Centric CRM 3.0 has been released. Centric CRM is an open source customer relationship management web application written in Java, using many open source libraries to create what they call an extensible business platform.

It has three editions: an enterprise edition, a group edition, and a community edition. The delivery mechanism is BitTorrent, after registration. An online demonstration is also available.

Application modules include:

• Leads
• Contacts
• Accounts
• Quotes
• Help Desk
• Communictions
• Project Management
• Document Management

Development features include, among other things, a rules engine for processing record additions, updates, and deletions; HTTP-XML API; multiple browser support; user hierarchies; and single user sessions.

Are the accounts and user info stored in a directory using LDAP?

Apart from the normal advantages of "single-sign-on" there is another very important consideration if you plan to use Windows Server 2003. If you save your users/password accounts in the database Microsoft demands CALs for every user that access the database! (even if you do not authenticate against windows accounts!!!) Or you have to buy External Connector License.

With LDAP and external authentication you get around this little problem.

Regards
Rolf Tollerud
("the extremly greedy department")

Should the lack of response be interpreted as a "no"? If so, then that's sad.

As much of an oxymoron as it is, Rolf has a point in his post. Why, in todays environment, would anyone create such a product and NOT base it on LDAP? The only result is that organizations must buy even more integration tools to make all the "I-own-the-user" type of applications work together. A CRM tool is much more interesting if I can use the addresses directly in my email program (which LDAP would give you), and if I can log into my workstation using the same account as I use for the CRM (which LDAP would give you).

Costs is always interesting! Especially as there is not 3 persons in the whole world that fully understand MS CAL licensing system ;-)

But it definitely seems a little silly to pay up for a external authentication system. Also I would expect a modern CRM system to be able to deliver as JSR 168-Compliant Portlets or Sharepoints Web-Parts (in the case of .NET).

What would be the pro and con of integrating Centric in Sitevision? Is it possible?

Regards
Rolf Tollerud

Should the lack of response be interpreted as a "no"? If so, then that's sad.

I tried getting a demo account, but I got this email instead:

Hello,

This message is to inform you that the Centric CRM demo you requested
within the last 24 hours did not get processed due to the overwhelming
response of version 3.0. Our press release encouraged hundreds of demos
from all over the world and some inadvertently did not get processed.

We have taken some steps to optimize the demo processing and hope that
you will visit us again and sign up for another demo.

Sorry for the inconvience,
The Centric CRM Support Team

Can only distribute modifications, not the original software.

Some clarifications...

We have a community partner that has implemented an LDAP integration, and one other is just starting an alternative integration. Neither one is far enough along for us to release it with our core code.

We have not extensively evaluated building a portlet interface. No reason it couldn't be done, but we haven't done it yet. Sitevision is not supported. Care to work on it?

Our license is a hybrid. Source is free for the taking but we reserve the right to profit from it. I know that some OS purists will take issue with this approach, and accept that. On the other hand, we have 50 man-years of our own development in Centric CRM, and over 700K lines of code, all produced at great expense. We encourage others to use it and modify it for their own use freely. We think this is quite fair.

Our demo server was overwhelmed by the response we got from the 3.0 release announcement. We have done some modifications and all is now well again. When a customer registers for a demo of Centric CRM, they get a private instance of a hosted enterprise system, not something that all the demo users share. Our little demo server (a dual 1.2GHz Athlon with 1GB of RAM and a single 200GB ATA disk) is now handling roughly 450 enterprise applications, each with its own PostgreSQL database. Centric performs quite well.

Finally, if portlet (or any other) capability is important to you, please join our community and help us build it. We're really very responsive to customer requests, we just hadn't heard that one as being important before.

Some clarifications...We have a community partner that has implemented an LDAP integration, and one other is just starting an alternative integration. Neither one is far enough along for us to release it with our core code.

Great! A CRM system is such a central piece that it'd be great if it could be easily integrated with other systems, specifically with regard to user info management.

We have not extensively evaluated building a portlet interface. No reason it couldn't be done, but we haven't done it yet. Sitevision is not supported. Care to work on it?

All you need to do (theoretically) is implement a portlet. Then it should plug right in.

What I had in mind was not one big Portlet but a bunch of smaller ones, that could be wired together allowing some degree of customizing.

I thought there might be some interest...

One of the Centric CRM community members has just announced in our forums that they have Centric CRM V3 authenticating against an LDAP database.