This document management glossary defines the terms you will meet when you evaluate, set up or run a document management system: records and retention, version control, capture and search, security, and AI. Each definition explains the term in general first, then says how infoRouter handles it, with a link to the page that covers it in depth.
Document Management Basics
- Document management system (DMS)
- Software that stores, organizes, secures and tracks an organization's documents in one place. A DMS adds what a shared drive lacks: version control, search by content and properties, permissions, and an audit trail of who did what. infoRouter is a document management system that runs on a server you control.
- More: Managing documents
- Electronic document management system (EDMS)
- Another name for a document management system, used especially where paper records are being replaced by scans and electronic files. The two terms describe the same kind of software.
- More: Why document management matters
- Enterprise content management (ECM)
- A broader term for managing all of an organization's unstructured content, including documents, records, images and forms, together with the processes that create and use it. A document management system is the core of most ECM programs.
- More: Enterprise content management
- Records management
- Managing the documents that serve as evidence of business activity, from creation to final disposition, according to retention rules. In infoRouter, retention schedules, disposition and legal holds are part of the Compliance module, licensed separately.
- More: Records management software
- Digital asset management (DAM)
- Managing images, video, design files and other media with metadata, so the right file can be found, approved and reused. infoRouter stores media files like any other document, with properties, versions and permissions.
- More: Digital asset management
- Knowledge management
- Capturing and sharing what an organization knows, from procedures and policies to project documents, so it survives staff changes and can be found when needed. A document management system provides the shared, searchable store it depends on.
- More: Knowledge management
Records, Retention and Compliance
- Retention schedule
- A rule that says how long a kind of record must be kept and what happens to it afterwards. In infoRouter, retention schedules are set on folders and documents, and documents inherit the schedule of the folder they are filed in. Retention is part of the Compliance module, licensed separately.
- More: Retaining and archiving records
- Cut-off date
- The event that starts the retention clock for a record, such as the close of a project, the completion of an audit or the termination of a contract. The retention period runs from the cut-off date, not from the day the document was created.
- More: Retaining and archiving records
- Disposition
- What happens to a record when its retention period ends: destruction, transfer, or permanent keeping. In infoRouter, records go through a disposition review before anything is destroyed, and every decision is logged. Disposition reviews use Workflow, licensed separately.
- More: Records management software
- Defensible deletion
- Destroying records on a documented schedule, after a recorded review and approval, so the organization can show why each record was deleted and on whose authority.
- More: Records management software
- Legal hold
- An instruction to preserve records that may be relevant to litigation, an investigation or an audit, suspending their normal destruction. In infoRouter, a legal hold blocks destruction for as long as it applies. Legal holds are part of the Compliance module, licensed separately.
- More: Records management software
- Audit trail
- A chronological record of the actions taken on documents: who viewed, edited, downloaded or changed permissions, and when. infoRouter includes an audit trail in every license, and end users cannot edit or switch it off.
- More: Regulatory compliance
- Chain of custody
- The documented history of who created, handled and changed a record over its life. In a document management system it comes from the version history and the audit trail together.
- More: Version control
- Document control
- The discipline, central to ISO 9001, of making sure documents are approved before use, reviewed and updated, available in their current version where they are needed, and withdrawn when obsolete. infoRouter's periodic review and ISO Log are part of the Compliance module, licensed separately.
- More: ISO document control
- Periodic review
- The scheduled re-approval of controlled documents, such as procedures and policies, at set intervals. In infoRouter, periodic review alerts the right people when a document is due for review. It is part of the Compliance module, licensed separately.
- More: ISO document control
- DoD 5015.2
- The US Department of Defense standard for records management applications. infoRouter is compliant with DoD 5015.2 guidelines.
- More: Regulatory compliance
- VERS
- The Victorian Electronic Records Strategy, the standard for keeping public records in Victoria, Australia. More than 75 Australian municipalities use infoRouter to manage public records under VERS.
- More: Records management for local government
- 21 CFR Part 11
- The US FDA regulation on electronic records and electronic signatures. infoRouter supports compliance with it through electronic signature controls, version history with timestamps and user attribution, and audit trails that end users cannot edit or switch off.
- More: Regulatory compliance
Working With Documents
- Version control
- Keeping every change to a document as a numbered version, so people work from the current one and any earlier one can be retrieved. infoRouter numbers, timestamps and attributes every version, and stores a checksum with each so any change to the file can be detected.
- More: Version control
- Check-in/check-out
- The locking mechanism behind version control. Checking a document out locks it for editing by one person; checking it back in saves the changes as a new version and releases the lock, so two people never overwrite each other's work.
- More: Version control
- Metadata
- Information about a document rather than its content: author, date, client, project, status. Metadata is what lets you search for every contract with one client, instead of guessing at file names.
- More: Document metadata
- Custom Properties
- infoRouter's name for the metadata fields you define yourself, such as an invoice number, a contract end date or a project code. Custom Properties are grouped into Custom Property Sets and can be searched and filtered like any other field.
- More: Document metadata
- Document Type
- A category of document you define in infoRouter, such as an invoice, a contract or a complaint, each with its own Custom Property Set. infoRouter Connect matches incoming documents against your Document Types, and the match decides which data it extracts.
- More: infoRouter Connect
- Library
- A top-level workspace in infoRouter with its own membership and security. People who are not members of a Library cannot see it. Our best-practice guidance is 5 to 50 Libraries, organized by security boundary, department or function.
- More: Library management
- Smart Folder
- An infoRouter folder with rules attached. Smart Folder rules can restrict folder creation and deletion, the file types a folder accepts, and check-in/check-out behavior, which keeps the folder structure consistent as more people use it.
- More: Folder management
- Warehouse
- The place infoRouter stores documents: a dedicated directory on your server, holding every file in its original format. Metadata, security settings and version information are kept in the database. The Warehouse, the database and the application directory are backed up together.
- More: Warehouse backup
- Subscription
- A request to be told by email when something changes in a folder or a document. In infoRouter, each subscriber chooses an email as soon as the change happens or one daily digest.
- More: Notifications and reporting
- Workflow
- Routing a document through review and approval steps, with notifications, deadlines and escalation, and a record of every action. infoRouter's Workflow module, licensed separately, supports sequential and parallel steps and rejection handling.
- More: Workflow management
- Sequential and parallel routing
- Two ways a workflow can send a document to approvers. Sequential routing sends it to one approver after another, in order; parallel routing sends it to several approvers at the same time.
- More: Workflow management
- E-form
- An electronic form template that replaces a paper form and keeps its data structured. E-forms are part of the base infoRouter license; routing forms through approvals needs the Workflow module, licensed separately.
- More: Forms management
Capture and Search
- Full-text search
- Search that looks at every word inside documents, not just their file names. infoRouter combines full-text search with metadata and Custom Properties, so a search can ask for the right words in the right kind of document.
- More: Search features
- OCR
- Optical character recognition: turning the text in a scanned image into text a computer can search. In infoRouter, OCR comes from infoRouter Connect, which stores the text with the document so it can be searched in infoRouter without changing the PDF itself, or from a capture product such as Kofax.
- More: Document scanning
- Hot Folder
- A watched directory on a server or scanner workstation. infoRouter checks a Hot Folder on a configurable interval and imports any new files into the folder you choose, so documents arrive without anyone uploading them.
- More: Hot Folders
- Email capture
- Filing emails and attachments into a document management system automatically. infoRouter's Email Scanner watches mailboxes, including Microsoft 365, Gmail, IMAP and POP3, and files incoming messages into the folders you choose.
- More: Email Scanner
- Bulk import
- Moving many documents into a document management system at once. In infoRouter you drag whole folder trees into the browser and the structure is kept; folders can be downloaded again as a zip file.
- More: Bulk import and export
Security, Access and Deployment
- LDAP and Active Directory synchronization
- Keeping a system's users and groups in step with the organization's directory. infoRouter synchronizes users and groups from Active Directory or any LDAP directory on a schedule you set, so access follows the directory instead of being managed twice.
- More: LDAP and Active Directory
- OAuth sign-in
- Signing in with an existing account from an identity provider instead of a separate password. infoRouter supports sign-in with Google (Google Workspace and Gmail) and Microsoft (Microsoft 365 and Entra ID) accounts.
- More: Security and authentication
- Permissions
- The rights that decide who can see, add, change or administer a document or folder. In infoRouter, permissions are set at the Library, folder and document level; the best practice is to assign them to groups rather than to individuals.
- More: Security and authentication
- Anonymous Library
- An infoRouter Library that visitors can open without signing in, for documents meant for the public such as manuals or published notices. It requires the Anonymous Access module, licensed separately. Anonymous visitors are not audited individually.
- More: Document library software
- Portal
- A separate entry point for a particular audience, such as employees, customers or partners, that shows only the documents meant for them. infoRouter supports multiple portals, one per audience.
- More: Portal management
- On-premise
- Software that runs on servers your organization controls, in your own data center or your own cloud account, rather than on a vendor's shared service. infoRouter runs on Windows Server with SQL Server or MySQL, and needs a professional installation and ongoing administration.
- More: Document management for IT teams
- Single-tenant and multi-tenant
- In a multi-tenant service, many customers share one software instance and its infrastructure. In a single-tenant deployment, each customer has a dedicated instance with its own database and storage. Every infoRouter deployment is single-tenant.
- More: On-premise vs cloud document management
Integration and AI
- Web Services API
- infoRouter's SOAP-based programming interface, which lets other systems upload documents, search, read and set metadata, and start workflows. It has been part of infoRouter since 1998.
- More: Web Services API
- WebDAV
- A standard protocol for working with files on a server as if they were on a local drive. Through WebDAV, people open and save infoRouter documents from Windows Explorer and from Microsoft Office, including Office on macOS.
- More: WebDAV
- PII (personally identifiable information)
- Information that identifies a person, such as a name, address, national ID number, or bank or card number. Documents like contracts, claims, invoices and HR files are full of it.
- More: infoRouter Connect
- Redaction
- Removing or replacing sensitive information in a document before it is shared. Before any text leaves your network, infoRouter Connect replaces the sensitive values it detects with placeholders, so AI services see only the redacted text, never the original document.
- More: infoRouter Connect
- Bring your own key (BYOK)
- Using your own account and API key with an AI provider, under your own contract and data-handling terms, instead of the software vendor's. infoRouter Connect works this way with Anthropic, OpenAI, Microsoft Azure OpenAI, Google Gemini or a compatible self-hosted model.
- More: infoRouter Connect
- Shadow AI
- AI tools that staff use for work without their organization's approval, often by pasting company documents into free public services. It is one of the main ways sensitive documents leave an organization today.
- More: Shadow AI and confidential documents
Still Have a Question?
The FAQ answers the questions we hear most about infoRouter, and the evaluation guide lists what to ask any document management vendor. To see these terms in practice, request a guided trial: we set up an evaluation with you, in the cloud or on your own server, with infoRouter Connect included.