Although SharePoint may be used by any organisation, those in the Public Sector usually employ slightly different methods and structures to those in the commercial world. Here at Ratio One we have been involved in supplying solutions to a number of governmental bodies and local authorities and we take pride in the finished projects.

There are a number of features that are characteristic of Public Sector sites - such as the use of an Integrated Public Sector Vocabulary (IPSV) for categorising and management of files and documents. Here, we can, with the use of our partner conceptSearching, allow public sector users to automatically apply 'metadata' to documents and assign them to the universally accepted IPSV standards. This means that when staff are searching for relevant files, they can be found easily in the correct areas.

Similarly, accessibility standards such as those defined by W3C are achieved within SharePoint by designing pages, sites, and web parts to this level. The same applies to other related areas such as e-GIF compliance. The e-GIF defines the technical policies and specifications governing information flows across government and the public sector. They cover interconnectivity, data integration, e-services access and content management. Again, we are pleased to incorporate these standards in the projects we produce for both the public sector and commercial sectors.