Bits 'n' PCs

THE BRITISH COUNCIL, the government-backed agency that promotes relationships between the UK and other countries, is launching a new website every two weeks. The Council's goal is that by the end of 2003 most of its 109 global learning resource and information sites will go ‘live’.

British Council has two key objectives that will be reflected in the new websites: one is to connect people worldwide with UK learning opportunities and creative ideas, and the other is to promote and communicate a positive image of the UK. By improving the quality of content, it hopes that the websites will be viewed as more useful and encourage a greater number of visitors to the UK. So far, the British Council has launched country- specific websites for the UK, France, Australia, India, and most recentlyJapan. Countries earmarked for new websites next year include Singapore, Italy, Indonesia, South and North America and five countries in southern Africa.

Obtree was chosen because of its robust content management solution and multilingual capability. This was essential due to the variety of languages published on the sites. For example, in the Arabic language the menus and text language need to read from right to left and this can be especially challenging compared with conventional web pages. Ease-of-use in configuring web pages and integration with current technology were also important.

With the launch of the new websites, authors around the world will be able to make changes to the content in a timely manner, ensuring up-to-date information is always provided on learning opportunities in the UK. Already, up to ten authors in Japan are updating content to the newly-launched Japanese website.

Supporting one of British Council's most demanding needs—multilingual capabilities, ase of configuration for multiple websites, languages and channels— means that each website will be written in English and the native language. Obtree's object-orientated approach to data means that British Council can deliver content that is separated from the corporate standard ‘look and feel’ and therefore facilitates local and international consistency.

British Council, 10 Spring Gardens, London SW1A 2BN. Tel: +44 (0) 20 7930 8466; fax: +44 (0) 20 7839 6347; e-mail: general.enquiries@britishcouncil.org; www.britishcouncil.org

Obtree Technologies Inc, Global HQ, Peter Merian-Str. 80, Postfach CH-4002, Basel, Switzerland. Tel: +41 (0) 61 278 96 96; fax: +41 (0) 61 278 96 97; www.obtree.com. UK: 2530 The Quadrant, Aztec West, Almondsbury, Bristol BS32 4AW. Tel: 0870 124 8755; fax: 0870 124 8799.

DOCUMENTUM, provider of enterprise content management (ECM), undertook four acquisitions in the past year or so: Bulldog (December 2001) for digital asset management, Boxcar (January 2002) for aggregation, eRoom (October 2002) for collaboration, and TrueArc, a leading records management company.
Simultaneously, IBM was making an acquisition of records management company, Tarian, showing the consolidation of the ECM market and the commitment towards compliance from key ECM players.
Compliance is a big issue and is likely to become even larger following the Sarbanes-Oxley act in the US. Because so many global companies are based in the US, regardless of individual country rulings, most global companies will end-up adopting the act as 'best practice' . The key to compliance is being able to prove corporate retention schedules, and have retention rules that enable content to be securely archived and stored.

Documentum Software Europe Ltd, 5 Roundwood Avenue, Stockley Park Business Centre, Uxbridge, Middx. UB11 lNZ. Tel: 020 8867 3000; fax: 020 8867 3030; www.documentum.com

IMSCAN SYSTEMS, provider of interactive electronic document management systems, has announced the release of a new version of its routing engine, IMSCAN Routing Manager which increases the productivity of business processes by controlling the movement of documents.

Designing the new version of the IMSCAN Routing Manager, IMSCAN took on board many observations offered by end users working in purchase ledger environments, an area particularly popular with the existing routing module. Many new features specific to this business area have gone into the new release, including authorisation enhancements, expanded notes usage, new delivery rules and enhanced interface.

Nolan Salmon, IMSCAN System’s Marketing Manager, comments, “Simplifying automation for the user has always been a goal that we have been striving for. It is something that our end users want and with this new version of IMSCAN Routing Manager we have achieved a higher level of simplicity. For example, a user on the network can be notified of the arrival of relevant documents by a simple pop-up window on his/her desktop. The user can then perform a variety of tasks with the document, including authorisation, checking for accuracy and comparing with an associated document. Once the task is complete the document can be passed on to the next stage via IMSCAN or even via email, fax or post.”

Imscan Systems Ltd, Yew Tree Court, Risley, Warrington, Ches. WA3 6WP. Tel: 01925 761000; fax: 01925 766334; www.imscan.net; e-mail: sales@imscan.co.uk.

TOPLEVEL OFFICEFORMS, an intelligent e-forms solution, has been chosen by Adullam Homes Housing Association to provide their internal users with intelligent electronic forms. An initial pilot scheme will focus on internal administrative forms.

Adullam has over 200 employees and currently processes around 100 expense applications and 200-300 purchase orders a month. The purchase orders are for a variety of project needs ranging from refurbishing a house to buying office equipment. The current processing of these forms is labour intensive and therefore expensive. By implementing and routing these documents as OfficeForms, Adullam can gain cost savings through increased data accuracy and reduced administrative effort. Toplevel will provide Adullam with an OfficeForms Form Designer and the training and services to enable them to create their own intelligent e-forms quickly and easily.

Adullam Homes Housing Association provides housing with support for around 700 vulnerable people in the Midlands, the north-west, Shropshire and Merseyside. Among them are young care-leavers, people with learning difficulties and those living with HIV. The projects are supported by a number of organisations including the Housing Corporation, local authorities, probation services and social services along with a number of other trusts. Adullam has developed its own housing and support standards (reflecting current good practice and legislation) that cover the association’s housing and support services.

Toplevel has also announced OfficeForms Version 5. New features include increased user-friendliness in making e-forms a useful tool to deal with external service users. For example, for organisations that publish OfficeForms e-forms on their websites, a new intelligent web applet can forms-enable the web user’s browsers when they go to the site thus minimising the support needed by service users and maximising ease of use.

OfficeForms Version 5.0 now incorporates HTML support which enables users to access forms through all platforms and a range of technologies including DTV and PDA’s.

Flexible distribution options for OfficeForms enables the sending of a pre-filled or partially filled e-form to another person, at the click of a button. Even recipients outside the organisation can receive, view/print or complete the form which is ideal for sending out copies of purchase orders electronically or jointly completing application forms with another party. The Version 5.0 Progress Feedback feature will minimise queries from external service users (to call centres and staff) regarding the progress of such documents by providing automatic feedback as their forms are processed.

For those customers who use e-process roles there is a cloning function which simplifies set-up and management of roles so that staff re-organisation can be quickly reflected in the software.

Toplevel Computing Ltd, Bath Road Trading Estate, Stroud, Glos. . GL5 3QF. Tel: 01453 753955; fax: 01453 753933; e-mail: nicky_mikulla@toplev.com; www.toplev.com

KCENTRIX SOFTWARE, a provider of knowledge sharing solutions that exploit and increase the value of corporate know-how through self-help knowledge portals, has recently unveiled ActiveProcedure, an interactive system to guide users through the appropriate application of corporate procedure.

As organisations compete in increasingly regulated and litigious environments, regulations or business procedures are expanding both in terms of their corporate importance and quantity and complexity. Making procedures available electronically is just one small step to ensuring awareness and compliance. ActiveProcedure takes this a stage further and ‘activates’ the procedures by creating a dialogue between the user and the corporate procedure repository. Through a series of targeted questions the user is guided to the appropriate answer and is provided with the associated forms and documents.

ActiveProcedure is the first in a series of applications from Kcentrix Software to exploit the value hidden in corporate know-how. By removing the complexity, procedures can be extended for use by non-information professionals, thereby reducing the reliance on corporate experts and creating a better informed, more responsive and productive organisation, whilst driving down business costs.

ActiveProcedure can be applied across all electronic procedures and is available for internal licensing or as a hosted solution.

Kcentrix. www.kcentrixsoftware.com

IM@T Online, February 2003