Pros and Cons of a BCS integration versus a Custom Integration
-
16-10-2019 - |
Question
What are the pros and cons of using the BCS to integrate an external system into SharePoint versus a custom integration.
Solution
Pros
End User
- Business Data Web Parts & External List can render data out of the box
- Enterprise & FAST Search Integration with Managed Property Mapping support
- User Profile Synchronization
- Office Integration via External Data Column
- Office Mapping for Tasks,Contacts and Calendar
- SharePoint Workspace Support
- Single Sign on Support
- Workflow support via External Data Column and External List
Developer
- Visual Studio Tooling Support
- SharePoint Designer Support
- Out of the box support for existing SQL Databases & WebServices
- .Net Assembly Connector can connect to any other datatype
- Server side API to develop custom web parts against
- Client Side API to develop custom client integrations against
- Write once work against any data source controls are possible
Cons
End User
- Out of the Box Web Parts look outdated
- External Data Column data needs to be refreshed
Developer
- Generation and Maintenance of Model file is time consuming.
- Data Model does not support subclassing.
- Writing controls that work against any data source is time consuming.
OTHER TIPS
Fabian Williams had a related post about the topic (BCS vs Alternates) a few months ago - http://www.sharepointfabian.com/blog/Lists/Posts/Post.aspx?ID=202
Licensed under: CC-BY-SA with attribution
Not affiliated with sharepoint.stackexchange