SharePoint Replication: Choosing the Right Technology for Instant Access

Transcription

1 SharePoint Replication: Choosing the Right Technology for Instant Access Contents Introduction...2 What happens when access to sharepoint is disrupted?...2 Identifying access challenges across the enterprise...2 sharepoint replication solutions...4 client-to-server sharepoint replication...5 server-to-server sharepoint replication...7 The Right Combination: Client and Server Replication...9 About Colligo Networks Inc...11 about metalogix...11 Copyright 2012 Metalogix International GmbH. All rights reserved. Metalogix is a trademark of Metalogix International GmbH. StoragePoint is a registered trademark of BlueThread Technologies, Inc. Microsoft, Exchange Server, Microsoft Office, SharePoint, and SQL Server are registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation.

2 Introduction This whitepaper is intended for IT professionals and developers who want to extend adoption of Microsoft Office SharePoint across the enterprise to increase the return on their investment. It specifically addresses how SharePoint replication technology can provide instant access to SharePoint for mobile professionals, remote workforces, and national and global offices. It discusses how the right combination of server-to-server and client-to-server replications solutions can resolve two important SharePoint adoption challenges: latency and offline access. The result for enterprises is improved worker productivity, collaboration, and enterprise content management. what happens when access to sharepoint is disrupted? With over 100 million licenses sold, SharePoint is fast becoming the solution of choice for over 17,000 organizations to enhance collaboration, support content management, and facilitate business processes (source: Microsoft, March 2, 2008). From small businesses to large enterprises, organizations rely on SharePoint to manage business information. Today s information workers depend on SharePoint for storing files, collaborating on projects, searching for corporate data, and managing business metrics. What happens when access to SharePoint is disrupted? Access to SharePoint can be slow from branch or remote offices. Mobile workers are often disconnected. These information workers either stop using SharePoint or copy content to local servers and hard drives. Manually copying content to hard drives takes time and leads to workers mistakenly using older versions of documents. Workforce productivity declines, collaboration breaks down, and business processes can stall. Essentially, intermittent or unacceptable access leads to adoption issues. IT managers today are charged with creating business value by supporting structured content, improving collaboration, centralizing business information, and keeping data secure. Enterprise content management and collaboration solutions, like SharePoint, can only support these objectives to the extent that they are adopted by information workers. identifying access challenges across the enterprise What portion of the workforce is affected by SharePoint access challenges? How many information workers are equipped with laptops? How much time do they spend outside the company walls? What portion of operations takes place at offices without a local SharePoint server? How long does it take to access a 1MB document from branch and remote offices? By looking at the entire workforce and operations, IT managers can identify SharePoint access challenges. mobile workers Mobile workers make up a significant portion of today s workforce. Research firm IDC reports that over 68% of workers in the Unites States are mobile, and predicts the number of worldwide mobile workers to reach 1 billion by 2011 (source: IDC, January 15, 2008). Mobile workers include sales professionals, consultants, auditors, and 2

3 field technicians, who spend the majority of their workweek outside the office. Travelling executives can also spend a significant portion of their time outside company walls. Even many information workers take their laptops home. Despite the latest innovations in wireless technologies, these mobile workers often find themselves disconnected while travelling, at client offices, or in the field. To remain productive, they require offline access to SharePoint to manage business information despite network unavailability, performance issues, and reception problems. Remote workers Remote workers include consultants and travelling engineers who need to stay connected to office systems. They include missionaries working in third world countries and officers on naval fleets. Telecommuters, now often called web commuters, make up a growing percentage of the workforce. While many organizations provide VPN access for remote workers, a reliable internet connection is not always available. Slow connection speeds and VPN sessions that time-out lead to frustrated SharePoint users. Microsoft Office Outlook in cached mode provides instant access to , regardless of connection speeds. By providing desktop caching solutions for SharePoint, IT managers can solutions for SharePoint, IT managers can eliminate latency issues experienced by remote workers. Background synchronization can drastically improve the user experience. remote branch offices Remote branch offices are becoming one of the top network IT initiatives of the decade, since enterprises view the branch as a critical beachhead for IT to deliver business value to the enterprise according to Research firm IDC (Source: IDC, June 2008). Small branch offices, however, also frequently experience latency issues with web-based applications. Organizations with small subsidiary, satellite, and remote offices may invest in Wide Area Networks, only to find that performance is unacceptable and adoption suffers. Accessing SharePoint sites and working on larger documents can be a frustrating experience for information workers. Remote offices, depending on their size, require either cached or local access to SharePoint. geographically dispersed organizations Geographically dispersed organizations typically rely on consolidated server farms to support multiple operations, which results in WAN performance challenges. National and international enterprises can invest in the fastest WAN technologies and purchase WAN accelerators, yet still struggle with performance during peak business hours. These solutions can simply be ineffective for certain operations and costs can quickly become 3

4 prohibitive. Large offices require local SharePoint access to provide LAN speed performance, in order for adoption to result in the expected return on investment. Practical demands require instant access to information managed in SharePoint whether users are at a remote site in Africa, a local office in the next city, visiting a client site in Asia, or on a ship in the middle of the ocean. The complexity of today s working demands and environment has led the way for replication technologies. sharepoint replication solutions Replication is the process of creating, maintaining, and synchronizing multiple copies of SharePoint data. So why are copies of content needed? To deliver fast access to SharePoint, in order to extend adoption and optimize the return on SharePoint investments. A typical SharePoint implementation requires bandwidth from a central server to reach out to various mobile workers and branch offices of an organization. Having to rely on expensive bandwidth and unreliable network connectivity can be costly and ineffective for most organizations. That is when replication becomes a valuable, time-saving, and costeffective alternative. SharePoint replication can be grouped into two general types of solutions, described below. 1. Client-to-Server SharePoint Replication Client solutions synchronize content between SharePoint servers and client software on desktops. Information workers (or IT) define a portion of SharePoint server content (e.g. a project team site) to be replicated locally on hard drives. This enables mobile and remote workers to instantly access critical SharePoint content cached on their laptops, regardless of network connectivity. This is useful while users are both offline and online in low bandwidth/high latency situations. 2. Server-to-Server SharePoint Replication Server replication is used to synchronize content from one SharePoint server to another. There are two main scenarios. In the first, a central farm provides bi-directional information to a branch office to reduce WAN requirements and improve performance. In the second scenario, replication is set from inside the firewall to outside the firewall for use in extranets. Both solutions can be used together, and each has its advantages, discussed next. 4

5 Client-to-server replication Client-to-server replication delivers immediate access to SharePoint sites by caching content locally on laptops and PCs. Caching improves user productivity by delivering a consistent SharePoint experience whether information workers are on or off the network and regardless of slow (LAN or WAN) networks performance. In addition to instant access, information workers also benefit from improved usability. Desktop software supports functionality that is not possible with typical web-based applications. For example, users can easily drag-and-drop content and right-click to quickly perform operations. With increased productivity and usability, the result is better adoption of SharePoint. Organizations that use client caching solutions are able to increase the number of information workers using SharePoint and to significantly augment the amount of structured content managed in SharePoint. View case studies at When organizations identify the need for a client solution for SharePoint, a number of requirements typically arise. IT managers want a solution that is easy to deploy, secure, and flexible. Information workers want a consistent experience, whether online or offline, that delivers both the rich functionality of SharePoint and the usability of a desktop application. Below is a list of typical IT and end user requirements for a SharePoint client solution. a) client-only solution A lightweight, client-only replication solution leverages out-of-the-box SharePoint web services and allows IT managers to offer instant access to SharePoint, without the need to deploy code to the SharePoint front-end servers or manage additional crawling servers. Content is cached on desktops, so access is instant, and background synchronization eliminates latency from the user experience. b) user-based content selection Collaboration workspaces in SharePoint are being created all the time by project and departmental managers, and the population of offline and remote users is constantly changing. For a solution to be practical, IT cannot be often responsible for publishing each site and sub- site for cached use. It is critical that the selection of content for offline sync be configurable by either the end user, IT admin, or both. For example, IT might define a core set of offline content for users and then allow them to add new SharePoint sites based on their individual needs. c) document libraries and lists Information workers need read and write access to their project documents, whether they are online or offline. Lists, both custom and standard, are also being increasingly usedin collaboration workspaces. One of the factors driving the increased use of lists is lookups. Users are realizing that lookups provide a much more flexible and powerful way of linking information, and are much easier to use than choice columns. So document libraries, lists, and lookups must all be supported by a client solution. d) metadata and views Access to metadata and views is critical from the desktop, to quickly organize and find content in SharePoint. With client software, metadata for documents and list items can be edited or added to one or multiple items at a time, with a simple right-click action. Default folder- level metadata can be also be set for automatic application at the/ time of drag- and-drop, whether online or offline. e) 2-way sync Where SharePoint is used for collaboration, users will need to access, modify, and add content. 2-way sync allows users to alter documents, add files, and change metadata offline. With client software, changes made are automatically synchronized to the SharePoint server when users are online. Access-based background synchronization ensure the latest content is always available when working online. Only content that is changed is synchronized to minimize network traffic. 5

6 f) from templates Many organizations rely on templates stored on the SharePoint server to store blank InfoPath forms and other documents. With the introduction of multiple content types in SharePoint 2007, organizations are standardizing document creation based on content type templates. Client software must support use of forms and content types, regardless of connectivity. g) management More and more, organizations are turning to SharePoint as a solution for sharing and archiving project s. By providing rich Outlook integration, SharePoint client technology can provide rich access to document libraries and lists. More importantly, it enables users to drag-and- drop s (including metadata and attachments) into SharePoint, all within the Outlook interface. And just like Outlook is available in cached mode to eliminate LAN or WAN/ latency and to provide offline access for mobile workers, client technologies allow users to manage s and SharePoint content online and offline. h) conflict resolution Since users are making changes while offline, there will invariably be synchronization conflicts (where two users change the same document). Support for check-in and checkout is important, but users also need the ability to modify unchecked documents offline. Efficient and user friendly handling of conflicts is therefore critical. Client software offers a number of options: (1) save as a new document, (2) choose the local version, (3) choose the server version, and (4) use compare and merge. i) custom desktop applications While IT managers want an out-of-the-box solution that provides immediate value in replicating the SharePoint experience on the desktop, they also want the option to extend its functionality. Their business environment may require more sophisticated metadata editors or integration to additional data sources. IT managers prefer investing in a client platform where the run-time engine can be leveraged to build custom applications. i) security Allowing users to only cache SharePoint content based on their user privileges is not enough. IT managers need to ensure that business data replicated on laptops and remote workstations is secure. Client replication software supports data encryption to ensure that enterprise data remains secure. 6

7 Client solutions for SharePoint are being deployed by corporations in many industry sectors to improve the productivity of their mobile and remote workforces. For example, Colligo ContributorTM for SharePoint has been successfully deployed by multi-national pharmaceutical companies to give their sales professionals access to forms and sales information when visiting clinics and hospitals. Consultants at professional services firms are using Colligo Contributor to manage engagements when working at client sites. Distribution organizations have deployed Contributor to eliminate latency issues previously experienced at internationally dispersed sales offices. Energy companies, particularly in the oil & gas sector, are using Contributor to keep project teams, supervisors, and managers working in the field updated with the latest information and safety bulletins contained in SharePoint. Manufacturing plants are using Contributor for offline access to plant manuals and safety procedures in the event of a disaster or server failure. Other examples of industries adopting client solutions include aerospace, agribusiness, electronics, telecommunications, and automotive. server-to-server replication Server-to-server replication copies and distributes data and objects from one database to another and then synchronizes the content between each of the instances to maintain consistency. One of the most compelling reasons to implement a server-to-server replication solution is its ability to give instant access to SharePoint. Server-based replication helps businesses with users in geographically distributed locations communicate more effectively over networks that are periodically disconnected, have limited bandwidth, or high latency. It gives remote and entirely mobile operations, such as shipping fleets, improved access to business portals by replicating them on the local server, and by reducing data transmission costs. View case studies at In these kinds of remote scenarios, selective replication is critical. In other words, if IT managers want to have only applicable content replicated, they can define it according to specific metadata. On the other hand, if IT managers want to have the entire web application replicated, including the presentation layer, they can make the remote user experience virtually identical to the user experience at headquarters. Let s talk money. Bandwidth can be expensive. Even if an office is smaller, say between 50 and 150 people, bandwidth considerations may drive it to implement a server-to-server solution. For example, if employees are frequently and repetitively downloading the same data using expensive bandwidth, server-based replication may still be a more cost-effective solution than using WANs. But more importantly, the performance that is achieved with local access is key to efficiency, employee productivity, and acceptance. Time is money. What about connectivity? In addition to traditional WANs, a growing number of organizations are relying on expensive and less reliable satellite communication to transmit data from head office servers to remote locations. Server-based replication can cut satellite communication costs by up to 90%, while ensuring that information workers have access 24/7 to business critical data and key SharePoint functionality. It 7

8 virtually guarantees that all users, irrespective of network connection, have access to key business data. When replication is interrupted by network downtime, it has enough smarts to pick up where it left off and continue with the replication process when the satellite system is back up and running. Organizations interested in backup plans and disaster recovery solutions will be very interested in the serverto-server approach. Should the central server become unavailable due to a natural disaster, power outage, or other reason, database replication improves availability of content. Since the other servers will have the most current versions of content, an organization can continue business virtually unimpeded, without any operational processes hindered. Finally, a logical separation of data is common where two farms are created with clearly distinct access and physical implementation, a partner portal and an internal intranet for example, but it is key to share information between these systems, and it is important to have a secure solution to replicate data between these environments. In general, here are some key features to look for in an effective server-to-server replication solution: a) BI-Directional Replication This is essential to ensure synchronization of content created at locations other than the central server. Both the site structure and permissions not only data should be bi-directional. To not enable communication from remote workers back to the central server would also cause remote workers to feel disconnected from their headquarter counterparts. b) transactional or Event-Level Replication This type of replication is typically used in server-to-server scenarios that require high throughput to improve scalability and availability, frequent reporting, and data synchronization between multiple sites. It is essential to ensure near real- time replication since replication occurs every time an action takes place within SharePoint, such as the check-in or check out of a document. c) replication that Can Cross the Firewall It is important that cross- firewall replication still maintain strong security. For that reason, IT should be able to selectively replicate certain content and have the ability to select bi-directional replication through a firewall and not only one-way replication. This is essential for global organizations that cannot afford to be restricted by environmental and physical boundaries during the course of business. d) replication that Makes Use of Microsoft s Bit Level Differencing Bit-level differencing can cut costs dramatically by making it possible to replicate only the edits or changes to documents, rather than the entire document. e) Selective Replication Selection provides the ability to decide what specific content is replicated and what is not based on attributes such as published or confidential to even further reduce bandwidth requirements or to provide logical separation of data. 8

9 The basic demand for efficient replication of data has wide appeal and is relevant to many practical applications across the enterprise, from disaster recovery scenarios to simply making sure that remote offices have access to SharePoint data and functionality needed for success. By combining client-to-server and server-to-server replication in one comprehensive solution, an organization can be certain it is reaping the most return on its SharePoint investment. The Right Combination: Client and Server Replication To ensure enterprise wide SharePoint access and adoption, IT managers must consider the specific requirements of mobile workers, remote workers, small remote offices, branch offices, and geographically dispersed operations. The number of mobile workers and the size and geographic dispersion of offices are important considerations in selecting the right combination of client and server replication solutions. The most cost effective solution for individual mobile and remote workers is a client-only replication solution, which requires no server modifications. For smaller remote offices, either a client or server replication can be deployed. The decision is typically driven by the number of SharePoint users, the amount of SharePoint content being synchronized, and the local cost of bandwidth. For large branch offices and national or international operations, server-to-server replication offers significant cost advantages. This table provides general guidelines for the right mix of client and server solutions required based on the makeup of the organization: Scenario Mobile Workers Remote Workers Small Remote Offices Large Branch Offices Geographically Dispersed Organizations Replication Solution Client-to-Server Replication Client-to-Server Replication Client-to-Server Replication OR Server-to-Server Replication Server-to-Server Replication Server-to-Server Replication Selecting the right solution for small remote offices typically requires deeper analysis. A client caching solution can be the best choice when there are less than 100 SharePoint users (many mobile) accessing smaller SharePoint sites, in a location where bandwidth is inexpensive. However, in a scenario where there are more SharePoint users, larger SharePoint sites, more frequent changes to content, or higher bandwidth costs, serverto-server replication can be the most cost effective solution. The following table can be used to evaluate alternatives: Scenario Replication Solution Number of Users # Traffic MB/User/Year x# Sync Traffic MB/Year # W AN$/MB X$ WAN$/MB X$ Client Licenses ($/Year) +$ Server Licenses ($/Year) +$ Server + Maintenance ($/Year) +$ TOTAL ANNUAL COST =$ TOTAL ANNUAL COST =$ 9

10 An organization with a remote mine site in Peru provides an illustrative example of a small remote office that requires both client and server replication. Server-to- server replication is used to maintain a SharePoint server at the mine office with current content from the SharePoint farm at headquarters in London, UK. This enables information workers at the mine to use SharePoint with quick response times, while drastically reducing the high cost of satellite WAN traffic. When the mine staff are out in the field (e.g. tracking and inspecting equipment), a client-to- server replication solution is used to access SharePoint from laptops. When mine staff return to the office, their laptops synchronize with the replicated local SharePoint server, not generating individual satellite WAN traffic. This combination of server and client replications ensures consistent access to SharePoint in the office and while in the field it also minimizes the costs for the office in Peru. Remote mine in Peru Head office in London, UK Laptop User Colligo Mine Office SharePoint Server Syntergy Satellite WAN Syntergy SharePoint Server Farm Laptop User Colligo Mine Field Staff Desktop Browser User Desktop Browser User Mine Office Staff To learn more about client solutions for SharePoint, please contact Colligo Networks. For more information about server replication solutions and solutions for moving SharePoint data quickly and easily, please contact Syntergy. 10

11 about colligo networks inc. Colligo is a leader in client collaboration software, helping organizations drive SharePoint adoption by providing an intuitive user experience that better integrates SharePoint into the way users work on their desktops. Information workers can easily access, modify, and create SharePoint documents, forms, lists, and metadata through familiar desktop interfaces. Contributor Client delivers instant access, online and offline, for mobile and remote workers. Contributor Add-In integrates Outlook with SharePoint for better and document management. Colligo is Microsoft Gold Certified. Learn more at About Metalogix Metalogix is the trusted provider of innovative content lifecycle management solutions for Microsoft SharePoint, Exchange and Cloud platforms. We deliver high-performance solutions to scale and cost-effectively manage, migrate, store, archive and protect enterprise content. Metalogix provides global support to thousands of customers and strategic partners and is a Microsoft Gold Partner, a managed partner in Microsoft s High Potential ISV Group and GSA provider. Metalogix is a privately held company backed by Insight Venture Partners and Bessemer Venture Partners. Metalogix 5335 Wisconsin Ave NW, Suite 510, Washington DC sales@metalogix.com