Build vs. Buy and Asp.net Server Controls
I’ve done three projects within the past couple of years where I have built the same server components for asp.net-based applications. It seems like everyone is using custom phone controls, date controls, calendar controls, credit card controls, zip code controls, etc. It’s always the same thing over and over.
Every time that I’ve done this, I’ve always felt that it wasn’t worth the effort. The requirements always change for the interaction of these controls and when you look at the final price of the man-hours to build these things it ends up being ridiculous. When you look at it on the surface, these are simple things. For some reason, it just always seems to take forever to get these things built and tested.
Here’s my advice… don’t build them if you can avoid it. Take a look at the controls that are for sale and evaluate them first. These are common problems with common solutions and there is no reason to re-invent the wheel over and over. If anyone has any control recommendations, feel free to leave them in the comments. I’ve never seen a really good control comparison for what is out there, but if you know of one then I’d love to see it.
March 6th, 2006 at 1:43 am
There’s several control suites out there, just depends on what types of controls youre looking for. For UI stuff, there’s Infragistics, Syncfusion, DotNetMagic, Xceed, and ComponentArt (but I’m guessing you already know about those
March 6th, 2006 at 1:44 am
The only problem with utilizing third party components is that you are now dependent on the third party for support, updates and fixes. Which may or may not come during your project timelines.
Even though I agree you should always look at the buy vs. build, I just want to make sure that if I buy then the company I purchase from has a good rep around supporting thier product and response times are fast.