Elearning! Magazine

MAY-JUN 2011

Elearning! Magazine: Building Smarter Companies via Learning & Workplace Technologies.

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In 2008, after SharePoint 2007 was released, Forrester predicted that SharePoint would "steamroll" the Enterprise 2.0 market despite "taking heat from some observers about SharePoint's wiki, blog and social net- working functionality." Some of these chal- lenges have been addressed in SharePoint 2010. However, I expect as Microsoft fills in the holes, these more agile third-party ven- dors will start to incorporate new functions that will take Microsoft years to respond to. FUNCTIONAL CHALLENGES SharePoint has quite a range of functional- ity. Yet here are some common functional issues: >>When you save a file back to SharePoint from your desktop, it does not delete the old version, which can cause confusion and a proliferation of documents. >>Write directly on a wiki (edit and save): easy to compare old and new versions. Microsoft wiki template is very limited in these abilities and not strong in many others. >> If you choose to "deactivate" a site, you lose all the customization infor- mation in that site. >> Can only add "list" templates to "list- based" sites. >> Can only add a picture from a Web address; can't browse your desktop to do it. >> Often difficult to trace a path back to the document. MAINTENANCE, TRAINING ISSUES Even if SharePoint is free through Microsoft's Enterprise license, a lot of cost is still involved: >>Most I.T. shops have to send represen- tatives out for SharePoint training or bring consultants in. Figure one con- sultant for 160 hours at $175/hr. to install and document. Figure one trainer $6,000 per week for every 50 students. >> TCO (Total Cost of Ownership) is com- posed of licensing cost plus develop- ment cost plus management cost plus support cost. SharePoint 2010 is only offered as 64-bit server and requires all new 64-bit servers to support it (64-bit Windows Server 2008 or 64-bit Windows Server 2008 R2). It also will require 64-bit SQL Server 2008 or 64- bit SQL Server 2005 — a rip-and- replace exercise if you don't already have these servers for the 2010 version. many companies are looking at upgrading their 2007 servers because Microsoft offers the upgrade free as part of its enterprise license. However, free is never free. The initial cost for the software often is the least expensive part of TCO. There have been a lot of improvements in SharePoint 2010 as well as the Microsoft marketing propaganda. This version seems to be focused a bit more on the Web, or work outside the firewall than 2007 (which was mostly Intranet focused). FAST search "Because of the attractive pricing and the current economic climate, five state governments have migrated from SharePoint to Premier Apps." >> Not an easy platform to develop appli- cations for; its development cycle is 50 percent longer than most other options. >> 50 percent of users find that the devel- opment of custom solutions require more effort than expected (AIIM report, 2008). >> SharePoint uses Web parts (like widg- ets) for customization. A number of third-party Microsoft partners build templates and widgets. Microsoft does defray some of the partner support costs through the SPDS program. THE GOOD AND THE BAD SharePoint 2010 is relatively new, and functionality is now included. Although SharePoint 2010 claims it is able to create communities for large enterprises, many enterprises choose Jive or other more community-oriented tools. Most enterprises today are more exter- nally than internally focused. With cloud-based collaborative services (CBCS), there is no longer the need for May / June 2011 41 Elearning!

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