SharepointLabs.com Blog on MOSS - WSS 3.0 sharing experience, technology, news, views and more

Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 continues to be a Internet buzz ever since its release. So what it is exactly and why from small business to large enterprises are leaning towards this new technology?

How many time in your organization you get the information (a file may be a doc or excel or any other file) when you need it? From independent studies 70% of information stored is never accessed on time by the organization when it need. The solution is here. Microsoft SharePoint products and technologies essentially empower businesses, organizations or institutes to effectively share and manage office processes with ease. This complex looking intranet requirement of many companies becomes reality as soon as the SharePoint technologies latest release MOSS (Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007) and Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 (released). This product and technology proved to be the biggest hit in Microsoft Product line after their Windows OS. This technology is browser-based collaboration and a document-management platform in core with flexibility to integrate with Microsoft and non-Microsoft based line of business products to automate part or entire processes of the organization. These can be used to host web sites that access shared workspaces and documents, as well as specialized applications like wikis and blogs from a browser. Any modification or customization required in this products are very much possible and they are then integrated to the existing SharePoint product in the organization. This customization is mainly called as "WebParts" or "WebPart creation". SharePoint is not intended to replace a full file server. Instead, it is targeted as a collaborative workspace, a tool for the management and automation of business processes, and a platform for social networking. This latest release is actually part of Microsoft Office System and as compare to previous releases that were part of Server Family.

This technology is an essential part of any business to enable them collaboration, processes and people as per need of business. SharePoint interface is through a web interface, such as a task list or discussion pane. SharePoint sites are actually ASP.NET 2.0 applications, which are served using IIS and use a SQL Server database as a data storage backend. All site content data is stored within a SQL Server database called WSS_Content.

SharePoint technology is actually collection of following two

* Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 (WSS)

* Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 (MOSS)

WSS comprises of the core functionality, with MOSS built on top to provide extra features.

Having SharePoint as part of your business infrastructure assures cost optimization as well as access to the information you need at the click of button from anywhere in the world. SharePoint is a part of the NEXT big thing i.e. Cloud Computing from Microsoft. Following is list of what you can do with SharePoint in a day or week which may take months to do if you decide to invest in custom development.

• Empower Teams Through Collaborative Workspaces
• Connect Organizations Through Portals
• Enable Communities with Social Computing Tools (blogs, wikis etc)
• Reduce Cost and Complexity for IT
• Connect your people to information and expertise
• Connect your people to key business applications
• Connect your people to role-specific resources
• Easily searchable documents sharing
• Manage diverse content
• Satisfy compliance and legal requirements (for example, records management, document management, clinical trial documents, legal documents, ISO processes documents, ISO processes, FEMA regulations for documents)
• Efficiently manage multiple Web sites
• Streamline business processes
• Integrated Architecture for Process-Centric Applications
• Personalized Dashboard for users
• Dashboards for executives and stack holders with access to all business critical information and data

The most amazing part of MOSS and WSS is that it comes with more than 40 business ready templates to be integrated in your implementation. These templates then be expanded by your own need by your IT Staff or you can hire qualified Microsoft Partner to do that for you. Following are the list of application templates available from MS.

Site Admin Templates

• Board of Directors
• Business Performance Reporting
• Case Management for Government Agencies
• Classroom Management
• Clinical Trial Initiation and Management
• Competitive Analysis Site
• Discussion Database
• Disputed Invoice Management
• Employee Activities Site
• Employee Self-Service Benefits
• Employee Training Scheduling and Materials
• Equity Research
• Integrated Marketing Campaign Tracking
• Manufacturing Process Management
• New Store Opening
• Product and Marketing Requirements Planning
• Request for Proposal
• Sports League
• Team Work Site
• Timecard Management

Server Admin Templates

• Absence Request and Vacation Schedule Management
• Budgeting and Tracking Multiple Projects
• Bug Database
• Call Center
• Change Request Management
• Compliance Process Support Site
• Contacts Management
• Document Library and Review
• Event Planning
• Expense Reimbursement and Approval
• Help Desk
• Inventory Tracking
• IT Team Workspace
• Job Requisition and Interview Management
• Knowledge Base
• Lending Library
• Physical Asset Tracking and Management
• Project Tracking Workspace
• Room and Equipment Reservations
• Sales Lead Pipeline

In this way Microsoft SharePoint is a horizontal solution for all the vertical of industries for their information access need and process management. So it is must have tool for any business and can address all your existing information sharing and accessing issues. We encourage every business to identify the potential of this and use it in the organizational need to reduce overall cost of ownership of IT infrastructure. Feel free to contact us (a qualified Microsoft Gold Partner and authorized partner for SharePoint Deployment Planning Services) or qualified Microsoft Gold Partner.