Help for SharePoint Administrators

Several free solution accelerators and an updated management pack will help administrators plan and manage two SharePoint collaboration products, Windows SharePoint Services 3.0, a Windows Server feature, and SharePoint Server 2007, used for corporate portal hosting, Web content management, document management, and enterprise search. The solution accelerators provide tools, code, and documentation to help solve several common SharePoint problems, including identifying which servers on a corporate network are running SharePoint and configuring large server farms. However, solution accelerators are not officially supported by Microsoft, and some may need to be tailored or extended to meet organizations’ needs.

Large Site Configuration, New Management Pack

Microsoft highlighted the following solution accelerators at its Mar. 2008 SharePoint Conference in Seattle.

Asset Inventory Tool. Currently in beta, this accelerator helps administrators identify and inventory SharePoint installations on a corporate network. The tool could help administrators control proliferation of “rogue” SharePoint deployments, a side-effect of the ready availability of the free Windows SharePoint Services.