Introduction of new Video ContentType, Audio ContentType and Image ContentType was a great investment in the area of Digital Asset Support in SharePoint server 2010. Introduction of Silverlight media player and ability to seek, cache and progressive download was the biggest investment in the area of Digital Asset Support.

To have all the above mentioned features, the minimum requirement is installation and configuration of IIS 7.0 Bit Rate Throttling. Though BLOB Cache and Silverlight is not mandatory to have, IIS 7.0 Bit Rate Throttling is compulsory to provide Digital Asset Support in SharePoint Server 2010.

Great, how do we install and configure IIS 7.0 Bit Rate Throttling?

I found following blog post was really interesting and descriptive enough for anyone to get a clear picture about this:

http://learn.iis.net/page.aspx/148/bit-rate-throttling-configuration-walkthrough/

Following are the minimum software requirements for installing SharePoint Server 2010:

• SharePoint Server 2010 is 62-bit only – we will not get a 32-bit version of SharePoint Server like the previous version.
• Windows Server 2008 with SP 2 64-bit or Windows Server 2008 R2 64-bit – SharePoint Server 2010 will not support Windows Server 2003. We need the 2008 version of the Windows Server for installing SharePoint Server 2010. Anyway, R2 of Windows Server 2008 will come only in form of 64-bit and that helps us to make the right choice.
• SQL Server 2005/ 2008/ 2008 R2 64-bit – we can use any of the versions listed above as the database server and it should be the 64-bit. If we are going to use SQL Server 2005, we need to make we apply the SP3 and the CU3 (Cumulative Update) or whichever latest. If its 2008, we need to apply SP1 and the CU2 or whichever latest. If its 2008 R2, we don’t have to apply any other things on top of that.

Minimum Software Requirements for SharePoint Server 2010

Microsoft provides you 02 Virtual Images which we can run in Hyper-V and these 02 Virtual Images will have all the required components loaded and configured them with the recommended configuration.

Only problem is, we need more RAM and Hard Disk space and also Hyper-V enabled machines in order to use these Virtual Images. And the biggets issue is the download size. It’s almost 14GB.

Thanks a lot Chandana for getting it downloaded for me on time.

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=0c51819b-3d40-435c-a103-a5481fe0a0d2&displaylang=en

With this best practice, we will be able to identify what assemblies, WebParts, iFilters, 3rd party controls, etc. not supported in 64-bit environment and we can recompile them.

Get ready for SharePoint 2010 upgrade: http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=155576

If your existing SharePoint environment on Windows Server 2003 and in 32-bit, Microsoft recommend upgrading from 32-bit to 64-bit and also from Server 2003 to Server 2008 at the same time and then upgrade from MOSS 2007 to SharePoint 2010 as a separate exercise.

With regard to Database server, if you are using SQL Server 2000 in a 32-bit mode, upgrade it to 64-bit SQL Server 2005 SP2 or SQL Server 2008 at the same time and then upgrade it to SharePoint 2010 as a separate exercise.

Don’t mix up architecture upgrade (32-bit to 64-bit), underline product upgrade (Server 2003 t0 2008 & SQL Server 2000 to 2005/ 2008) and SharePoint upgrade since we will not be able to isolate any issues arises.

Have you eve come across of pain in transferring initial data from Development server to Staging server or Staging server to Production server? How did you do that? Backup & Restore? Recreated the entire solution? Did you know the best approach for that?

Well, Content Deployment in SharePoint Server 2007 is designed for transferring initial content including site structure and the master data from Development server to Staging server or Staging server to Production server.

There were not enough information about this tool and here are some good articles:

Escalation Engineer Stefan’s Content Deployment – Best Practices

I have seen the success of this tool with few of our local clients (MAS, Dilmah ).

Here you have few videos and 10 Hands-On-Labs to get started:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepoint/ee513147.aspx

Here is you get a chance to download them and watch offline:

• Overview Video: 1001251_SharePoint2010_Overview_SneakPeek_Rizzo_mobile.wmv
• Developers Video: 1001251_SharePoint_SneakPeek_For_Developers_Andrew_mobile.wmv
• IT Pro’s Video: 1001251_SharePoint_SneakPeek_For_IT_Professionals_Riley_mobile.wmv

Guys, go ahead and download them for offline view.