SharePoint Servers in Multiple Time Zones

I'm working on a project where we have 2 servers on the east coast and 2 servers on the west coast.  It seemed that deploying a solution was taking a very long time.  What's happening is that when I deploy a farm solution, the timer job is scheduled to start immediately on the east coast but the same job is scheduled to start 3 hours later on the two west coast servers.

Here's the results of a sample query to illustrate:

SERVER_NAME      START_TIME
EAST-WFE-1        1/18/12 7:59 PM
EAST-APP-1         1/18/12 7:59 PM
WEST-WFE-1       1/18/12 10:59 PM
WEST-APP-1        1/18/12 10:59 PM

Using Evaluation Editions of Windows Server 2008 R2

When doing a demo or proof of concept it can be convenient to use an evaluation version of Windows Server 2008 R2, especially if you have to stand up a few servers for SharePoint.  You can download from here.  The evaluation period is 180 days.  You will need to "rearm" the evaluation every so often; e.g. the OS will eventually start rebooting on you.

To rearm, open a Command Prompt as an Administrator and enter this command:

slmgr.vbs /rearm

You should get a message box that says: Command completed successfully.  Please restart the system for the changes to take effect.  Reboot and you'll be happy for another 10 or so days.

Error occurred in deployment step 'Recycle IIS Application Pool'

You download a code sample of a SharePoint project and when you try to run in the debugger you see an  error like this: Error occurred in deployment step 'Recycle IIS Application Pool': Cannot connect to the SharePoint site: http://intranet.wingtip.com/. Make sure that this is a valid URL and the SharePoint site is running on the local computer. If you moved this project to a new computer or if the URL of the SharePoint site has changed since you created the project, update the Site URL property of the project.

To correct this go to the project properties dialog and update the Site URL property:

SharePoint 2010 Doesn't Have a My Sites Link

SharePoint 2007 My Links is not rendered in the top right of every page in SharePoint 2010.  You can add My Links to the My Site page by following these steps:

1. Open Central Administration 
2. Select manage Service Applications
3. Select the User Profile Service Application
4. Click Manage
5. Select Configure Personalization Site in My Site Settings section
6.  Click New Link
7.  Add My Links with a URL something like this: http://mysites.yourdomain.com/_layouts/MyQuickLinks.aspx

      Example of My Links link on my site page:

 

NOTE: You can also add other links as well