[This is a quick post that will be updated with more information later] One indicator of how how mature an organization is with their SharePoint management and usage is if folders are often/always used in document libraries. This is a practice learned when using file shares and then migrated into SharePoint sites either by simply copying data straight from those shares or by users not knowing of a better way. Thankfully, there is a better way! Using SharePoint columns, we can offer the same document organization but with added benefits of filtering, grouping, and sorting all documents in a library. Let's look at an example of how this can be a benefit for you…
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Building Business Intelligence Dashboards with SharePoint Data – December 1st 2015
I will be co-presenting at the Nashville Business Intelligence User Group meeting this month. We will be walking attendees through creating dashboards using Power BI and I will be focusing on using SharePoint data. I will show how to use Excel to create dashboards within SharePoint web part pages – first with an export of a SharePoint list and then an import of a SharePoint list into Excel. We will discuss the benefits and drawbacks of each method. I will then show linking to the same SharePoint list data using the Power BI Desktop application and then publishing it to Power BI. [UPDATE] The meeting went really well – Tammy…
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SharePoint 2016 and Maximum Degree Of Parallelism (MAXDOP)
I was a speaker at five SQL Saturdays this year and at each one of them I was asked why SharePoint requires the SQL Server Maximum Degree Of Parallelism setting to be set equal to 1. After explaining the reason, I would get a blank stare and then a response like “so SharePoint is inefficient and is hard-coded to look for MAXDOP=1?” Knowing that I would be asked the same question again at the next SQL Saturday, in late July I sent out a tweet trying to get an answer to the question: “Will SharePoint Server 2016 require MAXDOP to be equal to 1?” The only response I received was…
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SharePoint 2016 Email Settings, Sending Encrypted Email
With the introduction of SharePoint 2016 (Preview), we now have the ability to encrypt emails sent from SharePoint using SMTP connection encryption. First of all, your SMTP server must support STARTTLS and have it enabled. It must also support the TLS 1.0, TSL 1.1, or TLS 1.2 protocol. The MSDN New and improved features in SharePoint Server 2016 page also notes that SSL 2.0 and SSL 3.0 protocols are not supported. Compared to the 2013 Outgoing E-Mail Settings page, the SharePoint 2016 Outgoing E-Mail Settings page has two new settings – Use Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) and SMTP server port. To use email encryption, select ‘Yes' in the Use Secure…
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SharePoint Server 2016 (Preview)
On August 24th, 2015, Microsoft announced the availability of SharePoint Server 2016 IT Preview with a blog post by Bill Baer, senior technical product manager for the SharePoint team. I of course started downloading the software and began the SharePoint farm build. I built a small environment to begin testing: I am using two servers running Windows Server 2012 R2 – one with the Active Directory role & SQL Server 2014 with Service Pack 1 installed & on the second server I performed a simple install using the GUI. There is plenty of coverage on the web describing the different installation options (MinRole), so i won't go into a lot…
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SharePoint Install – Cannot connect to database master
This morning I encountered an error I hadn't seen in a while, so I thought I would share the resolution with everyone (and keep a record for myself the next time it happens). When configuring SharePoint using PowerShell after the initial install, you may encounter the error shown below. [New-SPConfigurationDatabase: Cannot connect to database master at SQL server at ServerName. The database might not exist, or the current user does not have permission to connect to it.] The error is misleading, as it implies that either there is no Master database on the SQL server or the current user doesn’t have the correct permissions. I did check the user’s permissions in SQL:…
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Using the ULS Viewer to Troubleshoot PerformancePoint Dashboard Designer Errors
After recently standing up a SharePoint 2010 development farm, I opened PerformancePoint Dashboard Designer so I could start putting together a Business Intelligence site. I opened a new Data Source within Designer and entered my SharePoint site URL. When I tried to get a listing of lists available, I received the following error: [ This data source cannot be used because PerformancePoint Services is not configured correctly. Additional details have been logged for your administrator. ] Amazingly for a Microsoft application, this error was pretty helpful in leading me to find the answer. This error message is designed to be presented to an end-user, so when it mentions the details ‘have…
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Removal of PowerPoint Broadcast in SharePoint Online
If you use the PowerPoint Broadcast feature within SharePoint Online, you will soon receive an email letting you know that the service is being removed and your library will be deleted. As stated in the email, “This feature will be removed from SharePoint Online in 90 days (2 October 2012), and all data stored in the Broadcast site collection will be deleted.” You can use two other ways to broadcast presentations to others in your company: 1. Use Lync Online (if you subscribe to the service) 2. Office Broadcast Service If you have questions about the removal of the service, you can contact the product team by posting here: PowerPoint…
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Branding the RSS Feed Web Part for Office 365
If you have attempted to use the RSS Viewer web part in SharePoint Online (part of Office 365), you will notice that it doesn’t work! Rene Modery has done a wonderful job creating the RSS Feed Web Part for Office 365 and with his latest release (June 29, 2012), you should put this on your list of must-have sandboxed solutions for Office 365. If you have used it before and had issues with SSL (Plan 2), Rene has fixed those issues with this release. The web part can also be branded via CSS, and in this post I will show you how. The original posting for the web part shows…
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SharePoint 2010 Updates and 503 Error
Today I updated a SharePoint Server 2010 test virtual machine with service pack 1 (SP1; Foundation and Server) and the August 2011 cumulative updates for SharePoint Foundation and SharePoint Server. I ran the SharePoint configuration wizard after installing all the updates. When I rebooted the server (suggested when encountering the User Profile sync problem after applying the patches) and tried to open one of the team sites, I received a 503 Service Unavailable error (as shown in the picture below). Service Unavailable – HTTP Error 503. The service is unavailable. Once I got over the “what did I do??!?” moment, I of course recognized this as an IIS error, not…
