 | | | MOSS/WSS are very pervasive technologies and being able to support the environments both from launch to decommissioning/migration is key. The MOSS/WSS feature set is huge, hence understanding what you can do out of the box with the product is difficult, if not impossible for one individual resource to know. But that doesn’t mean you should turn to custom development, more you need seek and if need be to bring in the right skills and experience of those that do understand how to get the most out of the platforms array of features, before you commit to development resourcing on the project.
Custom development definitely has its place however, but do not underestimate the effort it takes for even your best developers to come up to speed with the inner workings of SharePoint. Particular areas for your Training/R & D efforts are that of SharePoint branding, workflows and how you deploy your solutions, as the three main areas which crop up as being the more challenging than you perhaps expected or planned for.
Hence, having the experience to know when to use custom development is important because remember, you pay for your custom changes several times, not just the few days of developer time for a minor enhancement that doesn’t seem to be there out of the box.
| Sharepoint |