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Case Study

SharePoint Implementation - Social Intranet Case Study: A global infrastructure Engineering,

Procurement & Construction Company

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This project determines whether SharePoint could meet the client’s documents and record

management needs as well as introduces improvements to the client’s information management

practices. The client demanded a SharePoint Intranet Portal to move forward to support its existing

and long-term goals.

A gap analysis identified that the client’s need were not meet and decided to test SharePoint to

improve employee collaboration, centralized communication etc. to ensure that the key information

required by the client’s staff is up-to-date, accurate as well as easily available and searchable.

Why SharePoint?

Maximize investment in Microsoft

Industry standard

Scalable for the future

Provides solutions for current challenges

Better integration with other third-party systems

The project scope includes:

The intranet to provide a clean, well-organized and professional interface which meets the

communication goals for all staff.

Devise a new information system that is suitable for current intranet content but scalable for

longer term future use.

Integration and migration from critical business systems.

To increase staff engagement and motivation by improving the tools available to the staff for

collaboration, communication and team working.

Client Requirement

Project Challenges

The team faced the following challenges:

Developing a portal offering all the features and functionalities with an exclusive focus

on the user’s day-to-day important activities.

Providing a robust framework for supporting the smooth functioning of the portal

accessed by number of users simultaneously.

Improve collaboration, document management, information sharing between

employees and various departments.

Single access point for everyone with a new intranet portal that allows employees to

accomplish their objectives and improve productivity.

Creating a social interaction platform where employees can do their work, collaborate

and use applications and other enterprise systems.

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Technologies Used

Manpower

Planning

Strategic planning in designing the new information system in a manner that satisfies the

client’s current requirements by maximizing usability and streamlining business operations.

Thorough research and analysis was done and new information architecture was designed

that changed how the information would be structured and stored.

Operating System &

Server Management

Windows OS, Multi-Server Architecture with Staging & Production

Environment through Version Controlling releases, Server

Optimization, Security & SSL Implementation, Scheduler for Back-ups,

Alert Monitoring System Integration, Server Performance Tuning at

regular intervals, Software Firewall Configuration & Maintenance

Development Tools &

Environments

.Net Framework, Microsoft SharePoint, Visual Studio, ASP.NET, C#,

AJAX, HTML, CSS, JavaScript etc.

Database MSSQL Database Server, DB Clustering, DB Optimization, Master

Slave Replication, Query Optimization, Scheduler for Backups

Project Leader

1

Developers

4

Designers

1

Quality Assurance Testers

1

Synchronizing and incorporating web usability principles while developing numerous

features designed for enhancing the users' experience.

Ensuring user privacy and safeguarding their content.

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Detailed wireframes were developed to provide the basic visual prototype for how pages

would appear.

Regular communication with the client was established in order to validate the techno-

functional requirement of the new intranet development.

Integration of third-party applications were carried out into the new user-friendly SharePoint

environment.

The other significant task, a full content migration from the old system to the new system

involved hundreds-of-thousands of documents and this was accomplished successfully.

Architecture

The following diagram represents the logical SharePoint technologies architecture. SharePoint is now

in its fourth major release and comprises the SharePoint Foundation 2010 (formerly Windows

SharePoint Services version 3.0) and SharePoint Server 2010 (formerly Microsoft Office SharePoint

Server 2007). SharePoint Foundation 2010 is a free add-on to the Windows 2008 server, running on

top of SQL Server, Windows 2008 Server, and ASP.NET 3.x. SharePoint Server 2010 is a product

that comes with different editions (Standard vs. Enterprise) and options (Excel Services, Content

Management, etc.), and runs on top of SharePoint Foundation 2010.

Figure 1 - SharePoint 2010 Architecture

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Since SharePoint Server 2010 is built on Windows SharePoint Foundation 2010, they both share

a lot of similarity in architecture and foundation. SharePoint Server 2010 provides more

application-level features and services. It also has different and more extensive User Profile

management features than SharePoint Foundation 2010. The important point about this

architecture is that SharePoint relies on many user management and security principles from the

Windows Network Operating system, IIS, and ASP.Net foundation. In the rest of this section we

will take a look at:

SharePoint Foundation 2010 and SharePoint Server 2010 architecture

SharePoint Security (Authentication and Authorization)

SharePoint User Profiles in SharePoint Server 2010 and SharePoint Foundation 2010

Development Highlights

SharePoint Server was set up for the client for easy management of content.

A detailed on-site requirement gathering with different department heads helped set clear

boundaries on requirements for each module.

The intranet platform provided a comprehensive all-in-one solution that worked hand-in-

hand while taking care of every consideration from the beginning to the end of the process

including SharePoint development, technology integration, content migration and various

support activities.

Login was provided through AD to maintain security and aide in usability to the users. Users

could directly log into the site without having to enter credentials again.

A powerful document management system workflow was set up to keep check on every

document uploaded by using approval system of respective departments’ authorized users.

The Sharepoint server, Document server and Indexing server was set up separately in order

to have a good performance of the site regardless of number of users and data quantity.

While adhering to the industry’s best practices and rigorous quality control and quality

assurance standards, the new system was developed and delivered within the required time

constraints.

A customized IT ticket system was also set up in order to support the IT team in handling

day-to-day requests from end-users. It contained of workflows where automated emails

were sent out once a ticket was logged and even when it was re-assigned.

A customized dashboard was set up where data from multiple modules were placed for easy

and quick access to users.

A legacy ASP.Net BI system which was developed previously by CLIENT team was integrated

to work within the portal. User need not had to re-login to go into the BI and it was

controlled to be accessed by authorized users only.

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The website was setup on intranet of the client to protect its data from outside network

access.

Some of the screenshots of the portal are given below:

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