Session state is corrupted

If you got some error like that – the problem is in your TV, not in IIS, not in Sharepoint :-))

Exception message: The session state information is invalid and might be corrupted.

Stack trace:    at System.Web.SessionState.SessionStateItemCollection.Deserialize(BinaryReader reader)
   at System.Web.SessionState.SessionStateUtility.Deserialize(HttpContext context, Stream stream)
   at System.Web.SessionState.SqlSessionStateStore.DoGet(HttpContext context, String id, Boolean getExclusive, Boolean& locked, TimeSpan& lockAge, Object& lockId, SessionStateActions& actionFlags)
   at System.Web.SessionState.SqlSessionStateStore.GetItemExclusive(HttpContext context, String id, Boolean& locked, TimeSpan& lockAge, Object& lockId, SessionStateActions& actionFlags)
   at System.Web.SessionState.SessionStateModule.GetSessionStateItem()
   at System.Web.SessionState.SessionStateModule.BeginAcquireState(Object source, EventArgs e, AsyncCallback cb, Object extraData)
   at System.Web.HttpApplication.AsyncEventExecutionStep.System.Web.HttpApplication.IExecutionStep.Execute()
   at System.Web.HttpApplication.ExecuteStep(IExecutionStep step, Boolean& completedSynchronously)

This occurs when there is a null value used for a Session Key and later a string based session key is used.

- Code adds a Null session key - this works and there are no errors.

- At a later request, code adds a string session key.

You are doing one of the following:

Object var = SomeFunction();

Session[var] = AnotherObject;

Or

Session[SomeFunction()] = AnotherObject;

You need to the return value and ensure it is not null!

Edit Document from MOSS 2007 with Office 2003

I had a case with customer (who uses Office 2003 ~4000 PCs and approximately 150 computers with Office 2007) where if the users try to open office document from MOSS 2007 with Office 2003, the file is always opened as read only. Our custom application needs to open the doc for edit and check it out. So, the result were – it is not supported by Office 2003.

What is supported and what not, is described here

Finally, after customization of CORE.JS we succeeded to run Office 2003 to work as 2007 and these steps are described below :)

In the beginning I need to say, that this blog post were very important, regarding the chosen technical approach

1. I created empty file in the following path: C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Web Server Extensions\12\TEMPLATE\LAYOUTS\1033\Checkout.JS

2. I got the code of DispDocItemEx function from CORE.JS file (in the same folder) and paste it inside the new one

3. In Checkout.JS I modified the code:

Original:

================

else

    {

    fRet=stsOpen.ViewDocument2(window, szHref, szAppId);

    }

================

Modified:

================

    else

    {

    if (ctx.isForceCheckout==true)

    {

    fCheckoutForEdit=confirm(L_ConfirmCheckout_Text);

        if (fCheckoutForEdit==true)

        {

        CheckoutDocument(ctx.HttpRoot, szHref, null);

            fRet=stsOpen.EditDocument2(window, szHref, szAppId);

            }

       else

       fRet=stsOpen.ViewDocument2(window, szHref, szAppId);

    }

    else

    fRet=stsOpen.ViewDocument2(window, szHref, szAppId);

    }

==================

4. I created a copy of C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Web Server Extensions\12\TEMPLATE\GLOBAL\default.master with name custom.master

5. Added the following code just after the red line

<SharePoint:ScriptLink language="javascript" name="core.js" Defer="true" runat="server" />

<!-- Checkout JS customization BEGIN -->

<SharePoint:ScriptLink language="javascript" name="Checkout.js" Defer="true" runat="server" />

<!-- Checkout JS customization END –>

6. I uploaded custom.master into http://myportal/sites/mysitecollection/_catalogs/masterpage, published and approved the new file.

7. The next step were to configure the site to use customized master page

8. During the tests I found, that if I click on the file link (in document library page /AllItems.aspx) Office 2003 has the same behavior as Office 2007.

The file is checked out, “Shared workspace” pane is opened and on document close the following windows appear

But, here I want to make a note, that if you try to open a document in any other fashion (such hyper link in email or web page), the CheckIn-CheckOut menu items and/or TaskPane functionality may not be available or work as expected. This modification only affects the behavior of the document library page.

Sharepoint Error Message: “Your client does not support opening list with windows explorer”

I received the following message, when I tried to open document library in Windows explorer view: “Your client does not support opening list with windows explorer”

OS: Windows Server 2008 SP2 (x86)

Browser: IE 7

MOSS version: 12.0.0.6510

 

The solution:

By default, “Web Client” service is not installed with Windows Server 2008, you need to install “Desktop Experience” from Server Manager > Features

Special thanks to Nishant Shah

Map Sharepoint 2007 to 2010

 

A First Look at SharePoint 2010

Microsoft Online Services Availability

This morning, I found this post about free Sharepoint master pages, and there are links to instructions how to install them to Microsoft Online Services! I never visited it before, therefore I decided to explore MOS portal and get a trial of Sharepoint online! … but… after short registration I found, that the only available services for Bulgaria is Live Meeting Pro… :)

Obviously, it is only for our region, because when I changed my location to United States, the picture was change

I’m not sure, when “Business Productivity Online” suite would be available for our region, but I’ll investigate this situation and share the result online!

:-)

Try to open SampleWorkbook.xlsx

I tried to open “SampleWorkbook.xlsx”, which is a part of OOB Reports center site with my Office 2010

And… here is the result

WTF…. :)

MOSS 2007: Broken Approval Workflow

The server is currently being taken down for maintenance. Check with your system administrator to see when this server is scheduled to come back online.

The problem:

The server farm has been Quiesced

The solution:

Go to Central Administrator->Operations->Global Configuration-> Quiesce Farm and Click ‘Reset farm’

MOSS 2007 Event ID 6102

I had received the following message in the Event Log of my server on every 30-50 seconds:

Here are the details:

Log Name:      Application
Source:        Office SharePoint Server
Date:          6/11/2009 11:50:27 AM
Event ID:      6102
Task Category: Launcher Service
Level:         Error
Keywords:      Classic
User:          N/A
Computer:      VM-MOSS-01
Description:
LoadBalancer.RegisterLauncher failed:  Unable to connect to the remote server

The solution:

Open Central Administration-> Operations –> Service Accounts

For service “Document Conversions Load Balancer Service” change the account to “Network Service”

Silverlight Stsadm reference for WSS 3.0 and MOSS 2007

The Silverlight application which displays available stsadm commands is now live. There are great functionalities for search, filtering and zooming as well as predefined views for “Not in UI”, “New in SP1”, “New in SP2” and “View All”

Try it now for

MOSS 2007: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/office/sharepointserver/cc948709.aspx

WSS 3.0: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/windowsserver/sharepoint/dd418924.aspx

Citizen Service Platform in Bulgaria

Municipality of Kavarna just launched the first Citizens Service Platform (CSP) portal in Bulgaria. It offers four e-Services, integrated with digital signing functionality. The solution is based on Microsoft Office Sharepoint Server 2007, Dynamics CRM, SQL Server 2008, Windows Server 2008 and Cisco based call center.

We (MCS) developed the platform together with our Gold Partners with CAD R&D Progress and Paraflow

Read more (in Bulgarian):

http://computerworld.bg/25779_obshtina_kavarna_veche_predostavia_elektronni_uslugi_na_grajdanite_i_biznesa

http://www.dnevnik.bg/bulgaria/2009/06/01/728194_kavarna_predostavia_elektronni_uslugi_do_vsiaka_tochka/?ref=rss

http://dariknews.bg/view_article.php?article_id=361494

Download Free Sharepoint Masterpages

You can download and install three Sharepoint masterpages for free from Expert Sharepoint Consulting

   

Additionally the same site offers other masterpages which  you can buy and download

CSS Reference Chart for Sharepoint 2007

If you want to customize the look and feel of your sharepoint site, but can’t find the right CSS files and classes, look here. Heather Solomon has published on her blog a great resource/map for CSS classes and UI elements in Sharepoint.

Try it !

http://www.heathersolomon.com/content/sp07cssreference.htm

MOSS 2007 Site Customization Tips

Parthasarathi Bhattacharjee from MCS UK published a good article about customizations for Sharepoint sites and provided a list/map of ContentPlaceHolders of default.master as well as how to customize out-of-box web parts using CEWP and inject CSS and JavaScript into the page where it is placed.

http://blogs.msdn.com/uksharepoint/archive/2009/05/22/microsoft-office-sharepoint-server-2007-site-customization-tips.aspx

SUGBG (Meeting 4): MOSS Backup and Enterprice Search

When: 20 May 2009, 18:30

Where: Microsoft Bulgaria office (Sofia, Blvd.”Nikola Vaptzarov”, 55)

Sessions:

Backup scenarios for MOSS 2007

Alexander Miloev – Consultant, Microsoft Services

Enterprise Search (Part 1) - Search & User Experience

Tihomir Ignatov (me) – Senior Consultant, Microsoft Services

For more information, visit www.sugbg.org

Sharepoint Versions, Service Packs and Cumulative Updates

 

Service Pack / Hot Fix	MOSS 2007 Version
June CU ( KB971538 & KB971537 )	12.0.0.6510
April CU ( KB968850 & KB968851 )	12.0.0.6504
SP2 ( KB953338 & KB953334 )	12.0.0.6421
February CU (KB963654 & KB961755)	12.0.0.6341
Cumulative update (KB956056 & KB956057)	12.0.0.6327
Infrastructure Update (KB951695 & KB951297)	12.0.0.6318
Post-SP1 hotfix (KB948945)	12.0.0.6303
Post-SP1 hotfix (KB941274)	12.0.0.6301
Post-SP1 hotfix (KB941422)	12.0.0.6300
SP1	12.0.0.6219
October public update	12.0.0.6039
August 2007 hotfix package	12.0.0.6036
RTM	12.0.0.4518

April Cumulative Update for MOSS 2007 and WSS 3.0

WSS 3.0 April CU package
http://support.microsoft.com/hotfix/KBHotfix.aspx?kbnum=968850

MOSS 2007 April CU package
http://support.microsoft.com/hotfix/KBHotfix.aspx?kbnum=968851

 

Details Description:

WSS 3.0

MOSS 2007

Start from April Cumulative Update, the packages will no longer install on a farm without a service pack installed. You must have installed either Service Pack 1 (SP1) or SP2 prior to the installation of the cumulative updates.

After applying the preceding updates, run the SharePoint Products and Technologies Configuration Wizard or “psconfig –cmd upgrade –inplace b2b -wait” in command line. This needs to be done on every server in the farm with SharePoint installed. 

The version of content databases should be 12.0.0.6504 after successfully applying these updates.

Office client integration with SharePoint and FBA

Steve Peschka (@ Sharepoint Ranger Team) wrote good article about how to integrate your Office applications (Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook) with form based authentication Sharepoint site and achieve a functionality of remote login page in separate window, like this:

Read the details and all steps here:

http://blogs.msdn.com/sharepoint/archive/2009/05/13/update-on-sharepoint-forms-based-authentication-fba-and-office-client.aspx

Service Pack 2 for Office Sharepoint Server 2007 and Windows Sharepoint Services 3.0 has been released

 

Installation Steps

To keep all the files in a SharePoint installation up-to-date, the following packages need to be applied on all servers in the farm. Service Pack 2 contains all fixes released through February of this year, so customers can install it directly on RTM build of the products.

1. Service Pack 2 for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0
2. Service Pack 2 for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 Language Pack (if applicable)
3. Service Pack 2 for Office SharePoint Server 2007
4. Service Pack 2 for Office SharePoint Server 2007 Language Pack (if applicable)

After applying the preceding updates, run the SharePoint Products and Technologies Configuration Wizard or "psconfig –cmd upgrade –inplace b2b -wait” in command line. This needs to be done on every server in the farm with SharePoint installed.  The version of content databases should be 12.0.0.6425 after successfully applying these updates.

 

 

Overview of Service Pack 2 (SP2) improvements (Office servers 2007)

Microsoft Enterprise Content Management (ECM)

• Improves the performance and stability of the content deployment feature and of the Variations feature.
• Adds a new command to the Stsadm.exe tool. This tool provides the following functionality:
  • Lets a SharePoint administrator use the Variations feature to scan a site for errors, report the errors, and fix certain problems.
  • Finds and repairs missing peer relationships and corrupted entries in the internal variations relationships list.
  • Handles the propagation of large volumes of variations content in a more manageable way.

Microsoft Office Excel and Microsoft Office Access services

• Fixes Open Snapshot so that snapshots open more reliably, even if there is no SharePoint root site.
• Fixes display issues that cause calculations to appear incorrect in some cases.
• Improves connections to cubes by using .odc files in non-English cases.
• Improves the performance of programmatic scenarios.
• Fixes conditional formatting in Mozilla Firefox browsers.
• Improves support for generating Excel Web Access Web parts on new sites.

Microsoft Office Groove Server (64-bit version only)

• Office Groove Server 2007 Data Bridge now limits the number of file-sharing workspaces to 64 to make sure that all workspaces can be synchronized. This limit applies only to newly added file-sharing workspaces. If you already have more than 64 file-sharing workspaces, you can continue to use them.
• Improves synchronization reliability.
• Groove Server 2007 Manager can be installed and run with SQL Server 2008.
• Improves the Groove Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) connectivity and auto-activation functionality.
• Improves error reporting in the Groove Relay Server.
• Improves the robustness of Groove Relay Server.

Microsoft Office Forms Server

• Improves performance of large browser forms on InfoPath Form Services, both for memory usage and for page load time.
• Improves reliability of Forms Server and of Microsoft Office SharePoint Server by addressing the previous behavior in which an upgrade of an administrator-approved form template triggers an IIS reset.
• Improves the Digital Signature functionality for InfoPath Forms Services.

Microsoft Office Project Server

• Modifies the queue service to prevent it from using large volumes of memory over long periods.
• Improves the performance of certain database table indexes.
• Improves cost resource functionality. For example, the server now correctly handles tasks that have material or work resources assigned to the same task.
• Improves certain areas such as resource plans, build team, and the server scheduling engine.

Microsoft Office Search Server

• Improves the reliability and stability of WSS crawl, of SharePoint crawl, of crawling through a very large corpus, and of backup restore.
• Introduces a new command to the Stsadm.exe tool that lets a SharePoint administrator tune the Query processor multiplier parameter. For example, the Query processor multiplier can be used to tune the query performance for SSP indexing content sources that have highly restrictive permissions and many duplicates.
• Improves the accuracy of searches that involve numbers. For example, there is additional support for large numbers in which a comma is used to separate every three digits (for example, 1,000,000), for numbers that are between 9 and 40 characters, and for numbers that are separated by spaces.

Platform support

• Provides full support for Windows Internet Explorer 8.
• Provides level 2 browser support for Mozilla Firefox (versions 2 and 3).
  • For more information about browser support levels, visit the following Microsoft Web site:

    http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepointserver/HA101945391033.aspx (http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepointserver/HA101945391033.aspx)

• Provides support for Windows Server 2008.

How to obtain and install the service packs

This service pack update is available on the Microsoft Download Center. To download the service pack, visit the following Microsoft Web sites:

• 2007 Microsoft Office servers Service Pack 2 (x86)

  http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=B7816D90-5FC6-4347-89B0-A80DEB27A082 (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=B7816D90-5FC6-4347-89B0-A80DEB27A082)

 

• 2007 Microsoft Office servers Service Pack 2 (x64)

  http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=B7816D90-5FC6-4347-89B0-A80DEB27A082 (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=B7816D90-5FC6-4347-89B0-A80DEB27A082)

 

• 2007 Microsoft Office servers Language Pack Service Pack 2 (x86)

  http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=01C6A3E8-E110-4956-903A-AD16284BF223 (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=01C6A3E8-E110-4956-903A-AD16284BF223)

 

• 2007 Microsoft Office servers Language Pack Service Pack 2 (x64)

  http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=66C5026F-9F47-4642-8378-2526918009FA (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=66C5026F-9F47-4642-8378-2526918009FA)

 

Overview of Service Pack 2 improvements (Windows Sharepoint Services 3.0)

 

Some big areas of the improvements that the Windows SharePoint Services team wanted to highlight:

• Faster, more reliable content migration and data backup and restore
• Reduced memory consumption
• Smoother upgrade experience
• Significant database performance adjustments
• Updated integration for forms authentication
• Advanced permission management
• Helpful administrative tools
• Expanded browser compatibility

How to obtain and install the service packs

This service pack update is available on the Microsoft Download Center. To download the service pack, visit the following Microsoft Web sites:

• Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 Service Pack 2 (x86)

  http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=79BADA82-C13F-44C1-BDC1-D0447337051B (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=79BADA82-C13F-44C1-BDC1-D0447337051B)

 

• Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 Service Pack 2 (x64)

  http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=79BADA82-C13F-44C1-BDC1-D0447337051B (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=79BADA82-C13F-44C1-BDC1-D0447337051B)

 

• Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 Language Pack Service Pack 2 (x86)

  http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=085E5AC8-58F6-4CF9-8012-33B95EE36C0F (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=085E5AC8-58F6-4CF9-8012-33B95EE36C0F)

 

• Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 Language Pack Service Pack 2 (x64)

  http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=2C2B6CAF-B46D-45EB-AC4D-DEAAA48C3A2C (http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=2C2B6CAF-B46D-45EB-AC4D-DEAAA48C3A2C)

My Presentations @ Microsoft Days 2009 (Sofia, Bulgaria)

Here are my presentations from MS Days:

Microsoft Citizen Service Platform or how to deliver high efficient solutions for the Public sector and Business

SharePoint Development with Visual Studio 2008 (VSeWSS 1.3)

I would like to thank for the support to Paul Andrew and James Brown

Special thanks to Doncho Angelov and Alexander Miloev for the pics :-)

   

Sharepoint 14 and SP2 for 2007 Office servers

Microsoft Sharepoint 14 is now Microsoft Sharepoint Server 2010. It no longer be “Office Server” and MOSS… too bad!

“The primary reason why we took Office out of the name - lots of folks associate the name Office with the Office client. We wanted to take the opportunity to reestablish the Office name and brand to be synonymous with the client suite.”

Perhaps, the next version of WSS should be just WSS v4 ?!?!?

 

Service Pack 2 for the 2007 Microsoft Office System

When: 28 April 2009

What:

Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 SP2 and Microsoft Office SharePoint Server SP2 include fixes and enhancements designed to improve performance, availability, and stability in your server farms. SP2 provides the groundwork for future major releases of SharePoint Products and Technologies.

• An STSADM command line that scans your server farm to establish whether it is ready for upgrade to the next version of SharePoint and provides feedback and best practice recommendations on your current environment.

• SP2 offers support for a broader range of Web browsers.

• Substantial improvements to Forms-based authentication.

Windows Server 2008 SP2 and Windows Server R2 will be supported on their release.

Enterprise Content Management (ECM)

• The performance and stability of content deployment and variations feature has been improved.

• A new tool has been added to the STSADM command-line utility that enables a SharePoint administrator to scan sites that use the variations feature for errors.

Excel Services

• SP2 makes it easier to configure Excel Web Access Web Parts on new sites.

• Several rendering, calculation, and security issues have been resolved.

• Some display issues have been addressed.

• Improved compatibility with Mozilla Firefox browsers.

Groove Server

• Improved  synchronization reliability.

• Groove Server 2007 Manager will install and run with SQL 2008.

• Groove’s LDAP connectivity and auto-activation functionality have been improved.

• Error reporting in the Groove Relay Server has improved significantly.

• Groove Relay Server has improved robustness.

Forms Server

• Memory requirements and the page load times for large browser-rendered forms have been reduced.

• Browser rendering of various controls, such as the 'cannot be blank' asterisk and the rich text field has been improved.

Project Server

• Better memory management in the queue service.

• Performance to certain database table indexes is improved.

• Resource plans, build team, cost resources, and the server scheduling engine have improved.

Search Server

• Improvements to the reliability and stability of very large corpus crawls.

• Backup-restore has been improved.

• A new command has been introduced to the stsadm.exe tool that lets a SharePoint Administrator to tune the Query processor multiplier parameter.

• Improved accuracy in searches involving numbers.