A few Documentum-oriented readers of this blog have e-mailed me back-channel to ask why I wrote about Captiva two posts ago; the answer I gave is this: "To provide a view through a wider lens." From my observation, EMC's intention is to design products around business-oriented solutions; therefore no specific product, almost by definition, can do the whole job. So while a Documentum developer, for example, may see his/her role as customizing, configuring or writing code around WebTop, DFC, DCM and so on; EMC looks at the entire solution set: "How can we build as close to a Plug'n Play for our customers as possible ?"

Most of us in the Documentum world don't spend too much time thinking about Captiva. "It's Input Accel re-branded," is how one Documentum developer describes it. Another calls it, "Document Management .5. It's what companies used to scan paper in, stuff that wasn't created electronically." And that definition is good enough for a woman I interviewed six months ago; she got sick while searching through paper-based clinical study archives. "This stuff needs to be in the computer, not where it gets moldy," she says.

But EMC and Wikipedia see Captiva as something more than a tool that scans, stores and catalogs documents originally recorded on paper, electronically. Its larger value-add is......

There's a question on Linkedin that asks:

"What do you think about content management solutions sold using (the) software as a service (SaaS) approach? From your point of view, can SaaS solutions based on ECM technology (like Documentum, OpenText, Filenet) have success ? "

Here's the answer I gave:

" Post continued...

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Joe Tucci Shops Some More
April 12, 2008