BPC Keynote: 'What the Masters Think About SharePoint 2010,' Facilitated by Spence Harbar

At the conclusion of his introductory remarks, Bill English handed the reins over to Spence Harbar, who began the BPC keynote proper with an overview of the Microsoft Certified Master (MCM) program. Spence shared that it had been announced just this morning that, having previously been an MCM for SharePoint 2007, he is now among just four people to have been awarded MCM status for SharePoint 2010.

Spence delivered a brief history of the MCM program, including the core tenets of a Master, and just what is required to become certified as one. In brief, it sounds like the Microsoft version of an Army boot camp, with Spence mentioning the "pre-reading" list (which Brian Culver later discussed as consisting of over 7,000 pages of material), three weeks of intensive training at the Microsoft offices in Redmond, and the requirement to pass four different exams, concluding with an eight-hour hands-on qualification lab. In other words, this is a program for not only the most dedicated, but also only the most knowledgeable of SharePoint pros. Spence recommended that the surest way to guarantee a smooth SharePoint deployment is to engage the assistance of a MCM, and then proceeded to introduce the first of four of his fellow MCMs to join him in delivering the BPC keynote.

First up was Brian Culver, who spoke on the topic of claims-based authentication in SharePoint 2010. Brian explained that claims-based authentication is the new security model in SharePoint, using claims to establish identity. Benefits of claims-based authentication that Brian pointed out included: allows SharePoint to support multiple authentication providers per URL; automatic identity delegation within SharePoint; allows federation between organizations; and easily extensible and uses open standards (SAML, etc.). The bottom line on claims-based authentication, per Brian, is "Claims authentication is the foundation of an effective strategy to collaborate and communicate across your organization and other systems."

Next up was Chris Beckett, who spoke on the topic of Managed Metadata Services. Chris explained that "Managed Metadata is a new service in SharePoint 2010, built using the new Shared Service architecture." Chris pointed out as key features of Managed Metadata Services the consistency of metadata across SharePoint, as provided by Content Type Syndication and leveraged by tagging and search, and the Taxonomy Term Store, which "is the core element of the Managed Metadata Services," and which is "enormously scalable." Chris summed up by saying that "Managed Metadata is the foundation of an effective Enterprise Content management strategy to classify, label, find, and manage information across your organization."

Mirjam van Ost was the next MCM to speak, and her chosen topic was sandboxed solutions. Mirjam defined sandboxed solutions as being: SharePoint solutions (.wsp files); uploaded to and deployed from the Solutions Gallery at the site collection level; completely isolated in the site collection; incapable of bringing down your entire farm; and designed with hosted environments in mind. In describing the monitoring capabilities of sandboxed solutions, Mirjam issued a warning that if you alter the defaults and increase the available "resource points" that a sandboxed solution is afforded, in this case, you could potentially bring down an entire farm due to an excess of resources having been allotted to the sandboxed solution. In conclusion, Mirjam said that it's the balance between business agility and security and stability that sandboxed solutions provide that make them an essential component of SharePoint 2010.

Tom Resing was the final MCM to take the stage for the keynote, speaking on the topic of Business Connectivity Services (BCS) in SharePoint 2010. Tom explained that as the successor to 2007's BDC, "BCS allows you to connect your SharePoint websites to any kind of external system." Tom pointed out the three most important terms relating to BCS as being: external content types (the entity you're representing in SharePoint, e.g., customer, or order); external system (how you connect to the external content type); and external list (where you actually see and interact with the data in SharePoint 2010). Tom included three best practices relating to BCS while he was wrapping up, including: if you're still on 2007, use the BDC today to prepare you for the BCS experience; start with SharePoint Designer for designing BCS solutions; and encrypt your sensitive information.