Collections Management Software Review – Comparative Analysis

Individual Reports

EmbARK™

Vendor Information

Product Description

The following product description has been supplied by the vendor and has not been edited by CHIN. It may encompass products not demonstrated or aspects of demonstrated products outside the scope of this evaluation.

EmbARK™ is a sophisticated, yet easy-to-use relational database used by art museums, universities, corporate archives, collectors, and artists. EmbARK™ provides a rich, intelligent, and flexible template composed of more than 1,400 fields and 75 related files, integrating and networking all departments or functions in an institution into a single, user-friendly system. Not simply a textual database with imaging capabilities tacked on, EmbARK™ was built with images as a central navigational principle. EmbARK™ operates as a stand-alone or client-server configuration and is available in the following versions:

Collections Manager: Suited for museums, institutions, and individuals who need to track all aspects of an object's history and use, including acquisitions, authorities, commentary, conservations, exhibitions, insurance, loans, locations, reproductions, valuations, and more.

Cataloguer: Suited for educational institutions, visual resource libraries and individuals who require an effective image management package. The Cataloguer is capable of recording scholarly and technical information about objects and their makers, as well as cataloguing visual surrogates of those objects and tracking their circulation and use.

The Public Access Mode, enables an institution to create its own outreach and educational multimedia programs, which can include sound and QuickTime™ movies. This feature consists of customized introductory screens and provides for self-guided exploration of an institution's holdings, from collection overview to simultaneous comparison of up to four detail images in stunning 24-bit, continuous-tone color and is available for both the Collections Manager and Cataloger versions of EmbARK™.

Product Specifications

Product Sales Information

System Requirements/Structure

EmbARK™ can operate on any Macintosh Power PC, G3 or iMac computer or 32-bit Windows platforms (Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows NT). The Windows and Macintosh clients operates with a Windows NT server. Recommended configuration for clients and single user systems: a Power Macintosh (or better) computer running the Macintosh operating system (7.6 or better) or a Pentium (or better) computer running Windows 95, Windows 98 or Windows NT with 2 GB or larger hard disk and 32 MB of RAM (minimum). Recommended configuration for server: a Power Macintosh (or better) computer running the Macintosh operating system (7.6 or better) or a Pentium (or better) computer running Windows NT with 4 GB or larger hard disk with at least 200 MB of free space and 64 MB of RAM (128 MB strongly recommended).

Expertise Required

Although EmbARK™ is easy to configure and use, it is recommended that the customer designate a person to serve as the System Administrator.

System Standards

System Limits

Costs

The following information has been supplied by the vendor

Software

All prices quoted are in US dollars and are subject to change without notice.

Shipping and handling cost : $25 US

EmbARK License includes :

4D™ Runtime or 4D Server (depending on configuration), one documentation set ­ System Administrator & User Guides ­ in electronic and print format, tutorial and sample data file, sixty (60) days free software support for Single User installations and ninety (90) days free software support for Client-Server installations.

Annual Software Support Includes:

Training

Training is available at $1,000 US per day, excluding expenses. Training sessions may be customized to a particular site and users; advanced training may be scheduled for such topics as Imaging or EmbARK Web Kiosk configuration. Training time may be purchased in advance and used as needed. Installation/Set-up is $1,000 US per day, excluding expenses. For those sites implementing EmbARK in a client-server environment, ACIUS offers a "4D for Database Administrators" training session.

Documentation

The Embark™ system is completely documented, with hyper-linked, on-line manuals provided on CD-ROM with the software. Additional hard copies of the Cataloguer can be purchased for $99 US per manual set and $199 US for the Collections Manager manual set.

Other Charges

Data conversion and consultation are available at a rate of $1,000 US dollars per day.

Customer Support

Hot Line Support

Customer support is available from 08:30 - 17:30 Pacific Standard Time, Monday to Friday. Support is offered in English.

The hotline phone number is 1-800-449-6220.

Support Services

A user groups have been established and meets twice a year. Gallery Systems has indicated that they do produce newsletters.

Vendor Reliability

Gallery Systems was very responsive to CHIN e-mails and phone calls. The Gallery Systems carefully analyzed the requirements and criteria set out by CHIN and were well prepared for the software evaluation.

Reference

The following references have been supplied by the vendor.

Harvard University Art Museums
Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnography
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art
Columbus Museum of Art

The vendor is willing to provide a list of all installed clients on request.

Demonstration Environment

The following hardware/software was used to demonstrate and evaluate the EmbARK system: A Toshiba Tecra 750 CDT laptop, running Windows NT 4.0, Workstation (Service Pack 4) and EmbARK™V3.1.