Improvements in SharePoint 2010

Based on preview from Jessica Meats from Microsoft 03-Jul-2009


In no particular order...


Office web apps - There will be Office web apps that allow you to open and do basic editing of Office documents without having the client (e.g. Word) installed. Apparently works in any browser and looks like it's a web-server installed program so probably comes with SharePoint Server, possibly also a free download to Windows Server.



Ribbon – All Office apps will use the ribbon, including Outlook and SharePoint



SharePoint Workspaces – Is the new name for Groove and is MASSIVELY improved so now supports lists as well as document libraries and meta data. Way way way better so now SharePoint genuinely has work offline capability. Can also edit web pages offline.



Office Outspace – Much better integration between Office apps and SharePoint. So when you save to SharePoint from a Office app you see a really cool interface for meta data, where to save it etc.



Email storage and archive – Now set up to use SharePoint instead of Exchange Public Folders to save emails. Effectively goes into the records management system.



2-way BDC – Business data catalogue changes from read-only to read-write.



Browser support – Safari and Firefox users become 'first class citizens'. Question mark over IE6.



Accessibility – A lot better



Scalability and performance improvements



PerformancePoint Server – Is now included (in Enterprise version) so BI functionality massively improved, including the ability to show graphs in SharePoint pages without 3^rd-party products



Meta data much better - Now in hierarchies so it can support a classification scheme or taxonomy. Auto complete in meta data entry and support for folksonomy



Web content management – Big step up here. Much easier to use SharePoint for websites.



EDRMS – Big improvements here too, SharePoint can now compete better with more established document and possibly record management systems



Collaboration and social networking – My Site becomes a social networking hub that works like Facebook e.g. you can leave messages on people's profiles like the Wall and others can see it. Improved blogging.



Expert finder



Simultaneous editing of Office documents – By multiple people. So sections of the documents are checked out to you.



Search improved – Thumbnail previews, related searches, phonetic name lookup. We think the enterprise version has FAST search included