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Table of Contents
You're about to try out the default configuration of Nuxeo EP, a document management application built on top of the Nuxeo ECM platform.
The purpose of this document is to help you make an informed decision about the for your next ECM projects.
Nuxeo is a complete, robust and extensible Java-based Enterprise Content Management (ECM) platform developed under an open source license by Nuxeo and a community of contributors. It is designed to enable the building and running of a large range of applications withing the ECM scope, closely matching enterprises' needs from the server to the desktop.
Applications are developed on top of the Nuxeo platform by using components composition and extension: all Nuxeo components provide services that can configured without writing any code, and can contribute these services to other components using «extension points». This technique encourages the creation of truly reusable components and enables to quickly create complex applications by assembling and configuring existing components. Building vertical applications on top of Nuxeo SP is dramatically easy: you just have to choose the services you want to use, configure them and create the vertical extensions you need.
Nuxeo EP is the server part of the Nuxeo platform.
It provides, out of the box and with a default (but customizable) set of document types and other setting, the following basic document management functions:
content creation in workspaces;
versioning;
history;
users rights management;
content validation and filing using file plans, also known as sections;
etc.
Nuxeo EP also integrates advanced and/or original features, such as:
domains, a new level above workspaces and sections, that makes it possible to make your site organization always more accurate and fit your needs;
relations between the documents;
documents life cycle and associated workflows;
graphical customization using themes.
The purpose of this Evaluation Guide is to present the global functioning of Nuxeo EP and to enable you to evaluate Nuxeo EP for your next ECM project. To this end, this guide describes the following processes:
content creation (workspace, document);
content management;
content validation;
rights management;
themes management.
While reading this guide and/or running the default application, you should stay aware that only a small part of all the available services are showcased in the default application.
Nuxeo EP is available at http://www.nuxeo.org/sections/downloads/.
Nuxeo EP requires a Java 5 Java Runtime Environment (JRE) or Software Development Kit (SDK), available from http://java.sun.com/.
Thanks to its installer, Nuxeo EP is very easy to install on your
computer. Just execute the nuxeo-ep-5.1.4.GA-installer-1.jar file and
follow the instructions displayed.
When the installation is complete, you can launch Nuxeo EP (see next section).
Go to your installation directory, for instance
C:\Program Files\nuxeo-5.1.4.GA (under Windows).
In the "bin" directory, start the application using the appropriate "run" executable:
run.sh under Unix, Linux and Mac OS,
run.bat under Windows.
A terminal window opens. Starting the site can take several minutes. When the window scroll bar is down and the text “Started in” is displayed, the Nuxeo EP application is started and ready for use.
Open your browser and type the following address:
http://localhost:8080/nuxeo.
Use the information below to log in:
User Name: Administrator;
Password: Administrator.
Nuxeo EP is organized in domains, which can be defined as sites within the Nuxeo EP platform. They are composed of Workspaces, Templates and Sections, in which you can create and manage your documents.
Click on the icon 
until you arrive on the page Domains
on default server.
Click on the button.
Fill in the creation form.
When done, click on the button.
A confirmation message is displayed and the domain's content is displayed. Root sections, templates and workspaces are automatically created in the domain.
In the domain, click on Workspaces to enter the root workspace.
Click on the button.
Fill in the creation form.
When done, click on the button.
The Content tab of the workspace is displayed.
In a workspace, click the button.
On the content types page, click on a content type. In this case, we create a file.
Fill in the creation form.
When done, click on the button.
The Summary tab of the document is displayed.
Nuxeo EP includes Drag & Drop features. Install the extension corresponding to your browser, available on login page. Then, just drag your document from your desktop and drop it in a workspace. It is automatically loaded in the application.
In the workspace, click on the document name to open it.
Click on the Modify tab.
Modify the document's properties. In this case, we change the document's description.
Indicate if you want to update the document's version.
When done, click on the button.
The Summary tab of the document is displayed.
Click on the document name to open it.
Click on the Relations tab.
Click on Add a new relation.
Fill in the relation creation form.
Click on the button to search a Nuxeo EP document.
When done, click on the button.
The new relation is displayed in the Relations tab, in the Outgoing Relations part of the page.
Nuxeo EP documents have a life cycle composed of the following states:
project,
valid,
obsolete,
deleted.
The life cycle state determines which actions are available on the document. For instance, publication can be available only for approved documents.
To change the life cycle state of a document, you need to do specific actions, for instance you need to submit the document to a workflow. There are three different workflows:
parallel workflow,
serial workflow,
approbation workflow.
Only the approbation workflow enables you to change the life cycle state of a document.
The submission of a document to a workflow is made of two steps:
the definition of the workflow's properties,
the declaration of the users who participate to the workflow.
To create an approbation workflow:
Click on the document name to open it.
Click on the Workflow tab.
Fill in the workflow properties form.
When done, click on the button.
You now need to add reviewers to the workflow.
Fill in the reviewer declaration form to add a reviewer and click on the button.
The user is added on the workflow's roadmap.
Repeat step 5 as many times as you need to declare all the reviewers.
When done, click on the button.
The workflow participants can now approve the document.
When you submit a document to a workflow, you assign users to this workflow and give them a directive to validate the document. The documents the users need to review are listed in their dashboard. When all the users have approved the document, the workflow is automatically terminated and the document automatically gets into the output life cycle state defined upon workflow creation.
To approve a document:
Click on the Dashboard link in the upper right corner of the page to open your dashboard.
In your dashboard, click on the document's name to open it.
You arrive on the Workflow tab.
Type a comment and click on the Approve link.
The next reviewer becomes the current reviewer and has to approve the document.
When all the reviewers have approved the document, the workflow is automatically terminated and the document gets into the output life cycle state you defined when you started the workflow.
When documents are ready for distribution, you must publish them in sections. Sections are spaces devoted make content available for a wider audience.
Publishing is submitted to approval. To be able to submit a document to publication, you must have writing rights in the workspace and reading rights in the selected section. To approve or reject pending documents, you must have management or writing rights in the section.
To submit a document to publication in a section:
In the workspace, click on the document name to open it.
Click on the Publish tab.
Select the section in which you want to publish the document and click on the button.
The version number of the document is displayed in front of the section's name, to indicate what version is pending or published.
The document is not yet available to users with reading rights in the section.
To approve a document that has been submitted to publication in a section :
Click on the Dashboard link in the upper right corner of the page to open your dashboard.
Click on the document's name to open it.
The pending document opens in the section.
Type a comment and click on the button.
The document is published.
The document is now available for all the users who have reading rights in the section.
Access rights are determined for a whole domain or space, and are inherited in their children spaces. The Access rights tab enables you to give or deny rights to the site users. You can thus customize the access to content and make it more accurate.
In a workspace, click on the Access rights tab to manage the workspace access rights.
In the Add a new security rule part of the screen, search and select the user you want to give access to the workspace and the rights you want to give him or her. In this case, we give John Doe (jdoe) writing rights on the workspace content.
When done, click on the button.
The user and its rights are displayed in the Local Rights part of the tab.
In this case, John Doe, the user we just gave writing rights in the “User documentation” workspace, is displayed the tabs corresponding to his rights. In the workspace, he is not displayed the Access Rights tab, but he can create documents.
You can customize Nuxeo EP's look with the theme management module, NXThemes. A theme is the appearance of the Nuxeo EP site. NXThemes is a module that is integrated to Nuxeo EP and enables you to modify the content of the page and the way this content is displayed. To access NXThemes, click on Themes management.
A Nuxeo EP page is composed of fragments that display content. This content can be an image, a text or a menu, for instance. To insert a fragment in a page, use the button : just drag and drop a fragment from the Fragments box to create a new fragment.
You can the edit this fragment to determine its properties, such as the page(s) it is displayed on, the users who can see this portlet. You can also customize the look of the fragment, that is to say its fonts and colors. To edit a fragment, use the button and click on the fragment you want to modify.
When you edit a fragment, you can use the different perspectives available to check what the different categories of users will see.
When you modify a theme, you automatically create a new one. This new theme can be exported as an XML document using the button, so that you can integrate it in a new package.
Nuxeo EP is an ECM platform that enables you to create, process, share and retrieve documents. This guide presented its main features, so that you can discover and evaluate Nuxeo EP for your company or organization.
A mailing list dedicated to Nuxeo EP is available. You can subscribe here. Do not hesitate to give us feedback!
For more information about Nuxeo EP, please contact us at contact@nuxeo.com.
The Nuxeo open source ECM platform is developed and published by Nuxeo SAS, a company with offices in France and the UK.
Through our commercial offer, Nuxeo Connect, we deliver enterprise-grade functional and technical support, certified software patches and updates, and management tools that assist you during every stage of the application life-cycle - from design and development, throughout testing and deployment, to operations and monitoring. Nuxeo Connect helps reduce business and technical risks, increase productivity, speed time to deployment and improve your success rate for all Nuxeo-based projects.
We're also happy to work with partners, IT Integrators or ISVs, to deliver the best possible applications to customers.
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