There are already several out-of-the-box models available to use, for example, sales, customer services and many more. It is possible to develop custom solutions and new features on top of the existing models. Let us understand some terminologies:
- Out of the box: It is functionality that is directly provided by the software vendor. It consists of built-in entities, workflows, templates, plug-ins and other components. Few of these can be modified.
- Configurable: The functionality can be created using built-in objects(such as entities) shipped by the vendor. The configurable are forward compatible, which means compatible with future releases.
- Customizable: The functionality that is created using built-in objects by vendor and custom objects by the partner. It is not forward compatible with future releases.
There are a few factors which should be considered before going for custom development.
- Time: Custom development takes some time; it is also vital that the development team with programming experience is considered. If required functionality can be achieved through configuration, then it would save much time.
- Cost: Development team would cost more than using existing configurations if a team going with configurations have enough experience.
- Support: Custom development would require support for more related functionalities and bug fixing while Microsoft has a dedicated team working on future functionalities and maintaining existing functionalities.
- Updates: Every solution requires to update at a point of time which would take time and costs. Such upgrades create a continuous dependency on the development team or custom solution provider partner while Microsoft periodically releases updates.
