JarCastingImixs-Archive
Imixs-Archive is an open source project designed to provide a transparent and sustaining solution for document management and long-term audit-proof archiving of business data. In this context, business data means not only documents but also the comprehensible documentation of business processes. Imixs-Archive includes various modules and services integrated into the Imixs-Workflow project. The archive core technology is based on Apache Cassandra which offers a highly available Big Data Platform.
Architecture
The project pursues the following main objectives:
- Archive business data in a highly available Big Data Platform
- Optical Character Recognition (OCR) and text extraction
- Input and Output management of Documents
- Digital Signatures
- Retrieve archived business data
- Big Data Analysis
- Data recovery after a data loss
Imixs-Archive-API
The sub-module Imixs-Archive-API provides the core API to store business data into snapshots to be archived by the Imixs-Archive Service. This Core API is platform independent and based on the Imixs-Workflow API. The API can be bundled with an Imixs-Workflow instance.
Imixs-Archive-Service
The Imixs-Archive-Service provides an independent microservice archiving all data from a Imixs-Workflow instance into an Apache Cassandra Cluster. The Imixs-Archive Service provides methods to restore a single process instance or to export or to restore the entire archive. Restoring an entire archive can be used, for example, after a data loss or a Disaster recovery.
Imixs-Archive-Documents
Imixs-Archive-Documents provides Plugins and Adapter classes to extract textual information from attached documents - including Optical character recognition - during the processing life cycle of a workitem. This information can be used for further processing or to search for documents.
Imixs-Archive-OCR
Imixs-Archive-OCR provides a service component to extract textual information from documents attached to a Workitem. The text extraction is based on Apache Tika.
Imixs-Archive-Importer
Imixs-Archive-Importer provides a generic import service to be used to import documents form various external sources like a FTP server or a IMAP account.
Imixs Signature
The Imixs-Archive Signature API provides a service to sign PDF documents attached to a Imixs-Workflow process instance during the workflow processing life-cycle. The signing process did not only sign a PDF document with a X509 certificate, but also adds a visual element into the PDF document linked to the signature. This gives the user the possibility to visually recognize the signature and control the validity of the document based on the embedded digital signature.
What is audit-proof archiving?
Audit-proof archiving means that documents or business information can be searched, traced back to their origin, and stored securely against tampering. From an organizational perspective, a procedure for audit-proof archiving must be transparent for all members within an organization. The Imixs-Archive API combines these aspects together with the Imixs-Workflow engine into a powerful and flexible business process management platform.
Searching Information
Imixs-Workflow provides the foundation for creating, editing, and searching business data on intelligible defined process descriptions. Each process instance, controlled by the Imixs-Workflow engine, can be searched through a full-text index. A query can be structured - according to predefined attributes, as well as unstructured - based on search terms in a full-text search.
Tracing Back Information to its Origin
Any information controlled by Imixs-Workflow contains a detailed and consistently log from its creation to its archiving. This protocol can be read by both, IT systems and humans. Business information is archived in an open XML format which is independent from technical platform and storage solutions.
Protecting Information from Tampering
Based on a BPMN 2.0 process model, business data can be protected from changes at any time by well defined business rules within a business process. Imixs-Workflow supports a fine grained access control on the level of a single process instance. This concept allows protecting data from tampering. In addition, Imixs-Archive supports a snapshot concept that automatically stores immutable business data protected from any further manipulation.
Signing Information
Based on X509 Certificates documents (PDF) can be signed to guarantee their authenticity. Imixs-Archive-Signature provides method to sign documents. This service includes a certificate authority (CA) integrated into the Imixs-Archive platform.
