Open Text Releases Integrated Web Content Management Solution. Open Text Corporation said it is launching a broad Web Content Management offering, along with IXOS Software and Gauss Interprise, to give customers a single platform to manage corporate websites, intranets and extranets. The solution, set for release in May, is integrated with Livelink, so customers can include Web content in their complete Enterprise Content Management (ECM) strategy. The Livelink Web Content Management Server solution combines Web Content Management products from IXOS and Gauss to provide a range of features, from out-of-the-box Web publishing to Java-based solutions customers can deploy for more sophisticated Web development requirements. Integration with Livelink brings Web Content Management together with team collaboration, document management, records management, process workflows and other ECM capabilities. Livelink Web Content Management Server can scale globally with or without an application server, and also offers tight integration with application servers, such as IBM WebSphere, BEA WebLogic and Oracle 9i. Open Text, IXOS and Gauss will also continue to support Web Content Management solutions offered to customers today, including Gauss VIP ContentManager, IXOS Suite for Content Management (formerly IXOS-Obtree C4), and Livelink for Web Publishing. www.opentext.com [Gilbane Report News]

After the CMS implementation project. The first of the two CM Briefings looks at what needs to occur after the CMS implementation project. To quote: Much effort is focused, on the selection and subsequent implementation of a content management system (CMS). While it is obviously… [Column Two]

Why content management fails. Jeffrey Veen has written an article on why content management fails. To quote: To have any chance of success, a content management project must follow the same user-centered design practices as any other project. Task analysis, rapid prototyping, usability testing… [Column Two]

I agree with Veen on several points: user-centered design practices are important, you shouldn’t buy the vendor pitch without due diligence, and you certainly don’t want to radically change your processes or your toolsets to conform to IT or vendor requirements without good reason. The solution needs to fit the process and the user community.

However, Veen’s suggestion that a business should tell IT, “Here are our processes and our toolsets and those aren’t going to change,” (I am paraphrasing) seems too extreme. Sometimes, processes need to be streamlined. Toolsets are dated or are being used inappropriately. Overlapping toolsets waste financial and human resources and may need to be consolidated. During a content management rollout, there are numerous reasons why the business should keep an open mind with regard to potential process and technology change.

I’m noticing a theme with Adaptive Path. Generally speaking, they seem to be major advocates for the practical implementation of content management solutions, which I am totally on board with. But, in my opinion, encouraging a business unit to take a hardline stance against change is something that has the potential to create/reinforce the rift that is usually present between business units and a centralized IT organization.

Hot Banana Launches Hot Banana v5.0, Web Content Management. Hot Banana Software Inc., a leading North American Web Content Management System (CMS) company, today announced the launch of Hot Banana 5, a significant version improvement with many new and innovative features…. [cmswire]

I know nothing of this software. It could be the greatest WCM solution on the face of the Earth. But, holy cow, what kind of name is ‘Hot Banana’? I just can’t see Gartner saying, “Hot Banana has slipped into the Magic Quadrant,” or someone standing in front of a CIO talking about how Hot Banana is going to become mission critical.

Lenya is an open source content management system based on Cocoon.

The Future of Microsoft Content Management. There’s some monkey business going on at Microsoft. I’m sure I’m not the first to notice that they are making a huge ruckus about SharePoint, which naturally ties in with the Microsoft Content Management Server (MCMS), but one rarely ever hears much about MCMS. Finding collateral is not difficult. However, best of luck finding anything thats been generated in the last 8 months. What’s going on Mr. Gates? …we don’t have the full answer, but we’ve just gotten a new clue today…. [cms~wire]

Ann Rockley Launches New CMS Resource. Ann Rockley of The Rockley Group, Inc., one of the most crisp and intelligent voices in the CMS space and proselytizer of the “unified content strategy”, has launched a new CMS information resource. The RockleyBulletin.com web site is a collection… [cms~wire]

AIIM International (The Association for Information and Image Management)
http://www.aiim.org

AIIM Conference Information
http://www.aiimexpo.com

CMS Watch
http://www.cmswatch.com

CMS Wire
http://www.cmswire.com/

KM World
http://www.kmworld.com/

Open Source Content Management
http://www.oscom.org/

Portals Mag
http://www.portalsmag.com/

Seybold San Francisco 2004
http://www.seybold365.com/sf2004/index.php

Transform Magazine
http://www.transformmag.com/

XML & Web Services Mag
http://www.fawcette.com/xmlmag/

More vendor consolidation despite ECM market growth. IDM reports on a recent Meta Group report covering the future of enterprise content management (ECM). To quote: While the worldwide enterprise content management (ECM) market will continue to grow at a healthy rate, further vendor consolidation is expected in… [Column Two]

Here’s another quote from the article: “ECM systems are generally tactical and non-discretionary expenditures, but they are increasingly becoming strategic core investments. With organisations seeking more strategic enterprise content solutions, the ability of ECM software to fully manage all enterprise content and avoid costs by consistently applying proper compliance and legal risk policies/procedures is emerging as critical to organisations.”

FileNet Appointed ECM Product of the Year by Transform Magazine. Of all the enterprise content management products, FileNet’s P8 architecture has the most fully developed business process management component. In addition to basic workflow capabilities it provides process modeling, simulation and analytics. Tight integration with iLog gives the product access… [cms~wire]