SharePoint- Scanning vs. Capture Software

So, there are a number of options when you are trying to scan into sharepoint. What application do you choose?  What features are important?  Many of the software vendors label their software as capture, but in my opinion fall short of true capture functionality.

First, I think it is so important to differentiate between scanning applications and capture applications:

SharePoint Basic Scanning Software

Let’s create a definition and define a feature set for scanning applications.  A scanning applition is just a means to take paper, and quickly and easily convert it from paper to digital form.  They are well suited to environments with very basic needs, and what I call “onsie-twosie” scanning, or low volume environments.  Their feature sets provide very basic functionality, and may allow the use of basic separation, and very basic integrations with SharePoint.  The majority of scanning hardware vendors bundle these applications with their hardware, although there are vendors that have taken it to the next level, and provide enhanced scanning capabilities beyond the typical bundled software.

Examples of Basic SharePoint Scanning or Basic Imaging Software:

VizitSP (Web part scanning with a great viewer and search)

Fujitsu ScanAll (Vendor specific with basic scanning)

Dark Blue Duck Scan Enabler (Web part based scanning)

Kodak Capture (Vendor specific scanning app)

Knowledgelake Capture (Basic scanning for SharePoint with some capture features.  )

SharePoint Capture Software

Capture software can be utilized for basic scanning needs, but takes you to a whole new level from a “capture” perspective.  These applications typically have a number of ways to “slice and dice” documents, and really focus on efficiency, and minimizing the time required to scan, index and capture data.  Capture software provides numerous ways to automatically populate columns, including barcode reading, database lookups, OCR, and data extraction.  True capture applications provide integration with scanners, folders with images, SharePoint Web Dav folders, etc.  Any organization that is serious about processing paper documents, and want to do it in the most efficient, standardized manner, should look seriously at advanced capture applications:

PSIGEN PSI:Capture (Best overall SharePoint integration)

Kofax Ascent (Basic SharePoint integration, complex licensing, expensive)

It is interesting, as the true capture companies in the market have been very slow to adapt to and embrace SharePoint, probably because of their relationships/partnerships with other document management companies.

In summary, if you are planning on capturing more than a few documents a day and want to make sure the scanning process takes minimal time and can integrate into your business processes, go with Capture.

PSIGEN and Atalasoft Create SharePoint ECM Bundle

LAS VEGAS, Nevada, October 19, 2009 – PSIGEN Software, Inc., the leader in advanced capture and scanning solutions for Microsoft SharePoint, and Atalasoft, Inc., the makers of Vizit SP – the SharePoint Document Viewer today announced the release of a SharePoint Document Management bundle at the Microsoft SharePoint Conference in Las Vegas.

The partners have bundled their technologies to offer an end-to-end Document Management/Document Imaging solution for all organization sizes and types adapting easily to both Windows SharePoint Services (WSS) and Microsoft Office SharePoint Server (MOSS) environments. The combination of advanced capture and viewing technology will provide an affordable, feature rich option to a market with few alternatives.

Microsoft SharePoint Server is a powerful collaboration platform currently experiencing mass adoption across the enterprise, primarily for sharing office documents, replacing network file shares, document management, and as an intranet portal. Atalasoft’s and PSIGEN’s combined solution enables these organizations to realize additional benefits of SharePoint by providing cost effective document image capture, viewing, search and more advanced document management capabilities that leverages existing SharePoint investments.

“In today’s world, being able to put together the best of breed products like Atalasoft’s Vizit SP and PSI:Capture to create a seamless solution, will provide the on ramp to SharePoint that users and IT departments have been demanding”, said Bruce Hensley, President of PSIGEN.

“This combination of advanced capture and document viewing & management with Microsoft SharePoint is the ideal ECM solution enabling businesses to easily and cost effectively automate their paper-based processes,” said William Bither, President & CEO of Atalasoft.

The package is available through both PSIGEN’s and Atalasoft’s vast and growing Reseller Network.  The partners will be presenting their bundled technology offering at Microsoft’s SharePoint Conference is Las Vegas, October 18-22.

About PSIGEN

PSIGEN Software is the innovative leader in advanced capture and document management solutions. For more than 14 years, PSIGEN has provided software to improve all the processes around the conversion of paper to digital documents. The solutions focus on cost reduction, flexibility, standardization, and improved efficiency.   PSIGEN delivers these solutions through a network of resellers and distributors in the US and abroad. For more information, visit www.psigen.com.

“PSIGEN” is a registered trademark in the US, the EU and other countries. All other trademarks and registered trademarks belong to their respective owners.

CONTACT: PSIGEN Sales and Marketing: Stephen Boals, Vice President of Sales, 949-916-7700 x230.

About Atalasoft

Atalasoft builds software that improves how users interact with documents over the web through innovative image viewing, annotating, and processing technology. Products include DotImage, the leading imaging toolkit for .NET developers, and Vizit SP, the Document Image Viewer for SharePoint. Atalasoft is listed as one of Inc. Magazine’s 100 fastest-growing software companies and is a member of many industry organizations including AIIM, ARMA, and is a member of the TWAIN working group.

Founded almost a decade ago, Atalasoft’s products power over 1000 document management, ECM, and EMR applications built by ISVs, System Integrators, and Enterprises deployed to millions of end-users worldwide. Industries that Atalasoft serves include Healthcare, Financial Services, Legal, Government, Education, and Manufacturing.  For more information, visit www.vizitsp.com or www.atalasoft.com.

CONTACT: Atalasoft Sales and Marketing: John Casanova, Director of Business Development, 866-568-0129 x711 or at john.casanova@atalasoft.com.

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PSIGEN and Neudesic Partner to Provide Customized SharePoint Document Imaging Solutions

IRVINE, Calif., September  14, 2009 – PSIGEN Software, Inc., the leader in advanced capture and scanning solutions for Microsoft SharePoint, today announced the formation of a partnership with Neudesic, a Microsoft National Systems Integrator and Gold Certified Partner.

The partnership was created to offer customized Document Management/Document Imaging solutions for all organization sizes and types, providing a structured offering with SharePoint as the back end repository.  The combination of PSIGEN’s advanced capture technology and Neudesic’s Microsoft product expertise will be unmatched in the industry.

” We are extremely excited about this partnership, as we believe what the SharePoint market has been missing is highly functional, packaged solutions  that don’t create a never ending construction zone.” said Bruce Hensley, President of PSIGEN Software, “Together we provide expertise in diverse areas, which when put together, we believe will significantly increase the ROI on SharePoint Imaging Projects””

“PSIGEN provides a fantastic document imaging and management solution for SharePoint that aligns perfectly with our goal of delivering the most effective solutions in the shortest possible time,” said Parsa Rohani, CEO of Neudesic. “We’re excited to partner with PSIGEN and look forward to bringing our clients unmatched capability and value across a broad spectrum of SharePoint solutions.”

About PSIGEN

PSIGEN Software is the innovative leader in advanced capture and document management solutions. For more than 14 years, PSIGEN has provided software to improve all the processes around the conversion of paper to digital documents. The solutions focus on cost reduction, flexibility, standardization, and improved efficiency.   PSIGEN delivers these solutions through a network of resellers and distributors in the US and abroad. For more information, visit www.psigen.com.

“PSIGEN” is a registered trademark in the US, the EU and other countries. All other trademarks and registered trademarks belong to their respective owners.

CONTACT: PSIGEN Sales and Marketing: Stephen Boals, Vice President of Sales, 949-916-7700 x230.

About Neudesic

Neudesic is a Microsoft National Systems Integrator and Gold Certified Partner with a proven track record of providing reliable, effective solutions based on Microsoft’s technology platform.  Neudesic’s technical and industry expertise empowers enterprises to enhance their technological capacity and respond to business opportunities with a greater level of efficiency.  Neudesic was established in 2001 and is headquartered in Irvine, California.  Neudesic offers its products and services nationwide with offices located throughout the United States, and a global presence based out of Hyderabad, India.  For more information about Neudesic’s products and services, call (800) 805-1805 or visit our website at www.neudesic.com.

CONTACT: Neudesic Marketing Director, Melissa Ward, 949-754-4524.

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Scan to SharePoint Solutions and Standardization

One of the required attributes for any “scan to SharePoint” solution for document imaging, is the ability to structure scan data dynamically, and provide standardization to the scanning process. Implementing a scanning/imaging solution without the ability to standardize allows users to recreate their paper mess digitally. Interesting new article by CMSWire points out that the major issues with SharePoint are all focused around standardization.  Problems listed are:
-Insufficient workflow processes
-Disorganized content
-Lack of an over-arching site creation strategy

An example of a great tool for SharePoint Capture is PSI:Capture for SharePoint.   It provides the ability to standardize the structure of SharePoint through folder and file naming convention control, and makes it simple to provide a planned structure to which all users must comply.

Kodak SharePoint Scanning Site

I found this site this morning in my daily web crawl. Interesting how the hardware vendors are really beginning to push the SharePoint Scanning and Capture Solution.

Kodak SharePoint Scanning Page

What Should I Use for Scanning Images into SharePoint?

Scanner or Copier for SharePoint?

So, how do you choose which to use for your SharePoint MOSS or WSS Scanning/Imaging Project?

Scanning Multifunction Peripherals (MFPs/copiers) have become standard in most offices. I receive the same question all the time from prospects and customers: Can’t I just use my copier for scanning? In most cases, for a typical office, with typical documents, a copier is a perfect scanning solution. As offices become more complex in the way they handle their documents, or they expand their scanning efforts to other departments, dedicated scanners may be required to achieve the desired result.

Below are some interesting statistics provided by InfoTrends:

• 65 % of office workers use digital copiers/MFPs
• Over 50% use the “scan” feature daily
• 71% expect scanning requirements to increase from year to year
• 72% believe it is necessary to view images before processing
• 36% will require dedicated scanners versus MFP devices
• 36% believe they will need both scanners and MFPs

So what are the benefits/drawbacks to scanning with both types of devices? Below is a summary:

Benefits of MFPs as scanners:

• Leverage your existing investment in the MFP
• Most copier maintenance plans do not charge for scans, so you get “free” maintenance for the scanning function (no print/copy, no click charge)
• MFP manufacturers are really focusing on scanning capabilities: fast speeds, better quality and enhanced drivers, etc.
• Network scanning functions:
o Scan to email
o Scan to Windows Folders
o Scan to FTP
• One-to-Many relationship: all workers can use one device.

Drawbacks of MFPs:

• Contention – copying, scanning and printing may cause “a line at the copier”
• Poor performance with differing paper sizes
• Lack of color dropout (Scanning blue or black backgrounds will result in a black page)
• Lack of image correction capabilities (auto deskew, despeckle, black border removal, streak removal, etc.)
• Small Document Feeder sizes (50 – 100 pages)
• On average, file sizes are 10-20% larger
• Duplex scanning/DPI increase greatly slows down rated speed
• Black and White scanning only on some models

Benefits of Dedicated Scanners:

• Convenience – scan at your desk
• Duplexing does not slow down scanner
• Color dropout
• Superior image quality due to enhancement features
• Ease in handling differing paper sizes/types
• Larger document feeder selections (up to 1000+ pages)
• Smaller file sizes
• Ability to preview scanned documents at scan time

Drawbacks of Dedicated Scanners:

• One to One relationship – directly connected to PC
• Additional Maintenance costs

Above are all the pluses and minuses, but in a nutshell, when should you use a dedicated scanner?

• Scanning 100+ documents per day
• Workers that are constantly scanning throughout the day
• Mixed paper sizes, weights and colors
• Poor quality, older documents or when image enhancement is required
• OCR or ICR applications
• High volume copying and printing environments
• Large Document scanning
• High security environments

How do I find the right Scanning Application for Sharepoint?

I find it interesting the different directions scanning and capture hardware and software companies are going when it come to scanning into SharePoint. Most are focusing on enabling the direct connect scanner. Hardware manufacturers, like Fujitsu and Kodak have made efforts to include software apps that can enable “scan to SharePoint” functionality (and just about every other manufacturer).

These apps just seem to be a half-hearted attemp to really look at what is happening in the enterprise. Companies need a standard scanning and capture onramp for the Microsoft SharePoint Platform that can work with any scanning device or process images from directories. It cannot just be limited to a desktop scanner, but needs to work with scanning copiers and MFPs. It needs to be capable of both interactive and automated processing, with a deep feature set that will meet just about any capture need.

So, here are a few recommendations when it comes to choosing a software application for scanning to SharePoint:

Choose a company that has deep roots in scanning and capture. Many of the companies out there have not grown up in the scanning and capture industry, and their lack of experience shows in their product feature set.

Pick a software application that can work with both dedicated scanners and scanning copiers / MFPs

Make sure that the software has the capability to monitor hot folders, and automatically process documents from start to finish

Make sure that the company supports other Document Management Systems and output formats besides SharePoint. Most organizations have a need to migrate documents to other destinations.

Look for true integration with SharePoint. Some cool features out there include: Document Library Settings Import, SharePoint Lookup, and the ability to create libraries and columns automatically

These are just a few recommendations. Good luck.

Awesome SharePoint Viewer for Scanned / Captured Images

I have been working quite a bit with Atalasoft’s VizitSP lately. The software overcomes some limitations in Microsoft SharePoint’s document viewing capabilities when it comes to scanned PDFs and TIFFs. The product “image enables” SharePoint Document libraries, providing a thin client viewer (read web page), that allows for zooming, going from page to page, having multiple documents open in a tab, tree view, etc. The viewer also provides the ability to save, email and download, as well as annotate the documents. Full SharePoint feature set for VizitSP. When used with a true SharePoint Scanning and Capture application like PSIGEN’s PSI:Capture, which creates searchable PDFs, within standardized folders, it is a truly powerful app. Check out this great product.

Should I use Microsoft SharePoint for Document Imaging?

Ah, the debate goes on.  Can SharePoint really be used for Document Imaging?  Is it really capable of storing tens of thousands of image files?

There are a number of vendors out there building some really cool tools for high-volume import of image files into the SharePoint system.  But before utilizing this application for a true imaging tool, I think you need to ask some really pointed questions during the planning phase:

• How many pages per day are you going to be scanning?  Microsoft recommends that a Document Library should have 2,000 or less objects.  Why?  Mostly for performance reasons, as the system will display all the items within a library on a single page.  You can get around this with some planning.  Take for example an accounting department that is scanning invoices.  Maybe you create a new library each month or week to maintain optimal performance.
• Is your server hardware up to the challenge?  SharePoint requires some decent horsepower if you are going to be serving up large image files.  Remember, these files are stored within a SQL DB, so you may need to tier off your web server and DB server.
• What type of capture application are you using?  How you capture scanned images can really have an impact on the overall performance of the system.  If you are scanning with a high volume app like PSIGEN’s PSI:Capture, then you may want to schedule upload of images during off hours so there will be a minimal impact on the end-users.  If you are utilizing eCopy, and just scanning individual documents throughout the day, there will be a minimal impact on the server.
• How often will users be retrieveing the images?  If SharePoint is just going to be an archive for images that are rarely accessed, then network bandwidth may not be an issue.  If the images are constantly accessed by multiple users at 6 branch offices and internet users, then you will need to place high importance on network infrastructure. 

For more info on SharePoint, and additional articles on planning for a Document Imaging System, go to ScanGuru.

Barcode Cover Sheets and SharePoint

So, in my quest for the ultimate scanning application for SharePoint, I continue to test new technologies, but there are just so many companies jumping on the SharePoint Bandwagon. The most recent technology is one that i have been testing quite a bit lately, and I have mentioned it quite a bit in this BLOG (PSI:Capture).

Imagine users from all over your organization walking up to Multi-Function Devices (MFDs or Copiers), and scanning their documents. Only they are using barcode separator/cover sheets. How do they work? Well, the sheet can serve two purposes: separation and data. The separation function allows you to take a stack of 10 documents, put the separator sheets between each, and then scan the whole stack. The software finds the separator sheets and knows when one document begins and another ends. The data in the barcode can also be read, and populated into columns within the SharePoint application. An example?

Take this paragraph:

“Early on in his life as a midshipman at the Naval Academy, the most important lesson John McCain learned was that to sustain his self-respect for a lifetime it would be necessary for him to have the honor of serving something greater than his self-interest — service to his country. John McCain has always put his country’s interests before any party, special interest and even his own self-interest. He has always and will always do what is right for our country.”

I know, I know, a technology BLOG is no place for political innuendo…sorry. ; )  Needed a quick paragraph and the covention was on.

Now take this barcode:

The entire barcode is the paragraph above encoded.  It can be read, and entered into a column in SharePoint.  Now this is an extreme example, but these 2D barcodes allow over 1000 characters in a thumbnail sized symbol.  Barcode generators will also allow a separation character, so you can embed multiple pieces of data for different columns within the symbol.  So think of the possibilities…

Each user assigned to a project within SharePoint could have their own cover sheet that has their name, project, location embeded.  All they need to do is scan their documents with the cover sheet on top, and the next thing they know, their paper document is on the SharePoint site with their name attached, and all the fields filled in.

No, not science fiction and very affordable.  Their are several applications that support this function, most notably, PSIGEN products and Kofax products.  Some good additional info on ScanGuru.