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Documentum Content Management Foundations: EMC Proven Professional Certification Exam E20-120 Study Guide

Chapter 1. ECM Basics

In this chapter, we will explore the following concepts:

Content and metadata
Repository and Content Server
Various features of the Documentum platform

This chapter introduces key content management concepts in Documentum terminology. The concepts are described at a high level to provide an overview of the breadth of the platform. These concepts are explored in detail in the following chapters.

Content and Metadata

Databases are ubiquitous in modern technology solutions. This is a mature field and well-known best practices are routinely used for deploying databases. Databases provide standard means for accessing and manipulating structured data. Structured means that the data components (fields) are of specific type (integer, string, etc.) and this knowledge helps in querying and manipulating the data.

On the other hand, files stored on the file system are generally unstructured and can contain information in any form. Such files and the unstructured information contained therein are collectively referred to as content.

While databases provide standard means of managing structured data, content management systems (CMS) are a relatively new phenomenon. Since the content itself is unstructured, it is not possible to read and understand the content without any prior knowledge about it. Therefore, some structured data is attached to each content item, which describes the content item. This data that provides information about the attached content item is called metadata.

Content management systems utilize metadata extensively to provide sophisticated functionality. For example, metadata is essential for making documents searchable in terms of their author, title, subject, or keywords. It is hard to imagine any functionality of Documentum that does not utilize metadata in one form or another. The following figure shows two content items and their associated metadata:

Content Server

Content Server serves content to applications, which in turn provide friendly interfaces to human users. Content Server brings the stored content and metadata to life and manages its lifecycle. It exposes a known interface for using the content while hiding the details of how and where files and metadata are stored.

The term Content Server is used in two contexts — the Content Server software that is installed and resides on the file system and the Content Server instance, which is the running process that resides in memory and serves content at run time. However, there is little chance of confusion since the usage is often clear from the context and the term Content Server is typically used without additional qualification (software or process/instance).

A Content Server instance is dedicated to and manages only one repository. However, we will see later in architecture discussion that multiple Content Server instances can be dedicated to the same repository. This is typically done for performance reasons where the multiple Content Server processes divide up the load for serving content from the same repository. The following figure shows two Content Servers serving one repository:

Content Server is the foundation of the Documentum platform and provides the following services:

1. Content management services
2. Process management services (workflows)
3. Security service for content and metadata in the repository
4. Distributed services

These features are described here briefly and in more detail in later chapters.

Content Management Services

Content management services include library services (checkin and checkout of objects stored in the repository), version control, and archiving. The Content Server uses an object-oriented model and stores everything as an object in the repository.

Metadata can be retrieved using Document Query Language (DQL), which is a superset of Structured Query Language used with databases (ANSI SQL). DQL can query objects and their relationships, in addition to any database tables registered to be queried using DQL.

Data dictionary stores information about object types in the repository. The default data dictionary can be altered by addition of user-defined object types and properties. Properties are also known as attributes and the two terms are used interchangeably to refer to metadata.

Virtual documents link multiple component documents together into a larger document. An individual document can be part of multiple virtual documents. The assembly of virtual documents can also be controlled by business rules and data stored in the repository.

Collaborative services can be deployed with an optional license and make collaboration features available in client applications. Collaborative features (Documentum 5.3) include:

Room: This is a secured area within a repository with defined membership and access restrictions.
Discussion: This is a comment thread associated with an object.
Contextual folder: This is a folder with attached description and discussion.
Note: This is simple document with built-in discussion and rich text content.

Note

Documentum 6 is expected to introduce new collaborative features such as polls and calendars.

Retention Policy Services (RPS) is an optional product and enables use of policies to manage the lifecycle of the objects stored in the repository. A retention policy defines the phases through which such an object passes and how it is finally disposed of or exported.

Process Management Services

Process management services (features) include the following:

Workflows: Workflows typically represent business processes and model event-oriented applications. Workflows can be defined for documents, folders (representing the contained documents), and virtual documents. A workflow definition acts like a template and multiple workflow instances can be created from one workflow definition.
Lifecycle: A lifecycle defines the stages through which a document passes. For each stage, prerequisites can be defined and actions can be defined that are performed prior to an object's entry into that stage.

Security Services

A repository uses access control lists (ACLs), also known as permission sets, as the security mechanism by default. The repository security can be turned off as well.

While the repository security model is ACL, each object has an associated ACL. The ACL provides object-level permissions to users and groups.

When the repository security is enabled, the Content Server enforces seven levels of basic permissions and six levels of extended permissions. There are additional privileges and security components, which are discussed in later chapters.

Content Server provides robust accountability and capability via auditing and tracing facilities. Auditing can track operations such as checkin or checkout that have been configured to be audited. Tracing can provide detailed run-time information useful for debugging applications.

Electronic signatures can enforce sign-offs in business processes. A sign-off is a way of authorizing or approving a decision similar to signing off on paper.

Distributed Services

A Documentum installation can include multiple repositories and the Content Server is aware of distributed configurations that deployments can take.

The Content Server provides an application programming interface (API) and therefore needs a layer in front of it to expose its capabilities to human users. Documentum provides desktop and web-based client applications and supports creation of custom applications of either type. The following figure shows several client applications:

The full set of Content Server features is exposed via Documentum Foundation Classes (DFC) and Documentum Client Library (DMCL). DFC provides the API for interacting with the Content Server programmatically.

Documentum also provides a Web Development Kit (WDK) to facilitate development and customization of web-based client applications.

Documentum provides two interactive utilities for interacting with the Content Server using queries — IDQL and IAPI. These utilities are typically used by administrators and developers.

Description

This is a complete study guide including study material and practice questions to prepare for the EMC Proven Professional certification Exam E20-120. It can also serve Documentum beginners and practitioners as a handy guide and quick reference to the technical fundamentals that is fully up to date for Documentum 5.3. Beginners are introduced to concepts in a logical manner while practitioners can use it as a reference to jump to relevant concepts directly.EMC Documentum is a leading enterprise content management technology platform that helps enterprises to streamline the capture, processing, and distribution of business information including documents, records, e-mails, web content, images, reports, and digital assets. It can also automate entire business processes in accordance with business rules. EMC Proven Professional is an exam-based certification program, which introduced a new EMC Proven Content Management Application Developer (EMCAD) track in early 2007. The first exam in this track is Content Management Foundations (CMF) Associate-level Exam, with exam code E20-120, which tests knowledge about technical fundamentals of Documentum. This book is a study guide to help you prepare for this exam with hundreds of practice questions and an efficient exam-preparation strategy.

What you will learn

Key content management concepts for using Documentum Documentum platform architecture Using content with metadata User authentication Authorizing access for users and groups Securing objects with permissions Searching metadata and content Creating custom object types Managing customizations with DocApps Creating portable customizations with aliases Process automation with workflows and lifecycles Using virtual documents for collaboration and reuse Part 1: Fundamentals (Chapters 1 - 4)ECM Basics introduces the basic concepts of content management. Working with Content describes the aspects of creating and manipulating content. Objects and Types lays the foundation of designing and using metadata. Architecture describes the key components of the EMC Documentum platform and how they interact to provide the content management capabilities.Part 2: Security (Chapters 5 - 7)Users and Privileges describes the core concepts related to users for implementing security in Documentum. Groups and Roles provides additional capabilities for facilitating security management for groups of users. Object Security introduces permissions and ties them to users, groups, and privileges to realize the security model.Part 3: User Interface (Chapter 8)Searching describes the features for finding relevant content stored in a repository. While other user interface aspects are covered throughout the book, searching is described separately because of its fundamental importance to content management.Part 4: Application Development (Chapters 9 - 12)Custom Types describes how to create user-defined metadata structure and fundamental customization aspects. DocApps describes how to package the development artefacts for reuse and portability across repositories. Workflows and Lifecycles describe how to model and implement business processes in Documentum.Part 5: Advanced Concepts (Chapters 13 - 14)Aliases describes a mechanism for dynamic assignment of ownership, locations, and permissions. Virtual Documents describes how multiple documents can be managed as one larger document to facilitate collaboration.There are two practice test papers at the end of this book.There is a set of questions at the end of each chapter. These questions are meant to test your understanding. A good way to prioritize and focus your efforts is to use the questions to identify the areas where you score low and then work on those areas. The answers to all the questions and the solutions to the practice test papers have been provided at the end.

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