Starting in the 1980s and gathering pace in the 1990s, the first electronic document management systems emerged from vendors such as Documentum, later bought by EMC. These EDMS applications were aimed at managing electronic documents and solving the common business need for document management.
Core Elements of Electronic Document Management
Managing an electronic document is composed of:
- Storage of electronic content in a document database or "docbase" - typically as a single file but possibly as multiple related files. Content can be created within the EDMS or imported into it
- Location - organisation of document into either a defined folder hierarchy or directory structure, so that a user may browse or navigate their way through the folder hierarchy to the document. Or alternatively, simply rely on search to find documents
- Version control - document content is controlled and the EDMS manages the version hierarchy so that users see the current version or the current approved version or all versions as needed. A user will "check-out" a document to update it and the EDMS locks that document out to that user so that no-one else can update it at the same time. Then the user will "check-in" a new version of that document and so the system removes the lock and the new version is available
- Attribute or metadata - information held about the document to find it, search for it or possibly produce reports. The attributes can serve a number of purposes: describe the content, is about the document as the container of content, is to manage the document or perhaps all three. For example, title and author may be attributes and are also content within the document; subject and language attributes are about the document and this information may not be in the content; status [approved, draft...], retention period and archive attributes may indicate who should have access to the document and how long the document should be retained in the EDMS before being archived to a different system
- Retrieval - allow use or view of document
- Security - managing access to documents so that people can see, create, update, review, approve, link to or destroy a document according to their EDMS permissions or access rights
- Workflow - sending the document or a link to it to other users to perform their role with the document: review or approval
Within this general document space it was possible to specialise an EDMS to manage particular types of documents such as records, usually some information that a business must keep for legal or regulatory reasons. Beyond this specialisation of types of documents are different content types.
Other Content Types
Since an EDMS manages electronic files it is clear that other content files could also use an EDMS style approach, in particular:
- Web - typically HTML text files and web graphic files. Files used for creating websites and managing the content of that website
- Rich media or digital assets - typically large image files, video and audio files
This led to a newer general terminology of Content Management System or Enterprise Content Management (ECM) System (ECMS). More information about how Gartner describes ECMS and the vendors can be found here.
Similarity of EDMS and ECMS
Because of similarities between an EDMS and an ECMS many vendors have moved to describing their products as occupying the ECM space such as Documentum/EMC. From a business perspective the key is to understanding the key business problem and consequently what differentiates the various vendors and their solutions at a practical business level.
Roger Lever - Early career was in Treasury Banking and this led to my interest in financial investment, especially the stockmarket. Enjoy reading widely ...
