Advice for a document management system

Fri Feb 6 15:29:29 UTC 2009

Finally!

On Friday 06 February 2009 09:08:42 Dave Cramer wrote:
> I'm not sure if you are looking for a document management system, or a
> document editing system. I found this very interesting though.
>
> http://www.alfresco.com/

Yes! Use an enterprise class document management system.  Seriously folks, and 
I mean no offence here, I know we all love geeking out over our command line 
tools, docbooks, and LaTex systems, but seriously, you can't ask users to walk 
away from a set of comfortable tools without giving them something equally 
comfortable to work with. Furthermore, since the original question was about a 
document management system, it makes sense to focus on that rather then 
editing text as though we were still in the eighties. 

Alfresco, which is an open source Sharepoint-like system (for those of you who 
know what that is), lets users work with the tools they are used to, including 
OpenOffice.org, and yes, Microsoft Office. There are tools built-in that make 
it easy to collaborate on documents, maintain a versioning system, and export 
to many different formats including text, PDF, Flash, and more. 

All this can be done using share protocols like WebDav, FTP, NFS, etc, and 
through a rich AJAX Web interface . . . and no, I don't work for Alfresco. But 
there is a line that's worth thinking about . . . the right tool for the right 
job. 

Take care out there.

> Allows for collaborative editing, and management.
>
> Dave
>
> On Fri, Feb 6, 2009 at 8:46 AM, Aaron Vegh <aaronvegh-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w at public.gmane.org> wrote:
> > Hi all,
> > Thanks so far for your answers, both off- and on-list. I've been
> > reviewing these responses and trying to wrap my head around this problem.
> > Ultimately, I'm not looking to have a role in this project; ideally I'd
> > like to find someone who I could feel comfortable introducing to my
> > client, that can run with this problem.  I have some concerns, however,
> > with what I've read so far.
> >
> > 1. Substituting OO.o for MS Office doesn't strike me as a winning
> > proposition. In my (albeit limited) use of the application, I've come
> > away with the impression that while it may solve some issues, it will
> > create others. In the end, the client will end up with different
> > headaches altogether.
> >
> > 2. LaTeX or DocBook XML, while clearly a respected choice by this group,
> > is also to be approached with great caution. The assumption being that
> > non-technical users will balk at it. I get that, for sure. But I still
> > wonder if, with the right template design, a LaTeX or DocBook expert
> > couldn't put together a sample document, and arrange for training of the
> > staff who will use this. I think once people saw this text-based file on
> > the one hand, then saw a single command given and boom! instant, perfect
> > HTML and PDF versions -- they would find that very persuasive. Perhaps
> > persuasive enough to actually learn and use this thing.
> >
> > Let me be a bit more specific now. The client is the Ontario Legislature.
> > They are required to produce "Hansards", verbatim transcripts of the
> > proceedings of the legislature. These documents are published on their
> > web site. Here's an example of a PDF of a recent legislative session:
> >
> >
> > http://www.ontla.on.ca/house-proceedings/transcripts/files_pdf/29-JAN-200
> >9_L108.pdf
> >
> > You'll note that the document is both quite long and features a fairly
> > complicated layout, not to mention a large number of individual paragraph
> > and character styles. There are also errors in the rendering of this
> > document (for example, several blank pages). The original documents
> > produced in Word are done with very specific Word styles, so I would say
> > that the users are slightly above your average "non-technical".
> >
> > My thinking is that, any solution that requires post-processing is not
> > adequate. They already have a system that has several idiosyncrasies, and
> > exchanging that for another one (OO-based) is probably not going to be
> > accepted.
> >
> > If there are any serious, knowledgeable advocates of a clean document
> > creation pipeline, I'm looking forward to hearing from you. If you feel
> > this can be done with OO without compromising the translation between
> > formats, show me some examples using documents as complex as the kind at
> > issue here!
> >
> > :-)
> >
> > Cheers,
> > Aaron.
> > --
> > The Toronto Linux Users Group.      Meetings: http://gtalug.org/
> > TLUG requests: Linux topics, No HTML, wrap text below 80 columns
> > How to UNSUBSCRIBE: http://gtalug.org/wiki/Mailing_lists

-- 
Marcel (Writer and Free Thinker at Large) Gagné
Note: This massagee wos nat speel or gramer-checkered.
Websites: marcelgagne.com AND cookingwithlinux.com AND wftlbytes.com
Author of the "Moving to Linux" series of books
Follow me : http://identi.ca/wftl
Join the WFTL-LUG : http://www.wftl-lug.org

-- 
This message has been scanned for viruses and
dangerous content by MailScanner, and is
believed to be clean.

--
The Toronto Linux Users Group.      Meetings: http://gtalug.org/
TLUG requests: Linux topics, No HTML, wrap text below 80 columns
How to UNSUBSCRIBE: http://gtalug.org/wiki/Mailing_lists