Issue #0832/1 – With the arrival of DocuShare Express, much of the functionality of Xerox’s DocuShare content management and workflow software is now available to document and workflow intensive small business environments at a price that should be affordable. This brief article investigates the features of DocuShare Express and what has been trimmed from the corporate version to reduce the price without destroying functionality and usefulness.
At a starting level of €4,000 for 20 seats and 20 guest licences, the full DocuShare application is designed for large companies with masses of paper information, computer files and other digital content that is completely unmanageable by today’s standards using traditional filing and storage methods. The 20 seats will be reserved for the key executives and those with the prime responsibility for maintaining and managing the information. Read-only licences for those requiring access to the information are added at the cost of €5,000 for every 100 seats.
Coming in at €2,000 for 10 seats and 10 read-only licences, DocuShare Express is accessible to small service-oriented firms, such as solicitors and accountants, where employee numbers may be low but data and document content is high and varied.
Known as an ECM application (Enterprise Content Management), DocuShare is a database-driven application, designed to manage all documents and information in a digital repository that is easy and fast to access, avoiding the age old problem of where to find information that may be used rarely or may be a number of years old and required for its archival value only.
Documents stored in the repository may be digital originals, created in-house, scanned paper originals received from clients, official bodies and other correspondents, or digital materials emailed or faxed from outside the organisation. These could include letters, statements, emails, spreadsheets, presentations, reports, photos, videos, expenses claims or newspaper clippings – essentially whatever documentary evidence needs to be acted upon, archived and managed.
To function, ECM systems must have an on-ramp and an off-ramp. The off-ramp is easy – viewing a document on screen or printing/faxing a copy of a document is familiar to every office worker or home computer user. On-ramp experiences vary though. Not all offices (let alone homes) have an on-ramp suited to feeding an ECM system.
Even though desktop scanners have existed for a couple of decades and a large proportion of printers sold are multifunction devices, most of us make limited use of them. We have been so conditioned that a copier is for making a paper copy from a paper original, or a scanner is for inserting a paper photograph into a piece of school homework or marketing collateral that we never think of the wider implications of the technology.
For instance, when choosing a device for the home, how many people think of using a multifunction device to make PDF copies of all their old bank statements or utility bills so that the bulky originals can be destroyed while still fulfilling the legal requirements to maintain records for seven years?
Multiply that concept up to a business or enterprise level and there is scope for saving thousands of square metres of storage space and reduce time spent searching for documents, with associated stress levels, significantly. DocuShare, as an ECM system, takes all the stress out of the middle section between the on-ramp and the off-ramp.
Xerox quotes other benefits of the system as:
- Up to 25% savings in operational spend
- Reduction in carbon footprint
- Fail-safe, disaster recovery
- Accurate compliance with comprehensive audit trails
- Improved standardisation and accuracy
- Minimal impact on IT resources and systems
DocuShare Express is, understandably, a cut-down version of DocuShare, suited to the smaller organisation but still providing the versatility, savings and security of the full system.
Major features
Installation is simplified, based on Windows 2003 server application, and with no client application to install. For the user, the interface is a standard web browser. Because it is database-driven, with all documents indexed, documents are located and accessed very rapidly and a wide variety of search criteria can be applied to ensure accurate document location.Documents entered into DocuShare Express are given a title as well as a file name (the default title is the file name) and customisable meta data can be added if required. Documents from an existing file system can be imported and indexed automatically.
When documents are scanned into the system using an MFP, they can be handled in one of two ways. Either the desired location can be identified individually and manually or a selection of generic pre-printed cover sheets can be used to identify the destination for the document automatically.
In this way, a stack of documents can be added individually to a variety of locations in one batch operation by inserting the relevant cover sheets between the individual documents. Or, even for a single document, a specific cover sheet can quickly be withdrawn from a set of post trays (for instance) and the document scanned to its destination rapidly and accurately.
Automatic routing is one of the key benefits of DocuShare Express, allowing documents entered into the system to be distributed to known key users by email, fax or hard copy, as well as being stored in the repository, without the operator having to think about which individuals to distribute it to.
Valuable routing options include parallel routing and sequential routing, each of which benefits different workflow needs.
For instance, parallel routing distributes a document to multiple users at the same time for reference purposes, for unrelated action by the various users (including gathering independent comments or responses) or for action by only one user but provided to other users for reference purposes. This might be relevant to distribution of magazine articles or reports, for reference only or seeking independent responses, or the submission of expenses claims requiring a sign-off by a single individual.
Sequential routing, on the other hand, is valuable in a situation where multiple, independent responses or actions would only cause confusion. Here, the document is sent to a group of users, just one at a time, with the document not forwarded to the next user until the first user has completed the necessary tasks and provided the necessary additional information or sign-off. Documents falling into this category might include capital purchase orders where sign-off rises through the organisational hierarchy, quotations or bids needing input from several individuals with ultimate sign-off or customer correspondence requiring managerial approval before action can be taken.
These workflow options can all be custom designed and stored so that specific workflows can be selected instantly from a pre-defined list or scan cover sheet. Full tracking of workflow status is available to ensure that documents/workflows in progress cannot be lost, mislaid or ignored. In addition, document version control (with rollback) ensures that confusion between document versions is avoided and all users work on the latest iteration of the document.
To ensure document security, workgroup management includes the ability to apply ownership restrictions to documents as they are loaded into DocuShare Express to prevent unauthorised access or routing.
Other features of DocuShare Express include: WebDAV support (Web-based Distributed Authoring and Versioning) that allows collaboration on documents located on remote web servers; EIP support (Xerox Extensible Interface Platform) enables programmable workflow functionality using the Xerox MFP’s EIP interface; and LDAP support (Lightweight Directory Access Protocol) for address book information.
Limitations of DocuShare Express
As indicated, DocuShare Express is a cut-down on the full DocuShare. Features removed from the Express version include: Federated Search Support, which allows searching of multiple data sources with one query; Database Connectors for links with databases other than DocuShare’s own database; integration with Microsoft Windows, Office and Outlook, which would allow the use of a Windows client interface rather that a browser interface; and the Email Agent, which allows documents to be loaded into DocuShare by emailing the system.Features removed from DocuShare Express are those that are of less relevance to the smaller organisation. Namely: where use of a single data repository would be expected, with no links to third party database systems; and the web browser interface, with loading of paper documents using an MFP and digital documents directly from a PC, is adequate for the task.
At the top of the product range, DocuShare CPX (the enterprise solution), has a number of additional high-end features, such as: audit trail query and reporting; collaborative workspaces; and content rules and encryption.
DocuShare Express, therefore, provides enterprise-like document and content management and workflow capabilities to the small organisation at a cost that is affordable to those with a real need, always remembering that a server may need to be bought and installed in order to accommodate the system.
Suitability
DocuShare Express would seem to be particularly suited to organisations with:- large document volumes
- high frequency of document traffic
- complex routing requirements
- formal and managed IT infrastructure (system requires Windows 2003 Server Application)
This could potentially include doctor’s surgeries, small accounting firms, solicitors, school management, etc.
Perhaps one of the most attractive features of DocuShare, as an ECM solution, is its scalability. Now that DocuShare Express is available for small organisations with as few as 10 primary users, DocuShare is scalable from ten to tens of thousands of users, with no restrictions on global location, and has been performance tested to a volume of 20 million documents on a single server.
Thus, there is no reason for any organisation to fear that growth of the organisation will render their ECM system obsolete or ineffective. No organisation should be able to outgrow DocuShare, while organisation and document management efficiency can only benefit, providing major cost savings on the way.
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