SharePoint Options: MOSS Versus WSS

Contrary to popular belief, SharePoint is actually a family of products and is growing to offer more and more functionality. As such, one of the first decision points before testing/deploying SharePoint is whether to use the free version (Windows SharePoint Services – WSS) or the enterprise version (Microsoft Office SharePoint Server – MOSS).

Since WSS and MOSS have the same set of core features, it seems more relevant to focus on the differences between them in making the decision. Keep in mind that both versions have the same capabilities in the key areas of lists, file management, permissions, and other basic functionality.

The following is a list of features that MOSS includes but WSS does not include. The list is not comprehensive, but covers the major areas.
My Sites: Customizable site for each employee to have their own dashboard to what they are working on and what concerns them.

Social Networking: Visibility of co-workers presence and instant messaging integration.

Site Directory: Site searching tool to allow users to find sites and links quickly.

Enterprise Search: Multiple site and non-SharePoint site crawling to bring data from multiple location to the end user’s fingertips.

Business Data Catalog/Business Data Search: The integration of SharePoint to external business systems allows connections to other web services, relational databases, etc. For example, a field in your ERP system could drive the value of a column in your SharePoint list.

Excel Services: Allows users to view and interact with Excel spreadsheets housed in SharePoint in an Excel-like interface. In other words, users don’t have to download the Excel file in order to work with its data.

Information Rights Management (IRM): Allows an administrator to expire and delete a document after a given amount of time or initiate a Workflow on a document at set intervals.