Home Forums Discussions General Discussion Sushi, SharePoint and Snail Mail

OK, so for some reason, I can't find the thread I wanted to comment on, so I am starting a new one. While my title is witty and inviting, it is also meant to give Jon and John obvious fodder for poking fun at me as only they can do.

The thread was on SBS 2008 and SBS 2011 Standard and Essentials. I was with Sandeeep on using 2011 Standard even though I am on SBS 2008 Standard.

Wendell, who I find very intelligent on these subjects predicted I would disagree, and I do, so we will agree to disagree.

First, a domain is a group of accounts and network resources sharing a common database known as Active Directory and Security Policies. As such, it can use single sign-on allow clients to authenticate against the server and access certain services based on their account. The admin can do everything from the server including making users, mailboxes, permissions, etc.

A workgroup is a network of computers that does not use a single server and may require users to use multiple passwords to access certain resources. One could argue that given they are usually connected to a switch and the main computer is also connected to the switch that the main computer is the central computer.

In order to have a client/server domain, there must be a domain controller usually on the server. It so happens that with SBS, you can only have one domain controller on a network.

While one only needs a P2P workgroup to run AC basically as effectively as a client/server configuration, having a domain network does give multiple, multiple advantages, but it is necessary only if you want those advantages. Certainly, it takes a certain level of expertise for a client/server network compared with a P2P, but again, please let me state that a P2P is all that is necessary for AC.

I may be missing something but I do not see WHERE AMAZING CHARTS FINDS AC SHOULD NOT RUN ON A DOMAIN CONTROLLER. Please correct me if I am wrong.

EMAIL: Maybe Wendell is leaving some explanation out of his logic, but I find there are three levels of communication with AC, all of which having distinct advantages. We use, and I think many use some type of messenger system to allow instant communication across the network such as telling the physician Dr. So and So is on the phone. Using email or AC does not facilitate that communication as well. Most messages that are not speed-critical but are patient dependent work best with AC. Finally, email is simply email. I can't imagine not having email in any type of busiess.

While you can use any ISP with SMTP and POP3 for email and even combine these with a domain name, the advantages of using an Exchange Server are too many to mention. As Sandeep says, your email resides on your server and not on Roadrunner's or Yahoo. You can control your MX records and AREC (to point incoming email directly to your Exchange without even passing through an ISP. You can send email through your intranet without its going over the Internet. You can set up Journal Mail to copy EVERY email coming and going and even coming and going over your network. If this is not HIPAA required now, it will be. I have EVERY email copied from the day I opened. There are many, many other things you can do. When you look at the perceived complication of MX records and AREC, etc. (used also in regular ISP POP3 email), this can be set up in an hour by an IT specialist. Not one that is good at X-Box, but one that is good with Exchange.

Finally, SharePoint. This is where the Sushi analogy comes in. Microsoft considers SharePoint to be the most under utilized, highly rated product in their arsenal. I could sit here until I am blue in the face, but I can't even do justice to how helpful SharePoint is. Sure, I could say that one can put a website address on it for everyone, but you will just say we use favorites. I could say that you can put every file and folder on it so everyone can access it, but you will just say we share them from the server. So, I won't even attempt to explain why putting them on SharePoint is advantageous. Plus, SharePoint can do many other things including being the company website (not externally but on the intranet.

It is rather cool to be able to click on the companyweb (SharePoint) from home an instantly have that website appear at home with all the information you have in your office. This is much more secure than allowing users direct access to the user.

I also left out one of the neatest things with Exchange. Sure, you can use many techniques to get to Outlook Web Access or Outlook Anywhere, but to be able to use Outlook via HPPT/RPC and actually have Outlook at home which is identical to the Outlook on your desktop. In other words it is directly accessing Exchange Server. There are times that email sent to my server hits my Outlook at home before it does on my desktop. This is not sync. This is an actual Outlook connection to your Exchange Server.

Please understand that Exchange Server on your network server is somewhat akin to your ISP server that holds your email, but you have to access it so often.

Now the sushi part. It seems that most of us have acquired a taste for certain foods from so young that we can't even recall when we liked them or when we didn't. Sushi is almost the only example of a food that many don't necessarily like or dislike. They just haven't tried it. Many just assume they won't like it. SharePoint is like Sushi. You won't know how good it is until you've tried it. Or, like some, you won't like it.

I will say that SharePoint was down for a few days due to my ineptitude, and my staff nearly quit.

I felt artistic after reading Bert's title, so I decided to summarize his post in a haiku:

"Digital Sushi"

work group is plain rice,
says the northern guru of networks;
SharePoint is Dragon Roll

And, I knew I could count on John for the comedic touch. Now, I just await Jon's more biting sarcasm, lol.

The problem with servers is that it increased the level of IT skill needed for AC to be functional.

While I do not disagree that there there many advantages of a server system, simplicity has it's advantages.

Master Bert has said "taste the sushi and you will understand." I accept his wisdom implicitly. He has even outlined my arguments for how you can get around Sharepoint. Having not used it, for now I remain a lowly peasant.

Often what you are accustomed to using is how you want it set. Your staff was ready to bolt because Sharepoint was the way they are comfortable with doing things.

Master states Sharepoint is best
Using Exchange can be a total epiphany
Simplicity is inferior

Agreed.

Hiaku skills are a little rusty here....

Sharepoint's over my head.
Biting sushi, not sarcasm.
Snailmail, that's my speed.

As Jon so poetically point out: "Sharepoint's over my head."
So guys, can you lower the food trough down to ground level where I can reach it?
As a family doc with two staff members using AC P2P is there really any good reason for complicating our working hours? I don't for a second doubt your wisdom in such matters, but what is it exactly, Bert, that your staff does with Sharepoint that they love so much??

'Tis the gift to be simple,
'tis the gift to be P2P,
'tis the gift to come down
where we ought to be.

(Just kidding!)

John, (that's Boston John),
To paraphrase one description of Sharepoint (it might have been Bert's):
You can't understand how Sharepoint will help you until you actually use it.

So first you must get it, then learn how to use it, and only then will you understand what it does and why you need it.
There seems to be a sizable leap of faith for us P2P types.

Well, we have a Haiku group that meets every Friday at the Ichiban.

That gets misunderstood some times. I am certainly not advocating purchasing software that you knowing nothing about just so you will learn about it to see if you like it. This is only pointed at those who already have SBS and don't use it.

BTW, it doesn't work in a non-domain environment.

These are all of our documents, somewhere about 75, all alphabetized and shared with whatever permissions necessary. There are too many benefits to mention. Accessible by everyone at their computer.



These are the forms. All of these including Documents can be instantly emailed, put into spreadsheets, imported to Outlook and checked in and checked out with versioning.



An open folder in forms showing the wcc for documents in Word. These are versioned. Open to edit, then print to pdf in another folder.



We then have Contacts. Currently we have over 475. A click of a category brings up all Wal-Mart pharmacies or a click of Ortho, brings up all ortho consultants. These can be instantly exported to Outlook or Excel. When you enter the contact, you can enter as many search words as you wish to aid in searches. Each contact can be printed in a very nice format to give to the patient. Notice the fixer-upper-guy which all practices should have.



The home page with calendar events and website links for everyone's access. Links to custom user websites (only two). The central part can contain anything you wish such as files and folders that are considered very important.



Vacation requests which automatically generate an email to the admin for approval.



Vacation request for admin approval.



Approved vacation entered into calendar. We have a large calendar on the wall so vacations can be seen easily, but this calendar entry is the final say in who received their vacation request first.



Demonstration of all items in Forms or Documents or whatever folder imported into Outlook.



Userboard for internal discussions:

Announcements. All announcements are front and center and notify all users via Outlook. Why not just send via Outlook? Because all announcements are archived.



Picture of what a user sees when he or she opens their announcement email. When they view announcement, an email is sent to the admin or owner letting him or her know that the user has at least viewed the announcement.



View of archived announcements. We have 272 archived announcements including updated policies.

Another thing about the Server/Client setup: SBS Essentials 2011 is great piece of software too. (If you don't need Exchange or SharePoint).
The level of complexity involved is minimal. If you still think it's difficult, I've made a video series of setting up SBS Essentials from Scratch (even if you built your own server). It's in my signature below. For those people who are saying, "If it's so simple, why did you need to make a tutorial?"
1. Trying to prepare you for any surprises.
2. You're setting up a ton of stuff with SBS Essentials. Backups, Remote Web Access, Folder and Printer Sharing, AC. I'm no mathematician, but I'd imagine setting up a backup for one server by hitting next on a few wizards is a lot less time consuming than setting up 5 computers for backup with Windows 7. (Not to mention more cost effective than buying 5 external hard drives for backups.) The same holds true for folder shares and remote desktop. Only having to setup one computer does save a lot of time...
3. Come on, #2 wasn't enough?

Bert,
Your post demonstrating your use of Sharepoint was informative. I thought I would show you how we deal with some of the same issues in our simple, P2P world.
On our server is a folder we call "Shared Office Resources" (SOR). It is shared and each office computer has a desktop link to the folder. The SOR folder contains, among other things:
Documents (which can be shared, emailed, etc. Especially easily with Updox)
Forms
Credentialing files (no more finding, scanning, faxing the licenses, malpractice coversheets, etc)
Google office calendar for staff vacations, etc
Instructional files (equipment manuals, how-to info for AC, Updox, etc)
Medication assistance file (forms and info about patient assistance programs from drug companies; Walmart cheap drug list)
Contact lists

This was not meant to be exhaustive; I am showing the list simply to make the point that it is really useful to have a central repository of information that all can easily access...and that you can do much of what you describe (albeit less elegantly and with fewer options) with the simplest of software.

Agreed and well put. (as always)

And, JBS, the same thing can be accomplished using Paperport, the cheapest of all software... FREE!!!

OK, I figured I would let Jon's slide, but I have to give the advantage of using SharePoint. We all know that files and folders can be shared from a computer but using SharePoint has so many advantages. First, your average user is not going to know how to put a folder on a "main computer" and share it out. She is not going to know how to set permissions. Then, every client computer is going to have to be configured with a shortcut. Hopefully the link doesn't break.

With SharePoint, a user can open a web page and drag and drop a folder or make a new one, drag and drop a file or just browse to the folder on his or her desktop. The admin needs to be none the wiser. The admin can easily change permissions if he or she wants, but generally we leave them open to everyone.

It is unbelievably convenient to open the company site, which contains ALL the information pertaining to the company including every file. Once added, it is available to everyone. Being able to back up every file, folder, calendar entry, etc. with one click is also helpful.

This is exactly what the title references. And, I understand it. No one can ever appreciate the beauty and usefulness of SharePoint until they have used it.

One thing I haven't seen mentioned is that the SharePoint site can be accessed externally. Not every computer has remote desktop. So basically, you have a giant Dropbox with SharePoint being to download and edit files offsite. Furthermore, you can integrate with Office Web Apps which would let you use Microsoft Word, Excel, etc. through the browser even if the computer you're on doesn't have these programs. You can have the full power of MS Office and all of your files through the web browser. Contacts, calendars, etc. all available through the web browser.

To reinforce what Bert said, it's quite simple to use. Setting up a shared folder with all the permissions and then adding it to every computer in the office takes time and is a bit above the skill set of your average user. Sure you could add everyone to the permissions, but then anyone can read your files easily. Also, with P2P, if you do use password protected file sharing, you have to have either a dedicated account for filesharing or setup everyone's user accounts on one computer with their passwords. It gets messy. Then again, this can't be setup without a domain. It's much easier to navigate and manage than a traditional file share setup.

To be honest, SharePoint is definitely geared towards larger companies where collaboration can be difficult. I can understand why it's hard to see the benefits in a small office. Probably easier to just tell 2 staff members an announcement versus posting it on SharePoint. You can see the increasing benefit when you add more and more people to the mix. But the benefits are there regardless of the size of your corporation. I'm sure you all have developed similar systems using various pieces of software that work well for you.

Exactly. One really cool thing about having a domain name and public certificate is the access you have to your office.

1. First, you have Remote Web Workplace, the most secure connection to your office possible (for the most part). Once logged in, you have access to all computers (if you have permissions on the computer which is easy to do), SharePoint, Outlook Anywhere/Outlook Web Access, your server and more.
2. For connections, I find RDC/RDP much faster. Once you set it up (takes literally a minute), you can type in reception.riverview.local and remote to that computer in about five seconds over SSL. Since it remembers it, soon you have every computer in a dropdown, so it takes five seconds to get to each computer. Much faster than logging in to LMI. Of course, you can get LMI ignition but that is not free.
3. The EXACT 32-bit or 64-bit Outlook connected to Exchange Server so that your Outlook at home is IDENTICAL to Outlook on your desktop.
4. Outlook Anywhere icon if you wish to go that route. (Outlook in a web access)
5. After opening SharePoint, you can make a shortcut to it on your desktop. Now click on it, and SharePoint opens. The same SharePoint that is on your network. You can add files and folders on the fly, use Microsoft apps, add announcements, see the calendar, see the contacts, make a webpage -- anything.

Great discussion with incredible content! Thanks Bert and others for all these posts. I may not abandon P2P anytime soon, but it's nice to know what's out there.

Thanks John. You know P2P isn't really that much different than client/server. Both have all computers connect to a switch and a computer is designated to be the server. Really, it is only the logistics of what a server and active directory can do. Make clients authenticate against the server with single sign-on. The server simply has a lot more it can do. But, P2P isn't like it used to be.

Once again, I want to be clear that I recognize the power of SharePoint, and don't seek to diminish it. My point is simply that much of this can be accomplished without it and with a P2P. Please, do not take this as a criticism; it is not meant to criticize anyone, neither the "power IT" people here NOR the average users. I would bet that a significant portion of the latter group really doesn't have the know-how to understand or implement what you are discussing. I think that one of Sandeep's points is key: "SharePoint is definitely geared towards larger companies where collaboration can be difficult...You can see the increasing benefit when you add more and more people to the mix." I am in a small practice with a few employees whom I generally trust. If my situation were different, I would want or need a true network with the ability to easily set an assortment of permissions. For now, it is not that many people or machines, and everyone can read all of the forms, etc without much worry on my part.

To address some specifics:
My desktop in the office has logmein installed. That is how I access it from home. All of the other machines have logmein as well. I can sit at my desk and make changes or troubleshoot from there. I can also access every machine from home. If a program is on just one of those machines, I can use that program.

Putting a folder on the main computer and sharing it is no different than putting a folder on your desktop. Or you can create it on your desktop; then just drop it in the folder named "Shared Office Resources". Each machine has a single shortcut to SOR. None have broken yet, but creating a new one takes about 15 seconds.

Both of you talk about the need to set permissions. Again, I may be overly trusting, but given the size of my office and the way I view my staff, we are able to keep things pretty open. On the other hand, some key documents are individually set to be password protected. That is easy to do, and does not provide the highest level of security, but is enough to keep wandering eyes away.

Whoa! Sushi! Sushi! Sushi! Pleas think more sushi.

Jon, your entire post proves my post. Please understand I do not make money pushing SharePoint. Yes, you can get files from your server or "main computer." Yes, they can be put on the server by your staff. No, you don't need collaboration.

But, SharePoint is simply awesome! I am not saying get it. In fact, I don't think you can put it on any computer. So many times it has come up, and I have tried to talk it up, but here I am just saying you can't know how helpful it is until you use it.

I don't use the collaboration at all. To be honest, I find it quite stupid. Sandeep serve me up some Miso soup please, lol.

The advantage of having an intranet company web known as SharePoint is so helpful and, yes, powerful, it can't be known without experiencing it. I looked on YouTube to see some demos, and all it talked about what collaboration. Forget the huge office. Think of two users only.

Accessing it from home. Trust me, no one accesses their network from home more than I. I have used GoToMyPC, LogMeIn, RDC, RWW, VNC all of them. I can get to all my files that way. But, to click on SharePoint and have a browser open at your home computer with every single file, contact, calendar, announcements, I could go on and on right there organized in from of you is a thing of wonder. The first time I did it, I ran through the neighborhood shouting for joy. (no need to make fun of me here)

PERMISSIONS: Don't use them. Nuff said. Before anyone can say I mentioned them, I was just saying it is simple to do. I don't think the average user can drop a folder in SOR and set permissions if they need to. Not saying they do, just if they have to.

With SharePoint, my nurse could put a file on and protect it so only she can see it. That's cool. Has she done it. I don't know.

There is also a sub site on SharePoint named Haiku. You put in the subject and it generates a Haiku in under two seconds. We have over 500 Haikus at the moment.

I think some are taking this post wrong. Again, I am not saying you need SharePoint to run an office or that sharing files on a computer isn't close to being the same. I am just pointing out some of the strengths of SharePoint and trying to teach people what SharePoint is.

So, I figured I would compete with Lysistrata.

You guys are making life difficult for a college kid.

I dated her once. Hotter than Wasabi.

She gets around.

A fitting end to my attempt at sharing SharePoint.