The Magic of Hosted WSS
Whoa, I’m really falling down on my blogging lately. It’s not that I don’t have as much to say, it’s that Twitter and other things end up taking more of my time these days. ("Microblogging" is the word we use to make tweets legitimate.)
So here’s something. I think I may have outlined this a bit before, but I thought it might interest someone out there to know how much I manage to wring out of my $29/month of hosted WSS. My friends over at FPWeb.net keep me up and running and manage to make me feel like a Very Important Customer, even though Sympraxis Consulting is just a one man shop at the moment (that would be me).
WSS is generally pooh-poohed by the SharePoint aficionados out there as too low end to be useful. (Of course, Microsoft would also love it if everyone purchased licenses for MOSS.) However, I’m using my WSS site for a number of things, and I think that this is pretty impressive given that it’s free software:
- As my Internet-facing site (http://sympraxisconsulting.com) — This is fairly vanilla, though I do have a custom master page with custom CSS and a little jQuery just to give it some sizzle.
- As my Intranet (permission-protected)– While I have a custom master page and CSS applied here, the branding serves little purpose other than to give me a visual cue where I am.
- As my Extranet (permission-protected) – When I’m working with clients, I set up a site for each where we can share documents, etc. These are plain vanilla Team Sites or even Blank Sites to start. To date, these sites have gotten very little use. (It’s always surprising how little people who hire you to build SharePoint stuff for them actually want to use SharePoint to collaborate on the process!)
- As a demo site for some of the stuff I build (http://sympraxisconsulting.com/Demos) – This is a vanilla Blank Site with some customized pages with JavaScript, jQuery, etc., which I use as a place to demo some of the jQuery Library for SharePoint Web Services functionality and some other stuff.
- As my development platform for my jQuery Library for SharePoint Web Services (permission-protected) — This is where I’m doing my "work".
All this without ever touching the servers!
Ha! now I know why your solutions work for our site: Hosted WSS (www.potatopro.com). I am now working on getting the site faster.
Most (if not all) of the stuff I write about ought to work on WSS or MOSS, unless I’ve specified otherwise. I try to make sure that things are of general use.
M.
Doesn’t having your public site for your consulting firm violate their terms of service? I note on their page here (http://www.fpweb.net/sharepoint-hosting/comparePlans.asp) that External Connector licenses don’t start until you get to the “Professional” (and much more expensive at $195/mo) plan.
FPWeb is fully aware of how I’m using their services, as I discuss service-related things with their President from time to time. (He actually got in touch with me after I tweeted somewhat negatively about something.)
M.