At TSG we get questions all the time in regards to “How are your consulting engagements different between Alfresco and other ECM offerings like Documentum, FileNet/IBM and SharePoint.” For this post, we will explore how we have been successful with Alfresco Consulting initiatives and point out some of the differences to commercial ECM consulting.
Transactional Document Management
In discussions with a client recently, we evaluated “out of the box” document management applications with more transactional applications. This post will discuss and compare different document management paradigms and how they compare for transactional document management.
EMC World – 2011 – Day Three – ECM Strategy and Roadmap – 2011/2012 – Mark Arbour – Head of Product Management – ECM Applications
Attended another roadmap session focused on next 18 months. This post will try to summarize and present TSG thoughts.
EMC World – Day 3 – IIG Client/UI Framework Strategy and Roadmap – Jeetu Patel and Rohit Ghai
Attended Jeetu and Rohit presentation this morning. This post will discuss TSG’s thoughts around the roadmap.
Life Sciences Project Sampling
Technology Services Group offers many services and solutions to assist the Life Sciences Community. Consumer Search and Retrieve Application Clients typically spend a lot of money and effort developing a robust interface for their authors and approvers, but often this interface can be “too much” for users just looking to view and print approved documents. […]
NYPIUA Accelerates Productivity with Alfresco and TSG – Press Release
SAN MATEO, Calif.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Alfresco Software, a leading provider of modern enterprise content management (ECM) and business process management (BPM) software, announced that the New York Property Insurance Underwriting Association (NYPIUA), in conjunction with Alfresco partner Technology Services Group (TSG), is leveraging Alfresco One, an ECM platform and TSG’s High Performance Interface (HPI) as its new […]
Top 3 Reasons to Publish Content out of an ECM
Last month, we discussed what a consumer portal is and the benefits of using one. We also considered how to make the switch to using a consumer portal. First, let’s recap. A consumer portal is a read-only interface, separate from the ECM, that allows content to be accessible to a large audience at low cost. […]
Federated Content Aggregation – Comparison to Federated Search and Rolling Migration
During some interesting discussions this week, the team brainstormed around federations of content and how to name a federated approach where we are doing more than just search but not bringing along all the baggage that goes with a migration. This post will introduce the concept of “Federated Content Aggregation” approach to content management. Federated […]
Alfresco 4.0 – New Feature Comparison to Documentum (Part 1)
The Alfresco 4.0 Community Edition has been out since October, with an upcoming Enterprise release in the next month or so. Alfresco has dubbed Alfresco 4.0 as “the most significant release” of Alfresco to date. Instead of summarizing the major new functionality features and enhancements, below are some new features in the core Alfresco repository […]
Migrating from Documentum to Alfresco – Cost Differences
Back in 2010, we posted an article on the pricing differences between Documentum and Alfresco. With our series this year, this post will update our thoughts.
Documentum Business Continuity – A Cached Content Approach
One of the more successful applications we see long-term Documentum customers implement successfully is a business continuity solution based on caching approved content to a separate “read-only” repositories. This post will discuss the reasons for business continuity solutions and integration options for Documentum as well as business continuity war-stories from selective clients.
Documentum – EMC World – Momentum 2012 – Early Predictions
Once again TSG is attending EMC World in Las Vegas – May 21-24. For those interested, early discounts are still available at http://www.emcworld.com/momentum.htm. While not much is known at this point in time about the final agenda list (or who the opening/closing acts are), this post will try to take a guess at the dominant […]
Documentum Risk – Top 5 Reasons to Ditch Webtop
As we have been mentioning her in other posts, due to the purchase Documentum by OpenText, many clients are looking at ways to reduce the risk of an unknown Documentum future. This post will look into the risk of the most popular Documentum interface, Webtop.
Documentum Contributor Interfaces – D2, Webtop, HPI, and xCP
Part 1 – Document Creation, Checkout, and Checkin After receiving some positive feedback on a previous post comparing the search functionality of Webtop, D2, HPI, and xCP, we decided to continue with our product comparison. This post will compare Webtop, D2, HPI and xCP for From our experience, the user interface for consumers (those who […]
DynamoDB and AWS – How to build your own ECM capabilities for massive scale and performance
After the successful 11 Billion Document Benchmark with DynamoDB, we had a discussion with a couple of the major analysts as well as a nice shout-out from Jeff Potts on ECM Architect. We received a ton of great feedback on the scale of what we were able to accomplish along with lots of discussion specifically […]
Documentum – Should I stay or should I go? Thoughts on the OpenText Purchase Six Months Later
TSG talked with a 20+ year Documentum client yesterday about the future of Documentum. Like many Documentum customers, the client had postponed any decision about future plans for their system until there was a clear understanding of what OpenText would do with Documentum. With OpenText Enterprise World complete, this post will present our TSG thoughts […]
CMOD Migration to a Modern Environment
As we have discussed here before, many clients are looking to migrate away from Content Manager on Demand to new modern infrastructures like Alfresco or NoSQL (See our solutions for DynamoDB and Hbase). Whether outdated client/server interfaces, cloud initiatives or just a desire to move away from legacy solutions, TSG has seen multiple clients looking […]
Content Enabling Existing Applications – Connecting to Anything
One common challenges for clients is content enabling existing data driven applications. As we have been posting since 2014 on how to add content capabilities to existing claim and policy systems, many clients have invested considerable time and effort into data management systems that need to link to documents. These systems need access to content […]
ECM Sales Myths for 2019
In the hunt for “what to talk to customers about next”, we often see many of the ECM vendor sales teams get behind a concept, or technology, that can be marketed easily but isn’t always something clients eventually do or are successful implementing. For this post, we will list some of the myths (including a […]
Records Management in Alfresco and Documentum
Last month at our client briefing, electronic records management systems were a common point of interest, but interestingly, not a common practice. Even though everyone knew they needed to be smarter about using electronic records management only a few companies had taken the plunge. The others, like many of the companies we talk to every […]
3 Questions – What is a Consumer Portal?
ECM customers are no strangers to license costs. But year-over-year price increases and per-user licenses for a growing company can put a strain on any budget. In addition, most ECM platforms today come packaged with an “everything and the kitchen sink” user interface. The complex nature of such interfaces requires a large amount of user […]
Documentum D2 vs. HPI – A Closer Look at Search
Earlier this year, we posted about HPI Search compared to Documentum Webtop and D2 as well as our thoughts around some of the technical issues with D2. For this post, we thought we’d take a closer look at the options for search with D2 as compared to HPI.
Lucene Integration, OpenSearch Compliant & User Interface Enhancements – New HPI Functionality
In addition to the enhancements to HPI disscussed last week, we are also enhancing the search capability in HPI for a large Documentum pharmaceutical client. Features will include: Lucene Integration: enhanced compatibility of HPI and Lucene through TSG’s OpenContent web services layer Save Search: save, recall, run, delete and edit a saved search OpenSearch Integration: […]
Hadoop – Why Hadoop as a Content Store when Caching Content for ECM Consumers
Last week we posted on a publishing approach for enterprise search. Along with enterprise search, we have seen more and more ECM clients look to publish content out of the ECM repository for a variety of business reasons including performance, business continuity and reducing costs. This post will highlight how Hadoop can be used within […]
Alfresco Summit 2014 Recap
This year, for the first time, TSG had a booth at both the San Francisco and London Alfresco Summit events as the 2014 Americas Partner of the Year. The major announcements included the release of Alfresco 5.0 and the standalone Activiti Designer. We will be reviewing the product updates in an upcoming Alfresco user group meetup […]
Alfresco – Content Management Simplified for the Modern User
TSG just hosted a lunch and learn in Boston on May 20th and is hosting one tomorrow, May 22nd in Minneapolis focused on Content Management and the Modern User. There is still room available if you are in the area and interested in attending. This post will highlight our thoughts on the Modern Content Management user […]
Documentum or Alfresco – ECM Audit Trail – thoughts on how to increase user activity
I had a great conversation with a long-time Documentum client in regards to the need for an audit trail and reporting capabilities from his document repository. While it is something we have done in the past, I thought it would make for a good post to share that experience as well as some of the […]
Documentum and Alfresco – Electronic Forms and Workflow User Requirements
We met with a client this week that is evaluating the Active Wizard for an electronic forms infrastructure to replace many paper, Word and PDF forms within the organization. The Active Wizard is TSG’s most popular Open Source offering (currently on version 4.0). This post will present the “high priority” requirements along with our thoughts […]
Documentum Top Tips for 2012
One of our more popular posts has been our “Top Tips for Documentum” last posted in 2010. For this post, we will update the tips as well as add some best practices as clients prep for 2012 planning.
Build a Consumer Interface for Documentum – Client Case Study
With the recent purchase of Documentum by OpenText, many Documentum customers are concerned about what will happen to the products they have been using over the past decade. Customers should look at reducing their risk and reliance on EMC’s products, prices and services that will soon be under the control of OpenText. One major way to reduce […]
Federated Content Management – Enterprise Search with a new moniker?
One troubling point we continue to see in our industry space, whether it be content management providers like Nuxeo, ASG or even analysts like Gartner, is a continued push around the benefits of a federation search, often as an alternative to migration. This post will explore federated content management with a comparison to a very […]
EMC World 2016 – Momentum – What’s on the Horizon for Project Horizon (Leap): New Apps and Services
Finished off the first day with a presentation on the Vision and Roadmap for Leap. See last year’s post in regards to Project Horizon. Leap is the new name for Project Horizon.
Box and ECM – What is Box missing?
Box and other Enterprise File Sync and Share (EFSS) tools have been very successful filling the next generation document collaboration needs. Like SharePoint before it, Box and other tools, while being great at sharing files, being successful in collaboration doesn’t necessarily lead to success in ECM. Back in December of 2016, we wrote an […]
Enhancing Alfresco Share with HPI 2.1 – Document Workflow
TSG will be conducting a Webinar with Alfresco on February 11th (Recording Posted) on how to enhance or extend Alfresco Share with High Performance Interface (HPI) 2.1. This post is the fourth in a series of posts on how HPI 2.1 can work with Share and will focus on Document Workflow.
Do More with Alfresco – Speed and Secure Viewing
One of the unique features of OpenAnnotate (now Alfresco Enterprise Viewer) compared to other products on the market is the ability to quickly and securely view documents. This post will present a background on the speed and security AEV offers compared with typical browser based alternatives or competing products.
Migrating to Veeva – Reduce Risk, Stress and Cost with a Gradual Migration
Too often, migrating to Veeva Vault can be seen as a massive undertaking where the migration effort means moving all the content, integrations and people to the new platform in a migrate all-at-once “Big Bang” approach. Given the effort to move all the different components, along with training the users on a new system, it […]
Alfresco Content Accelerator – Collaboration Enhancements
The Alfresco Enterprise Viewer (AEV) has long contained collaboration features that dynamically display the users looking at a document. Recently we’ve updated the interface to include advanced functionality such as starting a Zoom or Microsoft Teams call directly from AEV. The Alfresco Content Accelerator (ACA, formally TSG’s OpenContent Management Suite) has been used for a […]
ECM Migrations – 10 Reasons there will never be an “Easy Button” for migrations
Just about every couple of years we will see a campaign from a software vendor or ECM integrator claiming that their new product or approach has made ECM migrations easier. Typically the marketing campaign will focus on a new sales initiative looking to more easily move clients from their old ECM platforms and software to […]
Combine, Split and Update PDF documents with only a Web Browser
In many of the Case Management scenarios we see at our clients, particularly in the insurance industry, requirements often include functionality that allow the user to easily combine, split or correct PDF documents from within the web browser. Most often, users want the ability to combine multiple documents or selected pages into one document in […]
Migrating to Alfresco – Reducing Risk, Stress and Cost with a Rolling Migration
Too often, migrating to Alfresco can be seen as a massive undertaking where the migration effort means moving all the content, integrations and people to the new platform in a migrate all at once, “Big Bang” approach. Given the effort to move all the different components, along with training the users on a new system, […]
Documentum Mobile Approval – Screencam and Demo Published
As we discussed in a previous post on mobile and third party approval, TSG is currently in the development process for our mobile approval interface for the Active Wizard. One of the early deliverables of the effort is a standalone demonstration of inbox/approve/reject functionality working on a variety of mobile platforms. A screencam of the […]
OpenContent Support
TSG works with you to get the most from your ECM investment. OpenContent Management Suite provides users of Enterprise Content Management (ECM) systems with a highly configurable interface to find and retrieve documents. Leveraging a powerful web services layers, it can easily integrate with Alfresco, Documentum, DynamoDB or Hadoop. Each module of the OCMS has […]
Alfresco Consulting – What makes TSG different?
Over the last two quarters, TSG has acquired multiple Alfresco clients that had initially purchased both Alfresco software and services from a different Alfresco consulting firm. With Alfresco turning 10 years old, we predict that more and more mature Alfresco customers will be looking “What’s Next” and may consider switching their Alfresco consulting partner. One of the […]
Content Deletion in Alfresco – More than Meets the Eye
An important and often overlooked component of implementing a content management system is the lifecycle of content once it has been deleted in the repository. There are a number of things to consider when coming up with a plan for deleting content, including recoverability, performance, and system resource usage. This article outlines the way that […]
Documentum D2 4.0 – Initial TSG Review
At EMC World and in subsequent marketing efforts, Documentum has created quite a buzz around the D2 v4.0 release. Documentum is promoting that D2’s powerful configuration services can deliver a modern client interface while simplifying the application implementation via configuration rather than code. Many Documentum users struggle with any new Documentum release in regards to […]
Documentum – Replacing External SharePoint Sites with a Simple Cached Approach
Many clients struggle with providing Documentum access to external users. Often times, access to “full featured” interfaces like D2 or Webtop can overwhelm simple retrieval of limited content. This post will discuss a simple solution developed for one of our clients.
Documentum or Alfresco – Use of Related Folders
One of the items our Documentum and Alfresco customers constantly struggle with is setting up their folder taxonomy in such a way that the taxonomy minimizes the requirement to jump between folders or open up search screens when performing a specific task within a folder. One of the very successful additions to our High Performance […]
EMC World 2012– Momentum – Monday Morning Sessions – D2
Attended two D2 sessions to kick off the day before the Joe Tucci Keynote. Sessions included: The New EMC. Documentum D2: A Demonstration of How to Deliver Superior User Experiences – Boris Carbonneil and Brian Roche Spice up your ECM Applications with the new EMC D2 – Peggy Ringhausen This post will discuss the sessions […]
TSG "Hack" Day – June 29th – 2011
On Wednesday, June 29th, TSG held its first ever Hack Day! The idea of a Hack Day originated at Yahoo! (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hack_Day), and similar ideas arose at companies such as Google, Facebook, and Twitter. This post will detail our experience.
MyDocumentum for SharePoint Part II
We (TSG) just finished an evaluation for one of our clients of MyDocumentum for SharePoint. Initially, the client wanted to leverage the MyDocumentum for SharePoint product as part of their effort to have SharePoint users contribute content to Documentum. The client had unused licenses to the product as part of their enterprise purchase agreement. As […]