David Wier

SetFocus From the Student Point of View

David Wier

Week 6 – Video Diary – It’s only the beginning

Posted by  on Thursday, March 11th 2010     

Check it out – my latest Video Diary post regarding my Setfocus Sharepoint class:
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Hi, this is David Wier.  Welcome back to my SetFocus SharePoint video diary. 

Features and solutions and customization, oh my.  Taking a little bit from the Wizard of Oz there, of course.  But this was a week that really showed me a lot.  It not only showed me the basics of features and solutions, but it told me that I was just now scratching the surface of what was to come.  And in Saturday, during my all-day class, I got a FedEx delivery of four more books on MOSS which we really haven’t started learning specifically yet.  We’ve handed it out.  We’ve said this is available but we haven’t started learning specifics there.  When I was first learning HTML on ASP, I coded everything by hand with notepad.  That way, I actually learned what was going on before using a code generator.  We did the same thing when starting SharePoint development and the environment, though, was totally different from the early days of HTML on ASP with XML being so case-sensitive and so forth.  And it was really a big chore.

That being said, I am glad that we did it because it gives us a better understanding of what’s really going on under the covers and I know it’s going to help me in the future based on my past experience.  Thank goodness, though, that there are tools that make the development much easier 

Week 5 Video Diary – SharePoint Development and Architecture

Posted by  on Wednesday, March 3rd 2010     

Check out what’s been going on in the Setfocus Sharepoint class last week:
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Hi, this is David Wier.  Welcome back to my SetFocus SharePoint video diary. 

 For those of you who haven’t been keeping up with my diary, I’m doing this to comment on my experiences with the SharePoint class I’m taking through SetFocus.com.  In case you don’t know also, I opted for the night time class, it was better for my schedule which is Tuesday and Thursday night along with every other Saturday we do a full day. 

Last week, we actually started on the development part of the course.  So having gone through the administration course previously or part of the course, our teacher started laying out the basic framework of what we’re going to be learning including the architecture of the SharePoint site.  SharePoint is built on top of ASP.NET, so in the architecture portion, we learned how the SharePoint website get intercepted, if you will, from the normal ASP.NET DLLs that get set up through IIS for ASP.NET.

I know this isn’t the actual correct terminology here.  It’s just a way to highlight what we’ve been doing.  I know that some people probably wouldn’t be too interested in this part, but to me, along the way it helps me make a lot more sense of the way SharePoint works.  So once again, I’m really looking forward to my next class and I’ll see you again on my video diary.

My head is spinning

Posted by  on Friday, February 26th 2010     

I’ll tell you what – - I’m certainly glad I did the night time course instead of the day time course. My head is spinning as it is. They tell me not to worry, that it will all come together. Well, I’m looking forward to that :)

Week 4 Video Diary – Starting SharePoint Development Track

Posted by  on Tuesday, February 23rd 2010     

Please check out my Video Diary installation this week. We started the Develpment section of our Sharepoint training at Setfocus last week.

Having come from an ASP.Net development background, development is what I really enjoy, so I’m really looking forward to this part of our training.
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Hi, this is David Wier.  Welcome to my video diary once again. 

 Wow, it’s only been a few weeks.  There has been so much coverage, so far.  And this week, we’re finally getting to the development section of SharePoint.  A few things were a little of a re-hash,  a few things were expanded on, but more, like workflows, were brand new and just took a little bit to get over my head around it.  It’s new stuff and I understand technically what a workflow is, but how to do it?  That’s something totally different.  But boy, SharePoint does have some neat stuff built in.  But this is just where I want to be and apparently, this is just where I need to be.  All I can say is now, I can’t wait for my next class.

Week 3 Video Diary – SharePoint Admin – Project

Posted by  on Wednesday, February 17th 2010     

Take a look at my latest Video Diary installation, concerning our Sharepoint Admin project :
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Hi, this is David Wier.  Welcome to my video diary this week.   This last week, we actually applied what we’ve learned previously in our class.  We created our first project for the admin section.   This was definitely an eye-opening experience.   Given a certain scenario, we were tasked for setting up a SharePoint site based on the scenario we were given.   I found out that it was one thing to learn about and do labs concerning certain aspects of a technology and actually applying the different aspects of that technology all at one time, which will be pretty much what it’s like in the real world. 

As I got to any particular step for which I couldn’t remember the details, I had to go back into troubleshooting mode and check all that my available resources could give me in order to complete the step of that project.   Having come from an ASP.NET development background,  I quickly realized that this was pretty much like the everyday life of a developer.  Bouncing back and forth between my current knowledge, that knowledge that I have not developed yet or have developed and just forgotten.

As I said earlier, this was an eye-opening experience, but it’s one that I understand that throughout the course I’ll be experiencing again as other projects are required.  I’m figuring that these experiences give me the basics that I can apply to any future position that I might get using SharePoint.

Week 2 Video Diary – SharePoint Admin training at SetFocus

Posted by  on Friday, February 12th 2010     

This is my second installation of my video diary, about my class experience at SetFocus.

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Hello, this is David Wier.  Welcome to my video blog.  This week in SharePoint class, we were exposed heavily to SharePoint administration.  We learned how to plan for an installation, install SharePoint, create web applications, site collections and the different nuances between them all.  Basically, we finished the admin book this week and we’re going to start on our project this coming week.

I realized that if I wasn’t dedicated to the outcome of this class and learning everything there was to know about SharePoint development, I wasn’t going to be able to make it.   This week wasn’t really hard necessarily, but there were also a lot of knowledge crammed into a small amount of time.   It takes a lot out of your schedule.   Sometimes it doesn’t seem like it, but by the end of the week, it sure did this week.   We learned a lot about how SharePoint roles get blurred within companies depending on finances available and many other things.   Therefore, as a student learning SharePoint development, we actually need to learn a lot about the admin portion of SharePoint in case we get assigned to admin duties within our prospective positions.

As you probably know by now, if you’ve been following the blog, I’ve been taking night courses.   So every other Saturday, we get a full day class.   I don’t know about the others in my class, but these classes seem to take a lot out of me.  I also now realize how much actual work is involved between the classes.   Doing these labs is important to get the actual experience in.   At this point, it surely looks like a long distance until completion, but at least I know I picked the right path.   When I finally do get there, I’m sure it will all be worth it and I’m glad I’m with SetFocus.

This week at SetFocus – SharePoint Admin

Posted by  on Tuesday, February 9th 2010     

Boy have I been surprised. I really didn’t think the Admin side of Sharepoint had so many parts.

I’m really glad that this Sharepoint Developer course has a a lot of Admin training in it also. This week has been really eye-opening as to what was required on the Administration side.  It looks like I’m going to be more prepared for the real world than I thought I was going to be.

Video Diary – Why I Chose SetFocus

Posted by  on Friday, February 5th 2010     

The goal of my weekly video diary is to talk about my experience as a SetFocus candidate in the Master’s Program.  Each week I will discuss various topics, but I really just want to offer an insider’s view of what I’m learning each week in the SharePoint training track and the real life process of juggling it all.

This is my very first video diary entry in which I answer the question, “why I chose SetFocus.” 

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Hi, I’m David Wier and welcome to my video blog.

 Today, I’d like to talk about why I chose SetFocus for my learning experience and my experiences so far.   I checked them out.  They had a pretty good reputation nationwide and that was pretty important to me but now that I’ve actually got into classes,  I’m finding that the reputation goes internationally.    I had a background of ASP.NET development but there was just — it just seemed to stagnate.   I mean, there’s new stuff on ASP.NET.   I’ve been working ASP.NET probably more than eight years, professionally eight years, but then, I guess,  I went to my first conference in September of 2000 when it was still in the alpha stages.  But I needed and wanted SharePoint training because I looked at it as being the next logical step for me and since they had SharePoint training and it was a Master’s Program,  they just really gave you a lot of experience and learning.

 SharePoint was a slam dunk.  I was — I was hooked on SharePoint from the start, but then I was also hooked on SetFocus’ program from the start, too, when I found out.

It’s very different in the first couple of weeks.  I wasn’t really sure what to expect.  But they have all these different things that you have to juggle and get used to – Live Meeting and at the same time you have a remote desktop connection.  You have this Polycom unit which has the online class so that you could see all the other students and interact with the other students.  And it’s a little rough at first because I was a little bit behind and had a bad, bad ISP.  Luckily I got a new one and the upload speed was much better, so everything is smoothed out and with the great support staff that SetFocus has, it helped me over the little bumps.   I got through and I was having my classes.  Now, every time that I have a class and it’s over with, it just leaves me wanting more.   I can’t wait to get to the next class.

First Week’s SharePoint classes at SetFocus

Posted by  on Friday, January 29th 2010     

I’ve actually finished 2 weeks of Sharepoint training from Setfocus, but here, I’m just going to talk about my experiences in my first week. And, by the way, I’m taking the night classes (T/Thur and every other Saturday).

I’ve never done something like this (online training), so it was very new to me. I got started a little late, so I didn’t have time to get things setup the way I needed, so I got a little behind. I have some tips for new students -

  1. Go through all your emails and read them thoroughly, following all the instructions.  They wouldn’t send you an email if it wasn’t important.
  2. If you don’t get something about the setup or the interaction or anything – don’t hesitate to call.  They have a great support staff and the staff is more than willing to help you out.
  3. When they tell you the upload speed is important – pay attention because it is.  Luckily,  I was in the process of changing from my local cable to AT&T Uverse.  My local cable provider’s upload speed was dismal at best,  and it really affected my first couple of days online.  Once I got a decent speeed from my provider,  it was a piece of cake after that.
  4. Start reading from the very first.  They usually give you a few chapters to read before your first class.  You will be way ahead of the game if you do this.
  5. If you’re a VB.Net guy, take this chance to learn C#- do all your labs in C#.  You’ll thank me at the end of the course,  I know. VB.Net is a great language, but there are 8 C# jobs out there for every 2 VB.Net jobs.
  6. Test your polycom setup as soon as possible since this is an important part of the class interaction.

I have been working in the .Net world now for over 8 years, and the first week, as an overview to ASP.Net I was surprised that I actually learned new stuff during that week.  Things were a little bumpy, overall, but now that I’ve got everything straightened out (thanks to all the staff at Setfocus who helped), it’s very smooth and I’m looking forward to the rest of the class. I’m very excited about my future possibilities now, thanks to SetFocus.

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