The biggest content management companies -- including Alfresco, EMC, IBM, Microsoft, OpenText, Oracle and SAP -- last week announced a jointly developed specification which uses Web Services and Web 2.0 interfaces to enable applications to interoperate with multiple Enterprise Content Management (ECM) repositories by different vendors. The companies have worked together on the standard since 2006.

The ultimate goal of CMIS is to dramatically reduce the IT burden around multi-vendor, multi-repository content management environments. Currently, customers must spend valuable time and money to create and maintain custom integration code and one-off integrations to get different ECM systems within their organizations to "talk" to one another. The specification will also benefit independent software vendors (ISVs) by enabling them to create specialized applications that are capable of running over a variety of content management systems.

A final gathering of all seven companies was recently held to validate interoperability of the specification before submission to OASIS.

The companies worked together to define an interface that:

• Is designed to work over existing repositories enabling customers to build and leverage applications against multiple repositories -- unlocking content they already have
• De-couples web services and content from the content management repository, enabling customers to manage content independently
• Provides common Web services and Web 2.0 interfaces to dramatically simplify application development
• Is development platform- and language-agnostic
• Supports composite application development and mash-ups by the business or IT analyst
• Grows the ISV and developer community

For more information, and to download a preview copy of the CMIS technical specification draft, click here.