Not too long after giving up on Bluespring’s BPM solution I came across Nintex on advise from somebody in the SharePoint community message boards. I think it was Ishai Sagi… Nonetheless I promptly signed up for the Nintex Workflow 2007 Beta and then their Release shortly afterwards. Ok, enough gibberish, so here’s my quick and dirty run down on my impressions of this software:

  • Workflow 2007 is built as SharePoint Solution files and enabled using Features.
  • Totally leverages the existing SharePoint workflow engine, no need to install any other process engines, or clients. Basically just upload the Solution files and install via Central Administration.
  • The workflow designer is built into each site and can be enabled as a Feature.
  • The designer utilizes AJAX enabling you to create the workflows ala Visio drag and drop style right in the browser. (That was key for me, no need to install separate designer client).
  • Email enabled workflow approvals. Using their LazyApproval system you can just reply to the workflow email with specific keywords to enable it to continue.
  • The UI is one of the best, very easy on the eyes.
  • Feature set may not be as robust as other full blown BPM solutions.
  • Relatively cheap (~$7000 US) and no crazy software licensing schemes. You can even buy it right off of their website without having to haggle with sales guys.
  • Tech Support was AWESOME. The couple of emails and bugfix requests that I sent them were totally attended to and resolved by the very next business day.

Nintex Workflow 2007 is definately welcome in any of my SharePoint implementations as it is very easy to install, administer and use. The browser based designer would enable any business user to be able to design workflow processes. So why only 1.5 thumbs up? Well, it could always be better 🙂

I wonder if anyone from Nintex will see this post…maybe they can send me some schwag eh? 🙂

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BPM, SharePoint

July 31, 2007

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