Frequently asked questions
Have a question about Document ONE? You might find the answer below. If not, please feel free to contact us.
Q: How many staff will I need to keep Document ONE running on a day-to-day basis?
A: Hardly any, once the libraries are set up and user training is completed. The user(s) that you assign to the role of 'Library Manager' will undertake all of the 'top level' tasks associated with Document ONE, e.g. creating new libraries, maintaining file classification schemes, etc. Generally this is not a full time job - but it will depend on the size of your organisation.
You might assign some staff members to roles such as 'Folder Maintainer', or you may choose to have the Library Manager undertake these functions as well as their standard library management functions.
Q: Can Document ONE scale to meet the needs of my organisation as it grows?
A: Yes. Document ONE has a flexible architecture which enables you to create as many document libraries as you need.
Q: Is it possible to specify custom metadata in search criteria when searching for documents?
A: Yes, but only when searching within a single library. This is because custom metadata can vary from library to library.
Q: Can we capture non-Notes emails (e.g. Outlook, Groupwise) into Document ONE?
A: Yes, but only via a manual copy-and-paste process. We are planning to look at an interface between Outlook and Document ONE soon that would enable Outlook users to file their emails into Document ONE libraries in the same way that users of Notes email can.
Q: Can we use Document ONE as our email archiving solution?
A: Document management systems like Document ONE are designed to complement email archiving systems, as their purpose is quite different.
The purpose of a document management system is to enable users to share information, including business-related emails, and to store descriptive information about all captured documents and emails so that users can find and retrieve them more easily. The purpose of an email archiving system is to ensure that any email, whether business-related or not, can be retrieved if needed for legal purposes.
The following table summarises the key differences:
Document Management Systems | Email Archiving Systems |
|
Users make a conscious decision about which emails to capture. |
All emails are captured automatically. |
|
Emails are filed in a folder in a document library that relates to their subject matter, and have metadata recorded to further describe them. |
Emails are captured in a single repository with no supporting information to describe them. |
|
Captured emails can be viewed by multiple users. |
Users can see only their own emails - only authorised users can see all emails. |
Email archiving solutions which complement Document ONE include:
Q: Does the Lotus Notes mail template need to be customised in order to file emails into Document ONE?
A: Yes. If you use a standard version of the Lotus Notes mail template, then we will provide you with a customised version of this mail template. When new versions of Lotus Notes are released, we will provide you with an updated copy of the mail template.
If your organisation uses a customised version of the Lotus Notes mail template, then we will provide you with the code and instructions required to implement the Document ONE email filing functionality into your own version of the mail template, or alternatively we can do this for you, if you prefer.
Q: Can users capture documents directly into Document ONE from external applications like Word & Excel?
A: Not directly - currently they need to save their new document or spreadsheet onto a local or shared drive, and then go into Document ONE and add it into the Document ONE library. However a Desktop Enabler that will enable users to save documents into Document ONE libraries directly from Word or Excel is in the process of being developed.
Q: How is archiving achieved within Document ONE?
A: There are several mechanisms in Document ONE for archiving.
Any folder can have a retention code applied to it to indicate how long the folder should be kept active, when it should be moved into off-site storage, and when it should be destroyed. This assists the Library Manager to identify folders (and the documents within those folders) that can be safely archived.
Both documents and folders can be moved from one library to another. Therefore if a particular library is getting large and unwieldy, the Library Manager can move the most current documents and/or folders to a new library.
Any library can be flagged as Inactive (i.e. archived). Such libraries can continue to be made available to your users for reference purposes (for example, documents in these libraries can still be retrieved via a Search), but users are prevented from adding any new documents into them.
Inactive libraries can be transferred onto an archive medium (such as a CD or tape) so that they are kept for historical purposes only, and are not available for users to search through on a day-to-day basis. These libraries can be very simply restored to the Document ONE system.
Q: Is there any physical limit on the size of a Document ONE library?
A: No. The only size restriction on a Document ONE library is where the operating system itself places a size restriction on the size of a Lotus Notes database (e.g. in some earlier versions of Windows, a single Lotus Notes database could not exceed 4GB in size).
Today most operating systems do not place size restrictions on the size of a Lotus Notes database. However it should be noted that the more documents a single database holds, the slower the performance of that database will be.
We recommend that a pragmatic approach is taken so that if the performance of an individual library starts to deteriorate, action is taken to either move some documents to another library, or to flag the original library as 'Inactive' (i.e. archived) and create a new library.
Q: Is Document ONE ODMA-enabled?
No. However a Desktop Enabler that will enable users to save documents into Document ONE libraries directly from Word or Excel is in the process of being developed using a COM interface.
Q: Does Document ONE support document locking across Lotus Domino servers?
A: No. Document ONE has document locking functionality which ensures that a user cannot edit a document which another user has open for editing, provided that both users are accessing Document ONE on the same Lotus Domino server.Document ONE does not prevent a document being opened for editing by more than one user in the situation where these users are accessing the document on different Lotus Domino servers (e.g. in different geographical locations).
