I am aspiring to become a SharePoint developer. Where should I begin?

With SharePoint 2007 picking up MOSS as it rolls across different enterprises, people (especially aspiring developers) are looking forward to get into SharePoint Developer’s hat. I would say this is easy and hard! It depends on how committed you are. I am recently getting this question more often either from my friends or through comments on this blog. So thought I should make it clear for the whole community on how to become one. Here is my two cents.

If you never had your hands on a Visual Studio or know nothing about SharePoint or other Microsoft Technologies, I recommend you start off from knowing how to program using either C# or VB.NET. People at Redmond, put together a vast list of resources keeping you in mind. Just go through each of the modules in all 3 tiers and you should be ready to have a look at SharePoint OM (Object Model). Its never a different ball, if you know how to program using C#. It is just a different day at work. More like the difference in Cricket Test match and Twenty20 (guys in US you will not understand this analogy!!)

http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/beginner/bb308786.aspx 

Ok what if you already know how to program using C# and also know something about ASP.NET, XML and JavaScript. Well and good, spend some time to quickly revise the modules in the above link. And you should be ready rock and roll. But where shall I start mate? Good you asked this question. You should understand what is SharePoint, pros and cons of using it etc (this is more like end user stuff). This will help you to get your heads around SharePoint thingy. Find some solid time to go through the links below;

http://office.microsoft.com/en-au/sharepointserver/FX100492001033.aspx?ofcresset=1

http://www.microsoft.com/sharepoint/default.mspx

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/office/sharepointserver/default.aspx

And finally http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepoint/default.aspx (this is more developer focused)

Also got some mood for watching SharePoint videos and Virtual Labs. Start looking at videos Here 

All the best guys, if you find this post interesting and helpful and also found this resources great for your SharePoint Developer Journey, please don’t hesitate to share your experience with Jag. That’s me!   

Thank You!