Introduction to Sharepoint 2010

Sharepoint can be hard to grasp as a concept, because it does not do one thing. Exchange handles emails, calendars, SQL Server is a database server, IIS is an internet server, but we cannot apply such a simple description to Sharepoint.

Sharepoint is not an application, but it is a platform, which is capable of hosting a variety of integrated solutions.

Sharepoint started life as Microsoft SharePoint Portal Server in 2001

These days several products may carry the Sharepoint label.

The server products are

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1. SharePoint 2010 Foundation
2. Sharepoint Server 2010 - Standard
3. Sharepoint Server 2010 - Enterprise

Each of these server products includes all the functionality of the version below it.

SharePoint Sites

SharePoint enables the creation of websites.
These are all based on a standard pattern, and all share certain features in common. ALL SharePoint sites are built on collections of lists and libraries.

So even a brandnew  blank websites have certain features as standard, such as "Like" buttons.
One big difference in Sharepoint 2010 from previsous versions, and from WebSites generally is the ribbon. Similar to the Ribbon in office, this allows you to edit SharePoint sites.

The Ribbon is access by clicking on Edit on a SharePoint page.

If you have permissions to edit a site, the Site Actions menu is very important. This will allow you to make modifications to the Sharepoint site.

The elements of Sharepoint are available individually available elsewhere, such as shared calendars and todist list, colaboration on documents - such as Google Documents.

It is the ability to combine them all together, without needing developer experience, which makes it very powerful. Add together SharePoint in the cloud, and it looks a very useful business tool.