Question

What is the exact differnace between sharepoint list and library in developer point of view?

Answer 1

According this blog, http://www.networkworld.com/community/node/22731, use Library for storing documents, and use Lists for data, for example, a database record. Here’s a direct quote

“I dug a little deeper and did find some points about list attachments
that suggest a list is probably not the best way to house documents if
the organization wants to take advantage of the full range of SP
features:

1) The title of the document is NOT indexed. So an end user would not
be able to search on the title of the document. Example: I attached a
document titled “Copy of Test Lobster.doc” but after incremental
indexing I get no results searching on the word “lobster.” (medium
issue)

2) I can attach multiple documents to one list item, which could cause
problems (minor issue)

3) You can’t (to the best of my knowledge) display the name of the
attached document. You only see the paperclip that signifies the
attachment. (major issue)

4) You don’t have document control, no check-in or check-out. (major
issue)”