Summary of GN4 features

Architecture

Service-oriented, with all the content management functions (import/export, access permissions, workflow, transformations, life-cycle, indexing and so forth) and database access handled centrally by the server. Client and external systems communicate with the server via Web services using HTTP or HTTPS protocols.

Front End Client

Web browsers and Microsoft Windows client based on Microsoft WPF technology; 3rd party clients such as InCopy and InDesign, Photoshop and Premiere Pro.

Input format

Texts in XML, Microsoft Word format, HTML or plain text. Images as JPEG, GIF, PNG, TIFF, EPS. PDF documents. Windows Media, MP4, Flash, QuickTime, 3GP videos. WAV, MP2 & MP3, RealAudio, Dalet, Windows Media, QuickTime audios.

Third party software plug-in

No third-party software is required, but it is possible to use Adobe applications with GN4.

Application Server

Windows ASP.NET / Microsoft Internet Information Server

Database

Microsoft SQL Server (2005 or later) or Oracle (10g or later)

Content Management

Content items are organized in a virtual folder structure. Access permissions are controlled by folders, and editorial workflow is organized 'moving' content between folders. Content items can be texts and multi-media, including links and relationships. Metadata is completely definable. It is also possible to define custom content types. The system handles content life-cycle with 'logical' delete, un-delete and purging; quotas; content expiration; complete audit-trail and versioning. Permissions and privileges are assigned at the user or group level. Users can belong to multiple groups, and permissions can be either granted or explicitly denied.

Search Engine

Solr engine. Multi-lingual, supporting rich set of full-text search functions and also automatic extraction of relevant terms and concepts from the indexed material by means of Stanbol semantic processor. SQL full text search engine. MySQL full text search engine. Oracle full-text engine.

Content Generation

Content in all the formats listed above can be imported directly for the system UI or directly by the server (spool folders, e-mail, Web services calls from third-party systems). Textual content can be created and edited directly in the system UI. Multi-media content can be checked-out to be edited locally with any third-party tool (e.g. PhotoShop to edit images). Content can be converted to different formats (e.g. videos to Flash, images to JPEG) and transformed (e.g. scaling/subsampling of images, XML conversions using XSLT) and send to outside systems or destinations - using Web service calls, direct FTP/file copy, e-mail.

Capacity

Thousands of editorial users and tens of millions of assets

Resiliency

All the system components (application server, database, full-text search engine) can be distributed on multiple servers with load balancing and/or clustering.

Security

Access permission are handled centrally at the data store level - no client or even internal system component can bypass access permissions checks. Support for integrated logins using Windows authentication. Support for HTTPS and VPN. Storage of sensitive data like passwords using encryption.

Interoperability

Complete open and documented REST-like Web service interface accessing all system functions. All content available as XML complying with a known schema. Any XML complying with the schema can be imported directly. Native support for XSL transformation and multi-media format conversions - both in input and in output. Multi-media support and interfacing with external systems are extensible with a plug-ins system.

Latency

The latency of server operation is kept low by a combination of in-memory caching of the most frequently used data and the high performance of the full-text search engine (sub-second search times). Latency on the client depends mostly on the network connection.

User working document backup

Client can store temporary backups on the local machine, and automatically recover them in the event of a crash, power failure. The Web client usually does not have access to the local machine disk, so it is limited to backups on the server.

Chart and Table generation by dynamics data source

The system does not have built-in charting capabilities, but it can generate XML or CVS data that can be opened and used directly in programs like Excel.

Document template Import

Custom document structures can be added to the system's schema - and so they can be entered directly from the UI. External document templates and forms that produce XML can be interfaced directly.

Code generation

The system is configured using an XML schema, UI XML configuration files - based on Windows Presentation Foundation, workflows using Windows Workflow Foundation and (optionally) external plug-ins developed in any .NET-compatible language (VB.NET, C#, managed C++, IronPython etc.). There is no automatic code generation.

Language Support

The database and UI are all entirely Unicode and support Latin and non-Latin languages - including Chinese and Arabic. Full-text search has complete support for English, French, Spanish, Russian, Arabic, Catalan, Czech, Danish, German, Estonian, Italian, Dutch, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Chinese. Spell-check and thesaurus are available in English as well as many other European languages.

Workflow notification

Third party E-mail or instant messaging.

Reports

The system keeps detailed audit-trails (including of content access and searches) and can display this information directly in its UI or export it in a variety of formats to reports tools or data-mining systems.