Running a SharePoint Site on Windows Home Server : Installing and Configuring Windows SharePoint Foundation 2010 (part 1)

Windows SharePoint Foundation 2010 is not difficult to install and configure, but it does break (temporarily) the default Windows Home Server website. The next few sections take you through the steps for downloading, installing, and configuring Windows SharePoint Foundation 2010, including how to get the Windows Home Server default website back on its feet.

Note

To run Windows SharePoint Foundation 2010, your server must have a 64-bit quad-core CPU, and at least 4GB of RAM.

Downloading and Installing Windows SharePoint Foundation 2010

To download Windows SharePoint Foundation 2010, first head for the Microsoft Download Center at www.microsoft.com/downloads/, and then search for SharePoint Foundation.

Note

If you want to download Windows SharePoint Foundation 2010 directly using your Windows Home Server machine, you’ll need to configure the Internet Explorer Enhanced Security Configuration (ESC) feature. By default, this feature makes it a hassle to navigate any site that’s not in your Trusted Sites security zone, so you need to disable it for Administrators. Click the Server Manager icon in the taskbar, and then click Configure IE ESC in the Security Information section. In the dialog box that appears, select Off in the Administrators section, and then click OK.

Follow these steps to install Windows SharePoint Foundation 2010 on Windows Home Server:

1.	Launch the file that you downloaded, and click Run when prompted.
2.	Click Install Software Prerequisites. The Products Preparation Tool appears.
3.	Click Next. The license agreement appears.
4.	Click I Accept the Terms of This Agreement, and then click Next. The Products Preparation Tool installs the software required for SharePoint.
5.	Click Finish.
6.	Click Install SharePoint Foundation. After a few moments, the license agreement appears.
7.	Click I Accept the Terms of This Agreement, and then click Continue. SharePoint asks you to choose the installation you want.
8.	Click Standalone. Windows Home Server installs Windows SharePoint Foundation 2010.
9.	When the install is complete, leave the Run the SharePoint Products Configuration Wizard Now check box activated, and then click Close.

Running the Initial Windows SharePoint Foundation 2010 Configuration

When you click the Close button to end the installation, SharePoint launches the Products Configuration Wizard. This wizard runs through a series of 10 configuration tasks that get Windows SharePoint Foundation 2010 ready to run. Follow these steps to perform this configuration:

1.	Click Next. The wizard displays a list of services and asks if these services can be restarted, if necessary, during the configuration.
2.	Click Yes. The wizard then runs through the configuration tasks, which takes several minutes.
3.	When the configuration is complete, click Finish. SharePoint then attempts to load the default site (http://server, where server is the name of your Windows Home Server).
4.	If you see the Connect to Server dialog box, click Cancel.
5.	Close the web browser window.

Creating a New SharePoint Web Application

During the initial SharePoint configuration, two things happen that cause the Windows Home Server default website to go offline and be replaced by the SharePoint default website:

• SharePoint stops the Windows Home Server default website.

• SharePoint creates its own default website and configures it to use TCP port 80.

This means that the http://server now loads the SharePoint default site instead of the Windows Home Server default site, as shown in Figure 1.

Figure 1. SharePoint takes over the http://server site.

To fix this, you can’t simply configure the default SharePoint site to use a different port or IP address, as you might expect. Instead, the solution is to create a new SharePoint web application that runs through a TCP port other than port 80. (In SharePoint, a web application is an object that acts as a container for one or more SharePoint sites.) You then shut down the default SharePoint site and restart the Windows Home Server default site.

For now, here are the steps to create a new SharePoint web application:

1.	Select Start, All Programs, Microsoft SharePoint 2010 Products, SharePoint 2010 Central Administration. The SharePoint Central Administration site appears, as shown in Figure 2. (Note that in the address of this site, the port number you see will be different from the one shown in Figure 2 because the port number is assigned randomly at setup.) Figure 2. You use the Central Administration site to configure SharePoint.
2.	Under Application Management, click Manage Web Applications.
3.	In the Ribbon, click New. SharePoint loads the Create New Web Application page, shown in Figure 3. Figure 3. Use the Create New Web Application page to set up your new SharePoint web application.
4.	For the most part, you can (and should) leave the settings as is on this page. If you want, you can make a couple of tweaks: Port— Enter any unused port that you prefer to use. Select Windows SharePoint Foundation Search Server— Choose your Windows Home Server computer here.
5.	In the Application Pool section, click the Predefined option (and leave Network Service chosen in the list).
6.	Click OK. SharePoint creates your new site, which might take a minute or two. When that’s done, you see the Application Created page.
7.	Click the Create Site Collection link to open the Create Site Collection page. You learn how to fill in this page in the next section.