Sharepoint 2010 Where to start?

[Nemesis13]

I have been given the task of setting up and running a new sharepoint installation where i can have intranet and extranet users access it. I have 0 past training with sharepoint I'm A+, Network + certified (a box jockey) this is a rather daunting task but I'm willing to learn. My question is does anyone have any experience with Sharepoint? How did you learn it? How hard is it to learn?

 

[Chiefcrowe]

I am learning it but am not the point person for our sharepoint site.
It was pretty tough to get our custom site working properly since it wasn't an out of the box installation and we were working with a very slow company that was developing it.

I can try to answer any questions you may have. Our web front end has 2 network cards, one with an external and one with an internal IP address. One other thing i would advise is to give the backend SQL server as much power and space as you can, those things take a lot of resources!!!

I'd look at some SP books, maybe try lynda.com and definitely set up a test environment where you can mess around with it.
Your systems will be running 2008 R2 right?

I have been given the task of setting up and running a new sharepoint installation where i can have intranet and extranet users access it. I have 0 past training with sharepoint I'm A+, Network + certified (a box jockey) this is a rather daunting task but I'm willing to learn. My question is does anyone have any experience with Sharepoint? How did you learn it? How hard is it to learn?

 

[Nemesis13]

Yes 2008R2, i have to talk with a few people to get a better understanding of what they want. It seems like they just want a share space, So one person can edit a doc, then someone else can edit it and so on. If this is the case i believe Sharepoint maybe overkill.
I have ran a few test installs and played around with it, Should i do a stand alone SQL install or just the integrated SQL function. In all honesty I think we might have a max of 10 users gonna use this thing.

 

[PowerYoga]

Sharepoint is hard. Lets get that out of the way. You need some formal training, SP is not something you can just dabble in and be an administrator for unless your SP project is simple.

Depending on the size of the firm you'll have a central administration server + multiple web frontends with a sql backend to support the various databases on top of indexers to crawl the SP space.

If you just need to share documents for 10 people, you don't need sharepoint. Setup a network share and give proper permissions and be done with it. Sharepoint is more for intranet + extranet + larger scale collaborative document sharing.

 

[dougp]

Sharepoint is hard. Lets get that out of the way. You need some formal training, SP is not something you can just dabble in and be an administrator for unless your SP project is simple.

Depending on the size of the firm you'll have a central administration server + multiple web frontends with a sql backend to support the various databases on top of indexers to crawl the SP space.

If you just need to share documents for 10 people, you don't need sharepoint. Setup a network share and give proper permissions and be done with it. Sharepoint is more for intranet + extranet + larger scale collaborative document sharing.

I guess that depends how you look at it, but SharePoint isn't really that hard if you understand the purpose and scope of the project (of setting it up.)

I recommend looking at SharePoint Designer once you have your server setup - http://sharepoint.microsoft.com/en-us/product/related-technologies/pages/sharepoint-designer.aspx

Also, TechNet will be a valuable resource - http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc263202.aspx

Also, you need to make sure this is licensed correctly. If you need information on licensing SharePoint, you can send me a PM here.

 

[Chiefcrowe]

yup, sharepoint is pretty crazy! but you can probably get away with having the database on the web server if it is a really small deployment.

 

[Nemesis13]

Thanks for the words guys, like i said 10 people at the most will be using this. I kinda see it as a waste but having the opportunity to learn something new is always good. At most we will have 4 extranet users.

 

[rsutoratosu]

I use sharepoint every day but never seen the back side... i guess its never too late to start learning.. im gonna setup a svr this weekend and see how it goes...

and if you find any good supports sites, post em here.. good luck to those that are learning

 

[PowerYoga]

You might want to look into a small business server approach if you only have a handful of users. But you really need to define the project scope before going into details as Sharepoint gets ugly really fast.

 

[Edgy]

I tend to agree with dougp - sharepoint does require a bit more initial investment effort investment for setup but it is not that difficult, especially if the requirements are known and not that complex in the first place. I would say the difficulty is proportional to the level of complication of the set requirements.

But even for small projects I can see Sharepoint being a preference over patch job of a network shared file for community edit... (sharepoint can be set to record discussions like a discussion board, to record and keep full historical versions of the file(s) being edited by whom and when, full tracking of user usage, customizable security settings etc.,)

 

[wrinkefreeon3]

I would recommend subscribing to plurasight, which is a online training, very good and you'll learn a lot. they have lots of sharepoint tutorials. read as much as you can, and understand it is a learning process but it is such a great product, especially for document sharing and workflow processes.