10/20/2005, 9:10am, EDT
Thursday, October 20th
Extensis announces Portfolio 8 DAM solution
Extensis says that Portfolio 8 has built-in workflow tracking out-of-the-box. With its new ability to add cataloging presets to AutoSync folders, files can be added to Portfolio with predefined metadata and can be moved through a workflow simply by dropping them into folders on the file-server. Portfolio can also keep track of the status of a job, helping communicate with and route files to other members of a team.
Extensis has also bundled a new series of sample catalogs for specific tasks, such as professional photography, stock image management, and document routing and approval. Fast cataloging quickly adds files to the Portfolio catalog and allows users to start working with them right away while other cataloging tasks happen in the background. Additionally, Portfolio can now use automatically created Screen Previews for creating CD's, DVDs, websites, and emails, making the process of sharing even offline files significantly faster.
Portfolio 8's new gallery features include private galleries, accessible only by the original creator and scratchpad galleries to easily collect items from several different locations and organize them for printing or other activities. Version 8 also brings significant improvements in speed, workflow and metadata handling.
"The digital asset management software market continues to gather momentum as more and more companies are realizing they need solutions to manage their growing numbers of assets," said Melissa Webster, Program Director at IDC. "Organizations need a solution that can be implemented quickly and at a reasonable cost to maintain business and workflow continuity."
Portfolio 8 offers other features such as full custom sorting using drag & drop to re-order, or sort items in Galleries, SmartGalleries, and disk folders. It also adds the ability to create Scratchpad Galleries, which are temporary baskets that allow users of any level to sort, edit and merge collections of files from multiple galleries or searches into a single gallery that can be used for printing, collecting or publishing.
In addition, Portfolio users can now use NetPublish to distribute a subset of a catalog, rather than an entire catalog via a dynamic website. NetPublish administrators can also track activity on their Portfolio-powered website via new logging features, which offer downloadable logs to keep track of important site statistics. Users can also specify the frequency of scanning for watch folders as well as attach a cataloging options preset to each new folder. Extensis says that FolderSync has also been refined so that ignored or excluded items do not change the folder status and that AutoSync folders can now dynamically remap file paths to server local shares allowing for greater server performance.
Portfolio 8 for both individual users and workgroups will be available for download and purchase in December 2005. Portfolio 8 Client/Server Solutions start at $5,000 and can be extended to include SQL database options with SQL Connect Modules ranging in price from $5,000 to $9,000. Client connections for Portfolio Server are available in volume licenses starting at $250 per seat. Portfolio catalogs can be shared via the web with the addition of Portfolio NetPublish for Server ($5,000).
Portfolio 8 is also available in a single-user version for $200. Portfolio catalogs can be published to the web by adding a Portfolio NetPublish license for $250 (five concurrent web connections). Upgrades to Portfolio 8 are available for $100 from Portfolio 6 and 7.
French, German and Japanese language versions of Portfolio will also be available in December 2005.
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