Document Management Systems

Posted by Slartibartfarst
Jan 26, 2013 at 11:05 PM

Gary Carson, Jan 26, 2013 at 03:36 PM: I noticed that a document management system called My Digital Documents is on sale at Bits today. Has anyone used this before? If so, is it worth the price? Also, has anyone had any experience with other document management systems (for single computers)? I have hundreds of documents, image files, audio files, etc., etc., to keep track of, but so far, it has seemed more efficient to just use Windows Explorer.
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Alexander Deliyannis, Jan 26, 2013 at 03:41 PM: Hi Gary, take a look at the recent thread on Paperport etc. http://www.outlinersoftware.com/topics/viewt/4698/0/paperless-paperport-14
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Posted by Gary Carson, Jan 26, 2013 at 06:20 PM: Thanks. Interesting thread. I don’t have any need to scan anything myself, so I guess using a document management system would just add a redundant layer of complexity. I try to keep my setup as minimalistic as possible and Windows Explorer, after all, IS a document management system in its own right.
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Posted by Alexander Deliyannis, Jan 26, 2013 at 07:23 PM:
Gary Carson wrote:
>Windows Explorer, after all, IS a document management system in its own right.

I agree. What I would find useful in this regard is a lightweight Explorer replacement providing fast Boolean search of document contents and preview of just about any kind of document.
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I suspect that what might be needed is a definition of a DMS (“Document Management System”).
Having had the experience of developing, installing and using DMSes (for myself and my clients) over the years, one thing in particular stands out: the general need to establish requirements - e.g. what the user requiring DMS functionality actually means when they say they want a DMS, or something like that.

The criteria that you might expect to list - i.e., the things that a DMS functional definition would need to meet - is typically likely to be largely based on perceived needs, which may often be derived mainly from experience.
If your experience is of the Windows OS’ logical hierarchical filing system (e.g., consisting of nested folders on a disk drive), then you could argue that “Windows Explorer, after all, IS a document management system in its own right”, and you would arguably be right in a circular fashion, as it would be so, according to your experience/perception and implicit/assumed definition of a DMS. So Windows Explorer would be a good DMS tool, and (say) xplorer² might be even better (I use it anyway, because I find it far better suited to my peculiar needs).

If you get users like this involved in trialling a DMS such as, for example, Microsoft’s SharePoint (A DMS and a document development and collaboration system), the experience can sometimes “blow their minds” as they start to realise new concepts of what is possible - lots of things that they never new existed and that are tremendously useful - things they never really knew they needed until now.
What has happened is that these become newly-discovered requirements which really make a distinction between a tool for working on a purely “administrative” DMS structure and a tool for working on an arguably much more useful thing - a basis for KM (Knowledge Management).

So regardless of what you might define as a DMS, here’s a suggested definition of :
KM - Definition of Knowledge Management.tif
http://docs.google.com/file/d/0B9rIby-RfgLNWEJzZXk4R2VGSnM/edit

Not forgetting something I referred to in a separate thread on this forum:
Documentation Standards and Methods: Repository documentation - File naming meta data standards and methods.
http://docs.google.com/document/d/1YtT6JaN0sOsCTbBd6UBE-1OPQSleBCbGkB8X0i-FKDg/edit

If you establish a definition for KM that works for your needs, then the requirements for a supporting DMS are much easier to identify - they are (say) all the administrative and collaborative tools/functions that you might need to support YOUR KM definition and the building of YOUR Knowledge Base.
You won’t need to ask, for example, “Has anyone tried out My Digital Documents?”, you will be able to go to the website and see how its functionality stacks up against your defined requirements (which presumably don’t include document scanning at present). You could do the same for Paperport and any other DMSes that might be mentioned in that thread. You’d be in control, armed with a clearcut requirements definition.