Nuxeo Enterprise Platform v5.2

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1 Reference Code: TA001693CMT Publication Date: Jully 2009 Author: Balachandar Ganesh, Sue Clarke TECHNOLOGY AUDIT Nuxeo Enterprise Platform v5.2 Nuxeo BUTLER GROUP VIEW ABSTRACT Nuxeo is a provider of open source Enterprise Content Management (ECM) solutions. The company s flagship offering, the Nuxeo Galaxy suite comprises the Java-based Nuxeo Enterprise Platform (EP) and components that sit on top of it to provide horizontal- and vertical-specific services. The EP is built on an infrastructure of plug-ins and extension points based on Open Services Gateway initiative (OSGi) standards. The components, which are essentially packaged applications, are built on a component-composition architecture and they talk to the Nuxeo EP using Web-services-based APIs. In Butler Group s opinion, the Nuxeo Galaxy suite scores particularly highly on Document Management (DM) and Digital Asset Management (DAM). The solution includes embedded search capabilities, workflow, rules engine, and an open source content repository as well as collaboration, Records Management (RM) and Web Content Management (WCM) capabilities. The target market for Nuxeo s ECM solution is primarily medium-sized businesses with 500 or more employees. KEY FINDINGS Nuxeo EP is extensible as it is developed on a plug-ins based architecture. Impressive Document Management and DAM capabilities. Offers embedded search capabilities. The solution is based on the open source LGPL licensing model. Open source model offsets acquisition costs and makes deployment economically viable. Offers document annotation and image editing capabilities from within Nuxeo s UI. The solution s collaboration capabilities lack inbuilt support for IM applications. Nuxeo s Galaxy suite has been developed on the Java code base. LOOK AHEAD Nuxeo s development plans include offering support for the Microsoft SharePoint protocol, the Content Management Interoperability Services (CMIS) specification, and the setting up of a Nuxeo workshop with commonly available development tools and debuggers to help build a community for developers to build applications for Nuxeo s EP. Butler Group. This Technology Audit is a licensed product and is not to be photocopied Page 1

2 FUNCTIONALITY The need to manage and monitor the entire lifecycle of content, from creation through to policy-based storage for streamlined retrieval and reuse, has become imperative in today s information-driven business environment. However, many current Enterprise Content Management (ECM) solutions do not reach a high percentage of enterprise information workers, due to high acquisition and ongoing maintenance costs and low usability. Also, most proprietary ECM solutions are targeted towards information workers involved in executing complex content-centric business processes, and these solutions usually involve a substantial degree of user training and changes in working practices that reduce adoption rates amongst the lower strata of the knowledge worker base. Open source ECM vendors have seen a considerable uptake in the recent past for this very reason. They target the needs of the mass, rather than restricting themselves to providing specialised, high-value capabilities for a few users. Product Analysis The Nuxeo Galaxy suite is Nuxeo s ECM offering, which comprises the Nuxeo Enterprise Platform, and a number of horizontal as well as vertical applications running on top of it. A schematic view of the Nuxeo Galaxy suite is illustrated in Figure 1. Figure 1: The Nuxeo Galaxy Suite Source: Nuxeo D A T A M O N I T O R Butler Group. This Technology Audit is a licensed product and is not to be photocopied Page 2

3 The Nuxeo Enterprise Platform (EP) is the core underpinning element of the Nuxeo Galaxy suite. The platform is Java based and is tied to the open source Apache JackRabbit repository. Nuxeo EP offers basic library services such as a query engine, access control, policy enforcement, content model, versioning, lifecycle management, audit trail, import/export, and metadata extraction. This platform is extensible in the sense that it is built on an infrastructure of plug-ins and extension points, based on the Open Services Gateway initiative (OSGi) (an open standards organisation that provides a framework for the modularisation of an application into smaller components). Horizontal and/or vertical applications that sit on top of this platform are developed using a component composition system meaning, they are self-contained black boxes providing certain services or pieces of functionality that extend the platform s functionality. These applications interface with the Nuxeo EP by means of an API. Nuxeo was initially developed on the open source Zope application server and was scripted using the objectoriented Python scripting language before the company decided to migrate to Java in This migration involved rewriting the entire application from scratch. Butler Group considers the migration to the Java code base as a step in the right direction by Nuxeo, as Java has a better portfolio of open source libraries than Python. The most relevant Java-based open source libraries from the ECM perspective include Jackrabbit (open source content repository), Lucene (open source search engine), jbpm (open source workflow management system), and JBoss Rules (open source, standards-based business rules engine). Nuxeo NewsWave, one of Nuxeo s packaged applications, leverages the platform s collaboration, Document Management (DM), Digital Asset Management (DAM), search, and workflow capabilities to provide a Web Content Management (WCM) system for press agencies and media houses. Figure 2 is a screenshot of the NewsWave UI. As illustrated, the NewsWave application segments the editor s console into multiple customisable workspaces. The screenshot below shows the solution s ability to support dynamic information feeds, multimedia content preview, content annotation, collaborative content authoring based on user-access rights (modify or read-only), a rich text editor, search, and content publishing. Butler Group. This Technology Audit is a licensed product and is not to be photocopied Page 3

4 Figure 2: Screenshot of the Nuxeo NewsWave UI Source: Nuxeo D A T A M O N I T O R Butler Group is particularly impressed with Nuxeo EP s extensible nature and believes that, with strong participation from within its developer community as well as from its integration partners, Nuxeo could, going forward, provide a number of vertical components that integrate with line-of-business applications as well as services that cater for vertical-specific requirements. Also, the open standards-based approach of Nuxeo, coupled with the company s stated promise of offering support for the Content Management Interoperability Services (CMIS) proposed standard in the near future, further enhances Nuxeo s capability to provide a standardised platform for information access and delivery across multi-vendor repositories. Butler Group. This Technology Audit is a licensed product and is not to be photocopied Page 4

5 Product Operation The architecture of Nuxeo s ECM solution is illustrated in Figure 3. Nuxeo Core, along with the content repository forms the foundation of the Nuxeo EP. It is capable of running on any Java platform (for example, the JBoss application server) and it can be extended using plug-ins. It can implement the JCA (Java EE Connector Architecture) to plug itself into third-party applications (for example, an RCP Eclipse application), and information systems. Nuxeo Core provides all the necessary low-level services to define, store, manage, audit, request, and search content. It also offers basic library services such as the query engine, access control, policy enforcement, content model, versioning, lifecycle management, audit trail, import/export, and metadata extraction. Figure 3: Nuxeo Architecture Source: Nuxeo D A T A M O N I T O R Butler Group. This Technology Audit is a licensed product and is not to be photocopied Page 5

6 The Nuxeo Service Platform (SP) sits on top of the Nuxeo Core to form the Nuxeo EP and offers high-level Web services-based (SOAP, Representational State Transfer (REST), and Web-based Distributed Authoring and Versioning (WebDAV)) interfaces to Nuxeo Core. The concept of low- and high-level services can be better understood by considering the following example. Document Lifecycle Management is one of the core capabilities offered by the Nuxeo EP. Lifecycle Management essentially means identifying and tracking the phase or state of a document (from creation to approval to publishing) within a pre-defined business process or workflow. While Nuxeo Core does not provide an embedded workflow engine, it provides a generic way to define document lifecycles, the way the document properties are related to its lifecycle and so on. This is a low-level service. A workflow engine (high-level service) is deployed alongside the Nuxeo Core which leverages the API exposed by Nuxeo Core to define a workflow and set the document s lifecycle properties. Based on the nature of the implementation and the context of Nuxeo s ECM solution in a production environment, Nuxeo EP proposes different technologies to implement the client side of the application. Available clients are the JSF Client, Nuxeo WebEngine, RCP, GWT client, Flex client, and Nuxeo Shell. Nuxeo uses the concept of Domains for document lifecycle management. Domains are essentially thematic spaces that comprise workspaces, sections, and templates. While content creation and modification can be performed from within a workspace, published documents can be viewed (based on user access rights) from within the section. It must be stressed that these published documents, when viewed from the section, are in read-only format and cannot be edited. Administrators can leverage the template to create new workspaces and sections and add users, as well as grant permissions and access rights. Documents can be created natively from within the workspace, or can be imported manually. The solution lacks capabilities to automatically export documents from Office productivity suites to the Nuxeo EP. To this effect, Butler Group would like to see either a Nuxeo task pane embedded within MS Office, or support for the Microsoft SharePoint protocol, thereby closely linking the site of content creation to the content management system. The Nuxeo Rich Client Platform (RCP) offers a rich interface for all of the services offered by Nuxeo EP. Nuxeo has leveraged the RCP to build, in Butler Group s opinion, a good Digital Asset Management (DAM) packaged application, which includes features such as: an extensible Hypertext Markup Language (XHTML) WYSIWYG editor, documents, videos and picture annotations, metadata extraction (for example, Exchangeable Image File Format (EXIF), International Press Telecommunications Council (IPTC), Extensible Metadata Platform (XMP), and ID3), thumbnail viewing, a batch image browser (to view images), and an image processing tool (to edit photos and change their resolution). The RCP also includes a set of portlets that can be customised, based on user requirements. The Nuxeo WebEngine is a content-centric Web 2.0 framework that facilitates the development of collaborative and dynamic Web sites and applications. These applications leverage the capabilities of the Nuxeo EP to collate and integrate unstructured information and leverage collaborative capabilities such as blogs, wikis, social networks, RSS feeds, and mashups to build content-centric Web applications. The Nuxeo WebEngine uses a REST-style architecture where access to all resources, including the content residing within Nuxeo workspaces, is provided via HyperText Transfer Protocol (HTTP). Nuxeo has embedded search capabilities that enable users to search for indexed documents. Nuxeo leverages the open source Lucene search engine, which offers Java-based indexing and search capabilities as well as features such as spellchecking and hit highlighting. A search toolbar that is embedded within the Nuxeo UI offers simple keyword-based search capabilities. The solution also offers advanced search features allowing users to specify parameters, (for example, dates of document-related events such as document creation date and publication date). Butler Group. This Technology Audit is a licensed product and is not to be photocopied Page 6

7 Product Emphasis Nuxeo does not attempt to compete with high-end, sophisticated, proprietary solution providers of ECM: rather it supplements these offerings by extending the reach of ECM across a wider user base. Keeping this in perspective, Butler Group believes the emphasis of the Nuxeo solution is in offering a platform-based solution that extends itself to provide horizontal-specific, as well as vertical-specific, content management services. We consider the Nuxeo EP to be a good, scalable platform, which offers basic library services that can be exposed to components that sit on top of the platform, to provide capabilities around DM, Collaboration, DAM, Records Management, and search. Nuxeo also offers packaged vertical-specific applications such as its press editorial system and DAM for Intelligence Agencies. DEPLOYMENT The resources that implement Nuxeo within any organisation are tasked with adapting the solution s interface, customising the document topology, and installing a business-proofed production instance of the solution. To this effect, Nuxeo offers a five-day training course that provides the basic concepts required to configure, customise, and install the solution. The company also offers a two-day post-installation training course that deals with monitoring the solution and configuring it for tasks such as replication and backups. Organisations have an option of deploying Nuxeo either through their internal resources, in which case it is recommended that they undergo the aforementioned training courses, or they can work with Systems Integrators (SIs). Nuxeo offers an intensive two-week training course for SIs and partners. The average time for deployment varies depending on the project scope and complexity. For example, a simple deployment that involves customising the interface, and configuring one set of metadata and one customised search interface can be performed in ten to 20 days. For larger ECM projects, the implementation time typically ranges from three months to one year. Nuxeo EP can be implemented in a modular manner, since it leverages the OSGi standard. The solution s architecture makes use of a component-based framework that offers specific pieces of functionality, which can be activated or de-activated on a needs basis. Post implementation, the resources that maintain Nuxeo typically perform basic operations such as checking the database connection pool and checking file system space. From past deployment examples, Nuxeo states that these resources are mostly provided from within the end-user organisation. Nuxeo's software is available on platforms such as Solaris, Linux (RHEL, Debian, and Ubuntu), Windows (XP, 2003, and 2008) and MacOS X. Nuxeo ties itself to one of the following databases: Oracle, PostgreSQL, MS SQL Server, MySQL, or DB2. Legacy integration is available using the following approaches: WebDAV access, legacy file system import, and Windows SharePoint Protocol (in the pipeline). Once implemented, MS Office and Windows Explorer can browse Nuxeo's repository as a SharePoint Server. Nuxeo s platform, as well as the horizontal/vertical specific components that sit above this platform, is available free of charge under the LGPL licence. Nuxeo Connect is the company s support offering available to organisations opting for professional support. Nuxeo charges for its support on a per-application basis and offers three Service Level Agreement (SLA) levels, the specifications of which are outlined in the figure below. Butler Group. This Technology Audit is a licensed product and is not to be photocopied Page 7

8 Figure 4: Nuxeo SLA options for the ECM platform Source: Nuxeo D A T A M O N I T O R PRODUCT STRATEGY The target market for Nuxeo EP is both horizontal and vertical. The company s strategy revolves around developing horizontal solutions, such as Nuxeo DM, Nuxeo DAM, and Nuxeo Correspondence, and vertical solutions such as, Nuxeo NewsWave, solutions for Education (Digital collaborative workspaces for teachers, pupils, parents, and administration), and DAM for Intelligence Agencies. These solutions are packaged as functionally distinct applications that extend the functionality of Nuxeo EP. In terms of company size, Nuxeo targets mid- to large-sized businesses with between 500 and tens of thousands of employees. Nuxeo adopts a direct as well as a partner-network based route to market. Direct sales are facilitated by the company s offices in Paris and London (in Europe) and Boston (in the USA). The company has established reseller agreements with SIs around the world, the most notable being with Atos Origin, Xerox, Thales, Capgemini, Logica, Steria, Business & Decision, Eurocis, AKKA Technologies, Smile, Micro Research, The Reference, Yerbabuena Software, and MetaLogic. The company s technology partnerships include RedHat and Sun Microsystems. Butler Group. This Technology Audit is a licensed product and is not to be photocopied Page 8

9 Nuxeo s release strategy involves one minor version (which caters for bug fixes and patches) every quarter along with one major release every 18 months. The company s plans for the next release (Nuxeo 6.0) involves setting up a Nuxeo Workshop, which is an environment for developers to create horizontal and vertical applications. This environment will include integration with popular development tools along with a live content browser and debugger, and the Nuxeo Command Centre, which includes facilities to monitor services through an administration console. COMPANY PROFILE Nuxeo is a privately held provider of open source ECM solutions, which is headquartered in Paris. The company has recently opened sales offices in London, UK and Boston, US. The company s open source offering, the Nuxeo Galaxy suite is based on the LGPL licensing model and has been developed on the Java platform. The company s revenue model is subscription based offering the product as a free-to-download version and charging for maintenance, support, and professional services. Nuxeo has been a provider of ECM solutions since The company has 50 employees, of which 48 are based in EMEA with the remaining two based out of North America. The employee split across functional departments is as follows: 20 in Research and Development, ten in Sales and Marketing, 14 in Support and Services, and six in Administration. Nuxeo states that it currently has over 300 customers that have opted for the company s support and services. Key customers of the company s Galaxy suite include: The Press Association, Agence France Presse (AFP), the BBC, Leroy Merlin, the French ministry of Education - Region of Rennes (France), the French Ministry of Defense Defence procurement Agency (DGA), the French Air Force, and Cengage. SUMMARY The ECM space consists of a diverse set of vendors originating from different backgrounds. While the upper end of the solution provider stack has seen a raft of acquisitions that has led to a significant shift in the strategies of large, proprietary solution providers of ECM technologies, the lower end of the vendor ecosystem has seen the entry of a number of open source vendors in the recent past, adding to the already densely populated ECM marketplace. While most of the open source vendors provide specific elements of the ECM technology stack, there exists a handful of end-to-end providers of open source ECM solutions Nuxeo being one of them. In Butler Group s opinion, Nuxeo is well placed to carve a niche out of this increasingly standardised ECM space if the company decides to leverage its integration partner and user development community, as well as in-house resources to develop more vertical-specific applications along the lines of DAM for Intelligence Agencies, which tie into specific business processes, or cater to the vertical-specific needs of enterprises. Butler Group. This Technology Audit is a licensed product and is not to be photocopied Page 9

10 Table 1: Contact Details Nuxeo 18 rue Soleillet Paris, Métro Gambetta France Tel: +33 (1) Nuxeo 8 Faneuil Hall Marketplace 3rd Floor Boston, MA USA Tel: +1 (617) Source: Nuxeo Nuxeo Betterton Street WC2H 9BP UK Tel: +44 (0) D A T A M O N I T O R Headquarters Shirethorn House, 37/43 Prospect Street, Kingston upon Hull, HU2 8PX, UK Tel: +44 (0) Fax: +44 (0) For Butler Gr Butler Direct Pty Ltd. Level 46, Citigroup Building, 2 Park Street, Sydney, NSW, 2000, Australia Tel: + 61 (02) Fax: + 61 (02) Butler Group 245 Fifth Avenue, 4th Floor, New York, NY 10016, USA Tel: Fax: more information on Butler Group s Subscription Services please contact one of the local offices above. Important Notice This report contains data and information upto-date and correct to the best of our knowledge at the time of preparation. The data and information comes from a variety of sources outside our direct control, therefore Butler Direct Limited cannot give any guarantees relating to the content of this report. Ultimate responsibility for all interpretations of, and use of, data, information and commentary in this report remains with you. Butler Direct Limited will not be liable for any interpretations or decisions made by you. oup. This Technology Audit is a licensed product and is not to be photocopied Page 10