Ask the Expert: EMC Documentum Connector for Microsoft SharePoint

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Currently the connector is based on an installation in the secure area of SharePoint (GAC).

This area is not acceable within Office365, so the connector will not work in Office365, as you are not allowed to install it.

It is an interesting topic. Office365 is a real cloud (public) solution. As Documentum is not (yet) available as a public cloud solution, are companies interested in a solution that will connect their private (cloud) solution to the (public) cloud??

who has an opinion???

Hi Experts,

Is it possible to have a seemless integration e.g. when you click on a document or select View option for a document in a browse webpart (or any other webpart) instead of being asked to open or save the document it would be better that the action is performed using the native application?

I have a DC4SP 7.1 instance and still have experience the same behavior.

Thanks,

Surya

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Thanks for flagging that, Ed. It has been fixed.

HI Surya,

Totally agree with you. UCF is something you prefer to avoid :-)

but when you want to edit a document via the browse webpart it will take more that one extra clicks to do so, as you always have to make sure you know where you downloaded the document to, as the standard check-in will ask you to browse throught you local system to select the document.

when you often edit documents via SP or have standard SharePoint users work with the connector I don't think the standard way is acceptable and you should go for the ucf option. It is often a painful process but once it works my experience is that it will remain working. The ucf.net version has the advantange that it does not need java on the client machine and the dependency of the java version and the ability of java to go through your client firewall is not a problem!

We are playing with options to use cookies via the SharePoint interface to keep the document info local but that is not an easy solution.

HI Surya,

This has to do with the ucf function of Documentum. As SharePoint out of the box does not know anything about where the document is stored it normally cannot use this.

Especially for this there is the ufc.net solution. This is a part of the dc4sp package.

It needs to be installed on the client and has the same challenges as normal ucf, but once you have it working, it will give you the same editting experience you have with webtop, but now in SharePoint.

Beside the client install, you need to change a setting in the properties file. This is written in the manual, about the donwload option.

Depending on the use case, I believe the 'check out to SharePoint' scenario could be an alternative way to edit in SharePoint and avoid UCF...

Thank you Jeroen, well one of the reason to use this connector is the non-dependence on ucf so will have to live with the extra click. I guess the same reason would be applicable when one has to browse to a document explicitly to check it in?

Thanks,

Surya

I guess this depends per use case. We would be interested if users can easily archive documents from Office365 to Documentum at end of projects (teamsite).

Seems like a good business case. Currently not possible with the connector.

It can be done with alternative solutions like a workflow from K2 or a dedicated SharePoint customization that will do this.

Adding the checkin to Documentum to a SharePoint library is a relative simple customization depending on the demand of flexibility needed. Showing the documents in Documentum and viewing the content will be a bigger challenge but we have the base of this solution already available.

Hi Surya,

I assume that your looking at the overall business performance and that to me is more than getting the file open in MS Word for editing.

The checkout to SharePoint scenario wins hands down if the work done on the document is not a single user performing a single edit on the document. If the user checks the document out to SharePoint a whole collaborative environment is availble to edit the document simultanously and in multiple itterations with more users (contributors, peer reviewers, approvers, etc.). Checkin is then done once that collaboration has finished. Formal reviews afterwords in Documentum could turn out to be formalities (because approvers are already involved in the collaboration).

If however it's just me making the edit, checkout to SharePoint is more clicks and a - in that case more or less - useless extra step. It takes more time and I as a business user don't get any added value in return.

Bottom line, it is the business users use case that decides what's best.

Hi Ed -- that's a good point.

But from a performance perspective what is preferred ? check-out/check-in to/from SharePoint OR  check-out/check-in to/from client machine?