To begin with, lets look upon some things that you do need to know before you
start with the Microsoft Product called
"SharePoint".
1. Microsoft Windows SharePoint
Services 3.0 - An extentions build on Windows Server 2003, which Provides
the infrastructure for collaboration and a foundation for building Web-based
applications with this versatile technology. In short, it
provides the base for SharePoint Server 2007.
2. SharePoint and .Net - SharePoint
development stack is build upon .Net Framework 2.0 so, it pretty much uses all
the .Net Framework 2.0 classes as its base classes. IT however, has its own
SharePoint API model, which is commonly used for development.
3. SharePoint and SQL - SharePoint definitely
uses SQL server to store the data which is uploaded into it. So be ready with a
big SQl space to accommodate SharePoint data.
Now lets Start with the basic definition of
SharePoint Server 2007 - Its a Collaboration software or a Content
management Portal which effectively manage and repurpose the content to gain
increased business value. In simple words, SharePoint's main purpose is to allow
various departments\teams in the company to upload,manage and share documents
using SharePoint sites. In addition to Sharing documents,it also allows you to
create and manage web sites, use workflows and various other options to
implement the business process.For more info see What are the sharepoint used for
SharePoint
Administration - As it a server, you would definitely need to learn its
administartion. SharePoint has two options avaiable for administration.
1.
Central admin - A website available to you immediately after you install
SharePoint (and after you ran its Config wizard). This website pretty much
allows you to perform and function in SharePoint like Creating\Deleting
Websites, Backup\Restore Sites,Set up Users\accounts, Install Custom components
and a lot more.
2. Stsadm Tool - This is a command
line tool available in SharePoint,
which allows you to perform all the administrative tasks that you can do with
Central admin site.
12 Hive - SharePoint stores a lot its Pages and
resources on the file system itself for fast retrieval. These Pages or Files
which make SharePoint Interface, are arranged in a Folder structure which we
call as 12 Hive. The 12 hive gets created at location
"C:\ProgramFiles\CommonFiles\Web Server Extentions\12" when you install the
SharePoint sever initially. To Know more about 12 hive and SharePoint solution
structure see Developer: 12 hive folder structure in sharepoint 2007
SharePoint
Development - SharePoint is also looked upon as a development platform,
since all the components in SharePoint, right from a small hyperlink to a fancy
button is customizable. You can add your links, buttons , pages and even whole
asp.net application SharePoint using its deployment architecture.For more
details see :Sharepoint 2007 development Tutorial
SharePoint
Object Model -
In Sharepoint Object model there are two Important
namespaces.
Microsoft.Office.Server -
This is a root namespace of all Office Server objects. This means all the
components or services available in Offiice SharePoint Server like BDC,
enterprise search etc can be accesed programmatically using this
namespace.
Microsoft.SharePoint -
This is the root namespace for all WSS 3.0 objects. Remember, Wss 3.0 is
the base platform used by Office SharePoint server. For all namespaces see SharePoint 2007 Object model
What is SharePoint
made of? - SharePoint Portal is a made of Web applications (WebSites in
.Net), Site Collections (a top level Site of the Web application) Web Site
Pages,Subsites(or child sites of Site collectons),Webparts,features and more ...
See the basic defination for all SharePoint Components that you will use during
development SharePoint Interview Questions:Important Definations