Big SharePoint Announcement got my ISV partners all excited!
Microsoft is posting on MSDN the preliminary versions of a significant portion of the remaining technical documentation for protocols promised as part of the interoperability principles. Specifically, this includes approximately 10,000 pages of technical specifications for:
· Protocols between Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 and Office client applications;
· Protocols between Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 and other Microsoft server products;
· Protocols between Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 and Microsoft Office Outlook;
· Protocols between Microsoft Office 2007 client applications and other Microsoft server products.
As a result of the posting, all types of developers - including independent software vendors (ISVs), open source developers, and developers in customer IT departments - will have consistent, open access to this protocol documentation that defines how these Microsoft products communicate with other Microsoft products. This consistent, open access to information will promote more interoperability options for developers of all types and will help foster improved real-world interoperability solutions in the marketplace.
In fact this got me so excited that I went to MSDN to find out where are these protocol documentation. I didn't see it in the Headlines for Developers section, where could it be? Hmmm.. I was almost skeptical that it's been released until I clicked on Library, and there's a new entry on the MSDN Library on the left navigation tree; Open Protocol Specification. Drum rolls..... The SharePoint Products and Technologies Protocols are right there.
Woo hoo! Just the kind of stuffs that my ISVs are expecting. In fact this came at the right time. About a month ago, a few "technologist" at a few ISVs decided to group together and form a SharePoint User Group. Initially some of them started abbreviating the name as SUG. I immediately replied to them saying that the name almost sucks. I proposed "SPUG", and hey it rhymes with SPARK. MOSS is where great ideas are sparked. Cool. In fact I often joked with an ISV of mine, MyBiz, that "May the MOSS be with you". In fact we can totally find a lot of analogies in Star Wars, but I reckon I should just leave all those comments undocumented. :p
The Malaysian SPUG does not yet have a website of its own. Eventually it shall have its home at techNation, and they shall be the first group to spearhead an effort to have a community site on MOSS 2007. Meanwhile I'm hosting the SPUG members in an Office Live Workspace of mine, and here's a screen clipping of it:
SPUG had a group created in FaceBook and here it is, http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=12021714387. It was started by Patrick Yong, who is an Office Business Application (OBA) Specialist in my team. If you want to read more about some OBA patterns and SharePoint tips and tricks, his blog is the place to go.
In a later blog post, I will write about how Office Live Workspace is just the right place to start collaborating on a project like starting your own user group. You want to create a distribution group in Outlook 2007, and have the contacts synchronized with your Office Live Workspace, no sweat. Consider it done.
