HPI – Expansion to support Contributors and Power Users

I am working with a client that will roll out HPI (TSG’s open source High Performance Interface) as their main Documentum interface for their contributors and power users. Typically users that simply need to search, view, and print documents use HPI as their main interface while power users have typically used Webtop or another custom interface.

My client decided to use HPI for all users for a few reasons. First, EMC has announced that it is moving towards DFS and Centerstage – away from Webtop. Second, since the ability to easily upgrade the application was important, the client wanted a platform where minor customizations would not be problematic in the future. And finally, with WDK planned for eventual phase out, they assumed WDK customizations would require a significant porting effort during future upgrades. The client opted to not use Centerstage since it doesn’t have an SDK framework to support custom development.

The other unique aspect of this implementation is that the users, both consumers and contributors, only locate documents via search, not folder browsing. As a result we had to make the contributor functions (check-in, check-out, delete, etc.) available via the search screens. When adding the features we focused on keeping the interface clean and intuitive for the consumers. Below is a list of some of the functions we added:

• Check-in, Check-out, Cancel Checkout (Content)
• Edit Properties
• Copy Document
• Delete Document
• View Renditions
• Bulk Import including ability to apply properties across a group of documents
• Search against all versions
• Ability to determine versioning (same vs. minor)
• Manual promotions (to support releasing of documents or demoting of documents)

 All of these actions, except bulk import, are accessed via a right-click menu option.

Actions requiring security checks (check out, delete, etc.) are accessed via the Advanced Actions menu option to minimize security processing and maintain a clean interface.  Advanced Actions will not even display if the user is in a read-only group.

We are excited about how the features were added with very little impact to the intuitive and streamlined interface.  Let us know any thoughts or suggestions you may have.