Sharepoint: first, ProjectWise StartPoint, then Citadon Jazz

The Bentley BE conference has now finished and various correspondents have compiled their reports, some mentioning the ProjectWise StartPoint product (previously covered here and here).

In the AECbytes newsletter, Lachmi Khemlani describes the new entry-level solution, saying it is designed for smaller, co-located teams rather than larger teams in multiple locations which full ProjectWise caters for.

"Like ProjectWise, one of the key features of StartPoint is its ability to integrate with Microsoft SharePoint, a portal and collaboration technology that includes features such as file access control with check-in/check-out functions, version control, powerful search features, calendars and message boards, and project websites with user-level customizations. …

"StartPoint is intended to be a cost-effective starting point for organizations that wish to grow to high-end ProjectWise capabilities, and the fact that the name selected for this product is so similar to "SharePoint" (to the extent that it’s easy to get confused between the two) again reflects Bentley’s strong desire to be aligned with the world’s leading software company."

By coincidence, I browsed Citadon’s website today and noticed that it too is to embrace Microsoft SharePoint for an entry-level product as part of a longer-term partnership with Microsoft. Its latest news release, entitled Citadon Announces Support for Microsoft SharePoint Server, SQL Server 2005, and Microsoft Outlook 12 and subtitled Citadon to Migrate Industry Leading SaaS Solutions to Microsoft Suite, says:

"Citadon’s initial step will be to utilize Microsoft SharePoint Services in Citadon Jazz – Citadon’s team collaboration/personal productivity tool that is currently in Beta testing. … Today’s announcement is part of Citadon’s continuing commitment to transform and simplify its users’ collaboration experiences and includes integration within familiar personal productivity tools such as Microsoft File Explorer, Microsoft Project and Microsoft Outlook. After extensive analysis, Citadon has determined that Microsoft SharePoint Services will provide significant architectural advantages for its clients. In addition, Citadon will leverage the new web services interfaces in Office 12 to more tightly integrate with Microsoft Office.

Citadon Jazz is essentially an email management tool (read about it here). It apparently organises emails and attachments automatically, scanning emails to find relevant key words and tagging them for easy access.