My "Mastering Microsoft SharePoint Foundation 2010" book is releasing for purchase on Valentines day!

UPDATED UPDATE:
Just a quick update-- the book, Mastering Microsoft SharePoint Foundation 2010, is in stock and available on Amazon, Prime shipping, two day delivery. (Yay) Interestingly, almost as soon as they had some in stock to sell, they were down to one book. I have to assume that is because of the pre-orders. And if that is the case, big thank you to all of you who pre-ordered.

http://www.amazon.com/Mastering-Microsoft-SharePoint-Foundation-2010/dp/0470626380/ref=wl_it_dp_o?ie=UTF8&coliid=IW4IHPKD5J3PF&colid=1DPHWYF9PWK9R

Due to the difference in the name on my SharePoint books, the WSS book has "C.A. Callahan" on it, and the SPF book just has "Callahan", Amazon has had some confusion concerning the byline for the books, and which book goes to what author page. They are sorting it out, but if you do notice there is some oddness there, they are working on it as we speak.

In addition, we have sorted out the tiny, little mistakes in the original product description of the SharePoint Foundation book, so now it more closely represents the content inside.

 UPDATE:
Turns out that the book is available from the Wiley site to purchase today (Valentines day): http://www.wiley.com/WileyCDA/WileyTitle/productCd-0470626380,descCd-tableOfContents.html, but it is not yet available on Amazon (I must admit, I was a little disappointed). I will be updating this post with the actual date the book will be available for shipment from Amazon as soon as I find out.

.....

The day has finally come. As of Monday Feb. 14th, 2010, Valentines day, Mastering Microsoft SharePoint Foundation 2010-- the book I've been working on for at least a year-- has been printed and is available for purchase (and shipment).

http://www.amazon.com/Mastering-Microsoft-SharePoint-Foundation-2010/dp/0470626380/ref=wl_it_dp_o?ie=UTF8&coliid=IW4IHPKD5J3PF&colid=1DPHWYF9PWK9R

The cover of the book has gone through a few incarnations. First, it was going to look like my previous Mastering Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 book; a white Mastering Series cover with burgundy and black text, and a compass on the bottom half of the cover. Kind of classy.

Then, I discovered that the cover had been changed, showing a stark, white server room with people in motion, and an orange box in the middle containing the title of the book.

But, as of last week, I noticed yet another cover for the book- hopefully, this is the cover that will be the final one- of a person standing at a workstation in front of a server rack (in a room full of servers apparently), all in silhouette, with a green box in which the name of the book is located. I rather like the look, and green is my favorite color.

The first part of the description of the book, something I did not write, is not entirely what the book is about (the publishers do try). This book is basically the updated version of the last- so it is a comprehensive look at SharePoint Foundation (as much as I could cram into about 1300 pages) from the ground up:

• From how to plan and prepare for SharePoint Foundation, to both types of installation (a chapter is devoted to each)
• To how to use SharePoint (from the interface, to web parts, to lists, libraries, sites, subsites, workspaces, site collections and web applications)
• To how to administer SharePoint (users and permissions, maintenance, monitoring, and disaster recovery)
• To more advanced topics, such as a detailed, step by step look at how to migrate from WSS 3.0 to SharePoint Foundation, to an introduction to PowerShell for SharePoint, and a quick reminder of how to use STSADM (SharePoint's command line administration tool)
• And finally advanced installation and configuration- covering detailed step by step information of how to, install additional servers for the farm, with a detailed overview of how to load balance them (using Windows Server's own network load balancing service as an example), as well as how to set up SSL, Kerberos, external data types using Business Data Connectivity (or BCS for some people) and SharePoint Designer 2010, and finally, a quick look at what an administrator needs to know about installing Office Web Apps.

As you can see, this book contains far more information than just what has changed since the last version (and doesn't really go into Exchange Server at all). Instead it is a one stop shop to help server administrators master SharePoint Foundation, giving you the grand tour, cover to cover.

And keep in mind-- there are bonus chapters on the web for the book: one is a lot of extra material, things I wanted to keep in the book but didn't have space, concerning extra coverage of web parts, lists and libraries. The other is about 24 pages of tables that go along as an addendum to the PowerShell and STSADM chapter. It is an extensive and convenient list of PowerShell and their corresponding STSADM commands, organized loosely by where their equivalent setting would in Central Administration. This bonus material is being completed and uploaded as we speak (well, you know what I mean), so feel free to stop by and grab them (the link to the content is listed in the introduction to the book).

So if a thorough and detailed book intended to give IT administrators mastery over SharePoint Foundation (and deep preparation for the foundational functions of SharePoint Server 2010 as well), then this book may be for you.

Special thanks to all of my reader reviewers and loyal attendees over this last year. The reader reviewers read every version of every chapter, giving me precious feedback, and answering my questions about if the information I was covering was what the readers want and if how I covered it will work for them, given the fact that all of this stuff had to be fit into just 1300 pages (or less-- the last book, without all the new features of SharePoint Foundation, was 1100 pages). It was a long, rather arduous labor of love for me, and is flatly all written for the audience of the WSS 3.0 Mastering book and all the students, attendees, and others who need a thorough, practical explanation of SharePoint Foundation. I tried to give you all what I would have needed if I was looking for a book to teach me, as server admin, what I needed to know to get my server up and running, and keep it running through thick and thin. Remember, this is not in any way a book for developers. There is no coding (except, maybe, when explaining how to use PowerShell), this is just for administrators who actually manage SharePoint, from top to bottom.

There should be a link on the right side of this blog that takes you to the Amazon page for ordering Mastering Microsoft SharePoint Foundation 2010, for your convenience. Feel free to give it a click and take a look (you can see if the cover has changed again, for starts...).

Something to remember: Now that the book is done, I will be posting a lot more on this blog, as this is the way I keep in touch with my readers concerning changes to the product due to service packs, new things I've learned, and any presentations I am doing-- particularly the free ones, I want to do a lot of free presentations in relation to the book.

Please feel free to leave me comments or post to my errata account (servergrrl.wss at gmail dot com) if you find any errors or issues with the book. I was, by far, not the only person who worked on the book (it turns out it takes a village to write a book). And between me rushing to finish (or rushing my contributors), and the technical editor, developmental editor, copy editor, proof reader, production editor, compositor, and even indexers, things I wrote, and pictures I took, may have changed far outside of my control by the time the book is printed (notice the number of editors, they are in charge of editing sentence structure, grammar, layout, capitalization, and more, and can do so without me). If there is an error, I really, really want to know personally-- so I can fix it here for you and all who might need to know the correction before they come across it too.

I'm happy to have done this work for you. I hope you enjoy it.