Service Application Architecture

Service Application Architecture

•       SharePoint 2007

–   SSP [shared service provider)

–   Each instance of The SSP has all services enabled

–   Each site collection was locked into a single SSP

–   The SSP was a single point of failure

–   Lacked scalability

–   Lacked flexibility

Service Application Architecture

•       Sharepoint 2010

–   SA (service application) architecture

–   Provide background services to SharePoint sites

–   More flexibility thon the SSP

–   Each SA can serve one or multiple sites

–   SAs can be placed in groups for simpler deployment to Web applications

–   Load balancing

SA Terminology

•       Service

–   Binary file[s) installed on The server form To execute a function

–   A program running in The server form That does something for SharePoint

•     Excel services do Excel data processing

•       Service Application

–   Implementation of the service

–   Reference to the service in the form

SA Terminology

•       Service application proxy

–   Target for calls to the SAs

–   Multiple instances of The service on the back end

–   Load balance between instances

•       Service instance

–   Single implementation of an SA

SAs in SharePoint Foundation

•       Business Data Connectivity service

–   Connect to external data sources

•       Usage and Health Data Collection

–   SharePoint Health Analyzer

•       Microsoft SharePoint Foundation Subscription Settings service

–   Multi-tenancy

•     More than one user consuming the services on one form.

Standard Edition SAs

•       Managed Metadata service

–   Centralized Taxonomy for social Tagging keywords

•       Search service application

–   Full-fledged search for Sharepoint sites

–   Search entire form and remote servers

•       Secure Store service

–   Claims-based authentication

•       State service

–   Track user state

•       User Profile service application

–   Full-featured My Sites

•       Web Analytics service application

–   Statistical tracking

•       Word Automation services

–   Workflows for Word documents

–   View Word documents within Web browser

Enterprise Edition SAs (BI)

•       Access services

–   Consume Access databases into a SharePoint site

•       Excel services

–   Work with Excel workbooks embedded into The site

–   Provide forms to modify cells

–   Use Excel workbooks lo create programatic application

•       PerformancePoint service application

•       Business Intelligence, dashboard and key performance indicators

•       Visio Graphics services

•       Render graphical visio diagrams based on data

•       Diagrams are created within the visio application

SA Security

•       Improves on SSP security from 2007

–   Claims-based authorization

–   Based on identities and properties of identities

–   Can be utilized for authentication with external networks outside of Active Directory

–   Support for SSL

•     Use encryption between WFE’s and application servers

–   Applications are isolated

–   A separate database is used for each application

–   A separate application pool may be used

–   Multiple service applications may be deployed with different accounts and different databases

SA Benefits

•       Granular deployment

–   Install on the server end then disable all features except the one needed

•       Configuration flexibility

–   SA proxy can take care of network load balancing by using round-robin Techniques

•       Administration delegation

•       Sharing of services across Web applications and even server forms