Part 2 of the 2-part series on how we migrated Conservation International's public websites to SharePoint Server 2007 is now online.  In this installment, we talk about how we designed and built the Silverlight v1.1-based Carbon Offset Calculator that is currently hosted on Conservation International's newly re-launched, MOSS powered, BiodiversityHotspots.org site.

I invite you to read the post and let us know what you think!

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You may recall in a previous post, I wrote about how I led a couple of projects to migrate Conservation International's public websites to SharePoint Server 2007 as well as implement a Silverlight v1.1-based Carbon Offset Calculator that is currently hosted on Conservation International's newly re-launched BiodiversityHotspots.org site, which is completely powered by MOSS.

I've been working with the Microsoft Gold Partners, Portal Solutions, LLC. and Applied Information Sciences, who were intimately involved in the effort to put together "How we did it" blog posts to showcase some of the processes that went into the creation of these great solutions.  Part 1 of he "How we did it" series is currently posted on the SharePoint Product Team's blog.  Part 1 discusses the MOSS architecture that was implemented to meet Conservation International's business needs around performance, scalability, and ease of use and is a true testament to the power and flexibility of the SharePoint platform.  This solution displaced two existing 3rd party web content management systems and provides a unified platform upon which Conservation International will continue to deliver advanced web capabilities as they strive to build upon their already established conservation ecosystem with hopes of bringing attention to many conservation and environmental issues that plague our planet.

Part 2 of the series will focus on how the Silverlight Carbon Offset Calculator was designed/built and will round out the "How we did it" series.  So stay tuned!!

I invite you to read the post and let us know what you think!

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As mentioned in my last post, in addition to the website redesign and replatform to MOSS, I also oversaw a project that involved taking one of the customer's primary "eye candy" applications, an HTML/JavaScript-based carbon calculator, and ported it to Microsoft Silverlight v1.1 Alpha.  We solicited the services of a couple of talented developers, Pete Brown and Steve Suing, both of Microsoft Gold Certified Partner Applied Information Sciences to construct a compelling user experience geared as showcasing how you can leverage Silverlight to build Rich Internet Applications (RIAs).  And what more compelling a business scenario than to build a solution geared at drawing attention to our carbon consumption with hopes at making us all take a more proactive stance and preserving the earth's natural heritage by conserving on our energy consumption!

Below are some screenshots of the application, that you can access here, and while you're there, make a contribution to a worthy cause!  Pete also has written a blog post that breaks down how the application was built.  Head on over to his blog and check out the post.

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 In the spirit of talking about the cool projects I’ve been working on as mentioned in a previous post I want to bring your attention to two new MOSS-powered websites that just launched, right at the eve of this year’s Live Earth event (that’s currently happening as I write this).  The customer’s name is Conservation International and they’ve just re-launched their public internet web properties on Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007.  Today, marks the official day of Live Earth, a 24-hour, 7-continent concert series taking place on 7/7/07 that will bring together more than 100 music artists and 2 billion people to trigger a global movement to solve the climate crisis. Live Earth will reach this worldwide audience through an unprecedented global media architecture covering all media platforms – TV, radio, Internet and wireless channels.

MSN is one of the sponsors of Live Earth and has launched an official website in support of the event.  Conservation International serves as one of the major content providers for MSN’s Live Earth website.  I’ve been working with this customer in migrating their existing web infrastructure, which was previously powered by two 3rd party content management solutions to Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007.  Working under a tight deadlines, we were able to successfully migrate their existing sites over to the SharePoint platform and this is a true testament of the power and flexibity SharePoint Server 2007 provides for establishing a robust internet web presence.  Also in the wake of the migration to SharePoint, we also found time to build a “real world” application, a web-based carbon calculator, using Microsoft Silverlight v1.1 and Microsoft Virtual Earth which is a true demonstration of the power and flexibility of the Silverlight platform in delivering compelling Rich Internet Applications (RIAs).

In future posts, I’ll go into more detail into how we built these websites, but in the mean time, hop on over to http://www.conservation.org/ and http://www.biodiversityhotspots.org/ and check out MOSS in action!  If you want to see the really slick Silverlight carbon calculator, hop on over to here

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