The following table summarizes the design pillars of Perceptive Content as they relate to the logical perspective of the architecture.
Pillar | Description |
---|---|
Flexibility |
Similar Client Design
The Client Tier products provide flexibility because almost all Perceptive Content functionality is available through a Windows or web browser client, or you can write your own client using web services. For example, you can search, view, and manage content in a Windows environment using Experience Client. OSM Storage Options In the Data Tier, the file-system based OSM provides you with the flexibility to store your data using a wide array of commercial technologies that best meet your performance and cost parameters. |
Functionality |
Features
The Client Tier gives users single-click access to any piece of content through the Business Tier functionality (scanned image, fax, email, enterprise report, or imported file) directly from records in your business systems. The Client Tier provides access to all functionality, including the capacity to manage and annotate documents, capture, view, search, route objects in workflows, and provide reports. |
Usability |
Familiar Platforms
Perceptive Software built the Client Tier on platforms that are familiar to our customers, including Windows, web browser-based, and web services-based solutions. Providing the clients in familiar platforms makes them more usable for our customer base. The clients adhere to graphical user interface standards that provide familiar tools, such as windows, menus, and dialog boxes. Consistency The Perceptive Content provides a consistent look and feel so that customers can seamlessly move between platforms. In addition, Perceptive Content Client includes standardized, information-rich, help topics that provide assistance when needed. |
Scalability |
Multi-threaded Approach
In the Business Tier, Perceptive Content uses a multi-threaded server model to handle large volumes of requests while scaling very efficiently. Using this approach, Perceptive Content tracks multiple users and their requests as threads with separate identities. This approach enables Perceptive Content to address an unlimited number of requests at the same time, while tracking the status of work for each thread until the work finishes. Hybrid Storage Model In the database, Perceptive Content stores metadata (information about the document such as, document indexes, version information, security privileges, and workflow status) and unlimited amounts of customer defined data, while storing document objects on the file-system rather than binary large objects (BLOBs) in the database. This hybrid storage model significantly lowers the database size, and increases overall system performance. Flexible Storage In the Data Tier, for the OSM, you can create separate object storage structures that you can subdivide and cluster using virtually any logical construct. For example, you can optimize storage around patterns of usage by creating multiple storage locations for different document sets. Using multiple storage locations, you can place frequently accessed data in one file system, while placing other data in near-line storage. This division allows the Perceptive Content object store to be distributed to extremely high-performance SANs and other dedicated I/O maximized devices, such as RAID, optical disks, HSM systems, or any combination of storage devices. Perceptive Content also supports the ability to archive objects to CAS (Content-Addressable Storage) devices. Remote Services Over TCP/IP, any Perceptive Content Client anywhere in the world can securely communicate with any Perceptive Content Server using your LAN, WAN, intranet, extranet or the Internet itself. The Perceptive Content communications subsystem bursts packets efficiently between the Perceptive Content Client pool and the Perceptive Content Server, optimizing load handling and providing an excellent user experience with sub-second content retrieval. Because Perceptive Content is a pure TCP/IP-based product, it offers the highest level of raw network performance and the greatest breadth of back-end scalability. |
Extensibility |
Integration in the Client Tier
The Client Tier offers a powerful variety of non-programmatic integration options collectively known as LearnMode that set it apart from stand-alone, post-processed, “filing cabinet” solutions. The Client Tier uses LearnMode for integrating with virtually any application delivered to any desktop application or enterprise system. Client-side integration options support single-click indexing and retrieval as well as user collaboration via email. Perceptive Content uses MAPI to invoke whatever email client you use and to auto-populate the body of the email. All major Perceptive Content functions are accessible programmatically on the desktop via Visual Basic script and COM function calls to allow a variety of more advanced integration options. Integration in the Business Tier The Business Tier provides functionality for customers who want to programmatically integrate Perceptive Content with their systems. Integration Server can be used with third-party applications to flexibly incorporate Perceptive Content functionality directly into products and enterprise systems by providing the required classes, functions, methods, subroutines, or other routines. Integration Server interacts seamlessly with Perceptive Content Server to increase efficiency with the use of your existing development tools. iScript enables the customization of business processes in Perceptive Content and provides the means for those processes to interact with third party systems using industry-standard interfaces such as COM, ODBC, ADO, and SMTP. |
Dependability |
Proven Programming Languages and Standards
Perceptive Software designed and built Perceptive Content using C++ and Java 2 technologies following object-oriented principles to provide maximum performance. Perceptive Software designs products that adhere to industry standards, such as:
OSM Mirroring In the Data Tier, the OSM provides the ability to write object data to multiple sources simultaneously to provide real-time redundancy of the OSM, which is also known as mirroring. You can configure Perceptive Content storage locations on the same server as the Perceptive Content Server or on an external file system located anywhere on your LAN or WAN. For example, one file system can be on RAID 5 with its mirrored file system located on an optical jukebox, while simultaneously writing to a magnetic storage system in an offsite, secure location. If the drive where the primary OSM storage fails after you select OSM mirroring, Perceptive Content automatically attempts to read the data from the secondary location. |