http://ciaops.podbean.com/2013/01/08/episode-44-ishai-sagi/
In this episode I speak with SharePoint MVP Ishai Sagi about the latest features coming to SharePoint 2013 whether on premise or via Office 365.
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Tag: SharePoint
Foundation 2013 Search challenges
This was going to be a post about the fact that I managed to get Search working on SharePoint Foundation 2013, and I did have it working. Honest. The initial issue I experienced seemed to either be the fact that I had accidentally installed SharePoint Foundation 2013 on the member server as a local (rather than a domain) administrator or that the times on the workstation and the server were too different. Whatever it was I did have it working.
That was until I powered up the machines (server and members server) to get some screen shots of it all working. Problem is now it does again! I also noticed the the SharePoint machine was really, really slow and when I took a look at the resources I saw:
From this you can see how much memory and processing is being consumed by SharePoint Search alone! Wow. You are doing to need more hardware grunt of you are planning to implement SharePoint Foundation 2013 from what I can see.
Now admittedly I am only running this on a virtual machine for testing purposes but I can tell you I didn’t have these issues with SharePoint Foundation 2010! The more I work with Foundation 2013 the more I am beginning to dislike it. Don’t get me wrong, I love SharePoint 2013 but getting this blighter to work is proving very, very difficult. I certainly hope others aren’t seeing these issues. Another reason to focus on Office 365 in my books.
The positive thing, when I did get SharePoint search working, was that SharePoint Foundation 2013 now incorporates all the features of Search Server Express (obviously the reason why there is no more stand alone Search Server Express product). It also includes the ability to index PDF documents WITHOUT the need to install separate iFilters.
Now, if I could only show you that actually working but as I said, when I booted the machines backup SharePoint search no longer worked on Foundation 2013. Back to the drawing board yet again.
Getting Started with SharePoint 2013 eBook
My final eBook for 2012 is now available in a variety of formats.
This book helps novice users understand the basic usage and operation of SharePoint 2013. It examines the following basic components of SharePoint: Documents, Calendars, Tasks, Picture Libraries, Recycle Bin and Search. The reader will be taken through a tutorial process on how to use each item. Much has changed since previous versions of SharePoint, however there are still some similarities. As such, this book may still provide some insight into the basics of older versions of SharePoint. It will show you how to start interacting with SharePoint 2013 so it can be put to use in your business as well as provide a number of resources for continuing familiarity with SharePoint 2013.
This booked is aimed at users who have never used SharePoint and is only $1.99 and available in PDF, ePub and Kindle formats.
The best place to pick a copy of this and other title from the CIAOPS is at the Publications page at – http://www.ciaops.com/publications, however most titles are also available from Lulu and Amazon.
CIAOPS SharePoint and Office 365 Guide available on monthly plan
I am pleased to announce that the CIAOPS SharePoint and Office 365 Guide is now available on a month by month payment plan of $ 30 p.m. (excluding any applicable taxes). To receive the Guide in this manner you will need to complete an application, agree to a minimum initial 12 month subscription as well as provide your credit card details (as all billing on this plan is done via credit card).
Please note that the pay by the month plan is for a minimum initial period of at least 12 months and does not receive any anniversary or referral discounts.
You can still elect to purchase the Guide on an annual basis of $299 and receive all the benefits if you want.
Don’t forget that the Guide is not a static product, content is being added every month. Amongst other things, this month will bring a set of over 70 practice exam questions for the 74-324 Administering Office 365 for SMB exam. For more information about the Guide visit www.wssops.com.
Sharegate is great!
Last year, when I attended the SharePoint Conference I came across the Sharegate product. It is basically a tool that allows you to move SharePoint data. I purchased a license shortly after that but I have also been provided a license as an Office 365 MVP (full disclosure).
Hopefully you know that you can drag and drop files into SharePoint using Windows Explorer. That works fine if you don’t want to copy any history, versions or meta data, which increasingly people do want.
File data is however, only a small part of information saved in SharePoint these days. Most sites have significant amounts of lists. So how can you copy or migrate these? The best way was to export to a desktop application like Excel or Access, there was always the option to save the list as a template and then copy it across and import it into the new location. In short, all very messy.
The problem has been, especially in the SMB space, has been the lack of a single tool to handle all this sort of migration and do so at a reasonable price. That was until Sharegate came along. Since I first started using the product it has added a variety of features, now including the ability to content from one site to another. Best of all the product is compatible with all current versions of SharePoint including SharePoint Online with Office 365.
You can see from the above diagram that the application is well laid out and easy to use. I like the fact that it remembers your sites and many of your actions so you don’t have to go through the whole configuration process over and over. I like how it also allows you to determine what level of interaction and notification you desire. Great for set and forget migrations.
I think that if you are regularly moving SharePoint information whether within sites or with migrations when Sharegate is an indispensible tool.
Only with SharePoint 2013 sites
As the above image shows, SharePoint Designer 2013 only works with SharePoint 2013 sites much like SharePoint Designer 2010 before it.
Search Service INOP in SharePoint 2013 Foundation
Now that I have SharePoint Foundation 2013 installed a member server I thought that I start looking at how well search works and in anything needs to be done to index third party documents like PDFs. What I found so far hasn’t been good news I am afraid to report.
Let me set the scene. I installed SharePoint Foundation 2013 on a member server and used the Complete installation method with the data residing on SQL Server 2012 Express. I used the SharePoint Configuration Wizard to set up the site using the defaults.
With SharePoint Foundation 2012 it turns out that search is now more like the old Search Server Express 2010. Thus, think of SharePoint Foundation 2013 as SharePoint Foundation merged with Search Server Express. You would think that is good wouldn’t you?
The first thing I found was that even using the SharePoint Configuration Wizard to set up farm indexing wasn’t enabled. When you go into the Search Application administration you see the following:
Local SharePoint Servers are a content source but there is no crawl enabled on these sites by default. Easy enough to enable some crawl rules. However, with that done I found that the indexing commences but remain stuck in the Starting state as shown.
And here it stayed no matter what I tried or how long I waited. When I attempt to do a search I get this every time.
My expectation is that out of the box, using a default installation that search would be enabled and would operate. I certainly not found that to be the case in my experience.
As I said, I have tried reinstalling and reconfiguring in a number of different ways and have still had no luck. I’m continuing to try and get to the bottom of why search on Foundation 2010 does seem to work. More updates soon.
Search Service on Foundation 2013
Following on from my previous blog post about the missing ability to add the Search Service to SharePoint Foundation 2013 from the Central Administration GUI after selecting a manual configuration method, it seems that the ONLY way you can add the Search Service to SharePoint Foundation 2013 is by using the SharePoint Configuration Wizard like so (you can’t even do it with PowerShell):
Visit the SharePoint Central administration site and select Configuration Wizards from the Quick Launch Menu on the left hand side.
Press the Start the Wizard button.
Select the account you wish to use for this service. It is always better to have one already created than try and create a new one on the fly here.
Scroll down for more options.
If you want just the Search Service Application then uncheck everything else and press the Next button.
SharePoint will bring out the traffic cones briefly while the service is configured.
You’ll then be asked to create a Site Collection, but since one has normally be created previously during the manual creation of SharePoint Foundation 2013, press the Skip button.
You should now see in the summary page that a Search Service Application has been configured. Interestingly, you’ll note that the following additional service have also been configured (even though they were unselected!):
– Usage and Health Data Collection Service Application
If you press the Finish button and have then have a look at the Service Applications you should see:
Then if you have a look at Services on Server you’ll see:
Where you should now see that the SharePoint Server Search (at the bottom of the screen shot above) is now Started!
Phew, that is a lot of work if you want to configure SharePoint Foundation 2013 manually! What it tells me is that you are actually better off, if doing a Complete installation, using the SharePoint Configuration Wizard to install and configure all the Services for SharePoint Foundation 2013 (which has always sort of been against best practice).
The next question is how does Search work and what needs to be done to get PDF indexing working? Once I work all this out I’ll post it up here.
