An ERP installed and used as it comes is close to nonexistent. The same set of definitions goes out to three companies, and one of them wants "customer" to read "dealer", the second wants three fewer fields on the order screen, and the third wants one more credit limit check before a save. The three differ by an order of magnitude in weight, but as long as all of them are expressed as code they travel the same delivery path.

In the comparison in Why ERP Needs a Definition-Driven Framework , what customization looks like under a definition-driven approach is a layer of data laid over the standard definitions.…