Are all your scanned documents accounted for?

The most important aspect of integrating two systems is to assure that there is a solid hand-shake and that the communication is accurately handled. Consider this transaction between Input Accel & Documentum:

Export Module> Request is made to create an object type for document
Content Server> returns Object id
Export Module> Set attributes for document
— network error —

Since the export module received an object id from the content server (although the transaction was not complete), Input Accel treats as though this export operation was successful. And on the other end, Documentum didn’t receive a comit (save) from its client and hence the object id is not saved.

Huge hole! Of course the possibility if this scenario (or equivalent) is very minimal – but that’s not the point. The mere fact that one could possibly lose data is just nerve wrecking.

This has been raised. And with Input Accel and Documentum under EMC, it was not that difficult to get the companies test there integration process without pointing fingers at the each other (although they tried to point how good their respective products were and that how this issue was the other product’s fault – you can’t do anything but laugh).