S #

Issue

Comments

1.

SharePoint tries to do too much

I take it as compliment. Yes, SharePoint offers a lot. You just need to pick and choose the things you want to use and use it right way

2

It duplicates features available elsewhere or work better than SharePoint, such as network drives (n:)

With any enterprise level tool, you need to have a process in place besides just the tool. It is not SharePoint problem that we are still using network drives, it is process problem. There is no way that network shares (n: etc) are better than SharePoint. SharePoint gives following features around documents, which network drives not even close to this list.

i.                    Automatic versioning management

ii.                  Check-in/ check-out

iii.                Storing Meta data

iv.                 Content Types

v.                   Document Approval Process

vi.                 Workflows

vii.               Email Alerts (e.g email me when document is changed by someone)

viii.             RSS Feeds

ix.                 Recycle Bin (Yes SharePoint Recycle Bin, try to delete a file from a network share and see if the same network share allows to restore it without having to maintain the duplicate copies)

x.                   Easy Security Management

xi.                 Document Ratings

xii.               Audience Targeting

xiii.             Information Management (Auditing, Barcodes etc)

3

Calendar

It is optional nice to have feature in lots of scenarios.

4

SharePoint Wiki is not wiki enough

SharePoint wiki feature offers a basic wiki functionality. You can customize the SharePoint wiki feature. There are lots of 3^rd party SharePoint add-ons for wiki. If business requirements in certain department demand more robust wiki functionality, they can use one of those 3^rd party add-on.

5

Top and Left Sidebar are distraction

Like in any website you can have different types of navigational structure. SharePoint uses left and top. Left is by default for features within the same SharePoint site (unless modified) and top is where usually cross-site links are added. Again for a department need, the site structure can be customized. One option is to start with a blank template or page and build items on top of it

6

Search is in a bad place

On most of the internet / intranet sites, search is usually on the top right section of the site. On few sites they place it on the side areas (usually to the right side). In SharePoint the search area can be placed in a different location or you can use Search Center feature in SharePoint Server to go to that portal page and use search across all contents

7

Overall organization of SharePoint is too complicated and its administration

SharePoint is more than a tool, it is a platform you can use to build your applications on. The SharePoint as a tool gives you lots of different ways to use and organize your information. The default layout, settings and information presentation might not be applicable to all cases. Users can customize the layout and presentation of their information. For example you can use a document library with default settings. In that case it will show you all documents in the same view. Imagine you have 100 documents. Still you can use it the same way. The better approach would be to create meta data structure for the documents, use columns to define the type of information you should associate with each column and then use Views, Sort, group feature to present the same document library but with more presentable manner.

8

It is Hierarchical and duplicates intranet

Majority of Internet / Intranet sites are hierarchical. As best design practices, you should not place all the information on the homepage of your website. For small website you can use a homepage and just one level. Due the type of information SharePoint offers, you should use hierarchical structure. as it offers better manageability, ease of navigation, security and administration.

9

Less Tech Savvy user can’t be blamed for wondering “What’s the point?”

It’s the Share-Point. Sharing and making things more visible across the enterprise is one of the objective. With little training and efforts, users can easily learn how to work with SharePoint. A decade or two back it must have been difficult for users to understand the network share and how to work with it. Then they understood it. Now with Web 2 technologies, I’m sure they will learn the new ways of information sharing and collaboration. It is just a matter of time