To be honest I still can’t understand the branding Microsoft is making for their online services: BPOS or business productivity online standard, Microsoft Online Services and Office 365, (I will call them MSCloud). I guess “All roads lead to Rome”… right? 

Problem definition

1. Our corporate email platform is Exchange Online, a MSCloud service. 
2. Our SharePoint (SP) servers are cloud based but are not hosted at a MSCloud service.
3. I need to setup SP to send automatic email notifications when changes occur. 
4. SP Administration allows the email notifications configuration only with SMTP servers set for Anonymous access.
5. Exchange Online provides an SMTP host but only works with authenticated access.

I can’t seem to successfully relay emails from SharePoint using the SMTP provided by Exchange Online.

Solution in a Nutshell 

1. SharePoint should use a local SMTP server.
2. The local SMTP server should be configured to relay to Exchange Online using authentication and correct ports.
3. Exchange Online should be configured to accept messages from your IP Range.

 Before you go forward

1. The solution has been tested with: SharePoint Foundation 2010 and Windows Server 2008 R2 within a development environment.

 1ST: Local SMTP & SharePoint

1. Open the Server Manager, I normally right click over “Computer” and select the “Manage” option.
   
   
   
   
2. Select “Features” on the Server Manager window and confirm that the SMTP Server is installed. If not select the “Add feature” option. I will assume you have it installed.
   
   
   
   
3. In order to configure the SMTP Server you will need to open the IIS 6.0 Manager. I know you are using IIS 7, butyou will be opening the IIS 6 Management Console (installed when installing the SMTP Server feature). Open it.
   
   
   
   
4. Right click on the Virtual Server and select “Properties”. There find the name of the Fully-qualified domain name.
   
   
   
   
   
   
5. Open the SharePoint Central Administration, go to the “System Settings” section and click on the “Configure outgoing email settings” link.
   
   
   
   
6. Fill the form using first the FQDN you found on the step 4 and then fill the email address you will use to send the notifications. This email is the one hosted on Exchange Online.
   
   
   

 2ND: SMTP Server settings

1. Open the SMTP properties (like the step 4 above).
2. Be sure that the section of IP Address says (All unassigned) and then click the “Advanced” button. Confirm that the port is 25.
   
   
   
   
   
   
3. On the tab “Access” click on the “Relay” button and add the IP addresses used by your network interfaces. (An ipconfig command on the command prompt would help).
   
   
   
   
4. Click on the “Outbound security” button on the “Delivery” tab. Be sure to select “Basic Authentication” and provide the correct credentials for the account specified before on the SP Central Administration (step 5 above). Then select the “TLS encryption” box and Ok to accept the changes.
   
   
   
   
5. From the same “Delivery” tab click on the “Outbound connections…” button. There modify the TCP port to 587.
   
   
   
   
6. From the same “Delivery” tab click on the “Advanced” button.
   
   
   

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  • There check that the FQDN is the same than the one set on your SMTP. 
  • The smart host is set to: smtp.mail.microsoftonline.com. There is a list of other smart hosts available for different geographical areas. 
  • Be sure that the “Attempt direct delivery before sending to smart host” check box is not marked.
    

 3RD: Exchange Online should be ready to accept communications from your SMTP

1. Go to the admin.microsoftonline.com page and authenticate with your administrative credentials.
   
   
   
   
2. Select Exchange Online from the “Service Settings” tab.
   
   
   
   
3. On the “Safe senders” section you can add new Safe senders be specifying domains or IPs. In this case you should add the public IPs (normally one) that your SP box uses.
   
    

After all this is done I would advise you to restart the SMTP and IIS services.

Now you are free to start setting up some email notifications on your SP sites. Just be sure that your user accounts have email addresses assigned.

p.s. Please feel free to comment and let me know if you find something to improve in this guide.

Credits: Vinit Keny a Microsoft Support Specialist helped me to find the way to success.

Originally posted @ NothingButSharePoint.com -Title and some typos are edited in this version.

This article is for any SharePointer looking for business opportunities. It’s not for developers looking for code or power users looking for tips.

A few days ago I participated, as an attendee, in the O’Reilly TOC (tools of change for publishing) Conference. I had high hopes of hearing the word SharePoint somewhere but I didn’t.

I heard many other words including workflows, content management, xml, search, and rights management. But the most common word was “App” and the second most popular was “e-book”.

During TOC I witnessed many striking events happenings and I would like to share them with you. After that I will try to bind my observations all together and end up with what I see as an opportunity.

Scenario

The majority of attendees were not IT Pros, but were book publishers, writers, editors and even graphic arts professionals. It is important to say that the conference is technology oriented orientated. The age range was vast but surprisingly there were a significant number of people over 60.

1. During the presentations and keynotes the primary note taking tool was the iPad. Then notebooks (Macs more than Windows based) and smart phones of all kinds (less WP7). The older generation of attendees used iPads. Very few people were taking notes on paper.
2. The usage of Twitter was outstanding and very helpful. The tweets were running fast and contributing to some kind sort of collective note taking.
3. There were attendees representing very small and focused publishing companies. Many of them trying to find out how to survive the huge transformation of their businesses: from the printed book to a couple of new paradigms: the interactive Apps (Mobile devices) and the E-books (Kindle, Nook).
4. There were attendees representing huge publishers that were astonished by the challenges their industry faces. Immense organizations slow to adapt but trying to keep relevant. Their most visible challenge can be described with a question: How do we offer value to writers if technology allows them to achieve similar results without us?
5. The publishing industry that used to be something between writers, editors and publishers has become more complex and now requires many more skills including graphic arts, interactive design, SEO, social networking, online marketing.
6. The market requests experience instead of  and does not value more information.
7. Royalties and subscription schemes are the preferred monetization strategies. No flat fees.

The main problem seems to be an economic issue; although the writer is the center of the business, there are so many more professionals involved in the production and distribution of the book. How do they maintain a good level of income for each one?

Contrast

A few weeks ago I attended a conference about the famous Cloud. This time, the conference was organized by Oracle. Most attendees were IT Pros from big corporations and financial organizations.

1. Most note taking was pen & paper with a few PCs using Windows XP .
2. There was no The conference had no Twitter handle and I saw only a few tweets about the conference “ I’m at xxx place” (irrelevant).
3. Apps? they were talking about private clouds for corporate use (intranets).
4. IT Pros were disconnected from businesses decision making. The most common worry I could find was a silent fear of losing their job.

Conclusion

It appears that the business world is mutating to a new self. An environment where the small business is empowered by technology and the enterprise is threatened by its resistance to change. Where the common challenge is to integrate multiple skills and technologies.

That means that product managers must adapt their deadlines in order to integrate processes where multiple professional need to participate in a synergetic process. It also means that using multiple platforms is going to be the rule. And that is something that applies directly to single band advocates (Microsoft, Google, Apple).

I also believe that the most important tech leaders will have to adopt the same modus operandi. For example: Why doesn’t Microsoft have a version of IE for Mac? Or why doesn’t Apple have a version of iPhoto for PC?

Opportunity for SharePointers

If you’ve read this far, you probably know what the opportunity is. Big and slow corporations changing direction, small entrepreneurs empowered and everybody trying to find a technological solution for facing the challenges of a global market looking for great experiences.

There are a huge number of publishers who are going to use WordPress as their engine for managing editorial workflows and content. Some are going to Drupal and some even to Joomla. Isn’t this the place for SharePoint to compete?

If publishers are going through this, then it is also happening to designers, consultants, opinion leaders, and probably to everyone. Would you say, today, that the Web isn’t for everyone? (1)

The mobile world is opening a new way of using the Web. SharePoint can support that.

(1) Years ago IT PROs had to convince companies to embrace the web. 

After a few interesting meetings I come to realize that the concept of collaboration and Enterprise Social Networking (ESN) can be confusing.

In my opinion, social networking tools should enable the negotiation of common interests between individuals. It is a system based on allowing each user to win by relating with others. The system works well because each user understands that tolerance is part of the reciprocal agreement; in Facebook I can see information submitted by my friends that may or may not be interesting to me.
 

ESN should work in the same way. That means that the the right question could be: What’s the common interest?

When I think about collaboration I imagine a set of tools that help me and my coworkers to share information in multiple ways. Tools that will enable each individual user to reach information. I see collaboration focused on information and ESN focused on results.

Obviously collaboration and ESN complement each other. 

Collaboration alone can cause adoption problems. Sharing information can be ineffective if only a few care about. 

When collaboration finds a purpose that answers a common interest then I believe becomes ESN. Enterprise Social Networking is not imitating FaceBook’s functionality it is implementing a new way of working focused on results and using collaboration tools.

ESN is based on social interactions with a purpose. A technological solution should only be part of the system.

Can you find a relationship between what Apple does and SharePoint?

I think the relationship exists in terms of strategy.

Note: When I talk about PC I mean Windows, Mac and other OSs.

During the past event where Steve Jobs launched the new MacBook Air he said a couple of important things: he believes that the new computers are the future and Apple will release a version of the App Store for Macs.

I went to the Apple Store to see how the beautiful new machines behave. My curiosity was based on the slow processors, small local storage capacity and short 2GB of Ram. The results were surprising to me.

The new MacBook Air flies. Playing a Youtube video and having all MS Office loaded, all iLife apps open the machine performed very fast. Each application had a document open and the iPhoto was full of pictures. That means something!

The PC industry went almost always with the hand of Microsoft. They coordinated the next versions of Windows and the hardware required to run it at its best. That was great for the industry. The concept was always getting faster and more powerful hardware to handle more complex software. 

Apple is making the first steps into the opposite concept. Now it is safe to have smaller machines with longer battery charge with less powerful processors. Why? because technology is allowing them to optimize the configurations and the ways we use computers are changed as well:

1. The HDD are normally slow, that is the bottleneck. New flash technology works much faster for example: iPhones, iPads, iPods and now the Mac Book Air.
2. New graphic cards are faster and more power savvy.
3. We are using the Internet for storing documents and other kind of files. The PC industry is getting “cloudy”. Attention with this note SharePoint PROs!

The success of the App Store is the envy of the Industry, now everybody wishes to imitate that success. The inclusion of it into the OSX is going to be in my opinion a big opportunity for developers. Apple is opening a new chapter and the rest of the industry will have to follow or innovate. Why is that such an important thing?

1. I miss the great apps from my iPad when I’m using my Mac. For example the experience of reading news using Pulse is much more effective than opening all the news sites at the same time or better looking than using Google reader.
2. Even if developers made such great apps for the PC environment I have no idea where to find them and losing the time searching is something I am against.
3. The Windows environment is full of great and experienced developers and the opportunity of having so many involved on a Windows App Store sounds like a great opportunity for Microsoft and partners.
4. Apps are small applications with a single need to fulfill. The experience of using a computer will be richer than now.

The full software as a service concept now involves hardware optimized for using services. That hardware must be easy to carry and independent for long periods of time from a PC.

The Web browser will lose importance (Microsoft please adapt fast). It will be better to make an App that runs good than a web site that needs to be compatible with multiple browsers. For example, I hate the slow PayPal web site but I love the PayPal App for iPhone; why not have a fully powered App instead of a slow web site?

Why would I need to use Google each day if I could search in a smaller DB of Apps in the App store?

Why would I need to search for services using Google if some apps already made that work for me? (for example Yelp will help me to find good restaurants).

If you are a SharePointer and you believe those trends are real then we have to try to ask the right questions in order to get ready to catch opportunities. In short the trends I’m talking about are:

1. App stores for multiple platforms will help developers reach customers and consumers reach solutions directly from a connected device.
2. The need of more powerful hardware will be limited to some special tasks. Powerful enough hardware will be accepted if mobility and independence increases.
3. Single purpose software will be an important choice for consumers.
4. Less browser use, less searching on a browser. More of socially supported applications.

As a consequence the online Ads industry will have to adapt.

So the questions I’m asking myself as a SharePointer are:

1. Is SharePoint a platform that can help me build single purpose Apps? - My current answer is: yes! by using SharePoint templates and Solutions. Soon by creating Apple Apps that feed from SP sites.
2. Is it possible to have corporate App stores?
3. Is SP the right technology to use for public facing Apps?
4. Is it a waste of resources to use SP as a web repository of information to feed Apps? in opposition to using free open source platforms.

Scenario:

I could see myself in a near future deploying customer side SharePoint Solutions that feed and connect with client side Apps available for PC and Mobile platforms.

If you are thinking on learning about SharePoint 2010 you probably wish to have a Test environment. For that you will need to define your requirements but so far I understand that for learning purposes the following would sufice:

• Single Server installation (DB and SharePoint in the same server)
• SharePoint Foundation2010 (replaces Windows SharePoint Services 3.0)

SharePoint comes with it own DB, it is called Embedded SQL Server 2008 Express. But that DB is limited to 4GB per database. You can also download the SQL Server 2008 Express (notice: without the Embedded), it is also free and has no storage limit.

Important: you need to install the SQL Server 2008 Express before installing SharePoint Foundation.

If you would like to setup your test environment on a virtual machine you will need a 64-bit version of VMware Workstation running on a 64-bit Windows 7.

Important: After installing the SQL Server 2008 Express check for updates and install them. After that proceed with setting up SharePoint Foundation.

Imagine building a SharePoint Site for managing a book collection. You would need that Site to store information about: books, authors, publishers, storage locations and meta data (search criteria).

After you finish designing the Site you will start using it and of course you will discover things to improve. SharePoint will make it easy to implement changes.

Now that your Site is a success you see that someone needs to manage a collection of software CDs. You would think that they could use your book collection Site as a sample. Sure, that would be good.

SharePoint offers a better alternative. It lets you save your Site as a template so other could reproduce exact copies in few seconds. Now your company could start using your Site Template as a base for organizing books, documents, CDs, equipment and many other things. That is productive and effective.

SharePoint will transform your Site in one file with extension “.stp”. That means that your site template can be named: collections_site.stp

An additional benefit of working with templates is that they can be deployed in any SharePoint environment easily. That means that you could share or sell the template to others that use the same version of SharePoint you use.

For complex sites there are some considerations. Feel free to contact me if you need some support.

SharePoint templates are one important competitive advantage.