MDS Configuration Manager

Problem
So you found yourself looking at a delightful love note…make that an error message telling you:

Could not load file or assembly ‘Microsoft.Web.Administration, Version=7.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35′ or one of its dependencies. The system cannot find the file specified.

Context
This error message appears after you install Microsoft Master Data Services (MDS) and you open Master Data Services Configuration Manager.  Unfortunately, this error prevents you from viewing the Web Configuration tab.  Fortunately, the error message is a clear indicator as to the problem.  MDS requires the use of IIS, Internet Information Services, for the web interface in the data management.  For some odd reason, or my lack of desire to know why, the Web Management Tools was not included during the installation.  The World Wide Web Services should already be installed, but notice that the IIS Manager is not present under the Administrative Tools indicating the missing Web Management Tools.

Solution
In a nutshell, you need one check box.  So here’s the treasure map, find the x!

1. Open up Program and Features.
2. Open up Turn Windows features on or Off
3. Check the following box to include Web Management Tools.

Mission accomplished.  Now move along with the deployment.

Sharepoint logs out of your life

WSS 3.0 seems precarious in the way it decides to log out. It seems as though I always have facebook and gmail open on my computer. While working on my sharepoint site I was switching users to see what the different users in the different groups see. I noticed that when I logged of the user on the sharepoint site, facebook and gmail also logged out. Sweet. Very inconvenient.

I haven't looked this up online, but I'm going to take a stab in the dark and state that sharepoint must delete all the cookies when it logs out. If you are reading this and know the answer, feel free to leave me a comment.

I may or may not look into stopping this nuisance. But since it's not really broke, why try and fix what ain't broke eh?

WSS Training

I found an excellent source text for configuration of Windows SharePoint Services on TechNet:
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc287736(TechNet.10).aspx

More resources:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepoint/default.aspx
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepoint/aa905692.aspx - screencasts offer an excellent run through of the topics.