WSS MOSS SharePoint version numbers

This is a very nice article describing how to find out which version of SharePoint you are running.

http://www.mindsharpblogs.com/penny/articles/481.aspx

Another great post regarding SharePoint versions from MindSharp.

Excel 2007 Add-in: Synchronizing Tables with SharePoint Lists

This is a nice add-in to Excel that lets it do a two way sync with a SharePoint list.

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=25836e52-1892-4e17-ac08-5df13cfc5295&DisplayLang=en

And this explains how to use it. Publishing and Synchronizing Excel 2007 Tables to SharePoint Lists

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb462636(office.11).aspx

Outlook BCM running on SQL Server 2008

Will BCM 2007 using a shared database work on SQL Server 2008? The answer is not clear. Technically there is no reason why it shouldn't. However, it has not been tested with SQL 2008 and the increased security in SQL 2008 may cause issues.

Should you move to SQL 2008 if you are using a BCM 2007 shared database? Probably not.

Can you? Yes, but you're pretty much on your own to troubleshoot any issues that arise to make it work correctly.

If you have done this, shoot me a note and let me know the steps you took or issues you ran into, I'm sure others would love to get feedback on how it went.

Improve Outlook BCM Business Contact Manager Performance - Three Outlook BCM Performance Tips

Many complaints about BCM is that it is a performance hog, it's slow, unresponsive, it freezes Outlook... blah blah blah. Well let's try to improve it a bit shall we.

First, if you aren't using the email linking feature then shut it off. I believe it's off by default but if you still go into Business Contact Manager -> Manage E-Mail Auto Linking, there are two tabs one for Emails and one for Folders. Click the "Clear All" button on both tabs and click ok.

Second, if you are in a shared database environment, each machine with BCM installed is hitting your SQL server every second. This creates a lot of traffice and a lot of performance problems. You most likely don't need to get your BCM data updated every second. This update is called a Polling Interval. This Polling Interval was supposedly set higher if you installed the service pack for BCM, however this probably isn't the case. So you need to manually set it higher. To do this open up Registry Editor on each client machine. The path to the key is HKCU -> Software -> Microsoft -> Business Solutions eCRM. Create a DWORD key in that folder called PollingInterval. Modify it's value and set the Decimal value to 180000 which is 180000ms or 3 minutes. Each minute is 60000ms so the Decimal value for one minute would be 60000. This way the client machine will only hit the SQL server every 3 minutes way down from every second.

Third, set the SQL memory for the client machines. By default each client machine will have SQL Server 2005 Express installed on it, this installs with Outlook BCM. By default the maximum amount of memory that SQL Server 2005 Express can use is 2147483647MB, that's huge and unnecessary for BCM. Download and install the SQL Management tools (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=C243A5AE-4BD1-4E3D-94B8-5A0F62BF7796&displaylang=en) on each client machine. Connect to the local SQL Express server and right click on the server within the management studio and choose Properties. Within the pane that comes up, click the Memory link and set the Max Amount of memory to 256MB. That's plenty for BCM. Click OK and it's done.

These 3 performance tips will help with the BCM performance.

Send me a comment if you need additional help.

Record iTunes streaming radio music

Download UrlHelper and follow the instructions on the page below. It actually works.

http://www.streamingstar.com/How-to-record-iTunes-radio.htm

Don't know how legal it is since ripping music seems to be off limits nowadays but what the hell, go for it.

Convert ArrayList to string[] array

So simple, yet I didn't know it.

VB: stringArray as string[] = arrayList.ToArray(typeof(string)) as string[];

C#: string[] stringArray = (string[])arrayList.ToArray(typeof(string));

form template cannot be opened in Microsoft Office InfoPath because it contains code that requires a version of the Microsoft Common language runtime

I received this error while trying to open an InfoPath form.

the form template cannot be opened in Microsoft Office InfoPath because it contains code that requires a version of the Microsoft Common language runtime that is not currently installed

I searched Google and MSDN but no solutions or even mention of this problem. After watching some tv last night and installing XP SP3 on my home computer it came to me that the CLR library needs to somehow get updated or fixed. But Windows had already been repaired and Office 2007 reinstalled, that should have fixed it but nope.

Hmmm.... I got it, let's try to install .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 and see what happens. There have been improvements made to the CLR in 3.5 SP1 and should maybe update the missing dlls. Sure enough after installing 3.5 SP1 and trying to open the form again it opened without problems.

So installing the latest version of the .NET framework fixed the issue.

Create a digital collage

This very cool tool from Microsoft Research creates a digital collage for you.

http://research.microsoft.com/AutoCollage/