Open source document manager wins user acclaim

Locally-developed open source document management system KnowledgeTree is winning widespread user acclaim, with several respondents to a recent survey comparing it favourably to commercially available systems.

As open source software KnowledgeTree, developed by local company Jam Warehouse, is available for free download by anyone in the world at SourceForge.net, the world`s largest open source software development site with over 100,000 registered projects.

"We knew KnowledgeTree was popular because it`s consistently been among the top 100 most active projects on SourceForge in the past few months," says Jam Warehouse MD John Thorne, "but it`s been very encouraging to see just how widely it`s being used and how happy users are with it."

The survey of 450 users revealed that KnowledgeTree is installed in a wide variety of sectors, from education through manufacturing to non-profit organisations, mainly in North America and Europe. Use in government is relatively low at 5% of respondents, but Thorne believes this sector represents one of the biggest opportunities for KnowledgeTree in South Africa. "Only 2% of our users at the moment are in Africa, but with government getting strongly behind the open-source movement that should grow," he says. "We think everybody in the public sector should be evaluating KnowledgeTree."

The size of current users is also encouraging: "We`re seeing it being used in some very big organisations," says Thorne. 22% of respondents had more than 50 users of KnowledgeTree and 12% had more than 100 users.

User satisfaction is high, with 93% of respondents being either very (48%) or somewhat (45%) satisfied with the system. One user commented that "KnowledgeTree is by far the best designed document management system. It has features that some of the commercial systems lack. We use it extensively in our organisation."

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Another noted that "we searched far and wide for a suitable document management system for our organisation`s needs and couldn`t find anything even close to KnowledgeTree`s combination of features."

Thorne says KnowledgeTree also presents good opportunities for consultancies: "It doesn`t have to be us who implements it," he points out. "Anybody can use it and generate a revenue stream through configuration, implementation and change management projects, for example.

"The more organisations use KnowledgeTree the better for Jam Warehouse, because we hope that many companies who go through the basic implementation will consider our Baobab Integration Server, which adds a host of additional features including access to documents as if they are on a standard network drive".

The Baobab product, which is priced according to a rental model with low annual user fees, is one way Jam Warehouse is making its investment in KnowledgeTree sustainable. The company also sells additional language packs and documentation, as well as undertaking customisation projects and support contracts for particular clients. The base product, however, will always remain free and open source.

Thorne says this has had some unexpected benefits. "It`s given us huge exposure and some major opportunities," he says. "We`re in contact with people who would never know about us otherwise, including some very-profile global organisations. Going the open-source route was a bit of an experiment, but we would definitely consider it again".