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This is the work part. Posts here relate to the craft of my career and profession.

Upgrading to SharePoint 2010

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No, I haven’t converted into a SharePoint fanboi.  I am merely acknowledging that it is here to stay, at least for two more versions.  Realizing that, my company has been doing quite a bit of SharePoint work in the past few years.  We have recently been looking at SP2010 and just upgraded a customer to the new version.

This dalliance with SharePoint has not gone unnoticed by some people in the local area.  I was asked to co-present with Wyn Van Devanter to the Washington, DC Web Content Mavens group on what web managers need to know before making the move from 2007 to 2010.

I thought I would share my slides and offer a few additional notes for people.  For the record, Wyn tackled the first part of the presentation and I handled the second portion.  We could probably each speak to the other half, but we each presented to our strengths.

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What ECM Vendors Can Do for Case Management Solutions

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image I just wrote on why we need Content Management for effective Case Management.  It really is more of a background into defining the challenges.  Now I am going to focus on how Content Management vendors can help solve this problem.

This is a little like closing the barn door after the horses have escaped.  Most of the vendors out there have announced Case Management strategies.  After my comments on EMC’s approach, many have felt that I thought that Content Management vendors should stay out of Case Management.

That is completely wrong.  They need to be involved.  So lets talk about the how…

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Why Case Management Needs Content Management

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One thing that I have observed in the last month or so is that people think that I either don’t understand Case Management or think that Content Management vendors shouldn’t be messing around with Case Management.  Well, both those observations would be wrong.

I thought I would take a moment to share some of my Case Management experiences and why I think that Content Management vendors NEED to be involved in solving the problem.

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CMIS 2.0, The Next Generation

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image It has been a month since I talked about CMIS, and that was focused on celebrating the release of 1.0 and the AIIM Demo.  Well, the time has come to look to the future and start thinking what we need out of CMIS to help where we need it…the future.

Short List

I’m just throwing a list of business cases that we need support for in CMIS.  Specific features may not be all listed, but I will be listing some to give an idea.  The goal here is to stimulate everyone’s collective mind and think about what we need in the next version.

  • Semantic Support: I was working with some interested parties several months ago and realized that I could force many Semantic requirements into the current model.  What was missing was the ability to query off of relationships.  This will allow for more advanced relationship management.  Mind you, more support for that management directly off of the CMIS domain model would be nice as well.
  • Records Management: Right now, you can apply policies to a piece of content.  In theory, that policy could be a retention policy.  Some enhancements to policies might be nice in order to identify RM policies versus generic policies.
  • Support for Defined Data Models: One thing that was readily apparent when building the CMIS demo was the challenges in managing the same metadata model against different repository implementations of that model.  There were variations in naming and other details.  It would be a great advantage if I could query the repository to determine if they support the needed data model and then just use it.  This happens now when you use the field “cmis:id”. It maps to the real name underneath the hood which isn’t always “id”.  For example, “r_object_id” is the actual field name for “cmis:id” within Documentum.
  • Create Content Types: Component Content Application developers, this one is for you! Leveraging off of the previous item, it would be cool if you could, through CMIS, create a new object type based upon a document or folder.  This would allow custom applications to have a generic CMIS script that would create any custom types needed by the application.  This will add an important abstraction for those using CMIS for multi-repository purposes.
  • New Bindings: Heard several ideas in the last year.  WebDAV and JSON were two.  If I had to pick one, I’d lean to the latter for creating advanced apps, though WebDAV has the distinct advantage of working well with desktop applications.  The number of overall bindings is only limited by those working on them, so get involved if you want a new one.

I’m sure that there are more, but I think those are the important ones.  It helps the web-heads, the ECM types, and the solution providers.

More on CMIS Needs

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An ECM Keynote for 2010

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I’ve been talking about a lack of leadership and vision in the ECM industry.  This is evident when you attend keynotes at various conferences.  Most keynotes at industry conferences are focused on what has been happening and what is happening now.  John Mancini’s keynote at the AIIM conference was as close as it gets these days.

Of course, AIIM can’t deliver the future, they can only point to it, so what do we do? We wait. What are we waiting for? Well, I’m not waiting right now.  For your consideration, I present to you a keynote on the future of ECM…..

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Another Year Older and Deeper in ???

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image Three years ago, I started this blog to rant about how the merger of EMC World and Momentum hadn’t really worked out.  Well, after three years of improvements, there is currently a good chance that next year the conferences will be co-located and separate.

Two years ago, I reflected on my first year and shared numbers. By that time I was pushing for an ECM standard for the SOA world.  I had just learned that there was an effort underway that we would later learn was called CMIS.  This month, that journey ended and it became a standard.

One year ago I was more goal focused as I looked back.  I worked on two of the three goals, failed in the Design Patterns, but I think it was a heck of a year.

I cannot take credit for what has transpired in the last three years, well maybe a little for the improved Momentum, but not for most of it.  A lot of it would have happened anyway.  At most, I have helped push alongside the rest of you.  That said, goals have been achieved and it is time for new ones.

Which leaves the real question, What next?

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My Day as Mark Lewis

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Another quick little post.  Working on some other posts, but I wanted to get this out.  This is a list of things I would do if I were in charge of IIG and had the funds to do what I wanted.  Obviously I am not going to have that job or the funds, but this is fun.

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Vision, Strategy, Tactics…1 Out of 3 for EMC

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I came to EMC World with a few goals, foremost of which was to see if EMC had a vision for Content Management.  Ten years ago, the vision was ECM.  That vision drove the industry for a decade.  Now people are looking around and asking what is next.  They are looking to the leaders in the industry for answers.

EMC had no answers to give, at least publicly.

I talked to a LOT of people all week.  I talked to customers, partners, and employees of EMC.  I bounced ideas, I listened to impressions, and I sought to make sure that what I saw, or thought I saw, wasn’t just me…

…and it wasn’t.  Not by a long-shot.

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EMC World 2010: Documentum Clients Overview, The New Face of ECM

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Lance Shaw is going to present on the Documentum clients.  Last night, I was told repeatedly to come to this session to learn more about the non-Case Management.  I was actually coming anyway, but let’s see what happens.

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EMC World 2010: The Information Advantage for Solving Today’s Business Problems

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Time for some more information gathering on the direction of the IIG group.  Rick Devenuti, the COO, is a good speaker, so it will be interesting how the messaging comes through today.

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