Guest Author: Mike Watson
SharePointMadScientist

Mark Miller posted a thought provoking article at http://www.endusersharepoint.com/2010/02/23/is-sharepoint-2010-relevant/ asking his readers if SharePoint 2010 was relevant as a topic at conferences. To this I answer with my own question: Do you care about doing SharePoint right? That is do you care that SharePoint makes your users productive, is available, and performs as expected? Undoubtedly, you’re answer is an unwavering “YES”. To which I respond, YES! SharePoint 2010 is very relevant to you and as a SharePoint developer, administrator, or end-user and you should be chomping at the bit to get SharePoint 2010 into your organization.

Based on my recent conversation with Mark, I believe the spirit of his post was to alert conference organizers that many folks will be using SharePoint 2007 (and even SharePoint 2003 mind you) for a long time to come. Conferences should continue to offer content on 2007 or risk alienating a lot of would be paying customers. This is expected as just about every organization I’ve ever dealt with moves slower than refrigerated molasses when it comes to updating their software. In the spirit of Mark’s argument, I concur that most current SharePoint 2007 organizations will remain on 2007 for some time. This is for several reasons including:

• Organizations are still rolling out their 2007 based projects
• Organizations don’t have the budget or time to invest in 2010 yet
• Organizations are scared of the new features and functionality in 2010
• Organizations expect to be or will find themselves marred in upgrade issues
• Organizations don’t yet understand the value of SharePoint 2010

My aim here is not to list a myriad of excuses for you to continue using SharePoint 2007, but to compel you to begin your move to SharePoint 2010. But why? Why should you start your move to SharePoint 2010? The specific reasons are too numerous to list but from a high level:

• End users will experience massive productivity gains once they familiarize themselves with 2010 client and server – Everything in 2010 is easier to use thanks to the ribbon, list functionality is well… more functional, and there is a wider variety of templates to support the specific needs of information workers. The ability to create and work with content in the Office client and SharePoint 2010 is just far superior to 2007.
• Administrators will find it much easier to keep SharePoint running long and strong – SharePoint 2007 was a serious attempt at providing an enterprise collaboration platform, but there were some holes that occasionally made running SharePoint a frustrating experience. It had a few scalability and availability issues that plagued administrators and resolving SharePoint problems sometimes felt like refuting the theory of relativity. SharePoint 2010 solved many of those issues through better architecture and by providing more administrator bells and whistles such as PowerShell, improved Central Administration, and better backup/recovery.
• Developers can build better, more supportable solutions in less time – SharePoint 2007 was very flexible with its expanded development story, but 2010 is so much better. Developers will find the Visual Studio 2010 integration way more productive, sandbox solutions offer a way to get code onto servers without administrator intervention, and the new features offer infinite customization capabilities.

Again, my aim wasn’t to list every possible reason a SharePoint shop would want to upgrade from 2007 to 2010, but simply wet your whistle with an overview of SharePoint 2010’s superior feature set. I highly encourage any organization currently invested in SharePoint 2007 to start considering SharePoint 2010 specifically in respect to their organizations current pain points with 2007. What they will find is that 2010 will address those points nearly line for line.

Guest Author: Mike Watson
SharePointMadScientist

Mike Watson (MOF, MCSE, MCSA, A+, i-Net+, Net+, CIW) is an enterprise SharePoint architect, entrepreneur, and instructor with a respected career within the IT industry and beyond. Mike is first and foremost a problem solver with experience in accounting, combat arms, farming, food service, finance, as well as information technology and draws on this wide experience to bring much needed perspective to SharePoint. Mike believes strongly in empowering people and their organizations to achieve their goals and is constantly searching for innovative solutions to common problems.