Questions from the roadshow
We continue the roadshow in Harrogate yesterday but this posts covers questions I made a note of to look up from all the previous roadshows at Nottingham, Bristol and Glasgow. Here are the ones I've looked at but there are still more outstanding which I'll post as I get some more answers on them.
Is there a comparison feature in excel that shows the diffs between two spreadsheets
not out of the box but there are some third party tools that do this. There are also some compliance related solutions which help to track small changes in spreadsheets in order to detect fraud. Cluster Seven do a good solution that integrates with SharePoint Server 2007 for this.
Walkthrough links
Links to where has it gone? If you are struggling to adapt to the new UI, these sites shows you a mock up of the 2003, lets you click on the feature and it will show you where it went in 2007. For the full post, including the links, click here.
Ribbon video
There is a very good video talking about the new ribbon and why we did it which is worth a look.
Sync toy
a popular tool is sync toy. Why is this not in vista? Well as the link says this is for the advanced photo user. Windows Vista base experience is aimed at the base level user and we need to keep the tools simple for the breadth scenario. Sync tool has been updated for the advanced user and runs on Vista for those who need this more advanced capability.
Office exams
The central training site has information about the certifications available. The Office Specialist is relevant to those deepening their Office system skills. These will be updated soon to 2007 as was announced recently. [update: here is the updated official link]
When to use Groove - link to Martin
I mentioned this very good post from Martin Kearn about his real world experiences of using Groove on a client project. Here are some links from my blog on the subject:
Do you get Outlook with each Exchange license?
no. Exchange, with a CAL, out of the box lets you access your inbox via OWA but you need to buy Outlook or an Office suite if you want the rich client - more on Exchange licensing here. More on Eileen's blog.
Will SharePoint Records Management in 2007 be certified with PRO? Will it require Meridio?
The certification against Public Records Office (PRO) and The National Archives (TNA) is no longer open for us to test against. Much of what we did rely on third party vendors in SharePoint Portal Server 2003 we do out of the box in SharePoint Server 2007. There is a white paper on meridio's site about their integration with 2007.
The issue is that TNA offered guidelines which many viewed as mandatory. We are caught between two models, older certs are largely obsolete and the new Model Requirements (MoReq 2) will not be specified until the end of this year and we are on the vendor review panel. DoD5015.2 is relevant in US, and also accepted here so that's why we are pursuing that.
Deployment tools link
Link to the Office deployment centre
In particular, the Office compatibility pack can be found here.
Dockit archive a sp site to cd
I think as a solutions for a read only cheap backup solution or as a way to transfer content from one server to another, there are ways to do this. I'm not familiar with the Dockit tool or whether there is a version for 2007. If others know, please comment here.
Can you license part of your estate with SharePoint Server Enterprise CAL and part with the base CAL?
legally the answer is yes - you can mix and match but we don't recommend it, because if you get audited you have to prove that standard CAL users are not using Ent features. It is easier if you have a separate farm.
Viewers for 2007
The Compatibility Pack can also be used in conjunction with the Microsoft Office Word Viewer 2003, Excel Viewer 2003, and PowerPoint Viewer 2003 to view files saved in these new formats. For more information about the Compatibility Pack, see Knowledge Base article 924074.
Sharepoint for mobile browser
See this kb article on which mobile devices are supported on SharePoint