Apparatus, method and article to manage electronic or digital documents in a networked environment

摘要

Systems and methods of electronic or digital document management allow satellite offices, sites or facilities to replicate some documents in a shared or common electronic document repository, while storing other documents only locally, while allowing document management functions seamlessly across an enterprise independent of whether the electronic or digital documents or files are replicated to a shared or common repository, for instance a central electronic or digital document repository.

主权项

1. A method of managing electronic documents shared across networked satellite nodes remotely located from one another, the method comprising:
storing a first plurality of electronic documents in a common electronic document repository, wherein the first plurality of electronic documents includes electronic documents owned by at least two different owners remotely located from one another; storing ownership information at a master node for the first plurality of electronic documents stored in the common electronic document repository, wherein the ownership information indicates that at least one of the electronic documents of the first plurality of electronic documents is owned by a first owner of the at least two different owners and at least one of the electronic documents of the first plurality of electronic documents is owned by a second owner of the at least two different owners, the second owner different from and remotely located with respect to the first owner; and storing ownership information at the master node for a second plurality of electronic documents which are locally stored by at least one satellite node at a respective location remote from the common electronic document repository, wherein the second plurality of electronic documents are not stored in the common electronic document repository, and wherein the ownership information stored at the master node for the first and the second plurality of electronic documents indicates for each electronic document a logical entity that has authority to authorize changes to the respective electronic document.