1. Planning and architecture for Windows
SharePoint Services 3.0 technology, part
1
Microsoft Corporation
Published: March 2007
Author: Windows SharePoint Services IT User Assistance (o12ITdx@microsoft.com)
Abstract
This book provides information and guidelines to lead a team through the steps of
planning the deployment of a solution based on Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services
3.0. The audiences for this book are business application specialists, line-of-business
specialists, information architects, IT generalists, program managers, and infrastructure
specialists who are planning a solution based on Windows SharePoint Services 3.0. This
book also includes links to planning worksheets for recording information related to your
planning and deployment activities.
This book is the first part of a two-part series. You can find the other part at the following
link:
• Planning and architecture for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 technology, part 2
(http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=85553&clcid=0x409)
The content in this book is a copy of selected content in the Windows SharePoint
Services technical library (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=81199) as of the date
above. For the most current content, see the technical library on the Web.
3. Contents
Planning and architecture for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 technology, part 1.........1
Abstract.......................................................................................................................1
Contents.............................................................................................................................3
Planning worksheets for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0..............................................8
Planning worksheets by task..........................................................................................8
Planning worksheets by title..........................................................................................11
I. Determine organization and user needs.......................................................................15
Chapter overview: Determine organization and user needs ............................................16
Determine objectives for sites..........................................................................................17
Identify primary objectives for sites...............................................................................17
Document storage.....................................................................................................17
Communication.........................................................................................................18
Collaboration.............................................................................................................19
Identify primary environments for sites.........................................................................19
Worksheet.....................................................................................................................21
Determine user needs and features to use......................................................................22
Determine user needs...................................................................................................22
Special considerations..................................................................................................23
Map user needs to features and determine which features to use................................23
Worksheet.....................................................................................................................27
Determine number of users and user types.....................................................................28
Determine number of users..........................................................................................28
Identify how users will interact with sites.......................................................................29
Determine user access requirements...........................................................................29
Worksheet.....................................................................................................................30
II. Plan Web site structure and publishing........................................................................31
Chapter overview: Plan Web site structure and publishing .............................................32
Determine paths for sites ................................................................................................33
Specific paths...............................................................................................................33
4. Additional paths............................................................................................................33
Worksheet.....................................................................................................................34
Determine sites and subsites needed .............................................................................35
Determine number of sites and site collections.............................................................35
Decide whether to use individual site collections or subsites within one site collection 36
Design site hierarchy....................................................................................................37
Worksheets...................................................................................................................38
Plan site navigation .........................................................................................................39
Create a site navigation diagram..................................................................................39
Understanding shared navigation.................................................................................40
Determine which sites share the top link bar................................................................41
Determine which additional links to add manually to the top link bar............................42
Worksheets...................................................................................................................42
Determine individual site content needs and structure.....................................................43
Formal: Survey stakeholders and users........................................................................44
Performing a content survey......................................................................................44
Informal: Rough organization with room to evolve........................................................45
III. Plan for content and search........................................................................................46
Chapter overview: Plan for content and search ...............................................................47
Plan lists ..........................................................................................................................48
Included lists.................................................................................................................48
About working with lists.................................................................................................50
Plan for custom lists......................................................................................................51
Worksheet.....................................................................................................................53
Plan document libraries ...................................................................................................54
Plan libraries.................................................................................................................54
Plan versioning, content approval, and check-outs.......................................................55
Plan versioning..........................................................................................................55
Plan content approval................................................................................................56
Plan check-in and check-out.....................................................................................57
Plan Information Rights Management...........................................................................58
Plan content types ...........................................................................................................60
What are content types?...............................................................................................60
About column templates...............................................................................................62
About folder content types............................................................................................62
Planning document content types.................................................................................62
5. Planning list content types............................................................................................64
After planning content types: next steps.......................................................................65
Plan workflows ................................................................................................................66
What are workflows?....................................................................................................66
Plan for search ................................................................................................................68
About search in Windows SharePoint Services version 3.............................................68
Plan for search administration......................................................................................69
Link to worksheet..........................................................................................................70
Security considerations for search ..................................................................................71
Sharing data across Web Parts....................................................................................71
Specify content as no crawl..........................................................................................72
IV. Plan site and content security.....................................................................................73
Chapter overview: Plan site and content security ............................................................74
Plan site security .............................................................................................................75
About site security elements.........................................................................................76
About assigning permissions........................................................................................77
About fine-grained permissions and permission inheritance.........................................78
Permission inheritance and fine-grained permissions...............................................78
Permission inheritance and subsites.........................................................................79
Choose which levels of site security to use...................................................................79
Plan for permission inheritance.....................................................................................80
Worksheet.....................................................................................................................81
Determine permission levels and groups to use ..............................................................82
Review available default groups...................................................................................82
Review available permission levels..............................................................................84
Determine whether you need additional permission levels or groups...........................84
Do you need custom groups?....................................................................................85
Do you need custom permission levels?...................................................................85
Worksheet.....................................................................................................................87
Define custom permission levels .....................................................................................88
Customize an existing permission level........................................................................88
Copy an existing permission level.................................................................................88
Create a permission level.............................................................................................89
Choose which security groups to use ..............................................................................90
6. Determine which Windows security groups and accounts to use for granting access to
sites...........................................................................................................................90
Decide whether to use all authenticated users.............................................................91
Decide whether to allow access to anonymous users..................................................91
Worksheet.....................................................................................................................92
Choose administrators and owners for the administration hierarchy ...............................93
Levels of administration................................................................................................93
Worksheet.....................................................................................................................94
V. Plan communication.....................................................................................................95
Chapter overview: Plan communication ..........................................................................96
Communications components.......................................................................................96
Plan presence integration ...............................................................................................97
About online presence..................................................................................................97
Advantages of incorporating online presence...............................................................98
Organizational considerations.......................................................................................98
Software requirements..................................................................................................98
E-mail account requirements........................................................................................99
Plan incoming e-mail .....................................................................................................100
About incoming e-mail................................................................................................100
Key decisions for planning incoming e-mail................................................................100
Basic scenario.........................................................................................................101
Advanced scenarios................................................................................................102
Safe e-mail server................................................................................................102
E-mail drop folder.................................................................................................103
Microsoft SharePoint Directory Management service..........................................103
Incoming e-mail server display address...............................................................104
Configuration options and settings modes..................................................................104
Before configuring incoming e-mail.............................................................................105
Plan the Microsoft SharePoint Directory Management service...................................106
Directory management service configuration options..............................................106
Worksheet...................................................................................................................107
Plan outgoing e-mail .....................................................................................................108
About outgoing e-mail.................................................................................................109
General requirements.................................................................................................109
Outbound SMTP server..............................................................................................109
From and Reply-to addresses.....................................................................................110
Character set..............................................................................................................110
7. VI. Plan for site creation and maintenance.....................................................................111
Chapter overview: Plan for site creation and maintenance ............................................112
Plan process for creating sites ......................................................................................113
Determine who can create sites and a method for site creation..................................113
Plan for Self-Service Site Management......................................................................115
Plan for custom site creation processes......................................................................116
Worksheet...................................................................................................................116
Plan for site maintenance and management .................................................................117
Plan for site maintenance............................................................................................117
Plan for managing site collections...............................................................................118
Plan site collection quotas.......................................................................................118
Plan site use confirmation and deletion...................................................................119
Worksheet...................................................................................................................120
8. 8
Planning worksheets for Windows
SharePoint Services 3.0
In this article:
• Planning worksheets by task
• Planning worksheets by title
This article provides links to worksheets that you can use to record information that you
gather and decisions that you make as you plan your deployment of Microsoft Windows
SharePoint Services 3.0. Use these worksheets in conjunction with — not as a substitute
for — Planning and architecture for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 technology.
Planning worksheets by task
For this task Use this worksheet To do this
Chapter Site objectives and environments worksheet List sites to
overview: (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=73269&clcid=0x409) create, goals
Determine for each site,
organization and
and user needs environments
[Windows in which sites
SharePoint will be used.
Services]
Users and user types worksheet Record
number of
(http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=73270&clcid=0x409)
users, types
of users, and
user access
requirements.
9. 9
For this task Use this worksheet To do this
Chapter Site hierarchy choices worksheet Identify
overview: Plan (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=73140&clcid=0x409) shared or
Web site unique
structure and elements,
publishing and decide
[Windows whether to
SharePoint create
Services] subsites or
site
collections.
Site hierarchy planning tool (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/? Create a site
LinkId=73144&clcid=0x409) hierarchy
diagram in
Microsoft
Office Visio.
Site paths worksheet (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/? Record
LinkId=73149&clcid=0x409) managed
paths that
need to be
created for
hosting
collaboration
sites.
Site objectives and environments worksheet List sites to
(http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=73269&clcid=0x409) create, goals
for each site,
and
environments
in which sites
will be used.
Chapter Content type worksheet (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/? Plan a
overview: Plan LinkId=73311&clcid=0x409) content type.
for content and
search
(Windows
SharePoint
Services)
10. 10
For this task Use this worksheet To do this
Document libraries worksheet Plan libraries
(http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=73312&clcid=0x409) based on
sites and on
document
types.
Chapter Administrators and owners worksheet Record
overview: Plan (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=73128&clcid=0x409) owners for
site and content each site
security collection and
[Windows site.
SharePoint
Services]
Custom permission levels and groups worksheet Record
(http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=73133&clcid=0x409) custom
permission
levels and
groups that
need to be
created.
Site and content security worksheet Record
(http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=73136&clcid=0x409) inherited and
unique
permissions;
record which
groups need
what level of
access.
Plan
communication
Plan for site Site creation worksheet (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/? Record a plan
creation and LinkId=73139&clcid=0x409) for creating
maintenance sites.
11. 11
For this task Use this worksheet To do this
Site maintenance worksheet Record the
(http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=73145&clcid=0x409) plan for
maintaining
sites,
including
quota values
and
automatic
deletion
choices.
Plan for and
design security
Planning worksheets by title
Use this worksheet For this task To do this
Administrators and owners worksheet Chapter Record
(http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=73128&clcid=0x409) overview: owners for
Plan site and each site
content collection and
security site.
[Windows
SharePoint
Services]
Content type worksheet (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/? Chapter Plan a
LinkId=73311&clcid=0x409) overview: content type.
Plan for
content and
search
(Windows
SharePoint
Services)
12. 12
Use this worksheet For this task To do this
Custom permission levels and groups worksheet Chapter Record
(http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=73133&clcid=0x409) overview: custom
Plan site and permission
content levels and
security groups that
[Windows need to be
SharePoint created.
Services]
Document libraries worksheet Chapter Plan libraries
(http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=73312&clcid=0x409) overview: based on
Plan for sites and on
content and document
search types.
(Windows
SharePoint
Services)
Site and content security worksheet Chapter Record
(http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=73136&clcid=0x409) overview: inherited and
Plan site and unique
content permissions;
security record which
[Windows groups need
SharePoint what level of
Services] access.
Site creation worksheet (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/? Plan for site Record a plan
LinkId=73139&clcid=0x409) creation and for creating
maintenance sites.
Site hierarchy choices worksheet Chapter Identify
(http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=73140&clcid=0x409) overview: shared or
Plan Web unique
site structure elements,
and and decide
publishing whether to
[Windows create
SharePoint subsites or
Services] site
collections.
13. 13
Use this worksheet For this task To do this
Site hierarchy planning tool (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/? Chapter Create a site
LinkId=73144&clcid=0x409) overview: hierarchy
Plan Web diagram in
site structure Microsoft
and Office Visio.
publishing
[Windows
SharePoint
Services]
Site maintenance worksheet Plan for site Record the
(http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=73145&clcid=0x409) creation and plan for
maintenance maintaining
sites,
including
quota values
and
automatic
deletion
choices.
Site objectives and environments worksheet Chapter List sites to
(http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=73269&clcid=0x409) overview: create, goals
Determine for each site,
organization and
and user environments
needs in which sites
[Windows will be used.
SharePoint
Services]
Chapter
overview:
Plan Web
site structure
and
publishing
[Windows
SharePoint
Services]
14. 14
Use this worksheet For this task To do this
Site paths worksheet (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/? Chapter Record
LinkId=73149&clcid=0x409) overview: managed
Plan Web paths that
site structure need to be
and created for
publishing hosting
[Windows collaboration
SharePoint sites.
Services]
Users and user types worksheet Chapter Record
overview: number of
(http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=73270&clcid=0x409)
Determine users, types
organization of users, and
and user user access
needs requirements.
[Windows
SharePoint
Services]
Workflows worksheet (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/? Record
LinkId=73315&clcid=0x409) workflow
name, type,
purpose, and
details.
15. 15
I. Determine organization and user needs
In this chapter:
• Chapter overview: Determine organization and user needs [Windows
SharePoint Services]
• Determine objectives for sites
• Determine user needs and features to use
• Determine number of users and user types
16. 16
Chapter overview: Determine
organization and user needs
Each organization is looking for a solution that meets its unique requirements. This
chapter helps you identify your organization's requirements and determine which
capabilities within Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 can help you meet those
requirements.
Whether you are a small business or department-level organization that wants to quickly
set up a place to share ideas or information, or a hosting company that wants to sell
services to other organizations, the information in this chapter helps you determine the
specific objectives for your sites, which capabilities to enable, and how to plan for your
specific sets of users.
Determine organization and user needs by using the following articles:
• Determine objectives for sites helps you identify some primary objectives for
your SharePoint sites and consider the environments in which the sites will be
used.
• Determine user needs and features to use helps you identify user needs and
then map those user needs to features that you want to use in your sites.
• Determine number of users and user types helps you determine server
capacity and any special features or settings you need to incorporate into your
sites.
17. 17
Determine objectives for sites
In this article:
• Identify primary objectives for sites
• Identify primary environments for sites
• Worksheet
Before you can design your sites based on Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services 3.0,
you need to identify what you want to accomplish. This article helps you identify some
primary objectives for your SharePoint sites and consider the environments in which the
sites will be used.
Identify primary objectives for sites
SharePoint sites are flexible and can help you accomplish many different things.
However, to have a useful and successful site or group of sites, you need to be able to
focus the sites on some primary objectives. That is, you need to know what you are trying
to accomplish with a site before you can design it. For example:
• Do you want to communicate with others in your organization by posting
bulletins or announcements and gathering feedback?
• Do you want to foster team collaboration by giving team members a place to
share ideas and work on projects together?
SharePoint sites can assist with both of these objectives. If you have multiple objectives,
you might best be served by creating multiple, possibly interrelated, sites. However, you
can have multiple objectives for a single site. If you are limited to a single site, organize
the site so that users looking for the communication point can find it right away, and users
looking to share information and ideas or store documents know where to start.
Review the following objectives. Consider which of these objectives most closely align
with your needs for each site you are designing.
Document storage
Document storage and workflow are key functions of many sites, even sites that are
primarily used for communication or collaboration. However, sometimes you might need a
dedicated document storage site for your organization. Whether you require a special site
18. 18
for document storage depends on many factors, such as how many documents need to
be stored, how many people are contributing documents, who needs to act on the
documents, and so on. You will have time to explore how to structure document storage
later in the planning process. For more information, see Plan document libraries
(Windows SharePoint Services).
Document storage sites or document storage sections of other sites often include the
following features:
• The ability to check documents in or out, track changes to documents, and
keep multiple versions of documents.
• The ability to route documents for approval or through specific processes
before publishing them to a larger audience.
Note:
Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 includes a workflow capability that you can
use to create a custom workflow process to route documents for approval.
• The ability to tag documents with metadata, so that documents can be more
efficiently sorted and managed.
Communication
A communication site helps you broadcast information to a group of people and collect
information or feedback from that group. Communication sites are primarily concerned
with distributing information, data, and documents to other people. For example, a large
organization might have a central site for broadcasting organization-wide information
about policies or events (such as a human resources site or a company events site).
Many communication sites are also used for gathering and sharing information. For
example, a community bulletin board is primarily a communication site. People in the
community come to the site to read items and to post items for others to read.
Communication sites often include sections for:
• Describing, publicizing, or announcing an event or other information.
• Viewing calendar or event information.
• Reading documents or editorial articles.
• Posting or uploading information or documents.
19. 19
Collaboration
A collaboration site helps members of a team or organization work together. Collaboration
sites are primarily concerned with sharing information and documents, generating ideas,
responding to other people's ideas, and tracking progress toward a goal.
Collaboration sites can vary depending on the team type, size, complexity, or objective.
For example, a small team that is working on a short-term project (such as organizing an
upcoming event or planning a new product launch) has different needs than a larger team
(such as a research department in a manufacturing company or the editorial staff in a
publishing company) that is working on a series of long-term projects. Members of an
organization working together to organize an event (such as a charity event) or to
encourage participation in the organization (such as a community or school organization)
have their own unique needs.
Collaboration sites often include sections for:
• Sharing information and data.
• Sharing documents.
• Sharing calendar or event information.
• Generating ideas and discussing ideas about a project.
• Adding, assigning, and tracking tasks.
Worksheet action
Use the Site objectives and environments
worksheet (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?
LinkID=73269&clcid=0x409) to record which site
types you want to create.
Identify primary environments for sites
To effectively plan your sites, you must identify for which environments the sites are
intended. Internet sites often have very different objectives and requirements than
intranet sites. For example, for an Internet site that you use to market a product, you
typically do not restrict who can view the content, but you tightly control who can add
content to the site. Conversely, for an intranet site meant for team collaboration, most
users contribute content and very few users just casually view the site. For some
environments, the size of your organization might influence your choices. For other
20. 20
environments, the mix of users interacting in the environment might influence your
choices.
Consider which of the environments described in the following table are applicable to
your sites.
Type of site Factors that influence the Examples
number of sites or type of
sites
Intranet The size of your • Small
organization organization or
small business
• Department or
group within a larger
organization
• Medium or large
organization
Extranet The mix of users, and use of • Combination
hosting intranet and
extranet, supported
by the organization
• Combination
intranet and
extranet, supported
by an external
hosting company
• Extranet only,
supported by the
organization
• Extranet only,
supported by an
external hosting
company
21. 21
Type of site Factors that influence the Examples
number of sites or type of
sites
Internet The mix of users, and use of • Internet site
hosting supported by the
organization
• Internet site
supported by an
external hosting
company
Worksheet action
Use the Site objectives and environments
worksheet (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?
LinkID=73269&clcid=0x409) to record which
environment the sites will be used in.
Worksheet
Use the following worksheet to determine objectives for sites:
• Site objectives and environments worksheet (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?
LinkID=73269&clcid=0x409)
22. 22
Determine user needs and features to
use
In this article:
• Determine user needs
• Special considerations
• Map user needs to features and determine which features to use
• Worksheet
In the Determine objectives for sites article, you identified the objectives for the sites you
want to create in your Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 environment. In this
article, you will review those objectives and user needs, plus any special considerations.
Then, you will map those user needs to features that you want to use in your sites.
Determine user needs
Previously, you decided whether you were primarily creating sites for document storage,
communication, or collaboration. In addition to these high-level objectives, you need to
determine whether there are additional user needs you want to address by using your
SharePoint sites. For example, users might need to:
• Interact with data and documents while traveling or working offline.
• Send e-mail messages to other members of the community, send documents
through e-mail to a site, or archive e-mail messages in a site.
• Quickly publish ideas on Internet blogs or wikis without requiring approval or
special permissions.
• Stay informed about changes to the site.
• Incorporate data from several sources.
23. 23
Worksheet action
Use the Site objectives and environments
worksheet (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?
LinkID=73269&clcid=0x409) to record any
additional needs your user community has or
requests that you have received from your
users.
Special considerations
Your environment also influences your decisions about what your sites can contain.
Identify any special requirements or needs that you might have because of environmental
factors. Considerations include:
• Client integration Which client applications do you have in your
environment that need to interact with your SharePoint sites?
• Server integration Which servers in your environment need to interact with
Windows SharePoint Services 3.0?
• Line-of-business application integration Are there any business
applications that need to be integrated with your SharePoint sites?
• Add-on solutions, features, applications Are there any solutions that you
have in your current environment that need to be integrated with your SharePoint
sites? If you are upgrading, are there any solutions or applications that were
integrated with a previous version that need to be upgraded?
• Hosting considerations If you are a hosting company, what do you need
to do to integrate with your billing, auditing, or other systems? Are there any
features that you want to provide at additional cost or features that you do not
want to provide at all?
Map user needs to features and determine
which features to use
The following tables include common list types, site types, and other features available in
Windows SharePoint Services 3.0. Map your user needs to particular features and review
the special planning considerations to determine if there are any requirements that you
need to meet or factors that you should consider before you use a particular feature.
24. 24
Communication features
Feature Description Special planning
considerations
Announcements Share news and information
with other site members.
Shared calendar Schedule and share event
information.
Links Share important links with
site members.
E-mail Send information to a site or Requires an SMTP mail
list, or to communicate with server to authenticate users,
all site members. filter spam, and provide
virus protection for e-mail
messages. For more
information, see Plan
incoming e-mail (Windows
SharePoint Services).
Survey Gather data from site
members.
Presence Find out which site Requires a client application
members are online and to process the presence
ready to communicate. information (such as
Windows Messenger).
Collaboration features
Feature Description Special planning
considerations
Discussion board Share and generate ideas
or discuss solutions.
Issue tracking Track issues that site
members are working on.
Contacts Store contact information,
such as phone numbers,
addresses, and so on.
25. 25
Document storage and workflow features
Feature Description Special planning
considerations
Document library Store, share, present, and Consider content types and
track documents. metadata that you want to
support.
Picture library Store and share pictures.
Tasks Assign and track tasks.
Recycle Bin Recover deleted items, Consider whether to turn on
documents, and lists. Recycle Bins for site
collections.
Information management features
Feature Description Special planning considerations
Alert Track changes to
documents, items,
lists, libraries, or
the entire site.
RSS feed Subscribe to a site Requires RSS client application.
and find out what
is new.
Auditing Flag what is If you want specific auditing reports, you can
happening on the create them by using the object model. For
site. more information, see the Windows
SharePoint Server V3: Software Development
Kit (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?
LinkId=72207).
Offline Take documents or Requires client application.
lists offline to
continue working.
Mobile View and
participate in the
site from mobile
devices.
26. 26
Feature Description Special planning considerations
Data connection Pull in data from
other applications
and Web Parts to
display content
from other
systems.
Search Find information For more information, see Plan for search
within a specific (Windows SharePoint Services).
site, list, or
document library,
or across all sites
in a site collection.
Special site types
Feature Description Special planning
considerations
Blog Publish your thoughts and Permissions for blog sites
ideas to share with the are configured differently
community. from other sites to prevent
people who can comment
on blog posts from creating
posts.
Wiki Participate in group content
authoring.
27. 27
Feature Description Special planning
considerations
Document Workspace Publish a document for Document Workspace sites
review or discussion. can easily multiply and get
lost. To more effectively
control your sites, use a
Document Workspace site
only when you need a
separate space with unique
permissions and additional
information about a
particular document. For
general collaboration on
documents, use document
libraries instead of
Document Workspace sites.
Document Workspace sites
can be created from several
Windows SharePoint
Services-compatible client
applications, such as
Microsoft Office Professional
2007.
Meeting Workspace Publish meeting agendas, Meeting Workspace sites
notes, and follow up tasks in can also be created from
one site. Windows SharePoint
Services-compatible client
applications, such as
Microsoft Office Outlook
2007.
Worksheet
Use the following worksheet to determine user needs and features:
• Site objectives and environments worksheet (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?
LinkID=73269&clcid=0x409)
28. 28
Determine number of users and user
types
In this article:
• Determine number of users
• Identify how users will interact with sites
• Determine user access requirements
• Worksheet
Part of understanding your organization's needs is to understand your users. How many
users do you have in your organization? Will they all be using your sites based on
Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 at the same time, and for the same reasons?
Are there special requirements in your environment that you need to plan for?
This article prompts you to ask questions about your users to help you determine not only
server capacity, but also any special features or settings you need to incorporate into
your sites.
Determine number of users
Step one in understanding your users is to estimate how many users will use your
SharePoint sites. Considerations include:
• How many users in total do you expect to use your sites?
• How many users do you expect to use your sites concurrently?
• Worksheet action
• Use the Users and user types
worksheet
(http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?
LinkId=73270&clcid=0x409) to record
an estimate of how many users will use
your sites.
29. 29
Identify how users will interact with sites
Step two is to identify how users will interact with your SharePoint sites. Identify what
percentage of users you expect to use specific feature sets in your sites. Considerations
include:
• Communication Will users view announcements, calendars, and so on, or
contribute items to those lists?
• Collaboration Will users add or change items in task lists or discussion
boards?
• Document storage Will users save to document libraries, or check
documents in and out?
• Search Will users search for people, content, or information in the sites?
• Third-party and earlier systems integration Will users query for data in a
database to display in a list or Web Part?
Worksheet action
Use the Users and user types worksheet (http://
go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?
LinkId=73270&clcid=0x409) to record how users
will interact with your sites.
Determine user access requirements
Step three is to determine any special access requirements that your users might need.
Most of these requirements must be taken into account when configuring your servers
and making authentication choices. Considerations include:
• Remote access Do users need to access your sites from outside of your
domain?
• Internet access Do you need to expose your sites to the Internet?
• Mobile access Do users need to be able to access your site from a mobile
device, such as a mobile phone?
• Offline capabilities Do users need to be able to take the content offline
and work on it when not connected to your sites?
30. 30
• Anonymous users Do you require users to be able access the site
anonymously?
Worksheet action
Use the Users and user types worksheet (http://
go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?
LinkId=73270&clcid=0x409) to record any
special access requirements for your sites.
Worksheet
Use the following worksheet to determine the number of users and user types:
• Users and user types worksheet (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?
LinkId=73270&clcid=0x409)
32. 32
Chapter overview: Plan Web site
structure and publishing
The effectiveness of a site, or a group of sites, depends on many factors, but key among
them is the ability to predictably locate the site and the content that you need within the
site. The structure of a site or group of sites and the navigation inside and among sites
are key to helping users find and share information and work together.
Depending on your role in the planning process, you may delve into your site structure
and navigation at different levels.
• If you are a member of the IT group for your organization — and are not
involved in planning the content in individual sites, but rather the overall
framework for sites — use the following articles to plan site structure and
navigation:
• Determine paths for sites [Windows SharePoint Services] helps you
decide which paths to use for your sites.
• Determine sites and subsites needed [Windows SharePoint
Services] provides information for site or application administrators who
are creating sites.
• If you are an administrator of a site and simply want to work on the structure
of your own individual site, use the following articles to plan site structure and
navigation:
• Determine sites and subsites needed [Windows SharePoint
Services] provides information for site or application administrators who
are creating sites.
• Plan site navigation [Windows SharePoint Services] helps you
design the navigation for your site.
• Determine individual site content needs and structure helps you
determine what to put in your site and how to organize the content so
that it is useful.
33. 33
Determine paths for sites
In this article:
• Specific paths
• Additional paths
• Worksheet
Specific paths
You have the ability to use specific paths in Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services 3.0
to contain your SharePoint site collections, similar to the way that folders contain files or
documents in the file system. By default, when you create a Web application, two paths
are created for you:
• Root path (/) This is an explicit inclusion that can contain one site
collection. For example, if you want a URL to appear as
http://company_name/default.aspx, you would create the site collection at this
root path.
• Sites path (/sites) This is a wildcard inclusion that can contain many site
collections. For example, when you use the /sites path, the URL for a site named
Site_A would be similar to http://server_name/sites/Site_A/default.aspx.
Note:
The name of the /sites path varies depending on the installation language.
Additional paths
You can also create additional paths, allowing you to group site collections. Then, when
you create a site collection, you can choose to:
• Create the site collection at the root of the Web application (if no site
collection has already been created there).
• Create the site collection under the /sites path.
• Create the site collection under any additional paths that have been made
available for that Web application.
34. 34
In general, the /sites path should be sufficient for most installations. However, consider
using other paths for the following situations:
• You have a complex installation and anticipate having a large number of site
collections, and you want to group similar sites together. For example, you could
use /personal for individual user sites and /team for group collaboration sites,
rather than using /sites for all.
• You want to be able to add a filter to your firewall or router to constrain a
specific namespace to internal access only. For example, you could expose the
/team path for external collaboration but not /personal.
Worksheet action
Use the Site paths worksheet
(http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?
LinkId=73149&clcid=0x409) to record your
decision to use paths, and specify which paths
you need to create to organize your SharePoint
sites.
If you have decided to use specific paths for your SharePoint sites, you can set them up
after deployment.
Worksheet
Use the following worksheet when you determine paths for sites:
• Site paths worksheet (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?
LinkId=73149&clcid=0x409)
35. 35
Determine sites and subsites needed
In this article:
• Determine number of sites and site collections
• Decide whether to use individual site collections or subsites within one site
collection
• Design site hierarchy
• Worksheets
The information in this article is for site or application administrators who are creating
sites by using Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services 3.0. If you are hosting sites, but
not designing or creating the sites, you can skip this article and continue on with the
planning process.
Determine number of sites and site
collections
SharePoint sites work best when they are focused on a single effort or are used by a
single team. They become difficult to maintain, out of date, and less useful when too
many people are coming to the site for different things. For example, if the same site is
used for tracking customers, storing company policies, and sharing documents about
products under development, the site is much more difficult to organize and can quickly
become cluttered. On the other hand, if you have too many sites, it can be difficult to
locate the information that you need.
A number of factors go into the decision of how many sites and site collections you need,
including:
• How many users will use the sites.
• How the users are related to each other or interact with each other.
• How the users will use the site.
• What type of content you expect to store in the sites.
• The complexity of information that you are trying to organize.
Review your list of site purposes and users, and decide how many individual sites you
need.
36. 36
Worksheet action
Use the Site objectives and environments
worksheet (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?
LinkId=73269&clcid=0x409) to review your list
of sites.
Decide whether to use individual site
collections or subsites within one site
collection
You must decide whether to create your sites as top-level Web sites in separate site
collections, or as subsites within the same site collection. This decision is based on how
much the sites have in common with each other, whether you want to be able to manage
them individually, and whether you want them to share elements, such as navigation or
search.
Within a site collection, all sites can use the same:
• Navigation bars (top link bar and breadcrumb navigation)
• Content types
• Workflows
• Security groups
• Lookup fields across lists
• Search scope
• Feature set
Choose top-level Web sites in separate site collections when you:
• Need separate security for different sites.
Note:
Although you can have unique permissions for a subsite, at times you might
want to be sure that there are no users and permissions in common between
two sites. In those cases, you should use separate site collections.
• Might need to move the site collection to a different database in the future.
• Want to be able to back up or restore that site only.
37. 37
• Want to be able to scope a workflow to that site only.
• Want to have a separate search scope for that site only.
• Want to use quotas to separately manage the amount of space that each site
takes up.
• Want to decentralize your administration and have site collection
administrators perform tasks, such as approving requests for access or
confirming site use.
Choose subsites within the same site collection when you:
• Want to share navigation between sites.
• Want to have subsites inherit permissions from parent sites.
• Want to share lists between sites.
• Want to share design elements (such as themes or styles) between sites.
Worksheet action
Use the Site hierarchy choices worksheet
(http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?
LinkId=73140&clcid=0x409) to record your
decisions about whether to create separate site
collections or subsites within a site collection.
Design site hierarchy
Develop your site hierarchy by using whatever method works best for you. Be sure to
identify which sites are top-level sites in a site collection and which are subsites of other
sites.
Worksheet action
Use the Site hierarchy planning tool
(http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?
LinkId=73144&clcid=0x409) (a downloadable
Microsoft Office Visio file) or other method to
create a site hierarchy diagram, including all site
collections, top-level Web sites, and subsites
that you need.
38. 38
Worksheets
Use the following worksheets to plan sites and subsites:
• Site hierarchy choices worksheet (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?
LinkId=73140&clcid=0x409)
• Site hierarchy planning tool (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?
LinkId=73144&clcid=0x409) (a downloadable Microsoft Office Visio file)
• Site objectives and environments worksheet (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?
LinkId=73269&clcid=0x409)
39. 39
Plan site navigation
In this article:
• Create a site navigation diagram
• Understanding shared navigation
• Determine which sites share the top link bar
• Determine which additional links to add manually to the top link bar
• Worksheets
Use this article to design the navigation for your site.
Create a site navigation diagram
Make a diagram of the sites you want to create. For example, the following diagram is for
a small travel company named Margie's Travel. The company has a set of internal sites
to help them organize their core business, which is planning conventions.
40. 40
Your diagram might include a single site collection, such as the example for Margie's
Travel, or it might have multiple site collections if you have a more complex set of sites.
Be sure to include all top-level Web sites, subsites, Meeting Workspace or Document
Workspace sites, and other sites that you plan to create and leave room for future
expansion.
You might also want to include the lists and libraries for each site, especially if you are
deciding whether to create a subsite for document storage or one or more document
libraries. For more information about planning lists and document libraries, see Chapter
overview: Plan for content and search (Windows SharePoint Services).
Worksheet action
Use the Site hierarchy planning tool
(http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?
LinkId=73144&clcid=0x409) (a downloadable
Microsoft Office Visio file) or other method to
review your site hierarchy diagram. Add your
navigation plan to this diagram.
Understanding shared navigation
The top link bar appears at the top of all pages in the site, below the site title. You can
share the top link bar between sites in a site collection, or have a unique top link bar for
each site.
The top link bar can display two levels of sites in a site collection. For example, the top
link bar for the Margie's Travel site collection might contain links for Margie's Travel
Home, Office Management, Convention Planning, and Sales and Marketing. In this
example, the top link bar looks like the following:
Home | Office Management | Convention Planning | Sales and Marketing
Note:
Although the top link bar can display two levels of sites, this does not mean that
all subsites at the second level have to be displayed on the top link bar. You can
determine whether or not a subsite appears on the top link bar when you create
it, or by configuring the navigation later in Site Settings.
However, by default, sites at a third level in the hierarchy do not appear on the top link
bar for the top-level Web site, even if they share the navigation. For example, the Tips
and Reports sites would not appear on the top link bar of Margie's Travel Home because
41. 41
they are subsites of the Convention Planning site. If you want these sites to appear, you
can manually add them to the top link bar, or create them at the second level in the site
hierarchy (as subsites under Margie's Travel Home, rather than as subsites under the
Convention Planning site).
The top link bar cannot be shared between sites in different site collections. However,
you can always manually add a link to a site in a different site collection.
Determine which sites share the top link bar
If you want the Home tab of a subsite to take you to the subsite's home page instead of
the shared navigation's home page, then you should use unique navigation. Otherwise,
you should use shared navigation. For example, the Margie's Travel site collection could
share the top links among all of the second-level sites, so that all sites have the same
navigation:
Home | Office Management | Convention Planning | Sales and Marketing
This works for a small team, such as in Margie's Travel, where all of the users in the
organization work with all of the sites. Each user in the site collection uses each of the
sites, so a shared top link bar is useful. However, if the Convention Planning and Sales
and Marketing teams work fairly independently and do not need access to each other's
sites, then the navigation for Margie's Travel could be customized to be shared at the
second level, rather than the top level, as in the following:
Margie's Travel Home site: Home | Office Management
Convention Planning site: Convention Planning | Tips | Blogs
Sales and Marketing site: Sales and Marketing
Keep in mind that the new global breadcrumb navigation always contains a link back to
the top-level site in the site collection. Therefore, even though users of the Convention
Planning site cannot go to Margie's Travel Home from the top link bar, they can go
directly to it from the global breadcrumb navigation.
Note:
Although the choice of whether or not to share a navigation bar is made during
site creation, you can change this option later. You might have to manually create
links if you change your mind, but you can do so easily by using the Top Link
Bar page in Site Settings for the affected sites.
42. 42
Determine which additional links to add
manually to the top link bar
Whether or not you decide to share the top link bar, you can customize the top link bar to
include links to any other URL that you need. Depending on the extent of customization
you need, you can choose between the following methods to customize the top link bar:
• If you want to add, remove, or rearrange the links in a top link bar, use the
Top Link Bar page in Site Settings for the site.
• If you want to create an entirely custom top link bar, and apply it to all sites in
a site collection, or to sites in different site collections, use SharePoint Designer
or Microsoft Visual Studio. For more information, see the Windows SharePoint
Services (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=72207&clcid=0x409).
Worksheet action
Use the Site hierarchy choices worksheet
(http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?
LinkId=73140&clcid=0x409) to review your site
and subsite decisions and record decisions
about how to structure the site navigation.
Worksheets
Use the following worksheets to plan site navigation:
• Site hierarchy choices worksheet (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?
LinkId=73140&clcid=0x409)
• Site hierarchy planning tool (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?
LinkId=73144&clcid=0x409) (a downloadable Microsoft Office Visio file)
43. 43
Determine individual site content needs
and structure
In this article:
• Formal: Survey stakeholders and users
• Informal: Rough organization with room to evolve
Creating a site is a quick process, but deciding what content to put in the site and how to
organize the content so that it is useful takes some time. You can approach this task in
many ways, but two recommended ways are:
• Formal method Survey your stakeholders and users to determine what
they want to see in the site. Follow this formal process if you are creating a large
or strategic site, with multiple audiences coming to it for different needs. It takes
careful planning and review to ensure that all audiences can come to the site,
find what they need, contribute appropriately, and continue with their work.
• Informal method Begin with a rough organization for the site, and from
there, let it evolve based on user needs and feedback. Follow this informal
process if you have a small, more casual collaboration site where most of the
users are working on the same set of tasks in a similar way.
In the Determine objectives for sites article, you identified the objectives that most closely
aligned with your site needs. Use these objectives to help you identify a method for
determining your individual site content and structure.
• Document storage site Depending on anticipated complexity, you might
want to follow either the formal or informal method. If you are building a large site
to store documents from several disparate teams, then you should approach the
task of organization formally. If this is just a small storage space for working
documents used by your team, then an informal process might suffice.
• Communication site You might need to follow the more formal method and
determine exactly who is coming to the site for what information, and how to
guide them there.
• Collaboration site You can probably follow the informal method, allowing
the site to grow and evolve as needed.
The following sections explain the process for each method.
44. 44
Formal: Survey stakeholders and users
If you need to pursue a formal planning process for your sites, you need to create a
formal planning committee to obtain input from stakeholders and to perform the following
steps:
1. Determine audience needs by performing an audience and stakeholder
survey. Find out what information each audience segment or stakeholder expects
to see or interact with.
2. Determine content needs by performing a content survey. Review and
inventory current content, content planned for the future, and underused or hard-
to-find content, and estimate the expected change in content over time.
3. Design your information architecture. Include which lists or libraries are
needed to organize information, what needs to be promoted on home pages, and
whether or not you need custom navigation to expose the information
architecture to site users.
4. Ask your target users and stakeholders to review prototypes of the
information architecture. Evaluate whether they find the information they need in
your prototype.
Performing a content survey
Prior to planning your site structure, you must understand the content that you already
have in your organization. By conducting a survey of your current content, you can
identify content needs and design and deploy a solution that addresses those content
needs. There are several specific elements you should include in your content survey,
including:
• Number of documents.
• Location of documents.
• Document types, both in terms of file types and classification.
• People and business structure.
• Content approval processes and workflow.
You can use your content survey to prioritize important content and suggest a structure
for that content. Content planning usually proceeds in stages. In the first stage, you make
large-scale structural decisions, such as which divisions or projects have separate
content needs and how many sites are needed for each separate body of content. Then,
content planning teams for each site, usually aligned to divisions or projects, decide on
45. 45
the appropriate structure to address the content needs at their level. This might require
revision of the large-scale structure as new content needs are identified. You might go
through several planning stages before deployment, and continue to plan for changes
even after your sites are operational.
Informal: Rough organization with room to
evolve
When you are creating an informal site, you can start out with a less rigid process, which
might include the following steps:
1. If you are integrating existing content into a new site, take some time to
evaluate what content you have and what you want to put into the site.
2. Then, generate ideas about what you think the site should include and create
a quot;must havequot; list. For example, a team collaboration site might include:
• Documents (project documents, plans, proposals, presentations,
bids — anything that your team needs to read or contribute to).
• Team schedules (holiday schedules, individual work and vacation
schedules, project schedules, and so on). You can log shared events on
your site and display then in Calendar view.
• Contact information (team members, partners, customers, suppliers
and vendors, and so on). You can create separate contact lists for
internal and external contacts, or mix them by using fields that you can
sort and filter.
• Tasks or assignments (identify who is doing what).
• Frequently used links to other Web sites (including sites about
related projects or teams).
• Important announcements or news that your whole team needs to
hear about.
• A blog — perhaps as the public face for your collaboration site.
3. Review any user scenarios you might have and think about what you might
look for in the site if you were a particular user.
4. Add any missing elements to your original list, and if possible, have the list
reviewed by a few target users.
After you have identified the rough elements, you can get started with the site, and let the
team members work on the organization as they go.
47. 47
Chapter overview: Plan for content and
search
As the administrator, owner, or designer of a site based on Microsoft Windows
SharePoint Services 3.0, you are responsible for structuring the content in your site and
making it easy for users to find, contribute to, and work with that content. If you are
creating a casual or temporary collaboration site, you may be able to allow content to
evolve as the site is adopted. However, if you want your site to be useful in the long term,
you need to pay attention to how the information in your site is stored and displayed. The
following articles will assist you as you plan the content for your site:
• Plan lists (Windows SharePoint Services) provides information about which
lists to create, what field types to use for your data, and what views you may
need to create for your lists.
• Plan document libraries (Windows SharePoint Services) provides information
about how to store documents in your site and how to control versioning,
approval, and other processes so your documents stay up to date.
• Plan content types (Windows SharePoint Services) provides information
about when to use content types, and what content types to create so that similar
data in your site produces similar experiences.
• Plan workflows (Windows SharePoint Services) provides information about
when to create workflows and how to structure them.
• Plan for search (Windows SharePoint Services) provides information about
how searching works for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 and how to manage
search settings.
48. 48
Plan lists
A list is a collection of information that you share with Web site members. For example,
you can create a sign-up sheet for an event, track project status information, or share
upcoming vacation times on a team calendar.
In this article:
• Included lists
• About working with lists
• Plan for custom lists
• Worksheet
Included lists
Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 includes the following types of lists by
default:
• Announcements Use an announcements list to share news and status and
to provide reminders. Announcements support enhanced formatting with images,
hyperlinks, and formatted text.
• Calendar Use a calendar for all of your team's events, or for specific
situations such as company holidays. A calendar provides visual views — similar
to a desk or wall calendar — of your team events, including meetings, social
events, and all-day events. You can also track team milestones, such as
deadlines or product release dates, that are not related to a specific time interval.
If you are using an e-mail or calendar program that is compatible with Windows
SharePoint Services 3.0, you can view and update your Microsoft® SharePoint®
team calendar from the calendar program. You can also copy events from your
personal calendar onto the team calendar and vice versa. For example, you can
compare and update your calendar on the SharePoint site with dates from your
Microsoft Office Outlook® 2007 calendar, by viewing both calendars side by side
or overlaid with each other in Office Outlook 2007. In addition, you can enable e-
mail integration for this type of list and send meeting requests to your team site
calendar so that team meetings are automatically added to the team calendar.
• Contacts Use a contacts list to store information about people or groups
that you work with. If you are using an e-mail or contact management program
49. 49
that is compatible with Windows SharePoint Services 3.0, you can view and
update your contacts from your SharePoint site in the other program. For
example, you can update a list of all your organization's suppliers from Office
Outlook 2007. A contacts list doesn't actually manage the members of your site,
but it can be used to store and share contacts for your organization such as a list
of external vendors.
• Custom Although you can customize any list, you can also start with a
custom list and then customize that list by adding only the columns you want.
You can also create a list that is based on a spreadsheet, if you have a
spreadsheet program that is compatible with Windows SharePoint Services 3.0
or Windows SharePoint Services 2.0, and Microsoft Internet Explorer. For
example, you can import a list from one that you created with Microsoft Office
Excel® 2007 to store and manage contracts with vendors.
• Discussion boards Use a discussion board to provide a central place to
record and store team discussions. The format of a discussion board is similar to
an Internet news group. If your administrator has enabled lists on your site to
receive e-mail, discussion boards can store e-mail discussions from most
common e-mail programs. For example, you can create a discussion board for
your organization's new product release. If you are using an e-mail program that
is compatible with Windows SharePoint Services 3.0, you can view and update
your discussion board while working in the other program.
• Issue tracking Use an issue-tracking list to store information about specific
issues, such as support issues, and track their progress. You can assign issues,
categorize them, and relate issues to each other. For example, you can create an
issue-tracking list to manage customer service problems and solutions. You can
also comment on issues each time you edit them, creating a history of comments
without altering the previous comments about the issue. For example, a
customer service representative can record each step taken to resolve a problem
and the results.
• Links Use a links list as a central location for links to the Web, your
company's intranet, and other resources. For example, you might create a list of
links to your customers' Web sites.
• Project tasks To store information that is similar to a task list (see below)
but also provide a visual or Gantt view with progress bars, use a project task list.
You can track the status and percentage complete as a task moves toward
completion. If you are using an e-mail or task management program that is
compatible with Windows SharePoint Services 3.0, you can view and update
your project tasks from your SharePoint site in your other program. For example,
you can create a task list on your SharePoint site to identify and assign the work
