Alfresco Reviews

Name: Alfresco
Brand: Hyland
Rating: 3.9 (11 reviews)

3.9 out of 5

11 reviews
75% willing to recommend

3,594 followers

What is Alfresco?

The Alfresco Digital Business Platform offers open, secure content services to let you unlock the value from your most important business information. Give users access to their content wherever and however they work with Alfresco’s open, flexible, and highly scalable cloud-native content services platform. Easily integrate and connect with everyday business applications. Find, view, collaborate on, govern, and securely share digital content—and get information to the right person at the right time.

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Alfresco is the #4 ranked solution in top Document Management Software and #10 ranked solution in top Enterprise Content Management solutions. PeerSpot users give Alfresco an average rating of 7.8 out of 10. Based on the analysis of the 11 most recent Alfresco reviews, the overall sentiment is negative, with a sentiment score of 3.2. (Among the lowest in the category). Alfresco is most commonly compared to SharePoint: Alfresco vs SharePoint. Alfresco is popular among the large enterprise segment, accounting for 66% of users researching this solution on PeerSpot. The top industry researching this solution are professionals from a financial services firm, accounting for 15% of all views.

Helped 816,406 peers since 2012

Featured reviews

Karthi Keyan

Head Of Information Technology at UTSB Management

I think the presentation layer could be improved - currently, it's too complex, and there are too many features cluttered all over the screen. Alfresco also needs to be well-integrated with Microsoft, as it's currently a nuisance for customers who rely on Microsoft's Office 365 solutions. There's a pretty obvious gap in the overlap between SharePoint when customers go to O365 and are presented with the SharePoint license and storage to start with, which Alfresco isn't taking advantage of.

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reviewer2560407

Program Manager at a financial services firm with 11-50 employees

Setting up and configuring Alfresco is moderately challenging. On a scale of one to ten, it is probably about a five. Training is necessary, but Hyland provides the training, guidelines, reference books, and setup manuals to help. With the right guidance, it is relatively easy to figure out the setup.

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it_user574515

Works with 11-50 employees

There were no particular stability issues. Alfresco underwent a major refactoring in a few areas of the product, such as: * Migration from ANT to Maven building environment * Migration to Solr first, and Solr4 eventually * Introduction of Dojo JS framework * Angular2JS These changes require engineers to pay particular attention when migrating or upgrading older versions of the product. As long as they follow the recommended upgrade procedure, there wouldn't be any major issues. Alfresco has a very steep learning curve, and unfortunately, during the learning process, it's very easy to make errors, which often are unforgiving. This is also why usually companies interested in buying Alfresco have to rely on companies that are specialized in administrating and customizing the software.

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Alfresco mindshare

Product category:

As of November 2024, the mindshare of Alfresco in the Enterprise Content Management category stands at 7.6%, down from 8.7% compared to the previous year, according to calculations based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Enterprise Content Management

Key learnings from peers

Last updated Nov 21, 2024

Valuable Features

Alfresco users highlight document management, content model flexibility, and integration with MS Office. They appreciate ease of installation, rapid deployment, Linux support, and extensibility. Customization through Surf framework and model types is valued. Automation via rules and Activiti BPM, along with metadata search capabilities, is endorsed. Collaboration and sharing are crucial for team sites. Open-source and configuration simplicity are frequently mentioned. Users leverage broad search functions with intuitive metadata indexing for efficient content retrieval.

"Alfresco allows broad searches with many index fields that you can search on, although the created fields and their values may not be intuitive."
"The most valuable feature is the flexibility of the searching elements of the metadata."
"I like the ease of use, sections, and calendar."

Room for Improvement

Alfresco could benefit from enhancing the Model Manager to support a full range of content model definitions like associations and mandatory aspects. Improving the intuitiveness of the user interface and development environment, offering better customization for non-developers, and integrating document capture functionality could be advantageous. Enhancements in repository management, document capture, metadata modeling, and seamless integration with Microsoft Office would improve user experience. A streamlined presentation layer and intuitive configuration are also areas for potential growth.

"The configuration of Alfresco is a big challenge."
"I think the presentation layer could be improved - currently, it's too complex, and there are too many features cluttered all over the screen."
"Metadata, auto class, disposition log, and legal hold."

Pricing

Enterprise buyers exploring Alfresco should consider that the Enterprise Edition requires a yearly license and offers advanced features like clustering and a graphical workflow editor. While the Community Edition is freely available, it's limited in functionality. Pricing has recently changed, and OEM licenses can vary by partner. Although the license costs are relatively high, Alfresco remains more economical than many competitors. Be mindful of additional costs for upgrades, integrations, and extra functionalities.

"The license for Alfresco is expensive - not the maximum, but close. There are also extra costs once you start building integrations, as implementation seems to be very costly."
"There are costs for any upgrade or additional functions."
"If you buy Alfresco through a partner, there is usually a OEM licensing option."

Service and Support

Alfresco customer service endeavors to satisfy users, providing assistance from both company and community resources. Technical support is deemed good but has a slow internal workflow, leading users to find resolutions independently. Enterprise Edition includes responsive support via tickets, whereas Community Edition often relies on forum solutions. Users rate technical support between 3.5 and 4 out of 5, with support from partners typically faster and more effective. Hyland assistance for classes or recertifications is friendly and helpful.

Deployment

Alfresco's initial setup varies in ease depending on familiarity with technical concepts. For those without specific knowledge, basic setup offers defaults, simplifying the process. Advanced setup requires understanding of components like database and server settings. Many find the setup straightforward due to helpful documentation and stack installers. Training and guides from Hyland assist with challenges, making Alfresco's setup manageable. Some liken the ease to SharePoint, while professional deployment may take weeks.

Scalability

Alfresco is reported to excel in web, application, and database scalability. It utilizes Apache web servers for load-balancing and supports separate scaling for its database layer using MySQL or PostgreSQL clusters. Users found its clustering capabilities robust, requiring minimal resource adjustments. SAN storage is typically used for metadata and content, aiding disaster recovery scenarios. Advanced J2EE frameworks are employed, and users note ease of scalability adherence with resources guided by Alfresco's specifications.

Stability

Alfresco is stable for users who follow proper installation and upgrade procedures, requiring certified administrators. Some users reported no stability issues, although simultaneous server requests can cause downtime, mitigated by JVM settings. Migration elements like Solr and Dojo JS require careful handling during upgrades. Users note a steep learning curve prone to errors, necessitating experienced support. Properly sized architecture is essential for large repositories, and minor improvements could enhance stability.

These insights are based on the in-depth reviews provided by peers to help you make a better buying decision.

Download our Alfresco Buyer's Guide for additional reliable information.