By Terry Engelstad
MCP, MCSE, CCNA, MCDBA, MCTS, MCITP
AIS Network Operations Manager

Recently, a SharePoint hosting customer asked us to perform routine maintenance on his SharePoint site.  As part of that, he asked us to clean out the Recycle Bin and have the automatic deletion mechanism disabled for the Recycle Bin.  He said that his company hadn’t cleaned its SharePoint Recycle Bin in over one year.

There are some things you might find interesting about the Recycle Bin, which is the first line of defense in recovering data. As you probably know, SharePoint uses a two-tier Recycle Bin. The first tier is at the User level where an item deleted from a List or Library will drop into the User Recycle Bin. This way, the Users can recover deleted items themselves. Then after a period of time, items will be moved from the User Recycle Bin to a Site Collection Recycle Bin. The duration for which an item sits in the User Recycle Bin is determined by a parameter in SharePoint Central and is specific to an entire Web Application.  The duration for which items will sit in the Site Collection Recycle Bin is determined by the amount of space available to hold these items and is also configurable via a parameter in SharePoint Central.

Currently, our customer’s User Recycle Bin is configured to never delete items.  There are quite a few items in various User Recycle Bins. There are two ways to clean them out.  First, somebody can go to each of the User Recycle Bins and remove items manually.  Or, second, the retention configuration parameter could be changed to a very low value, and after a period of time, the items will flush out on their own.

The difference between these two techniques is that the first one requires human intervention to find all the Recycle Bins and to make decisions about which items should be deleted or not. The second option is global and will affect all items in all Recycle Bins.

Naturally, if our client wants us to clean out the User Recycle Bins individually, they would also need to define the rules for deletion of those items (i.e., delete everything older than 30 days, for example).

On the other hand, if the customer wants us to change the configuration parameters, we’d be happy to do so.  That’s easy.

More questions about your hosted SharePoint?  Leave your comments below.

“To cloud or not to cloud?” is rapidly emerging as the technical question of the decade.

Industry analyst Gartner, Inc., expects 43 percent of companies to have most of their IT efforts running in the cloud in as little as four years. Due to that expected boom in cloud adoption, Gartner ranks cloud computing as the No. 1 tech priority for chief information officers.

Placing a mission-critical platform into the hands of an independent, third-party hosting services provider can uniquely position that

Should you host your SharePoint 2010 in the cloud?

organization to combine some of the best elements of on-premise hosting and Office 365 delivery. For many organizations, SharePoint is mission critical and the decision to shift from on-premise hosting to third-party hosting is not entered into lightly.  However, the benefits of doing so are increasingly appealing.  In comparison to on-premise hosting, third-party hosting offers superior flexibility, greater reliability and a better value.

Why a better value?  Ultimately, if an organization were to attempt to replicate the hosting infrastructure built by a third-party provider, it would become abundantly clear to that organization that outsourcing to a third party provides a much better value.  It is usually cheaper for an organization to host SharePoint on-premise – unless they want to do it right.  Replicating an on-site infrastructure that equals the performance, reliability, scalability, security and compliance environment that “comes standard” with a solid, Microsoft hosting partner’s services would be cost prohibitive.

Here, it is also important to note that for public companies or others that are audited, Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX) also drives the case for outsourced hosting.  SOX identified the Type II SAS 70 report (today’s equivalent is SSAE 16 Type II) as the only acceptable method for a third party to assure a service organization’s controls.  Many reputable hosting companies are SSAE 16 Type II-audited, which means the audit of the hosting company can be incorporated into the audit of the public company.  Relying on the audit performed on a third-party hosting company, at the hosting company’s cost, may be much more cost-effective than ensuring your own facilities and processes are SSAE 16-compliant.

Hosted SharePoint Specialists

Organizations contemplating a SharePoint deployment should recognize that there are applications hosting providers and then there are a handful of hosting providers that specialize in hosting SharePoint.  Many have Microsoft and additional compliance certifications, and that enhanced capability and level of service may be imperative to an organization requiring customized SharePoint hosting configurations, Microsoft-certified talent, and top-grade security and disaster compliance.

The hosting provider’s infrastructure is supported by many clients, thus enabling it to deliver a broad range of services at a substantially lower price (than managing identical services on-premise).

For the customer, there is little upfront capital expense and the monthly payments to the hosting company are predictable operational expenses.  The IT staff is freed up from spending precious resources and time on designing its own hosting solution architecture.  Stressing about managing backups, software licenses, hardware/software upgrades, and patching schedules is all in the hands of seasoned hosting experts who monitor the customer’s SharePoint solution in a disaster-resistant data center.

In addition to cloud hosting services, there are two general types of SharePoint hosting that a third-party provider may offer:

• Shared hosting. An organization’s applications and data are deployed on a server that is shared by several other organizations.

• Dedicated hosting. An organization either deploys its own servers or the hosting provider deploys servers dedicated for exclusive use by that organization.  Dedicated hosting may be provided by either dedicated physical servers or dedicated virtual servers.

Benefits and Drawbacks of Third-Party Hosting
A SharePoint hosting provider frees up an organization’s entire IT staff to focus on tasks that will help grow their business.  In their Service Level Agreements, most top-tier hosting providers offer disaster-resistant data centers, temperature and access controls, 24x7x365 monitoring and response, excellent connectivity, reliable uptime and availability, managed hardware/software upgrades and maintenance, routine backups and fail-over capability in the event of disaster.

The best providers develop a solid, personalized relationship with each customer, listening carefully to their needs and integrating their team of experts into the organization’s IT staff.

Benefits include the following:

• Customization. The hosting provider is capable of configuring highly complex SharePoint installations.

• Low upfront costs. Capital outlays are minimized. Outsourced hosting becomes an operational expense.  The hosting provider typically buys and manages the servers and provides the licenses.

• Staff. Highly trained hosting experts strive to integrate seamlessly with an organization’s team, thus helping to strengthen the relationship through personalized service.

• Security. An organization’s servers are typically highly secured, backed up and sitting in a disaster-resistant data center.  Many providers have SSAE 16 Type II designations as well as other compliance certifications.

• Scalable. Spikes in traffic can be sustained without the accompanying worry that the organization’s network will crash.

Drawbacks include the following:

• Portability. SharePoint hosting is complex, and organizations must enter into long-term contractual commitments with their hosting provider.  Switching providers in mid-contract, or reverting back to self-hosting, is not easy and the process of migrating data to a new hosting arrangement can be onerous.

• Slower deployments. Deploying the physical infrastructure is managed and thus not as turn-key as cloud-based hosting.

In addition to cloud hosting services already addressed by this paper, there are two general types of SharePoint hosting that a third-party provider may offer:

• Change management. Changes – either hardware or software – to the SharePoint configuration may require the hosting provider’s review and approval, so organizations must plan in advance.

• Flexibility. While third-party hosting may not recreate the level of flexibility associated with on-premise hosting, in most cases, the degree to which an organization loses out on flexibility and control is less than the degree by which it will save on capital outlays.

Just as with on-premise hosting, there is a large emphasis on customization and flexibility in the world of third-party hosting providers.  An organization will have full access to its own SharePoint environment – the way it should be – and any kind of software application that compliments its SharePoint (customer relationship management software, data mining programs, etc.) can be integrated.

Have more questions about hosting SharePoint in the cloud?  Download the “To Cloud or Not to Cloud” whitepaper and/or speak with someone in our office.

Looking for some good use cases for SharePoint or for some user adoption resources?

Last year, Microsoft launched their “That’s Why I Use SharePoint” site with some super resources to promote SharePoint user adoption.

It’s not just our clients.  SharePoint 2010 is making life a little easier everywhere.   Just check out these stories from real people who like using SharePoint, including folks representing Del Monte, Indiana University, BlueMetal Architects and Miami-Dade County Public Schools.

Why do you use SharePoint?  Have a SharePoint story of your own?  What user adoption approaches have you taken?

Just last week, we made a bold statement that has captured quite a bit of attention within the SharePoint community.

We revealed that we are now deploying SharePoint Server 2010 in a single private cloud for less than our competitors are charging for a public or hybrid cloud implementation.  And, we expressed our strong view that enterprise-class Microsoft SharePoint 2010 customers should look only to private cloud environments.  In short, it’s the only way to go based on sheer practicality and bang-for-the buck.

Enterprise-class SharePoint Server 2010 is hosted most cost-effectively in a private cloud.

Plain and simple, you want the most control over your SharePoint 2010 environment with the least hit to your organization’s bottom line, and you get every bit of that and more by moving from a traditional deployment to a hosted private cloud architecture.

Currently, hosting providers are steering enterprise-class SharePoint 2010 customers toward public cloud and hybrid cloud hosting models.  Our cost analysis research shows that those deployment approaches are needlessly costing more than they should and the customer sacrifices control at multiple levels.

A private SharePoint cloud is simply more economical and easier to manage for a large organization with security and compliance concerns.  An enterprise SharePoint Server 2010 platform implemented wholly in a private cloud, including the online storage components, exceeds core compliance requirements and surpasses the benefits of a public cloud or hybrid cloud.

With SharePoint 2010 deployed entirely in a private cloud, the customer gets:

• a hosted environment that is exclusively internal to the organization,
• complete control of its servers, security, permissions, policies and customization,
• seamless federation between line-of-business systems and various data sources,
• quick scalability for system resources, and
• the ability to move other core applications and platforms to the same private cloud.

Public cloud services like Microsoft Office 365’s SharePoint Online and deployments of SharePoint Server 2010 in a public or hybrid cloud are okay for small to mid-size businesses, but they’re very impractical when it comes to serving the best interests of a large business.

The private SharePoint cloud model is an ideal outsourcing alternative.  Sooner or later, global and large enterprises evaluating SharePoint 2010 deployment platforms are going to realize that an enterprise SharePoint Server 2010 platform implemented solely in a private cloud is, indeed, the only way to go.

Have a different opinion?  I’d love to hear your thoughts below.  Need a free quote on a Private SharePoint Cloud?  Naturally, we’d be happy to help you with that.

If you are not familiar with how SQL Server works, you should know that it does, in fact, use memory for caching of data.  If you don’t give it enough memory, then it won’t cache enough data.  If you don’t cache enough of the right data, then you must go to disk to get it.  If you have to go to disk to get it, then you are making excessive trips to the SAN to retrieve data, thereby reducing the overall efficiency to everybody on the SAN.

I’ve done a couple hundred installations of SharePoint, and I am definitely a believer in “more is better.”   When it comes to SharePoint, you absolutely must give it memory – and lots of it.  You cannot get away with shorting memory and disk space.

If you really want to tick off a customer, take a SharePoint Site that has a reasonable amount of traffic and start reducing the amount of memory SQL Server has to work with.  See how long it takes for that customer to start complaining.  It won’t take long.

By Jay Atkinson
AIS Network CEO

We love SharePoint 2010 but we are still keen to know, “When is the next edition of SharePoint scheduled for release?”

It’s still unknown whether the next edition of SharePoint is destined to be called SharePoint 15, SharePoint 2012, SharePoint 2013 or something entirely different.  I am guessing it will be “SharePoint 2013,” given that the release is planned for much later this year.  The beta will be released this summer, we’re told.  The Microsoft SharePoint Conference 2012 is November 12th-15th in Las Vegas, so releasing SharePoint 2013 then would make complete sense from a marketing standpoint.  But again, nothing has been announced beyond “Q4.”

SharePoint 2010 is something we love but we're still keen to ask when the next release is coming.

What will the new edition include?  Microsoft is mum at the moment and everything is pretty much scuttlebutt right now.  Mary-Jo Foley, who follows Microsoft and writes for ZDNet, indicated in her blog on February 22^nd that this next edition of SharePoint will include a new SharePoint Apps Marketplace.  According to her, SharePoint Apps “will support multi-tenant installations so that hosting providers can make available the same set of applications to multiple customers.”  And, “SharePoint 15 gets a new education module/option, making the product more of a head-to-head competitor with Moodle, which is an open-source course-management system.”

There will be a lot of additional activity at Microsoft this year.  Reading Redmond Channel Partner magazine is a great way to keep up with this type of information.  According to the publication, a number of new releases are expected this year.  Here’s a rundown:

SQL Server 2012

Release scheduled: April 1, 2012 (Now Released – updated 4/2/12)

Windows 8

Anticipated release: Between Q3 2012 and early 2013 (updated 8/15/12)

Windows Server 8

Anticipated release: Between Q3 2012 and early 2013 (updated 8/15/12)

System Center 2012

Anticipated release: Early 2012 (Now Released – updated 6/19)

Internet Explorer 10

Anticipated release: Between Q3 2012 and early 2013  (updated 8/15/12)

“Office 15″ (Codename for Sharepoint 2013/Office 2013)

Anticipated release: Q4 2012 or early 2013

(Download SharePoint Foundation 2013 Preview now. – updated 8/12)

Exchange 2013 (code for “Exchange 15″)

Anticipated release: Q4 2012 (updated 8/15/12)

Visual Studio 2012

Anticipated release: Q3 2012 (updated 8/15/12)

Windows Phone “Tango” and “Apollo”

Anticipated release: Q2 and Q4 2012, respectively (Tango Now Released, and Apollo On Track – updated 8/15/12)

Dynamics ERP Online

Anticipated release: September or October 2012 (updated 8/15/12)

Office 365

Anticipated update schedule: “Almost weekly” (updated 8/15/12)

Windows Azure

Rumored CTP release:  Spring 2012 (updated 8/15/12)

What do you think SharePoint 15/SharePoint 2012/SharePoint 2013 will look like?  Share your thoughts with us below.

There is a security feature in Windows 2008 called Loopback Checking.  It’s a security feature in IIS, which is a way of stopping some denial of service attacks.  Since SharePoint 2010 runs locally on the server, and accesses its own databases by way of Communication Foundation service calls through IIS, technically, SharePoint is performing what could be construed as a self-denial-of-service-attack.  There is a registry hack to turn off the feature.

This feature is only an issue on servers which are domain controllers and running SharePoint and SQL Server at the same time.  Loopback Checking is not a problem on servers which are not domain controllers, nor in multi-server farm scenarios where SQL Server is not running on the same server as IIS.

For more information about disabling the loopback check, see Microsoft Support Article 896861.

To review:  In June 2011, Microsoft released Office 365, which is essentially bundled online software hosted in the cloud. Office 365 replaced Microsoft’s Business Productivity Online Services (BPOS) and bundles together the latest upgrades of its SharePoint, Exchange and Lync Server solutions.  So, when you hear “SharePoint Online,” that means SharePoint as it is presented in Office 365, which is hosted by Microsoft. In my last blog, the first part of this series, I explained what Microosft Office 365/SharePoint Online is.  Now, let’s look at the benefits and drawbacks.

In today's blog, we look at the benefits and drawbacks of Office 365/SharePoint Online.

Online SharePoint is like a good off-the-rack suit – it does the job if you are a relatively low-level user. However, like a department store suit, it never fits perfectly enough to feel tailor-made.

The features and functionality limitations may be a deal-breaker for some organizations. For example, Office 365 does not allow for full server control and unrestricted access to customize the online SharePoint environment; it also restricts the maximum number of users to 50 and a number of search features are not included. Because online SharePoint cannot be highly customized, some organizations may eschew it for hosted SharePoint Server 2010, which allows for maximum customization. Organizations weighing the two options should study the service descriptions for each product; they will need to compare carefully the online SharePoint to its on-site counterpart.

Nevertheless, a good business case can be made for deploying Office 365. Among the benefits are:

• Comprehensive. The bundled services are attractive to many smaller organizations for which customization is of little importance.
• Fast. Turn-key configuration and anywhere-access go a long way in the small- to mid-size market.
• Less expensive. Maybe, maybe not. However, it does free an organization from the capital outlays associated with on-premise hosting.

Among the drawbacks:

• Storage. It’s more expensive per gigabyte.
• Service Level Agreement. Microsoft offers a lower SLA than most top-tier hosting companies. They do not guarantee 99.999% uptime.
• Comprehensive. An organization may not need or want all of the features offered – or the cost that comes with it.
• Features/functionality limitations. In comparing the on-site and online versions of SharePoint, an organization might find that the limitations of the latter are a deal-breaker.
• Impersonal hosting relationship. Microsoft is the hosting provider, and it will be challenged to match the rewarding, personalized experience that organizations often have with a smaller hosting provider – one who blends seamlessly into the organization’s own IT staff.
• Loss of flexibility and control. An organization can keep its on-premise infrastructure, and using the hybrid capabilities, still deploy Office 365 in the cloud.

However, if you require a high level of control and customization for SharePoint, you would be better served deploying SharePoint Server 2010 in the cloud. If, in future upgrades, Microsoft chooses to match more closely the features and functionality of online SharePoint to its on-site counterpart, namely SharePoint Server, the incentive to move to Microsoft’s cloud may be even stronger for many organizations. In the meantime, third-party hosting of either SharePoint Foundation 2010 or SharePoint Server 2010 may offer an optimal solution.

Are you using Office 365?  What do you think of it?  Check out our white paper for more information.

In June 2011, Microsoft released Office 365, which is essentially bundled online software hosted in the cloud. Office 365 replaced Microsoft’s Business Productivity Online Services (BPOS) and bundles together the latest upgrades of its SharePoint, Exchange and Lync Server solutions.  So, when you hear “SharePoint Online,” that means SharePoint as it is presented in Office 365, which is hosted by Microsoft.

You'll find SharePoint Online in Office 365. But, will it meet your needs adequately?

The convenient, pay-as-you-grow subscription plan to Office 365 requires that an organization pay Microsoft for only what it uses – per user, per month. The net benefit to an organization’s IT team is that it is relatively turn-key and requires far less administration than an on-premises deployment of the identical suite of applications. Organizations may find comfort in Microsoft’s guaranteed high availability and recoverability and its back-end administration, all of which are backed by a Service Level Agreement.

When evaluating an Office 365 deployment, organizations should be asking four key questions:

• Is Microsoft offering a better value? How much would it cost to run these same solutions on-premise?

• Do we need all of these products?

• Are the limitations of Office 365 a deal-breaker for us or our customers?

• Are my mission-critical applications going to be safe? What security assurances is Microsoft providing?

Office 365 Plans

Office 365 comes in two sizes – one for small businesses and professionals (referred to as Plan P) and one for medium-sized enterprises (referred to as Plans E1, E2, E3, and E4).

Microsoft designed Plan P for smaller organizations, ranging from 1 to 25 employees, with a cost of $6 per user per month. For somewhat larger enterprises, the more flexible series of “E” plans (“E” stands for enterprise) ranges from $10 to $27 dollars per user per month.   Plan P and the four Plan Es are not exclusive to the company size for which they were designed, so a small business could opt for a version of Plan E.

The Office 365 Plan P, according to Microsoft, “brings together online versions of the best business-grade communications and collaboration tools from Microsoft, plus Microsoft Office Web Apps, at a price that small businesses can afford.”  In our recent white paper, “To Cloud or Not to Cloud:  SharePoint 2010 Hosting Options…and Which One Is Right for You,” you will find a chart outlining what each plan does. 

Plan P highlights include:

• Email, calendar, contacts, personal archive, and 25 GB mailbox storage with 25 MB attachments using Exchange Online

• Support for workgroups of up to 50 people

• Online document viewing and basic editing capabilities using Office Web Apps

• Easy access to files from a mobile device using Office Web Apps

• Consistent file formatting from desktop Office to Web versions with Office Web Apps

• Sites to share documents and information with SharePoint Online

• Capability to design/ maintain a professional, public Web site with SharePoint Online

• Instant messaging, presence, online meetings, and PC-to-PC audio/video calls with Lync Online

• Ability to share a desktop with colleagues and partners using Lync Online

• Premium antivirus and anti-spam filtering with Microsoft Forefront Online Protection for Exchange

Plan P’s SharePoint emphasizes sharing content rather than collaborative content creation. Collaboration on creating and editing documents with Office Web Apps is “basic.” Plan P assumes that, unlike larger companies, small organizations are less likely to require robust collaboration.

The convenient, pay-as-you-grow subscription plan to Office 365 requires that an organization pay Microsoft for only what it uses – per user, per month. The net benefit to an organization’s IT team is that it is relatively turn-key and requires far less administration than an on-premises deployment of the identical suite of applications. Organizations may find comfort in Microsoft’s guaranteed high availability and recoverability and its back-end administration, all of which are backed by a Service Level Agreement.

Plan E Series

If Plan P feels somewhat light, an organization might consider Microsoft’s Plan E series. Office 365 for medium-sized enterprises is presented in four plans, each with access to some level of SharePoint. Not all four plans come with the same level of SharePoint or other features.  Choosing the optimal plan depends on three questions:

• How much are we willing to spend?

• How much SharePoint do we need and what customization is required?

• What other benefits of Office 365 do we need?

All four “E” series plans feature SharePoint’s ability to access information and documents, however advanced content creation and publishing only come with plans E3 and E4. So, to derive the full benefit of SharePoint through Office 365, an organization must choose either E3 or E4 at a cost of $20 or $27 per user, respectively.

Any thoughts yet?  What is your organization doing?

Come back to this site for Part II, the “Benefits and Drawbacks of Office 365. ” Also, you can download our whitepaper about Office 365 vs. on-premise hosting.

GUEST BLOG

By Michael V. Velotta
Founder, Intelishift Technologies

Last month, a prospective client asked a very good question related to the performance of his hosted SharePoint deployment.

The hosted SharePoint environment that he currently has deployed across North America, Western Europe and India is very slow.  Latency is an issue – 20 seconds to upload a file.  He wanted to know how he can minimize latency with a hosted SharePoint solution.  In short, he was concerned about performance.

Latency between Washington and Western Europe ranges between 80 milliseconds (ms) and 140 ms, depending on the country and the carriers within the country.  From Western Europe to Chicago, I’ll add 25 ms to that number.

Latency between Washington and India is 250 ms to 280 ms.  The wildcard here, however, is inside India.  India is heavily oversubscribed and a bad carrier could skyrocket the latency to north of 500 ms.  We’ve had a little more success from Fremont (CA) to India and can get the latency down to 200 ms; then we have the in-country latency issue again.

The holy grail (this is what large SharePoint shops do) is to have SharePoint servers at a datacenter “near” their offices: one in Washington, one in India and maybe one in Greece.  Then the SharePoint servers can sync up behind the scenes (or nightly).  The user’s latency problem goes away and the SharePoint servers are left to keep in sync without impacting the user’s experience.

What is your experience with this?  I’d be interested in your comments.

Michael V. Velotta is a technologist and entrepreneur.  He is the founder of Intelishift Technologies, a strategic data center solutions consultant for a diverse set of clients, including high-end technology firms, Fortune 500 companies, non-profits and government agencies.