Barebones CMS goes open source

Web browser with open layers

High-performance, easy website design and content management for team environments 

BY PAUL QUIGLEY

ECM Plus – CubicleSoft has just release Barebones CMS, which the company claims is a high-performance, open source content management system for web developers operating in a team environment.

According to CubicleSoft, Barebones CMS 1.0 was created after discussions with industry professionals, which, they claim, revealed a desire for a CMS that they could use to create mostly static websites easy for their clients to edit.

The company further stated that Barebones CMS has many desirable enterprise-level features, such as, a cacheing system that never gets in the way of designing a site. It also boasts a high-performance page serving – Barebones CMS served up to 1,700 pages per second during performance tests. It has a multilingual support system to allow translators to communicate with the rest of the team. Also, it boasts a revision system that can cut development and hardware costs for the organization.

Apparently, the company says, the product makes it possible to create an entire website without ever leaving the web browser: Programmers can write PHP code in the browser. Web designers can create and edit layouts using HTML and CSS in the browser. And Content Editors can edit content in the browser. Barebones CMS can eliminate the need for FTP clients and external text editors. That, in turn, can save time and money for businesses.

Barebones CMS is an open source product. It is dual-licensed under both the MIT and LGPL licenses and is free for both personal and commercial use. Financial donations to the project go toward future development.  Barebones CMS is available from barebonescms.com.

Power of ECM helps states control costs

Image via Wikipedia

Enterprise content management can help states meet constrained budget demands

ECM Plus – Enterprise content management will once again be an important means for state governments to control costs in tight budgetary times, according to a new list published by the National Association of State Chief Information Officers NASCIO.

Document, content and records/email management was ranked among the top ten tools identified by the CIOs surveyed.

The list, entitled ‘State CIO Priorities for 2011’ stated that the management of information and data will play an important role in helping state CIOs make their budgets.

It said that the management of information and data was a strategic priority for CIOs and also stated that digitalisation, storage, preservation policies and the subsequent search for that information would be essential for organisations.

“The economic crisis has made Enterprise Content Management (ECM) projects an important strategic priority for any IT department” commented Julio Olivares, CEO of DocPath Corp., a company specializing in manufacturing document software. “Its ability to automate tasks, increase the efficiency of internal processes and obtain a quick return on investment has been the key factors that have ensured the success of such projects.”

Despite cuts in IT budgets, more than 25 percent of organizations worldwide have chosen a project related to document technology in 2010, the report found.

DocPath said there were five ways that organisations can benefit from implementing ECM technology in 2011: increase productivity: One of the first consequences of an ECM project is the automation of processes that do not constitute the core of the company’s business, even though they might represent a high proportion of the company’s resource allocation. When automating these tasks, companies can expedite the internal organization and improve external response times.

Business managers are increasingly demanding that their systems departments adopt technologies that help them reduce costs. Document software allows companies to reduce printouts by 30 percent, release up to 99 percent of storage space and reduce excessive paper consumption and its associated costs.

 Securing information: Information is one of the main assets of any organization. Protecting it is essential to ensure the continuity of a company and prevent certain information from falling into the wrong hands. Document software technology allows the safeguarding of one of the most problematic issues regarding the security of an organization: the exchange of information with third parties and controlled access to documents of the company.

 Organisations and companies interact with their stakeholders through documents and it is that documentation, among other things, that helps to project an image and identity. With document software, organizations can design professional documents and then send them through various channels, thereby accelerating response times.

Rapid ROI: Document software projects can create a quick return on investment for any organization that adopts them. Initial results are visible within weeks and the up-front investment takes only a few months to be completely returned.

Sky’s the limit as celum lofts IV.8

celum's IMAGINE. Picture - samuel.calan

New version IV.8 proffers print and web enhancements, cloud offering

BY PAUL QUIGLEY

ECM Plus – Austrian digital media management specialist celum has just released Version IV.8 of IMAGINE, SWIFT, DYNAMO, and MOVIS, which now boasts Improved support for print and web assets, as well as greater user-friendliness, while also expanding functionality and integration, as well as support for third-party solutions,

celum DYNAMO’s content access API makes it possible to automate any digital content. It can be used in database publishing and to automatically generate documents from 3rd party systems.

“celum remote publishing solutions are renowned for controlling workflows and its user-friendly interface. Our web-to-print solution celum DYNAMO simplifies the process of editing layouts and ensures brand-compliant usage. Document creation, review and approval processes, as well as print jobs are all automatically started and controlled from a customized user interface”, states Michael J. Kraeftner, celum CEO. “We are proud to announce a set of important enhancements for brand and marketing automation with celum IV.8.”

MARMIND by UPPER Network, an online marketing project planning software, integrates with celum to make editing and distributing all kinds of digital media assets, from photos and graphics to videos and presentations, easier. With celum on board, MARMIND is the solution for all your marketing needs.

With celum IV.8, the HELIOS asset conversion integration brings important functionalities to pre-press production. IV.8 now supports even more formats and offers even more flexibility in the production of high-end output. The HELIOS integration also allows users to easily implement a clean color workflow and add digital watermarks to images.

Whether you need to share large EPS files or convert to other file formats, celum products ensure perfect results every time.

Unfortunately, using high resolution images online still seems to be unnecessarily expensive and time consuming. By integrating NeptuneLabs’ FSI Viewer, celum removed time and cost from the equation. celum users are now able to preview images in full resolution and can magnify image sections and objects from different angles, or even in different states, without needing to install a browser plug-in.

“celum desktop tools are indispensible when it comes to keeping down network traffic within your company. Everyone is used to dealing with long upload and download times; with celum desktop tools, speed and reliability improve significantly, saving you time and money”, Michael J. Kraeftner explains.
celum integrates seamlessly and completely in the most important desktop applications for creative processes─Adobe Photoshop, InDesign, Illustrator, QuarkXPress─as well as Microsoft Office. celum IV.8 also supports Adobe CS5 and MS Office 2010.

Integrating celum‘s IV.8 media asset management with Microsoft’s SharePoint 2010 gives users the best of both worlds. celum acts as the central digital asset receptacle for the office─through SharePoint─as well as for external agencies.

Reap the benefits of a user-friendly interface, adjustable user rights, management of high resolution images and 3D content, a clean color workflow, simple file conversion, a powerful web-to-print solution, and native integration with Adobe CS5, QuarkXPress and Microsoft Office 2010 by ordering celum IV.8 today! To see our software in action, request a web show at celum.com.

Michael Kräftner, CEO at celum said: “We are proud to be the first to offer a highly professional DAM solution, in the cloud, with no reduced functionality. damcloud.com is no austerity package: it gives you all the features expensive, locally installed software offers and is the perfect solution for temporary or location-independent projects.”

celum said: “With DAM in the cloud you avoid wasting time on system maintenance and enhancement. A software installation is no more necessary — damcloud.com is easily accessed through your web browser. Celum provides hassle-free, state-of-the-art technology so you can worry about more important things.

The company added: “You can modify your damcloud.com for optimal integration into individual work environments with up to four different modules. Allowing you to work on the go, upload images directly from Adobe Creative Suite, integrate rich content into your Microsoft Office documents, or benefit from controlled workflows. damcloud.com integrates perfectly into the latest office solutions, from Microsoft Sharepoint, to PIM and eCommerce.”

damcloud.com runs on cutting-edge, user-friendly celum technology, and at EUR 19.00 per user (I GB storage included). Monthly it can be customized to fit your needs – increase the amount of storage, add users, or activate new modules.

Identity Document Act kills ID Cards and NIR database

House of Lords consign ID cards and register to history. Picture: ZapTheDingbat

Last night in the Lords at 9.49 pm, Royal Assent was given to the Identity Documents Act.

All existing ID cards will now be cancelled within one month.

The National Identity Register, the database which contains the biographic and biometric fingerprint data of card holders, will also be destroyed within two months.

According to sources, this saves £835 million in planned future expenditure.

Clarion call for Digital Content Monetisation Show

DCM Europe 2011 – 24-26 January 2011, Millennium Gloucester Hotel, London

ECM Plus – Receive a 10% discount when you register with promotional code ‘ECM’. Register online at http://www.dcm-eu.com, call +44 20 7067 1867 or email info@dcm-eu.com

Digital Content Monetisation is the only event in Europe to focus on key changes you can make to your digital value chain to contribute to solid digital ROI.

Join over 114 senior experts from across TV, gaming, music, film, broadcasting, publishing, and sports to uncover successful strategies.

You’ll meet key speakers from content owners and media services including:
TV4, ITV, Bauer, Turner, Channel 4, SKAI, BSkyB, Warner Bros, Universal Pictures, LoveFILM, FilmFlex, News International, le Figaro, The Telegraph Group, The Guardian, Konami, Electronic Arts, SEGA, SCEE, Blitz Games, Penguin, Pan MacMillan, Random House, Real Madrid, Euroleague Basketball, WTA, Rugby Football League, Facebook, Mumsnet.com, Youtube, Spotify, SeeSaw and We7.

We have recently done a series of interviews with DCM speakers. Get an insight into what they have to say on the issues affecting media and content owners in monetising their content:

Henning Lindblad, VP Digital Marketing, WTA – discussing expanding the global reach of a sports brand, plus the critical role of social media in monetisation

Cosmo Lush, VP Digital Business Development, EMI Music – speaking about what devices excite him right now, how paywalls will revolutionise the way we pay for content and how the music industry has responded to piracy.

Trevor Albery, VP EMEA, Anti-Piracy Operations, Warner Bros – explaining how commercial, legal and anti-piracy teams can work together to combat illegal file-sharing.

Keep checking back as we will be adding more speaker interviews over the next few weeks.

You can also get a flavour for our DCM events by viewing video footage from our DCM New York event which took place in October. You can view – for free – the best panel sessions from the first day of the conference. This is a great opportunity to get your hands on some of the stories and tactics under discussion.

Register:

Online: http://www.dcm-eu.com
Email: info@dcm-eu.com
Tel: +44 (0)207 067 1867

www.dcm-eu.com

Iceland’s BrandRegard venture heralds spirit of Fjallkonan

Icelands's Fjallkonan

Icelandic new business venture fund invests in Transmit

BY PAUL QUIGLEY

ECM Plus – Icelandic New Business Venture Fund has invested in the software development company Transmit, and now owns 30.6% of the company.

According to the venture partners, Transmit’s aim is to become a market leader in providing on-demand software for managing digital marketing- and brand assets.

Transmit said its product, Brand Regard, is a web-based software solution that enables companies to maximize the potential of their most valuable asset: Their brand. It is a low cost, low risk brand asset management solution that helps companies convey their brand and make sure it is communicated effectively and consistently to its customers.

Helga Valfells, CEO of the New Business Venture Fund:
“We are very pleased with our investment in Transmit. We have much faith in the company and in the team behind Brand Regard. For us as investors, it is also very positive that Transmit has already made inroads in its marketing efforts in the UK which confirms both the market’s demand for their product and the company’s growth potential.”

Geir Freysson, CEO of Transmit added: “With Brand Regard, Transmit aims to seize a significant, new opportunity that has emerged in the digital asset management market. This investment in our company will allow us to move quickly in capitalizing this opportunity. We look forward to working with the New Business Venture Fund, and its involvement in our company is a great recognition in the progress we have already made.” 



PlaySpan partnes IP for content monetization

Image via CrunchBase

PlaySpan and IP Commerce touts payment method for digital content publishers

BY PAUL QUIGLEY

ECM Plus – IP Commerce is to join forces with PlaySpan, a Monetization-as-a-Service player in a new venture to deliver PlaySpan’s monetization solutions to both social and digital content developers via IP Commerce’s managed services platform.

According to IP, the partnership will also enable so-called ‘last-mile innovation’ for the $2.1 billion digital goods market for social and digital content developers to attract, convert and retain more customers by offering a large variety of secure and convenient in-app payment methods bundled within segment-specific Workflow.

Templates contain value-added services, modules and business rules enabled through IP’s managed services platform.

“The relationship with IP Commerce marks a significant merchant growth opportunity for PlaySpan’s Monetization-as-a-Service platform” commented Karl Mehta, CEO of PlaySpan. “Their established connectivity with leading acquirers and 360-degree platform approach allow us to immediately add valuable new distribution channels and fast-track strategic business agreements without technology lag times and associated costs.”

Alfred ‘Chip’ Kahn IV, CEO, IP Commerce added: “Our acquiring and processing partners are increasingly focused on targeted market segments because different software developers need different tools and Value-Add Services. PlaySpan’s pioneering approach and global reach into the digital goods segment, coupled with a growing demand for digital content monetization solutions, makes them the ideal partner to facilitate strong growth in this integrated payments market segment.”

PlaySpan said its monetization solutions is now used for more than 1,000 online games, social networks, and online videos. Their ‘Monetization-as-a-Service’ platform could also enables digital publishers and developers to generate new revenue streams and grow ARPU.

Its payments product, UltimatePay delivers over 85 global payment methods in 180 countries including credit cards, mobile payments and PlaySpan’s ULTIMATE GAME CARD, the multi-game pre-paid card available in over 50,000 retail locations across North America and a growing list of countries worldwide.

Image by Karl Mehta PlaySpan via CrunchBase

 

“PlaySpan’s pioneering approach and global reach into the digital goods segment, coupled with a growing demand for digital content monetization solutions, makes them the ideal partner to facilitate strong growth in this integrated payments market segment” added PlaySpan’s Mehta.

In the air tonight: WebDAV sees red

WebDAV does wireless OTA document management

MicaRed releases OverTheAir V1.4 WebDAV-based app

BY PAUL QUIGLEY

ECM Plus – MicaRed has just released OverTheAir 1.4, a WebDAV client for iPhone and iPad that supports AirPrint, iOS 4.2’s new feature that users can wirelessly print files with compatible printers.

According to MicaRed, OverTheAir is a file viewing app for iPhone and iPad that enables the viewing of files in cloud-based remote file sharing services, such as Dropbox and MobileMe, as well as WebDAV servers of businesses and individuals.

OverTheAir files can be viewed anywhere without a person’s own PC.

Version 1.4 supports AirPrint whereby users can print files they view via AirPrint compatible printers. OverTheAir is a free app and available through the App Store. OverTheAir supports iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch with iOS 3.0 or higher.

Top 5 trends for 2011 in mobility, cloud and content

Enterprise mobility moves content outside to the cloud

Mobile enterprise market in 2011 drives strategic business growth and brand loyalty;

BY PAUL QUIGLEY

ECM Plus – Mobile apps vendor Antenna has just published its ‘Top Five Trends’ for the mobile enterprise in 2011, with its predictions for the prevalence of mobility.

According to Antenna, the mobile enterprise market will significantly expand during 2011, driven by what is calls the continued ‘consumerisation’ of the enterprise and the proliferation of smarter mobile devices.

It said that businesses will make use of mobile and social technologies to provide instant gratification for users, offering ‘relevant information’ and dynamic content at the point of need.

Antenna also said this would see services and goods with deeper end user insight and a more personal touch, for what is dubs as ‘deploy happiness’ to ‘a world with increasingly connected, passionate and engaged employees and customers’.

The rationale for this, or ‘the foundation that underpins and enables these advancements’ as Antenna puts it, will be a so-called ‘mobile cloud’.

As IT organisations simplify the integration of mobile into existing technology infrastructure, choosing to ‘consume’ mobile applications and services in a hosted, on-demand model will be a key trend, Antenna claims,  rather than by building the mobile infrastructure and platform themselves.

Antenna said the top five mobile enterprise market trends will be:

1. Mobile is the Mortar
Many industry analysts predict smartphone sales will eclipse PC sales by 2012. Tablets such as the iPad, those powered by Android, and soon RIM’s PlayBook are being adopted at unprecedented rates. Antenna has already seen a sharp uptake in enterprise tablet interest, and 2011 will prove to be the first year of significant tablet deployment, which will likely come at the expense of laptops. The mobile channel will become seamless, as enterprises integrate mobility with their ‘bricks and clicks’ operations. Mobility is not a separate channel but one that has the unique ability to drive new growth to Web and physical storefronts, augmenting growth, driving new revenues, and deepening customer relationships with the brand.

2. The Mobile Cloud Reigns
Cloud-based mobility (a set of hosted services, typically powered by a mobile enterprise application platform or MEAP) will allow businesses and service providers to offer a ‘switch in the cloud,’ enabling them to build, publish, manage and secure mobile apps and content and scale mobility projects much more rapidly and cost effectively. As mobile apps proliferate for employees, customers and partners, enterprises will look to deploy their own branded app stores for greater application management, control and protection of the brand.

3. Mobile Commerce Ka-Chings
In almost every industry, but especially in retail, mobile apps will enable mobile commerce to flourish. Businesses must get up close and personal with their users, understand their exact needs in real time and deliver incentives and information to get consumers into the stores and to drive them to make purchases on websites. Mobile apps that seamlessly integrate collaborative technologies, contextual and location-based information, and rich content will generate new commercial revenue streams. In addition, business intelligence, monitored and acted upon in real time, will become a key piece of the 2011 landscape as part of mobile commerce growth.

4. Mobile Marketing with Meaning
Truly hundreds of thousands of mobile apps now occupy the “appmosphere,” and the number is growing at an exponential rate. In 2010, Antenna observed a key shift: Mobile users are no longer defined purely as workers, consumers, customers or partners – they are people. To thrive in the new era of mobile marketing, which will ramp up significantly in 2011, organisations must dive into the exciting discipline of intelligently interacting with mobile users and engaging with them in more meaningful ways that make their lives just a little bit easier.

5. Mobile Apps in More Flavours; Mobile Content and HTML5 on the Rise
Natively-built mobile apps will continue to grow, but app and content consumption via mobile Web browsers will also become a key component of a comprehensive enterprise mobility strategy. Pure Web or ‘thin client’ apps rely on a constant wireless connection to access content, in contrast to thick client native apps which retain data locally allowing the user to continue to work in the event of signal loss. ‘Rich apps’ that straddle this divide will become more common in 2011 as HTML5-enabled browsers become widely available. Utilising the HTML5 specification, companies can offer the best of both worlds via HTML5 apps that combine the “write once, deploy to many” capabilities of Web-based apps with the offline data access and rich UI of the native app.

However, enterprise mobile strategy in 2011 must incorporate the growth in HTML5 apps, Antenna stated, with multimedia content and mobile web usage ensuring a well-managed and secure environment exists for their deployment and use, it added.

“As businesses enter the new decade and younger people continue to shape consumer and enterprise behaviour, mobile is hands down where to invest for accelerated innovation, brand differentiation, and real shareholder value,” said Jim Hemmer, President and CEO of Antenna. “It’s a hugely exciting time and Antenna is committed to delivering innovative solutions that help our customers get ahead of the latest technology, develop trendsetting apps that spread happiness, and deliver measurable value to all businesses.”

Amazon and WikiLeaks: Online speech is only as strong as the weakest intermediary

Image by Aldaron via Flickr

by Rainey Reitman and Marcia Hofmann

The First Amendment to the Constitution guarantees freedom of expression against government encroachment — but that doesn’t help if the censorship doesn’t come from the government.

The controversial whistle-blower website WikiLeaks, which has begun to publish a trove of over 250,000 classified diplomatic cables, found itself kicked off of Amazon’s servers earlier this week. WikiLeaks had apparently moved from a hosting platform in Sweden to the cloud hosting services available through Amazon in an attempt to ward off ongoing distributed denial of service attacks.

According to Amazon, WikiLeaks violated the site’s terms of service, resulting in Amazon pulling the plug on hosting services. However, news sources have also reported that Amazon cut off WikiLeaks after being questioned by members of the staff of Senate Homeland Security Committee Chairman Joe Lieberman. While it’s impossible to know whether or not Amazon’s decision was directly caused by the call from the senator’s office, we do know that Lieberman has proposed “anti-WikiLeaks legislation” and that he has a history of pushing for online censorship in the name of “security.”

Importantly, the government itself can’t take official action to silence WikiLeaks’ ongoing publications –  that would be an unconstitutional prior restraint, or censorship of speech before it can be communicated to the public. No government actor can nix WikiLeaks’ right to publish content any more than the government could stop the New York Times and Washington Post from publishing the Pentagon Papers, which were also stolen secret government documents.

But a web hosting company isn’t the government. It’s a private actor and it certainly can choose what to publish and what not to publish. Indeed, Amazon has its own First Amendment right to do so. That makes it all the more unfortunate that Amazon caved to unofficial government pressure to squelch core political speech. Amazon had an opportunity to stand up for its customer’s right to free expression. Instead, Amazon ran away with its tail between its legs.

In the end, it’s not just WikiLeaks that suffers from corporate policies that suppress free speech, here on matters of intense public importance. It’s also readers, who lose out on their First Amendment right to read the information WikiLeaks publishes. And it’s also the other Internet speakers who can’t confidently sign up for Amazon’s hosting services without knowing that the company has a history of bowing to pressure to remove unpopular content.

Today Amazon sells many things, but its roots are in books, which historically have been a lightning rod for political censorship campaigns. These campaigns tried and failed to suppress Allen Ginsberg’s Howl, Nabokov’s Lolita, and even Orwell’s 1984. And it’s the book industry – including writers, publishers, booksellers and libraries – that has championed the rights of readers and helped America maintain a proud history of free speech in the written word, even when faced with physical danger.

While it’s frustrating to think of any hosting provider cutting services to a website because it considers the content too politically volatile or controversial, it’s especially disheartening to see Amazon knuckle under to pressure from a single senator. Other Internet intermediaries should now expect to receive a phone call when some other member of Congress is unhappy with speech they are hosting. After all, it worked on Amazon.

consolio enters ECM consultancy market

Image by mimax via Flickr

National enterprise content management practice dedicated ECM team taps expertise, custom application development capabilities for document management

BY PAUL QUIGLEY

ECM Plus – consilium1 has launched its new Enterprise Content Management (ECM) Practice Group to help enterprise clients in the private sector, such as insurance, financial, legal and healthcare – as well as the public sector/government.

The firm hopes to help prospective ECM users manage their information and to comply with new government-driven regulations.

It said the creation of a dedicated ECM group was on account of experience in the implementation of ECM projects. The firm added it would also provide a team of professionals with expertise in a variety of ECM solutions.

“As we continue to help shape the industry with a number of successful and innovative ECM implementations, we feel it’s the perfect time to launch a dedicated national practice group to support our efforts in the ECM space”

Performing complicated consolidations from disparate ECM systems, consilium1 is able to leverage its proven process methodologies and custom tool suites to successfully migrate content for clients, typically ahead of schedule. Based on a client’s individual needs, consilium1 provides custom solutions that greatly increase service levels, eliminate a substantial amount of licensing and operating costs, and generate a significant ROI within the first year.

consilium1 is partners with a number of ECM vendors, such as Alfresco, Documentum, Livelink, SharePoint and FileNet.

It uses a proprietary phased-engagement model that delivers significant operational efficiencies for clients. Providing a range of complete end-to-end services that include design consultation, implementation, application migration and data migration, the consilium1 ECM practice group also develops custom applications to streamline document migration and achieve an easier and more efficient ECM transition.

This experience and expertise allows the consilium1 Enterprise Content Management Group to evaluate an organization’s specific challenges and recommend the best solution for their business.

“As we continue to help shape the industry with a number of successful and innovative ECM implementations, we feel it’s the perfect time to launch a dedicated national practice group to support our efforts in the ECM space,” said Mike Brady, consilium1’s vice president of professional services. “Our proven tools and best practice methodologies allow us to guarantee cost efficiencies for our clients that are not offered anywhere else in the industry.”

Plextor proffers PX-NAS4 in network attached storage foray

Visual differentiation of NAS vs. SAN use

Secure, Safe & Speedy: The Plextor PX-NAS4 Device

BY PAUL QUIGLEY

ECM Plus – Plextor has just launched the PX-NAS4 network-attached storage (NAS) device for high-performance digital media offering massive storage capacity with fast data access, high security and reliability.

The PX-NAS4 offers high security, excellent reliability and massive storage space

The new NAS box also features dual LAN ports for faster data access and has up to 8 Terabytes of storage capacity across 4 Hot-Swappable drive bays.

Plextor said the new NAS was DNLA 1.5 Compliant and features iSCSI for network sharing, secure data with password protection and encryption, as well as multiple disk configurations, and, a spare bay for replacement if a disk fails

The PX-NAS4 also has a snapshot backup utility which provides for mirror-image back-ups of data.

As far as data access and sharing across networks is concerned, the PX-NAS4 boasts dual-LAN ports to deliver a massive bandwidth with data access speeds of up to 2Gbps. The device will enable digital media to be shared or streamed to compatible devices, with a suitable router connection.

With the added convenience of iSCSI, the PX-NAS4 can also be used for sharing and supporting network storage over existing installations.

Using four hot-swap drive bays, the PX-NAS4 offers 8TB of data storage space and can be expanded using the built-in 2 x eSATA and 2 x USB ports for external hard drive connections.

Plextor said that data stored on the PX-NAS4 is secure from unwanted access via password-protection and advanced volume encryption using AES 256 encryption. Added back-up options include multiple disk configurationsm, such as RAID5 or RAID10. The Sot Backup Utility is bundled with the device, offering backup which that takes a mirror-image of the current state of the NAS, to protect and safeguard data.

For more details see www.plextor.com

Magnolia launches multi-lingual open source CMS

Grand Old Magnolia Tree. Picture: Lisi

Magnolia CMS 4.4 Empowers Enterprise Web Authors

ECM Plus – Open source content management vendor Magnolia has released CMS 4.4, with tools for enterprise web authors to collaborate in multi-lingual sites.

According to the company, new features include collaboration controls to coordinate concurrent editing activities, convenient source language export and re-import of translated content, and multi-step forms that enable visitors to step forward and backward without losing their data.

V4.4 provides dependency management of content elements to assure that required data from various sources will be available when the page is published, non-immediate deletions so that an author can easily restructure a site and activate changes only once all activities are done, workflow controls for approval of deletions and undos, redlining to compare page versions, and web-based spell checker support.

Boris Kraft, Magnolia CTO said: “Previous enhancements had been aimed at developers using our templates to create custom solutions, and administrators setting up sites in multiple languages. This final rollout of our development cycle will have an even greater payback, by allowing enterprise content authors to collaborate in the efficient, cost-effective creation and translation of high-quality sites.”

V4.4 is available for immediate download. Both the Community and Enterprise editions of Magnolia CMS 4.4 are available for download immediately. The Community Edition is a free open source download. Pricing for the Enterprise Edition, which includes additional features for large organizations, together with professional service and support, starts at $12,000 USD.

Dolan quaffs DataStream Content

XML - eXtensible Markup Language

XML markup data goes from unstructured to ‘smarter’ forms

ECM Plus – Dolan Company has acquired DataStream Content Solutions. which sells federal legislative and regulatory data and advanced content management systems to information businesses, publishers and governments.

According to Dolan, DataStream’s proprietary processes and technology transform highly-complex and unstructured data into valuable products and services for its business and government clients.

The acquired firm specialises in applying XML markup language to convert complex and unstructured data into ‘smarter’ forms, enabling flexible queries and dynamic database updates, Dolan said.

Dolan added that DataStream’s proprietary business lines include Legislative Impact and Regulatory Impact, as well as data management technologies which facilitate searching vast federal databases.

The firm also said they were licensed to business clients and to the U.S. House of Representatives Office of Legislative Counsel.

The company also offers other data management, conversion and analytic tools and services. Subsidiary Potomac Publishing was included in the acquisition.

Dolan said its target markets have been government, legislative and regulatory sectors.

DataStream will continue to be run by its founder and president, Mark Anstey, and its chief information architect, Ed Schulke. Both will report to The Dolan Company’s Business Information Division Executive Vice President Mark Stodder. DataStream will remain in its College Park, Maryland, offices, Stodder said.

Sad Anstey: It’s an exciting fit between our technological approach to government information and Dolan’s ability to market high-value business information and intelligence.”

DataStream’s company’s Professional Services Division provides specialised outsourced services to the legal profession through three subsidiaries. NDeX is a provider of mortgage default processing services in the US; DiscoverReady provides outsourced discovery management and document review services to major companies and their law firms; Counsel Press is the nation’s largest provider of appellate services to the legal community.