The NO BS version of What Is SharePoint

SharePoint isn’t one thing. SharePoint is not a program, it’s a platform. It’s a collection of many different products and technologies all wrapped-up and given a name. And from one perspective, learning SharePoint is like learning Microsoft Office. SharePoint is a massive set of solutions of different things you can do with this platform.

SharePoint is a Server Product

SharePoint is a server product, you don’t install SharePoint on your own desktop or laptop, it is installed on your back-end systems and share across your network. There are some associated programs that can install on your desktop, things like SharePoint Designer and SharePoint Workspace.

The Microsoft Talk

Microsoft talks about SharePoint as having six different areas:

• Sites. SharePoint makes websites. It’s a massive website engine.
• Communities. SharePoint helps you work with other people. The idea of collaboration is built-in to this thing.
• Content. SharePoint gives you a place to put your content and stuff.
• Search. SharePoint lets you search your stuff. It’s a massive super-smart search engine.
• Insights. SharePoint helps to bring all your information together.
• Composites. SharePoint helps you build on top of itself. SharePoint has fantastic capability to be extended and customized.

More than anything, SharePoint is not a solution to a problem; it is a platform that you will use to build a hundred solutions to a hundred different problems.

I thank Lynda.com for posting the video.