Category Archives: General

Just stuff that doesn’t really have to do with anything in particular – blog updates, friend updates, etc…

SharePoint Online (O365) and Windows Phone

I LOVE the ability to view my SharePoint calendars in Outlook right with my Exchange calendars.  This is one of the greatest features ever in my opinion.  The problem now is that I expect to be able to do the same thing on my smartphone devices – but cannot.

Playing with the Windows Phone (pre-Mango) tonight and was hoping to be able to display a SharePoint calendar in my phone’s calendar view.  You’d think if anyone could do it, it should be the MS device but no go. 

Here’s the official post/statement:  http://community.office365.com/en-us/w/sharepoint/527.aspx

Ok.  It’s lame, but Mango isn’t that far out, so we’ll just wait and see. 

Sad smile

To be fair, I haven’t found a way to get this to work on the iPhone/iPad either, though there are a number of 3rd party apps available to assist with access to SharePoint sites.  On the iPad, the screen is big enough to actually navigate to the calendar site itself, which is better than nothing, but I still would like the one-stop-shop available with Outlook. 

Bamboo got close at one point – it looks like a product called MashPoint actually allowed some functionality for ‘real’ SharePoint servers for 2007, but nothing is available for 2010 or the Office 365 solution (sandbox solution).    

If Mango can pull this off – major points to them.  It still won’t solve the problem of my wife wanting to access our family SharePoint calendar on O365 though… Her employer doesn’t allow browser access to O365 – #FAIL. 

Hanging a Shingle: TrecStone…

A month ago (May 2011), I started a new venture called ‘TrecStone’ -  under which I’ll be doing consulting work, potentially adding other folks to the team down the road.  As you may imagine, I’ll be spending a lot of time in the Microsoft SharePoint space.  More specifically, I’ll be assisting organizations with their SharePoint platform strategy and utilization of out-of-the-box capabilities. 

The short story is that many organizations start their SharePoint implementation with a specific project or goal in mind. Once that solution is in place however, efforts to expand use of the platform tend to fade.  With much of the cost of SharePoint being up-front in hardware, software, training and customizations, it should be a priority for the business to make the most out of the platform they’ve already invested in. Yet, many times the enormous potential of the SharePoint platform remains unfulfilled.  My passion is to help organizations better understand their business needs and how SharePoint’s out-of-the-box capabilities can be aligned with those needs. 

I’m particularly excited about Office 365 entering the marketplace, as it will introduce new users and new use-cases while at the same time removing significant efforts to get started and manage server environments. 

Check back to see how things evolve as we get ramped up:  http://www.trecstone.com

Please let me know how I can help you or your organization!

Office 365 – The New Business Essentials

I recently attended a conference session about resources and tools available for new business owners.  While a lot of the conversation what about raising seed and venture money, one topic was about the tools and services that are essential to a new business. 

They listed a lot of the things that you would expect: A phone number, a good place to get business cards and a business address (see below). Being in the technology field, I was thinking along different lines. They didn’t mention a domain name, email and a website, though I hope it was just assumed.

I would argue that with the release of Office 365, this is also going to be a small business essential tool.  Office 365 is going to be a simple, inexpensive tool that can meet the core email and website needs while being chock full of so much more potential. 

  1. Sign up for Office 365
  2. Get yourself a domain name and configure your Office 365 account to use it for email and public-facing site. You may need some guidance or assistance with this, but it’s a lot less than setting up your own servers and there are a LOT of resources to help – online and other. 
  3. Build your public-facing site.  This can be as simple or complex as you’d like to make it, but with the template and tools available, you can be up in minutes. 
  4. Now, go about your business.
  5. In the meantime, start to look at all the other capabilities you have:
    1. Lync Online – Conduct your online meetings without needing another services like GoToMeeting, etc…
    2. SharePoint Online – Store and share your documents and other content.  MUCH more later as you learn about SharePoint’s capabilities…
    3. Exchange Online – Primarily your email, but so much more than the basic accounts you had in the past. Manage your calendar and resources and sync them from multiple devices. 
    4. and so, much more…

To be fair, during the session they did also mentioned DropBox, and GoToMeeting. Dropbox may still be a useful tool, depending on the devices you’re using, though Office 365 is going to fill a lot of that capability as well.  GoToMeeting is fully surpassed by the Lync Online capabilities and integration that Office 365 offers. 

So, if you ask me – I wouldn’t start a business without spinning up a Office 365 site as one of the first things. 

Notes and References:

  • The conference I was attending was the MHTA Spring Conference.  They did a fantastic job.  If you’re in the Minneapolis, MN area and can attend I highly recommend it.  MHTA is the Minnesota High Tech Association. 
    • Grasshopper Virtual Phone System – This could be useful as an alternative to giving out your cell number to anyone.
    • GotPrint.com – Yep, you need to have business cards and these are certainly inexpensive.
    • A P.O. box – Don’t want to be using your home address, but I prefer the UPS box option that allows for a real address with no ‘P.O.’ and notification when stuff arrives.

SharePoint Community Events… Busy Days

There are a handful of things happening in the next day or so that might be interesting to folks in the SharePoint space:

  • Wednesday 4/20 8:00 AM – Michael Gannotti’s Coffee Talk will be taking place. His talks include:
    • Microsoft Productivity News
    • Productivity Customer Onsite Experience
    • Special Guests
    • Tips and Tricks
    • Gadget of the week
    • Live Audience Q&A
  • Wednesday 4/20 11:00 AM – Q&A with the SharePoint MVP Experts.  Access the event by checking out the MSDN Events and Webcasts page.
  • Wednesday 4/20 6:00 PM – Microsoft Store at the Mall of America.  From 6:00 – 8;00 there is a Special Event for Business solutions.  They’ll be covering Microsoft Signature Pro and Microsoft Office 365 – Cloud versions of Microsoft’s communications and collaboration (yep – SharePoint) products.  Oh, and did I mention a 15% store discount during the event?
  • Thursday 4/21 11:25 AM – SharePoint ShopTalk
    Register for this week’s event.

Hope to see you there!

Office365 – Public Beta Available

Today the public beta for Office365 opened up.  (Happy Tax Day).  So, what does this mean?  And where do you get started? 

Well, there are a TON of resources out there for you to learn about Office365, how to get involved and what it can mean for your organization.  For starters:

So, what is this and why should you care? Office 365 is the newest version of Microsoft’s online (aka ‘cloud’) application offerings. This includes (depending on the version and licensing):

  • SharePoint Online
  • Exchange Online
  • Lync Online
  • Microsoft Office Professional Plus

The big picture is that you can use these services without installing, configuring and managing the hardware and core software stuff – a big load off for many organizations.  You do still need someone that can configure and manage the service for your organization. But it’s a lot less work and hassle than managing an on-site set of servers.

More importantly, you need someone to define *how* your organization is going to use these services and how it fits with the organization’s goals and technology roadmaps – which is where people like me come in.   

The short story is that it’s a lot of bang for your buck.  The next batch of questions now become:

  • Is Office365 a good fit for your organization?
  • What is the best way to use Office365 in your organization?
  • How will it work with your organization’s existing capabilities?

Office365 has a lot of potential to improve the productivity of users and organizations, but it also has the potential to add to the clutter of tools and systems that are out there – just as any platform used poorly can do. 

So, check it out, allow yourself to get excited by the potential, but then slow down and put some time into planning so you can be successful down the road. 

OneNote Needs Mind-Mapping

I recently saw a post about a Microsoft-hosted event called the 2011 U.S. Innovative Education Forum, which reminded me of something I’ve been meaning to post – a request to Microsoft:

Please add mind-mapping functionality to OneNote. 

That’s it. 

It really should be there – here’s why:

  • Kids are using it – It just makes sense to them because it’s the way we all think.  My second grader came home from school and showed me his ‘research paper’ that included what he called a ‘web’. It was a mind-map. Kids are already being trained to use this method for learning, organizing their thoughts and working from them. Fantastic. 
    Now, bear in mind that our kids to to a STEM school, so all public schools might not be using mind-maps yet, but they should. They used a tool called Kidspiration / Inspiration.  They weren’t sure which one. 
    I picked up the Home and Student version of Microsoft Office 2010 which includes OneNote and the kids are all over it – they love it.  Adding the mind-mapping capability just seems to be the next step. 
    Kids today are the future of your software market.  Yea, I know it’s a cliché, but it’s true and there are more of them than there are of us – so it’s a good investment.      
  • College age students would use it too – I can’t imagine how different my note-taking would have been with a mind-mapping tool and the right hardware that’s available now. 
  • Adults are using it – More and more I’m seeing people in meetings using some sort of mind-mapping software to take notes, which I think is fantastic.  I use a tool on my iPad right now called iThoughtsHD which is pretty good and is supposed to sync with client apps, though I don’t have one yet. In the meantime I just use the e-mail method which sends a list view of the content along with an image of the map. 
    For the same reason that it works for kids, it works for adults too – it’s a tool that’s consistent with the way we think. 
  • It makes sense and is an extension of the other note-taking that people want to do.  Let’s get it in the right tool.  If you step back and think about it, the core functionality seems to align with what’s already available in Visio for managing shapes and relationships, but the user scenarios are more aligned with OneNote.  Students and kids aren’t going to buy Visio. 
  • Once it’s built into OneNote, let me have the other Office integration features that we’re used to: create tasks that link to Outlook and SharePoint.
  • Let me add people as nodes – people pulling from my Outlook, the SharePoint Profile Store or Exchange.  
  • While you’re putting that together – make an iPhone and iPad version of it that syncs to the Cloud…  Smile 

Please. 

Oh, and meanwhile, Kid #1 comes up to me one morning and asks “How can I get access to my OneNote at school?”.  Smart little bugger. Now I need to get them set up on Live…

Thanks for listening. 

Random Links 4/11

At the end of every week or so I end up having a whole bunch of browsers sites open because I see something that looks interesting in a tweet, blog or linked from somewhere else and just leave the window open until I get back to it.  Lazy, I know, but I’m usually in the middle of something else at the time, so I just validate that it looks interesting and then come back to it later.  Inevitably, I don’t get back to the site until I need to shut down or reboot, where I then lose the link… So a while back I started sending myself a list of links every so often so I can read them later – dang this hording gene of mine.  Anyhoo, some of this stuff might be useful to others, so instead of emailing them to myself I’ll see if it’s at all useful to post them for myself and others to check out.  Here’s the latest batch:

It would be nice if I could capture where I’m getting these links from, especially when they are from others.  I’ll work on that… maybe it’s just what others do with their ‘[person’s name] Daily’ pages that I’m seeing all over the place now. 

Happy Monday!

SharePoint Saturday Twin Cities – 4/9 Recap

The latest SharePoint Saturday event in the Twin Cities was a huge success!  Some of the numbers:

The new location worked out very well – holding everyone without too much crowding (other than a few really popular sessions), with free parking and wireless access available.  A nice upgrade from our previous digs.  We also had a Kinect play area during the day.  Smile 

Presentations are now available on the site for download. 

Keep an eye on the official site for updates and news about the fall “ScarePoint Saturday” event – tentatively scheduled for October 29th.

A big thanks to Sarah Haase for overseeing the organization of the event, as well as to all the sponsors, volunteers, and attendees. 

See you in the fall!

New SharePoint Blogger!

Lookout SharePoint world – Sarah Haase (locally of Best Buy fame) has entered the blogosphere.  Sarah has been a presenter at the Minnesota SharePoint User Group, SharePoint Saturday – Twin Cities and the Best Practices Conferences and always has great information, especially when it comes to measuring the ROI of SharePoint solutions. 

Well, she finally started up a blog here:  http://sarahlhaase.wordpress.com/

Go check it out!

idubbs Blog Site Update

Started out with some routine maintenance and wanting to do a little enhancement: Update the blog engine to the latest version while adding twitter link capability to posts.  Ended up doing a bit more for fun.  Smile 

  • Backed up the WordPress site files and content (db).  You don’t really care about this, but I needed to do it before upgrading anything…  There are some more elegant methods and tools available, but I just did it manually this time around.  
  • Upgraded the MySQL and PHP engines.  You don’t care – no biggie. What is cool about upgrading this and the mySQL engine is that they were both done really easily due to the way WestHost has their site management set up – kudos to them. 
  • Upgraded the WordPress software.  Again, you don’t care, it doesn’t change the way anything looks.  Again, what is cool is the way that WordPress has their updates now – all automatic via the administration interface.  Slick.
  • Added the Tweet This plugin to allow users to tweet posts and post facebook statuses.  (cool)  This you might care about – if you’re able to find anything useful here and want to easily share it with others.  I hope you do…
  • Added a plugin to change the mobile experience, which works really well for iPhone users.  This – is really cool.  Thanks to @AndrewWoody for the heads up on this one – very slick for iPhone users to access the site.  WPTouch plugin.   
  • Adding another plugin to improve the experience for Windows Mobile users.  Thanks to @bsimser for raising the issue for WP7 users (since I’m not one yet) and @AndrewWoody again for ID’ing the fix – WPSuperCache plugin

And now, back to SharePoint…