Webmaster's blog
Document Scanning and Automation
From ScanGuru
The Capture Applications on the market today are 
outstanding when it comes to automation. For any organization that has a large scanning project, or requires minimal time and maximum efficiency from its scan operators, some level of automation is a necessity. So what does automation mean when we are discussing capture applications
Below are some key feature that will minimize the time and effort required to scan and process documents:
...
Key Features - Scanning Applications for Law Firms
From ScanGuru
What should a Law Firm look for in a scanning application?
Here are some suggestions:
Barcode Separator Functionality - Separator pages allow the user to insert a specially coded page between documents in a stack. Once scanned, the software uses these pages to determine when a document begins and ends. This allows the scanning of many documents at once, rather than scanning one at a time. There is also the notion of "intelligent separators" which allow you to encode data on the separator page, such as case, matter, attorney, etc.
Image Enhancement - These tools will automatically adjust contrast and brightness, remove problematic colors, remove speckles, and thicken fonts. If you want the highest quality image, with the least amount of scanning operator intervention, this is a key component to any scanning system.
...
Who wears the pants in your business?
by Corey Smith
When it comes to making decisions on moving to an electronic content management system in your business, who is the person most responsible for making that decision?
In the Records Management Report from AIIM last year, I found a very interesting chart.
...
Controlling Print Costs
By Corey Smith
When considering the many costs that an organization has to expend, one of the most mis-understood is that of printing costs.
The Gartner Group estimates that as much as 30% of organizations' print costs can be eliminated with simple print device management.
The challenge organizations have is that often there is a division of responsibility for purchasing print devices and supplies for those print devices. Different departments have different responsibilities when it comes to creating efficiencies and cost control strategies.
I have spoken with many IT directors that simply don't care how much printer supplies costs. The cost can be 15 cents for a b/w print and 50 cents for a color print but as long as the cost of acquisition of the device is low, they will buy it.
...
Scanning as a Compliance Driver
by Jon Reardon
In an unpublished InfoTrends’ research project conducted slightly more than one year ago, we surveyed the US financial services industry to learn about the adoption rates and technology usage behaviors of office/workgroup document solutions. Compliance matters loomed large in this study.
We surveyed more than 350 businesses in the segments of: banking, insurance, investment, and credit and lending. Approximately 50% of the respondents came from large businesses with 1,000 employees, followed by an even split between medium (100-999) and small (1-99) at 25% each.
...
Securing the Multifunctional Device
By Corey Smith
Every six months or so, comes a concern via the media that the MFP, or multifunction printer, is not secure and causes security holes on your network. When considering security on your network, there are some common sense approaches to ensuring you are protected from harm.
At eWeek, Rosen Sharma wrote a very simple article on securing your MFP. The article opens with the following:
Think you’ve plugged all of the vulnerabilities in your enterprise network? How about that multifunction printer over there in the sales department? As Dr. Rosen Sharma, president and CTO of Solidcore Systems explains, these devices frequently contain operating systems that are just as vulnerable to malware as your desktop computers.
...
Why Buy a Document Management System
from ScanGuru
The Business World is a rapidly changing entity, and technology helps adapt to these changes quickly and will help a company keep its competitive advantage. Paper has always been an inefficient medium for conducting business processes, and recently has become a key focus for Business Process Improvement (BPI) initiatives. So what are the main reasons for a company or organization to move towards the paperless environment?
Below are the two main categories:
...
It's all about efficiency and productivity
By Corey Smith
Last year AIIM released the Records Management Report.
One of the questions that was asked was why people would consider implementing an electronic content (record) management system (often we simply call it document management). I find the results very interesting, but not surprising.
The two most important reasons that companies want to implement an electronic document management system are (1) efficiency and productivity and (2) compliance to legal regulations (FACTA, SOX, HIPPA, etc).
...
Key Factors for ECM Project Success
from ScanGuru
Many of the Document Management and ECM System Implementations fail right out of the gate due to several factors. Most of them revolve around planning, and project definition and focus. Below are some key areas that are imperative to a project’s success:
Infrastructure
A huge part of the planning for a DMS/ECM System is examining your organization’s network infrastructure and ensuring it is ready. Implementing a system with inadequate resources can provide wrong end user perceptions. Focus should be placed on the below items:
- PC Clients – the client PC’s should have appropriate horsepower to handle their specific tasks. Obviously, basic search clients will not require extensive resources such as memory or hard drive space, but a scanning or OCR station may.
- Network – It is time to get rid of those hubs your brother in-law gave you, and upgrade to 100MB, or in some cases (at the server), Gigabit technology.
- Server – adequate memory, processor and storage is a necessity.
- Backup- often an overlooked area, planning for system backup, now and in the years beyond is very important.
...
Paper prices on the rise...
by Corey Smith
Leo Piccioli shared with me a chart about the growth of paper prices. He commented that, "every ten years or so a "paperless office" trend starts... and nothing really changes."
So, is the "Paperless Office" ever going to come?
...
