Chapter 11: Intranet and Internet Sites

The previous chapters have covered all the details about how to install SharePoint, how to do important configuration settings, and how to create sites for your users. This chapter will focus on two specific types of web sites: a public Internet site, and an intranet portal site. Typically, the first type of site is used for exposing content to external users, such as partners, or even anonymous users on the Internet; the other type is used to publish information for internal users within an organization. Some of the information in this chapter has been discussed previously in other chapters, but here you will see how all that information is used for building these two specific types of sites. The purpose of this chapter is to give you a realistic example with a complete step- by-step description on how to set up and configure these types of sites.

This chapter also compares how to build these sites using WSS alone and using MOSS. This is both a technical issue and a financial matter: If you want to use MOSS for these types of sites, then you must purchase the appropriate type of SharePoint 2007 client access license (CAL). If you instead will use a WSS environment, there are no SharePoint CALs; instead, you must make sure to have the proper Windows Server 2003 client access license model.

Analyzing the Needs

When building a software solution you need to know two things: What is the current situation, and what is your objective? To answer that you must analyze what you have today and the needs of your users. The more time and energy you put into this analysis, the greater the chance that you will do the right thing and avoid costly mistakes. A golden rule when analyzing this is to ask the right people, check the answers, if possible, and never accept a vague answer, like "I think we have enough free disk for your new SharePoint server." If you are even the slightest bit unsure about some answers, make sure to start a thorough investigation to get the truth. This does not necessarily mean that you have to do everything yourself; it could also mean that you delegate tasks to reliable people.

Another golden rule when you start designing the SharePoint environment is KISS - Keep it simple, stupid! If you can make it with just one SharePoint server, then do so; if the intranet will work with just one SharePoint group, then use one; if one document library will be enough for storing all documents, then use one library. Every time you add more servers, more SharePoint groups and more document libraries, you also add to the complexity of the SharePoint solution. And more complexity means more time spent on administration and management, plus a more complex environment to analyze if something goes wrong. So please, remember KISS. It will make your life easier, both when implementing the solution and when managing it.

Building an Intranet Using WSS or MOSS?

The boss comes to you and tells you that the company needs an intranet, and fast! You need to get something up and running within one week, if possible without spending any money. So, your mission is to build an intranet, and you start wondering what to do next. There are some questions you should get answered before you start, like the ones in the following table.

Open table as spreadsheet

Question	People to Ask	Comment
Do you need an intranet for the whole organization?	Top management; people responsible for managing organizational wide information	For a company requiring just a basic intranet, WSS may be sufficient. But if the requirements are greater, MOSS will fill your needs much better.
Do you need a local intranet for your department or teams?	Middle management; team leaders	WSS may be a good choice if the department or team is working with the same type of information.
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.
Is searching inside SharePoint sites enough for your needs?	All types of users	This is a complementary question to the previous one; if the answer is yes, then you could fulfill this need by using WSS and its search capability.
Is there a need to share and display Excel spreadsheets and diagrams, using a web browser?	Groups working with Excel	If yes, this need requires the Excel Services in MOSS Enterprise edition.
Is there a need to present InfoPath forms, using a web browser?	General managers, HR managers, sales managers	This requires the Forms Service, which comes with MOSS Enterprise edition.
Do you need a way of presenting more information than just the email address and phone number for some or all of your users?	Middle management, team leaders, project leaders	MOSS has its My Site feature that presents much more information about users than the typical "employee list."
Is there a need to present information stored in external line- of-business systems?	General managers, HR managers, sales managers	This requires the BDC feature in MOSS Enterprise Edition.

If the answers to these questions indicate that WSS will be sufficient, then by all means go on and build the intranet using Windows SharePoint Services. It will indeed be a very good platform for sharing information within your organization. With the new search capabilities in WSS 3.0, this intranet will also offer some basic search features.

But if you need more than WSS 3.0 will provide, don't hesitate to go with MS Office SharePoint Server 2007; its list of features is remarkable and will give you the best intranet and collaboration environment that Microsoft can offer today. If you are unsure what to choose, why not use the free MOSS 2007 evaluation copy that will work for 180 days? It will give you a fair chance to see what MOSS can do for your users.

Analyzing an Intranet

The intranet as we know it has been around for more than 10 years now. But let's look at what an intranet really is; here are some common definitions:

• q An intranet is a web application for sharing information that only internal users can access.

• q An intranet is a secure web-based environment where local users can access information.

• q An intranet is a web-based solution for sharing news, links, and documents with internal users.

An elderly definition states that an intranet is a TCP/IP-based local network, but this type of definition is not what is discussed in this book. The general consensus today is that an intranet is a web site where the local users will find the information they need, much like an internal company newspaper. Now stop for a while, and think again. Is this really what your user needs? Both yes and no! Who is asking for this intranet? Everyone, you say. This is true, but when I try to ask my clients this question, I often find out that:

• q Management wants to publish information about the company and its activities.

• q The users want to find information related to their work.

One of the reasons management wants to publish information is to ease the burden on some internal groups. If the intranet contains all the news and links to all local policy standards, handbooks, and forms, then it is up to the user to find it: "How do I apply for a vacation?" "Look at the intranet!" After a while, the users do indeed learn how to find the information they need. If you have an intranet in your organization today, how many of your users have this site as the start page for their web browser? How many of the users are checking the intranet every day, or at least once per week? I don't know the exact answer in your case, but the traditional intranets I have seen provide depressing answers - maybe 20 percent, if you are lucky. How can this be? Hint: Look at what the users are using as the default start page for their browsers (usually a search site, such as Google, or a news site on the Internet - and by the way, what site are you using?) Why is this? Because it gives the user what they want - interesting information that is updated frequently! This is something you should have in mind when designing your intranet. If you don't, well, why bother to build it at all?

If the intranet contains information that the users are interested in, you don't need to force them to check the intranet. But to be fair, all types of intranets cannot be all that interesting, at least not for all users; in these cases it would be great if the user could be notified whenever there is something new and interesting. Another important piece of intranets is pictures. Compare a typical intranet to some popular news web sites; did you notice how important the pictures are to make the articles more interesting? Your intranet should learn from these news web sites. To summarize it, an intranet should contain the following things to be interesting to your users:

• q Company news that relates to the current user, with pictures when possible.

• q External news from a web site the current user are interested in.

• q Information related to the user's personal tasks and interests, such as:

• q Forms for notifying the reception desk about absences and meetings.

• q Fill-in time cards or vacation forms.

• q Today's menu at the local restaurant.

• q The weather forecast for the users' local area.

• q Information related to the users' work, such as documents, contacts, and project information.

• q Information about coworkers, such as their e-mail, phone numbers, responsibilities, and pictures.

One could argue whether or not information such as external news and weather forecasts should be listed on the intranet, but in my experience this type of information is important if you want to make this site so interesting that users may even voluntarily use it as the start page on their web browsers. In the next section, you will try to follow these rules when building an intranet using a WSS environment.

Available Web Parts

When you build intranet and Internet web sites, you must know what tools that are available, that is, what Web Parts, and what type of functionality you can use for building your solution. One of the main differences between WSS and MOSS is the Web Parts available; the list below shows these Web Parts.

Open table as spreadsheet

Default Web Parts	WSS 3.0	MOSS Enterprise
Content Editor Web Part	Yes	Yes
Form Web Part	Yes	Yes
Image Web Part	Yes	Yes
Page Viewer Web Part	Yes	Yes
Relevant Documents	Yes	Yes
Site Users	Yes	Yes
User Tasks	Yes	Yes
XML Web Part	Yes	Yes
Contact Details	No	Yes
Business Data Actions	No	Yes
Business Data Item	No	Yes
Business Data Item Builder	No	Yes
Business Data List	No	Yes
Business Data Related List	No	Yes
Excel Web Access	No	Yes
IView Web Part	No	Yes
WSRP Consumer Web Part	No	Yes
Site Aggregator	No	Yes
Key Performance Indicators	No	Yes
KPI Details	No	Yes
Content Query Web Parts	No	Yes
I need to…	No	Yes
RSS Viewer	No	Yes
Summary Link Web Part	No	Yes
Table of Contents Web Part	No	Yes
This Week in Pictures	No	Yes
Business Data Catalog Filter	No	Yes
Choice Filter	No	Yes
Current User Filter	No	Yes
Date Filter	No	Yes
Filter Actions	No	Yes
Page Field Filter	No	Yes
Query String (URL) Filter	No	Yes
SharePoint List Filter	No	Yes
SQL Server 2005 Analysis Services Filter	No	Yes
Text Filter	No	Yes
My Calendar	No	Yes
My Contacts	No	Yes
My Inbox	No	Yes
My Mail Folder	No	Yes
My Tasks	No	Yes
Advanced Search Box	No	Yes
People Search Box	No	Yes
People Search Core Results	No	Yes
Search Action Links	No	Yes
Search Best Bets	No	Yes
Search Box	No	Yes
Search Core Results	No	Yes
Search High Confidence Results	No	Yes
Search Paging	No	Yes
Search Statistics	No	Yes
Search Summary	No	Yes
Categories	No	Yes
Sites in Categories	No	Yes
Top Sites	No	Yes

It is easy to see that MOSS provides a lot more Web Parts than WSS, so building an advanced web solution, such as an intranet portal or a public Internet site, is much easier with MOSS than with WSS.