atw: Re: Knowledge management - No, but seriously.

Christine:
On Wed, 16 Jul 2008 17:31:43 +1000,  you wrote:
> Guys
>
> I have been out of corporate for a while and am beginning to fall behind=
 in some areas.
> For example, what does knowledge management mean now?  Are there any=
 off-the-shelf
> systems that are particularly associated with knowledge management, as=
 distinct from
> content management, records management or document management.
>
Christine:

The Wikipedia entry holds maybe a "fair enough" summary of the dimensions of=
 the problem
in determining either what goes into and comes out of a KMS and what it=
 does, or is
supposed to do.

"A KM system could be any of the following:

1. Document based i.e. any technology that permits creation / management /=
 sharing of
formatted documents such as Lotus Notes, web, distributed databases etc. 2.
Ontology/Taxonomy based: these are similar to document technologies in the=
 sense that a
system of terminologies (i.e. ontology) are used to summarize the document=
 e.g. Author,
Subj, Organization etc. as in DAML & other XML based ontologies 3. Based on=
 AI
technologies which use a customized representation scheme to represent the=
 problem
domain. 4. Provide network maps of the organization showing the flow of=
 communication
between entities and individuals 5. Increasingly social computing tools are=
 being
deployed to provide a more organic approach to creation of a KM system."

[I think 5. is a reference to blogging and wikis =85 a bit hard to tell=
 though:-)]

(It might be added that combinations of one or more or all of these examples=
 might apply,
and sometimes do.)

Issues of indexing, document control, change / revision control and=
 auditing, topic
mapping and "collaborative authoring" sneak in here.

Various uses and work methods extend from the above -- for example, document=
 (fragment)
reuse has been a recent trend, with SGML followed by Docbook followed by =
 DITA XML. These
now seem to be complicated further by various competitive "Open" or would-be=
 "open"
standards.

More to the point, economically, is the increasing requirement for=
 translation of
documents, particularly into Asian and other languages which need two-byte=
 character
codes which are more suited to XML.

Meanwhile, technology's not entirely on top of the philosophy in these=
 areas, and while I
understand there are some expensive systems which seem to be doing well (I=
 haven't seen
them working on a daily basis, so this is hearsay) there is a whole range of=
 portals and
things generally based around database storage and web-based presentation=
 which are
supposed to help you find things and categorise them and put them into=
 knowledge and
organizational hierarchies.   These often don't look much better than=
 directory-based
file structures with some indexing, access permissions and revision control=
 features
added, but some have added "smarts", and most are getting better.   PHP and=
 Java seem to
be the dominant underlying code bases these days.

Don't just think "KMS" because "CMS" often means the same thing anyway. To=
 see a run down
on the range of systems available, start from:

http://www.cmsreview.com/


And good luck to all who sail in her.

Me, I'm waiting for a DITA XML database system in Open source which handles=
 content
indexing of Frame and Word files, converts to and from PDF accurately, but=
 also handles
binaries like graphics,  is a version control system with hierarchical=
 access controls,
gives good meaningful diffs, permits review commenting and collaborative=
 authoring, is
nicely topic mapped with "clouds" and natural language links, runs on=
 virtually any
operating system, is Open Source, eminently reconfigurable and programmable=
 in something
like Perl 6 language, has a built-in thesaurus, flesch and spell checks,=
 has
similarity searching and makes a nice cup of coffee just the way I want it=
 and at the
right time.  And if it can slake a few lusts for me, that'd be nice, too.

Appreciate a pointer to one like that when you've surveyed the field.....





   


-Peter M 
=A0peterm_5@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx 
=A0  
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