Microsoft InTune

If you weren’t aware then there is yet another cloud solution coming that I believe will make a major impact on the SMB space. It is called Microsoft InTune and will offer PC Management and security from the cloud.

It basically allows the installation of client software that connects the PC to the cloud allowing you to perform a number of tasks. Firstly you can monitor and examine the PC, you can also control the updates on the machine, you can also implement security and anti-malware and finally you can also use it for remote support. More information about the product can be found here:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-au/magazine/ff742836.aspx

and the actual product site is here:

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsintune/default.aspx

The product is also in beta so I though I’d hurry along and sign up to have a look but unfortunately, it seems to be limited beta of which Australia currently isn’t part.

Damm! I’m sure that it will make it’s way ‘down under’ soon and I’m keen to give it a whirl as I feel there is real call for such a product especially deploy via something like Microsoft BPOS (which is the plan).

There are already plenty of other tools out there that do the same or more but I think there is certainly a call for something simple and standard, a bit like Microsoft Security Essentials. It won’t be everything to everyone but I certainly think it will appear to a large segment of the market.

I think this certainly adds value to a potential BPOS offering and will allow IT Professionals to offer a greater range of services at a lower cost. Combine this with the planned implementation of Exchange 2010, SharePoint 2010, Office Web Apps and improved Office Communications Server I think you’d really have to be mad to not at least be checking out what these offer and how they can be integrated into your business.

This is simply more evidence (for better or worse) that Microsoft is moving to the cloud in a big way. I also think they are approaching it in a smart way with things like the new SBS Aurora which is a hybrid solution. However, this means resellers are going to have to learn to become ‘cloud and proud’ as I say.

I was wrong

When I said two years ago that I thought SBS 2008 was going to be the last version of SBS (here’s the post). Interestingly, it has taken until now for the future of SBS to be revealed and it seems to be a bit of an each way bet.

Firstly there will be a version called SBS 7 that will be the traditional in house SBS with servers, Exchange, SQL and so on. However, there will be a hybrid version called Aurora that will be based on Windows Home Server and have services hosted in the cloud. You can read about these products here:

http://www.winsupersite.com/server/sbs7_preview.asp

and here

http://blogs.technet.com/b/sbs/archive/2010/07/12/announcing-previews-of-our-simple-and-affordable-servers-for-small-businesses.aspx

Interestingly the Aurora product allows up to 25 users while SBS 7 allows up to the traditional 75.

My observations?

1. If the average SBS install is 15 users then Aurora is going to be the product that is most popular.

2. With most businesses divesting themselves of infrastructure (especially small businesses) Aurora gets the nod again.

3. If you are a reseller and you haven’t started learning about Microsoft online services a.k.a. BPOS well here is what Steve Ballmer recently told partners at the Microsoft world wide partner conference:

“If you don’t want to move to the cloud, then we’re not your company.”

4. SharePoint Foundation 2010 is included with SBS 7 and via the cloud so it is probably going to be an even more utilized feature of SBS going forward. If you don’t know SharePoint, Office Web Apps, Office co-authoring then you are going to struggle to provide value above and beyond just installing common services like email.

Reading Paul Thurott’s review (above) I have to agree with the following:

“solutions like Aurora make more sense, I think, for a much bigger percentage of the customer base”

So, good news that SBS will live on in at least two forms. I will be very interested to see how Aurora performs against 7 given the push to the cloud, now even more so by Microsoft.

SharePoint Foundation 2010 on SBS 2008 – the prep

So you want to install SharePoint Foundation 2010 onto SBS 2008 eh? We’ll I’m here to tell you that you need to do your prep work or else you are going to end up in a horrible mess. This post will take you through the steps you should complete prior to any upgrade. Future posts will cover the upgrade process.

Let’s assume that you have decided that you really want to install SharePoint Foundation 2010 on SBS 2008. The most compelling reasons are the ability to run Office Web Apps and allow document co-authoring with Office 2010. The first question to ask is whether you are planning to migrate your existing Companyweb data or start fresh? If you want to migrate your data (which the most likely option) then you are going to need to ensure that it is backed up.

I’d always recommend that you backup your SharePoint data a number of different ways just in case you need to roll back. So the first suggested way is to do a normal full backup or image of your system using the inbuilt SBS backup or imaging software. Ensure that you have all the SharePoint databases on that backup. By default the WSS v3 databases on SBS 2008 live in

c:\windows\sysmsi\ssee\mssql.2005\mssql\data (although they can be relocated manually or via the SBS 2008 wizards).

Next I’d do a command line stsadm backup via:

stsadm –o backup –url http://companyweb –filename drive:\directory\filename -overwrite

This will create a single file backup of your WSS v3 site. Why this? It is much easier in my books to create a new clean WSS v3 site somewhere (say on a virtual PC) and then restore a full WSS v3 backup using the above command. This form of backup is probably the most easily transportable there is for WSS v3.

While still at the command line I’d also do:

stsadm –o export –url http://companyweb –filename drive:\directory\filename1 –includeusersecurity –overwrite

Why this extra command you ask? The difference is that the –export command allows me to import the data into an existing WSS v3 site, whereas the –backup command overwrites what is there. Thus, maybe I want to import the data to a sub area of another site for testing or maybe recovery. Like I said the more options the better in my books.

With that complete and still at the command type the following:

stsadm –o preupgradecheck

What that will do is run a check to see whether there are any obvious deal breakers to prevent an upgrade from WSS v3 to SharePoint Foundation 2010. That command will produce a file you can study at your leisure and see if something untoward might pop out during the upgrade process.

If all that looks good then you are probably ready to commence the upgrade but here’s where I’d ask you to stop and think. What is your fall back procedure? What happens if it all goes belly up and you need to roll back to the original WSS v3? What happens if you need to reinstall WSS v3? Have you ever tried that? Do you know where to find the documentation for that? I’ll tell you now that there ain’t any install wizard to get Companyweb back up and running on SBS 2008 if things go pear shaped so I strongly recommend you understand how to do a full disaster recovery of WSS v3 on SBS 2008 before you go any further.

With that in mind, and with you hopefully scurrying off to do some research I’ll let you know that you can’t simply upgrade WSS v3 Companyweb on SBS 2008 to Companyweb on SharePoint Foundation 2010. You will have to uninstall WSS v3 completely from SBS 2008 before attempting to install SharePoint Foundation 2010. Yep, you read that right, totally remove WSS v3 from SBS 2008.

Now even before you install SharePoint Foundation 2010 on SBS 2008 you are going to need to install a swag of prerequisites. Do you know what these are? Will they affect anything that is already on the server? Will they interfere with any third party apps installed on the server (like AV produces say). Hopefully, you now understand my point about making sure you have a fall back plan in case problems do arise.

Next consider what database version you are going to use with SharePoint Foundation 2010. By default SharePoint Foundation 2010 comes with SQL Express 2008. Great you say but remember that SQL Express 2008 has a 4GB database limit. WSS v3 came with SQL Server Embedded Edition 2005 (SSEE) which has no database limit. So if your existing Companyweb databases are greater than that, or likely to grow beyond 4GB you have some thinking to do. The easiest and cheapest option is to go with SQL Express 2008 R2 which now has a 10GB database limit and remains a free download. Maybe you want to go full SQL Server 2008 as a license is included with SBS 2008 Premium if you have it. See, not as straight forward as you think.

Now SharePoint Foundation 2010 is going to need to have a version of SQL Server 2008 at least to operate installed prior to the installation of SharePoint Foundation 2010. There is already SQL Server 2005 on SBS 2008 that is used for WSUS amongst other things. What conflicts might that cause? What compatibility issues might that raise? Well for starters SQL Server 2008 generally can’t be installed if SQL Server 2005 Management tools are already installed so these will have to come off before SQL Server 2008 goes on. Do you know how to do this? Have you every installed SQL Server onto a SBS 2008 server? Do you know the correct procedure for getting it working? In some cases when you go to install some versions of SQL Server 2008 onto Windows 2008 it says that it won’t work on that version of the operating system. As I have blogged here before you may need to install an SQL Server 2008 Service pack first, then SQL Server 2008 then the Service Pack again. Simple eh?

I hope that you can at least begin to appreciate the complexities involved in getting SharePoint Foundation 2010 on SBS 2008 operational. I agree there are plenty of benefits but in my experience there is also plenty of pain. Stayed tuned to future posts where I’ll run through the steps of actually getting SharePoint Foundation 2010 running on SBS 2008. But for now do your backups, run the upgrade check and make sure you have a recovery plan.

Microsoft SMB Team down under

Thanks to a boat load of hard work from some SBS-MVP’s here in Australia the Microsoft SMB team is heading to our shores to speak with partners. An added bonus is will also be the attendance of Jeff Middleton of ‘swing’ and Sbsmigration.com fame.

All the details about the events, including registration can be found here. If you not only want to hear about the future of the SBS progress but also provide feedback directly to the team that makes SBS then I’d recommend you come along. I will also be a great opportunity to meet with your fellow SBS’ers.

SharePoint 2010 on SBS 2008 – Yes but why?

Susan Bradley posed a good question in a recent blog post as to why you would even consider putting SharePoint 2010 on SBS 2008. Even though it can be done as I have demonstrated recently, it isn’t a pretty process and may end up breaking a number of SBS integration components. So why would the average IT Professional even attempt it?

As Andy Parkes notes in the comments to Susan’s post the implementation of Office Web Apps is one reason. Office Web Apps requires SharePoint 2010 to operate so indeed if you wanted to run Office in a browser you’d need to have SharePoint 2010 installed.

I think the other main reason is to run Search Server Express. Previous I’d been battling away to get this operational on SBS 2008 without much luck but now I have also successfully installed in onto SBS 2008. Search Server Express provides enterprise level indexing of not only SharePoint sites but also file shares, public folders and web sites all through a familiar browser interface. I never really understood why Microsoft didn’t provide details on how to install it on SBS 2008 as I think it was a natural fit for SBS 2008.

Now given that it is POSSIBLE to install both SharePoint 2010 and Search Server Express on SBS 2008 the question still remains – for the average reseller – is it worthwhile? I’d have to say no. I believe it is a far better option to have a second server in the network (say a Windows Foundation Server) onto which goes both SharePoint 2010 and Search Server Express. It makes the setup easier, cleaner and provides better separation. The other question you have to ask is that if you did install SharePoint 2010 on SBS 2008 what happens when a service pack becomes available? Will it break that is there? Will there need to be a separate ‘SBS 2008’ service pack to accommodate this? Hmmmm….I think having on a second server in a ‘standard’ installation is much more robust.

The other issue I’ll raise about SharePoint 2010 on SBS 2008 is the fact that SharePoint 2010 typically runs on SQL Express 2008 (although installing to other SQL versions is supported). Given that most IT Professionals would prefer to install SharePoint 2010 on the SQL Express 2008 since it is free, they will face the inbuilt limitation of a 4GB database. So, if your existing Companyweb installation is greater than 4GB then you are probably going to have to install a full version of SQL before you install SharePoint 2010.

Again, as Susan says, I reckon you need to carefully consider that although you CAN install SharePoint 2010 on SBS 2008 whether you SHOULD in fact do it considering all the issues that it may unearth. However, if you REALLY want to at least you can, however I would still wait and see if any official guidance from Microsoft is forthcoming. I’ll certainly be putting more together about my process when I have attempted to resolve the integration issues.

SharePoint 2010 on SBS 2008 – Yes we can

Been neglecting the blog lately but I do have a good reason, honestly. I have been working hard behind the scenes trying to work out how to get SharePoint 2010 onto SBS 2008. I have documented my previous attempts with the beta and most recently with the RTM.

Not willing to accept that it couldn’t be done I went back to the drawing board and can now proudly announce that I have finally managed to get it working as the screen shot below shows.

Now I have to tell you that the process isn’t very clean or simple and honestly I really don’t why anyone would want to go through the pain but at least you can if you so desire.

I am still working on tidying some related issues around the process so I can provide a full set of documentation around how you can upgrade/migrate WSS v3.0 Companyweb on SBS 2008 to SharePoint Foundation 2010 Companyweb. This means retaining as much of the initial WSS v3.0 functionality as possible. So give me a little while to get all that down and document the process.

Stay tuned for the magic behind how it can be done if you REALLY want to!

SharePoint Foundation 2010 on SBS 2008

After manually installing all the prerequisites for SharePoint Foundation 2010 on SBS 2008 I attempted to install SharePoint Foundation 2010 on SBS 2008. If you really want to try this yourself and are baffled where the prerequisite Microsoft Filter Pack 2.0 is then you should contact me as you won’t find it on the Microsoft download site (that’s version 1.0 and 2.0 Beta, neither of which works) from what I see.

Because SharePoint Foundation 2010 detects an existing SharePoint v3 installation the only option that is available is an upgrade. Fair enough you say, but when you proceed you get:

which is basically game over. Interestingly when you go to the web link provided (http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=975805) it doesn’t exist which kinda indicates that maybe the KB article is still being written on this one. Nothing also comes up when you do a Google search.

So that’s it game over eh? One would have said that also about running Search Server Express 2008 on SBS 2008 wouldn’t you? Especially if you have been reading this blog (especially here). Well I’m here to tell you that I have worked out how to successfully install Search Server Express on SBS 2008. It ain’t pretty but it can be done and it’s only taken me almost 2 years to work out. Maybe getting SharePoint Foundation 2010 running on SBS 2008 is my next challenge from the gods of code? Hopefully, this won’t take me another 2 years!

Oh, you want more details on how to install Search Server Express 2008 on SBS 2008? You’ll just have to stay tuned or subscribe to the Windows SharePoint Operations Guide as it will be published there real soon.

I’m not the only one

I posted some thoughts yesterday about the ramifications of the demise of Essential Business Server for the SMB and particularly Small Business Server market. I was reading through Susan Bradley’s blog and was interested to see that she raised many of the same concerns in a recent blog post including:

“Make no mistake the chatter is less about a concern over the future of “M” and more over the future of “S””

and

“What’s the future hold? I’m not going to lie to you and say that Response Point, Office Accounting, MPAN program and now this, doesn’t put a slight bit of chill up my spine.”

When people of Susan’s stature start voicing these concerns you really need to be paying attention I believe. Again, this not about the product or the market segment, I truly believe that it is bigger than this. If you still have doubts have a look at this article:

’Cloudy days ahead from Microsoft’

as the subheading says here:

“MICROSOFT has switched its cloud computing marketing from half-hearted to full bore.”

This means that the focus has shifted (rightly or wrongly) from infrastructure to cloud. This is where Microsoft is throwing its resources. Maybe Microsoft’s solution is half baked but that doesn’t stop them allocating their resources there. History shows us that Microsoft tends to start slow and awkwardly in many markets but eventually, usually through sheer brute force, they take a dominate stake. I see no reason why the same won’t occur here.

Now you can quote me that this time it is different because of Google and guess what I totally agree with you. Why? Because it again reinforces my point that this online stuff, for better or worse, is not going away. The reality is that it is the traditional in house stuff that is.

You shouldn’t need to ‘read the tea leaves’ as Susan says in her post, to see that markets generally go where the dollars flow and Microsoft is currently tipping its bucket into the cloud. To reap the benefits you’ll have to probably follow their lead because in the end it is their products that people sell and support.

Technically, maybe the cloud stuff isn’t quite there but guess what that doesn’t matter because it is not the greatest driver here. Because the IT industry is being commoditized here major decisions are now based on cost. The cry is no longer ‘I want the best technology’ it has become ‘I want the cheapest technology’ because to the customer, most technology now looks identical whether it is delivered in house or from the cloud. Therefore in a world where there are few differences between products price becomes the differentiator and the cheaper one always wins. It would certainly seem that this is what we are seeing now.