Repository

During OSBC I was able to catch up with a number of fellow Alfresco customers. All of us are eager to gain a better understanding of how Alfresco will proceed with its repository harmonization. During the Alfresco Community in New York repository harmonization was a major theme during the Ask the Experts session. Clearly it's an important area of concern for customers.

Alfresco's road map on the wiki states the following priorities for 2008

• New and enhanced team and enterprise collaboration services

• Publishing and management services for dynamic, Web 2.0-enabled websites

• Web client usability

• Scalability, performance, and enterprise-readiness

• Standards

It's difficult to tell if repository harmonization is included in these initiatives or not. Clearly it is not spelled out as a explicit initiative unto its own. I am looking forward to the MuSCoW roadmap / release schedule we were told about at during the User Meetup in San Jose. MuSCow stands for Must do, Should do, Could do, Won't Do.

I had a thought today that I need to follow up on. We have been talking about "Repository Harmonization." I, for some reason assumed this meant that the two repositories will be consolidated in to a single solution, taking the best features and capabilities from each. This is a probably a question of semantics -- but I got to thinking today: "harmonization" is not by definition consolidation. Harmonization implies two or more entities acting in harmony (for example two guitar string vibrating at agreeable [very technical -- I know] frequencies.) I am still under the impression that harmonization means consolidation but I want to follow up and make sure. Clearly the combined feature set is important to the customers that I've had the fortune to speak with.