Editorial

Editorial - Spring 1999

by Richard N. Stover, Editor & Publisher

I just saw a fax advertising a META Group (www.metagroup.com) conference. The IT Era As We Know It IS DEAD! trumpets the headline. The conference title: Externalizing Business: Transforming the Value of Information. The headline provoked some thoughts about IT and its role in the future particularly on the implementation of Enterprise Resource Management (ERM).

ERM we define as embracing all of the technologies that impact the running of an organization, corporate or otherwise. Word processing, CAD, EDM, PDM, ERP are some of the major technologies involved to take an organization from an analog or manual document handling environment into the digital age. And while many of us are at the leading edges of these technologies, many more are still struggling with legacy data and systems and wondering how to transition to digital WHILE MAINTAINING THE STABILITY OF THEIR EVERYDAY OPERATIONS. You think that is not a problem? Guess again!

Every manufacturing company and almost every engineering-based company has a print room or engineering records department. This department has the responsibility for the control and maintenance of the drawings, all revisions and related documents. This is the legacy data for most product manufacturing and project-based companies. It is also the legacy data for many governmental organizations. The processes used by this department are the legacy systems. Any automation that is installed has to allow the existing processes to continue whether replaced by technology or not. Storing the documents, backing up the documents, providing an audit trail of revisions, making the latest revisions available for release, managing the configurations of the documents, are important procedures and processes to be maintained. When implementing any technology, these processes must be maintained without effecting daily operations. This is executive management's greatest challenge!

Does IT help with that challenge? Rarely, which is one reason for downgrading the role that IT plays in the technology implementation process. If executive management does not create the corporate culture that allows changes to be made at the individual job level, then technology implementations will be difficult and everyday operations will be interrupted.

How does an organization maintain stability of operations while implementing technology solutions? By implementing the technology in doable steps and by having the proper culture and political atmosphere that allows changes to be made. People need to be given latitude in how they perform their jobs so that changes (preferably initiated by them) can be made. The non-technical issues of implementing technology is a subject for many books to be written. IT plays a very small role in those non-technical aspects.

Regarding the technical aspects, the IT department may be lacking there as well. The following joke kind of sums up the IT department's dilemma. It seems that a hot air balloonist strayed too far from his point of origin and as it was getting dark, he became lost. Spotting a man on the ground, he yelled at him, "Where am I?" "You are about 30 feet above the ground in a hot air balloon," came the reply. "Oh...you must be a technologist," said the balloonist. "Yes, and you must be a CIO," said the technologist, "you don't know where you are, you don't know where you are going, but you expect me to help you." Until next time...

Letters to the Editor

I've just read my first issue of Document Management and I am very impressed. (I don't know how I've missed it these past five years but maybe it comes from getting bombarded with so many other trade journals). You have managed to pack a lot of RELEVANT information into a thin magazine. I particularly liked how your TOC included both printed and web articles. I was very excited to come across the last in a 4 part series of articles by Bob Zagami on LEGACY DATA IN THE ENGINEERING ENVIRONMENT. This is an area that is extremely important but frequently overlooked. Please direct me to how I can acquire parts 1-3. I could not locate a direct contact for Mr. Zagami. Thanks again for providing a good resource to the users in the Document Management World.

Sandra Keller

Information Systems Specialist

WV Division of Highways

(Via email)

Editor's Note: Thanks Sandra! Mr. Zagami's entire series of articles was reproduced on www.docmanage.com last Fall. Just look in the Back Issues section.

Mr. Stover - I just finished reading your article on 'The Raster to CAD Saga' in Document Management, Nov/Dec 98. I want to thank you for such a concise description of document conversion from the hard copy to raster, hybrid raster/vector and full vector with a data base. I own a small GIS shop, we do a lot of answering more than anything, primarily why is it so expensive to go from hard copy to vector. Our local strip miners cannot seem to understand that you do not scan in a document and it comes out as a fully vectorized, layered and corrected DXF. I go thru this several times each year! They are sure I should be able to scan, vectorize and layer a full 7 1/2 minute topo sheet for $100/sheet. I have had customers who went offshore, coming back with hybrid files - part vector/part raster, thinking they were getting all vector files. No one was mislead, the buyer did not read thoroughly or did not completely understand what they were getting. The key was that they were so much cheaper than we were. We are fortunate to have a small clientele who require high resolution scanning and very detailed vector files. Your description of Intelligence level 4 is what we do. There is a niche but as long as the offshore companies can produce data so inexpensively, I doubt the jobs will exist in this country. I hope to use your article to help explain the intricacies of document conversion.

Star Lakavage

AEgis Services

(via email)