We have been using Sharepoint for quite a while now. We have build a very customized Intranet and Extranet based on Sharepoint. We have build great blog and wike sites, which it helped our project teams more effectively collaborate. The Extranet was featured as a Microsoft case study.  

However, my honest opinion is that Microsoft has still a way to go. At this point in time there should be no difference between accessing a Sharepoint site and using basic functionality (downloading images from a image gallery or editing a wiki) from a MAC or a Windows system. Effective editing is only possible using the 3rd party editor from Telerik. Filtered RSS feeds are not possible. Wiki breadcrumbs are unusable. Not to talk about the missing support.

- Dieter

Obe feature that I'd really would like to have when working with lists is a concatination function between columns, i.e. one column would show selected values depending on slected values in another column. So far the only way I've been able to achieve this is to use InfoPath schema but it would be very useful to have this function directly on lists.

/Tom Gullberg

Never let people customize the defaults - use the style sheets etc but never alter the base code.

Every customized site breaks when going to the next version and must all be redone again.

SP fails to never lives up to its marketed potentional / function in a Government org since they follow different governance rules (policy and security) and SP breaks all of them in order to be functional. Thus they are all disabled and useless for any (Federal) agency. Leaving it as a storage area glorified Blog of useless stuff.

FORCE people to come up with categorization, areas, classification, and structure of the whole system before allowing anyone to see it. Once deployed no one will every classifiy anything unless forced onto them. Then it becomes a storehouse of stuff that you will never find again. (Think the last scene of "Raiders of the Lost Arc" when it is being put into a wharehouse never to be found again.)

Never organize SP according to the current business strucuture - organize it by functions and let each function have its own site and then have a changable global menu that can be rerferenced (Server side include) from a central site to do the site naviation. Thus as things are reorged the sites still function and locations don't change - the users just change the org name seen on the page and org codes and all is well. use generic names - finance, shipping, receiving, IT, Help Desk etc, don't use phrase of the year to name a site - you can never rename it.

<b>SharePoint 2003 Advanced Concepts</b>

In SharePoint 2003 Advanced Concepts, two world-class SharePoint consultants show how to make SharePoint ?jump through hoops? for you and do exactly what you want. SharePoint 2003 Advanced Concepts addresses every facet of SharePoint customization, from site definitions and templates to document libraries and custom properties. The authors cover both Windows SharePoint Services and SharePoint Portal Server 2003 and illuminate SharePoint's interactions with other technologies–helping you troubleshoot problems far more effectively.

just <a href="http://hotsoftwareslist.blogspot.com/2008/02/sharepoint-2003-advanced-concepts.html">click here</a>

<b>Microsoft SharePoint 2007 Unleashed</b>

SharePoint provides a cost-effective, easy-to-implement solution for organizations interested in enhancing team collaboration, document management, and search functionality and in providing a portal to access corporate resources and intranet/extranet environments. The SharePoint 2007 family (consisting of Windows SharePoint Service 3.0 and Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007) build upon these features and toolsets and introduce a staggering array of new tools and capabilities that undeniably make SharePoint 2007 an enterprise-class solution.

<a href="http://hotsoftwareslist.blogspot.com/2008/02/ebooks-for-microsoft-sharepoint.html">Click here</a> to download ebook

SharePoint is able to store documents and automate business processes based on documents. But how can you use SharePoint to capture and apply workflow to incoming paper documents?

The Dark Blue Duck Scanning Enabler™ product enhances Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 (MOSS) and Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 (WSS) adding support for Scanning.

Legal professionals, health professionals, public servants and others are benefiting from the combination of Microsoft’s SharePoint products and Dark Blue Duck’s Scanning Enabler™.

Large organizations are using the Scanning Enabler™ with MOSS to extend their Enterprise Content Management and search capabilities. Small companies are using the Scanning Enabler™ to address challenges they face when swamped by incoming paperwork (especially when the business is geographically distributed).

A number of bloggers have already tried out our product and feedback has been good.

learn more: http://www.darkblueduck.com/Products/ScanningEnablerWSS.aspx

Sharepoint's list is the fundamental object where data are stored; document library, forms, calendars, wikis, image library are built from is very useful. However, it does not provide column access control. So if you wanted it to use it to represent an approval data, it will not work because the person who creates it can aslo approves it.

By providing column access control, (i.e. determine who can access what at what time), you can use it to define workflows and build countless business processes as easy as building a list. We created this feature and now are using it for many of our projects. Check out http://www.webparts360.com to learn more about dynamic interface.

I am appraoching MOSS 2007 and SharePpoint from the standpoint of a first time installating and the more i learn about SharePoint the further away get from actually being able to implement it as there is so much indirect " Non SharePoint " infrastructue needed before you can deal with SharePoint. For example moving from a non domain based network to domain based, implementing AD (and all that goes with that  plus establishing dns and namepsaces, that will reflect urls in sharepoint sites instead of server names). There should be more info dedicated to this, how to implement MOSS 2007  starting from zero i.e a server not even taken out of the box leading to the network infrastructure land onto  planning installation, implementation, set up etc.

There also needed to be more detailed examples about each little feature how you can use it and how others are using it. Other real world examples help you in your own environment , see something you like then you start thinking I could use that in this site etc.  

"Learn how your business can save time and money by implementing best practice solutions in an online environment." from nSynergy.

It is a perfect opinion on SharePoint, I think.

There are also a free seminar series  about latest SharePoint information - Anyone who is interested in this can visit http://www.nsynergy.com/Pages/Seminars.aspx and register for joining it free of charge.

It&#39;s conference season, and I&#39;m lucky enough to be representing our community in several events