Can Telerik's Sitefinity Replace Microsoft's SharePoint?
Posted: Thursday, November 04, 2010
by Richard Winslow
Automated Results
Introduction:
Although the two products have similarities and Telerik is addressing more and more SharePoint functionality with each new release, in our opinion there are still two distinct purposes:
Sitefinity is geared for content management of a public website
SharePoint is geared for enterprise-wide document management and collaboration of an Intranet website.
Sitefinity is a great product with a great future; Telerik continues to enhance the product to with a keen eye for improving the product to address the most important aspects of content management.
SharePoint is a large cumbersome product that is way over priced for its functionality and major shortcomings. Our stance on SharePoint is to only stay on the surface with a configured implementation without customization. When we attempt to customize the product, we quickly find it is difficult if not impossible to manage (ex. custom forms with InfoPath will stop and restart the entire Sharepoint service because a DLL update is introduced). There are some very nice features that are hard to beat and thus we use it, but we vehemently warn our clients about the pitfalls of customization.
Can Sitefinity be used for document management and collaboration?
Yes it can, but the larger the implementation, the stronger the case becomes for the SharePoint features that Sitefinity doesn't currently have (ex. custom lists, spreadsheet data entry, nested sites within sites, the ability to save a template of an entire site hierarchy including data for easy reuse, and the granular backup scheme that allows single document recovery).
Will Sitefinity continue to challenge Microsoft until the tides change?
I'm confident that Telerik can and will take on Microsoft SharePoint. If you look at Telerik's product line, they have consistently implemented a better visual tool then Microsoft even when it is Microsoft's own design (ex. RADControls, Sitefinity, Web UI Test, etc).
Can Sitefinity do it in the near future?
No, I don't think so. Telerik is taking their time to get Sitefinity v4.0 right and addressing their current core customer base: website content management. That's where they should be concentrating and evolving. With there great visualization skills, they can and will add features that will directly compete with SharePoint.
What one SharePoint feature would I want to see in Sitefinity?
Allow me to copy HTML content including images and paste them into a content block where the copied images are handled automatically within Sitefinity. Thus a quick Control C to copy and a Control V to paste and the content is done. I don't want to have to save each graphic or image individually to my desktop, then upload them into a Sitefinity image library, then create a reference to each on within the text content at each strategic location.
Sitefinity is sold to customers because the time they save managing content within Sitefinity has an ROI of a couple of days. A CMS package breaks down the barrier to the creation of new content or the updating of existing content. One can login and go to an appropriate content module to add the specific content without worrying about page design and consistent website structure, it is done for them.
However, if you are looking to bring in existing content (ex. HTML with images), there can be a significant effort to 'reconstruct' the content when images are formatted into the content... the barrier is still pretty high.
So What are the differences between Sitefinity and SharePoint?
Sitefinity Sharepoint
Environment: Sitefinity: Public Sharepoint: Private
Libraries: Sitefinity: Yes SharePoint: Yes
Workflow: Sitefinity: Light SharePoint: Light with GUI
Image Library: Sitefinity: Better SharePoint: Good
Blogs: Sitefinity: Yes SharePoint: Yes
Wikis: Sitefinity: Good SharePoint: Better with cut and paste images
Newsletters: Sitefinity: Weak SharePoint: No
User Management: Sitefinity: Yes SharePoint: Yes
Role Management: Sitefinity: Yes SharePoint: Yes
Permissions: Sitefinity: Yes SharePoint: Yes
Forms Manager: Sitefinity: Full with v4 SharePoint: Difficult
Page Design: Sitefinity: Easy SharePoint: Complex
Custom Lists: Sitefinity: No SharePoint: Yes
Templates: Sitefinity: No SharePoint: Full reuse
Nested Sites: Sitefinity: No SharePoint: Yes
Search: Sitefinity: Good SharePoint: Excellent
Cost: Sitefinity: One time small cost SharePoint: Expensive to buy or lease
Slide Library: Sitefinity: No SharePoint: Yes
Web Parts: Sitefinity: No SharePoint: Yes
User Controls: Sitefinity: Yes SharePoint: No
What would you add to this list?
Please comment on your experiences, we want to hear from you.
Rich Winslow, co-owner of Automated Results Computer Consulting LLC. We improve business' profitability through software solutions.
We are a Microsoft Gold Partner and a Sitefinity MVP.
To learn more about Sitefinity and how to implement it...
http://www.automatedresults.com/Products/Sitefinity.aspx
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