Designing and applying information architecture for SharePoint

After some years developing projects with Microsoft Sharepoint, a part that many consultants and IT managers leave behind when building Sharepoint solution and web in general, is the way content are organized and the formulas used to build the information architecture of the solution.

 

Information Architecture can be described as “the science of organizing and labeling websites, intranets, online communities and software to support usability.”

In detail and having Sharepoint as a starting point when we talk about Information Architecture we include:

• site taxonomy/structure
• metadata
• search schema
• navigation
• content tree

I Navigation i.e. is automatically driven by the site’s structure, your site taxonomy will impact the usability of your navigation.

As better designed and adapted to the organization is an Information architecture more close you are to achieve the following goals:

1. Usability – Sites that lack a well-thought out IA tend to be less usable.  It’s more difficult to find information and site navigation tends to be substandard or confusing.
2. Compliance – Policies that allow us to adhere to compliance regulations are quite often driven by metadata.  If the metadata design is lacking, it may be difficult or impossible to stay in compliance, which can have tremendous legal and financial repercussions.
3. Site Management/Administration – A strong IA will help prevent site sprawl and may help address storage requirements or goals.

Besides my opinion i would like in this post to share with you some off the resources i pass to my colleagues and trainees:

• Channel 9 video about the topic
• Technet base article https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc262900.aspx
• Critical steps for a good Sharepoint architecture
• Sharegate best pratices about governace and information architecture
• A good article explain the best pratices : http://highmonkey.com/HighMonkeySite/media/slides/How-Information-Architecture-can-improve-in-SharePoint-2013.pdf
• A fantastic presentation with a description of some best practices associated with this topic http://www.slideshare.net/slemieux/sharepoint-information-architecture-best-practices

 

 

 

 

Sharepoint in the cloud (Azure or Office)

Nowadays when we go to a client or a fellow developing Sharepoint and we talk about Microsoft Sharepoint on the cloud a doubt always arise “are we talking about a Virtual machine on the cloud or Office 365? “.

In the past 3 years had been almost a war to justified to clients the options, especially with the push Microsoft had been making around Office 365. Today i’ had read a post from Chris McNulty that really summarizes what i had been writing saying and teaching about the theme (you can find the original post here http://www.cmswire.com/cms/information-management/sharepoint-in-the-clouds-choosing-between-office-365-or-azure-027187.php).

We hope that this can help you to take the right decision and have a clear idea about the differences. All the credits off this post go to CMSWire and Chris McNulty.

”

SharePoint in the Clouds: Choosing Between Office 365 or Azure
There are dozens of cloud hosting options for SharePoint, beyond Office 365. Amazon, Rackspace and Fpweb offer compelling alternatives to Microsoft’s public cloud for SharePoint online with a mix of capabilities.

These capabilities fall on the spectrum between two options:

1. IaaS (Infrastructure as a service) — cloud hosted VMs on which YOU install Windows, SQL, SharePoint. For better or worse, you have complete control over administration and customization.
2. SaaS (Software as a service) — fully managed solution delivering SharePoint services with full subscribed provider managed availability, backup, performance, installation, etc. For better or worse, you have limited control of administration and customization.

Now, it’s debatable that Office 365 itself is a pure SaaS solution — you carry a lot of responsibility for managing your own security and content. Let’s suppose that Azure hosted virtual machines represent IaaS and Office 365 represents SaaS.

Decisions, Decisions

How best to decide? Try the following survey. Give yourself points for each answer, and use the key at the end to see how your situation compares:

Answer Key

<40

You are comparatively free of the history and capabilities of many on-premises environments. As a result, you’re a strong candidate for Office 365. You will get immediate benefits from the platform services without needing to disrupt existing content patterns or internal processes.

41-80

You have the classic posture of an on-premises environment. If you are trying to gain some of the advantages of the cloud, an IaaS solution like Azure VMs may be a stronger fit for your organization. Based on your use cases, a hybrid between O365 and Azure may also introduce some of the service simplicity of Office 365 with the complete admin control from Azure.

>80

On premises forever! You can work on other projects for the year while your needs progress and the solutions improve.

Obviously, your use cases may vary significantly form those mentioned here. This is intended to help you access your success criteria relative to the business cases and economics. Best of luck with your cloud(s) evolution.

“

Sharepoint 2013 updates & resources

 

One of the things about Sharepoint that we should always be aware is updates and evolutions, in this post i will share some information about Sharepoint 2013 updates. And remember test updates always before you install them on your production machine.

(image credits to http://www.fifighter.com)

In the following Page you can find every updates launched until now for Sharepoint 2013

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepoint/jj891062.aspx

In the following table you can see the different build number’s and the updates and cumulative updates related with that, we will try to keep this table updated.

Version	Build #	Type	Server Package (KB)	Foundation Package (KB)	Language specific	Notes
Public Beta Preview	15.0.4128.1014	Beta	n/a	n/a	yes	Known issues
SPS 2013 RTM	15.0.4420.1017	RTM	n/a	n/a	yes	Setup, Install
Dec. 2012 Fix	15.0.4433.1506	update	2752058 2752001	n/a	yes	Known Issue
March 2013	15.0.4481.1005	PU	2767999	2768000	global	New Baseline
April 2013	15.0.4505.1002	CU	–	2751999	global	Known Issue
April 2013	15.0.4505.1005	CU	2726992	–	global	Known Issue
June 2013	15.0.4517.1003	CU		2817346	global	Known Issue
June 2013	15.0.4517.1005	CU	2817414	–	global	Known Issue
August 2013	15.0.4535.1000	CU	2817616	2817517	global	see KB’s

Long the way there had been released some individual HotFixes

Sharepoint Server:

• KB 2737983 – Update for Microsoft SharePoint Enterprise Server 2013 – update for Access 2013/SharePoint Server 2013
• KB 2752001 – Update for Microsoft SharePoint Enterprise Server 2013 – update for Microsoft SharePoint Server 2013
• KB 2752058 – Update for Microsoft SharePoint Enterprise Server 2013 – update for Microsoft SharePoint Server 2013
• KB 2760355 – Update for Microsoft SharePoint Enterprise Server 2013 – update for Microsoft SharePoint Server 2013

SharePoint Designer:

• KB 2752031 – Update for Microsoft SharePoint Designer 2013, December 11, 2012
• KB 2767858 – Update for Microsoft SharePoint Designer 2013, February 12, 2013
• KB 2768343 – SharePoint Designer 2013 hotfix package (Spd-x-none.msp): June 11, 2013
• KB 2817507 – SharePoint Designer 2013 hotfix package (Spd-x-none.msp): August 13, 2013 

Sharepoint 2013 up and runing on Microsoft Cloud

I had been doing some experiences of Sharepoint 2013 in the Windows Azure Platform. At this time i am finishing a full powershell script to help to automate this process.

But for the experience of build from scratch a Sharepoint 2013 Farm you have around the web a lot of material. Not all references drive you to a well succeeded installation, so i decided to share with you an excellent Technet blog post that in a few steps can lead you to a succeeded installation if you are needing to build a simple farm like  lab or staging environment.

”

Let’s Get Started!

In this step-by-step guide, you will learn how to:

• Register a DNS Server in Windows Azure
• Define a Virtual Network in Windows Azure
• Configure Windows Server Active Directory in a Windows Azure VM
• Configure SQL Server 2012 in a Windows Azure VM
• Configure SharePoint Server 2013 in a Windows Azure VM

Exercise 1: Register a DNS Server in Windows Azure

Register the internal IP address that our domain controller VM will be using for Active Directory-integrated Dynamic DNS services by performing the following steps:

1. Sign in at the Windows Azure Management Portal with the logon credentials used when you signed up for your Free Windows Azure Trial.
2. Select Networks located on the side navigation panel on the Windows Azure Management Portal page.
3. Click the +NEW button located on the bottom navigation bar and select Networks | Virtual Network | Register DNS Server.
4. Complete the DNS Server fields as follows:- NAME: XXXlabdns01
   – DNS Server IP Address: 10.0.0.4
5. Click the REGISTER DNS SERVER button.

Exercise 2: Define a Virtual Network in Windows Azure

Define a common virtual network in Windows Azure for running Active Directory, Database and SharePoint virtual machines by performing the following steps:

1. Sign in at the Windows Azure Management Portal with the logon credentials used when you signed up for your Free Windows Azure Trial.
2. Select Networks located on the side navigation panel on the Windows Azure Management Portal page.
3. Click the +NEW button located on the bottom navigation bar and select Networks | Virtual Network | Quick Create.
4. Complete the Virtual Network fields as follows:- NAME: XXXlabnet01
   – Address Space: 10.—.—.—
   – Maximum VM Count: 4096 [CIDR: /20]
   – Affinity Group: Select the Affinity Group defined in the Getting Started steps from the Prerequisitessection above.
   – Connect to Existing DNS: Select XXXlabdns01 – the DNS Server registered in Exercise 1 above.
5. Click the CREATE A VIRTUAL NETWORK button.

Exercise 3: Configure Windows Server Active Directory in a Windows Azure VM

Provision a new Windows Azure VM to run a Windows Server Active Directory domain controller in a new Active Directory forest by performing the following steps:

1. Sign in at the Windows Azure Management Portal with the logon credentials used when you signed up for your Free Windows Azure Trial.
2. Select Virtual Machines located on the side navigation panel on the Windows Azure Management Portal page.
3. Click the +NEW button located on the bottom navigation bar and select Compute | Virtual Machines | From Gallery.
4. In the Virtual Machine Operating System Selection list, select Windows Server 2012 Datacenter and click the  button.
5. On the Virtual Machine Configuration page, complete the fields as follows:- Version Release Date: Select the latest version release date to build a new VM with the latest OS updates applied.
   – Virtual Machine Name: XXXlabad01
   – New User Name: Choose a secure local Administrator user account to provision.
   – New Password and Confirm Password fields: Choose and confirm a new local Administrator password.
   – Size: Small (1 core, 1.75GB Memory)

   Click the  button to continue.

   Note: It is suggested to use secure passwords for Administrator users and service accounts, as Windows Azure virtual machines could be accessible from the Internet knowing just their DNS.  You can also read this document on the Microsoft Security website that will help you select a secure password:http://www.microsoft.com/security/online-privacy/passwords-create.aspx.

6. On the Virtual Machine Mode page, complete the fields as follows:- Standalone Virtual Machine: Selected
   – DNS Name: XXXlabad01.cloudapp.net
   – Storage Account: Select the Storage Account defined in the Getting Started steps from thePrerequisites section above.
   – Region/Affinity Group/Virtual Network: Select XXXlabnet01 – the Virtual Network defined inExercise 2 above.
   – Virtual Network Subnets: Select Subnet-1 (10.0.0.0/23)

   Click the  button to continue.

7. On the Virtual Machine Options page, click the  button to begin provisioning the new virtual machine.As the new virtual machine is being provisioned, you will see the Status column on the Virtual Machines page of the Windows Azure Management Portal cycle through several values includingStopped, Stopped (Provisioning), and Running (Provisioning).  When provisioning for this new Virtual Machine is completed, the Status column will display a value of Running and you may continue with the next step in this guide.
8. After the new virtual machine has finished provisioning, click on the name ( XXXlabad01 ) of the new Virtual Machine displayed on the Virtual Machines page of the Windows Azure Management Portal.
9. On the virtual machine Dashboard page for XXXlabad01, make note of the Internal IP Addressdisplayed on this page located on the right-side of the page.  This IP address should be listed as10.0.0.4.If a different internal IP address is displayed, the virtual network and/or virtual machine configuration was not completed correctly.  In this case, click the DELETE button located on the bottom toolbar of the virtual machine details page for XXXlabad01, and go back to Exercise 2 and Exercise 3 to confirm that all steps were completed correctly.
10. On the virtual machine Dashboard page for XXXlabad01, click the Attach button located on the bottom navigation toolbar and select Attach Empty Disk.  Complete the following fields on the Attach an empty disk to the virtual machine form:- Name: XXXlabad01-data01
    – Size: 10 GB
    – Host Cache Preference: None

    Click the  button to create and attach the a new virtual hard disk to virtual machine XXXlabad01.

11. On the virtual machine Dashboard page for XXXlabad01, click the Connect button located on the bottom navigation toolbar and click the Open button to launch a Remote Desktop Connection to the console of this virtual machine.  Logon at the console of your virtual machine with the local Administrator credentials defined in Step 5 above.
12. From the Remote Desktop console of XXXlabad01, create a new partition on the additional data disk attached above in Step 10 and format this partition as a new F: NTFS volume.  This volume will be used for NTDS DIT database, log and SYSVOL folder locations.If you need additional guidance to complete this step, feel free to leverage the following study guide for assistance: Windows Server 2012 “Early Experts” Challenge – Configure Local Storage
13. Using the Server Manager tool, install Active Directory Domain Services and promote this server to a domain controller in a new forest with the following parameters:- Active Directory Forest name: contoso.com
    – Volume Location for NTDS database, log and SYSVOL folders: F:

    If you need additional guidance to complete this step, feel free to leverage the following study guide for assistance: Windows Server 2012 “Early Experts” Challenge – Install and Administer Active Directory

14. After Active Directory has been installed, create the following user accounts that will be used when installing and configuring SharePoint Server 2013 later in this step-by-step guide:- CONTOSO\sp_farm – SharePoint Farm Data Access Account
    – CONTOSO\sp_serviceapps – SharePoint Farm Service Applications Account

    If you need additional guidance to complete this step, feel free to leverage the following study guide for assistance: Windows Server 2012 “Early Experts” Challenge – Install and Administer Active Directory

The configuration for this virtual machine is now complete, and you may continue with the next exercise in this step-by-step guide.

Exercise 4: Configure SQL Server 2012 in a Windows Azure VM

Provision a new Windows Azure VM to run SQL Server 2012 by performing the following steps:

1. Sign in at the Windows Azure Management Portal with the logon credentials used when you signed up for your Free Windows Azure Trial.
2. Select Virtual Machines located on the side navigation panel on the Windows Azure Management Portal page.
3. Click the +NEW button located on the bottom navigation bar and select Compute | Virtual Machines | From Gallery.
4. In the Virtual Machine Operating System Selection list, select SQL Server 2012 SP1 Enterprise and click the  button.
5. On the Virtual Machine Configuration page, complete the fields as follows:- Virtual Machine Name: XXXlabdb01
   – New User Name: Choose a secure local Administrator user account to provision.
   – New Password and Confirm Password fields: Choose and confirm a new local Administrator password.
   – Size: Medium (2 cores, 3.5GB Memory)

   Click the  button to continue.

6. On the Virtual Machine Mode page, complete the fields as follows:- Standalone Virtual Machine: Selected
   – DNS Name: XXXlabdb01.cloudapp.net
   – Storage Account: Select the Storage Account defined in the Getting Started steps from thePrerequisites section above.
   – Region/Affinity Group/Virtual Network: Select XXXlabnet01 – the Virtual Network defined inExercise 2 above.
   – Virtual Network Subnets: Select Subnet-1 (10.0.0.0/23)

   Click the  button to continue.

7. On the Virtual Machine Options page, click the  button to begin provisioning the new virtual machine.As the new virtual machine is being provisioned, you will see the Status column on the Virtual Machines page of the Windows Azure Management Portal cycle through several values includingStopped, Stopped (Provisioning), and Running (Provisioning).  When provisioning for this new Virtual Machine is completed, the Status column will display a value of Running and you may continue with the next step in this guide.
8. After the new virtual machine has finished provisioning, click on the name ( XXXlabdb01 ) of the new Virtual Machine displayed on the Virtual Machines page of the Windows Azure Management Portal.
9. On the virtual machine Dashboard page for XXXlabdb01, make note of the Internal IP Addressdisplayed on this page.  This IP address should be listed as 10.0.0.5.If a different internal IP address is displayed, the virtual network and/or virtual machine configuration was not completed correctly.  In this case, click the DELETE button located on the bottom toolbar of the virtual machine details page for XXXlabdb01, and go back to Exercise 2 and Exercise 3 to confirm that all steps were completed correctly.
10. On the virtual machine Dashboard page for XXXlabdb01, click the Attach button located on the bottom navigation toolbar and select Attach Empty Disk.  Complete the following fields on the Attach an empty disk to the virtual machine form:- Name: XXXlabdb01-data01
    – Size: 50 GB
    – Host Cache Preference: None

    Click the  button to create and attach the a new virtual hard disk to virtual machine XXXlabdb01.

11. On the virtual machine Dashboard page for XXXlabdb01, click the Connect button located on the bottom navigation toolbar and click the Open button to launch a Remote Desktop Connection to the console of this virtual machine.  Logon at the console of your virtual machine with the local Administrator credentials defined in Step 5 above.
12. From the Remote Desktop console of XXXlabdb01, create a new partition on the additional data disk attached above in Step 10 and format this partition as a new F: NTFS volume. After formatting this new volume, create the following folders:
    1. Create F:\MSSQL folder
    2. Create F:\MSSQL\DATA folder
    3. Create F:\MSSQL\LOGS folder
    4. Create F:\MSSQL\BACKUP folder
13. Open SQL Server Management Studio from Start | All Programs | Microsoft SQL Server 2012 | SQL Server Management Studio and update default folder locations to the F: volume.
    1. Connect to the SQL Server 2012 default instance using your Windows Account.
    2. Now, you will update the database’s default locations for DATA, LOGS and BACKUP folders. To do this, right click on your SQL Server instance and select Properties.
    3. Select Database Settings from the left side pane.
    4. Locate the Database default locations section and update the default values for each path to point to the new folder paths defined above in Step 12.
    5. Close SQL Server Management Studio.
14. In order to allow SharePoint to connect to the SQL Server, you will need to add an Inbound Rule for the SQL Server requests in the Windows Firewall. To do this, open Windows Firewall with Advanced Security from Start | All Programs | Administrative Tools.
    1. Select Inbound Rules node, right-click it and select New Rule to open the New Inbound Rule Wizard.
    2. In the Rule Type page, select Port and click Next.
    3. In Protocols and Ports page, leave TCP selected, select Specific local ports, and set its value to1433. Click Next to continue.
    4. In the Action page, make sure that Allow the connection is selected and click Next.
    5. In the Profile page, leave the default values and click Next.
    6. In the Name page, set the Inbound Rule’s Name to SQLServerRule and click Finish
    7. Close Windows Firewall with Advanced Security window.
15. Using the Server Manager tool, join this server to the contoso.com domain and restart the server to complete the domain join operation.
16. After the server restarts, connect again via Remote Desktop to the server’s console and login with the local Administrator credentials defined above in Step 5.
17. Open SQL Server Management Studio from Start | All Programs | Microsoft SQL Server 2012 | SQL Server Management Studio and add the CONTOSO\Administrator user to SQL Server with the Sysadmin server role selected.
    1. Expand Security folder within the SQL Server instance. Right-click Logins folder and select New Login.
    2. In the General section, set the Login name to CONTOSO\Administrator, and select theWindows Authentication option.
    3. Click Server Roles on the left pane.  Select the checkbox for the Sysadmin server role.
    4. Click the OK button and close SQL Server Management Studio.

The configuration for this virtual machine is now complete, and you may continue with the next exercise in this step-by-step guide.

Exercise 5: Configure SharePoint Server 2013 in a Windows Azure VM

Provision a new Windows Azure VM to run SharePoint Server 2013 by performing the following steps:

1. Sign in at the Windows Azure Management Portal with the logon credentials used when you signed up for your Free Windows Azure Trial.
2. Select Virtual Machines located on the side navigation panel on the Windows Azure Management Portal page.
3. Click the +NEW button located on the bottom navigation bar and select Compute | Virtual Machines | From Gallery.
4. In the Virtual Machine Operating System Selection list, select SharePoint Server 2013 Trial and click the  button.
5. On the Virtual Machine Configuration page, complete the fields as follows:- Virtual Machine Name: XXXlabapp01
   – New User Name: Choose a secure local Administrator user account to provision.
   – New Password and Confirm Password fields: Choose and confirm a new local Administrator password.
   – Size: Large (4 cores, 7GB Memory)

   Click the  button to continue.

6. On the Virtual Machine Mode page, complete the fields as follows:- Standalone Virtual Machine: Selected
   – DNS Name: XXXlabapp01.cloudapp.net
   – Storage Account: Select the Storage Account defined in the Getting Started steps from thePrerequisites section above.
   – Region/Affinity Group/Virtual Network: Select XXXlabnet01 – the Virtual Network defined inExercise 2 above.
   – Virtual Network Subnets: Select Subnet-1 (10.0.0.0/23)

   Click the  button to continue.

7. On the Virtual Machine Options page, click the  button to begin provisioning the new virtual machine.As the new virtual machine is being provisioned, you will see the Status column on the Virtual Machines page of the Windows Azure Management Portal cycle through several values includingStopped, Stopped (Provisioning), and Running (Provisioning).  When provisioning for this new Virtual Machine is completed, the Status column will display a value of Running and you may continue with the next step in this guide.
8. After the new virtual machine has finished provisioning, click on the name ( XXXlabapp01 ) of the new Virtual Machine displayed on the Virtual Machines page of the Windows Azure Management Portal.
9. On the virtual machine Dashboard page for XXXlabapp01, make note of the Internal IP Addressdisplayed on this page.  This IP address should be listed as 10.0.0.6.If a different internal IP address is displayed, the virtual network and/or virtual machine configuration was not completed correctly.  In this case, click the DELETE button located on the bottom toolbar of the virtual machine details page for XXXlabapp01, and go back to Exercise 2,  Exercise 3 and Exercise 4 to confirm that all steps were completed correctly.
10. On the virtual machine Dashboard page for XXXlabapp01, click the Connect button located on the bottom navigation toolbar and click the Open button to launch a Remote Desktop Connection to the console of this virtual machine.  Logon at the console of your virtual machine with the local Administrator credentials defined in Step 5 above.
11. In the Server Manager tool, click on Local Server in the left navigation pane and click on theWorkgroup option.  Join this server to the contoso.com domain and restart the server to complete the domain join operation.
12. After the server restarts, re-establish a Remote Desktop connection to the server and logon with theCONTOSO\Administrator domain user credentials defined earlier in Exercise 3.
13. In the Server Manager tool, click on Local Server in the left navigation pane and select IE Enhanced Security Configuration.  Turn off enhanced security for Administrators and click the OK button.Note: Modifying Internet Explorer Enhanced Security configurations is not good practice for production environments and is only for the purpose of this particular step-by-step lab guide.
14. On the Desktop, double-click on the SharePoint 2013 Products Configuration Wizard shortcut to launch the configuration wizard.  Click the Next button to continue. If prompted to start or reset services, click the Yes button.
15. In the SharePoint Products Configuration Wizard, when prompted on the Connect to server farm dialog, select the option to Create a new server farm.
16. On the Specify Configuration Database Settings, specify the following values for each field:- Database Server: XXXlabdb01
    – Username: CONTOSO\sp_farm
    – Password: Type the password specified when the sp_farm domain user account was created earlier inExercise 3, Step 14.
17. Click the Next > button and accept all other default values in the SharePoint Products Configuration Wizard.  Click the Finish button when prompted to complete the wizard.
18. The SharePoint 2013 Central Administration web page should launch automatically.  When prompted, click the Start the Wizard button to begin the Initial Farm Configuration Wizard.
19. When prompted for Service Account, type the CONTOSO\sp_serviceapps domain username and password specified when this account was created earlier in Exercise 3, Step 14.
20. Accept all other default values and click the Next > button to continue.
21. On the Create a Site Collection page, create a new top-level Intranet site collection using the following field values:- Title and Description: Enter your preferred Title and Description for the new site collection
    – URL: Select the root URL path – http://XXXlabapp01/
    – Select experience version: 2013
    – Select a template: Publishing | Publishing Portal

    Click the OK button to provision a new top-level Intranet site collection.

    After the new top-level Intranet site collection is provisioned, test navigating to the URL for this site collection from within the Remote Desktop session to the server.

22. On the SharePoint 2013 Central Administration site, configure a Public URL alternate access mapping for accessing the new top-level Intranet site collection from the Internet.
    1. On the Central Administration site home page, click the Configure alternate access mappingslink.
    2. On the Alternate Access Mappings page, click the Edit Public URLs link.
    3. On the Edit Public Zone URLs page, select and specify the following values:- Alternate Access Mapping Collection: SharePoint – 80
       – Internet: http://XXXlabapp01.cloudapp.net

       Click the Save button to complete the Alternate Access Mapping configuration.

23. Close the Remote Desktop session to the server.
24. Sign in at the Windows Azure Management Portal with the logon credentials used when you signed up for your Free Windows Azure Trial.
25. Select Virtual Machines located on the side navigation panel on the Windows Azure Management Portal page.
26. On the Virtual Machines page, click on the name of the SharePoint virtual machine – XXXlabapp01.
27. On the XXXlabapp01 virtual machine details page, click on Endpoints in the top navigation area of the page.
28. Click the +Add Endpoint button in the bottom navigation bar of the page to define a new virtual machine endpoint that will permit HTTP web traffic inbound to the SharePoint virtual machine.
29. On the Add an endpoint to a virtual machine form, select the Add Endpoint option and click the button to continue.
30. On the Specify the details of the endpoint form, specify the following field values:- Name: WebHTTP
    – Protocol: TCP
    – Public Port: 80
    – Private Port: 80

    Click the  button to create a new endpoint definition that will permit inbound web traffic to the SharePoint virtual machine.

31. After the endpoint configuration has been successfully applied, test browsing to the following public URL to confirm that you are able to access the Intranet site collection that is configured on SharePoint:- URL: http://XXXlabapp01.cloudapp.net

The configuration for this virtual machine is now complete, and you may continue with the next exercise in this step-by-step guide. Be sure to shutdown your lab VMs from the Windows Azure Management Portal when not in use to save on compute charges.

”

Original post at http://blogs.technet.com/b/keithmayer/archive/2013/07/15/step-by-step-build-a-free-sharepoint-2013-lab-in-the-cloud-with-windows-azure-31-days-of-servers-in-the-cloud-part-7-of-31.aspx#.Ukgoo4afjSw.

Sharepoint 2013 the development sprint had start

Looks like Sharepoint 2013 is in that point where the core developer’s architects and it’s should start to study. True!

 

Ihad spent some days in the last month looking to the new features and enchantments of the framework and i will write some posts about the technology, and at may main job i will start to schedule the training of my Sharepoint Team.

For the Sharepoint developer’s in the house i will recommend you to start looking to this http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/jj163091(v=office.15).aspx

 

There are some changes and upgrades and i truly believe that the Sharepoint development had been promoted to a major league in the 2013 version so don’ t let a lot time pass don’t miss this train 🙂