Chapter 4: Installing MS Office SharePoint Server 2007

In this chapter, you will learn how to install MS Office SharePoint Server (MOSS) with both types of available database configurations. You will also learn how to prepare for the installation and to understand the different types of system user accounts involved in this activity. After the installation is completed, you will learn how to check that everything is okay and some basic troubleshooting tips.

This chapter is organized into initial sections that explains what you are about to do and why, followed by a step-by-step description showing how to do it, and finally some more information, including any tips and tricks based on real-world scenarios.

Preparing for MOSS

In Chapter 2, you learned how to install the stand-alone version of Windows SharePoint Services (WSS 3.0). When installing MOSS you also install WSS, and the administration you learned to do in Chapter 3 is still valid. When running a MOSS environment, it is common to refer to the WSS part as the team sites, and this name is also used in this and following chapters. The procedure to install MOSS is very similar, but there are several important differences, such as the following:

• q More system user accounts to define and plan for.

• q Two more types of databases.

• q New SharePoint service roles.

• q A different type of SQL Server 2005 Express database.

The effect is that you must plan more carefully when installing MOSS compared to WSS. But you also gain many new and enhanced features, which enable you to build better solutions for sharing information among users in teams, departments, and complete organizations, and for more effective personal use.

In Chapter 2, you saw that WSS is the foundation for MOSS. It is simply impossible to install MOSS without WSS, and the setup program does it for you, so your SharePoint environment consists of one or more MOSS portal sites and any number of WSS sites. Everything you learned about WSS in the previous chapter is still valid when running MOSS and WSS together, including the option of running MOSS in a nondomain environment.

Just as with WSS, you can choose between two database types: Microsoft SQL Server 2005 Express (SQL Express), and MS SQL 2000 or 2005 Server. One thing you must learn right away is that the SQL Express version that comes with the stand-alone version of WSS is not the same as the SQL Express version that comes along with MOSS! The difference is that the WSS version of SQL Express, also known as Embedded SQL Express, is unlimited in size, while the SQL Express that comes with MOSS is limited to 4 GB of data. This is very confusing, and one can only speculate about the reason behind this decision. Maybe Microsoft thinks that if you invest in MOSS, you should also invest in the full SQL Server database engine.

MOSS Standard or Enterprise Edition?

There are two editions of MOSS: Standard, and Enterprise; they differ in functionality and price. You can upgrade from Standard Edition to Enterprise, but not the other way around. So, you'd better think twice about which edition your organization needs. Some of the most important features that are unique to MOSS compared to WSS 3.0, and the differences between the Standard and Enterprise Editions are listed in the following table.

Open table as spreadsheet

Feature/Function	Description	Standard	Enterprise
Site Manager	A module that gives the administrator a hierarchical view of the complete SharePoint environment. The administrator can create new sites, including lists and libraries, and list all documents awaiting approval, plus a lot more.	Yes	Yes
Social Networking Web Part	Used in personal sites (My Site) to show other people that you have something in common, such as being members of the same group or having the same boss.	Yes	Yes
Personal Site (My Site)	Used for two purposes: by the user as a personal web site, for personal documents, pictures, calendar, and the like, and also to display public information about the user, such as a name, a picture, a department, a phone number, shared documents, and so on.	Yes	Yes
Site Directory	A directory of all sites; makes it easier for users to find a given site.	Yes	Yes
User Profile	Stores properties about users; can import properties from Active Directory.	Yes	Yes
Audit Targeting	Allows the content author to target information to a specific group of people; for example, to show IT-related information only to computer nerds.	Yes	Yes
Portal Site Templates	Used to build portal sites, based on Publishing Pages, also known as web content management controlled web pages.	Yes	Yes
Roll-up Web Parts	Shows information stored in other locations that is related to the current user, for example tasks assigned to me.	Yes	Yes
Colleagues and Membership Web Part	Shows what memberships you and another user have in common.	Yes	Yes
Enterprise Search	Allows the user to search in over 200 file types in almost any content source, plus search for properties.	Yes	Yes
People Search	Allows the user to search for people based on properties such as names, department, company, skills, title, and more.	Yes	Yes
Business Data Search	Allows the user to search in external data sources connected to SharePoint using the Business Data Catalog, such as databases, SAP, line-of-business systems, and the like.	No	Yes
Retention and Audit Policy	Controls documents and information retention and auditing.	Yes	Yes
Policies, Audit and Compliance	Makes it possible to support compliance with SOX, ISO, HIPAA.	Yes	Yes
Slide Libraries	Allows the user to store single PPT pages individually, regardless of what PPT presentation they belong to, and then select the pages needed to create a new presentation.	Yes	Yes
Site Variations	Makes it possible to create a web site that adjusts its language for content, depending on the current user.	Yes	Yes
Brower-based Forms	Allows the user to open and use InfoPath forms in a web browser.	No	Yes
Browser-based Excel sheets	Allows the user to open and use Excel spreadsheets and diagrams in a web browser.	No	Yes
Share Excel sheets	Stores Excel spreadsheets and diagrams in SharePoint's Excel Services.	No	Yes
Data Connection Libraries	Defined connection to external data sources, that will allow MS Office 2007 applications to share and use these data sources.	No	Yes
Business Data Catalog (BDC)	Allows the user to configure connections to external data sources, then use that data in SharePoint lists and Web Parts.	No	Yes
Business Data Web Parts	Specially designed Web Parts for displaying external data retrieved by the BDC.	No	Yes
Report Center	A special web site for managing report libraries, data connection libraries, and spreadsheets, typically used for Business Intelligence.	No	Yes
Key Performance Indicators (KPI)	KPIs are used for communicate goals and status to drive results. Using the KPI Web Part, a user can create a KPI list within a Web Part page, without writing code.	No	Yes
Filter Web Parts	Used to filter information presented in other Web Parts.	No	Yes

When Do You Need MOSS?

Since WSS comes free with Windows 2003 Server and MOSS is not free, you must evaluate the needs of your users. In Chapter 2 you have a more complete list, but the following table lists some of the more common arguments for using MOSS. If you have one or more of these needs, then you must install MOSS. These questions should probably be answered by users in your organization. Make sure to explain to them why it is so important that they think hard before answering these questions.

Open table as spreadsheet

Question	People to Ask	Comment
Do you need an intranet that allows you to target information to certain groups?	Top management, people responsible for managing organization- wide information.	Only MOSS allows audience targeting of Web Parts, news items, and lists of information.
Do you need an easy and fast way to navigate a web site regardless of its location?	Subject matter experts, project leaders, power users, end users.	MOSS offers the Site Directory to meet this need. You can build similar functionality in WSS, but it requires much more work.
Do you want to be able to search for information stored both inside and outside SharePoint?	All types of users.	Only MOSS offers global search functionality.
Do you need a way of presenting more information than just the e-mail address and phone number for some or all of your users?	Middle management, team leaders, project leaders.	MOSS has its "My Site" feature, which presents much more information about users than the typical "Employee List."
Is there a need to integrate non-Microsoft applications into the SharePoint environment?	Top management, people responsible for managing organization- wide information.	MOSS has a feature called "Single Sign-On," which allows you to write code that displays information stored in other applications, such as SAP.
Is there a need to be compliant with special regulations such as SOX or HIPAA?	Top management, the legal department, information managers.	MOSS has support for compliance, policies, and auditing of documents and other types of information.
Is there a need to let users fill in forms, using a web browser?	Top management, people responsible for managing organization- wide information.	MOSS Enterprise Edition has the Forms Service, which will meet this need.
Is there a need to share Excel spreadsheets among users, without disclosing the formulas, and use these spreadsheets with a web browser?	Top management, people responsible for managing organization- wide information.	MOSS Enterprise Edition has Excel Services, which meets this need.
Is there a need to connect SharePoint to an external data source, for example an Oracle a database, or a SAP system?	Top management, sales managers, HR managers.	MOSS Enterprise Edition has the Business Data Catalog feature, which will meet this need.

The license model for MOSS is based on the MOSS edition, the number of MOSS servers and the number of MOSS users, that is, Client Access Licenses (CAL). If a user is just reading information, she still needs one MOSS CAL. The exact cost for MOSS installation depends on the type of software agreement you have with Microsoft and the number of users. If you have many users, you will pay less per user license than if you have a few users. You need to contact your license distributor to get the exact price.

MOSS allows you to choose between the free, but limited, SQL Express database and the full and unlimited MS SQL 2000 or 2005 Server. Since the SQL Express size limit of 4 GB is so low, in practice you must choose the full MS SQL Server for a production environment. Note that there does not have to be an exclusive MS SQL server for MOSS; if you have an existing MS SQL server and it has available capacity, you can use it.

Three Database Combinations

There are two types of databases and two types of locations possible. However, one of these options is not supported, so there are in total three types of configurations. The following table describes the options you have for MOSS and its database engine:

Open table as spreadsheet

SQL	Local Database Engine	Remote Database Server
SQL Express	Yes	Not supported
MS SQL 2000/2005 Server	Yes	Yes

Even though SQL Express comes free with MOSS, it is very hard to imagine this combination in a production environment, due to the 4 GB size limitation of SQL Express. Still, it may be relevant in some cases, and you will find more information about how to install it in the next section.

Single-Server Configuration with a Local SQL Express

This is an installation of both MOSS (including WSS) and SQL Express on the same computer. Microsoft sometimes refers to this configuration as a stand-alone server. The typical scenario for this kind of configuration is a pilot project or an evaluation of SharePoint. You should think twice before using this configuration in a production environment, due to the limitations of the SQL Express database.

Important 

Avoid installing SQL Express on an Active Directory domain controller, since they will conflict! Microsoft has released a fix for this: StandaloneDCWorkaround.msi . Without this fix, an error stating "The trial period for this product has expired" will be displayed.

MOSS has its own search and index module that is independent of the MS SQL database engine. Even when using the SQL Express database, you have access to the advanced search features in the portal site.

Single-Server Configuration with a Local MS SQL Server

This configuration is known as the single-server configuration and is perfect for the small- to medium-sized organization. It is also a very good solution for larger departments or subsidiaries of larger companies that need a very good intranet solution with advanced search capabilities, as well as a team collaboration platform. The cost is higher than the previous configuration, since it requires both a MOSS license and an MS SQL Server license.

Important 

You need one MOSS Client Access License (CAL) and one MS SQL Server 2000/2005 CAL for each MOSS user.

This database engine allows you to build a MOSS solution for many thousands of users, since there are no size limitations. Note that you do not need to activate the full-text search feature in MS SQL Server, since MOSS has its own search engine and does not rely on MS SQL Server for searching.

A Small Farm: MOSS with a Separate MS SQL Server

As with WSS alone, you can choose to install MOSS, including WSS, on one server and MS SQL Server 2000/2005 on another server. Microsoft calls this a small farm, just like the combination of one WSS and one MS SQL on two separate servers. The term farm simply means that you have two or more servers, regardless of the type of SharePoint installation.

Using a farm offers the following main advantages:

• q Better performance (it can support more users).

• q Capability to build clustered SQL servers (requires the Enterprise Edition of MS SQL Server).

It is possible to build MOSS solutions with more than one MOSS server for load balancing and fault tolerance. Microsoft calls such installations medium or large farms, depending on how many SharePoint servers you use. To understand how these medium and large farms work, you must learn about the different roles in MOSS, known as the front-end server roles, and what databases MOSS is using.

The Databases in MOSS

Since MOSS is more advanced than WSS, it also needs more types of databases to perform its tasks. Two of these types are the same as in a WSS environment, and the others are exclusive to MOSS installations. When installing MOSS using the Basic mode, each database name will have a suffix based on a Globally Unique Identifier (GUID) string, which is a 32-character-long string. If you install MOSS using the Advanced mode, you will be able to set these names manually:

• q Configuration database: (Used by WSS and MOSS.) Contains SharePoint configuration settings, such as front-end and back-end servers, mail servers, and portal site names. The name for this database is SharePoint_Config.

• q Content database: (Used by WSS and MOSS.) Contains the actual data, stored in the portal site and the team sites. Default name prefix: WSS_Content.

• q Shared Services database: (Used by MOSS.) Used to store information about the Shared Service provided; its default name is SharedServices1_DB.

• q Shared Services Search database: (Used by MOSS.) Stores search index and related content in the database SharedServices1Search_DB.

• q Shared Services Content: (Used by MOSS.) Stores general information for the Shared Services Provider instances in the database SharedServices_Content.

• q Administrative Content: (Used by MOSS.) Stores content related to central administration in the database file SharePoint_AdminContent.

You may create a new content database when needed, but the other types must exist in one copy only. Besides these databases, you may create one more, when installing the Single Sign-On function in MOSS. That database will be named by the administrator (for example, SSO for single sign-on).

The Front-End and Back-End Roles

MOSS has more built-in functionality than WSS. To accomplish this, MOSS is divided into four different services, known as front-end roles. These roles are:

• q Web Service

• q Search Service

• q Index Service

• q Help Search Service

• q Excel Calculation Service

• q Document Conversion Services

All these service roles can be configured to run on one single MOSS server or separated into several servers. Besides these front-end service roles, there is also the back-end server, which simply means the server that runs the SQL database engine. This can actually be the same physical server as the front-end server; if so, you have a single-server configuration.

By dividing the MOSS functionality into different roles, you can build solutions that match your requirements. For example, small and medium organizations with up to 10,000 users may be satisfied with a small farm consisting of one front-end server running all MOSS roles and one back-end server running MS SQL. Another organization may require fault tolerance and build a solution with multiple front-end servers running the Web and Search service, one more front-end server running the Index, Excel and Conversion services, plus a clustered SQL-environment as the back-end server.

In previous versions of SharePoint, only a limited number of configurations were supported, usually referred to as small, medium and large farms. This is no longer the case in SharePoint 2007, so you have the freedom now to configure whatever combination of front-end and back-end servers you wish to for your SharePoint environment.

The Web Service Role

This front-end role actually runs on both MOSS and stand-alone WSS installations. It is responsible for answering any request from users who connect to the SharePoint server. In other words, this role shows the user the web site pages and content. This Web role will constantly read and write to and from the back-end server to do whatever the user requests.

The basic action in any web application is very simple: A web client requests a web page by entering a URL address or clicking a link. This is known as a GET request and results in a connection to the web server, asking the web server to find the requested page and send it back using the HTML format. After that, the session between the client and the server is disconnected. When the user clicks another link, a new connection is established. After the new page is sent back to the client, the session is disconnected again. There is nothing that requires that the exact same web server be used for all the connected sessions from a web client. If you have another web server with access to the same information, it may answer the next connection from this web client. This is known as a stateless connection.

SharePoint's Web role uses stateless connections. If you install the Web role on several servers, it is possible to divide the client load among them. But you need to solve two problems first. One is to make sure all that web servers have access to the same information. This is done by using a common back-end database for all of them. The second thing is that all of these web servers must look like one single SharePoint server; otherwise, the web clients must select a particular web server to communicate with. By using the Windows Server 2003 Network Load Balancing (NLB) service, you will resolve the second issue. The NLB service is a feature in Windows Server 2003 that allows up to 32 physical web servers to share a virtual server name; to the client all these servers will look like one. This is known as a web farm (or a web cluster). However, SharePoint only supports up to eight servers running the Web service role.

To summarize: Use the NLB service when you need to create a web farm with two or more SharePoint servers running the Web role. It will automatically direct a new client session to the Web role that is available with the least load. If a Web role server goes down, clients will be directed to another Web role server. The result is both load balancing and fault tolerance.

The Search Service Role

This SharePoint role exists only for MOSS installations; WSS alone does not have this. This role is also referred to as the "Search Query" role. The responsibility of this role is to answer to search queries entered by the client. For example, when a user searches for the phrase "Viking," this happens:

1. The user enters the phrase in the search field in MOSS.

2. This request is received by the Web service.

3. The Web service sends the request to the Search service.

4. The Search service looks for this phrase in its indexing files.

5. The result (no match or a list of matching documents, files, and pages) is returned in Extensible Markup Language (XML) format to the Web service.

6. The Web service converts the result to HTML and sends this information back to the client.

This raises several questions: What are index files, where do they come from, and where are they stored? The answers are: An index file is a type of list that consists of thousands of words, with a pointer to all the content sources, that is, files, documents, list items, and pages, where these words will be found.

These index files are created by the Index service and replicated to each server running the Search service. These index file are stored locally on the server running the Search service, by default in the folder C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office Servers\12.0\Data\Office Server\Applications. By default, there is one single index, regardless of the content source.

Important 

Use the command stsadm –o editssp to change the location of the index files.

You can install more than one MOSS server running the Search service. Since this service is using local index files, it is not dependent on other servers or roles to do its job. It is possible to combine the Search service with other services, such as the Web and Index service. This makes it possible to use the Search role on the same server that is running the Web role, even in web farm scenarios, as long as each Search role server has identical copies of the index files. That would result in load balancing and fault tolerance for the search feature in MOSS.

Important 

To configure more than one search server in your farm, you cannot configure your index server as a search server.

The Index Service Role

This SharePoint service is also exclusive to MOSS installations. The Index service is responsible for building the index files by crawling through content sources. The actual crawling process is not performed by the Index server, but one or more of the front-end web servers.The SharePoint administrator configures what content sources this service will index, and how often. The index files created by the crawling process are automatically copied by the Index service to all search servers, in case you have a configuration with a separate index and search servers. You can configure this role to index the following content sources:

• q Any file server in your network.

• q Your MS Exchange server (including public folders).

• q Any Lotus Notes database.

• q Any other web application internally.

• q Any external web site on the Internet.

• q External data sources, using the Business Data Catalog.

For example, you can configure the Index service to scan and index all files and documents on your file server, all public folders in your MS Exchange server, your partner's public web sites, and your Oracle database. When the users later search for information, they will find it, as long as it is stored in any of these content sources, including any part of the SharePoint database.

The Index service is very resource-intensive in terms of CPU and disk access. Separating this service from the Web and Search services will allow you to support many more users in the SharePoint environment. The indexing activity can be split among several SharePoint servers. There is no fault tolerance built into this role, so if one index server or the front-end web server that does the actual crawling goes down, no other will take over the indexing crawling that server is configured to do. You can load balance by dividing the content sources to be indexed among the index servers.

Important 

Only one index server can crawl a given content source.

The WSS Help Search Service Role

This help Search service is available for both WSS and MOSS installations; its responsibility is to index SharePoint's help files and thus make them searchable. Note that this service will not index the user content of a WSS server, only the help content!

The Excel Calculation Service Role

This is only available for MOSS Enterprise installations. This is classified as an application service in SharePoint, and its purpose is to enable users to access MS Excel spreadsheets from within SharePoint sites; these spreadsheets may be stored in document libraries, or outside SharePoint. This service can be installed on multiple SharePoint servers, to achieve fault tolerance and load balancing.

The Document Conversion Service Role

This is another application service in SharePoint. Its purpose is to make it possible to convert documents from one format to another, for example from InfoPath forms to HTML, or a MS Word .doc file to HTML.

Medium and Large Farms

Previously in this chapter, you learned that a configuration with one MOSS server and one MS SQL server is referred to as a small farm and is designed to support up to 10,000 users. If you need to support more users or to ensure high availability, you need to build configurations with more than one MOSS server and maybe even more MS SQL servers.

The first option is to build a medium farm, which will support up to 50,000 users, depending on the configuration. Starting with SharePoint 2007, you can design any combination of SharePoint servers, for example:

• q A typical medium farm configuration with three SharePoint servers:

  • q Two MOSS front-end servers with both the Web and the Search role.

  • q One MOSS front-end server with both the index and all application services.

  • q One or more MS SQL back-end servers.

• q A medium farm in a clustered environment:

  • q A Windows 2003 cluster with two nodes, running active/passive mode. Each node runs the MOSS front-end Web and Search roles, plus the back-end MS SQL Server.

  • q One MOSS front-end server with both the index and all application services.

You can also build a large farm configuration that can support more than a million users, depending on the exact configuration and the hardware settings for the servers, for example:

• q Two to eight servers running MOSS assigned the Web role.

• q Two to four servers running MOSS assigned the Search role.

• q One to four servers running MOSS assigned the Index role, plus all application services.

• q Two or more servers running as a clustered MS SQL server.

Hardware Requirements

MOSS is similar to WSS when it comes to hardware requirements, although the memory requirements for a MOSS server are higher, due to the extra features available, such as the search functionality, Excel Services, and the Business Data Catalog. As long as there is at least 2 GB of memory, the speed and the number of CPUs will affect performance most. Just as with WSS, if you want to set up a demo environment or do a simple pilot installation, you will get far with 1 GB of memory and a single-CPU server. But be careful - there has been more than one pilot installation that suddenly came to be regarded as a production environment. If you suspect that this could happen to you, I recommend installing the pilot project on a server that meets the requirements for the production environment or is easy to upgrade with more CPUs and memory.

Important things to keep in mind when planning the production environment include the following:

• q SharePoint is a web application! There is no permanent connection between the client browser and the SharePoint server. Every time a user opens a link or a document, the browser connects, gets what the user requested, and closes the connection immediately after that, regardless of how long the user looks at that information. The result is that users who are not actively using MOSS are not consuming resources on the server. Make sure that this connection is fast enough to handle all simultaneously connected users.

• q The number of users in the organization is not the same as the number of simultaneous users. Typically, less than 10 percent of the total number of users are requesting information in SharePoint at any given time.

• q Different activities in SharePoint require different resources; for example, displaying a project site normally generates a very light load on the server, while indexing the database generates a much higher load. Make sure to schedule CPU-intensive tasks, such as indexing off-hours.

Calculating the Number of NOPS Required

You may recall the exact figures for calculating the normalized operations per second (NOPS) from Chapter 2, but here is the formula again for calculating the load on the SharePoint portal server. The term "normalized" means that the formula takes into account a number of variables, listed below. This information is used for estimating the number of supported users, given a hardware configuration:

Given the following estimated data that you must supply:

• q A = The number of users

• q B = The percentage of active users in a typical day

• q C = The number of operations per active user per day (1–10, typically 8)

• q D = Peak factor (1–10, typically 5)

• q E = The number of working hours per day

For more details about these parameters, see Chapter 2.

Example: An Organization with 15,000 Normal Users

Your organization has 15,000 employees (A). The percentage of active users in a typical day is 50 (B). The number of operations per active user is 7 (C). The number of working hours for the organization as a whole is 12 hours (E). You estimate the peak factor (D) to 10. The formula for this organization will look like this:

Now you have a good idea of the load your system will generate. The next step is to use this information to calculate the hardware you need. In this table are some typical configurations and the estimated number of normalized operations per second they support.

Open table as spreadsheet

Server Configuration	Estimated NOPS Supported
Small farm: One MOSS server and one SQL server, both configured with 2 GB memory and a dual 2.8 GHz CPU	65 NOPS
Small farm: One MOSS server and one SQL server, both configured with 2 GB memory and a dual 3.06 GHz CPU	105 NOPS
Medium farm: Two web and search servers, one index and job plus 1 MS SQL server with 2 GB memory and 2 × 3.06 CPU	110 NOPS

As you can see from the preceding table, for a typical organization there is no need to install anything other than a small farm, if only the performance is important! Notice that increasing the CPU speed makes a dramatic improvement of the number of NOPS supported.

Calculating the Disk Space Needed

When planning for the required disk space, you do not have to worry about the MOSS binary files, since they are small compared to other files. More important are the index and database files. Remember that with MOSS you get the free SQL Express database that is limited to 4 GB in size. Very few MOSS installations have less data than this limit, so you will normally end up using MS SQL Server. Regardless of the database type, you still need to follow this important rule:

Important 

You must always have at least 50 percent free space on your database disk!

The reason for this is that some database troubleshooting utilities need to make a copy of the database to perform their tasks. If you don't have the required space, you may get into a situation where you cannot fix a problem.

There is no difference between MOSS and WSS when it comes to estimating the required volume of data for your SharePoint environment. The documents, files, and pictures are responsible for more than 90 percent of the total database volume. To estimate the disk space needed for your database, start by estimating the number of files it will contain. For example, assume that you estimate it will contain about 100,000 files and documents, with an average of 400 KB; in total this will require 40 GB. Add to that 10 GB for the other types of information you will store, and you get 50 GB in total. Following the rule, you must have at least a 100 GB disk for the database files alone.

Important 

The new XML-based file format used in MS Office 2007 will reduce the file sizes to 50 percent, or less, compared to previous file formats. This is just one important reason to use MS Office 2007 in your organization, and there are many more.

Software Requirements

Since MOSS is a web application, it requires Internet Information Services 6.0 (IIS 6), running on MS Windows 2003 Server. MOSS also requires that ASP.NET and its supporting components be installed. The easiest way to get this configuration right for a SharePoint server is to follow the steps in this Try It Out.

Try It Out Prepare Windows 2003 for MOSS 2003

1. Log on to your Windows 2003 server as the administrator.

2. Click Start Control Panel.

3. Click on the button Add/Remove Windows Component.

4. Select the Application Server and click on Details.

5. Make sure that everything is cleared, including the Internet Information Service (IIS).

6. Set the ASP.NET check box, and it will automatically check all the components it needs, which happens to be the exact components needed by MOSS.

7. Click OK to save this configuration.

8. The next step is to install the .NET Framework 3.0 package, which will install ASP.NET 2.0 and Windows Workflow Foundation on this server:

   1. Go to http://www.microsoft.com/downloads and enter dotnetfx3setup.exe in the search field.

   2. Among the resulting files, click on Microsoft .NET Framework 3.0 Redistributable Package to open its download page.

   3. Before you download this file, make sure to select the language of your Windows 2003 Server; by default it will be English.

   4. You can now click Download to start the downloading of a "bootstrap file," that is, a small file that will start the downloading of the actual package, or you can scroll down this page and click either X86 Redist Package (32-bits Windows Server; 50 MB) or X64 Redist Package (64-bits Windows Server; 90 MB) to download the full setup file.

   5. When downloaded, run this file to install the .NET Framework 3.0; select the option I have read and ACCEPT the terms of the License Agreement (if you do), and click Install. This will start the setup, which will take several minutes to complete, depending on your hardware. When it is done, you will get a message stating that the setup has completed successfully.

You may use any edition of Windows 2003 Server for a MOSS installation. However, the Windows 2003 Server Web Edition does not allow a local database installation; in that case, you must use a remote MS SQL server.

The IIS Virtual Server

In Chapter 2, you got the background on the development of Internet Information Server (IIS), its virtual web servers, and their application pools, but here is a quick recap:

• q A web application is a virtual IIS web server that has been extended by SharePoint's Central Administration tool.

• q Each virtual IIS web server is running within an application pool, which will control the memory, system resources, and user identity used by its virtual IIS web server, and its site collection.

• q A site collection is created whenever a new top site is created; you can then create any number of nested subsites under this top site. Site collections are used to host SharePoint-based web sites, for example an intranet, with its subsites, or a public Internet site. Another example of a site collection is the SharePoint Central Administration tool.

• q Every site collection must be stored within a web application.

• q One web application can be used by multiple site collections.

In other words, when you need to create a new top site in SharePoint, you create a site collection; this site collection must be stored within a web application. To create a web application, you will extend an existing virtual IIS server. All of this is done using the Central Administration tool.

MS Office SharePoint Server has the same requirements as WSS in this respect. But where WSS started with two web applications (extended virtual IIS web servers), MOSS will create up to five different web applications during its installation, as you will see in the list below. Each of these web applications will be using a virtual IIS server with its application pool. All of this will be created during the installation and initial configuration of MOSS:

• q The user web site: By default will create a new virtual IIS server named SharePoint - 80 and an application pool with the same name.

• q The administrative site: By default uses the SharePoint Central Administration v3 site and an application pool with the same name.

Each web application can host multiple site collections, but only the top site in each site collection can be used for a portal site or public Internet site. An alternative is to create a separate web application for each portal site or Internet site. IIS supports up to nine virtual IIS servers with individual application pools. Since the administrative web sites share some virtual IIS servers as well as application pools, this server can have up to five portal sites with individual application pools. You can also use one single application pool that is shared with up to 99 virtual IIS servers.

When installing MOSS you will be able to create and select the web applications for the administrative site collections. The next step is then to create a web application for the site collection to be used by the user web site, typically the intranet site. You need to be sure about these two things regarding the user web site:

• q Which web application will be used by the user site collection? Be sure to use one that is using a virtual IIS web site with TCP port 80, to make it easy for users to open this site collection.

• q What user account will be used as the security account for this application pool?

Each application pool uses a setting called Security Account, which defines the security context for the application pool and its web sites. This can either be a built-in account (typically the Network Service) or a standard user account. Make sure that the selected account is granted the permission Database Creators and the Security Administrators in MS SQL Server. If you select a Basic MOSS installation, this is done for you automatically.

Important 

Use a separate service account for the application pool used by the Central Administration web application.

The application pool security account is just one of many examples of service accounts (i.e., user accounts used for specific services). In general, you should avoid creating a lot of service accounts, since the more you have, the harder they are to manage. Because the same service account can be used by several application pools, you should create a separate user account, for example SP_Service, and use it as the security account for multiple application pools used by SharePoint's site collections.

Important 

When using a separate MS SQL Server, select a domain user account as the application pool security account, since it is easier to grant it MS SQL roles.

The remaining application pools can usually share the same service account, unless you have very specific security requirements.

Service Accounts Used by MOSS

MOSS is more advanced than WSS and therefore needs more service accounts. Depending on how complex your SharePoint installation is, you might need more or fewer service accounts. You should create these accounts before starting the installation, but remember that you can use the same user account for more than one service if you want to keep the number of service accounts to a minimum.

Important 

Avoid using the standard Administrator account as a service account, since you need to update each MOSS service every time you change the password.

During the installation of MOSS, you need two or more of the following service accounts, depending on the type of SharePoint configuration. For example, the single-server MOSS installation with an SQL Express database only requires the Default Content Access Account to create the portal; the rest are preconfigured but may be changed later. Some of these service accounts are requested when you activate special features later, even for a single-server installation of MOSS. Use the following table as a reference for some of these service accounts in a MOSS installation and configuration.

Open table as spreadsheet

Service Account	Description	Recommendations
Application Pool Security Account	This account defines the security context for the web server connected to the application pool. It is also used when MOSS communicates with the database server. It must be a member of the Security Administrator and Database Creators role in MS SQL Server.	For single-server installations, use the Network Service account. For MOSS farms, use a domain user account for these application pools, such as sp_appservice.
Default Content Access Account	This account is used when the Index role crawls locations outside SharePoint's databases. This account must have Read access in these locations to do its job, but you can configure SharePoint to use a special user account for given locations.	Use an account with Read access to most of the locations that will be indexed; for example, sp_CA_account.
Configuration Database Account	This account is used by MOSS when communicating with the configuration database. You can use a local account or a domain account. It must be a member of the local server's Power User group or the local Administrators group.	This account will only be requested when using a full version of MS SQL Server. In most installations, it is okay to use the same account that is used for the Application Pool security account.

Minimum and Recommended Configurations

The following table provides a summary of the previous hardware and software requirement sections; it lists Microsoft's minimum and recommended configurations. Remember that for a pilot installation you can actually get away with even less than the given minimum memory size listed in the following table.

Open table as spreadsheet

Item	Minimum Requirement	MS Recommends
Operating System	Any edition of Microsoft Windows Server 2003	Any edition of Microsoft Windows Server 2003
CPU	1 CPU running at 2.5 GHz	2 CPUs running at least 3 GHz
RAM	1 GB	2 GB
Disk space	3 GB	3 GB plus free space for the web sites
File System	NTFS	NTFS
IIS version	6.0 with ASP.NET (in Worker Process Isolation Mode)	6.0 with ASP.NET (in Worker Process Isolation Mode)
Database engine	SQL Express	A separate SQL 2000 server with SP3, or SQL Server 2005 and its latest service pack
Internet Browser	IE 5.01 with SP2 or later	IE 6 with the latest service pack, or later IE versions