January 20, 2010 at 05:14Alfresco integrates its solutions with IBM Lotus
Alfresco has posted on its website a short demo video of the new Content Services for Lotus solution. The system is designed to manage content directly from Lotus Quickr, Lotus Notes, and Lotus Connections. Beta should be released in February, at the moment, Lotus users have access to a technical preview (simple registration is required), moreover, as an implementation on AWS.
In general, the just released version of Alfresco Enterprise Edition 3.2 supports “communal” use, i.e. clearly targets cloud implementations. Knowing the long history of support for open source solutions and their commercial enterprise versions by IBM, we can assume that Alfresco Content Services for Lotus will promote (at least) in the private clouds that IBM builds for its customers. This is very good for Alfresco: FOSS developers themselves are not rich, but in tandems with majors (especially iron ones) it is much more realistic for them to increase their income. Alfresco itself has few corporate customers so far - with 2 million free downloads of corporate projects so far there are only about a thousand. But IBM customers are much more likely to subscribe to services, which is the main source of income for FOSS companies. And, of course, if Alfresco, as a commercial entity, begins to live better, the community of the same name will not disappear.
For IBM, such collaboration means one more step towards small and medium businesses. The company has its own content management system, FileNet Content Manager. But it, as is often the case with its own IBM products, is focused on mega-corporations. Not everyone needs this, especially from those customers who choose, for example, between Lotus and SharePoint. Now IBM will be able to offer SMB companies an easier solution, and if there is also a cloud implementation, then it will be very profitable for the price. However, the specifics of prices / offers can be understood no earlier than spring. But for Alfresco you can already rejoice.
In general, the just released version of Alfresco Enterprise Edition 3.2 supports “communal” use, i.e. clearly targets cloud implementations. Knowing the long history of support for open source solutions and their commercial enterprise versions by IBM, we can assume that Alfresco Content Services for Lotus will promote (at least) in the private clouds that IBM builds for its customers. This is very good for Alfresco: FOSS developers themselves are not rich, but in tandems with majors (especially iron ones) it is much more realistic for them to increase their income. Alfresco itself has few corporate customers so far - with 2 million free downloads of corporate projects so far there are only about a thousand. But IBM customers are much more likely to subscribe to services, which is the main source of income for FOSS companies. And, of course, if Alfresco, as a commercial entity, begins to live better, the community of the same name will not disappear.
For IBM, such collaboration means one more step towards small and medium businesses. The company has its own content management system, FileNet Content Manager. But it, as is often the case with its own IBM products, is focused on mega-corporations. Not everyone needs this, especially from those customers who choose, for example, between Lotus and SharePoint. Now IBM will be able to offer SMB companies an easier solution, and if there is also a cloud implementation, then it will be very profitable for the price. However, the specifics of prices / offers can be understood no earlier than spring. But for Alfresco you can already rejoice.