Content Management Systems Reviews - Open Text - ECM Suite - Content Lifecycle Management

In my last post about Open Text, I started describing Open Text ECM Suite. The subject of my today's post is Open Text ECM Suite - Content Lifecycle Management. Content Lifecycle Management includes document management, imaging, records management, and archiving.

Managing, controlling, and securing content is critical to an organization’s overall information governance strategy. OpenText ECM Suite, Content Lifecycle Management gives organizations ECM solutions to manage content throughout its entire lifecycle.

Features

Fully featured, highly scalable, web-based document management provides a secure, single repository for organizing and sharing enterprise content.

Workflow automates processes, such as change requests and approval, for accuracy and consistency. Processes can be designed according to corporate or regulatory standards.

Imaging transforms physical records into valuable digital assets. Scanned information is indexed and classified with customizable metadata to make it fully searchable.

Records management enables full lifecycle management of all enterprise content, electronic or physical, enabling you to control retention and ensure destruction at the right time.

Intelligent storage management optimizes storage according to business context and metadata, leveraging less expensive media and provides high-end storage reduction services.

Last time I described Document Management (formerly Livelink ECM - Document Management) solution of this suite of products. Now: imaging solution.

Imaging Solution

OpenText Imaging accommodates the need to scan paper documents and the need to view electronic documents. It covers both aspects of business document integration—capturing documents from various sources including scanners, faxes, email, and other office applications, and retrieving documents for users in many different environments, including in remote offices and via the Internet.

The OpenText Imaging solution provides interfaces for integration with workflow, OpenText Archive Server, OpenText Content Server, and other business applications. With OpenText Imaging, documents can be captured, archived, and linked to all types of business objects within enterprise applications.

Features

The Enterprise Scan feature of OpenText Imaging:

Scales from hundreds to many thousands of documents per day.

Supports complex business processes by integrating with and initiating SAP Webflow, OpenText BPM Server, or Content Server workflows.

Integrates with Content Server, including single sign-on and scanning directly from a Content Server folder.

Integrates with SAP Business Suite applications, supporting SAP ArchiveLink and interchange of metadata between SAP systems and Content Server.

Provides built-in barcode support and automatic document separation.

Provides sophisticated pre-indexing capabilities, including pick lists and sticky fields.

Provides full-page views with the ability to zoom.

Generates scanned documents in TIFF, PDF, Searchable PDF, or PDF/A formats.

The DesktopLink feature of OpenText Imaging:

Integrates with Microsoft Word, Excel, and PowerPoint, allowing users to store and archive office documents directly from the originating application and link them to the appropriate transactions in business applications.

Stores and archives documents in Microsoft Windows Explorer via drag-and-drop or the file menu.

Stores documents in their original format or renders them in standard formats, such as TIFF or PDF, for long-term archiving and readability.

The OpenText Imaging ExchangeLink and OpenText Imaging NotesLink options:

Archive and link Microsoft Outlook or Lotus Notes emails or email attachments to the appropriate transaction in the enterprise application (such as SAP ERP), allowing the email to be searched and displayed directly within the enterprise application.

The Web Viewer, Java Viewer, and Windows Viewer features of OpenText Imaging:

Scroll, rotate, and zoom via an easy-to-use thumbnail view of document pages.

Append documents with notes that are automatically tagged with the current date, time, and user name.

Add, edit, and view annotations, including drawing elements such as arrows, lines, mark, checkmarks, and text elements.

Support form overlays, enabling documents to be displayed together in the original form in which they were printed.

Print or save documents locally, with automatic document rendering.

Perform free text search in documents like ASCII, ALF (Advanced List Format), and OTF (Output Text Format) documents.

Support ASCII, ALF, OTF, TIFF/FAX, and JPEG formats. PDF documents are supported in Web Viewer and Windows Viewer.

In my next post, I will describe records management and archiving solutions of ECM Suite - Content Lifecycle Management.

Content Management Initiative Implementation

The usual problem in content management arena is that employees spend a lot of time searching for information, re-creating information and while they are doing it, they are not being efficient and productive, and so the company looses money. Employees also use obsolete documents in their work and so the integrity of work and compliance is at risk.

How is this problem solved? By implementing a content management initiative. You have decided to implement a content management initiative. Where to start? This is the subject of my today's post.

In order for your content management project to be successful, I recommend that you follow these steps in this specific order.

Business Analysis

This is the first step in this initiative. It involves requirements gathering and development process. During this process you identify the specific needs of the business and then develop and implement the solutions to meet them. This could be for example a new content management system deployment, modification of a current content management system, integrating few content management systems, designing a search solution, etc.

You start with the user study. User study includes users’ requirements gathering and user side testing when necessary. Identify main stakeholders in you organization and include them in your user study. Involve as many stakeholders as you possibly can. All of them might be users of your system. During this process, specific needs of users as they pertain to the content management need to be identified and documented. Current content processes as they would apply to a new content management environment should be discussed with users. Your solution should be based on these requirements.

Based on the user study, the project requirements document (PRD) should be created. This document should include all user requirements and identify the scope of the project. This document would serve as the foundation of your project and will determine your specific actions.

User-centered design is paramount to the project success. When system is deployed based on users’ requirements, they are going to use it. Users will have the sense of ownership of the system which provides excellent starting point in the user adoption process. They know that the system being deployed will be what they need. This process will also greatly help change management processes that would be associated with this system deployment.

User study will help to avoid friction in the content management environment. Users will experience discomfort and stress if they find the system difficult to use or will not find features they need. You want to make sure that their experience is easy and to facilitate an engaging environment, so that there is no disconnects between the system and users. This will also ensure that everyone responsible for content creation and management is on the same page, even if they are not on the same team or in the same department.

Without the user study, the user adoption of the system and change management processes would be very difficult.

Content Strategy

Content strategy refers to the planning, development, and management of content. Content strategy evaluates business and users’ needs and provides strategic direction on how content and content processes can help to achieve specific objectives. Content management initiative is much more likely to succeed with a solid strategy supporting it. It can also help to save cost.

Content strategy starts with the big picture and then drills down to a granular level that can be implemented and measured. It encompasses everything that impacts content, including workflow and information governance. It looks across organizational silos and integrates the different business needs, goals, and tactics. It makes sure that the end product promotes consistent, effective and efficient user experiences and business processes.

This user adoption also will be much easier with clearly defined goals, content processes, and the tactics that have been identified by the content strategy. Content strategy will also ensure that everyone responsible for content creation is on the same page, even if they are not on the same team or in the same department. The development of a strategy and plan will not only help things run smoothly, but also actually ensure the business impact that your organization is looking to achieve.

The content strategy should outline the following:

• content types in scope of this project, content types outside of scope of this project and where they are going to be stored and managed;
• unstructured vs structured content management environment
• content creation processes;
• content flow including collaboration, review, approval of content as well as localization and translation processes;
• lifecycle of content from its creation to its archiving and destruction;
• content archiving processes;
• technology to be used or modified depending on your situation;
• vendor selection if you are going to acquire a new system;
• relationship between the existing systems where content currently resides;
• permissions to the system and type of these permissions;
• administrative support to the system;
• users training and support;
• migration of legacy content;
• identify content owners for each content type;
• content output formats and publishing processes;
• post-publication processes;
• information governance processes.

The content strategy is paramount to the project success. The content strategy could be outlined for short term and long term and what this project will mean in terms of business objectives. It should determine project goals, resourcing, workflow, and success metrics, which can save GPL from the high cost of ineffective content management initiative.

Technology

At this point in time, if you did not yet acquire a content management system, you would do a vendor selection and acquire a content management system based on your user requiremens. You would then work with your IT department and if necessary consultants to deploy the system. If you are modifying the system, you would work with your IT department to coordinate the system modification effort. You will have to write functional specification document which will outline the system functions - new and/or modified system.

Content Audit and Structure

Before any content is uploaded into a system, it is important to know what that content is and what type of content will be uploaded into the system in future. Proliferation of content without its analysis and structure will create the situation where it will be very difficult to find, reuse, and manage it. If you are looking into having a structured content management environment, this task becomes even more important. Chunks of content should be consistent and categorized. Inconsistent content cannot be efficiently reused and/or published. Taxonomy and metadata framework and archiving processes are based on the content structure.

Content structure development should be preceded by a detailed audit and analysis of existing content and projection of content types that might be uploaded into the system in future. Product and content types should be identified and detailed content audit conducted.

If you are in a structured content management environment and using DITA, after the audit, random samples of each content type should be analyzed for the similarity and list of DITA topics and their types should be created. Topics should be consistent as well as each topic’s beginning and end.

Content structure should also include definitions of how different types of content (e.g. notes, warnings, precautions) would be handled: using a topic, conditional reuse, filtered reuse, conrefs, images, tables, and what content is going to be handled through style sheets, etc.

Taxonomy

Every information system should include two access points to information: search function and browse function. Users use search function when they know exactly what they are looking for. Users use browse function when they do not know what they are looking for. Taxonomy needs to be created to accommodate the browse function in the system.

Users do not always know what they are looking for. In fact, in most cases, users do not know what they are looking for or they know it but are not able to find it using search. Users are going to look for ways to find content. It is easy to find uncategorized content when there are just few content items in the system. When there are many content items in the system, it is going to be very difficult to find them.

In the structured content management environment, where the number of content items is bigger than in the unstructured content management environment, this problem is much more serious. If you are going to use DITA, with the component oriented DITA use, the difficulty of finding content items is increased by two or three times, because users are looking for smaller needles in bigger haystacks. In the environment where localization and translation processes into multiple languages are involved, there are going to be thousands of content items in the system. The presence of the taxonomy in such environment is absolutely critical.

Having uncategorized content is the system will cause content proliferation. Proliferated content will be very difficult to find and reuse. Duplicate content will be unavoidably created.

Metadata, Naming Conventions, Controlled Vocabulary

Metadata

Metadata values for content items need to be defined to accommodate the search function of content items in the system. Each content type should have metadata assigned to it. Metadata values would be the criteria that users need to use to search for content items.

The general system search will accommodate the full text search of content. This search would be sufficient when there are just few content items in the system. When there are many content items in the system, the general system search will retrieve a long list of irrelevant items. Users are not going to browse through long lists of items. To make the search precise, the presence of metadata is necessary. If metadata is present, the search can be performed using metadata rather than full text search.

Metadata should be based on the content structure. Metadata should be validated in the user study and user side testing when necessary and adjusted as needed.

Naming Conventions

The role of naming conventions is very important in order for users to identify content items in the list without opening each one of them. Naming conventions should be created for each content type and should be based on the content structure. Naming conventions should be validated in the user study and user side testing when necessary and adjusted as needed.

Controlled Vocabulary

Controlled vocabulary is the list of controlled terms that should be used for some of the metadata fields. These controlled terms should be standard terms used in standard publications, documents, majority of users, etc. Controlled vocabulary would help to ensure that metadata values are consistent. Consistent metadata will ensure high precision search.

QA and System Set Up

After all the above items have been completed and the system has been deployed or modified, perform thorough QA testing of the system at this time, fix bugs if there are any and then perform regression testing.

Then set up your content management system based on the above criteria and per users requirements. After the system has been set up, demo content can be uploaded in preparation for user acceptance testing.

User Acceptance Testing

Prepare the system and the script for user acceptance testing. Invite all user groups to test the system. User acceptance testing would help to validate that the system meets user requirements and to encourage users to start using the system. When they participate in this process, this gives them the feeling of ownership of the system. This process will also help to uncover problems and/or bugs in the system and to see what suggestions users might have. User acceptance testing is paramount to user adoption and change management processes.

Pilot project

If user acceptance testing has been successful, upload content for a pilot project into the system. Start with a simple project that does not have many content items. The reason for the pilot project is that if there are problems in the system or in the process, it is easier to fix them with having just few content items in the system. Invite all user groups to test the system. If the pilot project goes well, continue with the next project which could include more content items. Upload few projects into the system. Then create a plan for the migration of legacy content.

Content Management Systems Reviews - Alfresco

In my post about open source content management systems (CMS), I mentioned that Alfresco, Drupal, Joomla, Apache Jackrabbit, Liferay are just few of the open source CMS. In this post, I will describe Alfresco which is very popular CMS.

Alfresco is an enterprise content management system for Microsoft Windows and Unix like operating systems. There are two types of Alfresco: Alfresco Community Edition and Alfresco Enterprise Edition. Alfresco Community Edition is free software. Alfresco Enterprise Edition is commercially and proprietary licensed open source for an enterprise. Its design is geared towards users who require a high degree of modularity and scalable performance.

It includes a content repository, an out-of-the-box web portal framework for managing and using standard portal content, a CIFS interface that provides file system compatibility on Microsoft Windows and Unix like operating systems, a web content management system capable of virtualizing webapps and static sites via Apache Tomcat, Lucene indexing, and Activiti workflow. The Alfresco modular architecture is developed using Java technology.

Alfresco has been built on leading industry standards, including: REST, RSS, Atom publishing, JSON, OpenSearch, OpenSocial, OpenID, Web Servcies, JSR 168, JSR 170 level 2, MyFaces, CIFS, FTP, WebDAV, SQL, ODF and CMIS.

The system has been designed with high scalability. It can be architected to support a large community of users and to be able to manage the high volumes of content associated with enterprise wide deployments. Simple to configure clustering allows companies to scale their Alfresco deployment.

Simple administration, changing server settings, can be done via standard JMX tools without the need to stop the Alfresco server.

Content Platform

Content platform is used for the system modules and includes the following features:

Rules and Aspects Services - create content rules on a folder, start a workflow, convert content into another format, move to another folder, notify a set of users via email, and extract the properties such as author, keywords, etc. from an office document.

Library services - check-in/out; minor and major version control.

Auditing services - who created, who updated, when created, when updated, when read, when logged in.

Search services - combined metadata, content, location, object type and tag search.

Transformation services – extensible engine with large number of in-built transformations including Office to PDF or Flash.

Thumbnailing services – content thumbnailing of first page.

Content modeling – create new content types without the overhead of inheritance.

Collaboration Services - REST based services - site, person, invite, activities, preferences, discussion, blogging and commenting.

Activity services – activity feed on the "who, what, when and where" of repository services – new or edited content, comments, new team members, critical calendar dates

Share interface

Share interface is used for the system modules and enables global teams to collaborate on content and projects. It includes social features such as status updates, content activity streams, tagging, and search. Team tools include a document library, blog, wiki, calendar, and simple workflow.

It includes the following features:

RSS Feeds - proactive feeds automatically update team members of changes – who did what, where and when.

Create Virtual Teams with user invitations and easy control of permissions.

Personal dashboard - allow users to setup and view information in a variety of ways.

Project Dashboard - each project has a dashboard to provide access to all project information including activities, team members, project calendars, modified content and project links.

Project Calendars - team calendars capture and share critical project dates.

Discussion Forums - team members can use online discussion forums to raise issues, discuss topics and capture thoughts to be shared with other team members.

Project Blogs - team members can draft project blogs. These can be reviewed within the team before being published externally.

Wiki pages.

Project Data Lists - users can create and share lists of items.

Social Tagging - social content (documents, blogs, wiki pages, discussion posts, etc.) can be tagged by team members, providing easy navigation to content.

Image Light Box - used to browse images managed within each project.

Alfresco includes document management, records management, web management modules.

Document Management

Document management module is architected to support a large number of users and to be able to manage very high volumes of content.

It includes full ECM functionality delivered through the modern, consumer-like Share interface. There is a single unified repository to manage any type of content – documents, images, video and audio. With support for CIFS and WebDav, IMAP & SharePoint protocol, you can drag and drop files right into Alfresco just like into a shared network drive. Alfresco can be mounted as an IMAP service in your email client, so that you can drag and drop content into Alfresco right from email.

There is inline preview. You can preview popular file types (like Microsoft Office documents, PDFs and images) directly within your browser, without having to download them.

Alfresco provides the ability to automatically create more than one document format for any content within the system. For example, Microsoft Word documents can have a PDF version automatically created at the end of an approval workflow for later publication on the website.

Alfresco looks just like SharePoint to Microsoft Office, allowing users to upload, check-in, check-out and modify content right from MS Office. It includes version control and allows users to track major and minor versions of documents with an audit trail.

Users can define unique Types and the associated metadata. More powerful than Types is the ability to create Aspects. Aspects can hold a set of custom metadata and be applied to any document, regardless of content type.

Alfresco provides workflows to help automate the processing of documents. Workflows can be built to support simple review and approval processes or can be configured to support more complex business processes. Users can create simple document workflows by themselves.

The system includes fine grained security levels, based on user, group and role management to control access to content.

Content can be replicated between Alfresco systems. Remote offices can have read-only access to content locally providing them with quick access and reducing wide area network traffic.

Lightweight scripting allows developers to create new reusable components using Javascript, PHP, and freemarker.

It is compliant with open standards like CMIS & JSR 168.

Records Management

Alfresco is used to manage the lifecycle of the content before it becomes a record. This allows the managing of the review and approval process of a company report as it goes through multiple revisions before the final, approved, version is filed as a record.

Records management module is built on top of Alfresco's Document Management repository, including the Share interface. You can upload records using drag and drop from the desktop or email client, or any web browser. It can be added as an IMAP service in any standard email browser, allowing users to drag and drop emails into Alfresco for uploading.

It includes multiple interfaces. End users can use the most appropriate interface to allow them to add new records.

Using Microsoft SharePoint protocol, users can upload and file records from within standard Office tools. Users can use the same web interface that they use to manage other content to upload, manage, and declare records.

Alfresco supports a multi-stage process for filing and declaring records. This allows users to file and then, at a later date, add the required information to enable them to declare the record. Users use the same Alfresco system to store and manage all of their content.

Users can create record series, record categories and record folders. Simple point-and-click configuration allows users to create unique record retention schedules for each of the record categories. Users can identify records that need to be reviewed, automatically prompting the user at the end of the review period. There is transfer support which support the ability to transfer records at the end of the disposition cycle. Full audit logs enable users to track who did what and when for each record.

The system provides support for a range of record types including electronic records (standard documents, scanned records, PDF records, and web records) and physical records. It also provides support for a wide range of relationships (e.g. Supersedes, Versions, References, etc.) Administrators can add their own relationships to support unique business requirements.

There is full support for holding records in the case of litigation, ensuring that records are not destroyed as part of the normal retention schedule when legal discovery is involved.

Multiple roles enable users to control which activities are available to each user. Role definitions can easily be extended to support each company's requirements.

This module is 5015.2 certified.

Web Content Management

This module provides an integrated collaboration environment to allow web teams to work together. Advanced social collaboration capabilities of Share interface can be used to work with globally distributed virtual teams.

Content can be created and modified directly within the web application. Transformation tools automatically convert office files into web-ready formats for publishing – removing manual conversion processes. Office-to-web automatically publishes enterprise content. Users can choose from a range of different interfaces for creating and updating web content.

This module acts as shared network drive. Users can continue to use existing desktop tools and simply use drag-and-drop to upload new content without the need for downloads or plugins. Using Microsoft SharePoint protocol, users can seamlessly upload and modify web content from within standard Office tools. Users have an ability to quickly create new sites, or micro-sites.

There is support for business processes that control how new content is managed through a review and approval process. Transformation services can repurpose content for delivery through multiple channels – web, smart phone, tablets, etc. Content can be published between multiple environments.

The module provides a scalable development platform that can be quickly downloaded and easily extended to meet business needs.

You can add more features as your requirements change. Using repository clustering, flexible deployment and transfer services, architects can define and build web infrastructures that they can scale to meet future business needs. The system provides repository interoperability, reduces vendor lock-in, and simplifies content migration.

Case Study - Autodesk - SharePoint Deployment

In the "Case Studies" series of my posts, I describe the projects that I worked on and lessons learned from them. In this post, I am going to describe the project of SharePoint deployment at Autodesk.

Autodesk is a software engineering company with worldwide presence. Autodesk worldwide marketing produced a lot of marketing assets. On many occasions, marketing produced assets which either was duplicate of what was already created in the past or assets that were not needed. Marketing assets were stored in a digital asset management system. This digital asset management system did not have a way to track marketing assets.

Marketing decided to use SharePoint which already was deployed at Autodesk as the tracking system for their marketing assets. This would be a tool where they would log an asset they would like to create and it would go through a workflow to vote, review, and approve this asset before it would be produced. After this asset was produced, it would be tracked in this system.

I started the project with identifying major stakeholders, gathering their requirements for this system, and writing use cases. It was decided to add BrightWork software in order to be able to create forms, reports, and templates in SharePoint. SharePoint features such as lists, workflows, discussion forums, blog were used for this project.

The project was approved by the company management. I created functional requirements which were submitted to IT. I have reviewed the document with the IT staff so that we would be in agreement about functional requirements and users’ needs.

A consulting company was identified for custom development of SharePoint and to integrate it with BrightWork. After this was done, I defined and created the information architecture, taxonomy, metadata based on users requirements. I created sites, lists, and workflows and set up information governance processes. I have also created advanced search and configured metadata for it. IT has configured the metadata and the crawler on the server level. IT has also set up all applications functions on the server.

Based on department managers’ decision, security permissions for documents were set up.

User acceptance testing of the system was performed. Users were satisfied with the system set up and functions and it was deployed. Information governance was set up from the very beginning. Group and individual training was conducted on ongoing basis.

After the SharePoint was deployed, users started tracking marketing assets creation in this system.

The project was a success. Company management and users were very cooperative in helping to make this project a success.

SharePoint deployment helped to increase efficiency and productivity of worldwide marketing and thus saved Autodesk cost because employees did not waste any time on recreating marketing assets that already exist. The system was adapted by multiple users.

Lessons learned

1. User-centered design is paramount to the project success. When you design and build the system based on users’ requirements, they are going to use it. Users have the sense of ownership of the system which provides excellent starting point. They know that the system you are building will be what they need.

2. Top-down support is critical for the project success. Management support is a huge factor in employees' encouragement to use the system and in setting up and enforcing procedures for information governance.

3. Assurance of users from the very beginning that they will not be left alone with the system provided their cooperation.

4. User acceptance testing helped to encourage employees to start using the system. When they participate in this process, this gives them the feeling of ownership of the system.

5. Ongoing training after the system deployment made user adoption smooth.

SharePoint - Blog Sites

A blog is a Web site that enables you or your organization to quickly share ideas and information. Blogs contain posts that are dated and listed in reverse chronological order. People can comment on your posts, as well as provide links to interesting sites, photos, and related blogs.

Blogs posts can be created quickly, and they often have an informal tone or provide a unique perspective. Although blogs are frequently used for commentary on the Internet, they can be used in several ways in a corporate environment. For example, in one of companies I worked, maintenance employees were using a SharePoint blog to document their findings during the site visit and their supervisor to respond by posting comments to their posts.

A SharePoint blog is a site that contains lists and libraries, such as a list of blog posts, a list of other blogs, and a library for photos. Once you create a blog, you can set up categories, and then customize the blog settings.

To create or customize a blog, you must have permission to create a site. When you create a blog, you need to decide whether you want the blog to inherit permissions from the parent site or set up unique permissions manually. In most cases, you should set up unique permissions for the blog to ensure that you can manage its site settings, lists, and libraries independently of its parent site. For example, you might want to grant less restrictive permissions on your blog than on the parent site, such as enabling all authenticated users on your intranet to read and comment on the blog.

You can also create and customize a blog by using Microsoft SharePoint Designer.

Before you start adding content to your blog, you will want to make sure that your site, lists, and libraries are set up the way that you want. For example, you may want to edit the description of a list to help your readers understand its purpose, change permissions for the blog or the Posts list, or track versions of your blog posts so that you can restore a previous version of a post if necessary.

Once created, you may want to customize settings for your blog, or for its lists and libraries. Once you have customized the settings for your blog, you can set up categories to help you organize your posts. Categories are especially helpful if you create blog posts about different subjects or for different purposes, such as current events, brainstorming for a special project, or a technology or hobby. When posts are organized by categories, people can more easily find the posts that fit their interests by clicking the appropriate category in the Categories list. If you don't want to use categories, you can choose None for the category when you create a post.

You can change the image and description that appear under "About this blog" by modifying the web part that contains this information.

To create a blog, follow these steps:

1.Click Site Actions, and then click New Site.

2.In the Create dialog box, click the Blog site template.

3.In the Title box, type a name for your blog site. The title appears in the navigation for every page in the site, such as the top link bar.

4.In the URL name box, type the last part of the Web address that you want to use for your blog site.

To create a blog according to the default settings, including the same permissions as the parent site, click Create.

To customize some of the site settings, such as set unique permissions or change whether the site appears in the Quick Launch or the top link bar, select More Options.

To create, edit or delete categories, follow these steps:

1.Click All Site Content.

2.Under Lists, click Categories.

The Categories list appears. If you haven't set up categories on the blog before, the list contains category placeholders, such as Category 1 and Category 2. Here you can create new categories, edit current categories, i.e. give them meaningful names or delete categories.

Have fun with your blog!

Enterprise Search vs Centralized Systems

It is the known fact that data is doubling every 18 months, and that unstructured information volumes grow six times faster than structured. Employees spend too much time, about 20% of their time, on average, looking for, not finding and recreating information. Once they find the information, 42% of employees report having used the wrong information, according to a recent survey.

To combat this reality, for years, companies have spent hundreds of thousands, even millions, to move data to centralized systems, in an effort to better manage and access its growing volumes, only to be disappointed as data continues to proliferate outside of that system. In fact, in a recent survey by the Technology Services Industry Association, more than 90% of its members have a single support  knowledgebase in place, yet the report decreases in critical customer service metrics, due to the inability to quickly locate the right knowledge and information to serve customers.

Despite best efforts to move data to centralized platforms, companies are finding that their knowledgebase runs throughout enterprise systems, departments, divisions and newly acquired subsidiaries. Knowledge is stored offline in laptops, in emails and archives, intranets, file shares, CMS, CRM systems, ERPs, home-grown systems and many others across departments and across the countries of the world.

Add to this the proliferation of enterprise application use (including social networks, wikis, blogs and more) throughout organizations and it is no wonder that efforts to consolidate data into a single knowledgebase, a single "version of the truth" have failed... and at a very high price.

The bottom line is, moving data into a single knowledgebase is a losing battle. There remains a much more successful way to effectively manage your knowledge ecosystem, all without moving data. The key to it is to stop moving data by combining structured and unstructured information from virtually any enterprise system, including social networks, into a central, unified index. Think of it as an indexing layer that sits above all enterprise systems, from which services can be provided to multiple departments, each configured to that department’s specific needs.

This approach enables dashboards, focused on various business departments and processes, which contain just-in-time analytics and 360-degree information about, for example, a customer or a prospective customer. Such composite views of information provide new, actionable perspectives on many business processes, including overall corporate governance. The resulting position of key metrics and information improve decision making and operational efficiency.

This approach allows IT departments to leverage their existing technologies, and avoid significant costs associated with system integrations and data migration projects. It also helps companies avoid pushing their processes into a one-size-fits-all, framework. With configurable dashboards, companies decide how,what, and where information and knowledge are presented, workflows are enabled, and for what groups of employees.

Information monitoring and alerts facilitate compliance. There is virtually no limit to the type of information and where it is pulled from, into the central, unified and, highly secure—index: structured, unstructured, from all corporate email, .PST files, archives, on desktops and in many CRMs, CMS, knowledgebases, etc.

Enterprise applications have proliferated throughout organizations, becoming rich with content. And yet all of that knowledge and all of that content remain locked within the community, often not even easily available to the members themselves. It is possible to leverage the knowledge of communities in enterprise search efforts. User rankings, best bets and the ability to find people through the content they create are all social search elements that provide the context that employees and customers have come to expect from their interactions with online networks.

Once you have stopped moving data and created the central index, you would be able to provide your employees with the access to pertinent information and knowledge. For many organizations, employees spend most of their time in Outlook. Other organizations with large sales teams need easy access to information on the road.

Also valuable is the ability to conduct secure searches within enterprise content directly from a BlackBerry, including guided navigation. Even when systems are disconnected, including laptops, users can easily find information from these systems, directly from their mobile devices. Again, without moving data, organizations can enjoy immediate, instant access to pertinent knowledge and information, anywhere, anytime.

Open Source Content Management Systems (CMS)

The proliferation of information has made enterprise content management a necessity for most organizations. Managing the growing amounts of content generated throughout the normal course of daily operations requires flexible, rapidly deployed solutions that transform traditional content repositories and static intranets into dynamic, user friendly work environments. However, content management solutions from proprietary vendors could be expensive for some organizations. Open Source Content Management Systems (CMS) could be a solution when budget is an obstacle in implementing enterprise content management initiative.

Open source ECM solutions have matured over the past several years, equaling the capabilities of proprietary software, and have been successfully deployed in major enterprises worldwide. They can support web content management, document management, records and email management, and collaboration. Today’s leading commercial open source ECM solutions feature all of the capabilities that proprietary applications offer - from rules-based content repositories to collaboration features combined with enterprise-grade scalability, reliability, and security.

With an open source ECM implementation, companies can benefit from the stability and reliability of an enterprise-class system, while being able to redirect IT dollars to revenue-generating business functions. Given the limitations of email, shared network drives and proprietary software, enterprises can turn to a new wave of established alternatives - commercially supported, open source ECM applications that solve real business challenges. The advantages of a commercial open source approach are numerous, with flexibility, ease of integration and lower cost leading the list.

Open source CMS are Alfresco, Drupal, Joomla, Apache Jackrabbit, Liferay, and JBoss/eXo portal platforms, and many others.

In my future posts, I will describe these open source CMS.

Content Management Systems Reviews - Open Text - ECM Suite - Document Management

Open Text ECM Suite - Document Management (formerly Livelink ECM - Document Management) is a document management solution that provides full lifecycle management for any type of electronic document. Document Management provides a single, authoritative repository for storing and organizing electronic documents. Web based interface and open architecture make it easy to deploy.

It is the powerful, fully integrated content management system that delivers the essential capabilities for managing documents. You can store, organize, access, and manage documents in an organized, hierarchical structure. Version control and audit trail functions ensure accuracy and currency. Powerful search functionality allows users to easily find what they need when they need it. Classification and metadata identify content authors and stakeholders so users can quickly find subject matter experts.

Documents from across entire organization can be consolidated within a centralized web-based interface. Each user has access to a personal workspace which can be customized to suit individual preferences and enhance the overall user experience. By allowing users to organize information intuitively, they can quickly access what they need.

The core library services are integrated with process automation tools. All important activities can be routed into work stream, allowing critical data to be included with key tasks and assignments.

Compliance measures for documents retention are included in the system.

Features

Repository: the system manages any type of electronic document in any file format. You can organize electronic documents into hierarchies of folders and compound documents within three types of workspaces that reflect the different ways in which people work: the Enterprise Workspaces; Project Workspaces; and Personal Workspaces. Dynamic shortcuts point to any document, folder or object within the repository.

Classifications - apply custom metadata to documents: you can associate metadata with documents. Metadata is indexed and can be used to easily retrieve and generate reports on documents based on your custom criteria. Each piece of metadata is an attribute, and sets of attributes can be grouped into categories that can be associated with any document. You can also add to your attributes, which improves the accuracy of attributes and enhances query precision. You can classify documents by applying pre-existing taxonomic classifications, categories or attribute values.

Classify documents according to alternate taxonomic hierarchies: Multiple taxonomic classifications can be associated with documents in their original locations. This lets you browse and search documents in the repository according to taxonomies that differ from the one implied by the folder structure, without having to create multiple copies of documents.

Information Retrieval:the web interface includes a simple search bar on every page that supports full-text or natural language querying within the folder or across the entire repository. The solution also includes an advanced search form for building search queries using system and custom metadata, taxonomic classifications, Boolean operators, and modifiers such as Soundex and a thesaurus. Search result pages provide result rankings, automatic summaries, clustered result themes, hit-highlighting and Find Similar. Users can save queries, result snapshots, and multiple search form templates.

Support for Any File Format: the system handles numerous file types including engineering drawings, system reports, email messages, periodicals, rich media, etc.

Rate and critique documents: Document Management allows you to rate the value of a document and write a critique that is saved with the document and viewed by other users. In addition to providing users with lists of the most highly rated documents, the solution tracks document usage to show the most recent and frequently accessed documents.

Workflows - automate change request, review and approval processes: graphical workflow designer tool enables you to automate document management processes, such as document change requests and document review and approval processes, to ensure that they are carried out accurately and consistently. You can design processes according to your own requirements or according to those imposed by regulatory agencies. Web forms streamline the data entry process.

Work directly from popular document authoring tools: the system allows users of popular desktop authoring tools, including Lotus Mail and Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Outlook, to open and save documents directly from the repository. Using Windows Explorer, users can drag and drop documents and folders between their desktop and the repository. Document Management also supports the WebDAV protocol, allowing users of WebDAV-compliant desktop applications to connect directly to the repository.

Email documents to and from the repository: You can assign a unique email address to folders in the OpenText Document Management repository, thereby allowing users to email document attachments directly to a particular folder. Each document in the repository has an email function, enabling the document's link or the document itself to be emailed to any recipient.

Use permissions to fine-tune access to documents: You can set up to nine levels of permissions on a document or folder in the repository. This helps you fine-tune the type of access that you want to grant to individuals and groups based on corporate policies. For example, some users may not have the permission to even see a document, others may have the permission to only view a document, and others may be able to modify or delete a document. You can assign roles and groups, control whether users can see documents, view their content, modify or delete them.

Version Control: Control document versions and prevent multiple authors from overwriting each other's work using Document Management's check-out and check-in functions. When a user checks out a document, it can be viewed, but not modified, by other users. Users can access the complete version history of a document and view the content of previous versions. Manage the history of documents. Create static pointers to specific versions to create a generation or to specify published versions.

Audit Trail: comprehensive audit trail functionality to automatically record the date, time and performer of every type of action, description of it, and related document activities such as who worked on it, reserved it, etc. Activities that can be recorded include document creation, renaming, reserving or unreserving, adding or deleting versions, viewing and so on. Integrated notification capabilities inform users whenever relevant content within the repository is updated.

Generate document usage reports: the system includes predefined reports, such as a list of the largest documents or all the documents owned by a given user. In addition, Document Management includes a report building tool for creating custom reports.

Manage compound documents: Use compound document containers to manage documents that comprise multiple document files. Within a compound document, sub-documents can be ordered and nested compound documents can be created. You can create major releases and minor revisions of compound documents as well as links that point directly to a particular release or revision.

Next post on Open Text ECM Suite - content lifecycle management.

Content Management Systems Reviews - Open Text - ECM Suite

In my first post about Open Text, I mentioned that Open Text Corporation is the software company which provides enterprise content management (ECM) software solutions. I described Open Text Solutions in general. In my today's post, I am going to start describing Open Text ECM Suite.

The Open Text ECM Suite integrates multiple technologies for document management, records management, web content management, portal, digital asset management, email management, and content lifecycle management. Other components include electronic discovery, auto-classification, document capture, document imaging and digital faxing solutions. The suite provides functions for team collaboration, forums, blogs, wikis, and real-time instant messaging and collaboration. These functions are connected through business process management tools to each other and to other business applications and processes.

Open Text ECM Suite includes the following products:

• Document Management 
• Content Lifecycle Management
• Records Management
• Knowledge Management
• Web Content Management
• Digital Asset Management
• Portal
• Auto-Classification
• Enterprise Search
• Rights Management
• Email Management
• eDiscovery
• Archiving
• Transactional Content Management
• Capture and Imaging
• OCR/ICR and Classification
• Collaboration
• Social Media
• Semantic Navigation
• Content Analytics
• Content Reporting
• Library and Collection Management
• Managed File Transfer
• Widget Services

Next post: ECM Suite - Document Management

Cloud Content Management

Cloud computing is the delivery of computing as a service rather than a product, whereby shared resources, software, and information are provided to computers and other devices as a utility over a network, typically the internet. With the power of cloud computing, small businesses can enjoy the same level of IT infrastructure as Fortune 500 companies with vastly limited overhead.

End users access cloud based applications through a web browser or a light weight desktop or mobile application while the business software and data are stored on servers at a remote location. Cloud application providers strive to give the same or better service and performance than if the software programs were installed locally on end-user computers.

In the past, all of a business computing would have to be done by its own servers. Now that we can compute over the web, servers do not have to be located within business offices, and with cloud computing, they do not even have to be owned by the business!

In addition to hosted servers, small businesses can now purchase software as a service (SaaS) that is hosted online and completely scalable. With software purchased as a service, a small business no longer needs IT personnel on site to install and maintain software and hardware. SaaS allows businesses to purchase software without multi-year contracts and without painful software installation.

An added benefit of cloud computing is its document storage capabilities. The cloud revolutionizes the way you store and access data. A great way for businesses to harness the power of the cloud is by utilizing cloud content management systems that store and organize documents online. By doing this, a business can securely leverage all the benefits of cloud computing for its content. Accessibility, scalability, sharing and collaboration are only a few of the benefits cloud content management can offer.

Because on-premise enterprise content management (ECM) software requires significant commitment of time and money, only big organizations have been able to take advantage of the efficiency, productivity, and cost savings of automated document management and workflow. These organizations can afford highly-customized on-premise systems that help them gain competitive advantage over smaller rivals.

Cloud enterprise content management solutions level the playing field for organizations of any size. Now, the smallest company or any budget-pinched department within a larger organization can have all the computing power, and the efficiency and productivity gains of the biggest companies.

The cloud enterprise content management (ECM) offers tremendous advantages over traditional on-premise content management software implementations. Solving a typical content management business problem requires the integration of multiple technologies like document management, workflow, scanning, capture, email management, etc.

For many organizations this involves a lengthy implementation process from initial business specifications to hardware and technology planning to cross-departmental functional groups to actual software installation and customization. It may be many months from the initial business need for a content management solution to the actual workable solution.

A cloud ECM solution, however, comes as a pre-loaded and immediately usable business solution. A cloud enterprise content management platform is accessible via an internet connection. There is no need to add additional modules or pay for expensive and time consuming integration services. A business unit can be up and running in days with an enterprise content management and workflow solution, while the on-premise ECM software implementation project remains stuck in its planning phase.

In content management, these advantages play an even larger role in project success. This is why analyst firms like Gartner and Forrester predict cloud providers to grow much faster than on-premise ECM software vendors in the coming years.

Benefits of Cloud Content Management

Rapid Deployment

With no hardware or software to install and no servers to buy, cloud content management virtually has no setup time. So, it can be deployed very quickly.

Access Anywhere

For a typical enterprise content management (ECM) solution to work, it requires that all of its components be available when they are needed. An implementation that includes multiple technologies like document management software, automated workflow, scanning equipment, document capture, email management, etc.. means that each will have a service lifecycle, and a service level, that will need to be monitored and tracked to keep the entire solution in working order.

A cloud content management solution, however, offers an application available anytime and from any internet browser. With cloud content management, you have all of your data right at your fingertips. By managing your documents online, information is always accessible and data can be shared instantly.

Easy Collaboration

Since it can be accessed anywhere, cloud content management systems allow any authorized personnel to access and collaborate on content. Sharing lets you get information to those who need it instantly, and from anywhere in the world. With cloud content management, you can bring important documents to everyone in your business.

Integration

Solving a typical enterprise content management (ECM) business problem requires the integration of multiple technologies like document management, workflow, scanning, document capture, email management, etc. In the installed content management software world, this often means a great deal of time and dollars dedicated to making multiple technologies work together.

By contrast, content management technologies can be integrated in a cloud, including capture, document management, workflow, e-signature, eForms and much more.

Low Cost

When it comes to enterprise content management (ECM) solutions, on-premise software carries a large price tag. Add up the software license, implementation services, additional hardware and networking costs, and annual maintenance fees and on-premise content management software can be out of reach of many organizations. Cloud ECM solutions, however, offer a highly-affordable alternative to automate document-intensive processes.

Not only are initial costs much lower, but the cloud content management model also brings you reduced costs over the long-term. There are no servers or software to administer and no annual maintenance fees. This is one of the major reasons why organizations that start with one cloud application, such as content management and workflow, tend to seek cloud solutions for subsequent applications.

Secure Content

ECM Cloud platform offers the highest level of security. There are additional security controls within the cloud solution where typical on-premise content management products do not have them.

Enhanced Business Agility

In a cloud, content management solutions can be quickly and easily tailored to meet your changing document management and workflow needs. In addition, there is an ability to take advantage of new features and enhancements as they become available.