Working with the Content Search Web Part in SharePoint 2013

The Content Search Web Part or CSWP is basically a web part that has been introduced in the latest version of the advanced web application development platform, SharePoint 2013. The web part makes use of the different modes and options of styling for the purpose of displaying content of varying dimensions on the SP pages.

A Quick Overview of Content Search Web Part

The good thing about CSWP is that it displays the search results in a typical manner, allowing users to format the same rather easily. Now, each of it is associated with a particular search query and it is the results of this search query that the feature displays. On the other hand, if you want to change the way in which the results appear on the pages, you have the option of using the display templates. The display templates are basically snippets of HTML and JavaScript that are responsible for rendering information that is returned by SP. The information awaiting display is inserted in the JSON format into the page.

When To Use CSWP and CQWP?

CSWP is capable of returning any content from the search index. This can be used on the SP 2013 sites at the time of connecting to a search service and getting back to the already indexed search results in the pages. The freshness of the content is determined by the number of crawls. Instant content or the fresh versions of the same can be displayed by means of using the Content Query Web Part (CQWP) instead of CSWP. This feature can also be used for displaying the minor versions of the content, which is otherwise, not facilitated by the search crawls. Yet another advantage of the feature is that it offers to display results from sites that are marked to be non- indexed by the site collection administrators.

How to Use the Feature?

Organizations, trying to make the most of this new feature in SP 2013, must follow the required steps in using the CSWP. Here is a brief overview:

• To begin with, the 'my community site' needs to be edited and the CSWP needs to be added. The latter is found in the Content Rollup category.

• Configuration of the feature can be done by means of clicking anywhere in the same and following this, choosing the tab, from which the feature’s Properties needs to be clicked.

• A query has to be setup and for this, one should click on the Change Query from the properties box.

• A Query dialog box consisting of four tabs namely the Basics, Refiners, Settings and Test, will open up. The Basics tab will offer you with the chance to see the Switch to Advanced Mode and eventually, click on the Switch to Quick Mode. The query will begin from the Quick mode.

• Reaching the Select a Query menu, one can either choose items that match a tag or pictures. Querying documents or items that suit a particular content type is also facilitated.

• With the Restrict by app option, one can query the current site, current site collection, specific URL or go for the Don't restrict results by app option. The Restrict on this tag option should be chosen.

• Additional filters can be added here or the advanced mode can be checked out for other options. The Refiners tab, on the other hand, allows further filtering of the queries.

• The Settings tab has additional options in the form of the Query rules while the Test tab offers the final query text for the purpose of testing. On finishing, one needs to click OK at the bottom of the Build Your Query dialog box.

• Setting up the way in which the results will be displayed is the final step in the process.

Knowing about the ways in which the CSWP works helps in making the best implementation of this beneficial feature of SharePoint 2013. You can hire developers from top SharePoint development companies in India who can help you build products within allocated budgets and time schedules.

We provide sharepoint porting services. If you would like to hire sharepoint programmers from our team, please get in touch with us at Mindfire Solutions.

3 business problems solved with SharePoint

With rapid globalization, businesses are required to cope up with the trend to operate from locations outside the office; hence the need for efficient communication becomes all the more evident. Dynamism and agility are the ultimate necessities for businesses to have a competitive edge, but paper-based processes or poorly structured documentation storage are becoming a hindrance, given the time as well as the effort needed in searching for information.

So far as paper documents are concerned, it is inconvenient to track them. Very often, there is the probability to lose them and moreover, manual processes can result in errors. Since the process state is not visible, considerable time has to be spent in completion of actions or monitoring the process. Poor visibility may also be caused by storage of documents in inadequately structured shared drives, wherein manifold versions often lead to duplication and loss of visibility for the most recent version. All these issues combined together lead to lower productivity and higher cost, with dire consequences such as litigation in case processes fail.

Across the years, SharePoint has emerged successful in solving these common business problems. With the passage of time, this product by Microsoft has become the standardized means for storage as well as sharing within an organization. Every client has a different manner of SP utilization for solving problems. Let us discuss three common business problems that SharePoint has solved.

Document Management : It is a fact that a number of businesses make use of sub-folder structure for storage of documents and emails are being used to distribute them. In this case, locating documents within a deep set of sub-folders or going through loads of emails might be a great hassle. Being a central location for the complete set of documents, SP is able to solve these problems to a great extent, enabling rapid access of documents.

A powerful feature of SharePoint document management is that the storage of “meta-data” or information is possible against the documents within columns. A much more robust solution is provided by SP, which brings together the data as well as documents. Moreover, document control features such as the capability of viewing track changes or version history have great potential especially in cases where using the latest version is extremely essential. Again, a document's major and minor versions enable a department or an individual to make alterations to a document without publishing the alterations before they are entirely ready. Version conflicts are prevented by the check-in and check-out features, and documents are also made available for out-of-office use.

Workflow Issues : Since SP empowers non-technical users with the capability of fixing efficiency issues, it is indeed a great tool for solving business issues as well as making room for rapid development. So, now employees who are well-versed with the issues can leverage SP to solve them without involving the IT department. This is where the beneficial uses of SharePoint workflows come in, which help in accelerating the process, reducing errors, doing away with unnecessary steps, providing better documentation along with enhancing communication.

SharePoint solutions also enable convenient document movement through approval process, updating information from other databases or software programs, and so on.

Collaboration : SharePoint goes a long way in doing away with the problems of disparate systems, unstructured data and decisions, thereby resulting in increased collaboration. Considering the collaborative aspect, the major areas wherein SharePoint comes in handy are HR Management, Compliance and Business Intelligence. As an efficient collaboration portal, SharePoint empowers investors, clients, partners, coworkers, stakeholders to share ideas and information on dedicated SP pages which store information pertaining to that particular project. Moreover, with the help of SP, a team environment can even be promoted amongst employees who work remotely, irrespective of the frequency at which employees meet each other.

Thus, it is clear that SharePoint, with its powerful features have been able to solve critical business problems thereby leading to immense benefits. Proper implementation and management can indeed lead to great business improvements. Sharepoint 2013 mobile development teams can help you build products within allocated budgets and time schedules.

We provide SharePoint portal development services. If you would like to hire sharepoint developer from our certified team of SharePoint developers, please contact us at Mindfire Solutions.

15 free SharePoint tools to make IT admins smile

SharePoint is a rich tool and offers extensive features for a better, customized and organized work flow. It enables to make processes easier and swift that enables organizations to make the best out of their employees. It is the best CMS that enables to manage huge amount of content effectively.

We live in a competitive world and latest technologies emerge to enable to deliver the best results possible. SharePoint is Microsoft's tool that enables to build richer attractive websites. It is considered to be the most popular collaborative tool that provides all the necessary tools to manage people and content effectively. This platform makes it easy for employees of an organization to share ideas and engage smoothly in knowledge sharing activities.

Some of the free tools which helps admins while customizing their websites are as follows:

1.Microsoft's SharePoint development Administration Toolkit 2.0 (for 2010 and 2007 versions)

Microsoft bakes a bunch of nice things into this little add-on, including a kit that generates test loads to check how well any SharePoint deployment runs. It includes another important addon for the Security Configuration Wizard so one can harden the profile of deployment through Windows Server 2008. The SPDiag 3.0 utility is most useful. It grabs a heap of statistics from all the servers in a SharePoint farm, interprets them and presents them in a very neat and customized report.

2.ManageEngine's Free SharePoint Health Monitor Tool

For smaller SharePoint deployment, this lightweight tool gives just an overall rollup of SharePoint farm's health status at a glance. The ManageEngine Free SharePoint Health Monitor fits this bill nicely, giving a conveniently efficient dashboard view where one can see the details about the memory, CPU and disk space usage for each server running SharePoint.

It can be drilled down into the SharePoint workload itself to see the response time, service status, Web server (Internet Information Services) process details and even SQL Server details such as buffer cache hit ratio, cache memory and free pages.

3.IntLock's CardioLog Analytics Free Edition

If systems have a quarter of a million page views or fewer per month, one can use this free tool to help which finds out the sites employees are using, how long they are typically engrosed with those websites and what areas of those websites are most used. It installs quickly and is compatible with all kinds of versions of SharePoint, even the latest new SharePoint 2013. One can easily upgrade to the paid version where the free edition has all of the same features, with the only differences being the page view tracking limit and allowing for web-based support.

4.Microsoft's SharePoint Designer (for 2007, 2010 and 2013)

Designer is like the FrontPage web design tool of the SharePoint world. One can use it to customize the look and feel of SharePoint websites, create and modify simple workflows and personalize a SharePoint deployment at ease.

If one have a large SharePoint deployment with multiple versions running at the same time, one must use the Designer version specific to the particular SharePoint edition.

5.Idera's Free SharePoint Admin Toolset

This is a combination of seven tools in one, a site monitor is present to check up on any SharePoint sites one manages, a space trends report to track using disk space on deployment for folders, libraries and websites, a handy accelerator that essentially rebuilds the database indexes on the SQL Server instance managing SharePoint deployment, a clean report to show how much SQL database space deployment is consuming, a permissions analyzer to show what users can access which specific websites and libraries, a smart tool to compare the configurations of site collections to see where they are different and a quick admin tool that brings together most frequently used links to SharePoint Central Administration. A very smart tool set to make tasks easier and smart way to deal with.

6.Idera's Free SharePoint Performance Monitor

To have a detailed information at what is happening under the hood of any SharePoint farm, this great tool Idera's Free SharePoint Performance Monitor is used. This tool gives a holistic overview of the performance statistics and metrics for SharePoint itself, the SQL Server instance on any given server and information about the host's operating system and memory configuration.

The tool also can be configured to send simple e-mail alerts when one of the performance indicators does not work. One can also monitor multiple websites at a time for their deployments and one can generate nifty graphs and charts about connections, requests, response time, pages, disk usage and many more.

7.McAfee's Network Discovery for Microsoft SharePoint

It is a good SharePoint-specific inventory tool. If one has overall responsibility for a network, one might not even know if one of departments has deployed a SharePoint server. The McAfee Network Discovery Tool for Microsoft SharePoint will scan the network to find SharePoint 2003, 2007 and 2010 environments and then display the results of its scan in a nice neat HTML report that shows in detail which servers have been deployed and what version they're running.

8.Axceler's ViewPoint for SharePoint

This is a great tool for visualizing in a convenient table form exactly which users have what permissions on any given site. This could be very useful in an auditing scenario or any environment where permissions can tighten without granting full access to users needlessly. One can choose to work from the graphical dashboard, to run and print reports to provide to management or to work through with any administrative tools. It works with both SharePoint 2010 as well as SharePoint 2013 deployments. It even requires full SharePoint administrator permissions to do its job properly.

9.Quest's Server Administrator for SharePoint

This great tool is suitable on SharePoint 2007 and 2010. It lets to see which parts of farm configuration are affecting the security, performance and availability of deployment.

It helps to build PowerShell scripts to maintain environment. It also helps with a migration to SharePoint 2010 from 2007, required to get to SharePoint 2013 as well, by showing which parts of deployment are ready for the upgrade and which are not. And it provides an intelligent rating to show what is most important to upgrade before one begin against what would simply be "nice to have."

10.SharePoint SUSHI

SharePoint SUSHI is an open source project hosted on CodePlex that essentially takes the most common administrative tasks and puts them in one convenient tool. SUSHI, which bills itself as a "Swiss army knife for SharePoint," stands for SharePoint Utilities with a smart and useful interface.

One can view the lists and sites of any given user can access, which is really helpful for looking at effective permissions, upload user photos as profile images, back up and restore sites; apply a theme to a group of sites with one click and much more.

11.Clockwork Software

It is SharePoint Migration Tool, reliable migration of documents from old ECMS to SharePoint 2010 or SharePoint 2013. From any SQL Server based ECMS (EDRMS, DMS, CMS) with files stored on a network drive or share. ECMSs such as Hummingbird DM6, DOCs Open, Worksite, FileNet etc.

- Migrate all versions and metadata (including managed metadata)

- Migrate to SharePoint libraries and folders

- Apply document level security if desired

- Currently in use on migration projects totalling about 2 million documents

- Good for small migrations with a cost effective pricing scheme.

12.Metalogix

It can migrate content into SharePoint from just about any source system. From one SharePoint version to another (2003, 2007, 2010, WSSv2 or WSSv3), from various Enterprise Content Management systems (eRoom, Stellent, Livelink) and from file systems, exchange public folders, blogs and websites.

13.PCVITA Express Migrator

It is SharePoint comprehensive too designed for enterprise to migrate content to SharePoint as part of SharePoint migration strategy that goes above and beyond other traditional SharePoint migration software, thereby allowing to have visually architected migration. It provides an effective and simple solution for enterprise to migrate their business-critical data from different repositories (Lotus Notes, File Share, File System, Public Folder and SharePoint etc) to Microsoft SharePoint Server. The SharePoint migration product granularly migrates content while keeping all the associated metadata & permission intact.

14.Vyapin

A powerful tool for developing SharePoint application for migrating documents, NTFS permissions, data and their associated metadata properties from network file shares, file servers and local hard drives to Microsoft SharePoint 2013, Office 365 (SharePoint Online), SharePoint 2010 and SharePoint 2007.

Here are the list of functions it provides such as migrate folders and files into SharePoint libraries from various file servers and network shares. Carry forward default file properties, including custom Office document properties to the respective documents in SharePoint. Automate entire migration process, with the ability to correct and rectify migration errors using the pre-migration validation tool. Migrate content from file shares to on-premise SharePoint servers and SharePoint Online in Office 365 (Standard) environment using a single application.

15.Tzunami

This Deployer tool offers a cost-effective solution for migrating and consolidating multiple content sources into SharePoint. It supports almost all versions of SharePoint, from SPS 2001 to SharePoint 2013. Automating the entire process of migrating unstructured content.

SharePoint offers multiple benefits for enterprises big and small. It is for this reason that enterprises are stressing on this particular technology for enabling them to function optimally. It enables to increase employee productivity and enables them to remain more focused with their work. It can function as an effective content management system, document management tool and collaborative platform. Businesses have profited much more with this awesome tool and it has enabled to enhance business initiatives. SharePoint development services are frequently used to reap maximum benefits.

We provide custom SharePoint development services. If you would like to speak to one of our certified SharePoint developers, please contact us at Mindfire Solutions.

Top 12 SharePoint Content Security Risks and how to avoid them

As organizations are increasingly using hosted SharePoint farms, SP sites or SharePoint Online for regulated and sensitive data incorporating PII or Personally Identifiable Information, customer financial data, healthcare information as well as intellectual property, data security has become a thing of high priority. Along with this, organizations also have to combat expensive compliance risks that revolve around regulated data and Sharepoint. Certain compliance or security risks associated with SharePoint environments can have grave impacts on organizations, if they are left unattended. Security breaches, irrespective of the means which cause them, can lead to fines, brand damage, loss of customer trust along with other serious effects. Let us discuss 12 of the commonly occurring security risks and ways to avoid them.

• Lack of awareness regarding SharePoint content: Governance guidelines should be implemented and content classification should be provided. This involves execution of periodic content scans coupled with providing training to end users. Along with this, SP metadata as well as work-flows should be used by teams for routing sensitive information to safe locations.
  
  
• Collaboration barriers: There are a number of users who regularly copy confidential or sensitive data from SP to their hard drive or to a USB drive, for, say, emailing it to some other person. In most cases, the aim of this copying is to facilitate information sharing with a person lacking access to SP documents. Hence businesses need to enforce clear policies regarding information-sharing, followed by access monitoring and enforcement of policy compliance.
  
  
• Not securing SharePoint from privileged insider accounts: Privilege levels with respect to administrator accounts should be limited, followed by deployment of third-party security solutions for enabling encryption as well as access control.
  
  
• Non-existent or deficient audit trails for SP usage or administrative access: For all the administrative alteration made to Sharepoint and also with respect to system or file access, it is advisable to enable auditing.
  
  
• Lack of content security in SP servers, in transits or endpoints: Companies need to implement solutions which offer content security on SP servers and on backups by means of encryption as well as access control. Along with this, teams should take into account whole-disk encryption with regards to end-points, particularly laptops. SSL encryption can also be enabled by security administrators through data in transit.
  
  
• Misconfiguration of permissions or access controls: First, existing SP permissions need to be audited, followed by review or creation of control policies relating to corporate access. It is good to line up SP permissions along with corporate directory services. With this, administrators would be able to comprehend the use of inheritance as well as improperly managed item-level permissions.
  
  
• SP platform security risks: You should harden platforms through disablement of services or ports that are not required for the platform function. Moreover, patch on a regular basis and take into consideration application white listing.
  
  
• SharePoint and Malware: A server malware solution should be implemented, updating the antivirus definitions on a regular basis.
  
  
• Failure to set limitation on service and administrator accounts: It is advisable to set limitations on privileges relating to service accounts as well as go for disablement of the install account. Also do not make use of shared administrator accounts.
  
  
• SP network configuration and system architecture issues: Putting a dedicated SP web front end within a DMZ, make use of a single function with respect to each server and harden SP, database as well as OS in accordance with the best practices.
  
  
• Setbacks in executing backups, and in providing DR capability: On a regular basis, backups need to be performed and the same need to be restored. Then the means of recovery from disasters with the help of SharePoint services should be considered.
  
  
• Improper search indexing: Often to obtain search results, administrators leverage an admin account, which leads to results that are not relevant for everyone. To avoid this, administrative accounts should not be unnecessarily used for operations wherein they are not required.
  

Management of all the above-mentioned security risks by implementing proper security controls help a lot in mitigating compliance and content security risks in SharePoint. Moreover, putting the SP environment across a robust security footing enables you to widen the scope of SharePoint use within your organization for enhanced communication or collaboration. You can hire developers from top SharePoint application development companies in India who can help you build products within allocated budgets and time schedules.

We provide SharePoint webparts development services. If you would like to know more about SharePoint 2010 development or SP2013 development expertise, please get in touch with us at Mindfire Solutions.

Need for Change Management in a Hybrid SharePoint Environment

Microsoft does recognize that Hybrid SharePoint environments are here to stay for some time. Most of the companies have earnestly started exploring the implications of the cloud. Organizations are realizing that they need adequate amount of time to figure out whether they are required to transfer their assets to the cloud, and if so, how they would be moving their digital assets within the cloud. It is a fact that software delivery is moving towards the cloud and maximum number of organizations across the globe are considering their own strategy for the cloud. However, the rate of adoption of the cloud varies as per the industry, geopolitical as well as regulatory openness. As organizations gradually make this shift, they will continue to transfer certain digital assets along with prime work loads to the cloud. Hence solutions will definitely be required for management of the new hybrid world.

The dilemma with this hybrid world coupled with the associated requirement for change management solutions are not completely new. However, the velocity with which companies are shifting key work loads towards the cloud is creating an awareness of these requisites. Around ten years ago, collaboration platforms as well as hosted supply chains appeared online, a majority within the high-tech manufacturing space, experiencing the pains of a shift to the cloud: huge file transfer protocols, WAN optimization, edge devices, single sign-on along with other means of communication enhancements across private networks. Years later, we happen to be dealing with a number of similar issues, and this time, it's on a much higher scale. A lot of improvements have taken place in the collaboration technologies but there is still the need for tools to assist in managing between cloud platforms and on premises.

Hybrid environments would continue to remain a prime factor for a minimum of three to five years. This recognition by Microsoft showcases the requirement for robust change management abilities across the cloud and on premises environments. Change management does not simply imply migration, it also takes structural mobility into consideration. Moving content, lists, metadata, forms, workflows as well as other components within diverse SharePoint environments along with maintenance of their integrity, has turned into a business imperative.

Change management within the hybrid SharePoint development environment implies the following:

• Enhanced movement between the development, staging as well as production environments.
• Development of solutions once, followed by going for replication of the same across environments.
• Restructuring of topology and content as workloads are migrated into the cloud.
• Creating and managing governance standards which are consistent, throughout these environments.
• Introducing bulk changes to the environments instead of site-by-site.
• Creation of dashboards as well as federated reports across all the environments.

There are a number of efficient vendors for rendering support to the hybrid SharePoint world, thereby offering administrators with flexible as well as powerful tools for the purpose of reporting, permissions management, information architecture management or re-design, compliance and auditing, along with distributed management which offers farm admins to power users increased hold over their environments. There are suites which offer great assistance within the change management category, providing potent functionality for helping organizations manage and gain control over their hybrid SP environments.

As organizations begin to explore Office 365 and how to reap adequate benefits from the large investments made in the transition from SharePoint on premises to a cloud-oriented model, it is advisable to begin thinking about the ways in which the various assets can be managed during the transition, whatever time the transition might involve. Proper solutions that cater to the needs of administration, governance and change management with respect to SharePoint must be adopted for business effectiveness.

We provide custom SharePoint development services. If you would like to speak to one of our certified SharePoint developers, please contact us at Mindfire Solutions.

Should I migrate to SharePoint on Office 365?

Office 365 has become one of the largest bets of Microsoft. But it is essential for the end-user to ensure that whatever is being done proves beneficial for the business, brings returns and adds value. Hence there is a common dilemma as to whether one should migrate to SharePoint on Office 365. Before finding an answer to that question, let us understand some basics.

An Overview

As companies increasingly feel the need for information technology, it can be said that every company needs to fulfill some core needs, namely, Instant Access to People, Email as well as Collaboration on Files.

• Email: Undoubtedly, sending and receiving of mails is a requisite for all organizations. But it is not possible for everyone to afford the effort, time and expertise that go into maintenance of an infrastructure like this. Office 365 provides Exchange as a service, facilitating the execution of a number of activities without the need to worry about the infrastructure.
• Instance Access to People: So far as the world of the end users in concerned, instant messaging is quite common. However, when it comes to the workplace, there is hardly any means of communicating, which has become a challenge given the present need to operate from outside the workplace. With proper access to people, the requirement for internal mails is reduced. Lync as a service is offered, which renders instant messaging along with real-time presence. Even voice calls are possible and you can also create pre-planned online meetings with people internal or external to your organization.
• Collaboration on Files: The File Server or Shared Drive no longer lives up to the expectations of modern technology advanced users. A company server comprising a physical folder structure has documents stored within one folder or another, a phenomenon that hinders the ability to find or classify. Currently the workforce expects document access and has fundamental collaboration needs such as content approval. SharePoint as a service is offered by Office 365, ushering in the robust champion platform within the package. Since long, SharePoint has been utilized as a platform for building Extranets, Team Collaboration Sites, Intranets as well as Websites. It fulfills a number of fundamental collaboration requirements and also makes room for creation of other web-based solutions.

Why should you consider migration?

This is an obvious question. So, let us look into some of the benefits to be derived by migrating to SharePoint on Office 365.

• Cost: Migrating will definitely do away with a large portion of the maintenance cost. All servers, support systems, configurations along with anything else required to keep the maintenance activity in-house are eliminated and just offered as a component of this particular solution of Microsoft. There is in fact no need to buy servers or licenses.
• Updates: Office 365 is a great option if you want your workforce to be up to date with all latest versions, thereby benefiting from the latest integration and features. As a subscription model, automatic as well as free upgrades to both the products and services available are obtained, based on your plan.
• Hassle-free: It is indeed great for businesses if they do not have to worry about deployment, servers or other things that come with possessing in-house servers or your own IT department. Getting the service of instant communication, live meetings, emails along with a collaboration platform is a great thing.

Many people try to avoid migrating to this platform because of certain legal and compliance issues. However, most of the worries originate from personal beliefs. To do away with such legal concerns, you should look deep into the Trust Center, which is a storehouse of information. It should be realized that your content, depending upon your location, might be available with datacenters in other countries. Given the sensitivity of the documents, it might be difficult to consider migration. But the Trust Center offers Data Maps, thereby assisting with notifications once the data is transferred to another location. If you need an experienced hand with your sharepoint migration to office 365, you can hire a SharePoint development company in India who can help you migrate within allocated budgets and time schedules.

We provide sharepoint webparts development services as well. If you would like to speak to a certified SharePoint programmer from our team, please get in touch with us at Mindfire Solutions.

SharePoint Migration Using 3rd Party Tools

Currently in SharePoint, content migration is achieved using third party tools. Leveraging third party solutions simplifies the procedure along with reducing the effort or time needed for the process. It also cuts down on the cases of failed migrations arising out of issues such as file corruption. Analysis has revealed that clients spend good amount of time preparing data for migration, and these efforts may not yield fruit in case the policies and procedures are not adhered to. Owing to such risks, clients prefer using third-party ISVs or independent software vendors for migrating content from on-premises SP into the hosted service. Let us check out the following third party tools that facilitate migration or consolidation of content.

AvePoint: A recognized leader in rendering infrastructure management solutions for Microsoft SP, AvePoint is a cost-effective and efficient solution for migrating business-critical content from diverse electronic repositories to Microsoft SP. The following are a few of the different DocAve Migrator modules:

• Content can be automatically moved from source SharePoint 2003 or 2007 into the mapped elements within SP 2007 or 2010 by SharePoint Migrator.

• Website Migrator provides an efficient, reliable and affordable solution for the organized transfer of web content to MS SharePoint 2007/2010.

• Content sprawl is reduced along with IT productivity enhancement by eRoom Migrator through centralization of eRoom project databases as well as other collaborative assets across a single SharePoint 2010 and 2007 repository.

• Consolidation of manifold EMC Documentum content sources over SP can be automatically achieved by Documentum Migrator, thus maximizing ROI for legacy content present within EMC Documentum.

Clockwork Software: This software offers reliable document migration from old ECMS to SharePoint 2013 or SharePoint 2010. Successful migration can also be achieved from any SQL Server based ECMS (CMS, DMS, EDRMS) with files stored over a network drive or share. ECMSs such as Hummingbird DM6, Worksite, FileNet, DOCs Open and so on. With this, various version and metadata can be migrated to SharePoint libraries as well as folders. It is also good for small migrations.

Idera SharePoint migration suite: It is by far the most comprehensive solution available. This tools empowers you to visually architect as well as organize content and metadata during the migration process, thereby improving usability, eDiscovery, search and manageability. This suite can be used again and again, without any services, in a variety of scenarios that include SP site reorganization, SP platform upgrade, as well as rolling out new applications and sites. The following are the components of the migration suite:

• SP information architect which facilitates rapid and convenient development, deployment as well as maintenance of SP taxonomies and metadata.
• SP content organizer allows for the application of metadata and relocation of files anywhere within SharePoint with simply a few clicks.
• With the help of SharePoint migration manager, content can be deployed, migrated or compared within different versions of SP or from file systems.

Metalogix: Data can be migrated into SharePoint from any source system by using Metalogix. It is possible to migrate from one version of SharePoint to another, from diverse Enterprise Content Management systems as well as from Exchange public folders, websites, blogs or file systems. For simplifying the process, there are different kinds of modules like SharePoint Site Migration Manager,Website Migration Manager for SharePoint, Metalogix Migration Manager for Blogs, etc.

Axceler-Davinci Migrator: It reduces the risk, brings down the cost as well as reduces the time required for the procedure. With the help of the Davinci Migrator, you would be able to identify possible problems prior to their occurrence. Migration estimates aid the creation of realistic schedules. Moreover, Davinci allows migration in a single big wave or a series of continuous smaller waves. Hence you have the freedom to operate as per your own schedule.

Apart from the above-mentioned ones, there are a number of other tools such as Vital-Path, Vyapin, Tzunami, Proventeq and so on. By using these third-party tools, many obstacles that cause hindrance to the overall migration process, can be overcome. If you need an experienced hand with your sharepoint migration, you can hire developers from top companies in sharepoint. That will surely release a lot of stress associated. However please do ensure that the vendors you choose at least possess the awareness of tools available.

We provide sharepoint portal development services. If you would like to speak to one of our certified SharePoint developers, please contact us at Mindfire Solutions.

Understanding Details of SharePoint Reporting

SharePoint reporting is a broad and important area of discussion. Prior to going into the discussion of what is SP reporting and how does it help, it is necessary to look into why the same is necessary. When it comes to the governance implementation, understanding and managing the activities within the SP environment is extremely essential. Now, these include identification, assessment as well as prioritization of data, measuring and monitoring of the same, review and modification of the government strategy and creation of policies that guarantee overall security.

What is SharePoint Reporting?

SharePoint Reporting is a wide area that calls for varying requirements based on site, site collection as well as farm-level requirements. Seen from the perspective of the administrators, appropriate reporting helps in the maintenance of governance rules and compliance policies while also monitoring the issues related to growth and scalability.

Different Areas of SharePoint report development

SP Reporting can be broadly divided into five categories as follows:

• Permissions Reporting which involves troubleshooting to find out why users are unable to see the content, communicating about various types of compliance and auditing to find out who can access sensitive content.

• Usage or Activity Reporting is about finding out which content to be used, planning prospective growth as well as grasping hardware requirements.

• Audit Reporting to determine the details of the access and accordingly, adhere to the internal along with external compliance requirements.

• Performance Reporting that involves monitoring page load time to detect problems apart from planning for enhanced usage.

Permission

Report of permissions is immensely crucial for several reasons as follows:

• Auditing
• Maintenance of accurate records of user access
• Troubleshooting problems related to functionality that arise from the users' attempt at performing tasks without the required permission.

However, even with this, SP is unable to carry out centralized management of all permissions. Moreover, real time report is not a feasible option either because the data is available at the site-level, gathering which takes a lot of time. The newly improved 2013 version of SP solves these problems to a great extent though farm-wide visibility is still demanded by the administrators.

Usage and Activity

It is an essential way of tracking mechanism for planning capacities, disaster recovery while also helping the administrators undertake a much more effective management of the respective environment on a daily basis.

The concept paves the way for the necessary resources for the monitoring as well as measuring of the level of user adoption. This ensures that the businesses are able to derive the maximum profit out of their investment.

Storage

It is about analyzing storage, which in turn, is essential for planning capacities as well as understanding the requirements of growth cum performance of every team within an organization. Finding out the best practice to monitor as well as set limits on the size of the SP sites is an integral part of the governance policies. This should be followed by the setting of the governance policies on the right track along with assuring the end users about the availability of the storage to cater to their particular business needs.

Audit

For the SharePoint administrators, it is an essential point of focus, allowing the platform to become more widely adopted as well as critical for business operations. Audit reporting helps in establishing a stronger and well-maintained governance using both technology along with the best practices.

The requirement for this arises from several quarters, including the necessity of additional data as a part of capacity planning and for producing reports that display the access to certain items within a period.

With the web application development platform of SP growing within an organization along with more of such secure content finding their place in SP, auditing helps administrators by offering them with the much- needed tools. These tools enable proper management of important events along with changes that take place within the environment.

Performance

This comes from outside the development platform of SP by means of reporting against the farm as well as customer script. Third-party monitoring along with performance tools are also available. Now, most of the performance reporting is owned by the operators and not the SP administrators or end users. Attempts are made at filling this gap by means of the addition of the toolkit.

With the above-mentioned ones being among the popular most, there are also other options of SharePoint reporting. Understanding the concept allows organizers to manage both systems and resources with care and expertise.

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