SharePoint 2010 helps people work together and share information with each other. The interface to SharePoint is simply the browser (Internet Explorer, Firefox, and Safari are all supported). SharePoint sites are setup as containers where the collaboration takes place among people. Several site templates exist to choose from when creating your site. Getting started with a site is also easy since once the site is created, it guides you with the next steps you need to take to change its title, icon, navigation, color theme and more. The next step is to create site components such as lists and libraries that will help you store your site content. Serving up this content to users is done with SharePoint pages which can be customized to your end users’ needs.
Before getting started with working in SharePoint sites, you need to install the SharePoint Server first. Installing the SharePoint Server requires a server running Windows Server 2008. Installation is a fairly straightforward process but it should be attempted with proper planning upfront keeping the hardware and other requirements in mind (please refer to http://sharepoint.microsoft.com/). Once SharePoint is installed, all of its components are configured and proper services are turned on at the server level. Then a web application is created. A web application in SharePoint’s case is simply an IIS website that has been extended to run SharePoint. Creating a web application also creates a content database to store all user generated SharePoint content and structures. Under a web application, several site collections can be created. A site collection is exactly what it sounds like – a collection of sites – with one top level site and several subsites.
SharePoint can be customized and components can be created directly using the browser or another free powerful application named Microsoft SharePoint Designer 2010 (SPD). SPD will allow you to create site components, workflows, customize pages, web parts and many other things that are not even possible to accomplish using only the browser. Microsoft recommends that site administrators and designers should utilize SPD to truly realize your investment in SharePoint technologies.
