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Alfresco

Score9.1 out of 10

74 Reviews and Ratings

What is Alfresco?

The Alfresco platform, from Hyland, delivers comprehensive cloud-native content services. It is used to intelligently activate processes and content to accelerate the flow of business.

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Top Performing Features

  • Content search & retrieval

    Helps users find the content they are looking for. Various methods for assistance include filters, tags, metadata, and the like.

    Category average: 8.1

  • Content capture & imaging

    The system supports the digitization of content.

    Category average: 8.6

  • File sync, storage & archiving

    Storage system for long-term preservation & retention of content in an organized fashion; foundational to the ECM.

    Category average: 8.6

Areas for Improvement

  • Content publishing & creation

    Supports the publishing of content to web pages or other avenues leading out of the enterprise.

    Category average: 7.7

  • Mobile support

    Repository access from mobile devices

    Category average: 7.5

  • Artificial intelligence

    Artificial intelligence and natural language processing help automate document classification

    Category average: 6.5

Alfresco is still the best ECM for customization and easy of use.

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

<div>We use Alfresco to manage all the documentation we digitize from our customers. With Alfresco is easy to store it, sort and then search for it.</div><div>

</div><div>Being Open Source makes it very customizable, so we can adapt to our customers demand, that are very unique and we we're not able to do with other ECM solutions.</div>

Pros

  • Storing documentation
  • Full-text search engine
  • Automate record lifecycle
  • Creating rules for documents and folders
  • Highly Customizable

Cons

  • ACA interface is very lacking
  • APS could have a fully Open Source version
  • Deprecation of important features in Community edition

Return on Investment

  • We were able to save money by only needing to use 1 platform to serve our customers
  • The Community version is free to use
  • We charge our customers for customization so this greatly boosted our sales.

Usability

Alternatives Considered

Nextcloud

Other Software Used

GLPI, Nextcloud, Zabbix, Grafana, AWS Backup, Windows Server, Ubuntu, NGINX, Apache Solr, PostgreSQL, MariaDB Platform, pfSense, Microsoft SQL Server, Hyper-V, KeePass

Alfresco Activiti - The most advanced, rich in features and easily integrated BPMN tool

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Alfresco Activiti is used as a BPMN modeling tool. Around 1000+ business process models are created using the same tool and [are] deployed. For the different types of requests, the respective workflows are invoked and manual tasks are created for various roles. Along with manual handling of tasks the auto-escalation and auto-close features are also used.

Pros

  • Creates tasks based on the roles configured in workflow
  • Tasks can be auto-escalated and auto-closed based on timer configuration
  • From workflows the external APIs can be invoked

Cons

  • REST calls should be improved in terms of configuration like scheduling the API call
  • No option to invoke legacy SOAP Apis
  • Even for minor issues the entire BPMN model needs to be shared with support team
  • The documentation needs a lot of improvement especially for activiti micro service adoption

Return on Investment

  • Needed manual tasks creation and escalation, it provided the solution
  • Easy integration with the tool from various micro-services
  • Documentation and deployment needs improvement

Alternatives Considered

Oracle BPM Suite, Camunda Platform and IBM Business Process Manager

Other Software Used

Oracle BPM Suite

Usability

UI dampens otherwise great versatility

Pros

  • Document storage with metadata
  • Document versioning
  • Document workflow
  • Check-on and Check-out
  • Rest API for integrations
  • Easy customization
  • Fine-grain-level role and permission
  • Vibrant community support

Cons

  • User interface is not intituve
  • Customization of user interface
  • Dependency on partner solution for common use cases like content capturing and imaging (e.g., OCR).

Return on Investment

  • Open-source production with vibrant community support
  • Cost effective compared to many proprietary CMS solutions
  • Customizations are possible; therefore, it can me utilized with many possible ways of integrating it with other ecosystems.

Usability

Other Software Used

MS SharePoint, Slack, OpenText Enterprise Content Management (ECM)

WHY ALFRESCO!!!!

Pros

  • Document management i.e. it promotes a paperless office
  • Cloud solution i.e. ability to access content outside your work zone
  • Collaborative web content
  • It also brings content and process together

Cons

  • Ability to scan directly using Alfresco scan features
  • Ability to integrate with social network platform.. i.e. upload and share to Facebook or Instagram
  • Interface should be much more user-friendly and light

Return on Investment

  • Reduce the stress of [making] several copies of paper
  • It transferred the captured document to the proper department
  • Reduce employment rate

Other Software Used

MS SharePoint, Dropbox, CTERA Enterprise File Sync & Share

Content Orchestration and Automation

Pros

  • Archival and search and retrieval functionalities.
  • Organization and metadata applications for content processes and orchestration.
  • Scaling to serve more use cases and larger content stores and archives, as well as migration to the cloud/hosted environments.

Cons

  • Alfresco Process Services and Alfresco Application Development Framework integration makes for best functionality/application of ECM.
  • Use case alignment - Marketing content and documentation of specific business requirements and user stories being available as reference material/documentation.
  • Integration with multiple silos for content.

Return on Investment

  • End-to-end content process solutions.
  • Automated process-flows.
  • Ability to find and orchestrate content assets.

Alternatives Considered

Liferay Digital Experience Platform (DXP)