The e-VU Blog

Dave Poyser, our Associate Director, answers the question "why do Intelligent Filing still write desktop software under their myOfficeFiling.com brand".  So, in his own words, here's Dave:

This topic has arisen quite a few times lately, why do we still create our e-VU (Professional & Express) software as desktop applications rather than 'cloud' based solutions.  Well, first off, it's not because we're anti-cloud, far from it; we use several cloud services internally (as well as e-VU Professional!!), and we also promote the services to our clients when the solution is the best fit for the requirements.  The benefits are well documented for both small and large businesses alike, reduced IT spend, remote access to data - especially from portable devices like the iPad, to name a couple.  


When it came to creating e-VU Professional 5, we sat down to discuss our target market in relation to what we would release. We'll be the first to tell you that in the past, we've been guilty of trying to make e-VU Professional all things to all businesses.  But that's not what e-VU is about anymore.  As a product, it has a clear focus, it is to be a fast, easy to use document management system for the small business (sole trader to 20 users) in existing and emerging markets, a sort of 'My First DMS' solution, a tool that can be used as the DMS of choice or as a stepping stone to more powerful software after first learning the concept of electronic filing.  It's not a niche product, therefore it has to be flexible for various usage scenarios but it's not designed to integrate with third party systems as this level of requirement is usually better served from one of our partners solutions.


There's no denying that the software is perfectly suited to being a cloud based solution, but the big dependency of the cloud is access, either from fixed lines such as ADSL/Fibre or mobile access (3G modems/dongles/mobile phones).  For our target demographic, this isn't always that great (especially relying on flaky 3G signals) and there are relatively low bandwidth usage allowances (which in some instances have quite harsh fair use policies) to contend with.  Given the multitude of things that a small business has to contend with on a daily basis (even during times of prosperity) adding even more considerations into the mix just doesn't make good business sense.   


Yet, this is now, and given the rate of technology change, we're sure that this is not how things will remain (the 4G trials in Cornwall are proof of that); with that regard, we're already investigating the use of cloud services to drive the e-VU Professional database.  With a small development team though, this takes time to explore properly. We're well aware of the disruption that rushing headlong into a project of this scale can cause.

So there we have it.  What are your thoughts on Dave's post & the approach that myOfficeFiling.com is taking?

Labels: 2011, 2012, cloud, e-VU Professional

myOfficeFiling.com and Intelligent Filing are pleased to announce the launch of the latest release of their document management software, e-VU Professional 5.  This release has been sometime in the making, but after a successful release of file@home 3 (of which e-VU Professional shares a considerable amount of code) the majority of changes have now been ported to the e-VU Professional 5 code base.  So, that's the big announcement but I bet you're dying to know what's new/changed/removed.  Suffice to say, all the information you're looking for is waiting for you in the User Guide - all nicely presented at the beginning of the document.  But as a brief introduction, here's a summary of all these things:

Labels: DMS, document management, e-VU Professional, facebook, launch, myofficefiling.com, release, scanners, site refresh

As the title says, welcome to the new look myOfficeFiling.com.  

Labels: e-VU Professional, facebook, launch, myofficefiling.com, site refresh, twitter

If you've been around the new site, you'll have come across the e-VU Express page, and found very little there.  This is because we've actually pulled the plug on the last publicly available version of e-VU Express while we turn our attention to the forthcoming release e-VU Express 5.

Labels: 2012, beta, document archiving, document management, document scanning, e-VU Express, release

Have you ever been in the situation where you needed to email a copy of a document to someone quickly? Not a document already saved as an electronic file, a paper copy, that needs to be sent in double quick time, maybe as a PDF file?  If you have, the chances are you've probably not had the tools to hand to do it, or the tools you have are clumsy (or overkill if you have to use your DMS software).

Well now there's another way; Paper2PDF is a fast, free way to scan paper records to PDF. We're telling you about it here because its been developed by our Associate Director of all people (that'll keep the code monkeys on their toes).  Here in his own words, he describes why he did it:

"Working from my home office for the majority of the time, I don't have access to a lot of the hardware & software we have in the head office, specifically a good scanner and scanning software. Like most home offices, mine is equipped with printer/scanner combo device. Whenever I need to send a copy of document by email, I'm left with two choices, use the really poor software that comes with the scanner or use e-VU Professional.  The former is painful whilst the latter is an [admin] headache because it produces an unnecessary audit trail in the system. So I set about building a straight forward easy to use app for turning paper into pdf & paper2pdf was created. Having been using it for a few weeks and after speaking with the MD, we agreed that we could release the app as freeware so that anyone could use it."

So there we have it. If that sounds like a piece of software you're looking for, head on over to http://paper2pdf.net and download your copy today.

Labels: DMS, document management, document scanning, e-VU Professional, freeware, paper2pdf, scanners