Installing and Configuring Office Web Apps for SharePoint 2010 (part 2)

3/25/2011 9:38:12 PM

Reviewing Central Administration Settings for the PowerPoint Service Application and Word Viewing Service Application

Farm administrators should familiarize themselves with the range of options available for the different Office Web Apps. The Excel Office web app functionality is embedded in the Excel Services web app, so the settings available for the Excel services application are more complex than those for the PowerPoint service application or the Word Viewing service application.

To review the PowerPoint service application, follow these steps:

1.	Navigate to the central administrator site, and from the home page under the Application Management section, click Manage Service Applications.
2.	Click the top-level PowerPoint Service App link (not the link indented under it), and the Manage PowerPoint Service Application page opens, as shown in Figure 3. Figure 3. Manage PowerPoint Service Application page.
3.	In the Supported File Formats section, note the options for file format support include Open XML Presentations in the .pptx and related formats (.pptm, .potx, and .potm), and PowerPoint 97–2003 Presentations in the .ppt and related formats (.pot).
4.	The Broadcast Site section lists a default broadcast site with a URL (http://abcsp1004/sites/broadcast in this example) and a link to the New Site Collection page, where an additional Broadcast Sites can be created. Click the URL to visit the Broadcast Site and verify that it loads. Figure 4 shows the home page for the broadcast site. Figure 4. PowerPoint Broadcast Site.
5.	Click the back arrow for the browser to return to the Manage PowerPoint Service Application page.
6.	Finally on this page, the PowerPoint 97–2003 Presentation Scanning section allows the option to disable PowerPoint 97–2003 presentation scanning, a process that checks for malicious content in the document but can slow down performance. A best practice is to leave Presentation Scanning enabled, unless performance issues are encountered, in which case it can be disabled. Tip You can set maximum worker processes for the PowerPoint Viewing service application by using Windows PowerShell, which can also affect server performance. See the Microsoft document “Configure PowerPoint service application settings” (http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee837424.aspx) for the instructions and the PowerShell script.
7.	Review the settings to ensure that they meet the organization’s requirements, and click OK if changes were made or Cancel if no changes were made.

To review the Word Viewing service application, follow these steps:

1.	Navigate to the Central Administrator site, and from the home page under the Application Management section, click on Manage Service Applications.
2.	Click the top-level Word Viewing Service Application link (not the link indented under it), and the Word Viewing Service Application page opens, as shown in Figure 5. Figure 5. Word Viewing Service Application settings page.
3.	In the Supported File Formats: Viewing section options are provided to enable support for Open XML (.docx, .dotx, .docm, .dotm) and Word 97–2003 (.doc, .dot) file types.
4.	The Embedded Font Support section is set to not Disable embedded fonts, but embedded fonts support can be turned off if needed.
5.	The Word 97–2003 Document Scanning is enabled by default but can be turned off if needed.
6.	The Recycle Threshold is set to 5 by default and refers to the number of Word documents that a process should be allowed to render before the process is recycled. Changes require an IISreset to take effect.
7.	Total Active Processes specified the number of worker processes dedicated to viewing Word documents and is set to 3 by default. Changes require an IISreset to take effect.

Verifying the Site Collection Features Are Enabled for Office Web Apps

Assuming the previous steps were followed and the Office Web Apps installed, the site collection features need to be reviewed to make sure the appropriate ones are enabled. Follow these steps to verify that the feature is enabled on site collection where the Office Web Apps feature will be used:

1.	Navigate to the site settings page for the site collection that houses the documents that will be accessed via Office Web Apps using an account that is a site collection administrator.
2.	In the Site Collection Administrator section, click Site Collection Features.
3.	Locate the Office Web Apps entry and click the Activate button.
4.	Test that viewing Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote documents in the browser and editing in the browser is functioning properly.
5.	If the functionality is not working properly, check the settings for the document library and default behavior in Central Administration covered in the next two sections.

Verifying the Settings in the Document Library

An additional step to take in an existing SharePoint 2010 environment is to validate the settings of the document library or libraries that house the documents that the administrator wants to support the Office Web Apps access method. Follow these steps to make sure the document library is configured to support Office Web Apps use:

1.	Navigate to the document library with an account that has Owner-level permissions on the site and click on the Library tab on the Ribbon, and then click the Library Settings button.
2.	Click Advanced Settings in the General Settings section.
3.	In the Opening Documents in the Browser section, select the option next to Open in the Browser or Use the Server Default (Open in the Browser). Click OK.
4.	Test that viewing Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote documents in the browser and editing in the browser is functioning properly.
5.	If the functionality is not working properly, check the settings for the site collection, as covered in the previous section, and default behavior in central administration covered in the next section.

Set the Default Open Behavior for Site Collections in Central Administration

This following method is also available for setting preferences for how documents are handled in document libraries:

1.	From Central Administration, click Site Actions, and then from the drop-down menu, click Site Settings.
2.	On the Site Settings page, in the Site Collection Administration section, click Site Collection Features.
3.	On the Features page, scroll down to locate the Open Documents in Client Applications by Default feature, click Activate to open documents in the client application by default, or click Deactivate to open documents in the browser by default.
4.	Test that viewing Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote documents in the browser and editing in the browser is functioning properly.
5.	If the functionality is not working properly, check the settings for the site collection and document library, as covered in the previous two sections.