Step by Step Setup - PreRequisites
Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 is now finally out in its beta2 avataar. Having been involved with this product since as early as august, the one thing that has been the bane of all the testers is how to install and configure this product properly so as to be able to jump right in. Owing to this, till today, we are still seeing installation issues pop up with every milestone release. Here lets look at what the various installation options are and how do you decide what options to choose?
For the sake of an example lets say you have a clean Windows 2003 Server at your disposal. The moment you double click that setup exe, you are going to see a nice sweet prompt telling you to install certain pre-requisites.
Obviously you need IIS installed from the additional windows features. But apart from that you also need two important components. The first of these is the .NET Framework 2.0. In most cases the correct version of the .NET Framework 2.0 would already be present on the server. How do you verify the presence of the .NET framework 2.0? Check the installed programs in the Add/Remove Programs Dialog. You should find an entry that says Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0. In the event that you do not find it, heres where you can go and get the Framework redistributable:
.NET Framework 2.0 redistributable for x86
.NET Framework 2.0 redistributable for x64
.NET Framework 2.0 redistributable for IA64
The second component is the Windows WorkFlow Foundation. Earlier this was available as a seperate download under the name WinWF. However, now it has been clubbed with the WinFX package and is available as one single installation. This particular framework is still in Beta stage since it is targeted for a release on the Microsoft Windows Vista/LongHorn platforms. You can get the correct version here: Microsoft Windows WorkFlow Foundation Runtime Components Beta 2.2
once you have installed both the above components, you need to install IIS from the Windows Server disk. Depending upon whether the .NET framework was installed later or earlier compared to IIS, you would also need to install Asp.NET extensions. To do this, open a command prompt and dir to C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727. From this location, execute the aspnet_regiis installer with the -i flag. Now open IIS using the IIS Manager, and hit the Web server Extensions tree. In the list of extensions, enable the one for ASP.NET 2.0.50727
Now you are almost set to begin the installation. There is just one consideration left - do you want to install SharePoint 2007 as a standalone (with SQLExpress) or as a farm install (which would require installing SQL Server). If you chose the farm option, you would need to install SQL Server as well. MOSS 2007 Beta2 is supported to work with both SQL Server 2000 SP3a or higher as well as with SQL Server 2005. If you chose to install MOSS as a standalone installation, then the setup would install SQL Express for you.
So go ahead and launch the setup!
