Document Management Systems

Last month I asked for input on choosing a Document Management System. Thanks to all who gave advice.

My final decision was WebEx's Weboffice. ProjectLocker came a very close second.

A key observation I made while choosing was that there's a real need for a service to Just Make This Work. I spent a lot of time, reading, trying, but not nearly enough time to do any of the tools justice. I just wished for someone to come and read my mind and tell me what to do. I'm no slouch at IT stuff, so if I found it cumbersome, folk with less technical experience would be at sea. There's money in them thar confused users methinks.

BUT ANYWAY - WebOffice. Well, it does what it says on the tin. It provides ease of use for my non-geeks, and an intuitive permissions set up. It wasn't one of my requirements that the chosen tool support WebDAV, but the fact that it does makes for easy backups and the option for my Windows users to use Web Folders.

Cost was WebOffice's main drawback - or rather, cost for the given space. But under a "special offer", they pulled down the cost and beefed up the space, and I was happy.

I really wish I could have made ProjectLocker work, since it has a simple but very usable workflow facility. That would have allowed me to build approval flows for documents such as HR hiring docs. But that really is a nice to have and wasn't enough to compensate for ProjectLocker's less intuitive interfaces. (Fine for software developers, for whom PL appears to have been built; but not for non-geeks). The other Very Useful thing that ProjectLocker had that WebOffice does not, is file versioning. But, again, it's a nice to have, not an essential.

Again, thanks to all who made suggestions; especially the local folks with their own offerings. All were impressive enough to make me go "hmmm". But sheer time pressure, and my ongoing need to fight my natural maximizer tendencies, were what pushed me to Weboffice in the end.