When developing software, what does your company prioritize? Most would say speed to market and minimizing costs, while still meeting consumer needs. This article focuses on the first two priorities, though their impact on the third is also significant. So, let me ask development teams:

Why Reinvent the Wheel?

Microsoft .NET has been around for over 23 years, and a vast array of tools and frameworks are available to accelerate business application development. Our job as developers is to integrate these existing solutions to meet our business needs effectively. Need an example?

A Costly Lesson in Custom Solutions

At one of my previous jobs, the architects embarked on creating a custom workflow program before I joined. After reviewing their work, I was puzzled why they hadn’t leveraged the built-in workflow capabilities in .NET or a pre-existing framework from a company like K2, renowned for its workflow solutions. They were determined to build a superior solution themselves. Four and a half years later, when I left, their custom workflow framework was still non-operational, costing the company tens of thousands of dollars on a framework that never worked.

Similarly, lead developers frequently approached me with issues or features they needed. My first suggestion was always to explore existing frameworks. However, they often claimed they lacked time to research, yet paradoxically spent extensive time developing from scratch. This approach led to major delivery delays and feature deficiencies, ultimately allowing competitors to poach many of their customers.

The Financial Impact of Rewriting Code

In a more recent role, I was tasked with adding a simple feature to an ASP.NET Razor page—a filter by customer email address. Since I was new to Razor, this took me 3.5 days. At an hourly rate of $65, that costs $1,820. Had we used a third-party grid from companies like DevExpress, GrapeCity, or Telerik, I could have completed this in under 3 hours, saving $1,625. Not only would this have been faster and cheaper, but it also would have allowed me to add extra features like sorting and grouping without additional coding.

The Misconceptions Around Third-Party Tools

Despite the clear benefits, I’ve encountered resistance to third-party tools. I’ve spoken about the value of these tools at conferences and user groups, only to find some developers dismissive of their benefits. It seems some developers prefer to complicate matters rather than embrace solutions that could simplify their work and enhance their productivity.

Demonstrating Value: Time and Money Savings

Managers and accountants often fail to see the value in third-party products. They readily allocate budgets for endless code rewrites but are reluctant to invest in third-party solutions. Let’s change that perspective. For example, at a previous job, we used an outdated source control system that was inefficient compared to Team Foundation Services (TFS). I calculated that each developer wasted an average of 5 hours a week with the current system, translating to a staggering $67,500 weekly across the company. Presenting these figures led to the adoption of TFS, saving significant costs and boosting productivity.

Embracing Third-Party UI Frameworks for Modern User Experience

Creating a modern, user-friendly interface is complex and time-consuming. Third-party UI frameworks streamline this process, offering robust solutions for various .NET application types. Companies like Telerik, DevExpress, Syncfusion, GrapeCity, and Infragistics provide comprehensive frameworks that cover everything from UI controls to reporting and testing. For example, DevExpress’s Universal subscription costs $2,199 annually—significantly less than the cost of developing a single control internally.

To address concerns about responsiveness and vendor reliability, many companies offer codebase escrow services, ensuring access to code if the vendor goes out of business.

Essential Third-Party Tools for Enhancing Visual Studio Development

Here are some must-have tools to enhance productivity and code quality in Visual Studio:

• CodeRush from DevExpress (free): Boosts productivity with advanced refactoring, code analysis, and navigation features.
• GhostDoc from SubMain (free version available): Automatically generates XML documentation comments, saving time and ensuring consistency.
• .NET Memory Profiler from SciTech Software AB: Detects memory leaks and optimizes usage, ensuring your application is resource-efficient.

Summary

Investing in third-party products can save your company thousands of dollars annually and deliver better quality code, faster feature development, and improved customer satisfaction. I hope this article inspires you and your team to explore third-party solutions before embarking on custom development projects. Download these products, test them, and see how they can enhance your applications. What are your favorite tools or add-ins? Share your thoughts in the comments below.

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256 Seconds with dotNetDave (E4) – Choosing a Third Party Product

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