Preliminary SharePoint 2010 information

Here is some useful information about the new upcoming release of SharePoint:

via Microsoft SharePoint Products and Technologies Team Blog
We’ve heard loud and clear that you want system requirements information as early as possible to assist in your budgeting and planning, so today we’re happy to announce (and confirm) some preliminary system requirements for SharePoint Server 2010:

• SharePoint Server 2010 will be 64-bit only.
• SharePoint Server 2010 will require 64-bit Windows Server 2008 or 64-bit Windows Server 2008 R2.
• SharePoint Server 2010 will require 64-bit SQL Server 2008 or 64-bit SQL Server 2005.

In addition to the requirements listed above we also wanted to share with you some preliminary detail about SharePoint Server 2010 browser compatibility.
To ensure the best possible experience across multiple browsers we’re focusing our SharePoint 2010 engineering efforts on targeting standards based browsers (XHTML 1.0 compliant) including Internet Explorer 7, Internet Explorer 8 and Firefox 3.x. running on Windows Operating Systems. In addition we’re planning on an increased level of compatibility with Firefox 3.x and Safari 3.x on non-Windows Operating Systems. Due to this focus Internet Explorer 6 will not be a supported browser for SharePoint Server 2010.
So, what can you do today to get into the best shape for SharePoint Server 2010?

• Start by ensuring new hardware is 64-bit. Deploying 64-bit is our current best practice recommendation for SharePoint 2007.
• Deploy Service Pack 2 and take a good look at the SharePoint 2010 Upgrade Checker that’s shipped as part of the update. The Upgrade Checker will scan your SharePoint Server 2007 deployment for many issues that could affect a future upgrade to SharePoint 2010.
• Get to know Windows Server 2008 with SharePoint 2007, this post is a great starting point.
• Consider your desktop browser strategy if you have large population of Internet Explorer 6 users.
• Continue to follow the Best Practices guidance for SharePoint Server 2007.
• Keep an eye on this blog for updates and more details in the coming months.

Below are a few common Q&A’s (which we’ll add to as required)

Q: What about Internet Explorer 6 and SharePoint 2010 publishing sites?
A: The Web Content Management features built into SharePoint 2010 will provide a deep level of control over the markup and styling of the reader experience. These features will enable customers to design pages that are compatible with additional browsers for viewing content, including Internet Explorer 6. A standards based browser such as Internet Explorer 7, Internet Explorer 8 or Firefox 3.x will be required to author content.
Q: Is Internet Explorer 6 officially supported by Microsoft?
A: Official Microsoft Product Support for Internet Explorer 6 will expire in July 2010. You can find additional information on Microsoft’s Support Lifecycle Policy including specific dates, product information and support offerings here: http://support.microsoft.com/gp/lifepolicy.
Q: Why are you only supporting the 64-bit versions of SQL Server 2005 or 2008 for SharePoint Server 2010?
A: This decision was based on our current test data for SharePoint Server 2010 and real world experience from customers running SharePoint Server 2007 with 32-bit SQL Server. SharePoint performance and scalability can benefit significantly from 64-bit SQL Server and the throughput increases are significant enough for us to make the difficult decision to only support SharePoint Server 2010 on 64-bit SQL Server 2005 or 2008. It has been our strong recommendation for some time that SharePoint Server 2007 customers take advantage of 64-bit SQL Server due to the inherent performance and scale benefits it can provide.

Enough about Calendar Web Parts - here's a cool SharePoint iPhone application!

Ok - now I think I've covered the world of SharePoint Calendar web parts pretty comprehensively, here's something more fun!

One thing I was thinking of developing was a way to access SharePoint lists on the iPhone - properly!

Yes, I know you can render a SharePoint page nicely on an iPhone, but proper navigation still eludes us... except now..

I found these folks in Australia - Spyk Software - have created a very good, stable iPhone app called iShare that will let you navigate a SharePoint site! It works really well - just read only for now - but you can set up multiple servers as needed. That saves me the effort of developing that one! Thanks ;-)

Seriously, go check it out and support them... good job folks and keep up the great work!!

Kwizcom Calendar Webpart

Kwizcom produce a calendar webpart, but as you can see from the picture, the design is fairly complicated. It seems to only have limited features and add only a little extra functionality to the standard Microsoft SharePoint calendar.

http://www.kwizcom.com

Ole Software Calendar Webpart

Another firm that offers a calendar webpart, but which has less functionality than ours, is Ole Software. They offer a nice presentation of a web part that can show multiple list in one view, but at the time of writing the part does not offer user friendly features like checkbox selection of which list to show/hide, Outlook 2007 design, drag and drop, resizable, mini calendars. However, again worth checking out and let us know what you think!

http://www.olesoftware.com

Virto Software Calendar Webpart

I just found this firm, looking for similar calendars. This team have put together a nice (though non standard Microsoft Office style) 'Google-calendar look' web part, with similar functionality to ours. In review, I think we have more options for the typical user such as:

- In our web part you can select which view of which list you would like and we allow you to overlay different views of a same list in different colors - e.g. My Events, Your Events in different colors from one SharePoint list and you can easily click our checkboxes to show/hide.
- In our web part you have Mini Calendars on the left for quick navigation.
- Ours is a little less expensive
- We offer iCalendar export for sharing to your Outlook, Google, or iCal calendars if needed

All in all though no doubt a nice web part and seems like a good alternative to ours if for some reason you want to spend more and not buy ours! Let me know what you like or don't like about their offering and if you agree with my assessment. As I said it's a good alternative and good luck to them (and all the makers of SharePoint web parts - we're a big community really). We'll include your ideas of improvements in future upgrades for our calendar! :)

http://www.virtosoftware.com

Bamboo Solutions Calendar Webpart

Bamboo Solutions offer a number of different webparts, and they have a calendar webpart, with lots of features particularly oriented to tracking timelines and project management functions. While it does have a lot of data connectivity options, the user interface is relatively standard, and does not have drag & drop 'Outlook 2007' type functionality.

http://www.bamboosolutions.com

Other SharePoint Calendar Webparts

In addition to our own great webpart ;-) there are a few other SharePoint calendar webparts out there by similar companies. As technology consultants, we know that not everyone has the exact same need for their calendar webpart in SharePoint - functions, style, price, and browser compatibility may differ for instance from person to person.

Our goal at SharePoint-Central is to help you find the right webpart for your site, and as a result we'll blog about the ones that we know are out there. If you know of any others, please let us know and we'll include them here in our blog.

..and do let us know of how you think our own webpart could be improved, or what you are looking for!

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