SER Solutions, Inc. announced the commercial availability of its e-mail search tool, SERoutlookAccess, designed specifically for use with Microsoft Outlook 2000+. Accessible directly from Outlook’s toolbar, SERoutlookAccess uses natural language queries, not just keywords to search for content including e-mails, e-mail attachments, Calendar, Contacts, Journal, Notes, Posted Documents, and Tasks. With SERoutlookAccess, users simply type in what they are looking for – words, phrases, sentences, paragraphs, or even the entire content of a document. SERoutlookAccess’ search technology includes fault-tolerant capabilities that overcome typos or misspellings and return accurate and relevant results. SERoutlookAccess operates on Windows 2000 or Windows XP running Microsoft Office 2000, 2002 (XP), or 2003. In addition to SERoutlookAccess, SER offers Personal and Enterprise Search solutions to find information on PCs, enterprise content management systems, mail servers, file servers, databases, intranets, the Internet, etc. www.ser.com

ebrary introduced a new enterprise, server-based technology addressing how ordinary documents in the Portable Document Format (PDF) are viewed, distributed, and shared. Code named “Isaac” and currently in beta with several academic institutions, ebrary’s new technology enables libraries to easily and cost-effectively create and share Remote Collections of PDF content within the institution, with peer institutions, or on the Internet. Additionally, it allows them to create Virtual Portals that seamlessly integrate PDF documents from any Remote Collection, their institutional repository or content management system, as well as existing subscription databases. The new server-based technology integrates all the PDF content an institution owns, with the PDF documents it produces, with the PDF content it borrows and leases, while protecting copyrights through a variety of access controls. The technology is delivered via a single Web-based administrative user interface that contains a library’s brand. The ebrary Reader optimizes online viewing of PDF documents by serving one page at a time instead of the entire file in ebrary’s Exchange Data Format (EDF). Anyone, regardless of bandwidth or connectivity limitations, can access files in EDF without downloads. Like PDF, an EDF document maintains the exact appearance of the original document. Unlike PDF, EDF documents feature advanced research capabilities and word-level interaction through ebrary’s customizable InfoTools. Isaac will be available in Q3 2005. In separate press releases, ebrary announced the availability of Custom Collections and a new perpetual access model, a partnership with BookSurge to bring print-on-demand capabilities to libraries worldwide, and a strategic distribution partnership with Blackwell’s Book Services. www.ebrary.com

ClearStory Systems announced the release of Radiant MailManager, a scalable e-mail active archiving solution that provides complete lifecycle, compliance, and storage management for the corporate e-mail knowledge base. Radiant MailManager is a complete, scalable solution for capturing, managing, and storing e-mail communications. The solution is available as a standalone application or as a component of the Radiant Content Suite, which provides management and on-demand access for the full range of enterprise content. Radiant MailManager’s key features include comprehensive capture and indexing, easy retrieval, effective sampling and review, storage management, and policy-based lifecycle management. Radiant MailManager features easy administration, with configurable rules for policy and category management. Radiant MailManager’s training-based analytics mean that searches and e-mails flagged for review get more accurate over time, reducing the resources required by enterprises to review non-compliant e-mail. Radiant MailManager is the latest addition to the Radiant Content Suite, a platform for integrating rich media and business documents into enterprise business processes. www.clearstorysystems.com

I have been spending a lot of time with the Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX) lately — and have run across a really useful book. The title is Beyond COSO: Internal Control to Enhance Corporate Governance, by Steven J. Root (Wiley, 1998).

Yes, I know … the book predates SOX. When it was published, people were still talking about what a great company Enron was. Undergraduate accounting students were still hoping to land a job with Arthur Andersen. That is part of what makes the book useful.

As many of you probably know, SOX and the SEC don’t  prescribe just how a company must set up internal controls — the SEC only requires that you use a suitable, recognized control framework. In the final rule, the SEC points out that COSO — the framework developed by the “Committee of Sponsoring Organizations” of the Treadway Commision — is such a “suitable” framework.

What make’s Root’s book so interesting is that it is a critique of COSO.  At the heart of this critique is Root’s concern that COSO focuses too narrowly on controls to ensure accurate financial reporting, giving short shrift to the kinds of operational controls that often really make a difference between a business that succeeds and one that doesn’t.

When you look at SOX, you can take Root’s concerns and add an exponent.  Compliance with section 404 of SOX takes what little emphasis there is in COSO on matters other than financial reporting and discards it: 404 compliance is ALL about internal controls to ensure the accuracy of financial reports.

To be sure, accurate financial reporting is a good thing. But it is a rare CEO who decides that what it will take to make his or her company great is better financial reporting.  Improved quality, a stronger connection to the customer, returns exceeding the cost of capital — yes — these are things that management focuses on.  But, better financial reporting?

The sad thing is that improved internal controls really can improve quality, customer response time, and the decision making required to improve return on investment.  But a company that focuses solely on SOX compliance is going to miss these things.

Is this a topic — a concern — arising in your companies as you come to terms with SOX?

Anyway, take a look at Root’s book. It provides a historical perspective on SOX that is missing from some of the recent focus on “compliance.”

Software AG plans to acquire Sabratec Ltd. for its ApplinX legacy integration technology. The combined capabilities of the two companies will provide customers with the ability to integrate virtually all of their mission-critical legacy applications with the newest business architectures. The ApplinX product is synergistic with Software AG’s Enterprise Transaction Systems and XML Business Integration portfolios. The ApplinX technology focuses on helping mainframe customers with applications written in COBOL to cost effectively extend those applications to other business systems. As part of the agreement, Software AG will acquire Sabratec’s Israeli headquarters as well as Sabratec, Inc., located in New York. In addition, Sabratec’s partners in 14 countries worldwide will be able to offer the full line of XML-based integration solutions from Software AG. www.softwareag.com

Thinking ahead to San Francisco, we would like to get some input on topics for workshops. In Boston, we had three post-conference workshops:

• Web Content Management Systems: Principles, Products & Practices
• Content Technology Choices for Technical Communicators
• Enterprise Search – Principles, Players, Practices, & Pitfalls

There’s room at the San Francisco conference for additional workshops, and a few potential topics come to mind:

• XML and Content Management
• XML-Based Electronic Forms, to include InfoPath, Adobe eForms, and XForms
• Content Security, to include Digital Rights Management, Policy Management, and Compliance and Governance
• Understanding and Using the Darwin Information Typing Architecture
• Taxonomy, Categorization Tools, and Information Architecture
• XSLT, XSL-FO, and other Technologies for Content Transformation
• Digital Asset Management State of the Art and Market Snapshot

What would people like to see? Please weigh in with preferences and ideas. I am going to look for some kind of online polling device and will look to post a poll based on some initial feedback.