Phil Scarratt wrote:
Hi all
Wondering what people's recommendations/experiences with document
management systems (or ECM systems) are?
I've got to select a DMS/ECM for a non-profit organisation (actually a
publisher) and have Nuxeo, Alfresco and OpenKM on the shortlist.
TIA
Fil
Hi Phil,
11 years in that industry must be good for something, I suppose :-). Of the
three DM/ECM products you mention, I have experience with Alfresco, and passing
knowledge of Nuxeo (as well as far too many brain cells wasted on their
proprietary brethren, e.g. Documentum, TRIM, Stellent/Oracle, IBM Content
Manager)
There are a few issues outside of technology that you should think about regardless of
your choice. Are you after DM, or the whole ECM box-and-dice? (RM, DAM/Image management,
Archiving, workflow/bpm, WCM ... and DM). There is overlap, but ECM is a cumbersome
beast if all you want is DM. Are you prepared for the cost/effort? Not talking about
software here, but the key to successful DM/ECM projects is managing them as a change
management exercise, which means "people" costs. Making the change to a
managed DM/ECM environment is often a huge cultural shift, and the best technology can
wither and die if the organisation has a bad reaction.
On the Alfresco front, it definitely has some advantages. There's local support here in
Sydney, the product has a great roadmap, and John Newton's team seem quick to pick up the
technology trends in ECM (e.g. they had CMIS prototype support in the same month the
standard was announced). Given my particular biases, I like it because it's also
technology agnostic under the hood, giving you OS, database and app server choice.
Another big plus is that it is definitely a "growing" product and company. You
aren't going to be left with orphan-ware in two years' time :-). Other current trends
they seem to be following are heavily tied to collaboration, so if that's a current or
future requirement, it has some benefits.
Probably the only major gotcha I'd warn about is the enterprise version trap. Some of
the nice bells and whistles are only available in the paid version. No problem with
this, per se, it's their business model and best of luck to them. They do, however, have
an unusual support model where support partners agreeing to partner with Alfresco on the
enterprise edition are contractually bound to *not* support the community edition.
Again, that's not really a technology issue, more a business one. You are in luck again,
as there are both kinds of support available here in Sydney - enterprise partners who
only do enterprise support, and other support outfits that support both (without the
"ent. partner" label).
Anyway, that's my 2ยข. If that raises more questions for you, please feel free
to contact me.
Ciao
Grant
:-)
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