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Opinion & Analysis

Is SharePoint a Business Operating System?


Executive Summary

The operating system war is over, in case you didn't notice, Microsoft won. Nothing, not Linux, nor Mac OS can change that, or ever will. The only technology that is a threat to Microsoft in that regard is the Web.

The way in which Microsoft fought the OS war is relevant when we look at SharePoint. Microsoft made hardware manufacturers an offer that they could not refuse. For very little money they could put the latest version of Windows on every computer they make, if they agreed to put it on all of them. Seeding the hardware market in that way allowed Microsoft to make money, and gave computer manufacturers the ability to sell them quickly, in very large numbers, and with a wide range of capabilities. The key to this success is the developer community that built enormous volumes of applications (using Microsoft software tools) to permanently solidify both the hardware manufacturers dependance on Windows and the users reliance on the same Windows platform.


Using Microsoft SharePoint as an ECM Platform


Executive Summary

There is no arguing with the numbers: 100 million Sharepoint licenses, $1 billion dollar Microsoft business. SharePoint is definitely out there, and it's installed in a lot of places. The problem is that very few know what to do with it. This is particularly true when it comes to using it for "true" Enterprise Content Management (ECM) applications, as discussed in this article. To be fair, part (perhaps a large part) of the problem, is that SharePoint is able to do so many things. That coupled with all the the talk and noise about it, generates such undeniable confusion that it turns the quest for the "right" solution into a navel pondering exercise. In the absence of clear direction, we at Kollabria thought we should try to answer the question: Can SharePoint be used as an ECM platform?