SharePoint 2016 to Feature Deeply Ingrained Cloud Services
July 7, 2015
As additional details continue to be released, the SharePoint community speculates about the role of the cloud in the upcoming 2016 version. According to the GCN article, “SharePoint 2016 Built on Cloud Foundation,” cloud will play a central role.
Read all the details in the article, which begins:
“When SharePoint Server 2016 is released next year, Microsoft’s cloud services will be deeply ingrained, creating a more unified end user experience across components. ‘Everything we’re doing in Office 365 inspires the [SharePoint Server] product going forward, and you’ll see this cadence continuing,’ said Mark Kashman, a senior product manager at Microsoft on the SharePoint team.”
It sounds like users may have a steeper learning curve on this upcoming version, but then the pace may be set for the next several years. What will be interesting to see is whether users find the cloud focus to be intuitive, or if it is a hindrance, particularly for those who have voiced a preference for on-premises capabilities to continue. Microsoft is definitely trying to walk the line and be all things to all people, but then that has always been both its greatest strength and its greatest weakness. Stephen E. Arnold is a longtime leader in search and he knows the strengths and weaknesses well. His Web service, ArnoldIT.com, features a dedicated SharePoint feed, and is a great resource for users who need to stay up to speed without a huge investment in research time.
Emily Rae Aldridge, July 7, 2015
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
Bing Game: Search Has to Be Fun, Fun, Fun
July 6, 2015
Navigate to “Microsoft Put a Pong Game in Its Bing Search Engine.” Yep, when I run a query I definitely want to distract myself with a quick video game session. Doesn’t everyone 70 years old have this compelling need to lose focus and forget why one visited a search engine in the first place. No wonder Bing is just so darned wonderful. Just the other day I was looking for information about the Citadel exploit from 2011, and I ended up playing Pong. Wow, as I recall, the experience was really helpful to my work.
The write up states;
People are discovering that if you search for “pong” on the Bing site, the search results include a playable version of one of the first video games ever made. The game allows the classic digital paddles to be moved up and down with a mouse or keyboard on the PC, or via fingers on touch screen.
Let’s have more distractions to prevent me from experiencing incomplete and irrelevant results to my queries.
Stephen E Arnold, July 6, 2015
Software Market Begs for Integration Issue Relief
July 2, 2015
A recent report proves what many users already know: integrating an existing CMS with new and emerging software solutions is difficult. As quickly as software emerges and changes, users are finding that hulking overgrown CMS solutions are lagging behind in terms of agility. SharePoint is no stranger to this criticism. Business Solutions offers more details in their article, “ISVs: Study Shows Microsoft SharePoint Is Open To Disruption.”
“A report from Software Advice surveyed employees that use content management systems (CMS) on a daily basis and found 48 percent had considerable problems integrating their CMS with their other software solutions. The findings mirror a recent AIIM report that found only 11 percent of companies experienced successful Microsoft SharePoint implementation . . . The results of this report indicate that the CMS market is ripe for disruption if a software vendor could solve the integration issues typically associated with SharePoint.”
No doubt, Microsoft understands the concerns and perceived threats, and will attempt to solve some of the issue with the upcoming release of SharePoint Server 2016. However, the fact remains that SharePoint is a big ship to turn, and change will not be dramatic or happen overnight. In the meantime, stay on top of the latest news for tips, tricks, and third-party solutions that may ease some of the pain. Look to Stephen E. Arnold and his SharePoint feed on ArnoldIT.com in order to stay in touch without a huge investment in time.
Emily Rae Aldridge, July 2, 2015
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
Compound Search Processing Repositioned at ConceptSearching
July 2, 2015
The article titled Metadata Matters; What’s The One Piece of Technology Microsoft Doesn’t Provide On-Premises Or in the Cloud? on ConceptSearching re-introduces Compound Search Processing, ConceptSearching’s main offering. Compound Search Processing is a technology achieved in 2003 that can identify multi-word concepts, and the relationships between words. Compound Search Processing is being repositioned, with Concept Searching apparently chasing Sharepoint Sales. The article states,
“The missing piece of technology that Microsoft and every other vendor doesn’t provide is compound term processing, auto-classification, and taxonomy that can be natively integrated with the Term Store. Take advantage of our technologies and gain business advantages and a quantifiable ROI…
Microsoft is offering free content migration for customers moving to Office 365…If your content is mismanaged, unorganized, has no value now, contains security information, or is an undeclared record, it all gets moved to your brand new shiny Office 365.”
The angle for Concept Searching is metadata and indexing, and they are quick to remind potential customers that “search is driven by metadata.” The offerings of ConceptSearching comes with the promise that it is the only platform that will work with all versions of Sharepoint while delivering their enterprise metadata repository. For more information on the technology, see the new white paper on Compoud Term Processing.
Chelsea Kerwin, July 2, 2014
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
Microsoft Puts the Cloud First with SharePoint Server 2016
June 30, 2015
Discussion of the cloud seems to push users into two camps: for and against. While hybrid is probably truly the way of the future, folks are still currently either of the “love it” or “hate it” variety. Redmond Magazine has provided good ongoing coverage of the upcoming SharePoint Server 2016 release, and their article, “Microsoft Taking a ‘Cloud First’ Approach with SharePoint 2016,” gives more details about what can be expected.
The article says:
“SharePoint Server 2016 will be a very cloud-inspired product when commercially released next year . . . Microsoft’s cloud services have been looming in the background of prior SharePoint Server releases . . . Office 365 cloud services have played a role since SharePoint Server 2013, and they will do so going forward with SharePoint Server 2016.”
One of the main promotional points of the new release is a promised “unified experience” for SharePoint users. While cloud skeptics still have reason to be cautious, the promised improvements may win them over. To stay up-to-date with the latest news regarding SharePoint, stayed tuned in to ArnoldIT.com and the dedicated SharePoint feed. Stephen E. Arnold is a longtime leader in search and his expertise comes in handy when trying to stay current without spending a lot of time doing independent research.
Emily Rae Aldridge, June 30, 2015
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
Oracle Data Integrator Extension
June 29, 2015
The article titled Oracle Launches ODI in April with the Aim to Revolutionize Big Data on Market Realist makes it clear that Oracle sees big money in NoSQL. Oracle Data Integrator, or ODI, enables developers and analysts to simplify their lives and training. It cancels the requirement for their learning multiple programming languages and allows them to use Hadoop and the like without much coding expertise. The article states,
“According to a report from PCWorld, Jeff Pollock, Oracle vice president of product management, said, “The Oracle Data Integrator for Big Data makes a non-Hadoop developer instantly productive on Hadoop…” Databases like Hadoop and Spark are targeted towards programmers who have the coding knowledge expertise required to manipulate these databases with knowledge of the coding needed to manage them. On the other hand, analysts usually use software for data analytics.”
The article also relates some of Oracle’s claims about itself, including that it holds a larger revenue than IBM, Microsoft, SAP AG, and Teradata combined. Those are also Oracle’s four major competitors. With the release of ODI, Oracle intends to filter data arriving from a myriad of different places. Clustering data into groups related by their format or framework is part of this process. The end result is a more streamlined version without assumptions about the level of coding knowledge held by an analyst.
Chelsea Kerwin, June 29, 2014
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
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Major SharePoint Features Disclosed
June 23, 2015
SharePoint Server 2016 has caused quite a stir, with users wondering what features will come through in the final version. At Microsoft Ignite last month, rumors turned to legitimate features. Read more about separating fact from fiction in the newest SharePoint release in the CIO article, “Top 4 Revelations about SharePoint.”
The article begins:
“Some of the biggest news to come out of Microsoft Ignite last month was the introduction and the first public demonstration of SharePoint Server 2016 – a demo that quelled a lot of speculation and uneasiness in the SharePoint administrator community. Here are the biggest takeaways from the conference, with an emphasis on the on-premises product.”
The article goes on to say that users can look forward to a full on-premises version, bolstered administrative features, four roles to divide the workload, and an emphasis on hybrid functions. For users that need to stay in the loop with SharePoint updates and changes, stay tuned to ArnoldIT.com. Stephen E. Arnold is a longtime leader in search, and his Web site offers a unique SharePoint feed to keep all the latest tips, tricks, and news in one convenient location.
Emily Rae Aldridge, June 23, 2015
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
Make Your Data Pretty
June 19, 2015
It is very easy to read and interpret data when it is represented visually. Humans are visual creatures and it can be easier to communicate via pictures for an explanation. Infographics are hugely popular on the Internet and some of them have achieved meme status. While some data can be easily represented using Adobe Photoshop or the Microsoft Office Suite, more complex data needs more complex software to simplify it visually.
Rather than spending hours on Google, searching for a quality data visualization tool Usability Tools has rounded up “21 Essential Data Visualization Tools.” What is great about this list is that it features free services that available to improve how you display data on your Web site, project, or whatever your specific needs are.
Some of the choices are obvious, such as Google Charts and Wolfram Alpha, but there are some stand outs that combine JavaScript and draw on Internet resources. Plus they are also exceedingly fun to play with. They include: Timeline.js, Tableau Public, PiktoChart, Canva, and D3.js.
None of the data visualization tools are better than the others, in fact the article’s author says what you want to use is based on your need:
“As you can see, there is plenty of Data Visualization tools that will make you understand your users in a better, more insightful way. There are many tools being launched every day, but I managed to collect those that are the most popular in the ‘industry’. Of course, they have both strong and weak sides, since there is no one perfect tool to visualize the metrics. All I can do is to recommend you trying them yourself and combining them in order to maximize the efficiency of visualizing data.”
It looks like it is time to start playing around with data toys!
Whitney Grace, June 19, 2015
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
Microsoft Artificial Intelligence Upgrades Artificial Insemination
June 11, 2015
No joke. I read “Cómo Microsoft Destina Su Inteligencia Artificial a Insemina Vacas.” The main idea is that using Microsoft algorithms, the efficacy of births has jumped. The write up reports:
Raquel Durá, responsable de Microsoft España, explica a Teknautas que los ganaderos recuperan en poco tiempo la inversión del sistema, y por otro lado, este es escalable según las necesidades y dimensiones de la explotación. “Todo empieza con una pregunta”, explica Sirosh en referencia al origen de GyuHo: “un ganadero preguntó si no podía optimizar su explotación de alguna manera”, y a partir de ese punto entran en acción el análisis de los datos y los modelos matemáticos que anuncian con precisión milimétrica, los momentos claves para la explotación óptima del negocio. O como ellos mismos dicen, “el internet de las vacas”
If your Spanish is as rusty as mine, Google translates the passage as:
Raquel Durá, head of Microsoft Spain, told Teknautas that farmers quickly recover the investment in the system, and secondly, this is scalable according to the needs and size of the holding. “The project started with a question,” Sirosh [a developer] explained with reference to the origin of GyuHo [the insemination process], “a farmer asked if he could not optimize its operation in any way”, and from that point the application of Microsoft’s AI allowed for optimal operation of the inseminations for Internet cows.
I would be delighted if Microsoft could improve the precision of its search results with equal aplomb. I am tempted to ask the cow, “Was it as good for you as it was for Microsoft”? I shall refrain.
Another question, “What does IBM’s Dr. Watson make of this probing matter?”
Stephen E Arnold, June 11, 2015
Jury Is Still Out on Microsoft Delve
June 11, 2015
Sometimes hailed as Pinterest for the enterprise, Microsoft Delve is a combination of search, social, and machine learning, which produces an information hub of sorts. Delve is also becoming a test subject, as enterprise experts decide whether such offerings intrude into users’ workflow, or enhance productivity. Read more in the Search Content Management article, “Microsoft Delve May Drive Demand for Office365.”
The article summarizes the issue:
“As Microsoft advances further in its mobile-first, cloud-first strategy, new offerings such as Microsoft Delve are piquing companies’ curiosity but also raising eyebrows. Many companies will have to gauge whether services like Delve can enhance worker productivity or run the risk of being overly intrusive.”
As SharePoint unveils more about its SharePoint Server 2016, more will become known about how it functions along with all of its parts, including Delve. It will be up to the users to determine how efficient the new offerings will be, and whether they help or hinder a regular workflow. Until the latest versions become available for public release, stay tuned to ArnoldIT.com for the latest news regarding SharePoint and how it may affect your organization. Stephen E. Arnold is a longtime leader in search and his work on SharePoint is a great go-to resource for users and managers alike.
Emily Rae Aldridge, June 11, 2015
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
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