This month we have Craig Carpenter (MCSA, MCSE, MCT) visiting speaker from the UK presenting at the user group. Craig is here in Wellington this week training a SharePoint Administrator class as part of Combined Knowledge Asia Pacific and MindSharp training now offered in New Zealand. Developer training for SharePoint and WCM development will be coming up soon! This months session topic: Best Practices for SharePoint Web Applications. In this session Craig will showcase best practices for deployment of SharePoint web applications. This session is targeted towards all levels of SharePoint enthusiasts. As one of the founders of Combined Knowledge, Craig Carpenter (MCSA, MCSE, MCT) has over ten years experience of training and consulting on Microsoft platforms. Craig started his IT career within the education arena, a start that provid ...[Read More]

So this blog post is to inform everyone about me stepping out into the big world of SharePoint with some great talent to back me up in bringing the best of SharePoint to New Zealand. I am now officially working as an independent SharePoint consultant under my own company brand called Knowledge Cue. Let me tell you a bit about why and how I came to this decision. I have been working in the Microsoft solutions space and was fortunate enough to get involved in SharePoint projects back in 2001 and 2002 when the product was at it's infancy and anyone hardly took any notice of it. This was usually a combination of MCMS 2001, 2002 (Microsoft Content Management Server) and then SharePoint Portal Server 2003 and WSS V2. With the early pre-beta launch of Office SharePoint Server 2007 or "MOSS" as many refer to it these days, in 2006 ...[Read More]

Via [ Paul Andrew ] I'm pleased to announce the release of the User Guide, Samples and Walkthroughs for the Visual Studio 2005 extensions for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0, v1.1. The Visual Studio 2005 extensions for SharePoint were released back in Feb 2008 and an update for Visual Studio 2008 is planned for release in June 2008. Official description and questions can be directed on Paul's announcement about the Visual Studio extensions post. For Developers (ASP.net) who are looking at starting out on SharePoint there is also a MSDN web cast series that will be happening over the next few weeks.   Each MSDN Web Cast is an introduction for .NET Developers to SharePoint and the Topic. You need to register for the web cast by clicking the link and entering some details. Then you get emailed a link to sign on and participate in ...[Read More]

Last evening we had our Wellington SharePoint user group session and the topic was "Content Types". Mark (OJ) introduced the concept of Content Types and some guidelines on how to use Content Types in your SharePoint deployments. Here are the resources and links that I promised. Power Users (Create and Maintain Content Types via the SharePoint Administrative Interface) If you are new to SharePoint and the concept of SharePoint Content Types the following list of links are very important to follow. Introduction to Content Types http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepointserver/HA101495511033.aspx Create a Site Content Type http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepointserver/HA100997781033.aspx?pid=CH101237641033 Change a Site Content Type http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepointserver/HA101000041033.aspx?pid=CH101 ...[Read More]

Want to learn about SharePoint aka:MOSS at a leisurely pace? No access to a Server with MOSS installed? No to Worry you just download this self contained learning module so you can learn about MOSS functionality and the core features. Videos and Interactive modules make it easier for you to understand key concepts. Installing is easy but you'll need to be an administrator on the PC you are installing this. Download the SharePoint Desktop Learning Installer from here. Technorati Tags: MOSS,SharePoint,WSS,Training ...[Read More]

The AKS Kit 1.0 is a set of samples and building blocks that can be used in your new SharePoint deployments. The AKS Kit can be now downloaded from CodePlex.   The Accessibility Kit for SharePoint (AKS) provides templates, master pages, controls, and web parts along with technical documentation that enable designers and developers to advance the accessibility of Microsoft Office SharePoint Server (MOSS) 2007 and Windows SharePoint Services (WSS) 3.0 based web sites and applications for people with disabilities, especially those who are vision impaired. It is up to partner integrators to download the samples and provide solutions based on the Kit. This is not a full end to end solution for making your site compliant by just installing this kit. Technorati Tags: MOSS, WSS, AKS, Administration, Accessibility, Solutions, SharePoint, ...[Read More]

Following up from my previous post on SharePoint training here are some more great training resources now available! Collaboration Selection Guide Collaborating with SharePoint Server 2007 Overview SharePoint Server 2007 Sites and Workspaces Selection Guide SharePoint Server 2007 Document Collaboration Get Started SharePoint Server 2007 Team Sites Get Started Customizing a SharePoint Server 2007 Site Get Started SharePoint Server 2007 Web Parts Learn More SharePoint Server 2007 Meeting Workspaces Get Started SharePoint Server 2007 My Sites Get Started SharePoint Server 2007 Site Access and Storage Learn More SharePoint Server 2007 Surveys Get Started Outlook 2007 and SharePoint Server 2007 Integration Overview Outlook 2007 and SharePoint Server 2007 Integration Get Started Using InfoPath 2007 ...[Read More]

I get asked by clients and co-workers about how to do various things with SharePoint when SharePoint has being deployed or planning is underway for a deployment. I always recommend training for end users and support personnel is a key step in ensuring the successful adoption of SharePoint. In some cases the training should start parallel to the deployment so that  end users get familiar with concepts such as "Lists", "Document Libraries", "Slide Libraries", "Content Types", "Site Columns". These concepts and terms if not effectively demonstrated in a business relevant contextual manner end users will mostly not understand how SharePoint can be used. So if you are an organisation deploying SharePoint here are some options that you may want to consider for training your end users and ...[Read More]