Going Deep in Document Management with Metadata and Indexing
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by: JimKemp
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Date: Tue, 24 Feb 2009 Time: 12:00 AM
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Ask people what the phrase "document management" means, and the answers you get will vary widely. For some, it's a catch-all term used to encompass everything from document scanning, to version control, to document retrieval, to document creation, to electronic and paper archiving, to document retention, and more. However, going deep into document management, there are some key aspects at the core that make management of information effective. These are Metadata and Indexing.
Going as far back as records were kept, hand written documents were stored in folders and boxes based upon an agreed upon structure designed for easy document retrieval. Shelving, filing cabinets, boxes and folders were used to implement a logical sub-structure system for bulk storing documents. An early example of the process was one used by governments for maintaining birth certificates. The storage of birth certificates could be maintained in a filing cabinet labeled by the hospital's name, in a drawer marked with the year, and in a folder named by the month. This structure of bith certificate filing: hospital name - year - month, is the rudimentary basics of metadata attributes, and is designed to allow for efficient document retrieval.
With the evolution of affordable shared file servers people began producing exponentially more documents, yet the process of storing and retrieving the documents followed similar techniques as the old paper-based storage methods. Documents were stored and managed on shared file servers using folder structures that essentially mirrored the paper filing process.
The benefit of a document management system is that it allows people to store documents in a logical folder structure while also including useful metadata attributes and providing full-text indexing. The combination of a logical tree-based folder structure and metadata allows people to quickly navigate to documents or to perform detailed searches for the information they need. The additional metadata associated with each document generally allows for a flatter (fewer sub-folders) storage hierarchy meaning easier navigation and fewer misfiling of documents because the metadata attributes are displayed on the screen along side of the files as sortable column values. In addition, metadata attributes, when combined with full-text indexing, allows for searching that breaks the bounds of a folder structure and eliminates costly, labor intensive searches when the search criteria doesn't match the folder structure.
Digitizing metadata can generate great efficiencies. Using the birth certificate example, when a request is received for a copy of a birth certificate using a shared file server based exclusively on a folder hierarchy, the search will fail if there is a requirement to retrieve information not represented by the folder structure itself. For example, a search that requires all birth certificates issued with Dr. Smith as the attending physician over the last nine months. If the doctor's information is not associated with the folder structure or part of the file's name, manually opening and reading through the content of all the documents throughout the storage system is the only option for gathering the required records.
About the Author
Document Locator is an enterprise-class document management system designed to enhance efficiency, reduce risk and improve collaboration. ColumbiaSoft is a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner, meaning its products are fully integrated into popular Microsoft Windows applications. Get more Document Management information.
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