Buy, not build - Confessions from a Telerik junkie

Most of the developers I know don't like 3rd party controls. They like to be in the front seat, to have control. That's of course a good thing, because it shows they take responsibility for their own code, and they also have full control of future changes.

I understand why they do this, but I have a different opinion. There is no need to reinvent the wheel. If someone already has done your job then you could focus on other things. Choose a vendor! I myself use Telerik GUI Controls all the time. Telerik is a serious, professional company that has grown immensely over the last year. Their controls are fast and reliable, customizable and they always have well defined roadmaps for future changes and features in their product families.

So instead of using several weeks developing my own treeview with load on demand nodes and context menus, I can use default built-in features on the telerik treeview and use my resources to focus on other aspects of the product.

Of course, there are other 3rd controls vendors out there with less professional values that you should avoid. There's NOTHING more annoying than running into a bug that's beyond your control. You simply have to wait for the vendors to fix it. That's probably the biggest reason why developers like to build things themselves. If you have experienced this once, you would definitely not want to be there twice!

But as long as you use a professional vendor like Telerik you have nothing to fear. It's going to save you a lot of time. Check it out yourself at http://www.telerik.com