Simplifying File Uploads to SharePoint
Posted @ 12/2/2010 1:23 PM By Caroline Marwitz
Uploading a large number of files into SharePoint and then making them searchable is not an easy trick. Byte24’s Doc2point solution aims to address that problem by enabling not only raw document transfer but using metadata and content types to upload documents and ensure they’re actually stored in a useful way.
“SharePoint itself cannot do this, not even with most upload add-on products or scripts,” Byte24’s founder, BjÖrn Lindqvist told me. “Someone might perhaps mention SharePoint’s WebBDAV upload. [But it’s] both slow and a possible security issue – and cannot use metadata or content types.”
There are two major ways to use Doc2point, according to Lindqvist:
1. One-time document migration (e.g., when moving to SharePoint as a company-wide solution)
2. Dynamic, constant document synchronization from other systems into SharePoint
Doc2Point can be used both with and without index files. Index files can be used to control in more detail exactly how files are uploaded and what metadata to insert. “Doc2point is super-fast and uses very little memory,” Lindqvist notes. “Testing shows it is at least as fast as standard Windows drag-and-drop transfer, even though it does so much more on the fly. It has been tested with data libraries with close to 1TB of documents – without a glitch.”
As a consultant, Lindqvist saw the need to simplify document migration to SharePoint and to synchronize files with such systems as ERP, project management, document production, and financial systems. He created Doc2point in answer to that need. “I am a former employee of - and expert on – StreamServe (now OpenText) – so I know the integration that Doc2point enables is unique in that respect.”
Doc2point is available for around $1,500 to $2,000 per server (which, notes Lindqvist, is about the cost of two days with a senior SharePoint consultant), though the company is moving to a new licensing model and the price could change. Byte24 also sells non-exclusive source code rights for about five times that amount, notes Lindqvist. For more information, visit Byte24’s website.