Alfresco Community is a free enterprise document management system. Alfresco document management system overview

Alfresco - an overview of the ECM system in Russian

Web-based Open Source system for intranet collaboration, content management (ECM) and business process management (Alfresco Activity). Contains personal start pages, document library, search engine, virtual workspaces, microblogs, wiki, blogs, forums, calendars.

Alfresco alternatives

Overview of the Alfresco system

The Alfresco system is one of the most common electronic document management and project management systems in the West. This is largely due to the openness of the code (full Open Source) and the difference from most open source products by the stability of work and the possibility of scaling to the tasks of a business of any size. This is not surprising, since the “father” and main designer of the Alfresco system to this day is John Newton, one of the leaders and co-owners of Documentum, the world market leader in enterprise-scale electronic document management systems. Companies such as Activision, American Stock Exchange, Cisco, Electronic Arts, etc. successfully work with the system. The system can work on almost any platform and with any database. A number of Alfresco systems easily cope with the load of millions of stored documents and tens of thousands of users.

The low popularity of the system in Russia is a consequence of the fact that until recently there were no companies capable of providing professional services for the implementation, support and training of users of the Alfresco system.

Benefits of Alfresco

Alfresco is an EDMS with web access. This is convenient because:
No need to install additional software on users' machines.
No problem updating the client software.
Can be used from anywhere in the world, including mobile devices

Alfresco has the most advanced web-interface: convenient, fast and beautiful.
But European and American EDMS, including Alfresco, stopped placing their main bet on the web interface 3 years ago. Of course, there is support for it, but it is used for remote access to documents and nothing more.

Because when a person is in an office or branch united in a VPN network, there is nothing more convenient and easier than working with folders and files in the usual way. Edit documents in office applications. People are used to working this way, they know how to work this way, and they will work this way. And the use of any other interfaces, even the web, causes understandable irritation, a decrease in the speed of work and, as a result, sabotage of the implementation.

But how to work with standard folders and files, because they do not support versioning, access control by roles, routing, etc.?

The solution has long been found and used in European and American EDMS:

Imagine that you have 2 folders on your desktop (Or any number of folders, this is just an example):
"Documents for Consideration"
"Corporate Documents"

You open the first one. There are 3 documents. You know that if they are there, you have to make a decision on them. We open them in the usual MS Word by double-clicking. And, lo and behold, you can not only read the text of the document, but open any versions, read comments, make decisions and send the document for consideration to arbitrary persons without leaving anywhere from MS Word (MS Excel, MS Power Point). Moreover, there you can see your tasks, incoming and outgoing.

Need to create and launch a new contract for approval? There is nothing easier. Create a document in MS Word and send directly from there using the standard route. Or, first create a file and simply copy it to the "Corporate Documents" / "Draft Agreements" folder. The document will immediately be entered into the EDMS and sent along the standard route.

Nobody refuses the Web-interface either. Alfresco's web interface allows you to perform all of the above functions and much more. Web is convenient on business trips, for quick access from a phone or laptop, for performing complex group operations with documents and tasks, and generating reports.

There are 2 main versions of the Alfresco system: Community Edition and Enterprise Edition.

Community Edition completely free, can be downloaded and installed in any company. However, the system has no support other than the voluntary help of members of the Alfresco user community. But despite this, the Community edition remains one of the most common options for electronic document management systems in Europe. The system supports the possibility of hosting on a cloud of servers or a cluster, thereby being a worthy solution for both 10 and 10,000 users. Embedded databases: MySQL and PostgreSQL.

Services of Alfresco Community Edition implementation companies:

Installation
- Russification
- Guarantee for the work of implemented business processes

Enterprise Edition- industrial edition of the system, which runs under the control of powerful Oracle or MS SQL databases. Such systems are certified by Alfresco and system users are provided with a guarantee for the stable operation of the system, support and updates.

Sale and implementation of the certified Alfresco Enterprise Edition system:

Delivery of a certified system
- Installation
- Implementation of business processes
- Warranty for the operation of the system as a whole
- Guarantee for implemented business processes
- Annual system support hotline
- Annual update of system versions
- Training of technologists (Remote + seminars)

The main features of the Alfresco system:

Full web interface
Full text document search
Integration with LDAP
Integration with Sharepoint
Integration with MS Office
Email integration
Integration with Firefox&IE
Integration with Google Gadget
Document versioning
Version comparison
Flexible role-based access to documents
Support for the JBoss jBMP graphical business process editor
Support for simple workflows Created using the "create wizard"
Embedded project management system based on microsites

Screenshots

Homepage

Document details

Administration panel

Reviews and news about Alfresco

2015. Video: Alfresco Document Management System Interface

Alfresco is a replicated integrated content management system for development organizations by the British company of the same name. Used to manage documents, records, web publishing, teamwork, and business processes in an organization. Exists in two editions. Alfresco Community is free, distributed under the terms of the LGPL. Alfresco Enterprise Edition is a paid commercial version of the product, distributed under its own proprietary license, is open source and complies with open standards.

2013. Alfresco came to Russia

Alfresco, a web-based (and cloud-based) system for content management and collaboration, has been implemented in our country for several years by local integrators. And since Since this is an open-source product, and it has a free community version, it has become the most popular in Russia. But now Alfresco apparently saw a serious potential in our country and decided to take sales and marketing under its control. The founder of the company, John Powell, came to Moscow to open a representative office. Apparently, now Alfresco will focus on promoting its cloud version in Russia and selling it directly. And for partners, they leave the opportunity to create and sell their own OEM solutions based on Alfresco (similar to how many integrators now create their portals based on SharePoint).

2013. The SaaS version of Alfresco has updated interface and search

Alfresco Cloud is a SaaS version of the popular Alfresco ECM that was launched about 2 years ago. The other day this solution was updated, and the main change is the new interface, which has become simpler and more convenient. The developers have hidden some menus and buttons, and added more options for customization and personalization. Also in the cloud version, an advanced content search by several criteria appeared. Overview video of Alfresco Cloud - see below:

2012. Alvex - Russian solution based on Alfresco

ITD Systems announced the release of Alvex, a document and business process management system based on Alfresco. Alvex solves the problem of combining rigid business processes described by strict regulations and real daily tasks, the diversity and dynamic connections of which do not fit into formal schemes. The Alfresco system provides tools for corporate content management (ECM), social content management (SCM), business processes (BPM). Alvex adds the ability to create dynamic business processes (Dynamic BPM) to Alfresco. Alvex also expands Alfresco's capabilities in terms of ECM / BPM, provides tools for linking processes to the company's structure and convenient tools for monitoring the current situation for both ordinary employees and managers. Like Alfresco, Alvex comes in Community and Enterprise editions. The Community version is available under the LGPL license and is completely free.

2011. Alfresco Community 4 integrates Apache Solr, social networks and Activiti BPM

The new version of the free open-source content management system Alfresco Community 4 introduced many new features. Alfresco's own search engine has been replaced by the popular open source search engine Apache Solr. Also, the Activiti BPM business process management engine was integrated into the system. New social features let you subscribe to peer updates, like content, and easily share content on YouTube, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, and SlideShare. The ability to collaborate on content has also been improved through integration with Google Docs, Apple iWork and Adobe Creative Suite. Recall that in addition to the free Community-version, Alfresco sells the Enterprise version. Alfresco supports the Russian interface language and is being implemented by some domestic companies.

2011. Alfresco releases collaboration system for small businesses

The Alfresco content management system has become quite widespread in our country due to its low cost and the availability of a free open-source version. But still, this is a rather complicated solution and it was not suitable for small businesses. Now Alfresco has decided to correct this shortcoming and released the Alfresco Team solution, which is designed for collaboration (with content) at the level of departments and small companies. It resembles the Sharepoint Team Site or Box.net, only in comparison with them - more functional and cheaper. Users can create sites (workspaces) with pages of different formats - file storage, calendar, wiki, task list, blog, forum. Alfteso Team functionality includes social tools (comments, ratings, likes), update feeds, web viewer (which allows you to view even video and audio files), mobile versions for iPhone and iPad, workflow engine (implemented on Alfresco BPM), document converter (eg doc -> pdf).

2011. Alfresco integrates Activiti's BPM engine into its ECM system

Last fall, Alfresco introduced the free open-source BPM system Activity. Initially, Activity was conceived as a separate product and was developed by a separate division of Alfresco in collaboration with VMWare SpringSource. But by popular demand from the community, the company has integrated Activity into its main Alfresco ECM system. Until now, Alfresco used another product - JBoss jBPM - as a business process management system. An updated version of Alfresco with the Activity engine will appear in the fourth quarter of this year. Activity BPM will also remain available as a standalone product.

2011. Alfresco and Jive have integrated their solutions

The leader of the social software market Jive and the developer of the leading open-source ECM system Alfresco decided to join forces and introduced a connector that allows you to integrate these solutions. This is a fairly logical and profitable move for both companies. It is clear that a lot of content is created in a corporate social network, and it somehow needs to be controlled and managed. On the other hand, to organize collaboration in a social network, you need to provide easy access to files and documents. It is only surprising that it was these two companies that agreed, because. More recently, Jive executives have been very critical of open-source systems. The connector is based on the new CMIS standard and allows you to publish content in both directions (from Alfresco to Jive and vice versa). In addition, it allows you to synchronize the user base and their access rights to each piece of content thanks to the support of the LDAP protocol.

2010. Alfresco wants to beat Sharepoint with WCM

Web content management (WCM), which generally boils down to creating internal and external sites, has always been a weakness of SharePoint. The new version of SharePoint 2010 contains much better WCM functionality, but upgrading to this version is quite expensive. It is necessary to invest in 64-bit architecture and upgrade server software (to Windows Server 2008). According to research by consulting company Global360, only 8% of companies using SharePoint have migrated to the new version so far. But the open-source competitor of SharePoint - Alfresco is updated more often and does not require such capital investments. The new version of Alfresco Community Edition 3.4 focuses on web content management as a major advantage over SharePoint. Alfresco developers believe that seamless integration between intranet and external web applications is becoming increasingly important. For example, a marketer wants to be able to create documents in Word and publish them on the site without the help of IT professionals (which is quite problematic in SharePoint). The new version of Alfresco supports SharePoint Protocol and CIFS technologies for the ability to work with the site directly from MS Office. In addition, similar work from Google Docs is supported.

2009. Alfresco and Ingres are preparing an open-source competitor to Sharepoint

Developers of open-source systems Ingres and Alfresco plan to release an alternative to Microsoft SharePoint. It will be based on a database from Ingres and a corporate content management system from Alfresco. In addition, the distribution will include Linux OS, which will make the system ideal for supporters of open technologies, in particular, government organizations. The development will be based on completely open source code, the Linux operating system and standardized hardware, which will keep implementation costs to a minimum. The developers also thought about those who already use Microsoft SharePoint - the new collaboration system is fully compatible with the technical protocols of SharePoint and Office, which allows the open system to be closely integrated with the developments of the corporation.

2008. Alfresco - open-source ECM in Web 2.0 style

The London company Alfresco, which develops the ECM system of the same name, was founded in 2005 by Documentum co-founder John Newton and Business Objects top manager John Powell (pictured). Having lured quite a few employees from Documentum (which was bought by EMC), as well as other players in the field (Interwoven and Vignette) and having received $ 20 million in investments (including from SAP Ventures), the company seriously threatens the leaders of the ECM market. And the developer community helps her in this - after all, Alfresco publishes the open source code of the system under the GPL license. True, this does not mean that the Alfresco system is free. There is a free version for the Alfresco Community community and a paid version - Alfresco Enterprise, which is sold along with company support.

2008. Free ECM in a web 2.0 world

John Powell, CEO of Alfresco, is optimistic about the company's future and its role in the enterprise content management market. Alfresco's approach is different from other major ECM players such as IB, Oracle and Microsoft. They don't sell software (it's free), but their implementation and support services. Powell says, "Users no longer perceive enterprise content management systems as a complex end-to-end solution. They want simple and functional tools." Traditionally, due to "clunky" interfaces and architectures that are not really service-oriented, it is quite difficult to implement enterprise content management systems. Most of Alfresco's services use the Representational State Transfer (REST) web architecture, which makes it much faster to set up the required features. Powell cites a recent integration with Facebook as an example to show that his company's software is "designed for Web 2.0." “Using REST, it only took us two days to integrate with Facebook. In less than a week, our customers were able to use the Facebook portal through which they shared data and collaborated in real time.”

Alfresco is an open source information platform developed by Alfresco Software Inc (UK). The platform is not an electronic document management system, but on its basis you can build a ready-made system on your own or with the help of specialists.

Projects to build a unified ECM system based on Alfresco have now been implemented in many countries: France, Switzerland, USA, Great Britain, Belgium, Japan, Mexico, Italy. By world standards, this is one of the most common electronic document management and project management systems.
In Russia, Alfresco is also applicable, it is used by many large companies with complex business processes and an extensive organizational structure. The developers of the Russian company Citeck have already implemented various projects on Alfresco in companies: BNP Paribas Cardif, General Electric, Unilever, DHL, Gazprom Space Systems, Raiffeisen Bank, Moscow Government and others.

The choice in favor of Alfresco is often determined by 7 main reasons:

Free software (Open Source Software) and open license. This allows you to increase the number of jobs without licensing costs;
A large number of system developments by Alfresco Software Inc and a large community. All tools for system development;
Famous brand. Alfresco is the world leader among programs for the organization of electronic document management;
Convenient multilingual web interface (including in Russian). It provides access to shared documents from anywhere in the world via a secure connection;
Low requirements for IT resources: the ability to integrate into any IT infrastructure of the organization;
Demanded integrated components in the system: joint scheduling, meeting support, case management, document accounting and control, and much more;
Complete cross-platform - server and client parts can run under various operating systems, such as: MS Windows, Linux, Mac OS X, etc.

A distinctive feature of the system from most open source products is the stability of work and the ability to scale to the needs of a business of any size.

In general, Alfresco is a unique system that automates content management processes and covers the full life cycle of most types of documents: contracts and related documents, primary financial documentation, incoming and outgoing correspondence, instructions and tasks, orders and instructions, safety and labor protection documents, personnel applications and orders, documentation for tenders and the procurement process.

The system can manage any kind of documents. In corporate practice, they are divided into two types of data: structured and unstructured.

Structured documents are often presented in the form of tables and records that are stored in accounting systems (1C, SAP, Oracle, and others). Unstructured content includes content that goes beyond the general structure - a set of files and folders, media and video files located on external media or on the Internet. And the management of unstructured content is handled by a separate class of systems, namely Enterprise Content Management (ECM), to which Alfresco belongs.

Citeck has been implementing projects based on ECM Alfresco for more than 7 years in Russia and other post-Soviet countries.

Why choose us ... There are many such reasons, but there are three key:

In 2014, Citeck signed a partnership agreement with NTsPR LLC, which is the official representative of Alfresco Software, Ltd in Russia and the CIS countries.
Thus, Citeck can use a single platform for managing corporate information resources - Alfresco Enterprise Edition - with ;
Employees of the company are certified as "Alfresco Certified Engineer";
We offer our solution based on Open Source Russian assembly. Our Citec ECOS platform is included in .

Described system versions: Citeck ECOS 3.2.a, Alfresco Community 5.1.f.

List of abbreviations

Table 1 Abbreviations

Basic concepts of the system

Applications server is a Java Enterprise Edition software component that enables the launch and execution of Java applications.

Alfresco system structure

Three-tier structure

Alfresco follows a three-tier architecture (Figure 1):

data storage (Physical storage);
Alfresco Application Server (Alfresco Content Application Server);
Alfresco client applications (Alfresco Client).

Figure 1 - Structure of Alfresco links

The Data Storage link consists of a file storage (File System) and a database (Relational DB). File storage is used to store document content (files) and document versions. All other information (metadata) is stored in the database. The Alfresco database schema is not a public API, changes frequently from Alfresco version to version, and therefore should not be used when interacting with Alfresco. Instead, it is recommended to use one of the many public services (Embedded API, Remote API, see below) to interact with Alfresco.

The "Application Server" link provides advanced services for working with documents. The entire business logic of working with data is concentrated on this link. To work with various types of clients, the application server provides various types of external protocols, such as CMIS, REST API, CIFS, IMAP, and others. On the other hand, the application server works with the data warehouse through a connection to the DBMS (JDBC) and the mechanisms of the OS file system. Thanks to the use of these mechanisms, any implementation of the DBMS and file systems can be used as a data store, the only essential requirement is the presence of the necessary JDBC drivers and OS.

The "Client Applications" link is represented by various Alfresco client applications. These can be both web clients in the browser, and applications for desktop and mobile platforms, and even access through file system mechanisms (CIFS, FTP, WebDAV).

The described architecture allows you to implement various types of document-oriented applications, such as file management (Document Management - DM), web content management (Web Content Management - WCM), document management (Records Management - RM) and others.

Application server structure

The Alfresco Application Server is a Java web application and consists of various components. At the top level, the structure of the application server is shown below (Figure 2).

Figure 2 - The structure of the Alfresco application server

The application server should be considered as an extended DBMS that provides a wide range of document management services:

services for working with content (Content Services) - modeling, search, version control, multilingualism, export / import, content conversion, content classification through categories and tags, selection of metadata fields from content;
control services (Control Services) - business processes, rules and policies, access rights, access audit, preview generation, publication;
collaboration services (Collaboration Services) - favorites, "I like", the feed of events, wikis, blogs, forums.

These services are provided through a number of programming interfaces and protocols:

internal interfaces (Embedded APIs) - an interface for Java, JavaScript, FreeMarker (templates), languages for modeling content and business processes;
external interfaces (Remote APIs) - interfaces for web services (SOAP), web scripts (REST), as well as CMIS API (options for SOAP and REST);
other protocols (Protocols) - CIFS, WebDAV, FTP, IMAP, SharePoint.

The application server architecture allows you to implement various types of modules and extensions to a standard set of interfaces:

content models;
business processes;
additional services for Java, JavaScript, FreeMarker;
rules and actions, policies;
additional web scripts (REST API).

Interaction with related systems

To implement its services, the application server uses the services of related systems. In particular, third-party systems are used for:

indexing and search (Lucene, SOLR);
authentication (LDAP, NTLM, Kerberos, External)
content transformations (LibreOffice, ImageMagick, SWF Tools).

Indexing and searching are absolutely essential features in most Alfresco applications. In new versions, Alfresco no longer uses the Lucene subsystem and recommends using SOLR.
The search subsystem supports a number of characteristics essential for applications:

checking access rights before issuing search results to the user;
support for various search languages, including Full Text Search, CMIS, Lucene.

Authentication subsystems allow you to delegate the user authentication function to external systems. The most common way to integrate with enterprise infrastructure is to use directory services such as Microsoft Active Directory for this purpose. With this integration, user information is imported from AD to Alfresco, and authentication takes place using one (or several) of the LDAP, NTLM, Kerberos protocols. Comparison of authentication protocols is given below (Table 2)

Table 2. Comparison of different authentication protocols

When using NTLM, the Alfresco server plays the role of a "man in the middle", in fact exploiting a protocol vulnerability. Therefore, only NTLM version 1 is supported. NTLM version 2 is not supported when interacting with Active Directory because authentication to third-party services is not the purpose of the NTLM protocol. The recommended authentication protocol for integrating into an enterprise infrastructure is Kerberos.

Content transforms are used for various purposes, such as generating previews and icons, printing, image scaling. LibreOffice is used to convert office formats (and PDF), ImageMagick is used to convert images (and PDF), and SWF Tools is used to convert PDF to SWF for preview.

These services can work as Windows services, but this is not provided by default in the Alfresco distribution.

Resources needed to run Alfresco

Hardware resources

Very roughly, Alfresco's system requirements can be calculated as follows.

For 50 concurrent or 500 registered users:

1.5 GB JVM RAM 2x server CPU (or 1xDual-core)

For 100 concurrent or 1000 registered users:

1.5 GB JVM RAM 4x server CPU (or 2xDual-core)

For 200 concurrent users or 2000 registered users:

2.5 GB JVM RAM 8x server CPU (or 4xDual-core)

If you intend to deploy the Alfresco server in a virtual environment, then these figures should be multiplied by two.

The volume of the database depends mainly on the approximate volume of cards, for example, the number of documents 1000 x number of fields 20 x average field size 10 bytes x average number of versions 5 x indexing factor 2 = 1000 x 20 x 10 x 5 x 2 = 2,000,000 bytes = 2 MB.

If processes are put on documents, history is kept, or other additional information is stored, this should also be taken into account.

The amount of disk space depends on the content size of the documents, for example, number of documents 1000 x average size 1 MB x average number of versions 5 = 1000 x 1 x 5 = 5000 MB = 5 GB.

The size of the disk space for the index (lucene, SOLR) is calculated in a similar way, and several times less (approximately 3 times).

Program resources

The standard installation of Alfresco on Windows systems creates the following services:
alfrescoPostgreSQL - to run PostgreSQL - a DBMS that services the Alfresco database;
alfrescoTomcat - to run Apache Tomcat - a servlet container that serves Alfresco web applications.

If these service names have been taken, then the installer selects similar unused service names, such as alfrescoPostgreSQL-1 or alfrescoTomcatnuml.

When installed on Linux systems, a single alfresco service is created that runs all the necessary Alfresco components (PostgreSQL and Tomcat by default).

Alfresco components occupy the following TCP network ports by default (Table 3).

Table 3. Comparison of various authentication protocols

Port	Component	Protocol	Description
5432	PostgreSQL	PostgreSQL
8080	tomcat	HTTP	Web application port
8443	tomcat	HTTPS	Web application port
8009	tomcat	AJP
8005	tomcat		Shutdown port
8000	Java		Java debug port (off by default)
7070	VTI	SharePoint	Support online editing
21	Alfresco	FTP	Can be disabled in alfresco-global.properties
445	Alfresco	CIFS	Can be included in alfresco-global.properties
50500	Alfresco	RMI	Also a few other RMI 8100 LibreOffice ports
8100	libreoffice	libreoffice

If these ports are already occupied by another, then when installing Alfresco, you can specify other ports for PostgreSQL, Tomcat and VTI, and configure Alfresco ports in the alfresco-global.properties file. If you want to specify other ports after installation, you can also do this, you must refer to the component configuration guides.

Alfresco Extension Methods and Customizations

Alfresco is distributed as a WAR file (WAR - Web Archive - Java archive format) or several WAR files that need to be installed on the Java application server(s) (such as Apache Tomcat or JBoss Application Server). Extensions and modules are usually packaged inside web applications, while configuration elements are located in a separate place - the so-called. shared classpath (for Tomcat, this is the tomcat/shared folder).

Alfresco supports the following packaging options for third-party extensions:

not packed files;
ZIP archive;
JAR files
AMP files.

A JAR file (JAR stands for Java Archive) is a Java archive format and is supported by all Java application servers. JAR files are installed in the shared classpath or directly in the "WEB-INF/lib" folder of the web application. However, in this case, their integrity is not guaranteed, so it is recommended to pack these files into AMP archives.

An AMP file is an Alfresco Module Package format (AMP - Alfresco Module Package), which is also a renamed ZIP archive with special internal structure conventions. When you install an AMP file, its content becomes part of the WAR file.

Configuration elements are located in the shared classpath. In particular, the main alfresco configuration file, the alfresco-global.properties file, is located at the root of the shared classpath (for Tomcat, this is the tomcat/shared/classes folder). The configuration of other extensions is located at classpath:alfresco/extension (for Alfresco repository) and classpath:alfresco/web-extension (for Alfresco Share). Commonly used configuration files are listed below:

alfresco/extension/*-log4j.properties - log4j log configuration files;
alfresco/extension/subsystems/Authentication — authentication subsystem configuration files (for example, interaction with MS Active Directory);
alfresco/extension/custom-vti* — VTI module configuration files (SharePoint Protocol support for online document editing);
alfresco/web-extension/share-config-custom.xml - Share custom configuration.

Alfresco log files (event logs)

Alfresco log files, depending on the Alfresco version, are located either in the Alfresco root folder, or in the tomcat/bin folder, or in the root of the file system (Linux). Alfresco generates one log file per web application. Accordingly, in a standard installation there should be log files:

alfresco.log - Alfresco repository event log
share.log - Alfresco Share event log (web interface)
solr.log - SOLR (Indexing Service) event log

In addition, Apache Tomcat maintains its own logs, they are located in the tomcat/logs folder:

catalina.out for Linux, alfrescotomcat-stdout.YYYY-MM-DD.log for Windows - Apache Tomcat stdout
localhost_access_log.YYYY-MM-DD.txt - log of served requests

All of the above log files are set to rotate, a new file is created and used every day, but old files are not deleted. If old files need to be deleted as well, Alfresco and Tomcat settings need to be adjusted accordingly.

Citeck ECOS expansion modules

Three-level structure of modules

Extension modules are designed to add new functionality to the Alfresco system. In order to ensure maximum reuse of functionality in a wide variety of applications, a three-level structure is used:

kernel modules (core) - contain basic functionality applicable in a wide range of applications (like Alfresco itself);
application modules (applications) - contain functionality applicable only in certain document management applications, for example, contract management (contracts), attorney management (attorneys), order management (orders), etc.
implementation modules (custom) - contain functionality that is applicable only in a specific implementation of the system in a specific organization. Each organization has its own set of modules.

A typical system deployment involves kernel modules, one or more application modules (or without them), and deployment modules.

The Alfresco framework allows modules of more specific levels to override the implementation and configuration of modules of more general levels. In particular, application modules and kernel modules can be overridden in injection modules.

Composition and functions of kernel modules

The core of the Citeck ECOS system includes the following modules:

1st-override-repo;
1st-override-share;
idocs-repo;
idocs-share.

Modules with the "-repo" suffix are intended for installation in the alfresco.war web application (Alfresco repository), modules with the "-share" suffix are intended for installation in the share.war web application (Alfresco Share - web interface).

Modules prefixed with "1st-override-" are for overriding Alfresco files. Modules with the "idocs-" prefix contain the core functionality of the Citeck ECOS system core.

Among the functions that the Citeck ECOS system adds to the Alfresco system, the following main functions can be noted.

Magazines. Represents the possibility of document-oriented viewing and searching for various types of documents and other objects in the system. A distinctive feature of magazines is that they take into account the specifics of various types of content and display only relevant attributes in each specific case.

Organizational structure. Represents the ability to model the structure of an organization in which the system is used through the built-in mechanism of Alfresco groups. A distinctive feature is the ability to mark groups with different labels corresponding to different types of units and officials. Through the use of the mechanism of groups, it is possible to issue rights to units and officials, as well as setting tasks for officials.

Templates. Content templates allow you to generate document content based on a given template. Card templates allow you to generate related documents according to a given template, such as approval sheets, access history, etc. Notification templates allow you to customize the sending of email notifications on specified events. Autonumber templates allow you to generate document numbers based on a given template. Templates in docx format (MS Word 2007) are also supported.

Advanced process capabilities. Opportunities for automatic issuance of rights for the duration of the task and their removal after the end of the task. Ability to attach documents to tasks. Deputy support.

life cycles. The possibility of a simple description of the life cycle of documents in the form of a set of states and transitions between them. A distinctive feature of the lifecycles component is the ease of implementation and extension of lifecycles even after they have been launched. Basic business processes (approval, signing, etc.) have been implemented, from which it is possible to compose the life cycles of documents.

Reporting support. Automatic uploading of information to an external database to simplify reporting using third-party tools.

Case management. The ability to organize cases - special containers with arbitrary types of attachments.

Integration. Ability to synchronize Alfresco directories with external sources. Data sources such as SQL-compatible databases, XML files, simple files (for content import) are supported. It is also possible to upload information to external storages.

Document card. The ability to create a document card from various sections (cardlets), you can rearrange sections and specify arbitrary conditions for their display.

User interface. Various visual components that expand the capabilities of Alfresco Share and increase the usability of the system.

Composition and capabilities of application modules

Application modules include the following modules:

contracts - contract management;
attorneys - management of powers of attorney;
orders - order management.

Application modules deploy sites in the system (site of agreements, site of powers of attorney, etc.) and logs for managing the corresponding types of documents, contain the definition of models and forms for these types of documents, the definition of special policies and predefined templates, as well as some default settings, which can be overridden in injection modules.

Synchronization service description

The synchronization service allows you to synchronize data across different data stores. Supported storages include:

Alfresco repository;
external databases;
folders with XML files;
folders with arbitrary files.

The synchronization service operates on the following basic abstractions:

Object DAO - a service for accessing some kind of data storage, Source DAO (data source) and Target DAO (data receiver) are distinguished;
Object Type - the type of objects that the Object DAO operates on, each Object DAO operates on its own type of objects, for example, repository objects, database records, XML elements, etc.
Object Info - information about an object of type Object Type, existing or potential, Object DAO allows you to get Object Info from Object Type and create (update) Object Type from Object Info;
Object Converter - converts Object Info from Source DAO format to Target DAO format;
Sync Configuration - synchronization parameters: from where to transfer (Source DAO), how to convert (Object Converter), where to transfer (Target DAO).

Below is a diagram of data flows during synchronization (Figure 3). The transformation takes place as follows:

Source DAO receives the next set of objects to synchronize (either all or only updated since the last synchronization);
Source DAO converts received objects into Object Info format;
Object Converter provides Object Info format negotiation between Source DAO and Target DAO; additional Object Converter objects can be used to convert individual fields;
The Target DAO creates or updates objects based on the information received.

The synchronization service supports the loading of object relationships through special Object Converter implementations that allow you to find and/or create related objects according to the configuration.

To improve the speed of import / export, the synchronization service supports multithreading and combining the synchronization of several objects in one transaction. You can adjust the maximum number of concurrent transactions (that is, the number of threads) and the maximum number of objects in a transaction.

Download description of Citeck ECOS and Alfresco.

Alfresco is the best open source enterprise content management system. It is compatible with Microsoft Windows, Macintosh and Unix/Linux platforms. In this review, we will present Alfresco Share document management application.

Introduction

Alfresco Share offers the user a set of tools for document management within the enterprise. The system is characterized by simplicity and at the same time rich functionality, providing its users with close and fruitful cooperation. Alfresco Share tools centralize the enterprise's workflow, standardize document processing processes, increasing the degree of interaction between employees. As a result, the working time required for processing documents, passing them through the authorities, archiving documents and searching for them is significantly reduced.

The system also gives participants completely new opportunities. Such as versioning, centralized search, hypertext documentation and others. The indisputable advantages of the system over the usual (non-integrated) workflow make it possible to achieve much higher labor productivity. By integrating the workflow, the system saves working time, reduces time costs, thus significantly increasing the degree of economic efficiency of the enterprise.

The purpose of this presentation is to roughly illustrate the capabilities of the tools provided by the system. We are ready to hold a more detailed presentation at any time convenient for you. Contact by email at [email protected].