Monthly Archives: November 2008

The Business Benefits of an Agile Approach

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Read my recent article for iWeek magazine on the topic of agile development and some of the business benefits it can provide.

From the article:

“Agile methods enable software development teams to deliver the highest possible business value in the shortest amount of time, while being able to adapt to changes in requirements during development. This is a huge leap forward in terms of value for money, in an industry where late delivery, inflexible requirements, cost overruns, and quality issues are all too common.

So what are some of the business benefits of an agile approach?”

Configuring Forms Based Authentication on MOSS 2007

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Configuring FBA on MOSS 2007 is fairly straight forward, but if you do not pay attention to each step, you could be in a world of pain.  I found the configuration pretty simple and the value it gives the organisation immense.

I did however run into one small issue on my initial testing server.  The famous “Uknown Error”.  This error occurred as I tried to authenticate my user.  Turns out I had forgotten to give the application pool identity rights to the custom database created for my FBA user store.  Once allocated all worked like a charm.

I couldn’t find anything on the net about this so either everyone started from scratch when they saw this error or simply haven’t run into it.  In any event, hope this helps!

//11 November 2009//

Found this really good post on step by step configuration of FBA.  Just thought I’d add it – http://www.simple-talk.com/dotnet/windows-forms/configuring-forms-authentication-in-sharepoint-2007/

SharePoint Language Packs and Windows Server 2008

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We are currently busy with a pilot roll out in Europe and while deploying the farm with various updates I came across the fact that not a lot of information on Windows Server 2008 and Language Packs are available.  In any event, I soldiered on and eventually got it to work thanks to lots of trial and error and a colleague from home.

Now most if not all websites I consulted prior to installing the language packs simply mention that you need to install the MOSS Language Packs if you are running SharePoint and there is no need for the WSS Language Packs.  Well, thanks to a colleague that figured this out the hard way, we installed the WSS language packs after the MOSS language packs (yes I frowned as well) and badaboomtish, the language features started working.

I find it very odd that this isn’t well documented on the net, but ja, here is the installation path I took to get our server farm up and running language packs, infrastructure updates included:

- Scripted MOSS Installation (Not slipestreamed as I’ve read about some issues with it)
- WSS and SPS SP1
- Infrastructure Update (read more here)
- All necessary updates (August Cumulative et al, read more here)
- WSS / MOSS Language Packs (order does not matter)
- Language Pack Service Packs

Note:  If you are busy with a particular update, complete that on all the servers in the farm before moving to the next.  For example, don’t install WSS language packs and move onto the MOSS language packs without installing them on all and executing the configuration wizard.

Pay special attention to each step and if the wizard fails to update (Configuration Failed) there is a 99% chance that your server is not on the same patch level (one or two behind) as the other servers.  Trust me, spending an extra hour on a large farm will save you days in the long run. 

I’ve seen posts where people are asked to add missing files to 12 hive directories and dll’s to the bin directory and honestly, if it gets to that, it’s time to re roll.

If I come across any other funky workarounds I will be sure to update this post.

Happy Deploying.