Learn about SharePoint 2016

If you would like to get first information about SharePoint 2016 I would recommend the following two blog posts:

• Evolution of SharePoint - from Julia White, general manager for the Office Product Management team
• The SharePoint related session list from Microsoft Ingite in Chicage 
• Top 3 sessions to learn more about SharePoint Server 2016 at Microsoft Ignite - from Bill Baer (I guess you know Bill, right?)

Features deprecated in SharePoint Server 2016 IT Preview

The following features and functionality have been deprecated or removed in SharePoint Server.

SharePoint Foundation

SharePoint Foundation 2013 remains available for use. For more information, see SharePoint Foundation 2013.

Previous releases of SharePoint Server included SharePoint Foundation, a free edition of SharePoint that included most of the core functionality and architecture provided by the commercial editions of SharePoint. SharePoint Foundation is no longer available in the SharePoint Server 2016 release.

Standalone Install mode

SharePoint Server 2016 IT Preview doesn't support the standalone install option, so it is no longer available in the setup program. Use the MinRole during installation and choose one of the available install options. The Single Server Farm option where everything is installed on the same computer is supported for dev/test/demo purposes. When you use this option, you must install SQL Server yourself and then run the SharePoint Server 2016 farm configuration wizard.. For more information, see "MinRole farm topology" in New and improved features in SharePoint Server 2016 IT Preview.

ForeFront Identity Manager client (FIM)

Earlier versions of SharePoint used ForeFront Identity Manager client (FIM) to synchronize between Active Directory and SharePoint. SharePoint Server 2016 IT Preview no longer uses FIM as the synchronization client. The default process is Active Directory Import. You can also use any synchronization tool such as Microsoft Identity Manager 2016, or any third-party tool. We'll soon release tools to help you deploy and configure Microsoft Identity Manager 2016 to work with SharePoint Server 2016 IT Preview for identity synchronization.

Excel Services in SharePoint

Excel Services and its associated business intelligence capabilities are no longer available in SharePoint Server. Excel Services functionality is now part of Excel Online in Office Online Server Preview, and SharePoint users can use the services from there.

The following Excel Services functionality has been deprecated:

• Trusted data providers
• Trusted file locations
• Trusted data connection libraries
• Unattended service account
• Excel Services Windows PowerShell cmdlets
• Opening of Excel workbooks from SharePoint Central Administration site

The following Excel Services functionality requires Excel Online in Office Online Server Preview:

• Viewing and editing Excel workbooks in a browser (with or without the Data Model)
• Excel Web Access web part for SharePoint
• ODC file support (no longer requires Data Connection Librariees)
• Programmability features such as JavaScript OM, User Defined Function Assemblies, SOAP and REST protocol support

SharePoint BI capabilities

SharePoint Server 2016 requires updated versions that will ship later this year. The SQL Server 2014 Power Pivot and Power View add-ins for SharePoint 2013 cannot be deployed or used in SharePoint Server 2016 IT Preview. The following business intelligence features won't be available until then:

• Power Pivot Gallery
• Scheduled Data Refresh
• Using another workbook's Data Model as a data source
• Power View reports (standalone or embedded in Excel workbooks)
• Power View Subscriptions and Report Alerting

Power Pivot Management Dashboard

• BISM Link support

Tags and Notes

The Tags and Notes feature is deprecated in SharePoint Server 2016 IT Preview. Users can no longer create new tags and notes or access existing ones. However, an administrator can archive all existing tags and notes by using theExport-SPTagsAndNotesData cmdlet.

Verify that you meet all of the following minimum requirements.

• You must have membership in the securityadmin fixed server role on the SQL Server instance
• You must have membership in the db_owner fixed database role on all databases that are to be updated.
• You must be a member of the Administrators group on the server on which you are running the Windows PowerShell cmdlet.

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•  

Export-SPTagsAndNotesData -Site <http://site.contoso.com> -FilePath <tagsandnotes.zip>

Where :

• <http://site.contoso.com> is the URL to an existing SharePoint root site where you want to export the tags and notes from.
• <tagsandnotes.zip> is the name you give to the .zip file that you want to export.

Stsadm.exe

We recommend that you use Windows PowerShell when you perform command-line administrative tasks. The Stsadm command-line tool has been deprecated, but it is included to support compatibility with previous product versions.