Okay, I confess that I have been thinking about blogging now for some time, but like everyone I have my excuses. Joel Oleson has convinced me now that I should be part of the SharePoint Blogging Revolution. So I am in. Reading and searching SharePoint blogs have become an almost daily part of my everyday life, and have proven to me to be extremely useful in my team's development on top of the SharePoint platform.

A little about me. My name is Tom Chmielenski (had to shorten the blog name, if I wanted any visitors) and I currently work for Bentley Systems, Inc (we develop software for the world's infrastructure.). I am the senior technical lead on a product called ProjectWise StartPoint (this product integrates CAD files (.dgn and .dwg file formats) with the SharePoint platform.). Thus, our integration relies heavy on the OpenDocuments ActiveX Control to accomplish this integration.

But to date, I haven't heard people talk much about the use of this control with SharePoint 2007 nor have I heard from other third party vendors who want to integrate their file formats to play nicely in the SharePoint environment. Therefore, the goal for me here in this blog is to share what my team has learned (mostly the hard way) in this area. Maybe some day you can help my team out along the way as well.

Before I go farther, let me state the normal disclaimer applies to all postings on my blog:

The information in this weblog is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights. This weblog does not represent the thoughts, intentions, plans or strategies of my employer. It is solely my opinion. Inappropriate comments will be deleted at the authors discretion. All code samples are provided "AS IS" without warranty of any kind, either express or implied, including but not limited to the implied warranties of merchantability and/or fitness for a particular purpose. In addition, nor do my opinions do not reflect those of my blog host, SharePoint Experts.

--Tom