Joeri Paeleman is one of the owners and founders of DMP. As key developer of the DMP FLO Suite software, he's got a thing or two to say about both the technical background, and the ways in which the DMP FLO Suite is implemented by the customers.
The DMP FLO Suite has always contained lots of functionalities for metadata-driven workflows. Custom modules with unlimited amounts of fields (resulting in complete PIMS applications), but also freely extensible metadata for assets in the digital asset management system. And these functionalities have now been extended with support for XMP metadata.
Import and visualization
All XMP metadata present in a file is visualized in the digital asset management detail view. This way, all users are informed about the history of the file.
Copy to Extra Fields
Next to the visualization, the metadata can also be copied directly to the Extra Fields of assets. This way, the information can easily be used in workflows with the normal tools and functionalities that you already have implemented. Since the extra fields can easily be configured to be searchable in the digital asset management interface, you can also allow end users to search for the information in the XMP metadata of individual assets. But similarly, you might use the metadata in your custom interfaces. Rights information could be used to prevent users to download certain files, or to prevent their use in a web2print storefront. The Ghent Workgroup information about proofing or ad creation can be used to visualize the track record of certain approvers or products. And the extensibility of XMP combined with the flexibility of the DMP FLO Suite pretty much allows you to implement an unlimited amount of workflows.
Ease of use
Around the XMP implementation, we created a lot of tools. Some can be easily configured. Appending metadata fields from predefined XMP schemas, for example, can be done easily from the FLO Suite interface. More advanced users can easily expand on the available schemas. This way, any type of XMP metadata can be used in the automated workflows.