Mobile and web app development: 8 key features to implement in a document management app
Information technologies have penetrated almost every field of our life. Companies use various kinds of software systems that simplify and optimize business processes.
In this article, we will talk about document management systems (shortly called DMS) and web or mobile applications development as document management solutions as well.
DMS are used, obviously, to manage various kinds of documents. There are a plenty of enterprise mobile and web apps that serve for this purpose and simplify employee work.
This implies a number of features that can be implemented in a DMS, and in this post, we’ve gathered and described the most significant ones.
1. Data storage
Document management software system allows storing data and documents of the enterprise in one place. You won’t have to keep piles of papers and towers of files in your office for all the data will be stored on the server.
And that is where cloud services come in handy so that you don’t need your own server for storage and you can access all the files you need over the Internet.
This is less expensive than owning an in-house server and gives your employees a much more flexible access to all your documents. It should be also noted that a feature of data storage is one of the most popular ones in custom mobile and web app development.
2. Format conversions
Even more, businesses nowadays stop keeping documents in old-school ways, that is on paper, replacing it with document management solutions.
If you want to do the same thing in your business, you should think how to transfer all the data you have on paper into a digital system and how to deal with further paper documents you will receive in the future.
Contemporary document management apps allow you to easily scan documents and to transform them into digital formats as well as to use text recognition functions.
Thus, your employees won’t have to type anything when they receive a letter per ordinary post – they just scan it and choose the most suitable format to transform to – and the document is in your system.
3. Integration
You use various software systems such as CRM, ERP, BPA, and others. Probably, you would like to allow automatic synchronization between all of them to enable simple data transfer and collaboration within your team.
Fortunately, it is not a problem for many systems and will become even much easier if you choose custom app development for your enterprise. You can even develop a single software system for your business that will include CRM, DM and ERP systems as its constituents.
Thus, the data stored in the document management app will be directly and instantly accessible to employees working with other types of enterprise software.
4. Collaboration
If the workflow in your enterprise implies teamwork, and this is the case for most companies, you certainly would like to allow fast and easy collaboration of your employees working on the same document.
With a simple document management app, they will be able to edit the document simultaneously, see all the changes made by every single co-worker, leave comments and conduct discussions within the document without conducting meetings and the meeting room.
It will save time and allow more effective work on the project. Web and mobile applications development is an efficient solution to automate business processes related to documents.
5. Version control
You know that moment when you work on a project and recognize that you have gone in the wrong direction at a particular moment? Even if not, this happens quite often and it is usually tough to deal with the consequences.
Version control systems are essential in the work of programmers (such as the popular Git software), however, they also can be used for different types of businesses.
Even if something goes wrong in the work on a particular document, your document management app will allow you to see what changes were introduced and by whom. Thus, your team will be able to go back to the last “ok” version and keep on working without conducting discussions and reducing conflicts risk.
6. Security and access control
Information security is essential to successful business. If you need not only to protect your information from intrusions from outside your enterprise but also create different access levels among your employees, a document management app will do the job just perfectly.
You can set different accessibility for every document and control who can view, edit, comment and make suggestions for each file in your system. This feature will secure that the work goes according to your vision and plans and your employees can see what they are allowed to see.
7. Search
Imagine a pile of paper documents and you have to find a paragraph describing a specific term. Would you like to go through each piece of paper in this pile? Probably not. That would be tedious and really time-consuming.
But if you have a document management app, you can do that within seconds. Just use the search feature and the system will show you all the places in all the files that contain the target words you need.
Thanks to this, you will save both your time and nerves. So, remember to implement such a useful feature during your custom mobile or web app development.
8. Mobile
As everything goes mobile nowadays, you should not forget about creating a mobile version along with your document management web application.
This will increase the flexibility of the system for your employees will be able to use it wherever they are. Even if an employee is, for example, at the airport going to a conference abroad but there is an urgent question or problem on some document, he/she will be able to manage this just in a few moments from the smartphone or a tablet.
It is quite convenient for everyone, isn’t it? Again, this saves time and hence money as well as your employees’ nerves.
Here at Smartum Pro, we provide our clients with useful recommendations concerning their businesses and suitable work methodologies for software development projects.
We provide quality enterprise web and mobile applications development services to help our clients optimize their business processes and meet their goals.