So the trend seems to be favoring purchasing software over building it. But I think Buy vs. Build is a slippery slope, and more so, should be more clearly named: Buy and Configure vs. Build on a Framework.
In my mind, the difficulty of configuring down a complex piece of software is really just as difficult as building up a piece of software from pre-built frameworks, plug-ins, and templates.
The intent with Buy is not necessarily to spend money (though I do know people that value software strictly on its price tag), but to follow a basic principle: don’t reinvent the wheel. If someone has already done it, use that first. The question for me is: when does configuration cost more than building?
| Buy or Build | Where you spend your time | Considerations |
| Buy the enterprise tool that does everything | comparing and contrasting various products, learning how to use the proprietary product you select, and a lot of configuring | does more than you want, pay a company for support |
| Build with pre-built frameworks, plug-ins, and templates | understanding your business need, learning how to use general-purpose components, and program what you want | does exactly what you want, pay a consultant for support |
In my experience, configuring is very expensive. I think about my Java programming days when it felt like half of my time was simply spent figuring out how to configure the fancy and expensive server.
From a learning perspective, I’m all about the build. I would much rather have knowledge about a general-purpose framework than knowledge about a proprietary system. General-purpose knowledge has much longer-term value, and can be re-used over and over and over again.
What do you think?
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Nice blog entry. It’s a tough call between buy vs. build. Yes, building does help create ‘local’ knowledge base and configuring ‘buy’ software can be a royal pain. Our org, like most orgs, grapple with buy vs. build all the time. One item that you did not mention is SaaS, Software as a Service. In a few instance we have actually success used SaaS…