Issue link: https://epubs.iltanet.org/i/98946
www.iltanet.org Costs became more predictable, and our costs for licensing and extra backup schemes were reduced. Return on Investment Google for Email? In the past two years, there has been an increase in cloud-based technologies, so we decided to further evaluate our server infrastructure and determine the continued usefulness of cloud technology versus our traditional data center. We found that on the NetDocuments initiatives used in our firm, the return on investment was good. Being connected directly to our data — everywhere, at any time — allows us to minimize licensing to our Citrix environment. We were also able to decommission one of our Citrix servers, and some valuable hard drive space freed up. Three of our four servers were opened up, leaving one server to be used primarily as a local document server for NetDocuments. Costs became more predictable, and our costs for licensing and extra backup schemes were reduced. A virtual environment using NetDocuments has paid off for us, especially when our servers have gone down or we have been kept from the office due to weather events. Our displaced attorneys and staff were still able to work within our DMS without too much complexity. After using cloud-based DMS technology for a few years, we began to explore a new email solution. We first took a strong year-long look at Google Apps as a contender to replace our on-premise Exchange system. It is a solid program for email management, and it allows flexibility. We were satisfied with the Google Apps model for security and the anonymity of data center locations throughout the world. It also offered solid user adoption, mainly because most of our staff members use Gmail at home. Upon further examination, we realized the Google offerings went much further. The Google Plus application would bring social collaboration aspects for office and committee use, as well as for teams working together. It brought Google Sites as a platform for extranets, which was very simple to use. Despite its good points, we ran into walls with Google Apps that we just couldn't seem to get around. Google Apps couldn't integrate with our accounting system. It provided no tight integration to our current DMS and, because of the anonymity of its data centers, Google Docs 8 ILTA White Paper