Windows SharePoint Services Supports Office Collaboration

Windows SharePoint Services (WSS), the successor to SharePoint Team Services (STS) and a free add-on for Windows Server 2003, makes it easier to create and customize team sites—specialized intranet sites for team and project information. When combined with Office 2003, WSS supports common team-based activities such as document collaboration and meeting facilitation. While improved collaboration and easier development and deployment of team sites may entice customers to upgrade to Windows Server 2003 and Office 2003, server and site proliferation could cause administrative headaches for IT planners.

Goal of WSS: Easy Team Collaboration

The combination of WSS and Office 2003 is Microsoft’s latest attempt to position Office as a tool for team collaboration. Earlier attempts date back to the Office Server Extensions introduced with Office 2000.

The center of WSS-based collaboration is the team site, an intranet Web site that provides a central repository of team information. Although it is possible to navigate and browse team sites with a Web client like Internet Explorer (IE), team members can interact with the team site while working within Office applications in other useful ways. For example, users can use Outlook to add important events posted on a team site to their calendars, or view information related to a particular document (such as a discussion thread) while editing the document in Word.