end-users need only download the MSI and run it on their SharePoint server. A template MSI will be provided for contributors to the project which includes the template installer, full or custom selections for installation (users will be able to choose what templates they want to install), graphical preview for each template (if the developer includes them) and option to create sample sites based on the templates chosen.

greghughes.net weblog - copyright 2005 - licensed under a Creative Commons License.

Fixing InfoPath Forms in Application Templates

anguslogan — Wed, 10 Aug 2005 03:23:00 GMT

Via Bill Simser

With the recent release of the 30 or so (have to be careful as the number seems to change everytime you look at it) WSS site templates that Microsoft has provided us, some people are scratching their heads wondering why these OOTB solutions are not so out-of-the-box. Read on to find out why and how to correct these problems.

For the most part, the sites work fine. Install the template, create a site and you're off to the races. For some however there are parts of the sites that will challenge you for a credentials and others that ask for locations of Web Services. This is part and parcel in the way that InfoPath forms are stored and work with Windows SharePoint Services.

With InfoPath forms stored in a WSS site you can (with Service Pack 1 installed) consume the Web Services that WSS offers and use this to populate drop down lists, lookup tables, etc. in your InfoPath form. This is great for something like a request form where you want the lookups to be dynamic and controlled. It does however present a problem when you try to move the forms to another server like how the templates were offered up recently for download.

We'll walk through fixing the Travel Request site as it's one of those ones that needs some extra care before you can start using it. You can use the principles here for any of the other templates.

The original forms for the site were created on a specific server by the folks at Quilogy so when you click on the Submit a New Travel Request from the home page you'll see this:

Why is the InfoPath form trying to connect to this Web Service? Simple. There are lists embedded in the form that are being loaded from it and need information from the site. Of course you don't have credentials for their site plus you'll want your forms to be reading from your own site. So here's how to fix this.

First click Cancel on the dialog above and quit InfoPath. Now return back to the site and select Travel Request Form from the side navigation bar. This is the form library that holds the form you fill out when you launch it. Select Modify settings and columns for this form library under the Actions pane. Now click on Edit Template under the General Settings. This will launch InfoPath so we can change our form to point to our own site.

Choose Tools then Data Connections from the main menu. You'll see the connections that this InfoPath form has back to the SharePoint site.

So we see Departments, Employees, currencies, and Main submit. The first three are lookups and Main submit is for sending the form back to SharePoint (the Submit to SharePoint button on the form). Select Departments and click Modify. This brings up the dialog to change the settings for this connection:

The first page is the URL to your SharePoint site. This is the main thing to fix because we want to point it to our own site. Enter the URL to the site here and click Next.

You'll notice that it took a second for the next step to come up. This is because the Wizard actually goes to your site and pulls back the lists and libraries that are available. If you have added one, it will appear here. Now select Departments and click Next.

Now you need to select the fields that will be available in the form. This is usually just the name but you may need to play around depending on the form you have. Also from the Data Connection screen above it tells you some details about the connection (like if it loads each time the form loads or not). Use this information to help you decide how you want things configured. For now, click Department_Name and click Next.

The name will normally be filled in for you and you can choose to have it retrieve the information automatically. Click Finish and we're done with this Data Connection.

When you've added one, you might want to check it. Click on File | Preview | Default (or Ctrl+Shift+B, yes, just like Visual Studio). This will launch the form and connect to the SharePoint site to fill in any initial values. If there are any errors you'll see them or if the form challenges you then there's something that's loading from outside of your site. Continue to fix the fields until you have a form you can preview. The dropdowns should now work as expected and retrieve their values from your SharePoint site.

The last piece to modify is the submit part. This is the Main submit Data Connection and is currently hooked up to http://wsstemplates.quilogy.net/â€ so we want to change this. This one requires you to change the URL to the fully qualified path to the form library itself. So selected "http://wsstemplates.quilogy.net/TravelRequest_Basic/" and replace that with your own URL (keeping the "Travel Agent Request Form" intact) and click Next then Finish.

Now click Save and close InfoPath. Return to your site and launch the form (by clicking on Fill out this form in the form library or from the main page). The form should launch correctly and you can fill it out and click on "Submit to SharePoint" where it will save the new form back to the site and you can view it there.

That's it. Takes about 5 or 10 minutes to clean up the template but now you're ready to use it in your own environment. Hope that helps!

Canberra SharePoint Community & any interest in a Microsoft Portals User Group in Brisbane?

anguslogan — Tue, 09 Aug 2005 03:32:00 GMT

I want to get something like this happening for Microsoft Portals (SPT/MCMS) in Brisbane... Who would be interested in it? We have quite a few Govt agencies running SharePoint Products & Technologies or Microsoft Content Management Server ... so Who is game?

Via Frank Arrigo

I got the following note from Gayan Peiris about a new user group starting in Canberra, focusing on Sharepoint.

ATT: Canberra SharePoint Community

The Canberra SharePoint User Group will be launching on Wednesday 17th August 2005 to give the Canberra SharePoint community, including both technical and business people alike, a chance to get to know each other over some beer and pizzas and to share and expand their knowledge of SharePoint and its uses.

Gayan Peiris from Unique World will give two presentations, one on "Deployment Options" , and another on "Web Parts You Can' t Live Without ". The purpose of this User Group is to increase knowledge of SharePoint and its uses in the Canberra community.

Start: 6.00pm

Date: Wednesday 17th August 2005

Venue: Microsoft Canberra. Walter Turnbull Building. Level 2, 44 Sydney Ave Barton, Canberra.

For more information on the Canberra User Group, and to register your details, drop by to http://sps.uniqueworld.net/canberra. You can also participate in the online discussions to help ensure that the user group focuses on the topics of interest to you.

If you have any questions or require any further information please do not hesitate to contact us, we look forward to seeing you there.

[ Currently Playing : Start Me Up - Folksmen - Mighty Wind: The Album (02:25) ]

Wierd WSS Behaviour - Creating from Template as exceeding quota causes images to be dropped.

anguslogan — Sun, 07 Aug 2005 08:12:00 GMT

I was playing with all the new templates and I managed to max out the personal site quota (100mb by default). So the site was created with no images - very wierd - I've never seen that before.

I had to increase the quota and then delete the site and recreat it to get all the pictures

SPS/WSS password management

anguslogan — Sat, 06 Aug 2005 02:05:00 GMT

This solution should even make Spencer Harbar happy after his last rant about changing passwords without using IISADMPWD

[Via Mart Muller's Sharepoint Weblog]

A very usefull tip by Maxim about how to provide self-serviced password management for SharePoint (WSS/SPS) with 0 lines of code. Something where weâ€™ve been looking for a long time! From Maximâ€™s blog:
â€œThe solution that I came up with solved the following issues:
In the case where the Active Directory accounts expired and the user were trying to log into the SharePoint (WSS/SPS) the user will now be redirected to a screen to change their password.
With the use of Content WebPart and IISADMPWD virtual directory to it will provide end- users of the WSS/SPS site with self-serviced password management solution
1. Find the folder [drive]\Windows\System32\Inetsrv\Iisadmpwd and register iispwchg.dll
Click Start, and then click Run.
In the Open box type the following, and then press ENTER:
regsvr32 c:\windows\system32\inetsrv\iisadmpwd\iispwchg.dll
2. Exclude IISADMPWD from WSS Managed path
Click Start, point to All Programs, point to Administrative Tools, and then click SharePoint Central Administration.
On the Central Administration page, under Virtual Server Configuration, click Configure virtual server settings.
On the Virtual Server List page, select the virtual server you want to configure.
On the Virtual Server Settings page, under Virtual Server Management, click Define Managed Paths.
Under Included Paths or Excluded Paths, select the check box next to the path you want to remove, and then click Remove selected paths.
Or STSADM.EXE can be used to do the same thing as:
You can also remove an included or excluded path by using the command line. For example, to remove an exclusion for the site at http://server1/hrweb/webapp, you would use syntax like the following:
stsadm -o deletepath -url http://server1/hrweb/webapp
3. Configure the PasswordChangeFlags property in the metabase to make sure that the Password Change functionality is enabled
Open command-line and Locate the C:\Inetpub\Adminscripts directory.
Type the following command, and then press ENTER:
cscript.exe adsutil.vbs set w3svc/passwordchangeflags 0
Note: 0 = This value indicates that you must use a Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) connection when you change the password.
4. Configure IISADMPWD virtual directory
When the Virtual Directory Creation Wizard starts, follow the instructions to create the virtual directory with the alias that is named "IISADMPWD." Make sure that the path points to the Windows\System32\Inetsrv\Iisadmpwd directory. Make sure that both "Read" permissions and "Run Scripts (such as ASP)" permissions are selected
5. Creating Self-Serviced AD Password Management WebPart
Add Content Editor Web Part to the WebPart Page
Click on Modified Shared WebPart from WebPart Chrome menu then Source Editor and past URL that reflects your settings for example:
Change Password
Thatâ€™s it! Congratulations, you just configured Self-Serviced Password Management WebPart with 0 lines of code. Of course this solution is not as elaborate as a custom written code but with the amount of time it takes to enable this functionality I think it is well worth the minimal effort.â€

Mark Bower : Just how important is SharePoint to Microsoft?

anguslogan — Fri, 05 Aug 2005 05:23:00 GMT

[Via Erol]

Mark Bower : Just how important is SharePoint to Microsoft?: "In this morning's keynote session Steven Sinofsky told how BillG has personally taken the role of Lead PM on the Windows SharePoint Services v3 User Experience team. If you are in any doubt about how strategically important this product is to Microsoft, that should give you some clue. And if you don't like what you see when you get to PDC, you'll know who to blame ;)

Using iWay adapters for BizTalk to enable SharePoint integration

anguslogan — Thu, 04 Aug 2005 02:29:00 GMT

[Via Mart Muller's Sharepoint Weblog]

A whilo ago weâ€™ve been doing a Proof of Concept for getting PeopleSoft data into SharePoint and back. In our case, we needed to get the data out of and old version of PeopleSoft, which was quite a challange. We used an iWay adapter to do that and that went quite well.
Today, Microsoft announced that they bought eight iWay application adapters for BizTalk. The adapters Microsoft purchased will help BizTalk Server customers connect more easily to third-party applications from Amdocs, JD Edwards, Oracle Corp., PeopleSoft, Siebel Systems Inc. and TIBCO Software Inc. iWay customers that have purchased licenses for the .NET-based adapters will receive a license for the corresponding Microsoft adapter with the purchase of Software Assurance.
Some information about integration with SharePoint using Biztalk and iWay on MSDN can be found here.