IBM Content Manager leverages IBM’s core software technologies to deliver an enterprise class, industrial strength solution. IBM Content Manager is built on and includes the following software components and features:

• IBM WebSphere Application Server provides the capability to manage applications, access, and transactions. The resource manager is implemented as a Java2 Enterprise Edition (J2EE®) Web application and requires the WebSphere Application Server as its J2EE compliant application server. Users and processes on a wide variety of platforms can interact by using the facilities provided by WebSphere Application Server.
• DB2 Universal Database™ provides comprehensive metadata management, access control, and search capabilities to enable rapid content location and delivery. Some content solutions do not provide a database for metadata management or require you to procure licenses.
• Tivoli® Storage Manager boasts a wide range of supported storage devices and provides hierarchical storage management for the content repository. It allows you to store objects, long term, on a storage device other than fixed disks attached to the resource manager.
• IBM Content Manager OnDemand processes print output from application programs, extracting index fields from the output data, and then stores the extracted index information in a relational database and one or more copies of the data in the system.

Installable on Microsoft® Windows®, AIX®, Solaris, Linux®, and z/OS®, IBM Content Manager provides a complete solution to the problem of storing and retrieving documents in almost any format.

Workflow

Workflow is included with, and built into the IBM Content Manager server. It is considered "document-centric" meaning the document, or folder of documents, is central to the process and all of its work tasks. The work is done within the document environment.

This tight integration supports the high performance of the routing engine with little overhead and maintains a single, common security model. It also means content in workflow can draw directly on other content manager services such as information lifecycle management and records management. A change in the workflow state by flagging content to become a business record, for example, will automatically modify document access and retention rules.

IBM Content Manager provides document routing capabilities such as parallel and serial processing models, decision and collection points and automatic branching. The comprehensive Document Routing API is available to programmers through C++ or Java™ and has a Web Services interface.

Defining document routing processes is made easier with Content Manager's workflow builder. A simple, graphical, drag-and-drop interface is used to build processes that run in the Content Manager environment. From simple sequential tasks to sophisticated process modeling, the graphical builder makes it straightforward to include any Content Manager document routing construct in your process and speeding the time to deployment. Below is a sample workflow constructed from the workflow builder.

Security

In many enterprises, it is desirable to have a single point of user ID administration, usually accomplished by using Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP). IBM Content Manager system can integrate with an existing LDAP and automatically import user IDs and group definitions. This allows enterprise-wide maintenance of all user IDs and eases IBM Content Manager user account management. This feature enables security, with controlled access to virtually any or all components of the IBM Content Manager system.

IBM Content Manager provides two types of single sign-on capabilities for two environments (Web and desktop):

• Single sign-on through WebSphere Application Server security
• Single sign-on through database authentication

Availability

IBM Content Manager supports the ability to recover from unexpected failures and provides high availability features within the product. The product features alone are typically not enough to achieve true high availability for most implementations. This makes the integrated capabilities of the DB2 relational database, WebSphere Application Server, and Tivoli Storage Manager important.

To support high availability, the DB2 Content Manager infrastructure leverages a traditional n-tier architecture comprised of multiple components. With its multi-tiered infrastructure, DB2 Content Manager can inherently contribute to availability by segregating functions, allowing for increased redundancy, failover load balancing, process isolation, increased scalability, and simplified management among components.

Web Services

Web services are a standards-based mechanism for accessing a system using XML-based messaging over a messaging bus based on the HTTP protocol. IBM Content Manager provides a self-contained, self-describing modular Web services interface.

You can use this interface within your applications with other Web services or in complex business processes to seamlessly access stored items. IBM Content Manager delivers a set of out-of-the-box Web services operations, such as:

• Support that leverages the power of WebSphere Application Server
• Java stack for remote access functionality and semantics
• Web services interface that allows dynamic integration with applications regardless of their programming language or platform

Some key features of the Web services interface include:

• Support for .NET client applications, including support for Direct Internet Message Encapsulation (DIME) attachments
• Support for Java and J2EE client applications, including support for MIME attachments
• Support for automatically generating Web Services Description Language (WSDLs) specific to your system
• Support for all core content and document routing functions