A few sharepoint concepts I can't seem to grasp

Question

Despite my background with asp .net C#, I've really tried to get my head around the different concepts and development techniques surrounding Sharepoint 2010 and I can honestly say I'm really struggling. As a last resort - I'm posting on here at the risk of being marked down on questions that you will say I could have found out through research myself (but I've been on this for days now believe me). So I have a few questions no doubt anybody proficient in Sharepoint will be able to help me find answers to.

Stages of development in Sharepoint:

I understand that in asp .net C# (and any other typical web design platforms) we have the 'design stage' were, as developers, we'll design the website and it's content (putting CMS' to one side for now) and then you have a 'view stage' were end-users view the website - pretty simple. But with Sharepoint I'm completely lost as to how I can view the lifecycle with regards to stages that it may go through. I'm confused because I've configured and set up my Sharepoint web app and a site collection. That's fine, that seems like the admin side of things - but now the development is done how? I've followed a guide to assign master pages and css to the site collection for branding purposes but there's also the option to manage this site through the ribbon!? Do we want end-users to see this ribbon? Basically, if anyone can clarify what responsibilities are left with the end-users after a hand-over from the developers it would help me a lot to grasp the concept of Sharepoint and what it offers. Also, does if Sharepoint is a CMS does this mean there's a 3rd stage to the lifecycle (i.e. Sharepoint developers develop the framework for the site which will manage content, users will manage the content, another type of user will view the content)??

Use of VM's:

My computer's spec is now high enough to host VM's through hyper-v, so it does. I'm currently using a VM for Sharepoint development. Why? If I'd read around and found that the only reason was because Sharepoint cannot (without fiddly hacks) be ran on Windows 7 (and I may need a win 7 vm for day-to-day office use) then I'd understand - but it seems that VM's are also handy because should I mess up a sharepoint installation I can start again - why would I need to? I've never ever came accross any other type of installation (apart from OS installations) that could go wrong enough to require a complete restoration of a hard-drive image. What exactly can go wrong?

Managing Sharepoint content in VS

Again, comparing to standard asp .net C# development - I create my pages (using master pages and/or controls if I see fit) and they appear, simple. With sharepoint - it seems that the content (saved in a database which is automatically created by a Sharepoint installation) is mapped to a page (saved in our directory - an aspx page). If this is right - then how do we manage the aspx pages and develop them further in VS? Or are we not meant to amend the appearance of lists etc.?

Thanks a lot, like I say I expect a bit of negativity here regarding the style of question but it really is necessary to help me move forward. I'm not lazy by any means - if you can refer me to links that will help a complete newcomer to sharepoint grasp any of the concepts I've mentioned above I'll happily do the reading - but I've only managed to come accross material targetted at those who already have a firm grip on Sharepoint.

Answer 1

You really need to read more about SharePoint. Instead of looking into Web parts and how to customize SharePoint, you should grasp the concepts first.

First of all, StackOverflow is not the place for SharePoint questions because there is a dedicated StackExchange site for SharePoint here.

Then, I think you better get a book about it. Start in the configuration track before moving to the development track, it will help you understand the development specifics.

As a general idea, with SharePoint you create sites. A site (collection) may be composed of other sites, and that gives you a navigation. In the lower level you have pages, in which you can add content managed by SharePoint (Lists) or custom web parts that have to be developed in ASP.NET. You can have sites totally built with out of the box functionality, no custom development involved. When you build a web part, you upload the assembly to SharePoint and, having a page in edit mode, add the web part to the page. You also have plenty of web parts out of the box.

There is also a product called SharePoint Designer, that helps you customize SharePoint pages. You can browse the complete structure of sites and pages in your site and edit them.

You don't open a SharePoint site in .NET and start changing pages from there. .NET is only for creating custom web parts or other extensible components.

This is really a high level overview, there is a lot into SharePoint. Don't expect to learn everything about it in some weeks, I don't think there is even someone who knows it all. That's how large the product is...

Good luck!!