Finally, Microsoft Ignite 2015 took place. Being the largest, most comprehensive and popular technology event the world over today, it also included a lot of other domestic technical events. SharePoint 2016 was among the key things that dominated the day at the event.
During the event, Microsoft uncovered interesting information about Sharepoint 2016 through Bill Baer, who apparently heads Sharepoint at Microsoft. The event offered an opportunity for many to learn more about this version of the product, including what to expect, latest changes and improvements, release date, amongst many other details.
An analysis of Baer’s presentation together with other information that was shared about SharePoint revealed a lot. Take a look.
Cloud improvements
Currently, Office 365 and SharePoint Online run Sharepoint 2013, of course at worldwide sort of scale. Both are able to develop new features, uncover and fix issues, test bug fixes while running the software in production for a countless number of customers. Interestingly, what emerges out of these later is a combination of both of them together with the premium cloud Add-on. It’s simply a merger of the former on-premises product version and a somewhat cloud-specialised edition of the same.
However, according to Baer, before Microsoft engaged in the development of this new version, they examined the cloud service together with all the aforementioned features combined. What emerged formed the starting point for additional improvements on the on-premises product.
Much of the focus has been dedicated to SharePoint’s files, Sites, Content management and portal components.
Among the new experiences Microsoft has added to SharePoint’s cloud service, includes the About me next generation portal which makes use of the Microsoft’s Delve tool and Office Graph.
Baer added that such new changes are meant to be additive to the software and he even went further to state that Microsoft still plans to bring in a number of them into the next release.
Deployment and patch enhancements
Unlike before where we had stand-alone deployments, for this new version, all deployments will be farms that boast of multiple servers.
In addition, patching as well as updating has been enhanced. The two MSIs per SharePoint core service, as well as the one language pack services, can easily be updated while doing production without one being inconvenienced in any way.
Authentication and authorization
Both aspects have been well factored out in SharePoint 2016 version since we are moving into an increasingly cloud-based world.
The current version has notably moved away from windows identities towards claims based authentication, OAuto and WS-Federation and authentication using SAML.
Furthermore, the Azure active Directory has been, for instance, trusted by default.
Also not forgetting to mention the new search service that is able to index both on-premise content with this new version as well as Office 365. Once the indexes have been combined, users will be able to search a single time and then have results matching their search query availed from both locations.
Migrations
Migrating from SharePoint 2013 to SharePoint 2016
If you’ve already migrated to SharePoint 2013, it will be much easier for you to upgrade to the latest version. You’ll simply attach your SharePoint 2013 database to the latest version.
In case you have sites on SharePoint 2013 that still use the SharePoint 2010 experience, you’ll have to move them into the 2013 user experience first before attaching the database
Migrating from Sharepoint 2007;2010 to 2016
Currently, most organisations still use Sharepoint 2010. So in case one needs an upgrade to the latest version, the process will be quite difficult. For Sharepoint 2010, you’ll have to physically migrate it to Sharepoint 2016. Same applies to SharePoint 2007.
Overall, if all the aforementioned end up being a reality, then the version will be worthy of the cost one will pay for the upgrade. We can all expect to benefit greatly from this product.
The bottom line
After Microsoft’s Ignite 2015, we all had the opportunity to look forward to one of the best tools ever developed by the Company. SharePoint 2016 is set for release early next year and maybe it might end as the platform you’ll experience through to 2020.
