SharePoint 2007 - General Best Practices

[LadyWolf]

Hey there. Let's get this forum going!
SharePoint is becoming more and more popular at my "real job" lately and I've been poking around, developing best practices for what we're referring to the "back end" (the development site) and "front end" for end user portals, used to host final materials for general consumption. The infamous "they" have locked down a lot of the functionality in terms of customization (skins and such) but through trial and error we've come up with some workable sites.
I'm wondering if anyone has any best practices to share with the class.

Some of my team's best practices include:

• For "back end" sites, turn on the "Always check out" functionality. This way, you don't have to remember to check a file out before editing so no one overwrites what you're editing.
• We've also worked out some naming conventions so they make sense on the site and if we need to copy the file off the site and send it to review with Compliance it still makes sense either way.

[JoeP]

1.) Establish a governance plan. Lack of a governance plan is one of the biggest causes for SharePoint failures. See Governance Resource Center for SharePoint Server 2007 for more information.
2.) Learn and buy into the SharePoint terminology. Some of the SharePoint terms don't mean the same thing as what you are used to (i.e., a SharePoint site is just a page, content types are not file types). See Mark Schneider's SharePoint Taxonomy and Governance Blog for more information.
3.) Use as much "out of the box" as possible. Customization will make your life miserable when you migrate to a newer version. If you must customize document heavily.
4.) Investigate the free tools at http://www.codeplex.com" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;.
5.) Always do a custom install to install a farm even if it is on one server.
6.) Learn and encourage use of enterprise search.

BTW, are you using WSS or MOSS std. or MOSS enterprise?

Joe