#Project and ##ProjectServer Oct CU available

Oct 2012 CU for Project and Project server is now available for download. Note that SP1 is pre requiste for this update to be installed on your environment.

For download link and more details, please follow:http://blogs.technet.com/b/projectadministration/archive/2012/11/05/microsoft-project-server-and-sharepoint-server-2007-and-2010-october-2012-cu-announcement.aspx

Happy updating.. 

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Project Server 2013 RTM Available NOW !

Following first wave release of : Microsoft Project Professional 2013, and SharePoint 2013 are available for download on MSDN,  Microsoft Project Server 2013 is now available for download to MSDN and TechNet subscribes.



For more details: Microsoft Project Server 2013 RTM available for download on MSDN.

Happy exploring ..

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Demand Management using SharePoint Designer 2013

One of the amazing capabilities of Project Server 2010 was introduction of Demand Management concept, which let us automate complete project/proposal life cycle to provide more control to the project flow and data.

Development of Project workflows, at high level, can be seen comprises of following major steps process:

1. Configuration within project server, such EPTs, PDPs, custom fields etc. etc.
2. Develop workflow using .Net or Use of any 3rd part tool such Nintex workflows for Project Server 2010

The above can best illustrated by following diagram, where the complete process was categorized in three major phases:

Sometime back i have blogged in detail about the development options to build Project Server 2010 workflows here.

Now in Project Server 2013 (#projectserver2013), Microsoft has taken major steps to improve this experience and simplifies the process of implementation of Project workflows. Project Server workflows can now be implemented using SharePoint designer in addition to Visual Studio.

Yes you are reading it absolutely rite, its now possible to create workflows by using SharePoint designer 2013. which means that with very limited coding knowledge, see the emphasis :), you can create complex Project workflows to manage the life-cycle of a wide range of project and proposals.

I am excited about this improvement, and believe that it can attract more users now to utilize the advantage of workflows. Let me dig more into detail of and share with you soon in future.

Until then you might be interested to follow the official blog of SharePoint Designer 2013 to stay up to date with the new features and offerings.

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Project Server 2013 - My First PWA

In continuation to my work related to evaluation of Project Server 2013, i have finally reached to the final milestone of provisioning my first PWA 2013 site .. wohooo... :)

My very brief and spontoneour reaction was, man its awesome :) .

The interface and arrangment of options are quite different than its predecessors, where Project Server 2010 was following almost the same interface and same placement of navigation links to different options as it was in Project Server 2007.

However PWA 2013 in first glance looks quite different, first the links in navigation pannel are all filtered out and only major ones are there now such as Projects, Approval, Resources, Tasks and Reports. Which is good as i always use to think that this whole lot of options on home page can be be quite puzzling for naive end users. But ofcourse this doesnt mean that options are missing, its just that they are hidden by default.

The home page also got metro interface, where i can see few quick link to options such as more settings and etc., and i have yet to explore all this in detail.

Prior to reaching to this stage, i have created OOB web application and its also nice to see all new SharePoint site.

The option to change the site look and feel and logo etc. let me quickly change the layout of my site. It comes with few built-in themes, with flexibility to change the color theme and font style etc.

 

 

 

Keep coming back for more interesting stuff related to Project Server 2013 here.

 

Cheers.

 

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SharePoint 2013 becomes more customer's oriented :)

Now this might not be a big deal for many of you, but i am quite excited to have my first SharePoint 2013 server farm configured and Central Admin up and running :)

Also the first thing which strikes to me, and encouraged me to be more optimistic towards the promisisng offerings by this new version, is when i was configuring farm services through wizard and been put on hold with this nice polite message while server doing its best to run all the services.

Isn't it reminds you of nice polite sound been heard from customer services desk, or by support engineer sitting over to the next side of your phone when you connects with customer support :) Seems like SharePoint decided to be more customer centric this time, and will treat its customers (including consultants, developers and end users) with more love and affection then it ever had :)

Kool stuff....

Look forward to more blogs coming up your way as soon as i move forward with my evaluation of 2013 product...

Cheers.

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I am Alive..

Hello all,

Its been a while since i am not writing, and that due to multiple reasons. First and foremost is due to my over occupied work load, and other reasons are several :) so lets ignore all the other excuses.

But the good thing is that i am back to business, and more focused towards what i love to do the most.

There is a lot happening in Microsoft world, new versions of almost all the client and server products are on their way - which is great and exciting.Same is for the SharePoint family products, and the one i (and all of EPM lovers :) ) was quite anxiously looking forward to was Project Server 2013.

Currently i am in phase of setting up my VM with PS 2013, and will get back with more information through blogs in future. You can get your hands on to lot of information related to PS 2013, available on Tech Net in very structured way, here.

Cheers.

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Project Server 2010 supports SQL Server 2012

With the recent release of SQL Server 2012, Project Server 2010 Hardware/Software support TechNet documentation is also updated.

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee683978.aspx

The SharePoint Server 2010 Service Pack 1 and Project Server 2010 Service Pack 1 updates must be installed to your Project Server 2010 installations in your farm in order to use SQL Server 2012 to host your farm databases.

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Project Server 2010 integration with SAP

Recently Microsoft partner company, Adviscon, has published white paper "Project Server 2010 integration with SAP". There is not enough information available related to the integration of  Project Server and SAP and its benefits, and this white paper indeed is a valueable material. Below is the executive summary from the white paper to give you an overview, and the link to download the white paper: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh770392.aspx

This white paper outlines the benefits and scenarios for integrating Microsoft Project Server 2010 with SAP’s ERP; in particular integrating the actual time reporting from SAP with the time-phased planning and resource forecasting power of Project Server 2010. 

This integration is cost-effective and enables the source of record Actuals (both Cost and Time reporting) to bring actuals to the planning activities that Project/Program Offices or Scheduling groups use Project Server 2010 for. 

This connection and process enables a large national company to drastically reduce the time spent in planning and trying to map the actuals directly with the way that the organization schedules work. Further, it enables the feature rich reporting capabilities of Microsoft Project Professional, Project Server and SharePoint Server and puts that planning and reporting directly in the hands of the end users.

This white paper is not a Detailed Technical Systems or programming write-up, but a customer solutions case study focusing on the value of systems integration of a Project and Resource Planning Organization.

 Happy reading.

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Project Server Databases Restore Failure - 3203 Error

Phew ..... wasnt really sure that i was able to overcome this and thought that all my efforts are lost now. But finally managed to fix it, and decided to put all bits and pieces in blog to help others.

I took the backup of my PWA i.e. 5db set, and when i tried to restore it to SQL so that i provision it on my VM environment, the following error has been thrown by SQL restore dialog box:

I am pasting the additional error information from the screen shot so that google can find it out for you:
______________________________________________________________________________________

an exception occurred while executing a transact-sql statement or batch. ( Microsoft.sqlserver.connectioninfo)

Additional Information :

Read on "C:\ProjectServer_Published" failed : 38(Reached the end of the file.) ( Microsoft sql server, error : 3203)

___________________________________________________________________________________

The Problem was that the source server database path was not found in destination server, so now you manually need to restore databases using sqlcmd with replace option. You can follow the steps to resolve this:

1. open command prompt using adminsitrator.
2. Type sqlcmd to connect to the default instance of SQL Server on the local computer, and the contents of the Command Prompt window will be:

   C:\>sqlcmd

   1> _
3. This means you have connected to the default instance of SQL Server and sqlcmd is now ready to accept Transact-SQL statements and sqlcmd commands. The flashing underscore after the 1> is the sqlcmd prompt that marks the location at which the statements and commands you type will be displayed.
4. Type the following script to get the Physical and Logical file name and its path of your database :
1. RESTORE FILELISTONLY FROM DISK = N'D:\<file_name>'
2. Go
3. 

   
   
5. Using the information you will get after running the above script, type the following script to restore your databases:
1. RESTORE DATABASE <file_name_New>
   FROM DISK = N'D:\<file_name>'
   WITH REPLACE ,
   MOVE '<Source physical file name returned by prev command>'
   TO 'C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL10.MSSQLSERVER\MSSQL\DATA\<file_name_New>.mdf',
   MOVE '<Source Logical file name returned by prev command>'
   TO 'C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL10.MSSQLSERVER\MSSQL\DATA\<file_name_New>_log.ldf'
2. go
6. This will now take some time depending upon the size of your database, you will see the cursor blink while its processing in the back. After a while output lines will start appearing indicating that status, and if it all goes smooth than the last line should be like this:
1. RESTORE DATABASE successfully processed 16668 pages in 8.765 seconds <size mb/sec>

Repeat the same above steps to restore all your databases, once all your database will restore successfully provision the PWA using the restored dbs.

Until next time, happy and prosperous new year ahead.

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Year 2011 in review

A year 2011 is been a roller-coaster ride for me through out in terms of personal and professional activities. Professionally, being a Project Management specialist using Ms EPM solution, it was year of lot of new learnings and achivements. Since the release of SharePoint 2010 and than later Project Server 2010 during mid of last year 2010, there were so much to catch up to grasp the early release of the product and than to demonstrate and implement to the real world scenarios. And without any doubt the Project Server 2010 is the most mature product from any of its predecessor, and this claims the Microsoft the highest rating for Project and Portfolio solution out in market.

Inspired by the idea of reviewing my blog at the year end, here are my top 5 blogs of year 2011 based on the number of hits:

1. Project Server 2010 - Task and Timesheet workflow
2. Project Server 2010/2007 Permission Settings
3. Project Professional 2010 - Baseline BUG
4. Project Server 2010 - Resource Picker on PDP
5. Project Server - Project Progress Tracking Methods

All your comments and feedback motivates me to write more and serve the community and readers out there to know more about Project and Project Server 2010. So folks keep visiting and sending your feedback, have a great year ahead.

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