It’s TechED week in Orlando, and I’ll wager than a goodly portion of you are in attendance, hopefully getting a good look at Microsoft’s new “PC as a table” (codenamed “Milan”). It certainly looks cool, and offers some interesting possibilities as a game table, a network trouble-shooting helper or a way to collaborate in real-time in the same room. It’s almost retro in that regard as most people are looking for ways to collaborate at a distance or even asynchronously.

Windows SharePoint Server is fast becoming the tool of choice for that sort of collaboration. But security in the SharePoint milieu is something you need to pay special attention to – after all, there’s lots of proprietary information moving around among the SharePoint participants.

One of my favorite third-party tools companies has, for some time, offered a security management facility for your Windows network. ScriptLogic’s Security Explorer is a graphical solution for real-time, interactive management of access controls and Windows (NT/2000/XP/2003/Vista) security on Windows file servers and workstations across the enterprise.

Security Explorer gives you the ability to manage, search, duplicate, back up and recover permissions and security across the network from a point-and-click interface, while simplifying the management of NTFS file and folder security, file shares, services, printer access, registry security and scheduled tasks, all the while ensuring that access to privileged information is restricted on Windows servers and workstations, and helping to standardize security management across the entire Windows network.

This week, ScriptLogic has announced enhancements to Security Explorer that address some of the security challenges inherent to Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007. According to the company, Security Explorer for SharePoint will improve the security management related to end user access to SharePoint, assisting with regulatory compliance while optimizing IT resources.

With the Security Explorer for SharePoint version, you can explore a tree view of the entire SharePoint site, set and search user permissions for SharePoint libraries and files, and back up and restore security settings as necessary. Security Explorer for SharePoint can also edit SharePoint permission levels and SharePoint groups, making it a comprehensive permission management solution for SharePoint.