We've officially released the Microsoft Certified Architect certification. This will be a hard one to get.  I plan to get it - you?

I will be at TechEd Boston next week, working in the Office TLC area.

Here's my schedule if you want to drop by and talk about the 2007 Office system, architecture, and other topics:

June 12   9AM-1PM

June 13   1:30PM-5:45PM

June 14   9AM-12PM, 3PM-6:45PM

June 15   3PM-6:15PM

Give me a shout if you're in going to be in town. It should be a great event!

Thanks to all of you who attended yesterday's webcast.  There are so many great integration points between SharePoint, Exchange, and Outlook that we were bound to go over!  I will be posting the reply link and the answers to many of the in-webcast questions in the next day or two so that everyone will benefit.  Stay tuned.

Every once in a while I get a question about the lack of Macros and VBA in Office 2007.  Macros and other developer tools are indeed available, as you can see here.

However, the Developer Tab is hidden by default. To enable the Developer Tab in Word, for example, go to the Office button in the upper left, click "Word Options". Then select the "Show Developer tab in the Ribbon" checkbox.

I will be giving a webcast on configuring SPS 2003 & Exchange/Outlook integration points.  I'll also cover how to configure some of the new MOSS 2007 & Exchange/Outlook points as well.  The audience is an IT Pro, Architect, or Developer.  See you there!

Title: Integrating SharePoint Portal Server 2003, Outlook, and Exchange

Date/Time: 6/7/2006 9:30 AM Pacific

Duration: 60 minutes

Presenter: Scott Jamison

Attendee Registration URL: http://msevents.microsoft.com/CUI/EventDetail.aspx?EventID=1032298065&Culture=en-US 

Audio Information: 800-227-8104 PIN: 6778

I've gotten some Office SharePoint Server 2007 questions like "why aren't slide libraries available on my site" and "where is Excel services?"  They probably aren't enabled. There are two easy places to enable site features:  Site Settings and Central Administration.

First, check Site Actions > Site Settings > Site Features, which will list the available features within a specific site and whether they are enabled:

If you want to enable features for all exisitng sites in the farm, go to Central Administration > Operations > Enable Features on existing sites:

So I've got the Outlook 2007 beta running as my default mail client. It's very stable and I'm never going back. My favorite features:

• RSS Feeds.  Seeing all of my RSS feeds (like my favorite blogs and SharePoint sites) in an Outlook folder is great.
• As-you-type search.  It's such a time-saver to find emails (and RSS feeds!) instantly. It's one of those 'you have to see it to believe it' type of features.
• To-Do Bar.  I'm a big fan of seeing my email, upcoming appointments and tasks all at the same time.  Now I want this on my desktop...Vista, anyone?
• Improved Object Model. The improvements Randy Byrne and team have made to the Outlook 2007 object model are amazing. I will be posting some of the new add-ins I've created once Beta 2 is available publicly.

If you haven’t seen this already, the Messaging and Security Feature pack for the Verizon Treo 700w is available. This is great stuff for mobile email users!

http://www.palm.com/us/support/downloads/treo700wupdater/verizon.html?creativeID=RFB|700w_update_msfp

What does this update do?

The Palm® Treo™ 700w Updater 1.10 for Verizon Wireless includes the following enhancements for your smartphone:

• Includes Microsoft®'s Messaging and Security Feature Pack (MSFP) with Direct Push for automatic wireless sychronization of email, calednar, contacts, and tasks
• Enhances email capabilities for more support of push email solutions, such as WirelessSync and GoodLink™, and of synchronization capabilities, such as the ability to maintain an "always on" data connection after POP or IMAP email synchronization and the ability to auto-synchronize all email accounts based on user setting².
• Updated memory management
• Pictures and Videos enhancements
• New Wireless Manager provides an updated interface for turning wireless radios on and off on your 700w smartphone

I just downloaded the new Microsoft Office Communicator Mobile client for my PocketPC Phone (I've got the Treo 700w). I must say - Communicator is simply amazing. I love the fact that I can use a consistent client application on my phone, at a kiosk, or on my PC.

So now, in addition to using my phone to get my hotmail, corporate email, browse the web, and open Word/Excel/PowerPoint docs, I can now search for anyone in the entire Global Address List and see their online status, IM them, send them an email, or call them (at work or on their mobile device).  Great stuff!

Oh...and it's free to anyone who is licensed for Microsoft Office Live Communications Server 2005 with SP1.

One of the recommendations I often give for SharePoint content databases is to create several of them right from the get-go. This provides partitioning to keep the databases at a reasonable size (you should keep them under 50GB). If you are approaching the limit, you can always create a new database. But what about splitting already existing databases into several smaller ones?

Here's a tool on GotDotNet that helps with this process. The tool "write locks, backups and restores Site Collections in a given input file to a new SharePoint Content Database." 

Does anyone have feedback on this tool or seen any other solutions?

One of the things I love about technology is when I see tools that enable people to do their jobs better.  Yesterday, I was speaking with with Alban deBergevin (he's the Project solution specialist at Microsoft in the Northeast).  We were talking about the Project family and I realized that most folks don't know what the upcoming Project Portfolio Server product even does.

Office Project Portfolio Server 2007 is a governance solution that helps execs & managers gain visibility and insight into programs (collections of projects). It helps answer questions like, "should we be funding this project?" and "we have resources for 3 of these 5 proposed projects...which one will make the biggest business impact?"   I'm looking forward to working with customers who want to make better decisions!

I often get questions regarding the new features in Windows SharePoint Services v3.0. For now, Dustin Miller has a great blog entry on this topic: http://www.sharepointblogs.com/dustin/archive/2005/09/14/3503.aspx.  I'll be updating this site with the full list of features when Beta 2 comes out.