Judging by the Google clicks on the site, the original Collutions (wss.collutions.com) site went down about midday Wednesday EST.

The hoster's own site isn't responding either, so this may be a long wait (and maybe even the end of this site).

In the meantime all of the same WSS FAQ content is available at www.wssfaq.com which as always links to http://wss.asaris.de/sites/walsh/default.aspx

I recently received two recent Wrox books.

- Professional Microsoft Search - Sharepoint 2007 and Search Server 2008

(Amazon US: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0470279338/heme0f)

- Professional SharePoint 2007 Design

(Amazon US: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/047028580X/heme0f)

One major difference between them is that the first deals ONLY with Search. The second on the other hand extends the boundaries of what is "Design" way past anything I would consider to be design and is in fact for me more of a mixed bag of interesting but isolated chapters on a wide range of topics.

Let's start with the first book. It's the first one I have seen on Search (and there is also the MS Press book "Inside the Index and Search engines" which I haven't seen) so it's perhaps fooolhardy to say that if you are at all interested in Search you should buy this one, but I'll say it anyway because it covers everything and more that I could think of.

(Even though the single Search chapter in the Design book had lots of stuff that I couldn't find in the Search book - which I've read all of just over half the chapters but have scanned the rest to look for just that information)

There's really only one thing that jars when reading the book and that is that there were three different people involved in writing it - and it shows. Very roughly speaking there are parts of the book that are at helicopter level (written by Microsoft non-Search specialist is my guess); then there are the parts of the book that think that everything in the product is wonderful (written by Microsoft Search specialist ?) and then there are the chapters and parts of chapters that go into details of real use of the product and are not afraid to say that things don't work as you would expect (written by the one writer who doesn't work for Microsoft is my solid guess).

There's one lovely part where it tells you that there is a "slight complication" that you don't get any search results at all if your site isn't using Kerberos. I spent hours wondering whether this was the non-Microsoft guy being sarcastic or the MS Search guy trying to justify a poor design decision ...

There's also sometimes a curious order to some of the chapters which i imagine is caused by slotting in the work of two or more authors into the same chapter.

So, for instance, the chapter on Federation Search has towards the middle a section with very complicated stuff that is followed by the simplest of all things (clicking on Modify a (Search) Web Part and changing the default values). In any normal, logical order, that very easy section would surely have come very early on in the chapter not right at the end.

But these are minor flaws. I learnt a lot by reading the chapters I have read so far and although I wouldn't give it 5 stars at Amazon, it would be worth a clear 4 and a bit.

Now on to the Design book.

Here you have the impression that they (in this case the four authors) didn't really know half of the time what they were supposed to be writing about. The foreword for instance was written by Heather Solomon and she seemed to think that this was a book about SharePoint Designer.

Well there are a few chapters on SharePoint Designer that's true but there are also chapters on standard MOSS functionality; on Search (see above - that's a really good chapter btw) and on Accessibility for what Microsoft define as the "physically challenged".

There's also an early chapter on designing your SharePoint site by using a very expensive Adobe Product (Photoshop). 

This seems completely mad if you want to sell a lot of copies of a book as most people will not have this Adobe product and will certainly not feel like buying it in order to do the design. Yet the use of this product is even listed on the back cover and although at the start of the chapter there's mention that you can also use other cheaper (or free) products to do the same kind of thing, all they seem to use is that expensive product.

At the moment therefore I'm at a loss as to who ought to buy this book. Should people who want the SPD content buy it instead of a book dedicated to SPD (Hardly)? Should people specialising in Search buy it for the one Search chapter (actually the answer is probably yes, but that answer applies only to serious search specialists)? Should people wanting to know about Accessibility for the physically challenged buy it for that single chapter (imo, No)? Should people wanting information on standard MOSS functionality buy it for those chapters when there are so many other MOSS books out there both for developers and non-developers (I doubt it) ?

In other words whereas the Search book is a slam dunk buy if you want lots of Search information, with this one you'd better look at the Design book closely in a bookshop and decide if enough of it is about things you are interested in. If I were buying, I'd only buy this as a third or fourth (or fifth or sixth or ...) to add to my other more specific books.

P.S. The Amazon web site shows at present four 5 star reviews and one three star one. So far without giving it enough time, I'm inclined to side with the three star reviewer who seems to have expected what Heather Solomon indicated in her foreword, but what she got was - as i've tried to indicate above - something else.

My own Amazon review will have to wait until I've given the book as a lot more time. The Photoshop chapter alone ensures that it won't be getting 5 stars but 4 is still possible if the quality of the other chapters matches the quality of the Search chapter - despite the lack of real focus of the book as a whole.

 

 

 

 

 

Note: All of the addresses of the KB / Articles - 2007 Products / MS / Non-MS Articles below were valid at the time I added them to the WSS FAQ
site and to this file. I can't guarantee that they still are.

(Items are added to the WSS FAQ throughout the week so you will find new items more quickly by checking at wss.collutions.com or www.wssfaq.com daily.)

From 23rd - 29th November 2008

NOTE: Amendment to KB articles: Microsoft are now not amending the date of a KB article if the change made is marked as a version point change (so from 2.2 to 2.3 for instance).
This ought to mean that the amendment made is cosmetic rather than important as important text changes ought to result in a major version change (such as from 2.2 to 3.0).
Because of this change and to avoid unnecessary effort I will in future not amend the listings in the WSS FAQ sites if only a minor version change has taken place.
I will continue to amend both the date and version numbers of major version changes and of course will continue to add all relevant new KB articles that my RSS feeds and other sources give me.

I.1 2007 KB Articles 

New

None

Modifed

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/952167/en-us

Folders may have to be excluded from antivirus scanning when you use a file-level antivirus program in Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 or in SharePoint Server 2007 (ver 5.0)

20th November 2008

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;957693

Description of the SharePoint Server 2007 hotfix package (Coreserver.msp): October 28, 2008 (ver 2.0)

19th November 2008

I.b Forefront KB Articles

New or Modified

None

I.c InfoPath 2007 KB Articles

New or Modified

None

I.d SPD 2007 KB Articles

New or Modified

None

II. Articles - 2007 Products

New

A. Office 2007 Server Products

** Special Search Server 2008 section **

http://www.codeplex.com/tmt/Release/ProjectReleases.aspx?ReleaseId=19742

View or change content index locations (Search Server 2008) (updated 30th November 2008)

30th November 2008   (probably a mistake and it should have been 30th October ...)

http://www.thesanitypoint.com/archive/2008/11/22/search-federation-part-2-customizing-results-with-sharepoint-designer.aspx

Search Federation Part 2 - Customizing Results with SharePoint Designer (Blog - Woody Windischman)
 
22nd November 2008

http://www.thesanitypoint.com/archive/2008/11/18/search-federation-with-sharepoint-part-1.aspx

Search Federation with SharePoint - Part 1 (Blog - Woody Windischman)
 
18th November 2008

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd255991.aspx

Configure index and query server roles (Search Server 2008) (updated 30th October 2008)

30th October 2008

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd255992.aspx

View the content index location for the index server (Search Server 2008) (updated 30th October 2008)

30th October 2008

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd255995.aspx

View the content index location for a query server (Search Server 2008) (updated 30th October 2008)

30th October 2008

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc825782.aspx

Move site collections to a new database (split a content database) (Search Server 2008) (updated 23rd October 2008)

23rd October 2008

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc706840.aspx

Archive and retrieve content by using Stsadm import and export operations (Search Server 2008) (updated 23rd October 2008)

23rd October 2008

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd181962.aspx

Migrate an SSP to another farm (Search Server 2008) (updated 9th October 2008)

9th October 2008

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc950776.aspx

Security for Federation (Search Server 2008) (updated 9th October 2008)

9th October 2008

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc262507.aspx

Create a custom dictionary (Search Server 2008) (updated 9th October 2008)

9th October 2008

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc262033.aspx

Security considerations for search (Search Server 2008) (updated 9th October 2008)

9th October 2008

http://www.thesanitypoint.com/archive/2008/09/05/the-quote-language-quote-of-advanced-search-part-2.aspx

The "Language" of Advanced Search (Part 2) (Blog - Woody Windischman)
 
5th September 2008

http://www.thesanitypoint.com/archive/2008/09/02/the-quote-language-quote-of-advanced-search-part-1.aspx

The "Language" of Advanced Search (Part 1) (Blog - Woody Windischman)
 
2nd September 2008

http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=121946&clcid=0x409

Presentation: Understanding and deploying hotfixes, public updates, and service packs (Search Server 2008) (updated 21th August 2008)

21th August 2008

---end of special section for Search Server 2008 ---

http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=135694&clcid=0x409

Using scripts to automate SharePoint Server 2007 installation

26th November 2008 (date added)

http://blogs.msdn.com/sharepointdesigner/archive/2008/11/25/locking-down-sharepoint-designer.aspx

Locking Down SharePoint Designer (MS TeamBlog)

25th November 2008

http://microsofttech.fr.edgesuite.net/TechEdOnline/Videos/447_high_fix.wmv

TechEd Europe chat on "SharePoint Guidance" from MS Patterns and Practices (Robert Bogue)

23rd November 2008 (date added - there are also .mp4 and .mp3 versions available)

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd263437.aspx

Deploy inter-farm shared services (Updated 20th November 2008)

20th November 2008

http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=133329&clcid=0x409

Protecting Office SharePoint Server 2007 by using System Center Data Protection Manager (white paper) (Updated 13th November 2008)

13th November 2008

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd278299.aspx

Updatealerttemplates: Stsadm operation (Office SharePoint Server *and* WSS 3.0 - identical articles) (Updated 12th November 2008)

12th November 2008

(as the title above indicates there were two articles one supposedly for MOSS and the other for WSS 3.0. Apart from this the text (which referred only to WSS 3.0 in both) was identical)

https://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=1C356D9A-BE11-4BEB-88E7-4EB7141D7F89&displaylang=en

Updates for Microsoft Office SharePoint Designer 2007 Help

11th November 2008

B. Other Office 2007 products

None

C. Other relevant products

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=bce7684a-507b-4fc6-bc99-6933cd690cab&displaylang=en&tm

Microsoft Silverlight 2 Software Development Kit Documentation (ver 2.0)

25th November 2008

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=66d3e6f5-6902-4fdd-af75-9975aea5bea7&displaylang=en&tm

SQL Server 2008 Upgrade Technical Reference Guide

25th November 2008

Modified

None

III WebCasts (+ PodCasts, On-Line courses) for 2007 Products

http://channel9.msdn.com/posts/VisualStudio/Sharepoint-Development-with-Visual-Studio-2010/

PDC 2008: Sharepoint Development with Visual Studio 2010 (Channel 9 - Reza Chitsaz)

14th November 2008

IV WSS v3 FAQ

New

http://wss.asaris.de/sites/walsh/Lists/WSSv3%20FAQ/DispForm.aspx?ID=1605

X.231 SharePoint Snippets (Workflow Extensions/Custom Workflow Template for Debugging) (MS Code Gallery - Tobias Lekman)

http://wss.asaris.de/sites/walsh/Lists/WSSv3%20FAQ/DispForm.aspx?ID=1606

X.232 Imtech SharePoint A (extended HtmlAnchor control) (codeplex - Waldek Mastykarz, Imtech (NL))

http://wss.asaris.de/sites/walsh/Lists/WSSv3%20FAQ/DispForm.aspx?ID=1607

X.233 Useful Sharepoint Designer Custom Workflow Activities (codeplex - "unclepaul84" and others)

Modified

None

V WSSv2 KB Articles (plus SPS 2003 Hot fixes)

New or Modified

None

VI WSSv2 FAQ

New or Modified

None

VII. MS Articles

New or Modified

None

Note: All of the addresses of the KB / Articles - 2007 Products / MS / Non-MS Articles below were valid at the time I added them to the WSS FAQ
site and to this file. I can't guarantee that they still are.

(Items are added to the WSS FAQ throughout the week so you will find new items more quickly by checking at wss.collutions.com or www.wssfaq.com daily.)

From 16th - 22nd November 2008

NOTE: Amendment to KB articles: Microsoft are now not amending the date of a KB article if the change made is marked as a version point change (so from 2.2 to 2.3 for instance). This ought to mean that the amendment made is cosmetic rather than important as important text changes ought to result in a major version change (such as from 2.2 to 3.0).
Because of this change and to avoid unnecessary effort I will in future not amend the listings in the WSS FAQ sites if only a minor version change has taken place. I will continue to amend both the date and version numbers of major version changes and of course will continue to add all relevant new KB articles that my RSS feeds and other sources give me.

I.1 2007 KB Articles    (*now only one section for WSS and MOSS*)

New

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;958577

Error message when you visit a sub-folder under a Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 list that contains more than 2,000 list items that have non-inheriting permissions: "#RENDER FAILED"

13th November 2008

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;958579

Error message when you perform a content deployment of a Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 site collection that has a custom site template: "Cannot import site"

13th November 2008

Modifed

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;953445

Error message when you edit an .aspx Web page in SharePoint Server 2007: "Value does not fall within the expected range" (ver 2.0)

17th November 2008

I.b Forefront KB Articles

New or Modified

None

I.c InfoPath 2007 KB Articles

New or Modified

None

I.d SPD 2007 KB Articles

New or Modified

None

II. Articles - 2007 Products  (no longer with all links to articles for other Office 2007 and other 2007 Products)

New

A. Office 2007 Server Products

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/magazine/dd148643.aspx

Light Up SharePoint With Silverlight 2 Web Parts (MSDN Mag, Nov 2008 - Steve Fox, Paul Stubb)

21st November 2008 (date added - Magazine date November 2008)

http://redmondmag.com/features/article.asp?editorialsid=2581

The SharePoint Upgrade Trap (Nov 2008 Redmond Mag - Brien Posey)

15th November 2008 (date added)

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc263467.aspx

Deploy software updates for Office SharePoint Server 2007 (Updated 12th November 2008)

12th November 2008

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc288269.aspx

Deploy software updates for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 (Updated 12th November 2008)

12th November 2008

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=752cb725-969b-4732-a383-ed5740f02e93&DisplayLang=en

Visual Studio 2010 and .NET Framework 4.0 Training Kit - November Preview

12th November 2008

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd277865.aspx

Performance and capacity requirements for Hyper-V (Updated 6th November 2008)

6th November 2008

B. Other Office 2007 products

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=537ac5b3-9ac2-4667-916b-99928bca9f70&displaylang=en&tm

SharePoint Designer 2007: Non Technical Resources (Trials, Pricing, Purchasing, Activation, Licensing and Support) (ver 2.0)

13th November 2008

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd197636.aspx

Move all databases (Office Forms Server 2007) (updated 23rd October 2008)

23rd October 2008

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd197635.aspx

Recover your farm after a configuration database problem (Office Forms Server 2007) (updated 23rd October 2008)

23rd October 2008

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc197307.aspx

Plan for capturing and storing deleted objects (Office Forms Server) (updated 16th May 2008)

16th May 2008

C. Other relevant products

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=0a8e1a32-6524-4567-af65-633f0dbe033c&displaylang=en&tm

Windows Small Business Server 2008 Premium Trial Software Download

13th November 2008

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=0f513086-078b-47a8-a889-842dc93a69ab&displaylang=en&tm

Live Search SDK (ver 2.0)

13th November 2008  (added because it's an SDK)

Modified

None

III WebCasts (+ PodCasts, On-Line courses) for 2007 Products

http://www.microsoft.com/emea/teched2008/itpro/tv/default.aspx

TechEd EMEA session: Using MOSS 2007 to Create Rich Internet Facing Publishing Sites Using Web Content Management (Ryan Duguid)

7th November 2008

http://msevents.microsoft.com/CUI/WebCastEventDetails.aspx?EventID=1032391390&EventCategory=5&culture=en-US&CountryCode=US

TechNet Webcast: Building SQL Server Reporting Services 2008 Large-Scale Solutions (Level 400) (Denny Lee)

31st October 2008

http://msevents.microsoft.com/CUI/WebCastEventDetails.aspx?EventID=1032390947&EventCategory=3&culture=en-US&CountryCode=US

Sharepoint: Basics Tips & Tricks (Dominic Aguilar)

14th October 2008

IV WSS v3 FAQ

New

http://wss.asaris.de/sites/walsh/Lists/WSSv3%20FAQ/DispForm.aspx?ID=1604

VI.136 TaskSync (commercial - MicroLink LLc)

http://wss.asaris.de/sites/walsh/Lists/WSSv3%20FAQ/DispForm.aspx?ID=1593

X.220 SharePoint User Change Password (codeplex - "Filip_CZE")

http://wss.asaris.de/sites/walsh/Lists/WSSv3%20FAQ/DispForm.aspx?ID=1594

X.221 SharePoint User AD information Web Part (codeplex - "Filip_CZE")

http://wss.asaris.de/sites/walsh/Lists/WSSv3%20FAQ/DispForm.aspx?ID=1595

X.222 SharePoint Search Bench v2.0 (codeplex - "kindohm")

http://wss.asaris.de/sites/walsh/Lists/WSSv3%20FAQ/DispForm.aspx?ID=1596

X.223 ULS Viewer (codeplex - Keir Gordon)

http://wss.asaris.de/sites/walsh/Lists/WSSv3%20FAQ/DispForm.aspx?ID=1597

X.224 SharePoint PowerEventReceivers 1.0 (codeplex - cglessner)

http://wss.asaris.de/sites/walsh/Lists/WSSv3%20FAQ/DispForm.aspx?ID=1598

X.225 SharePoint SUSHI (codeplex - " josephflu")

http://wss.asaris.de/sites/walsh/Lists/WSSv3%20FAQ/DispForm.aspx?ID=1599

X.226 SharePoint Farm Site Collection Backup (codeplex - fmuntean)

http://wss.asaris.de/sites/walsh/Lists/WSSv3%20FAQ/DispForm.aspx?ID=1600

X.227 Office SharePoint Server 2007 farm automated setup (codeplex - "emberger")

http://wss.asaris.de/sites/walsh/Lists/WSSv3%20FAQ/DispForm.aspx?ID=1601

X.228 WSS and MOSS Home Drive 1.1 (codeplex - " gilesh")

http://wss.asaris.de/sites/walsh/Lists/WSSv3%20FAQ/DispForm.aspx?ID=1602

X.229 Welcome Webpart for MOSS 2007 (codeplex - "cygoh")

http://wss.asaris.de/sites/walsh/Lists/WSSv3%20FAQ/DispForm.aspx?ID=1603

X.230 InfoPath Forms Services 2007 Web Testing Toolkit for VS 2008 (codeplex - MS people)

Modified

http://wss.asaris.de/sites/walsh/Lists/WSSv3%20FAQ/DispForm.aspx?ID=1364

V.114 Seamless Teamwork: Using Microsoft SharePoint Technologies to Collaborate, Innovate, and Drive Business in New Ways (MS Press - Michael Sampson) *released*

http://wss.asaris.de/sites/walsh/Lists/WSSv3%20FAQ/DispForm.aspx?ID=1379

V.119 Inside SharePoint Administration (Charles River - Steve Caravajal, Shane Young, Todd O. Klindt) *released*

http://wss.asaris.de/sites/walsh/Lists/WSSv3%20FAQ/DispForm.aspx?ID=1410

V.127 Using Content Types in SharePoint 2007 (Charles River Media - David Gerhardt, Kevin Martin)

(chapter titles added)

V WSSv2 KB Articles (plus SPS 2003 Hot fixes)

New or Modified

None

VI WSSv2 FAQ

New or Modified

None

VII. MS Articles

New or Modified

None

When I wrote my book I did it using Windows Server 2003 R2 and in order. In other words anyone following it chapter by chapter would see what the screen shots show. No more, no less.

Now I'm using a WSS 3.0+SP1 installation (the same version number I used in the book) that was installed on Windows Server 2008 and I've done exactly the same installation of MSSX (Search server 2008 Express) on top of it that I did when writing the book. Only, oddly, things are different.

To save me writing it all again here's the text of a message I wrote today to the Search Server 2008 Express forum.

---------------------------------

I earlier installed MSSX on top of WSS 3.0 + SP1 on Windows Server 2003.

At the end of that process I went to (WSS) Central Administration/Application Management/Manage Web Applications and needed to Activate Office Server Enterprise Search and Office Server Site Server.

I then went to the (WSS) Home Page and went to Site Actions / Site Settings and three new Search selections (Search settings; Search sources; Search keywords) were listed under the Site Collection Administration section.

----------------------

I later installed MSSX on top of WSS 3.0 + SP1 on Windows Server 2008.   (same version number of WSS 3.0)

At the end of that process I went to (WSS) Central Administration/Application Management/Manage Web Applications and Office Server Enterprise Search and Office Server Site Server were already activated.

I then went to the (WSS) Home Page and went to Site Actions / Site Settings and NONE of the three new Search selections (Search settings; Search sources; Search keywords) were listed under the Site Collection Administration section.

----------------------

Now I see this as extremely odd to say the least - unless the Search Server team have amended their download exe since I downloaded it for the book (which would be odd because that was the RTM version - not the beta). Can it really make such a big difference which Operating system you are running your apps on ?

The more serious problem is that the reason I had these details (and screen shots - so I can prove they look differently now) was because I showed in the book how to amend the standard WSS search box once you had installed MSSX to give more options. Even going manually to the Search Settings page at the WSS (as opposed to the MSSX) site and entering the value of the MSSX default page for where to search seemingly has no effect any more.

 

 

P.S. There's another curiousity. The book version of the Advanced search results (for MSSX) included a column with Live Search results. This so-called "Federated Search" was something that I hadn't specified in that Windows Server 2003 version (mainly because at the time I had no idea what Federated Search meant (!)), yet it was there, as the screen shot clearly shows. I even commented on it being there by using "no such thing as a free lunch - Live Search" as the caption of the screen shot. Now, in the present (Win 2008) version, there's no Live Search column (unless you go in an manually specify one). How odd.

Just to let me know that searching Amazon Books for SharePoint (my standard search) isn't enough, I was pointed at three new (to me) SharePoint CD and DVD courses when I did a search for SharePoint but of the whole site.

It might be worth having a quick look at the three new ones (item numbers 174, 175 and 176) at the B. Courses section of the Books page

(http://wss.asaris.de/sites/walsh/Lists/WSSv3%20FAQ/V%20Books.aspx)

After that search had shown that I was missing a few things, I thought it might be time to do a new search of the German and French Amazon sites as it had been a while.

That too was worthwhile. There are very few books on SharePoint in French and German that aren't translations of English language books, but the search on the French site found another one that will be out (like so many - do they know something I don't know, as it seems late to me?) in the first quarter of 2009

That one is "SharePoint 2007 - Personnalisation, développement et déploiement (in French) (Editions ENI - Stéphane Eyskens, Ludovic Lefort)" at

http://www.amazon.fr/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/2746046725/wssfaq0fe-21

 and of course it's available for Pre-Order already.

Meanwhile the German site also managed to produce a couple of new original German language books (although I'm beginning to think a couple of the ones I've listed for years (!) will never arrive.)

"Access 2007 und SharePoint im Team (in German) (MS Press Germany - Dirk Grasekamp)"

(http://www.amazon.de/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/3866456514/wssfaq0e-21)

is due in February 2009 (and for selfish reasons, as I have a chapter and a half on Access 2007 and WSS 3.0 in my own book, I hope it won't be earlier!) but the other

"Praxisbuch Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 (in German) (Hanser Fachbuchverlag - Dirk Larisch)"

(http://www.amazon.de/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/3446417079/wssfaq0e-21)

is due in December this year.

There were also a couple more books translated into German promised, including the very good

"Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 - Best Practices (in German) (MS Press - Ben Curry, Bill English, MS SharePoint Team)"

(http://www.amazon.de/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/3866456506/wssfaq0e-21)

which should be out in December with a bit of luck, plus (out already) the translation of the Ed Hild, Susie Adams book called in German

"SharePoint-Lösungen entwickeln: Intelligente Office - Dokumente mit.NET und Share Point"

(http://www.amazon.de/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/3772364896/wssfaq0e-21)

Enough for the German speakers to be getting on with for a while, I think.

Note: All of the addresses of the KB / Articles - 2007 Products / MS / Non-MS Articles below were valid at the time I added them to the WSS FAQ
site and to this file. I can't guarantee that they still are.

(Items are added to the WSS FAQ throughout the week so you will find new items more quickly by checking at wss.collutions.com or www.wssfaq.com daily.)

From 9th - 15th November 2008

NOTE: Amendment to KB articles: Microsoft are now not amending the date of a KB article if the change made is marked as a version point change (so from 2.2 to 2.3 for instance).
This ought to mean that the amendment made is cosmetic rather than important as important text changes ought to result in a major version change (such as from 2.2 to 3.0).
Because of this change and to avoid unnecessary effort I will in future not amend the listings in the WSS FAQ sites if only a minor version change has taken place.
I will continue to amend both the date and version numbers of major version changes and of course will continue to add all relevant new KB articles that my RSS feeds and other sources give me.

I.1 2007 KB Articles    (*now only one section for WSS and MOSS*)

New

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;951597

12th November 2008

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;958714

Error message when you execute common searches in an Office SharePoint Server 2007 site: "Turn on more accessible mode Skip to main content Turn off more accessible mode"

11th November 2008

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;958578

The "Check Names" button does not work as expected after you set a "Peoplepicker-searchadcustomfilter" LDAP filter in a Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 site

7th November 2008

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;958008

Security trimming is not honored when more than one List View Web Part is displayed on the same page in a Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 site

7th November 2008

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;958615

The index is corrupted when the SharePoint Server 2007 index server experiences power failure or restarts unexpectedly

6th November 2008

Modifed

None

I.b Forefront KB Articles

New or Modified

None

I.c InfoPath 2007 KB Articles

New or Modified

None

I.d SPD 2007 KB Articles

New

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;957250

Description of updates for SharePoint Designer 2007 Help: November 11, 2008

12th November 2008

Modified

None

II. Articles - 2007 Products  (no longer with all links to articles for other Office 2007 and other 2007 Products)

New

A. Office 2007 Server Products

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=1c356d9a-be11-4beb-88e7-4eb7141d7f89&displaylang=en&tm

Updates for Microsoft Office SharePoint Designer 2007 Help

11th November 2008

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=d9af2c25-989c-45c4-8008-1f15722190ed&displaylang=en&tm

External Collaboration Toolkit for SharePoint

10th November 2008

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=c9d6c8c5-8a62-4961-8c1b-df08b667b1c4&displaylang=en&tm

Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 Technical Library in Compiled Help format (Downloadable CHM version of WSS 3.0 content on TechNet) (ver 2)

6th November 2008

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd277864.aspx

Move Windows Internal Databases to a different drive (Windows SharePoint Services 3.0) (updated 6th November 2008)

6th November 2008

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd207313.aspx

Configure high availability (Office SharePoint Server) ((Starter Page with links only) updated 30th October 2008)

30th October 2008

B. Other Office 2007 products

None

C. Other relevant products

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=1bef6a35-9785-4a0b-b227-387c0ee85a36&displaylang=en&tm

Microsoft Office SharePoint Online ("Service Description")

10th November 2008 (date added)

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=961db8ce-8473-47c2-92eb-b822ec5af0c9&displaylang=en&tm

Windows Server 2008 Evaluation Virtual Hard Drive Images (for Virtual Server 2005) (60 days extendable 60 days at a time to a max 240 days)

10th November 2008

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=5acd7537-87d2-43a8-a3e3-2709977de77f&displaylang=en&tm

Windows Essential Business Server Software Development Kit (SDK) (ver 6.0)

7th November 2008 (added because EBS contains WSS and also because this is an SDK)

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=3be0488d-e7aa-4078-a050-ae39912d2e43&displaylang=en&tm

SQL Server 2008 White Paper: Analysis Services Performance Guide

6th November 2008

Modified

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=e4600fd9-f53d-4ded-88bf-6bb1932794f9&displaylang=en&tm

SharePoint Monitoring Toolkit (version 1.0.0.46)

12th November 2008 (version number *down* from v2 30th July 2008)

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=ba006584-711d-4ce7-9e1f-181aedf6434a&displaylang=en&tm

Office SharePoint Server 2007 Technical Library in Compiled Help format (Downloadable CHM version of SharePoint Server content on TechNet) (ver 3)

6th November 2008

III WebCasts (+ PodCasts, On-Line courses) for 2007 Products

None

IV WSS v3 FAQ

New

http://wss.asaris.de/sites/walsh/Lists/WSSv3%20FAQ/DispForm.aspx?ID=1590

VI.133 HelpDesk for Outlook and SharePoint (commercial - kalmstrom.com)

http://wss.asaris.de/sites/walsh/Lists/WSSv3%20FAQ/DispForm.aspx?ID=1591

VI.134 SharePoint Attachments for Outlook (commercial - kalmstrom.com)

http://wss.asaris.de/sites/walsh/Lists/WSSv3%20FAQ/DispForm.aspx?ID=1592

VI.135 myDocs (commercial - nSynergy)

Modified

None

V WSSv2 KB Articles (plus SPS 2003 Hot fixes)

New or Modified

None

VI WSSv2 FAQ

New or Modified

None

VII. MS Articles

New or Modified

None

Search Server 2008 Express is based on SharePoint v3 but to take that fact and draw the conclusion that you should use it when you are showing a company what it is possible to do with SharePoint is in my opinion taking things way too far.

The reason for me even mentioning this is that I saw a couple of days ago a blog item from someone who claimed that they had abandoned using WSS 3.0 for proof-of-concepts at prospective SharePoint users but nowadays always used Search Server 2008 Express.

In the case he was writing about, they had a prospect for whom even MOSS would be free so it seemed odd to me that you should do any proof-of-concept with anything less than MOSS - after all if a customer who doesn't need to pay for MOSS decides on using SharePoint they are hardly likely to choose WSS 3.0 (or Search Server 2008 express!) because it's free.

So there was an "he's mad" indication right there but what about the "we've given up using WSS 3.0 and nowadays only use Search Server 2008 Express"?

Well, if anyone has been looking at the Microsoft forums they'll see that Search Server 2008 Express ("MSSX" from here in this piece) is much worse supported than WSS 3.0 / MOSS 2007 so I suppose to get support they are going to have to lie and say they are using WSS 3.0 .... Strike 1.

But let's assume they are right and technically (for team sites etc.) MSSX is WSS 3.0 plus more, then is this still a valid approach?

Not in my view, because you can in this case have your cake and eat it too, because you can install WSS 3.0 and then install MSSX on top of that.

So now you have both.

But do you have any benefits in doing things this way? Well as I think the whole idea of just installing MSSX is mad, I'm not going to spend time on trying it out and thus won't be able to give you a list of what you miss out on, with one VERY BIG exception that I already know about - size of databases.

You see, if you install only MSSX you get *for all your databases* the 4GB size restriction that comes with the version of SQL Server 2005 Express that that product installs.

If, on the other hand, you install first WSS 3.0 and then MSSX, you have (WSS 3.0) the "Windows Internal Database" version of SQL Server 2005 Express for your default database (which to remind the world once again - unlike the MOSS version - does NOT have a database size limit) and only the search databases used by MSSX use it's (4GB restricted) version of SQL Server 2005 Express.

... and before you ask, after you have installed MSSX on top of WSS 3.0, the database system it will use for any new "WSS 3.0" databases will by default be the (4GB restricted) MSSX version of SQL Server 2005 Express. However, like most defaults, this too can be over-ruled and your system told to use the WSS 3.0 (not size restricted) database system for all new content databases.

So there you are. Why it is foolhardy to install only MSSX.

Having written the above comes the thought "So why do they do it the way they do?" After all it would have been just as easy to carry on using WSS 3.0 for their proof-of-concepts.

Could it be that this was hidden marketing - "we know so much about SharePoint that we are advising you to use MSSX rather than the WSS 3.0 less well-informed companies are telling you to use! I've seen stranger things.