24 Part I: Understanding the SharePoint Development Platform Figuring Out Where SharePoint Online Is Going Okay, no technology is perfect (you knew that). One of the downsides of using SharePoint Online is that the version available Online usually lags behind the version available On Premise. For example, when SharePoint 2010 was released, the Online version continued to be 2007 for some time. The reason for this lag is that the Online team is working through all the same quirks that go along with upgrading from the previous version to the new version. It's much the same scenario as what companies around the world have to work through when they upgrade their own platforms. Only after the Online team has created a stable and secure platform can they start moving Online customers to the new platform. Keep in mind, as well, that Online upgrades happen automatically. If you're an Online customer and want to stay with the old version of SharePoint, you're out of luck. The platform mitigates this by allowing for upgrades that don't affect the look and feel of the sites that use the platform, even when the underlying SharePoint version is upgraded. If you have a SharePoint 2007 team site and you upgrade to the 2010 version, your site can continue to look