The
proposed system will offer the following advantages to the department of
computer science, University of Port Harcourt;

1.     Reduced
Storage: The cost of commercial property and the need to store documentation
for e.g. retrieval, regulatory compliance means that paper based document
storage competes with people for space within an organisation. Scanning
documents and integrating them into a document management system can greatly
reduce the amount of prime storage space required by paper. It also allows any
documents that still have to be stored as paper to be stored in less expensive
locations.

2.     Flexible
Indexing: Indexing paper in more than one way can be done, but it is awkward,
costly and time-consuming. Images of documents stored within a document
management system can be indexed in several different ways simultaneously.

3.     Improved,
faster and more flexible search: Document Management Systems can retrieve files
by any word or phrase in the document – known as full text search – a
capability that is impossible with paper.

4.     Controlled
and Improved Document distribution: Imaging makes it easy to share documents
electronically with colleagues and clients over a network, by email or via the
Web in a controlled manner. Paper documents usually require photocopying to be
shared. This provides a cost saving by reducing the overheads associated with
paper based document distribution, such as printing and postage and removes the
typical delay associated with providing hard copy information.

5.     Improved
Security: A document management system can provide better, more flexible
control over sensitive documents. Many document management system solutions allow
access to documents to be controlled at the folder and/or document level for
different groups and individuals. Paper documents stored in a traditional
filing cabinet or filing room does not have the same level of security i.e. if
you have access to the cabinet you have access to all items in it. A document
management system also provides an audit trail of who viewed an item, when or
who modified an item and when, which is difficult to maintain with paper based
systems.

6.     Disaster
Recovery: A document management system provides an easy way to back-up
documents for offsite storage and disaster recovery providing failsafe archives
and an effective disaster recovery strategy. Paper is a bulky and expensive way
to back-up records and is vulnerable to fire, flood, vandalism and theft.

7.     No
Lost Files: Lost documents can be expensive and time-consuming to replace.
Within a Document Management System, imaged documents remain centrally stored
when being viewed, so none are lost or misplaced. New documents are less likely
to be incorrectly filed and even if incorrectly stored can be quickly and
easily found and moved via the full-text searching mechanisms.

8.    
Digital Archiving: Keeping archival
versions of documents in a document management system helps protect paper documents
that still have to be retained, from over-handling.