Ms-Office tools integration with Alfresco By using share point protocol

In this post we are going to discuss how the integration will happened between Alfresco share and Microsoft windows tools.

The Microsoft Office SharePoint Protocol Support offers Microsoft users greater choice by providing a fully-compatible SharePoint repository that allows the Microsoft Office Suite applications (for example, Word, PowerPoint, Excel) to interact with Alfresco as if it was SharePoint. This enables your users to leverage theAlfresco repository directly from Microsoft Office.

You can also use Microsoft Office SharePoint Protocol Support to enable online editing for Office documents within Alfresco Share. It enables your users to modify Office files without checking them in and out. Alfresco locks the file while it is being modified and releases the lock when the file is saved and closed.

Installing the SharePoint Protocol Support AMP:

1. Browse to the Alfresco Enterprise download area.
2. Download and expand the alfresco-enterprise-spp-3.4.13.zip file.
3. Shut down the Alfresco server.
4. Move the alfresco-enterprise-spp-3.4.13.amp file to the amps directory.

This file holds the functionality for the SharePoint connector.

5. Apply the SharePoint AMP to the alfresco.war file using the Module Management Tool (MMT).

Note:For Tomcat, alternatively, run the apply_amps command in the Alfresco\bin directory, which applies all the AMP files that are located in the ampsand amps_share directories.

6. Start the Alfresco server.
7. Verify that you have applied the SharePoint AMP by checking that you have the following directory:

/webapps/alfresco/WEB-INF/classes/alfresco/module/org.alfresco.module.vti/context

Prerequisites for using SharePoint Protocol:

Refer to the update "Software Update for Web Folders (KB907306)" or the visit the following link for full details http://www.microsoft.com/download/en/details.aspx?displaylang=en&id=15123. Install this software.

Configuring share point protocol to alfresco:

1. Open the alfresco-global.properties file.
2. Add the following code in alfresco-global.properties file.

     #Alfresco SharepointProtocol configuration

    vti.server.port=7011

    vti.alfresco.deployment.context=/alfresco

    vti.alfresco.alfresoHostWithPort=http://127.0.0.1:7011

    vti.share.deployment.context=/share

    vti.share.shareHostWithPort=http://127.0.0.1:7011

    vti.server.external.host=127.0.0.1

    vti.server.external.port=7011

Configuring SharePoint Protocol for Online Editing:

The following issues are known for configuring the SharePoint Protocol for Online Editing

• There is a known issue with Office 2003 and 2007 Office documents opening as read-only in Internet Explorer for all versions before Vista SP1.

Refer to the knowledge base article 870853 on the Microsoft website to enable the Online Editing functionality.

• To use Online Editing on Windows 7, you must set BasicAuthLevel in the registry.

Basic authentication is disabled on Office 2010 by default. To enable it, create or edit the following registry

Open Run->regedit.

key:HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Office\14.0\Common\Internet: BasicAuthLevel=2.

Alternatively, use Pass-through or Kerberos authentication.

Note:It is important to set the vti.server.external.host andvti.server.external.port properties in the alfresco-global.propertiesfile to the externally resolvable host and port name that SharePoint clients will communicate with. These properties default to the host machine's local name and port 7070, respectively. These values are used by Share to generate the Edit Online link, which opens the document using the SharePoint module.

Testing:

Now open the any tool of windows

Save this in your local PC.

Follow these steps

Go to: File->publish->create document workspace.

It will pop- ups new window

You need to enter the documentworkspace name and url of share point protocol installed in alfresco Repo

Click on create.

Its open pop up for credentials of alfresco to login and to create document workspace.

We can see the details of the document workspace and we can make operations from MS-office tools like Creating new workspace, uploading new documents and sending invitations to others(alfresco users),etc..

Created work space in alfresco repo:

Opening document which is there in alfresco repo from windows tools

Open ms-office

Go to : file->open

Enter the url of SharePoint of alfresco repo in filename.

Then open

Its open one popup for alfresco credentials.

Enter the credentials 

And ok it will open all the document work spaces of alfresco repo.

you can select required folder and you can open it.


Thanks&Regads
Vikram Vanama