SpringCM made two significant announcements this week -- an upgrade to its hosted content management system and free access to its records management tools for customers for the next two years.The records management functionality was originally released earlier this year with SpringCM 4.4. Although it has solid capabilities, it's unlikely that it was one of the primary reasons that people selected SpringCM. That said, it's a really nice add-on and it integrates well, making it a really nice value add. The only drawback is that it's currently a limited-time offer of records management functionality free for the remainder of 2008 until the end of 2010, after which the normal fees will apply.

For SpringCM 4.5, the company's flagship software-as-a-service content management offering, the main enhancements focus on improvements to process management, beefed-up security, and enhancements to user-facing document management features.

To improve process management, SpringCM 4.5 introduces what's called a Managers Workflow Console. The Workflow Console serves as sort of a centralized dashboard for the tasks assigned to each group so that team leads can get a quick view of what needs to be done versus what's already been accomplished. Complementing this are numerous improvements to reporting.

Security improvements focus on two main areas. The first is enhancements to account level security, intended to give administrators more granular control over what each user has access to. The second enhancement focuses on document security, with versioning and audit trails both significantly enhanced.

In addition to these core enhancements, a number of user-facing improvements have been included, such as enhancements to the drag-and-drop functionality, improvements to search, and better handling of multiple document types.

All and all, SpringCM 4.5 is a solid package, and the opportunity to get records management included at no additional cost certainly sweetens the deal.