Ask the Expert: What's New in EMC Documentum 7.1?

I'm answering myself:

(Happening in both windows and linux 7.1 setups): If you configure the docbroker to work in secure mode only it will use port 1489 even when the log indicates it is using 1490. Launching the docbroker with -port 1490 will make the docbroker listen to 1490 while the log indicates it is using 1491. Either fix this behaviour or note it in the installation guide because as now it is... confusing.

I've been playing again with one of the two machines I've used to setup the SSL configuration, and I must say that what I said is completly wrong. Setting the docbroker in secure mode only, uses port 1490 by default. I messed with a lot of files/database entries so I probably broke something while I was testing it...

Really interesting question and answer about security !

Alvaro de Andres  did you get all the expected answers ?

I've been attempting to configure a new development environment using the new certificate based SSL mode and the Documentation and White paper are both very hard to follow and missing important information.  This is the biggest challenge facing Documentum administrators and developers.  I've never seen complete, thorough, error-free documentation for any Documentum product.  I understand it is hard work but that is what we pay you for.  We expect accurate and complete documentation.  The business of configuring this software is hard enough already without wasting an entire day only to discover a crucial step was left out of the Documentation. 

This could all be solved if EMC would provide a wiki formatted documentation site.  If we had a wiki we could correct the documentation ourselves and not need to wait months and submit multiple needless SRs just to get a correction to the documentation.  If we can't depend on your to give us accurate documentation then you should at least let us fix it ourselves.

Is this something we could see with 7.1?

I noticed that also, it seems to just be getting worse all the time, how many different store types is too many for EMC?   I was thinking about suggesting they use a single type of store but I like your suggestion better.

I can't say I'm not disappointed   I've not had a chance to try D2 due to there being no direct upgrade path from Webtop to D2.  A new user interface just isn't something I've been able to convince management to pay for seeing as though they've already bought a user interface and feel like they are getting charged twice for something that should be provided as an upgrade since they have a support contract.   So, it's a tough sell, but I know that isn't your area of expertise so I'll not bother you with it anymore than I already have.

However, you make an excellent point, though I don't think it was your intent.  There is a general lack of consistency with EMC Documentum products.  If you have a new, objectively better form of documentation for D2, why have a different system for everything else?  I think EMC should strive for a uniform, standardized way of providing software and services, including documentation.   I know a lot of these products were acquired and are slowly being integrated, I'd suggest that a bit more polish be applied before they are released.  I want to see a more homogenous product that has already had all of the rough bits from integration filed down before I get my hands on it.

Excellent idea fainemr  for the wiki documentation but .... Its not like that in DCTM 7.1 !

I like the new documentation for example for D2 , it's the HTML based documentation. Did you already try it ? What's your thought ?

fainemr  I do agree with you, documentation is not consistent at the moment.

Documentumm platform documentation is effectively a bit old school

This could all be solved if EMC would provide a wiki formatted documentation site.  If we had a wiki we could correct the documentation ourselves and not need to wait months and submit multiple needless SRs just to get a correction to the documentation.  If we can't depend on your to give us accurate documentation then you should at least let us fix it ourselves.

Mark, I completely disagree with you. Wiki won't change anything because EMC follows the next principle: what is not documented is not supported (if somebody want to disagree with me, read this first as example, though I have hundreds of such cases), and this principle is very convenient: it allows to sell wide range of support services (extended support, professional services, educations, certifications, etc) - you can download IIG's financial results and find out how much IIG earns due to the lack of documentation Wiki is able to relieve your routine work, but nothing more

Julien Fontaine wrote: Really interesting question and answer about security ! Alvaro de Andres did you get all the expected answers ?

Yep, thanks

About the documentation: (I think maybe this should be posted in the documentation poll too...)

From my experience, Documentum documentation is one of the best out there. It's sad, but it's true (if you think otherwise try nuxeo, alfresco, liferay or opentext...), you could always find "weird" things (how many 6.x bpm versions "survived" the James section in the documentation after being removed in 6.0?), but usually documentation is pretty good in comparison with the competition (but there's a lot of room for improvement ).

About the wiki: I don't see it happening. I have a detailed step-by-step guide on how to setup certificate-based ssl. I could update that wiki with the information. I could also be fired for posting that "internal" documentation , meaning that "we" know how to do something that not many people has done, if EMC doesn't share with us why should we share with them, etc. IMHO, wikis usually don't work in the opensource world (what I said in the preivous post, ie: nuxeo simply changes the version number from the wiki and that's all...) and I'm sure won't work here (that feeling of paying for something, then "fixing" it, then documenting it... no, I don't see it happening )

What I think it should be done (at least) is

• Mark the status of the whitepapers. I don't think whoever did the SSL WP was wrong, it probably worked that way when that wp was done, but it is clearly obsolete/wrong/misleading/missing information now (missing parameters in certificate generation, where's the cipherlist parameter?, where's the jms configuration?, wdk apps? xPlore? xCP stack?). Mark it obsolete, or for reference only, or advise it could not be up-to-date, I don't know, but do something!
• Pay attention to things like the ssl configuration we're talking about, if this is a new and "strongly recommended" feature, be sure that's is clearly explained, otherwise it'll look quite bad to the customers. There are settings or configurations that are not commonly used and most people won't even notice (ever), but things like the ssl setup or this one: D2 causing ClassCastException in Logger class in JMS, which you won't find in the D2 install guide, really hurt the credibility of the documentation

you can download IIG's financial results and find out how much IIG earns due to the lack of documentation  Wiki is able to relieve your routine work, but nothing more

I though IIG employees had access to more detailed/additional documentation in their IRM site (as a competitive advantage with partners). I was wrong.

You're right PanfilovAB . EMC supports only what is documented... but a sort of wiki documentation in this community will be interesting.... a sort of unofficial documentation.

About the documentation: (I think maybe this should be posted in the documentation poll too...) From my experience, Documentum documentation is one of the best out there. It's sad, but it's true (if you think otherwise try nuxeo, alfresco, liferay or opentext...), you could always find "weird" things (how many 6.x bpm versions "survived" the James section in the documentation after being removed in 6.0?), but usually documentation is pretty good in comparison with the competition

You're trying to compare incomparable products. Try to compare powerlink with MSDN or with IBM portal (here I should also note that last two are completely free), or try to compare xCP documentation with IBM ICN RedBook: http://www.redbooks.ibm.com/redpieces/pdfs/sg248055.pdf, or try to find something really useful about security in EMC documentation (for example try to find any information about application tokens, something like described here)

you can download IIG's financial results and find out how much IIG earns due to the lack of documentation  Wiki is able to relieve your routine work, but nothing more I though IIG employees had access to more detailed/additional documentation in their IRM site (as a competitive advantage with partners). I was wrong.

I think either you didn't understand my point, or I yours. My point is: if there was good documentation who would pay for extra services?

PanfilovAB wrote: you can download IIG's financial results and find out how much IIG earns due to the lack of documentation  Wiki is able to relieve your routine work, but nothing more I though IIG employees had access to more detailed/additional documentation in their IRM site (as a competitive advantage with partners). I was wrong. I think either you didn't understand my point, or I yours. My point is: if there was good documentation who would pay for extra services?

My point was that I've always considered the possibility that EMC wasn't releasing as much documentation as they could, so they can sell you both the product and "better" support than other companies (2x business), as I've seen before this argument when bidding with/against EMC, but I was wrong, as they have access to the same docs we do.

If there was good documentation... most likely goverments/public sector would pay support/extra services (either EMC or partners or freelancers) just to have someone else to blame if something goes wrong (I know customers that question why they pay support, and customers that don't pay support anymore because they find support useless ) but I think that's a different discussion out of the topic of this thread.

but I was wrong, as they have access to the same docs we do.

Why do you think so? I had already posted some stuff about privileged roles and agentexec, can also post internal note about how EMC was trying to make BPM faster without any success

BTW, I think that if we had Wiki, its quality would be the same as Documentum Support Forum with the next most popular suggestions:

1. restart everything
2. clear caches
3. reinstall

That's not quite true... if we had adequate documentation or at least they could help us a little bit to understand how this thing could work on the new version, they would have avoided the loss from the extra license

If you had documentation that BPS is unusable, has very limited functionality and it functionality could be replaced in 2 working days would you pay for additional software?

PanfilovAB wrote: If you had documentation that BPS is unusable, has very limited functionality and it functionality could be replaced in 2 working days would you pay for additional software?

Of course, if that was going to spare our time for extra deployment of an EAR file every time. Process Integrator is set up once and can be updated easily through DAR installation that we are already preparing for the Webtop client. If you accumulate all the extra effort required for all the involved teams, it might be equivalent.