Slide presentation on contextual design considerations of SharePoint logical architecture and site taxonomies.

1. Dan Usher
21 May 2009

2. Introduction
Logical Architecture
Taxonomy
Project Planning
Technical Requirements
Scenarios
Conclusion

3. Who am I?
What environments have I worked in?
What have I seen?
What is this talk about?

4. Logical Architectures skipped…
Site Collections popping up all over the place…
Permissions are a mess…
Where’d my admin access go….
Information can’t be found…
Search isn’t working right…

5. Collaboration Portals
Content
Enterprise Search
Management
Workflow
Business
Process and Intelligence
Forms

6. What’s the context of your use for SharePoint?
What are you trying to accomplish with
SharePoint?
Do you need to be able to roll up data?
Re-utilize SharePoint groups
Workflow tools?
Consider the context of your environment and
requirements
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7. Considerations, Tradeoffs and Compromises to
meet the Context
Assessing the context…
What capabilities are sought after?
What are the environment limitations?
Are you building into the cloud?
Consider the context…

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9. What defines a logical architecture?
Why is a logical architecture important?
How can you really make use of a logical
architecture?
What does a logical architecture consist of and
look like?
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10. Web Zones Web Applications
(Intranet, Extranet, Int Multiple SSPs
ernet, etc.) and Zone My Sites
Policies Collaborative Team
Different Sites
Authentication Models Secure Content
Content Databases Authoring and
Publishing
Application Pools Site Collections
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11. Windows SharePoint Services Example
Reference: http://bit.ly/sps-ref-wssLA

12. Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 Logical Architecture Example
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Reference: http://bit.ly/sps-ref-mossLA

13. Extranet
Public Facing Website
Permissions models
Authentication Schemes
Interoperability with other applications
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14. Taxonomy is the science (and art) of classifying
a broad range of things. Originally used to
classify plants and animals –
phylum, genus, species, etc. – taxonomy is now
applied to everything from product inventory to
web sites.
Reference: http://bit.ly/sps-ref-tax
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15. SharePoint Farms
Web Applications
Collections of Site Collections
Collections of Sites
Managed Paths
Nesting Paths
Reflection of the Organization
Requires out of the box thinking
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16. Blog
(/blog)
Root Site Search Center
/ (/search)
Personal
(/personal)
SharePoint Monkey
sharepointmonkey.org
Development
(/work/development)
Work Sites Networking
/work/ (/work/networking)
SharePoint
(/work/sharepoint)

17. Why not just deposit everything in a single
document library?
Why not just use search for everything?
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18. Inheritance and Breaking it…
…and re-inheriting it
Defined in a Governance Plan hopefully?
SharePoint Groups
AD / LDAP Groups
Single Users
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19. Site collections bridge logical architecture and
information architecture. The design goals for
site collections in the model are to satisfy
requirements for URL design and to create
logical divisions of content.*
Reference: http://bit.ly/sps-ref-sc
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20. How does a project plan fit into
logical architectures and taxonomies?
Or rather…
How does a logical architecture and taxonomy
fit into a project plan… 
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21. http://go.spdan.com/hmewo
Microsoft has a project plan for planning…
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22. What will the system do?
Collaboration?
Publishing?
Development Platform?
How big will the system be?
How will it be accessed?
What will be the level of usage?
Are we dealing with a cross domain solution?
SQL Mirroring or Clustering?
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23. Surrounding Infrastructure
System Memory
IIS
Number of Web Applications
Number of Identity Pools
Number of sites / site collections
DNS
Authentication Methods
PKI / SSL / Wildcard Certificates
Network Interfaces / IP Addresses
Storage
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24. Small Organization (250-300)
Document Management
Collaboration
Federation
Low Hardware / Software Budget
Information Rollups
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25. Taxonomy may reflect an organization’s natural
divisions
Single Site Collection rolls up information easily
Works well with small numbers of users
“Out of the box method”
Reutilizes Site Columns and Content Types
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26. Small Farm
Use of SharePoint
Designer
User Management
Tool
ADFS
Taxonomy using Sites
Rolled Up Information
Security Group
Madness
User Training
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28. Pirate Nosh Logical Architecture Example
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30. Collaboration
Document Management
Workflow
Records Management
Large User base - 100k users
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31. Complex Permissions
Extranet Access
Smartcard Authentication
High Availability
Integrity of Data
AD Infrastructure - Security Groups
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32. Integration of 3rd Rights Management
Party Records Server
Management Solution User Management
Use of the DOD through AD or Third
5015.2 Record's Party Tools
Management Pack Large Farm
with a Microsoft
Partner
Third Party Wiki
Integration
(Confluence, MediaWi
ki, etc.)
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33. SQL Configuration Log Shipping
Mirroring - remove the Third Party Mirroring
complexity Tool
Clustering - better
scalability
Split DNS
Mirror the data of the WCM System
cluster - best of both Captaris, K2, Nintex?
worlds
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34. Typically doesn’t get planned overnight
May or may not reflect what an organization
actually looks like
Best to plan it out with time
Discover what is out there…
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35. Binary Brewery Logical Architecture Example
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37. Binary Brewery Physical Architecture Example
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38. Each SharePoint implementation project requires
that you examine the contextual considerations
of the environment and define a vision.
Defining such a vision will provide goals to work
toward, to make your implementation both
successful and effective to end users.
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39. Your requirements drive your taxonomy and
logical architecture...
Which in turn drive your hardware
requirements...
If you don't know what you're going to use
SharePoint for, start off small and scale your
farm up as you go...
Crawl… Walk… Run…
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40. What you start with on Day One isn’t what
you’re going to end up with in…
Six months…
A year…
Day 472…
Remain Flexible!!!
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41. User adoption in and of itself will cause your
environment to change…
…adapt to the context as it changes.
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43. Follow me on Twitter – twitter.com/usher
Follow my blog –
http://www.sharepointdan.com
IM?
gTalk danusher79
Live danusher@live.com
E-mail: dan@spdan.com
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