Upcoming Events, SharePoint FBA and News Update..

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So we are almost one month into the new year and already Darryl and Co are almost ready for the great big New Zealand road trip.  From the sneak previews I have seen so far this Road Trip is going to be one not to miss. So if you happen to be in New Zealand and in the following locations you should sign up today!

The tour will include the following dates and locations:

Following this in March MS NZ has the “Launchwave 08” technical event planned.

](https://www.microsoft.com/nz/events/launchwave/default.mspx)

[ More information ]

Also if you are ready to test out SharePoint and Windows Server 2008 check out the following resources.

Via TechNet

To understand what Windows Server 2008 will provide in terms of new enhancements check out:

Before you can install MOSS or WSS on Windows Server 2008 you’ll need to create a slip stream build for each version. Download the correct version of the SP1 (x64 vs x86) for your deployment environment.

Extract the service pack files by running the following command.

EX: For WSS SP1 x86

‘c:\wssv3sp1-kb936988-x86-fullfile-en-us.exe /extract:c:\WSSSP1’

Say Yes to the prompt asking you to agree to License Terms.

Then extract the SharePoint.exe file by running ‘c:\SharePoint.exe /extract:c:\WSS’

Copy all of the files from WSSSP1 folder to C:\WSS\Updates\ folder.

Now you have a slip stream build for a WSS install with SP1. You can follow the same steps for MOSS.

If you are about to purchase new hardware I fully recommend that you get x64 capable hardware platforms. MOSS/WSS will be fully x64 in the next versions so you’ll be future proofing your deployment.

MSFT does not currently support production deployments of WSS/MOSS on SQL Server 2008 CTP. But the last I heard was that the product team will support SQL 2008 as of launch date later in the year.

Last year Zac and I started a small project showcasing how SharePoint can use forms based authentication and the ASP.net pluggable authentication providers. The FBA article I posted on my blog still gets fair bit of visitors according to my site stats. I recommend the following articles released on MSDN for developers and site admins on FBA.

**Forms Authentication in SharePoint Products and Technologies (Part 1): Introduction **[http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb975136.aspx]

Forms Authentication in SharePoint Products and Technologies (Part 2): Membership and Role Provider Samples [http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb975135.aspx]

Forms Authentication in SharePoint Products and Technologies (Part 3): Forms Authentication vs. Windows Authentication [http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb977430.aspx]

The original MOSS forms project is still on Codeplex but has been integrated to the CKS project. 

To get the latest releases of FBA go to:

CKS:IEE (Intranet/Extranet) Forms Based Authentication Solution

Forms Based Authentication Tools

If you are using FBA you’ll want to try out this handy utility created by Steve Peschka.

Profile Import Tool: A tool for importing users and updating their profile properties in MOSS 2007 when using forms based authentication.

And if you wanted your SharePoint site to have Windows Live Authentication you can do that too!

Windows Live Authentication 1.0

Watch out for the CKS:EBE (Enhanced Blog Edition) release in February. There are so many WSS blogs now using CKS and I am just working on getting my blog converted to CKS:EBE in the coming months.

Personal News and career change

Last year was a blast and this year is going to be even better, a few of you may already know that I have left Provoke Solutions where I enjoyed being part of a great team specialising in SharePoint solutions (Ari, Zac,  Brendon) and we did some awesome SharePoint projects that gave Provoke a very high profile both locally and internationally in the SharePoint space.

So I am now working with the team at Intergen (NZ MSFT Gold Partner) and fellow MVP Mark Orange (OJ). I am excited about the change and new challenges for this year. Obvious question of why the sudden change? I wanted a change and to expand my skills onto more areas such as CRM 4.0 and the MSFT Business Solutions offerings. So my blog might have a few CRM related postings soon enough. There is also some quite plans for SharePoint training which I will announce in the near future.

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