SharePoint 2010 Service Applications Configuration Part 1

SharePoint 2010 provides different services to users and in SharePoint 2010 you can select only those services which are required by your users, customers and partners. In this article and next couple of articles related to service application configuration we will focus on configuring resources that can be shared across sites within your server farm.

What is SharePoint Service Applications?

SharePoint 2010 Service Application replaces old Shared Service Provider architecture from SharePoint Server 2007. SharePoint 2010 service applications are used to enable sharing resources across sites running in different web applications and different farms. Key benefit of this architecture is, we can use Service Applications as plug and play, use and share whenever we need and stop if we don’t need it anymore.

What is Web Application?

SharePoint Web Application basically a logical container, it contains site. Each web application must have at least one site collection. Each site collection can have more than on site. Each site can have more than one sub sites.

We can describe web application with the help of following picture.

Association between Service Applications and Web applications:

Service application and Web applications are associated with each other by service application connections. SharePoint 2010 Central Admin and Power Shell are used to manage services and create a service connection between service application and web application.


Service Applications Available in Different Core Editions of SharePoint 2010 Server:

SharePoint  Server 2010 Foundation Service Applications
	Has Database	Cross-Farm Capable
Business Data Connectivity	YES	YES
Usage and Health Data Collection	YES	NO
Web Analytics	NO	YES
Microsoft SharePoint Foundation Subscription Setting Service	YES	NO

SharePoint Server 2010 Standard Service Applications
	Has Database	Cross-Farm Capable
Managed Metadata Service	YES	YES
Search	YES	YES
Secure Store Service	YES	YES
State Service	YES	NO
User Profile Service	YES	NO

SharePoint Server 2010 Enterprise Service Applications
	Has Database	Cross-Farm Capable
Access Service	NO	NO
Excel	NO	NO
Visio Graphic Service	NO	NO
Word Automation Service	NO	NO
Performance Point Service	NO	NO

Note: SharePoint Server 2010 Standard Edition contains all service applications from SharePoint 2010 Foundation edition and SharePoint Server 2010 Enterprise contains all service applications available in all other editions.


Server Farm Configuration Wizard:
The Server Farm Configuration Wizard is quickest and easy way to deploy services on your server farm. These are following steps you can use to run farm configuration wizard.


1. Navigate to Central Administration. In the Quick Launch menu on the left, click Configuration Wizards.

2. On Configuration Wizards page, click Launch The Farm Configuration Wizard.

3. On the Configure Your SharePoint Farm page, select Walk Me Through The Settings Using This Wizard; then click Next.

4. Under Service Account, select either Use Existing Managed Account or Create New Managed Account. Then enter a username and password of an account with farm administrator permissions in the available fields.

5. Use the available check boxes to select the desired services; then click Next. Many of the services may already be selected and unavailable to be deselected.

6. When the Create Site Collection page appears, you can click Skip and create the first site collection later, or you can create the first site collection during the wizard.

7. To create the first site collection, give the site collection a name in the Title field.

8. Add an optional description in the Description field.

9. Under Web Site Address, append the URL with a descriptive name for the site collection URL in the URL field.

10. Under Template Selection, choose the desired template tab, choose the desired template, and then click OK.

11. When you get to the last page of the wizard showing you a list of services running on the site collection, click Finish.

Note: The Farm Configuration Wizard is used to add services only. Once the services are added you cannot run wizard to remove these services. If you run this wizard again, you will see services are already selected and greyed out; this mean service is already configured. If you need to remove services, you can do it manually. 

In this article we learnt basics about service applications, web applications, different service applications available in different core editions of SharePoint 2010 server and we also learnt how to run farm configuration wizard and automatically configure service applications.
In next part of this service application configuration, i will try to explain how we can manually configure these service applications and how we can stop and start service applications


This article is referenced from these two books
SharePoint 2010 Administration by Todd Klindt, Shane Young, Steve Caravajal
SharePoint 2010 Configuration Study Guide By James Pyles


Please don't forget to comment thanks

SharePoint 2010 Server Farm Configuration Part 2

This is continuation of series SharePoint Server Farm configuration. In part 1, I explained how to configure usage and health data collection and this part 2, I am going to explain about diagnostic logging configuration.

Diagnostic Logging Configuration:

As James Pyles said beautifully in his book “Microsoft SharePoint 2010 Configuration” Diagnostic logging “takes the pulse” of SharePoint relative to specific events, letting you detect and ideally prevent potential problems.

 Diagnostic has some default setting which you can change e.g. location where you want to save log file, limit the amount of space for logging, backup log files and so on.

I am going to explain steps of configuring diagnostic logging using SharePoint 2010 Central Admin website.

Note: You must be member of Farm Administrators group to perform this task.

1.       On the Central Administration page, click Monitoring.

2.       On the Monitoring page under Reporting, click Configure Diagnostic Logging.

3.       On the Diagnostic logging page, under Event Throttling, you can select the All Categories check box to enable event throttling for all events, or you can expand each event and granularly configure throttling to meet your specific requirements.

4.       Use the Least Critical Event To Report To The Event Log menu to select one of the following:

None

Critical

Error

Warning

Information

Verbose

5.       Use the Least Critical Event To Report To The Trace Log menu to select one of the following:

None

Unexpected

 Monitorable

High

Medium

Verbose

6.       Under Event Log Flood Protection, verify that the Enable Event Log Flood Protection check box is selected.

7.       Under Trace Log, either accept the default path for the location where the traces log will be written or specify a path. The location must exist on all servers in the farm.

8.       In the Number of Days to Store the Log Files field, accept the default value of 14 or specify a value.

9.       You can restrict the amount of disk space used by Trace log, Just click checkbox in restrict trace log disk space usage area and specify maximum storage space for Trace Logs.

Click Ok and apply all these settings. I hope you must be enjoying this multi part series of SharePoint Server Farm Configguration. Please don't forget to post your comments thanks :)

SharePoint 2010 Server Farm Configuration Part 1

After successful installation of SharePoint Server 2010, now it is time to do some practice. In this article I am going to explain how to setup SharePoint Server Farm for demo or production operations.

In this post I am going to explain how we can configure data collection and logging configuration tools as these tools are important for troubleshooting and tuning purposes and also this is very import topic with prospect of SharePoint Exam 70-667.

·         Configure usage and health data collection.

·         Configure diagnostic logging.

·         Configure incoming and outgoing email integration.

Usage and Health Data Collection Configuration:

It is responsibility of administrator to keep a close eye on system logs to monitor the usage patterns and health of system. I am going to explain steps how you can use SharePoint Central Admin website to configure usage and health data collection. This activity is configured for whole farm not for individual server and you must be a member of farm administrators group to perform this task.

Note: Keep in mind logging requires a lot of resources and performance, it is recommended always turn on required logging for required period of time and turn off when you don’t need it.

Follow these steps to configure usage and health data collection in Central Admin.

1.       Open Central Administration home page, and then click Monitoring

2.       On the Monitoring page under Reporting, click Configure Usage and Health Data Collection.

3.       When the Configure Usage And Health Data Collection page appears, under Usage Data Collection, select the Enable Usage Data Collection check box to enable usage data collection.

4.       Under Event Selection, select the check boxes for the events you want to log in the Events To Log List.

5.       Under Usage Data Collection Settings section, please specify path for Log File Location where you want to save usage and health information, keep in mind path must exist on all servers in the server farm. In our scenario just accept the default path because we just have only one server at moment.

6.       In the Maximum Log File Size field, enter a value between 1 and 20 for the maximum disk space for the logs in gigabytes.

7.       Under Health Data Collection, select the Enable Health Data Collection check box.

8.      Click Health Logging Schedule and select the desired the timer jobs to set the schedule for when the jobs will run.

9.       Under Logging Database Server section, select either Windows Authentication or SQL Authentication.

10. Click Ok and you complete wizard.

Hope now you will able able to understand how to configure Usage and Health Data Collection logging. This article is reference from book "Microsoft SharePoint 2010 Configuration" by James Pyles. Please don't forget to comment thanks :)

Databases created by SharePoint 2010

As I mentioned in my previous post, I will explain more about databases created by SharePoint 2010. In this post I am giving you good overview of each database created by SharePoint 2010. If you want to read more about this topic you can read from chapter 2 of book “Microsoft SharePoint 2010 Administration by Tom Carpenter and James Pyles”.

To see list of these databases just open your SQL Server management studio and expand databases folder. You can see in below screenshot list of SharePoint Databases.

SharePoint 2010 Core Editions and Features

In this post I am explaining about SharePoint 2010 core editions and features of each edition.

There are four editions as follows

1.       SharePoint 2010 Foundation (Free Edition)

2.       SharePoint 2010 Standard Edition

3.       SharePoint 2010 Enterprise Edition

4.       SharePoint 2010 for internet sites

In section I am explaining major features which are missing in each edition

Missing Features in SharePoint 2010 Foundation:

·         Social tagging

·         My content

·         My profile

·         Enterprise Wikis

·         Secure store service

·         Web analytics

Missing features in SharePoint 2010 Standard Edition:

·         Visio Services

·         InfoPath Form Services

·         Excel services

·         Access Services 

SharePoint 2010 for internet sites can be purchased as SharePoint 2010 Standard Edition or SharePoint 2010 Enterprise Edition.

Microsoft SharePoint Bases - Useful Links

Hi guys hope you are well and enjoying my blogJ in this post I am sharing some useful links. As you all know, to understand new technology you should have strong basics and concepts. Same case is with SharePoint Server, it is highly depends on networking, active directory, OSI layers, IIS and SQL server concepts. Please go through these links and refresh you IT knowledge it will definitely help you to better understand Microsoft SharePoint 2010.

Networking Concepts
· OSI Layers – http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc977633.aspx and  http://support.microsoft.com/kb/103884

· Address Classes – http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc940018.aspx
· DNS – http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc779489(WS.10).aspx
· DHCP – http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc780760(WS.10).aspx
· Firewalls – http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc527574(WS.10).aspx

AD (Active Directory) Concepts
· AD – http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb742424.aspx
· AD Fundamentals Webcast – https://msevents.microsoft.com/cui/WebCastEventDetails.aspx?culture=en-US&EventID=1032295120&CountryCode=US

IIS (Internet Info. Server) Concepts
· Core IIS Administration – http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb727092.aspx
· Web Site Administration (IIS 6.0) – http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/WindowsServer2003/Library/IIS/33e0a51a-5f8a-40f2-9923-cdd604e1a812.mspx?mfr=true

SQL Server Concepts
· Overview of SQL Server – http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc966521.aspx
· SQL query basics – http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb264565(SQL.90).aspx
· SQL Server backup restore – http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms187048.aspx

Please don't forget to comment thanks :)

SharePoint 2010 Logical Architecture

In this post I am going explain about logical architecture of SharePoint 2010. The logical architecture is basically structure of SharePoint contents; it explains how SharePoint is managing and storing contents.
See below figure of SharePoint 2010 logical architecture, you will have better idea how SharePoint defines the content structure.

The logical architecture includes three elements in a SharePoint 2010 deployment including:

1.       Server farms

2.       Sites

3.       Site collections

I am trying to give an overview about all three elements In this post, reset I will suggest please read complete Chapter 2 from book SharePoint 2010 Administration by Tom Carpenter and James Pyles.

Evolution of SharePoint

Microsoft SharePoint is not a new technology it is among us since 2001. Microsoft's continues enhancements each and every year make it more scalable, robust and powerful. Now in 2012 this product is on its full boom and popular everywhere. But Microsoft is still enhancing this product and makes more changes; you might have heard Microsoft is releasing SharePoint 15. I am not going to that path now :) I am new student of SharePoint and I have to dig it from scratch.

In this post I am going to explain history of SharePoint when it was started and where it is standing now.
I have referenced this article from book [SharePoint 2010 User's Guide by Seth Bates and Tony Smith]

Microsoft’s SharePoint technology was initially introduced in 2001 with the release of SharePoint Portal Server 2001. This product provided some fundamental tools made to allow users to publish and find documents. It allowed for the creation and management of document taxonomies and represented the first step in providing a way to catalogue and search for documents across an enterprise.

SharePoint Assessment Test

Hi Guys Quiz time now to test our SharePoint knowledge so far :)  This Quiz is based on first chapter of book MCT Microsoft SharePoint 2010 Configuration Study Guide. This quiz covers question about what's new in SharePoint 2010, Hardware and Software Requirments for SharePoint 2010 Server. Please try and check your answers in the end.

1.       You are a SharePoint administrator of a Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 environment, and you have been tasked by your CIO to investigate the viability of upgrading your production system to SharePoint Server 2010. Which of the following options are true?(Choose all that apply.)

A. SharePoint Server 2010 is a 64-bit only application.

B. SharePoint Server 2010 can run only on 64-bit Windows Server 2003, 64-bit Windows Server 2008, and 64-bit Windows Server 2008 R2.

C. SharePoint Server 2010 can only use 64-bit SQL Server 2008 for database services.

D. SharePoint Server 2010 deployed as a single server can use SQL Server 2008 Express Service Pack 1 as an integrated database.

SharePoint 2010 Environment Requirements

This article is referenced from book MCTS: Microsoft SharePoint 2010 Configuration Study Guide. This entire book is related to SharePoint exam 667. I extracted few important bits from first chapter of this book and I am explaining about hardware and software requirements for SharePoint 2010:

1.       SharePoint Server 2010 is a 64-bit only application.

2.       SharePoint Server 2010 will be able to run only on 64-bit Windows Server 2008 or 64-bit Windows Server 2008 R2.

3.       SharePoint Server 2010 will be able to use only 64-bit SQL Server 2008 or 64-bit SQL Server 2005 for database services.

SharePoint 2010 Single Server farm deployment guide

To learn any IT technology you need to be familiar with environment and it is the best way to learn things and practice. Books and reading material can only give you theoretical knowledge but to get practical knowledge you must have hands on technology. Especially students like me who wants to pass Microsoft certifications must have setup practical environment, so that they could understand things better.

In this post I am going to explain how we can setup SharePoint 2010 demo environment and do practice.

I am going to do Single Server farm deployment which is a complete all-in-one installation of SharePoint 2010 and the infrastructure components on a single server. The AD (active directory) and DNS are installed on separate servers.

We are going to setup SharePoint environment with two servers. One server is for our Active Directory, Domain Controller and DNS server, other server is for SharePoint and Database Server.

	SharePoint Server Database Server
	Active Directory DNS

SharePoint Exam Guide From Microsoft

In this post i am trying to explain about all possible exam paths for SharePoint.

Basically there are two tracks

1. SharePoint Administration Track
2. SharePoint Development Track

To complete SharePoint Administration track you need to pass two Exams

1. 667 - TS: Microsoft SharePoint 2010, Configuring
2. 668 - PRO: Microsoft SharePoint 2010, Administrator

For Development track you need to pass these two exams

1.573 - TS: Microsoft SharePoint 2010, Application Development
2. 576 - PRO: Designing and Developing Microsoft SharePoint 2010 Applications

If you will pass any above mentioned SharePoint Microsoft exams you will be MCITP (Microsoft Certified IT Professional)

If you want to gain the title MCP (Microsoft Certified Professional) you need to complete either Administration track or Development track.

Guys i will suggest you go through above mentioned links and check what are exam requirements. Main think is to make you mind, which track you want to choose first.

My programming skills are not very good, i will try to choose track A first (SharePoint Administration)

Please post you comments, ideas and suggestions thanks

What is SharePoint

This my first post about SharePoint. I am going to explain what is SharePoint? According to my understanding SharePoint is website build engine, it builds website for every purpose. SharePoint helps to share and collaborate your work with your team members. You can share your work not only within the organisation but also outside the organisation.

I studied different definitions from different sources, i am quoting these definitions, it will give you a better idea and understanding of SharePoint. 

1. SharePoint provides business users with the tools they need to effectively manage and share information, automate business process, collaborate, and interact with others. [SharePoint 2010 Users Guide by Seth Bates and Tony Smith]
2. A SharePoint site is a Web site that provides a central storage and collaboration space for documents, information, and ideas. A SharePoint site is a tool for collaboration, just like a telephone is a tool for communication, or a meeting is a tool for decision making. A SharePoint site helps groups of people (whether work teams or social groups) share information and work together. For example, a SharePoint site can help you:
   * Coordinate projects, calendars, and schedules.
   * Discuss ideas and review documents or proposals.
   * Share information and keep in touch with other people.
   SharePoint sites are dynamic and interactive — members of the site can contribute their own ideas and content as well as comment on or contribute to other people’s.[Office.Microsoft.com]

I must share this video, these guys explain SharePoint in plain English. Please have a look thanks

Please don't forget to contribute i am waiting for your comments. Please add your valuable thoughts thanks very much!