Issues and Incompatibilities

The following sections review troubleshooting issues and incompatibilities you may encounter when you use Web discussions with SharePoint Portal Server.

Storing Web Discussions

SharePoint Portal Server stores Web discussions according to URLs. SharePoint Portal Server directs you to a specific URL for a Web discussion, based on the location of the document:

• Discussions for documents that are in the workspace are in the following location:

  http://Server_Name/Public/Workspaces/Workspace_Name/System/Discussions

  Following the earlier example, the URL for a Web discussion of a document located in the workspace:

  http://Adventureworks/Public/Workspaces/Adventure/System/Discussions

• Discussions for documents that are stored outside the workspace are in the following location:

  http://Server_Name/Public/Workspaces/System/Discussions

  Following the earlier example, the URL for a Web discussion of a document stored outside the workspace:

  http://Adventureworks/Public/Workspaces/System/Discussions

  By default, discussions that are stored in this location are not searchable.

You must display hidden folders to view these folders.

Consequently, users cannot retrieve discussions for a document that is moved or renamed. When you move or rename a document, or any portion of its path, the document is disassociated from its discussion items.

Deleting Discussions

Although Web discussions are typically managed from the Management dashboard of the dashboard site, you may have difficulty deleting discussions for documents that are stored outside the workspace, those created by using the Online Collaboration toolbar accessed from Internet Explorer, and those created from Office applications for documents with high-ASCII or DBCS URLs.

To delete these discussions, an administrator must use the installable file system to access the Web storage system drive. For more information about the Web storage system drive, see Appendix B, For More Information.

Viewing Web Discussions

If you experience difficulties viewing all the associated Web discussions for a document, confirm that your users are all using the same Web discussions server. If Office users have specified a different Web discussions server than the server that is specified on the Web Discussions toolbar, more than one Web discussion about the same document can occur.

There are two steps to confirm which servers have been chosen.

• On the Web Discussions toolbar, available from the Discuss link, confirm that the correct Web discussions server is the active server.
• On the Online Collaboration toolbar available from Office applications and Internet Explorer, you can choose a Web discussions server and should confirm that you chose the same server as the one used for the Web Discussions toolbar.

For more information, see Choosing a Web Discussions Server on the Client earlier in this chapter.

Installing SharePoint Portal Server and SharePoint Team Services Together

If Microsoft SharePoint Team Services is installed on the computer on which you want to install SharePoint Portal Server, you must uninstall SharePoint Team Services before you install SharePoint Portal Server. In addition, you must delete the following registry key:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Office\9.0\Web Server

Incorrectly editing the registry may severely damage your system. Back up the current version of the registry before making any changes. You should also back up any valued data on the computer.

Installing SharePoint Team Services after you install SharePoint Portal Server changes the the way Web Discussions work in the following ways:

• Discussion items are not included in the index and are not available for search.
• You do not receive notifications for subscriptions to documents or folders in the workspace when you subscribe by using the Online Collaboration toolbar. The Online Collaboration toolbar is available from Office and Internet Explorer.
• Subscriptions made by using the Online Collaboration toolbar and all discussions are stored in SharePoint Team Services. SharePoint Portal Server does not include these subscriptions and discussions in the backup image.

Installing SharePoint Portal Server and Office XP Together

If you install Office XP on a computer running SharePoint Portal Server, the Online Collaboration toolbar does not allow you to specify a Web discussions server from Internet Explorer. This prevents you from using the Online Collaboration toolbar in Internet Explorer to add discussion items and create subscriptions from this computer.

To discuss a document from a computer running SharePoint Portal Server and Office XP, open the document with Office XP instead of with Internet Explorer. You have the option of using the active document's server or choosing a different Web discussions server as appropriate for your deployment.