Microsoft shipped Windows Sharepoint Services 3.0 today. There’s an X86 and an x64 edition. I’m a fan of Sharepoint. I really think an organisation can change the way shared storage is provisioned and can take the concept to a nother level. Storage becomes a shared workspace where dynamic teams can work together independant of the involvement of IT. The platform can be customised to their needs and becomes an interactive web application that is very simple to maintain and develop. This technology is slowly gathering momentum. It appears to have taken hold abroad but has been slow to garner attention here in Ireland, unfortunately.
The FAQ states that the following are new features in WSS 3.0:
- Improvements to collaboration workspaces: SharePoint sites now offer e-mail and directory integration, alerts, RSS publishing, templates for building blogs (also known as weblogs) and wikis (Web sites that can be quickly edited by team members—no special technical knowledge required), event and task tracking, improved usability, enhanced site navigation, and more.
- Enhancements to content storage: SharePoint lists and libraries now provide per-item security for better data control and integrity, a recycle bin, and enhanced flexibility for storing more types of content. Row and column capacity has also been increased, as has retrieval speed. Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 can be easily integrated with smart client tools. In particular, close integration with Microsoft Office Outlook 2007 provides offline access to events, contacts, discussions, tasks, and documents.
- Easier provisioning of workspaces: Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 provides more sophisticated and flexible security, as well as greater control over security settings and permissions.
- A more robust foundation for Web applications: Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 provides greater flexibility for customization and development of Web-based services and applications built on the Windows SharePoint Services platform.
For me the key things in there are:
- RSS: it ties in nicely with IE7 and Outlook 2007. RSS is a fantasitc way to gather information from disperate locations.
- Blogging is here to stay. Having a blog template makes WSS 3.0 more friendly not only to the small business but it can be excellent for internal communications in a corporation.
- Recycle Bin: WSS 3.0 backup/recovery without the aid of an agent from the likes of Commvault is painful. Having a recycle bin is excellent.
If you’ve not heard of WSS or seen it in action, I strongly encourage you to check out the MS virtual labs for Sharepoint technologies. Don’t be scared, you do not need to be a "web slinger" to get great functionality out of this product.