This section details how to deploy Social Squared for Microsoft® SharePoint® 2013 & 2016. It is essential to read this section of the online documentation and complete the step in the Installing Social Squared section, before you can use Social Squared. Information on using and administering Social Squared can be found later in the documentation.
To successfully deploy Social Squared within your organization, you will need to complete the following steps:
- Plan the use of Social Squared within your organisation.
- Plan the installation of Social Squared
- Install Social Squared
- Activate at least the Social Squared Forums site collection feature on one site collection.
- Within that site collection, configure each site with the Social Squared database that should be used by users of that site.
- Create and Manage Forum Groups and Forums
- Administer Social Squared, configure pages to display Social Squared related information, and get your users to use the forums.
If you have any questions related to this documentation or the Social Squared product, please contact Lightning Tools by clicking Submit Support Ticket on Lightning Tools web site.
Installation Planning
To install Social Squared, you will require access to both:
Database server
Social Squared uses Microsoft® SQL Server® as the repository for Social Squared user profile information along with the topics, posts, and configuration settings. The main reason for using an SQL Server database is performance and scalability, allowing for an Enterprise-wide forum tool to be used without performance issues for hundreds or thousands of active users.
Not only can you use Social Squared as an Enterprise-wide forum tool with multiple forum categories, you can also use Social Squared for multiple smaller forums, perhaps at Team site or site collection level, whereby you require the posts to be separate. Either of these configurations are possible using Social Squared. Although, it is possible to have multiple separate instances of Social Square using a single SQL Server database by configuring the Social Squared Web Parts to display specific forum groups; however, if you wish to keep forums totally isolated from each other, for security reasons, Lightning Tools, recommend using separate SQL Server databases. You configure at a site level the Social Squared database that should be used; that is, all users in a site could use forums stored in one Social Squared database, whereas users in another site, even within the same site collection, could use forums stored in a different Social Squared database.
Social Squared supports Microsoft® SQL Server® 2005, 2008, 2008 R2, 2012, and 2014. On the computer where you want to create the Social Squared SQL Server database(s), you will require a SQL Server login that is a member of the following SQL Server roles:
- securityadmin fixed server role.
- dbcreator fixed server role.
Once you have created the database(s), and you want to run Windows PowerShell® cmdlets that affect the database(s), the account that is used to run the cmdlets must be a member of the db_owner fixed database role for the database(s).
In a development or test environment, both SharePoint and SQL Server may be installed on one server. In a production environment, it is liekly that SQL Server and SharePoint Server are installed on separate servers. If your IT department have installed Kerberos, this will not affect Social Squared. However, if your organization still uses NTLM Windows Authentication, and the SQL Server database resides on a separate physical machine to the SharePoint (IIS) server, the pass-through authentication between the Social Squared SharePoint components and the Social Squared database will fail, since Windows Authentication only works over a single hop. That single hop is from the user’s machine, where the web browser is opened, to the SharePoint server. The token cannot pass over a second hop – from the SharePoint server to the SQL Server. This is known as the double hop issue, and is not specific to Social Squared, but an issue associated with Windows Authentication and the NTLM protocol which affects all distributed Windows applications.
If you cannot persuade your IT department to use Kerberos, you have two other options. You can use Secure Store to handle the authentication or you can use a SQL Server Authentication user ID so that the Social Squared SharePoint components can connect to the Social Squared database. To use SQL Server Authentication user IDs, you need to configure the SQL Server in Mixed mode, which enables both Windows Authentication and SQL Server Authentication. On SQL Server, Windows Authentication is always available and cannot be disabled. To use Secure Store, you will need to create a secure store target application as described here:
Plan for Kerberos authentication in SharePoint→
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SharePoint server
The Microsoft® SharePoint® 2013 related component of Social Squared 2013 are packaged as a SharePoint farm solution, and therefore cannot be installed in Office 365™.
The farm solution once activated, installs:
- A number of application pages that can be accessed in the Social Squared Forum section on a site’s site settings page.
- One Farm feature, which enables you to licence Social Squared, using the Manage Lightning Tools products licensing link on the System Settings page on the SharePoint Central Administration web site.
- Two Web Application features, which map to two timer jobs that are created for each Web Application created in the SharePoint farm:
- Social Squared Digest Email Job, By default this timer job is scheduled to run daily starting every day between 10:00 AM and no later than 12:00 AM.
- Social Squared Reply Via Email Job. By default this timer job is scheduled to run every 5 minutes.
- Social Squared Digest Email Job, By default this timer job is scheduled to run daily starting every day between 10:00 AM and no later than 12:00 AM.
- Five site collections features:
- SocialSquared Forums Web Part
- SocialSquared Forums Active Users Web Part
- SocialSquared Forums Popular Topics Web Part
- SocialSquared Forums Tagging Web Part
- SocialSquared Reporting
- SocialSquared Forums Web Part
- Two site (web) features:
- Social Squared Digest Email Registration
- Social Squared Reply Via Email
- Social Squared Digest Email Registration
Social Squared can be used on any version of a SharePoint on-premises installation, that is, the site collection features and Web Parts can be used on pages in a SharePoint Foundation 2013/2106 on-premises installation, and can be used and seen on pages where users are assigned either the standard or enterprise SharePoint Server 2013/2016 licenses.
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