For international companies to successfully position themselves, global content management strategies, i.e. adapting product information and company presentation to individual target markets, are the decisive factors. According to assessments by the Common Sense Advisory consultants, last year in Germany alone more than a billion US dollars were spent on language services. In their study on global management, viable solutions, along with the most common content management systems, were presented and evaluated in this context. Web content management and technical content management emerged as the most important areas of application.
System Requirements for Global Content and Processes
For the creation of content and texts it is important in global content management that systems comfortably support the capture of content as well as subsequent processing, translation, and management. Texts in various languages - including those with non-Latin alphabets - should be easy to publish. Typically, translation and localization are integrated into workflows, so that the exchange of content between systems needs to work seamlessly. Data standards such as TMX or XLIFF, as well as other text standards such as DITA (Darwin Information Typing Architechture) ensure this. In this area, SCHEMA ST4 achieved one of the highest scores with 3.25 of a possible 4.00 points, on the same level as EMC Documentum and behind DocZone and IBM FileNet.
SCHEMA ST4 also scored extremely well in the area of process support. Comparing systems, the consultants examined how integrated the workflows are, how easy the exchange of project data, and how well the integration with language technologies are handled. Here SCHEMA ranked only 0.63 points behind the frontrunner.
Services and Support by System Providers
Another central aspect of the study was the services and support by the providers. For software interface and user guide localization and customer service and technical support, among docoriented systems the global players EMC Documentum and IBM FileNet had the highest scores, followed by SCHEMA ST4.
In regards to multiregional rollout scenarios, SCHEMA still has one or two tasks to accomplish. "We are in the process of implementing our internationalization strategies," comments Stefan Freisler, CEO and responsible for marketing at SCHEMA GmbH. "We are very well prepared for the Englishlanguage regions. In the US, for example, SCHEMA ST4 is in use at Philips Healthcare."
Future Developments in Global Content Management
Where are we headed? No IT solution is an island, say the Common Sense Advisory consultants. This is especially true for content management systems, the content and texts of which can be used in various departments, or even across an entire company. When selecting a system, therefore, it is very important to ensure an easy integration into the IT environment. Above all, the system should possess standard interfaces to professional translation management solutions.
Also very important for the future is the ongoing integration of content component management into the complete product lifecycle management portfolios of classical DMS and ERP providers.
SCHEMA - Complex Documents Made Easy!
SCHEMA GmbH was founded in 1995 by a team of IT and documentation specialists in Nürnberg, and is represented by over 60 employees in four locations. SCHEMA's flagship standard software is the XMLbased editing and content management system SCHEMA ST4, offering efficient features for all aspects of creating, managing, and publishing complex and large amounts of documentation. Its scalability makes it suitable for small editing teams as well as for companywide solutions for information logistics.
SCHEMA ST4 is successfully deployed across a wide range of industries to manage all tasks around complex documentation including technical documentation, software documentation and help systems, catalogs, labeling for pharmaceutical companies, solutions for specialized publishers, contract and bid management. Integrating SCHEMA ST4 into modern IT environments is simple: implemented in Microsoft .NET Framework, it supports the entire bandwidth of documentationrelevant standards (XML, XSL:FO, DITA, etc.) and boasts a wide range of interfaces (MS Office, Adobe CS, SAP, Documentum, SharePoint). A wide network of partners enables SCHEMA to offer specifically tailored solutions for the various needs of customers and industry.
Among the numerous customers already using SCHEMA ST4based solutions are: ABB, Agilent, Avaloq, Bosch, Boehringer Ingelheim, Bundesanzeiger Verlagsgesellschaft, Carl Zeiss, Daimler, InterComponentWare, Lindauer Dornier, Lufthansa Systems, MAN, Reifenhäuser, Schaeffler Gruppe, Siemens, Österreichische Bundesbahnen, Philips, STOLL, T-Systems, Voith and Wolffkran.
For more information please visit: http://www.schema.de