Integration with Office SharePoint Server 2007
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Microsoft Office Project Server 2007 integrates with the core platform and advanced components of Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007. Office SharePoint Server 2007 includes several server products and components that are built on the Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 platform. Because Project Server 2007, Office SharePoint Server 2007, and related products are built on the common SharePoint Products and Technologies platform, developers can use a common set of development tools and techniques to integrate and extend all of the products.
Components of SharePoint Server 2007
Office SharePoint Server 2007 aggregates services and applications that were previously separate products. For example, the functionality of Microsoft Office SharePoint Portal Server 2003 and Microsoft Content Management Server (MCMS) 2002 are now part of Office SharePoint Server 2007. In addition, Office SharePoint Server 2007 adds new administrative, collaboration, business process management, and business intelligence features along with Excel Services, Enterprise Content Management, a common search architecture, and workflow.
Figure 1 shows the major application features and components of Office SharePoint Server 2007 and the shared application and administration services.
Figure 1. Applications and components of SharePoint Server
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Note
Figure 1 offers a generalized view of Office SharePoint Server 2007 and the Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 platform, and does not show which of the shared application services are specifically associated with the core components such as the Windows Workflow Foundation run-time engine.
Products
Project Server, Office SharePoint Server 2007, and Microsoft Office InfoPath Forms Services 2007 are separate products. All of the products in the 2007 Microsoft Office system, including Office SharePoint Server 2007, Project Server, and InfoPath Forms Services, make use of the Windows SharePoint Services core platform. Project Server and InfoPath Forms Services include some of the services in Office SharePoint Server 2007, but require Office SharePoint Server 2007 for integration with applications and features such as Web Content Management, built-in workflows, and Excel Services.
All of the features in Office SharePoint Server 2007 can be integrated and extended with a common set of tools and technologies in Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 and Microsoft Office SharePoint Designer 2007. Microsoft ASP.NET 2.0 allows developers to create and modify Web Parts, master pages, provide personalization for Web sites, and integrate an extensible provider model for navigation, security, and other platform features.
Project Server requires either Microsoft SQL Server 2000 with Service Pack 3 or later, or SQL Server 2005 Service Pack 1 or later. If these applications are installed on a single computer, InfoPath Forms Services and Office SharePoint Server 2007 can run with SQL Server 2000 MSDE or SQL Server 2005 Express Edition. For a farm installation using multiple computers, all of the 2007 Microsoft Office server applications require the full SQL Server product.
Figure 2 shows the main page of Microsoft Office Interactive Developer Map application. The Interactive Developer Map includes relationships of all of the Microsoft Office client and server applications, Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 features, and related development tools and services. If you install the Interactive Developer Map from MSDN (http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/office/bb497969.aspx), you can click each item to see a page with links to online documentation for that product or feature.
Figure 2. Microsoft Office Interactive Developer Map
.gif "Microsoft Office Interactived Developer Map")
Office SharePoint Server 2007
Office SharePoint Server 2007 provides a common administrative framework for all of the related server-based applications and solutions, multilingual Web content management capabilities, server-based Microsoft Office Excel components, advanced collaboration, Enterprise Content Management, and business intelligence.
Excel Services enable rendering of server-based workbooks by the Microsoft Office Excel 2007 client or thin rendering of workbooks in Internet Explorer. Access to server-side calculation of complex models and the calculation results are available through a Web service API.
Enterprise Content Management allows users to create validation processes, notifications, and workflows around 2007 Microsoft Office system documents from applications such as Excel 2007, using Windows Workflow Foundation. These processes can encompass a whole workbook down to the cell level in scope. Office SharePoint Server 2007 includes several built-in workflows; developers can add more complex workflows using Microsoft Office SharePoint Designer 2007 and Windows Workflow Foundation in Visual Studio 2005 extensions for the .NET Framework 3.0.
Web Content Management capabilities include authoring of Web templates with formatting constraints using SharePoint Designer, Web-based authoring using templates, site navigation, managing security access, and multisite publishing. Web Content Management integrates the same tools for creating workflows that Enterprise Content Management uses, along with authoring, approval, Web publishing, policy and auditing, rights management, and multilingual staging.
Enterprise Search is built in for fast indexing through a Microsoft Office Outlook 2007 store and other Microsoft Office documents and SharePoint pages. The Enterprise Search capabilities include indexing, relevance, alerts, a customizable user experience, and a Web service API. Enterprise Search is also extensible, for example, developers can extend Enterprise Search to include external systems such as SAP Web services.
Business Process Management includes the Business Data Catalog metadata model, which you can use to describe actions and the API of a line-of-business (LOB) application such as enterprise resource planning (ERP), and determine what methods to call for specified data or actions. The Business Data Catalog streamlines the application development life cycle for business application integration. Developers can write and test the Business Data Catalog metadata, system administrators can manage Business Data Catalog deployment, and business analysts can then build solutions using Office SharePoint Server 2007.
The SAP Web Parts delivered with Office SharePoint Server 2007 can read data from SAP Web services. There are several ways developers can create components that write data to SAP: call the SAP Web services directly, or define actions in the Business Data Catalog and link them with the Microsoft Office InfoPath 2007 client-based or Forms Server–based forms or other applications.
Single Sign-On is a pluggable component that enables integration of existing identity management solutions with Office SharePoint Server 2007.
Business Intelligence capabilities include scorecards, key performance indicators (KPIs), and the Report Center. Advanced People Profiles and a People Search Center enable the location of people and groups throughout multiple organizations; Audience Targeting allows content contributors to highlight and present specific content to a selected user base.
The Report Center allows users to easily find and analyze documents and Web pages that contain numerical data. Users can connect to enterprise data sources and generate SQL Reporting Services and Analysis Services reports. Dashboards can provide access to business data through Business Data Catalog–based LOB objects and Web Parts that connect with SAP applications.
Collaboration features in a Office SharePoint Server 2007 portal site can include discussions and task lists for basic project management. Collaboration actions can be based on presence information (whether a team member is online, away, offline, in a meeting, or on the telephone).
Workflows are collaboration processes that are built on Windows Workflow Foundation in the Microsoft .NET Framework 3.0. Windows SharePoint Services does not provide any built-in workflows, although you can develop workflows using Microsoft Office SharePoint Designer 2007 or Visual Studio 2005. Office SharePoint Server 2007 includes workflows such as the Enterprise Content Management (ECM) review workflow. The Project Proposal approval workflow in Project Server is based on the ECM workflow and requires Office SharePoint Server 2007 in order to operate.
InfoPath Forms Services
InfoPath Forms Services provides server-based Microsoft Office InfoPath 2007 forms that are accessible from a browser, without requiring the InfoPath client application or a form download. InfoPath Forms Services enables business process owners to create workflows and archiving for forms-based processes. InfoPath Forms Services is built on the core Office SharePoint Server 2007 and Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 components.
Office Project Server 2007
Office Project Server 2007 includes the Office SharePoint Server 2007 core and administrative services and the Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 components for a comprehensive enterprise project management solution. You can add the full Office SharePoint Server 2007 product and integrate additional features with Project Server for extended solutions.
Project Server can import a task list from Office SharePoint Server 2007 or a Windows SharePoint Services site and convert the task list to a Proposals and Operations project for management by Project Web Access with simple timesheets, and task and resource management. Project Server can also convert a Proposals and Operations project to a full enterprise project management solution that includes schedule recalculations, cost management, and comprehensive reports.
Project Server can make use of KPIs that are exposed in reports managed by SharePoint Server; the KPIs actually come from SQL Server 2005 Analysis Services. For detailed developer information about other 2007 Microsoft Office system products, see the following SDKs:
Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 SDK
Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 SDK
Microsoft Office Forms Server 2007 SDK
The Microsoft Office Project 2007 SDK will include examples that show how to integrate Project Server with a wide range of Microsoft Office system products.
See Also
Concepts
Other Resources
Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services Developer Center
Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 SDK
SharePoint Server 2007 Developer Portal
Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 SDK
Microsoft Office Forms Server 2007 SDK
Developer Introduction to Workflows for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 and SharePoint Server 2007
2007 Office System Starter Kit: Enterprise Content Management Starter Kit
Visual Studio 2005 extensions for .NET Framework 3.0 (Windows Workflow Foundation)