InfoCodex Blog: Cross-Language Search

A Document Management System (DMS) is a database containing a collection of unstructured documents, supplemented by metadata such as customer numbers, keywords etc. for index-based search and retrieval.

It generates some structure in large archives of documents, but this structure is created and maintained by human resources. The organization of such system requires substantial human efforts and so does the daily filing of new documents (keyword setting etc. for subsequent search and retrieval). An additional problem is that today’s DMS structures do not necessarily fulfill tomorrow’s needs if the fields of interest change over the course of time (see, e.g.,  Wikipedia entry on Document Management System, ISO 15836:2009, SN EN ISO 11442:2006).

InfoCodex, on the other hand, automatically creates and maintains a virtual order according to
the current fields of interests reflected by the documents. Similar to a chaotic warehouse system where the physical location of items is irrelevant as long as a structured catalogue is maintained, InfoCodex organises large amounts of documents which can be dispersed across different sources (file servers, e-mailboxes, Internet, Intranet, databases) by generating a virtual, but highly structured information landscape. No manual input is required to organize the archives or to generate keywords or other search indexes. The user-dependent access rights are fully granted, and the virtual order is always kept up-to-date. The prerequisite is, however, that the documents at hand have real thematic content and are not just forms like delivery notes, invoices, vouchers etc.

Conclusions

• For the administration of documents with real thematic content (business correspondence, business reports, contracts and written agreements, offers, research reports, news articles etc.), where the focus is on a targeted and fast retrieval of the documents, IntoCodex can certainly replace a costly DMS.
• For the administration of process information with little thematic content (delivery notes, invoices, vouchers, bank receipts etc.), InfoCodex can be a supplement to a DMS but it cannot replace a DMS.