.Net to SharePoint Migration - Top Insights you can't ignore for a successful migration

Any sort of migration must always begin with a proper understanding of the capabilities of both the source system and target system. What new potentials the target system might provide? Is there any missing functionality in the target system that might necessitate the purchase of third party components? These are some aspects that need to be considered prior to taking the plunge. A proper understanding of the differences as well as the similarities of both the platforms will definitely help in the entire process of migration.

Today, a number of .NET developers are considering a move towards the creation of a SharePoint site. So, why such a move has been favored by web developers all around? Well, here is a quick look at the reasons that favor the SharePoint solution:

• No need of providing support as well as maintenance to data stored in the database of SQL server in the SharePoint.
• Site templates can be used for the creation of new sites and publishing pages featuring different layouts.
• Versioning of the content can be maintained easily without any coding
• Security of item level can be provided without taking up any extra effort.

These reasons strongly support the migration of .Net application to a publishing website of SharePoint. In most cases, the use of a migration tool is witnessed as it ensures an efficient and successful migration. The migration strategy involves the following aspects.

1. Source System (SS) - An application based on .Net usually stores data in a specific database of SQL server. This is referred to as the source database. The data comprises of the profile information of user, static texts, files, and images.

2. Staging Database (SD) - A staging database needs to be designed for pushing the data (apart from the binary ones) from database of the source system with proper formatting making use of the stored process. It is to be noted that the binary data will be recovered directly from the source system file.

3. Target System (TS) - Following this, it is important to create a parallel sub site for each .NET application page categorized under diverse functional areas in SharePoint under separate site collection.

4. Migration Tool (MT) - Henceforth, the migration tool that is designed will extract the data from the source system database and subsequently push it to the publishing pages of SharePoint in the corresponding site. Here is a look at the process:

Choose the content pertaining to a specific functional area from the staging database into the .Net Data Table and create publishing pages concerning each row mentioned in the table. You must update the metadata following this:

• The tool helps in wise migration of all Meta data including the Modified date as well as Created date along with other specific custom fields.
• It also helps updating the published content, rollup image, and page image on the fly
• The tool also assists in setting the custom properties of a customized web part in a publishing page on the fly.
• It will choose the binary data from the database of the source system along with uploading the specific data into the picture and document library of the SharePoint site respectively.
• For a specific functional area, the migration tool will likely go for the creation of sub sites on the fly following it up with creation of page with the updated Meta data.

The tool also offers the status of the presently running tasks.

General Steps to Migration

ASP.Net to SharePoint migration involves three basic steps. Here is a look at the same:

• Addition of a Web Deployment Project to the website that helps creating a single DLL for all codes and several other dependent DLLs of the website.
• Copying the DLLs bin folder into the bin folder of the SharePoint and modification of the web configuration file for using the copied DLLs.
• Opening of the SharePoint site from the Designer and importing the web pages from the application following it with the linking to proper DLLs.

Adopting the above-mentioned steps and strategies will surely help you to go forward with the successful migration of .Net to SharePoint. To help you with small migrations, you could even use webparts. To help you with SharePoint Webparts development, there would be numerous companies who can assist.

We provide custom SharePoint development services. If you would like to discuss with our SharePoint developers, please get in touch with us at Mindfire Solutions.