The document discusses strategies for a small company ("David") to successfully import documents from a larger company ("Goliath") into Alfresco. It recommends determining where documents are located, which documents are relevant, how many documents there are, and who owns the documents. It also advises dividing problems into smaller pieces and asking for help when needed. The process of importing documents from a large company is compared to battling Goliath, with many potential challenges that must be addressed.

1. David and Goliath
David Ciamberlano
The misadventure of an Alfrescan vs a big Company

2. Learn. Connect. Collaborate.
David & Goliath
David beat Goliath with a single precise shot
But in the real world, things work quite differently…
If you want to tame a “big Company” make sure you have:
strategy, patience, resilience, pragmatism, common sense…
(and most of all a fair amount of luck!)

3. Learn. Connect. Collaborate.
David & Goliath
David beat Goliath with a single precise
shot
This talk contains some humble suggestions, taken from real cases, on how
to deal with these kind of projects.

4. Learn. Connect. Collaborate.
David & Goliath
David beat Goliath with a single precise shot
This talk contains some humble suggestions, taken from real cases, on how to
deal with these kind of projects.
In particular I would like to focus on one aspect that could seem easy to
accomplish but it’s not:
the import of the existing company documents in Alfresco.

5. Learn. Connect. Collaborate.
The Alfrescan
ready to fight…
1

6. Learn. Connect. Collaborate.
The Big Company
CC BY 3.0 - David Revoy / Blender Foundation
Management
Rules
Departments

7. Learn. Connect. Collaborate.
The Big Company
…ok…
maybe I exaggerated a little…
Actually the big company is
more like this
(but it’s scary anyway!) CC BY 2.0 - Bernt Rostad

8. Learn. Connect. Collaborate.
The Battlefield
First of all, we need to know the battlefield!
(Sun-Tzu also says so in “the Art of war”. At that time Alfresco didn’t exist yet
so he spoke about the war… but the concepts are the same!)
Our battlefield is: the documents

9. Learn. Connect. Collaborate.
The Challenges
Resign yourself to the fact that you will face (many) problems, obstacles and challenges.
A golden rule is:
let the problems emerge
…as soon as possible.
Your job is to find and resolve problems…
2

10. Learn. Connect. Collaborate.
The Problems…
You cannot escape from the problems… *
* No you are not Cary Grant!
Do not try to move them away ...
sooner or later they will find you!
So it’s better to deal with them
right away.
Public domain photo

11. Learn. Connect. Collaborate.
Divide et Impera!
And don’t try to solve the problems all together…
use the Divide & Conquer principle.
And if you are stuck… it is probably a good idea to ask for help.
Often the clients have the solution that you are looking for (after all, they know their
company much better than you).

12. Learn. Connect. Collaborate.
4 Key Questions
Four important questions to keep in mind:
– Where are the documents?
– What documents are relevant?
– How Many documents are there?
– Who owns the documents?
There are obviously other aspects to consider but in 5 minutes we can’t talk about everything…

13. Learn. Connect. Collaborate.
Where the documents are
In a Big Company the documents could be scattered in the most "exotic"
places…
3
"I’ve seen things you people wouldn't believe…"
License: CC0 1.0

14. Learn. Connect. Collaborate.
Where the documents are
In a Big Company the documents could be scattered in the most "exotic"
places…
You need to discover all
the “data sources” and for
each of them determine a
different action plan.

15. Learn. Connect. Collaborate.
What Documents Are Relevant
Not all the documents are relevant for our goals…
in real fact, many of them are:
• waste “copy of copy of draft project-plan.xls”, ”blade-runner.avi”, …
• obsolete “y2k-bug-solution.pdf”, “budget-2005.xls”, …
• simply not important "xmas-party-2017.docx", "room-reserv-2017.xls" …

16. Learn. Connect. Collaborate.
What Documents Are Relevant
You need to identify the "good ones" and discard the others.
This task could be difficult but it will greatly reduce the amount of data to
manage and analyze.
Not all the documents are relevant for our goals…
in real fact, many of them are:
• waste “copy of copy of draft project-plan.xls”, ”blade-runner.avi”, …
• obsolete “y2k-bug-solution.pdf”, “budget-2005.xls”, …
• simply not important "xmas-party-2017.docx", "room-reserv-2017.xls" …

17. Learn. Connect. Collaborate.
How many documents there are
Once you understand what the relevant documents are…
… you need to count, weight and classify them.
4

18. Learn. Connect. Collaborate.
How many documents there are
Once you understand what the relevant documents are…
… you need to count, weight and classify them.
Knowing how many documents must be migrated to Alfresco, what’s their medium and
total size and what type of data you have is important for:
• hardware sizing and architecture design
• choice the correct import strategy
• make an estimate of the migration time

19. Learn. Connect. Collaborate.
Who owns the documents
Most documents have restricted access.
Do you think it’s easy to discover who is their owner?
No!
• people change position, job, department
• the data could be old and nobody could remember who produced them.

20. Learn. Connect. Collaborate.
Your mood will be like a rollercoaster
License - cc0
When you are here,
don’t be too afraid…
…things are not as bad as
they seem to be!

21. Learn. Connect. Collaborate.
Your mood will be like a rollercoaster
When you are here,
don’t be too afraid…
…things are not as bad as
they seem to be!
When you are here, don’t
get too excited…
…things are not as good
as they seem to be!

22. David and Goliath
David Ciamberlano
Thank you!