Wiki or SharePoint?

Matt27[lt]

I am trying to get organized some things in our HelpDesk. One thing is information which need to be provided to Call Agents and HelpDesk personnel. To this day all info was published to our SharePoint site, but after some time it got littered with useless, doubled or old info. I and others find it harder and harder to dig info we need. I started looking to alternatives and one is then internal wiki page. I liked the idea, visited some companies who use it and saw how it works. It is much better than SharePoint for keeping HelpDesk info and etc.
What about your experience? Would you recommend stay with SharePoint and try to organize info here or go with a Wiki setup?
Has anyone implemented Wiki at their company? Is it difficult or time consuming?
Or maybe there are other alternatives too?
Thank you.

phoeneous

Sharepoint is way too complex, for me at least. I know some guys that only do Sharepoint and nothing else. You should like into Visual Studio 2010 Web Developer Edition. It lets you create all sort of cool stuff, and it is free! I just started developing an in house web application for our receptionists that lets them keep track on clients. Some programming experience might be needed but you can use the net to learn the bits that you do not know.

RobertKaucher

phoeneous wrote: »

Sharepoint is way too complex, for me at least. I know some guys that only do Sharepoint and nothing else. You should like into Visual Studio 2010 Web Developer Edition. It lets you create all sort of cool stuff, and it is free! I just started developing an in house web application for our receptionists that lets them keep track on clients. Some programming experience might be needed but you can use the net to learn the bits that you do not know.

SharePoint is only as complex as you need it to be. I have seen end users get sites up and running in minutes.

OP, Have you looked at the actual Helpdesk template that is available in the Fab 40 templates? Also, sales guys will tell you their systems will toast your bread and brew your morning coffee if they think that will get you to write a check. If your system was housing duplicate/useless data it was because it was poorly designed and your users were lazy and/or not trained. What does it matter which vendor a wiki site comes from if 3 of your users post different articles for the same fix? This is why you use things like content approval workflows and content life cycle management work flows.

If a vendor's option is better than SharePoint at doing a specific thing it is because the vendor's product costs money. SharePoint can be anything you want and it can be as good or as bad at doing things as you design it to be. If you want a collaboration system that you and your users can customize and which makes customization easy then SharePoint is the way to go. If you want something that does 95% of what you need right off the shelf - then you will need to invest in a custom built app.

IMO, SharePoint is superior to 90% of collaboration products because of one thing: Work Flow! There is hardly a business process that cannot be automated with SharePoint and specialized WF components can be downloaded from CodePlex and built using SharePoint designer. And if you can build a rule in OutLook you can build a WF in SharePoint Designer.

SharePoint does a lot of things for free and most admins don't even know half of what she is capable of and how easy her framework makes customization. Don't knock my baby girl 'cause you don't understand her!!!

And yes, SharePoint is anthropomorphized as a female.

Everyone

Most Help Desk ticketing systems have a knowledge base feature...

Matt27[lt]

I decided to go with a SharePoint. Think it would be easier to fix or re-order old things, instead of implementing new ones. Will have to start from small projects, because cannot afford right now to study SharePoint system deeply enough. Also, I found two colleagues of mine, which know SharePoint so I can simply create a specification document and delegate the task to them.
Thanks for the replies.

Devilsbane

We actually use the wiki library inside of sharepoint for creating how to's for our users. Our references are located elsewhere.

Xcluziv

I believe Sharepoint would be your best route. As Robert stated and from experience with dealing with Sharepoint at work, its very efficient. On our Sharepoint site we keep track or project documentation, IT timesheets, HR documents, Announcements, etc. Very robust in how you can design and develop your Sharepoint site