Throughout the history of SharePoint, users have encountered the challenge of upgrading versions due to dependencies on Windows and SQL server upgrades. Whether driven by technical or financial considerations, the outcome remained the same—a recurring platform ritual every few years. Thankfully, with Webparts360, our package and deploy mechanism facilitated smooth migration of solutions between versions, easing the process.
However, everything changed with the advent of SharePoint Online. Microsoft undertook a significant reengineering effort to create this online platform, enabling seamless future changes and additions without disrupting users. This decision introduced numerous fundamental changes that made it infeasible for us to develop a migration tool for Webparts360. By constructing your new solutions to run on SharePoint, you ensure their longevity as long as SharePoint continues to exist.
Undoubtedly, SharePoint has evolved and transformed. It now serves as the cornerstone for collaboration and storage within Office 365. Teams' integration with SharePoint enhances real-time communication, teamwork, and remote collaboration. While SharePoint primarily focuses on content management, document storage, and intranet capabilities, Teams expands upon these functionalities by offering chat-based collaboration, audio and video conferencing, and application integrations, all within a unified interface. Consequently, any solutions should leverage these features to harness the innovation provided by Teams.
SharePoint Online is often considered the last upgrade for several reasons:
Cloud-based platform: SharePoint Online is a cloud-based version of SharePoint, which means it is hosted and managed by Microsoft in their data centers. This eliminates the need for organizations to maintain their own infrastructure, perform updates, or handle scalability concerns. By moving to the cloud, organizations can benefit from the agility, scalability, and cost-effectiveness of a cloud-based solution.
Continuous updates and improvements: SharePoint Online receives regular updates and new features from Microsoft. As a cloud service, Microsoft can push updates seamlessly to all users without requiring individual organizations to perform manual upgrades. This ensures that organizations using SharePoint Online always have access to the latest features, security patches, and improvements.
Integration with other Microsoft services: SharePoint Online is tightly integrated with other Microsoft 365 services, such as Microsoft Teams, OneDrive for Business, and Exchange Online. This integration enables a seamless collaboration experience across multiple tools and applications, enhancing productivity and efficiency.
Enhanced security and compliance: Microsoft invests heavily in security and compliance measures for SharePoint Online. They provide robust security features, data encryption, multi-factor authentication, data loss prevention, and compliance certifications to help organizations meet their regulatory requirements. By migrating to SharePoint Online, organizations can leverage these built-in security and compliance capabilities.
Scalability and flexibility: SharePoint Online allows organizations to scale their usage based on their needs. It provides flexibility to expand or contract storage, adjust user licenses, and accommodate changing business requirements. This scalability eliminates the need for organizations to invest in additional hardware or worry about capacity planning.
Collaboration and remote work capabilities: SharePoint Online offers powerful collaboration features, such as document co-authoring, versioning, workflows, and access controls. These features facilitate seamless collaboration among team members, regardless of their geographical location or device they are using. With the rise of remote work, SharePoint Online provides a robust platform for teams to collaborate effectively.
In summary, when you migrate to SharePoint Online, it means you outsource all the software updates, infrastructure engineering and hosting complications to Microsoft. You get to enjoy its capabilities without having to worry about "keeping the lights on" tasks. You only need to focus on contents, solutions and training to drive its adoption.
Since 2016, our clients who have adopted Webparts360 to construct their business-critical solutions on SharePoint Online have reaped the rewards of a dependable and scalable platform. By avoiding the need for platform upgrades, they have achieved significant savings in costs and time, representing a substantial advantage.
Feel free to contact us for a no-obligation discussion on the optimal approach for your final SharePoint upgrade. We'll be happy to provide guidance and recommendations tailored to your specific requirements.
Comments