Hermes wore winged boots to run in the clouds, serving as the personal agent and herald to Zeus.  Today many companies are exploring the benefits and challenges of cloud based platforms, services and technologies.  I had the chance to visit with Chris Riley at CloudShare.  My objective was to uncover some real world knowledge that could be applied immediately to help you find your wings.

CloudShare offers a free 14 day trial, using the QuickStart guide you can be up and running in the cloud in under 15 minutes.  When reviewing the site you initially see a strong focus on SharePoint with several pre-built templates.  It is very simple to spin up a SharePoint instance and start configuring document libraries, collaboration sites or start testing custom developed web parts.  This can give an organization a great sandbox for implementing test cases to eliminate some of the risks associated with deploying SharePoint.  A great post outlining ways to avoid things like SharePoint sprawl can be found in an AIIM blog recently posted by Nick Inglis

As you dig deeper you find that many applications or platforms that you need to spin up for Testing, QA or Development purposes can be supported by CloudShare.  Imagine all the costs associated with hardware, product licensing and labor you could save.  Several use cases have been very successful for Independent Software Vendors (ISV’s), Training organizations and Enterprise class customers.

ISV’s are using this for fast and affordable customer test sites.  This gives them an immediate, template driven method for creating ‘Try & Buy’ virtual work spaces to showcase their software.  An ISV can setup repeatable templates with completed software install, configuration test data, site content and user access in minutes.  It is so straightforward most software product sales professionals could spin up virtual work spaces for customer prospects without a sales engineer.

Professional training organizations are setting up pre-built environments complete with training labs.  A trainer can share a copy of an environment with a class and provide ‘over-the-shoulder’ instruction without actually being over the students shoulder.  This type of collaboration usage portends some of the exciting new features you can expect to see from CloudShare in the very near future.

Enterprise customers are leveraging the benefits of this solution to augment the expenses of providing physical server farms for software development QA and testing.  The ability to roll this solution out to support near shore and off shore development teams is another area to be considered.  With hardware, software licensing and labor a business could easily spend $20K to setup a SharePoint 2010 development environment.  With CloudShare ProPlus this could be done for as little as $49 per month.  Ready. Set. Cloud.

I setup a Microsoft Office 2010 machine as my first virtual machine (VM).

As part of the CloudShare ProPlus offering you get a single login with up to 6 VM’s 10GB RAM, 300GB HD, 10 CPU’s.  Currently a single login is tied to a single environment, in the future the ability to have multiple environments accessible from a single login will be provided.  Chris eluded to several really hot new features that are planned and you will need to keep a close eye on CloudShare, they use an agile development methodology so new updates are often made bi-weekly.

You can access your environment and VM’s using either a remote desktop plug-in (RDP) or a fully web-based VNC Console.  The RDP requires a java runtime that you will need to plug-in to your browser.  I am using Chrome and found no issues and the speed of the RDP was very nice, hardly any lag in cursor movement.  I experienced more lag with the Console interface, switching back and forth between RDP and VNC was seamless.

Overall the user experience is very straightforward and the time that it can save an IT department, Sales Engineers and Training professionals is substantial.  With a little upfront planning and work to create your own templates the return on your initial investment is substantial.  As an ISV the benefits to the sales cycle are clear, this is a killer app that will put you in position to close more sales with less technical effort.

Some things to think about using CloudShare ProPlus for:

• Educating yourself or employees on what the Cloud is and how it can be used
• Application development and testing
• Server Hosting to reduce upfront hardware investments
• Training / Classroom virtual work space  and labs
• Personal PC in the Cloud – Microsoft Office

Comments welcomed

Check out http://cloudpwr.com 

I have spent nearly two decades selling, designing and delivering complex electronic document management and workflow solutions using third party software.  In 2010 I led a group that was developing a new content management solution from the ground up. It was exciting and fun to be using all that knowledge and experience to design something new and different, yet keeping true to best practices and fundamentals.  Initially the software was designed to be implemented as an on-premise solution but we began porting the technology to support a cloud strategy in early 2011.  As the hours of research and development mounted I gained a unique perspective on the many approaches to cloud computing for document storage and collaboration.  I relied on internal team members to focus on the core development activities while I continued to lay out key areas that would differentiate the product.

My guiding design principle was simplicity.  “Give the user everything the need and nothing they don’t”

At this years Info360 event in Washington DC I heard Aaron Levie echo some of these same perspectives in his keynote addresses.  I spoke with Spencer Chen from Huddle and heard some of what they are doing differently from Box.  Although a review of the websites make it clear that they both see SharePoint as their main competitor.  What they all have in common is a fundamental belief that paper is irrelevant so they don’t really address the capture aspects that are important to any real world deployment of ECM technology.

Jeff Shuey, whom I respect a great deal recently posted a blog after the Microsoft WPC11 event that shows this bias in a bold quote from Steve Ballmer.  The difference in the approach I was taking came from my experience implementing Legacy ECM solutions for accounts payable, human resources, medical records, waybills, etc.  There are just some basic facts of document management, records management and compliance that cannot be ignored or dismissed.  Granted some of what the enterprise thinks they need and what they really need are often very different.  But that should be managed as a function of solution sales,  professional consulting and project management.  To simply dismiss these functions or requirements leaves the solution incomplete and more importantly leaves real revenue on the table.

There are a variety of software offerings that are gaining momentum in the Cloud space.  They each differ slightly in their functional approach and cost.  Some like Box and Huddle are focused on simplicity using a file sharing approach to make collaboration easy and affordable.  Others like SpringCM and FileBound are taking a more holistic approach and incorporating more traditional document management capture, storage, auditing, workflow and search functions.

Key components to consider:

Advanced features to consider:

Costs are all over the board some services are focused on giving you free storage while others are using a more traditional method of selling the software either in a monthly fee or annual contract.  I have only touched on 4 of the players in this market.  There are dozens more in niche industries like Medical, Real Estate, Transportation, and Legal that may be relatively unknown to some ECM professionals.  To say the least there is no shortage of options and I am certain more will be popping up in the near future.

If you have used any of the 4 products I have highlighted I would like to hear from you in the comment section.

Check out http://cloudpwr.com 

The current state of content management software is in flux. A transformation is taking shape in the form of innovation, specificity to function and the technology used to process and share content. While stalwarts of the industry continue to add layers of complexity, upstarts have begun to make their mark advocating simplicity of design.

The fundamental needs for managing unstructured information that exists outside of traditional line of business or structured data systems has not changed. What is changing are the ways in which we want to use content, the devices that access content and the demographics of the workforce. ECM software is now considered by many as an IT Platform. As a Platform, the software is required to meet a laundry list of features and capabilities regardless of operational business or user benefit. Industry analyst and consultants have cavorted with software companies in order to create a quadrant of magic features that every ECM buyer must evaluate, or face certain failure. I will not even mention that whole Sarbanes Oxley mess.

I have been fortunate to work with a tremendously talented group of ECM professionals in my career. I have been involved at every level of solution design for each of the various defined disciplines in the industry. Using ECM technology to enhance business productivity has given me the experience to know the difference between necessary functions and unnecessary features. By working in technical engineering, project management and user roles in hundreds of ECM use cases, I have come to the conclusion that most legacy software packages are way too complicated and unnecessarily expensive.

While many lauded the arrival of SharePoint as the coup de grâce for legacy vendors, many acknowledge that the platform is so broad and requires so much customization that it fails to deliver key business productivity functions as quickly and easily as the Microsoft marketing team would have you believe. Meanwhile, the other legacy vendors continues to layer newer e2.0 features on top of already bloated product suites.  Legacy ECM solutions get the job done, and they will meet any diligent RFP coordinators mandatory requirements including most if not all of the evaluation committee’s checklist criteria.  However, if you are evaluating ECM software today you should take a step back and ask yourself; “Do I really need all those buttons, commands and features?”

Many longstanding ECM professionals are in a catch twenty two. While many might agree with me, how many of them are willing to stand up and say so. If you currently sell, integrate, consult or work in this industry you likely work with legacy ECM vendors to put the proverbial food on the table. The history of technology teaches us that change is inevitable. As we look to the future, we should all know that the next generation ECM technology will not be what it has been or what it is today.

Comments Welcomed.

Check out http://cloudpwr.com