MCMS Service Pack 2 Information
Updated: November 26th 2005.
Introduction
This page consolidates information about the recently released Service Pack 2 (SP2) for Microsoft Content
Management Server (MCMS). Originally announced at TechEd 2005, Florida in early June 2005, SP2 offers both increased platform
support and a culmalative install of previously released QFEs. In addition links to SP2 related documents and blog posts will be included here.
Availability
SP2 has shipped and can be downloaded from the following locations:
The distribution is suitable for both Standard and Enterprise Editions of MCMS.
There is no slipstreamed install for SP2. An existing installation of SP1a is required.
Fixes
SP2 is not a culmalative serice pack, and requires a previous installation of SP1a. The list of all 59 fixes is here.
Installation
Installation of SP2 is non trivial and depending upon your scenario there are additional manual tasks and a number of known issues. The following links provide guidance:
Platform & Tools Support
Similar to the way that SP1 enabled support for the .NET Framework 1.1 and Visual Studio 2003, SP2 offers the following
platform and tools support:
- SQL Sever 2005
MCMS databases can be hosted by SQL Server 2005 offering advantages in security, deployment and
performance.
- .NET Framework 2.0
MCMS applications can be hosted within the v2.0 runtime (in particular ASP.NET 2.0 and take
advantage of v2.0 language features. This provides numerous opportunites to refine MCMS applications and thier code structure.
- Visual Studio.NET 2005
MCMS application development can be done in VS.NET 2005. One of the greatest advantages here is
the use of the new HTML editing and designer features in VS.NET along with improved developer productivity.
New Functionality
Yes, SP2 will offer new functionality as well! However, the new functionality is that primarily enabled by the support for
ASP.NET 2.0.
- Authentication & Navigation Provider support
ASP.NET 2.0 Authentication and Navigation Providers will be
supported. For example for a navigation server control, this would make use of the SiteMapProvider - with a SiteNode
representing a channel or posting.
- Master Pages
MCMS applications can utilise ASP.NET Master Pages. Basically, placeholders go into the
Master Pages Content Placeholder within a Content Page. Note that Placeholders within the Master Page file are not supported.
Note that ASP.NET Web Parts are not supported under SP2 within MCMS Templates.
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Preparing for SP2
Accompaining the the release of SP2 will be a best practices white paper and samples demonstrating modular code approaches
for MCMS applications. In the meantime however, be sure to check out the MSDN white paper,
Designing Your MCMS 2002 Solution for Reusability.
SP2 Related Resources
If you are interested in learning more about ASP.NET 2.0 and MCMS, check out Stefan's excellent series of articles:
Code Samples
The following SP2 related code samples are available:
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