With the recent release of SharePoint 2010, one of Microsoft’s fastest growing products has gotten even hotter. SharePoint 2010 has not only become more popular among end users and IT pros, but it’s also doing extremely well with developers. This is in part due to the significant advances in the platform, but also because of the great tooling that Visual Studio 2010 has introduced.

Platform capabilities and tooling combined make SharePoint one of the most compelling collaborative platforms in the market today; a platform where many projects seek out custom development. Platform capabilities and tooling, though, are just the foundation; to truly build boundless solutions using SharePoint requires a solid understanding of how you can apply those capabilities. And as you embark on your custom development projects with SharePoint, it’s important to get the right training and insight into the platform to ensure you not only understand what you can exploit in SharePoint 2010 but also how you can build and deploy compelling solutions.

If you’re picking up this book, you’ve probably got more than a casual interest in SharePoint; you’re likely ready to begin or are already actively engaged in SharePoint development. SharePoint 2010 offers so much for the developer, ranging from sandboxed solutions, new data modeling and management capabilities, improved user experience programmability, workflow, line-of-business integration, security, to enterprise content management, and much, much more. And to provide you with a clear, concise breakdown of each of these areas and to help you build the professional-grade solutions you need to build, I can’t think of anybody better than Ted, Andrew, Scot, and David to deliver this to you. No matter where you are in your SharePoint development career, Inside Microsoft SharePoint 2010 provides you with a technical understanding that cuts across new features and functionality, giving you invaluable insight into SharePoint 2010.

As you make your way through this book and beyond, I hope you’ll see and experience the great potential that lies within SharePoint 2010. For the developer, it represents a significant shift enabling you to more easily build and deploy great solutions on what is one of the best collaborative platforms on the market today. And in the true spirit of the Inside series, with this book you’ll get a deep look into the innards of SharePoint 2010; it’s one of the core books you’ll keep on your shelf as a reference that will eventually become dog-eared and tabbed from overuse.

Enjoy Inside SharePoint 2010, and best of luck in your SharePoint development!

Steve Fox

Director, Developer & Platform Evangelism

Microsoft