As far as we know, there is only one product which is similar in any way
to pageVault and that is Vignette's webcapture.
(Vignette inherited webcapture when it acquired the "Tower Technology"
software company.)
Both products address the same goal of providing evidence of content generated
by a web site, but the tools have a different emphasis and radically different
implementations.
Scope |
pageVault |
Static and dynamic content, however generated.
All unique responses except those explicitly excluded.
Content which is "Non material" can be defined.
|
webcapture |
Static and dynamic content generated as part of e-commerce transactions.
All responses which are generated as part of a defined transaction
boundary are archived.
|
Emphasis |
pageVault |
All unique content in its complete context generated by a web site,
regardless of how, why or by whom it was requested.
|
webcapture |
Content delivered to a particular user as part of a transactional
interaction with the web site.
"Billed primarily as a customer service
or cstomer self-help tool, recorded sessions can be used both by
customers and corporate representatives to assist customers with
transactions they have initiated on a site, or resolve potential legal
disputes by providing a concrete record of the transaction itself."
|
Architectural Philosophy |
pageVault |
Simple, specialised (does one thing), stand-alone. Small is beautiful,
less is more.
Inexpensive. A tactical solution.
|
webcapture |
"Enterprise" sized. Part of the large Tower IDM suite. Requires an
Oracle database and associated infrastructure. A strategic
solution.
"TOWER IDM is designed to be a tightly integrated solution.
TOWER does not usually sell the individual modules as stand-alone
offerings.
..
Its average deal size, for software only, is about $1.5 million."
|
Access |
pageVault |
Web based. Search by URL pattern and/or date time and or version count.
Search by textual content functionality is planned for
Version 1.3, May 2003.
Display options include side-by-side version comparision,
auto-play through versions, response metadata.
Complete arbitrary "point in time" view of a collection of web-sites.
No browser plugin required.
|
webcapture |
Web based. Search by URL pattern and/or date time and/or metadata and/or
textual content of page.
Display options include session replay.
Browser plugin required |
Retention |
pageVault |
Material can be deleted from the archive only by explicit action, based
on URL matching and date range.
|
webcapture |
At point of archive, material can be given a retention date at which time it
will be automatically deleted. Retention can be also set dynamically
based on last access (eg "last access plus 6 months"). |
Access Restrictions |
pageVault |
Coarse site defined implemented by standard authentication provided by the
viewer servlet container framework (eg, Tomcat or Apache based authentication
realms which may use LDAP). Access to parts of the archive based on
requested URL is not supported by pageVault, but could be added using
a custom site authentication filter. It is assumed users accessing the
archive are priviledged to access the entire archive.
|
webcapture |
Site defined; LDAP supported. Fine grained and flexable, allows selective
access to parts of the repository. |
Archive repository storage |
pageVault |
Native B+Tree index and filesystem. All responses are compressed.
|
webcapture |
Oracle 8i. Responses are not compressed. |
Implementation Costs |
pageVault |
License varies from $US2,200 to $US8,000 for the first machine,
with volume discounts thereafter
(details here).
Implementation is very simple requiring no more than a few hours
planning and installation from start to finish even for the first time user.
|
webcapture |
Not sure. Oracle 8i license required in addition to webcapture
license and implementation costs. |
Buzzword Compliance |
pageVault |
-
|
webcapture |
LDAP, J2EE, EJB, XML |