| Status | Approved |
| Owner | |
| Stakeholders |
Issue
Many business process steps involve the handling of documents by an enterprise system, be it via the generation of output documents, the ingestion of documents from business partners or other sources, or by using externally-maintained documents in transactions. Documents are typically seen as unstructured or semi-structured information and consume significantly more storage than transactional data inside the ERP system's database. Both of these characteristics make management inside the ERP database an unwise choice, especially when running on HANA which is relatively expensive on a per-gigabyte basis. It is thus advisable to use a document management system that is separate to the database of the ERP system. Due to the different use patterns involved, a single solution or system will likely be insufficient to support all. Hence this document will recommend a document management solution for each based on a qualitative analysis of the most feasible options in the market.
Recommendation
The overarching recommendation is to use the native SAP BTP-based Forms Service for document generation, and the OpenText suite of products for document management. Different OpenText products are recommended for different document management patterns:
| Pattern | Recommended solution |
|---|---|
| Generation of output documents | SAP BTP Forms Service by Adobe |
| Archival storage of output documents | SAP Archiving and Document Access by OpenText |
| Ingestion and processing of invoices | SAP Invoice Management by OpenText |
| Referencing external documents in transactions | OpenText Extended Enterprise Content Management (xECM) |
Background & Context
Assumptions
Constraints
Impacts
Business Rules
Options considered
Option A:
Option B:
Option C:
Option D:
Evaluation
Option A | Option B | Option C | Option D | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Criterion 1 |
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| Criterion 2 |
|  Con |
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| Criterion 3 |  Pro | Con | Con | Pro |