I’ve done it … I’ve successfully performed my first integration/configuration of WSSv3 and Search Server 2008 Express. It is a powerful combination that gives you all the search features of MOSS while running in a WSSv3 environment. It is really a straight forward configuration to perform and Microsoft has published a great TechNet article on it here.
It really is that simple, install WSSv3 (with SP1), run configuration wizard, install Search Server Express, run configuration wizard again, set up search server (including indexing) and you’re ready to go. When I did it for the first time, after setting up search, I was getting an error that Search Server could only be run on a single application server. I was doing a single server install so I couldn’t figure out what was going on. Apparently, I had forgotten the indexing setup of Search Server and for some reason, not having indexing turned on and configured throws this error. After finishing up the indexing piece everything worked like a charm.
This does bring up, what will probably be one of the primary downsides of Search Server, is that you can only have one Search Server per farm. Using the Express version you are unable to load balance your search servers. If you wish to set up a Search Server farm, you will need to purchase the full version of Search Server.
As I continue to utilize Search Server, I’ll be posting more on some of the features and configuration possible. A comparison of MOSS, Search Server 2008 Express and Search Server 2008 can be seen here.
I had to stray from my typical topic for tonight…as some of you know; I’m a big time Red Wings fan. Despite being down in FL, I’ve been able to watch the games live online here. Ok, so not exactly live, when comparing it to TV (which my brother and friend are watching back in MI)…online is about 30 seconds behind TV.
Last year I was able to make it to a play-offs game last year, and have tickets for game 7 of the first round this year if it happens. Maybe I’ll even go for tickets for the cup if they can make it that far. My spirits were lifted after seeing the first two games of round one in Hockeytown. Sure, we made some mistakes, Hasek let in quick goals he shouldn’t have, but we were able to pull through. However, the last two games in Nashville have been very disappointing. We just can’t pull it together. Hopefully being back at home for game 5 will re-energize us and give us the boost we need to make it on to the next round and continue to the Stanley Cup to take it to its right spot in Detroit once again. GO RED WINGS!!!!
Oh…and on a side now…I saw this commercial during the game tonight and it made me laugh. It’s one of the best that I’ve seen so far.
I passed my Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 – Application Development exam this morning. I’m now a MCTS in both Administration and in Application Development. I received a 752 and needed a 700 to pass. I wasn’t able to study nearly as much as I wanted to, but have been doing SharePoint work for nearly 2 years now, so that went a long ways in helping to pass the exam. The studying I did do was simple to follow the links posted by Paul Galvin on his blog here. It was a great resource for studying, so between that and hands on experience I was able to get my certification.
The other day a client had a requirement of putting a link to a quiz about a training video as well as making sure that the user watched the entire video. I thought, why not just put the link at the very end of the video, disable any controls to fast forward the video so the only way the user can get to the quiz is to sit down and watch the video.
I did some research, and the only format I discovered that this was reasonable to do it in was to do it in Flash. So, I took the .wmv video from the client, imported it into flash, took a screen shot of the last frame of the video, added it at the very end, and create some text on the image with a hyperlink embedded that took the user to quiz. I bundled it all together into a .swf file. Now the trick was to get it to play in SharePoint. Fortunately, Michael had done this not long ago and posted it on his blog here. Using his solution the video was easily embedded in the page and the client was happy.
Thanks Michael!
For those of you that are interested in just using a downloadable web part to play the Flash, EPC Group offers a free download on their website.
I went out and picked up a couple of SharePoint books today that look pretty good. The first one was Windows SharePoint Service 3.0 Inside Out by Errin O’Conner, the CEO of my new employer, EPC Group. The other book was Professional SharePoint 2007 Development by a variety of people, including John Holliday, whom I had the pleasure of meeting at the latest JOG meeting and Adam Buenz whose blog I follow.
Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to read Errin’s book as I had to give it away to a client shortly after purchasing it, however I have another one coming in the mail so I can read that one. The SharePoint Development book looks good from a quick scan with lots of code samples. In the past I have focused primarily on SharePoint administration, but am starting to delve deeper into development, hopefully this book will prove a good resource.
The other day I upgrade my blog from WordPress 2.3 to 2.5. So far it’s been working really well and the upgrade was nice and simple. The new backend user interface is much nicer. So far my favorite feature has been the ability to upgrade pluggins right from the admin pages rather than downloading the pluggins and uploading them manually.
There are still a couple of my pluggins that an automatic upgrade doesn’t work for, but overall it’s a very nice improvement. Maybe one of these days I’ll switch over to blogging on a SharePoint site, but for now this is cheaper and has been working well.
I’m sorry I haven’t had many new posts in a while. I’m in the transition between BlueGranite and EPC and haven’t had much to write about as I make that transition.
The most exciting thing I’ve done in the last few weeks was attend a JOG meeting with John Holliday, MS MVP. The topic was a custom SharePoint solution for auditing in WSS and MOSS. Keep an eye on his blog for the sample code and some useful tools for developing SharePoint solutions.