Content Repository , Document Repository , whats the difference if any?

Question

What is the difference between CMSs and DMSs ? Both store date , give access to the data , where do they differ? Can apache Jack Rabbit be used in place of Alfresco ?

Answer 1

Content management refers to a system that stores content of any type. It tends to involve a workflow (i.e. creators, editors, publishers). Content management oalso often deals with fragments of data applied to templates. For example, a template for a page may be created with editable body, sub title, title etc.

Document management refers to a system that stores electronic documents or files of any type. Document management can be considered a subset of content management - a more specialised form of content management as it approaches the management only of electronic files, not necessarily the potential to store fragments of content.

Jack Rabbit and Alfresco both supply content management services so they can also be used to support document management by the simple fact that one is a subset of the other. So in this case, it's more down to which provide the features you need.

Answer 2

I would differentiate the two based on they mutability of the data under management:

• In a Document Management System, the Documents are immutable (and often opaque) blobs created by external applications
• A Content Management system contains mutable data (the content) and provides an interface to mutate said content.

Of course, DMSs have evolved to break this rule - for example, by adding document properties to a Word Document... however, people seem comfortable with calling this "metadata" and therefore it can break all the rules.

Given the immutable nature of the data, a DMS can make assumptions that a CMS can not - given these assumptions, I would be careful stating (as per Wolfwyrd's comment) that DMS is a subset of CMS.