Windows SharePoint Services

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Windows SharePoint Services (WSS), or Windows SharePoint, is a free add-on (value-add) to Windows Server 2003 made available by Microsoft, which offers basic web portal and intranet functionality. It includes portal pages called web part pages made up of web parts (developed in ASP.NET), team, document, and project sub-sites, version-controlled document storage, and basic search functionality. It is made up of an ASP.NET web site hosted on Internet Information Services 6.0, using a SQL Server or MSDE database back-end to store data.

Windows SharePoint Services also forms the basis for Microsoft Office SharePoint Portal Server and Microsoft Office Project Server. Office SharePoint Portal Server is the enterprise version of Windows SharePoint Services, and is not free like WSS is.

[edit] Versions

The first version, called SharePoint Team Services (usually abbreviated to STS), was released at the same time as Office XP and was available as part of Microsoft FrontPage. STS could run on Windows 2000 Server or Windows XP. The only things it had in common with SharePoint Portal Server 2001 were some common graphical images and styles.

Windows SharePoint Services 2.0 was marketed as an upgrade to SharePoint Team Services, but was in fact a completely redesigned application. Key differences in document storage facilities differentiate the two products. SharePoint Team Services stored documents in ordinary file storage, while keeping document metadata in a database. Windows SharePoint Services 2.0 stores both the document and the metadata in a database, and supports basic document versioning for items in Document Libraries. This versioning capability was not present in STS. Service Pack 2 for WSS added support for SQL Server 2005 and the use of the .NET Framework 2.0.

Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 is planned for release in 2007 as part of the Microsoft Office 2007 suite and Windows Server "Longhorn". It includes many new features, such as mobility, RSS, wiki and weblog support, and much improved navigation. WSS 3.0 is built on the .NET Framework 2.0 and the Windows Workflow Foundation component of the .NET Framework 3.0 (formerly called WinFX).