So my experience with NetSuite began in March of 2017. My company planned to replace Microsoft Dynamics Great Plains with a new accounting system. We decided that getting a full ERP system in the cloud was our best bet. We identified better accounting packages in the cloud, but not a better full ERP with an integrated eCommerce solution. So NetSuite was our choice.

Our plan was to replace Great Plains with NetSuite in October of 2017, which we did. But the bulk of our business systems to this day remain outside of NetSuite. Which brings me to my task list for implementation. I’m a programmer. So my job was to tie it all together.

I began by retooling from c# to JavaScript. Next, I discussed which version of SuiteScript I should be writing with our solution provider. They told me that they wrote both SuiteScript 1.0 and 2.0, but that 2.0 was relatively new, so they tended to use 1.0. So that’s where I began.

To date, my resume includes server-side user event scripts in SuiteScript 1.0, some server-side libraries, client SuiteScripts, server-side RESTlets, and a fair amount of SuiteTalk web services.

Having spent decades in the Microsoft SQL Server, IIS, and ASP.NET platform, I am extremely pleased with NetSuite’s level of extensibility. Many of the SuiteScript APIs can be called either from the client or server-side. This is awesome. And the language, JavaScript, is also the same on both client and server-side.

This carries over to the libraries I’m writing. They are also available for me to call from either client or server. As you might imagine, this presents some challenges. But the concept is fantastic.

Since development is done in the cloud, NetSuite provides a way of turning on SuiteScripts so that only the developer runs them. This is great for testing. And a developer can test their scripts using any role, which effectively allows for impersonation during testing. Super!

Whenever you work with accounting systems, there are lots of rules that you need to adhere to when doing customizations. NetSuite is no exception. But there are so many avenues to customize NetSuite. I give Even Goldberg high marks for his team’s design. It is really well done!