SharePoint Portal Server provides robust dashboard functionality out of the box. In addition, the SharePoint Portal Server dashboard site can be customized to include a variety of existing or custom Web Parts. For example, Outlook can be integrated with the SharePoint Portal Server dashboard to provided integrated email functionality according to the way your end users need to work. Additional Web Parts such as stock tickers, traffic maps, custom reporting, and query results can be integrated into the dashboard to provide value to the end user . These custom Web Parts can be added and linked together without having to purchase or maintain a full custom Web site application. SharePoint Portal Server allows further customization to allow Web Parts such as document folder views, news details, subscription notifications, and even the search box to be registered with several digital dashboard sites, and many of the capabilities within SharePoint Portal Server are scriptable using Microsoft Active Data Objects (ADO) and OLE DB, SQL full-text search queries, or Collaborative Data Objects (CDO) extensions. An example of this type of customization may be a personal dashboard that includes a custom Web Part for an Internet search engine such as Alta Vista, integrated with CNN news. An Integrated Solution The real value of SharePoint Portal Server is realized when several of the key features ”like the search engine and document management ”are closely integrated with your organization's categorization taxonomy and other custom Web Parts to provide a solution-based business application. The following section provides a couple sample solution scenarios that further describe the potential of SharePoint Portal Server. |