Dalim has poured its 40 years of experience into Fusion, a version of the digital asset management to workflow and output eco system that abides in the cloud and uses the flexibility that that environment provides.
The company has rewritten its entire technology deck to bring it up to speed in terms of cloud computing and to take advantage of the power the cloud platforms provide. Others, says Dalim Software UK managing director Colin Price, have tried to adapt existing code for the new environment. “Eight years ago we realised that software can get old if it is not using the latest technology. We had to start again,” he says.
“We started to build our platform using totally different technology and one for the modern print world.”
This includes the tools that are available to cloud computing for instant expansion when needed rather than requiring investment in additional physical servers. As extra performance is needed, Dalim runs its applications using microservices which expand and contract as needed. One early adopter of this approach in the US has to handle thousands of jobs each day, delivering them back within 48 hours. Dalim is delivering 16pp print ready PDFs a second down to an inkjet press for printing.
“This is the architecture for the future,” Price says. “It scales up and down according to need.” It also means that payment is by use rather than having to invest in a suite of software and hardware to run it. All Dalim’s applications are available, though not all users will need the full suite and will only pay, via tokens, for what is used.
All integration is written with APIs, an approach that is better able to cope with updates in the applications it integrates with than a server based workflow.
Fusion combines the functionality of Dalim’s ES, Twist, Drive and Dialogue applications to span the process from asset management and indexing incoming assets through the proofing, imposition and output steps. Instead of one off payments for licences to operate these systems, Fusion is a pay for use model.
It is built on a MACH architecture, that is Microservices, API first, Cloud native and Headless if required. This means that users can choose to stay with the Dalim user interface or can design their own to operate within a browser, which might become an online print portal.
The approach means that Dalim is able to work with smaller customers than it has in the past, while not restricting its most sophisticated customers that have used the software to automate complex media worlds involving video, websites or digital retail displays as well as print.
