Using UCM as content management system for Siebel

Abbreviations can be confusing: UCM can stand for Universal Customer Master or for Universal Content Management. I am discussing the latter.

The Siebel file system is the place for saving documents in Siebel. However, for more demanding customers, Oracle provides a very easy to implement adapter that allows you to use Oracle Universal Content Management as your file system in Siebel. Recently I implemented this solution as part of a Proof of Concept. In this post I’ll share my experiences with you.

The integration between the two is realised using iframes. You basically replace all attachment applets by iframes, that show the relevant files in UCM. The content of the iframe is created by UCM in plain HTML. Using stylesheets provided by Oracle, the iframe looks just like a real Siebel applet, so the user won’t notice much difference. You can use UCM for storing attachments related to most Siebel Business Components like Account, Contact, Activity, Case and so on. From the applets (or: iframes), the user can open documents, add new documents, view and edit metadata and search in the list of files.

Now comes the great part: you can have it all up in running in a few hours! As described in the documentation on the adapter, you start by enabling a few components in UCM and setting the configuration variables. In my case, this was done by an UCM expert, so I could start straight with the Siebel part. This starts with locking a number of projects and importing SIF-files. These files change all the traditional attachment applets (Siebel File System) to Managed Attachment applets (UCM iframes).

After the import, compile all the locked projects and turn to the Symbolic URL administration in Siebel. From there, you configure the connection to UCM. All the right settings are mentioned in the documentation, the only thing you need to change yourself is the location of UCM (i.e., the URL). Set up the height of the applet to the desired size, restart your server and you’re done! All attachment applets now show the relevant files in UCM, and newly uploaded files will be stored in UCM.

Although being very easy to install, I feel the current solution still lacks some functionality. Although the user interface is similar to Siebel, it feels like Standard Interactivity mode, lacking easy quering, editing and adding records functionality. All this occurs through a popup. Also, attaching an existing document to another Siebel record (such as a case, contact or account) requires filling in the Row ID, which is normally not something users are familiar with. There’s still quite some room for improvement, but it’s a nice way to quickly set up a content management system.

For a Public sector project, we’ve also set up a UCM Siebel adapter that uses UCM as a Virtual Business Component in Siebel. Although more complex to set up, this overcomes the disadvantages mentioned above and shows the documents in a real Siebel applet. I’ll write a blogpost about that soon!

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Posted by: Rick van Haasteren (3 post(s)).

Rick is a Siebel 8.0 Certified Expert since September 2008. He operates well between the IT side and the business side of an organization, specializing in marketing and CRM. During his studies, he has gained extensive experience with marketing research and marketing strategy. He also has experience with CRM and data analysis. During his Siebel Core Consultant Course, he has gained knowledge with Siebel. Rick has worked in various projects in the public sector, gaining experience with BI Publisher, Siebel Configuration and business analysis. Experienced in: • Siebel configuration • BI Publisher • Siebel Smartscripts • UPK • Business Analysis • Market Analysis • Marketing strategy • Web development & Web design