Docman 1.4 is really well done and free...1.5.1 costs a small fee to download ns and custom grouping
3) Integrated search
I can't say enough about this product. It is the must have Joomla extension!

Although Docman generally work very well indeed, and is an excellent and well thought out product, we recently came across a bug that gave us quite a headache for a few days.
As it turns out, the bug actually has been reported in Joomlatools support forum, but it persists nevertheless.

The problem crops up after installing Docman, and either transferring your Joomla instance to a different server, or changing the server name or IP. All of a sudden, the Joomla backend starts taking an unbearably long time to load its menus, and administration becomes a real paoin.
We found that the source of the problem is that upon isntallation, Docman writes the addresses to the images it uses for its menus as absolute links within the MySQL database. The problem crops up as soon as you transfer your Joomla instance to a new server or change the server's IP or name.

We posted the full description of the problem and the solution we devised in our public blog:
http://gb-advisors.blogspot.com/2009/11/joomla-docman-administration-page-slow.html
Note that the fix is at the database level, and does not involve uninstalling of modifying docman or any other component in any way. For the same reason, it should not make any difference which release of Joomla 1.5 you're running, nor where your site is being hosted.
The fix should also allow you to transfer your site to any server without any problems.

I sincerely hope this post helps someone else avoid the many hours of troubleshooting we had to spend on this, and also helps everyone derive the greatest enjoyment out of this otherwise very excellent extension.

Very useful, easy for dummie users. It is a great option for Intranet projects.

First of all, I must agree with all the posts saying that it is a shame there is not a native 1.5 version.
But you coders out there, I am sure the team is quite busy (aren't we all) and don't have the necessary time to finish the version 1.5. So if you got time or need desperately the native version, offer them some of your time.
Meanwhile I've published my first theme made in just about 2 hours time.
This shows how easy it is to have a great looking display of your documents.

This is a good component but not complete.
1) It is impossible insert an expiration date when i upload a file so this file will be delete in that date.
2) It isn't native for joomla 1.5 and in a few time joomla will be 1.6 version.
3) I cannot delete multiple files but one at once.
4) Doesn't exist a costum mail send automatically to interest user or group when the file is loaded.

This is a good extension, but I can't set group rights for category :-(

Joe

Where to start...

Adding documents is awkward and too complicated for its purpose.

Lack of module makes displaying documents extremely limited. Themeing is ridiculously awkward.

I cannot modify a theme because for some reason the save post returns index2.php as a file download instead of executing. No, it's not an issue with my server. No other combination anywhere in any other site, application or functionality in Joomla does that.

And as is typical with Joomla, this is the only choice available anyway...

Hopefully you will do this for the 1.5 release! It is a pain in the a$$ to set permissions on each file.

As the owner of a engineering consulting firm I just needed a document manager that employees and customers can use to store and share all of their documents on our server. The unlimited categories and subcategories, user/group permission settings and clean interface was exactly what I needed. It installed easily and we have yet to encounter any bugs. THANKS TO THIS DEVELOPER!!!

Thanks to the developer, this is excellent files manager extension. It's great for joomla community if you guy can provide native version. Keep up the good work

The Joomla community has developed only a couple of download extensions that will track who downloads what to even a minimal degree. DOCman is one of those extensions. If you need to log user info in relation to downloads, it's worth checking out.

That said, I recently decided to try DOCman again, after running into an inexplicable bug for Remository---and I was still disappointed.

The default layout is very visually clunky and often run against hierarchical formatting concepts and the notion that important things (like document titles) should be more visible than descriptions and other subordinate elements.
DOCman does not allow you to post abstracts, in addition to full descriptions. Full descriptions appear everywhere.
The way DOCman handles downloads that you want everyone to be able to view, but only registered users to be able to get, is awkward at best (a big flaw IMHO).
The one-description-to-rule-them-all limitation makes the implicit process flow and navigation both complex and odd. There's no purpose to a details page, for example, that shows no more details than the doc-list page. Meanwhile, a preview button only available on the full-details page launches an empty preview lightbox unless your download is an image, then the download dialog just pops up on top of it. On the description page, the doc title doesn't launch the download; only the little download button way at the bottom of the page does. These are just a few of DOCman's quirks.


Ultimately, we found Docman to be unsuitable for purpose. To end up with a reasonably scannable list of downloads and intuitive information flow would have required not only significant css edits, but core code hacks, as well.

While DOCman might be the best available extension for download management, its limitations highlight the generally not-yet-ready-for-prime-time nature of this category of extensions.

Bottom line: this is the absolute best product for downloads in Joomla - so long as you're running a 1.0.x site. Unfortunately, it's also the best for 1.5 sites - 'unfortunate' because while it's still the best of the available solutions, it won't run in native mode.

I have long been a fan of docman, because very few of the other available extensions combine the features and ease of use in this extension.

However, it is not compatible with Joomla! 1.5 native; that, to me, makes it far less attractive, especially for new site development, which I am trying to do exclusively in native mode. There are comments by the developers on the docman website to the effect that "legacy mode is just as good as native mode" - if that is so, why is there a native mode at all?

There are also comments on the website that there is a native version in the works. Unfortunately, it's been "in the works" for nearly two years; I'm probably not the only one who is becomming tired of "all show, no go" as far as 1.5 native compatibility. Hence the title of my review.

Promoting DOCman as a searchable database of arts & cultural documents, any implementation for commercial/customised use of DOCman requires editing the default template. It will be great to see this extension develop more advanced search capabilities, template editing and a flexible back end (easier custom fields adding).

I installed Docman and have been trying to get the group email notification option to work for a couple of hours. It's there in the configuration, but the tool tip makes no sense. After a little research I discovered that the tool tip refers to another setting that has been removed in this version. Maybe the developer just forgot to remove the radio button. It doesn't work, so thought I'd save others the time I wasted. There is a plugin that will notify the webmaster or uploads, but it's not at all the same thing as group notification. Otherwise looks like a good extension.

If your considering a download Manager for Joomla then this is a good choice.
Allowing user uploads and with the DOCman extentions you can add multiple files you have already placed on your website.
Or add files from a remote location, it makes populating your Joomla a breeze.
Drawbacks:
A few of the Essential DOCman extentions do not work as expected
I have seen very few replies on the support forums about the critical issues within them.
That said, I belive this component will overpower the rest once the mods are fine tuned.

anybody knows how to move the file/s in another category within DOCMAN? i've uploaded 100s of file and trying to figure out the best way to move to another category.

any help or suggestion will me much appreciated

This was a great addition to our Joomla Web site and keeps all of our documents (PDF's Word, Excel, etc) together in one place categorized into folders and makes it EASY for our customers to find what they are looking for. Thanks!

Why do I rate a legacy component to 5 stars? Its easy because it is the only DMS for the Joomla CMS. There are a lot of very good download components for both J!1.x and J!1.5, but if you need a well written document management system with user access control and document check-out / check-in, there is only Docman. I use it since J!1.x and on most of my J!1.5 sites and never felt in trouble. It is easy to extend. For example on the site users can build icc profiles online and are getting the results automatically in their private Docman download area. Thanks a lot for docman and a look forward for the upcoming native versions. Please take the time you need to make it solid as docman has been in the past.

DocMAN is the best you can get for Joomla 1.0 series. On Joomla 1.5 it sucks a bit. It sucks, because you are forced to use legacy mode in order to run it. It sucks, because the last version is nearly one year old and still not in stable state. It sucks because of it's strange requirements for permissions on the joomla root folder.

On the other hand it has some nice features. A lean (but "seen everywhere") out-of-the-box-design and a good rights management system

But with a look on the slow (not to say nothing-goes) development progress, i ask myself, if this project is still alive or if docman is the "dead-man-walking" in this category of the extension repository.

After reviewing the latest RC, i decided to uninstall it and test other components, because i don't have a good feeling with this project. We'll see... If something moves forward, i will have again have a look on it.

I found this to be a good extension but somewhat limited. Some features I have seen in other file repositories but that are lacking here are:
- some kind of rating system
- the ability to add extra fields in the document details and be able to search by these fields. Currently you can only search by document name and description. Would be nice to be able to search by filename, username, or any custom field.