alfresco - 3rd party program - integration - need advice

[fhomasp]

Hey,

I need some information, I'll be as specific as I can.  I hope I'm posting this in the right section.

I am working on a content management system that is supposed to replace a sharepoint environment in terms of collecting and managing resumés (CV).  My first idea was to create a space for every employee and storing the resume in that space.
Then there is a third party program in development that keeps track of employees' programming skills in various environments.
Upon ending a project every employee is required to fill in and/or update their internal resume, which is the first document that is being used to show to clients.
My idea is to take info from these documents and get this info automatically to the skills program, which uses a mysql database.  The manager should be able to get on the intranet and synchronize his application with the alfresco-kept internal resumes.

I was thinking along the lines of using OpenOffice writer, convert the .doc internal resumes to openoffice and attempt to get the data out.  The advantage is that the internal documents use the same structure.

My question goes a little something like this, I'm asking because I want to start out right:

- What's the best way to go about it, any info is appreciated.
- I have the SDK but many of the examples won't run, am I missing someting?  I am using tomcat as server and I am running alfresco on it.
- I mainly program in Java, is this the best interfacing language?
- Can I build custom JSF pages for use with Alfresco?
- Can I synchronize user rights from an existing environment, like active directory?
- …

I'd really appreciate all the pointers and helpful info I can get.  This whole thing serves as Thesis for my last year in computer sciences so keep in mind that I'll have to do all of it on my own, after my normal working hours.

Cheers,
Thomas

[fhomasp]

And where do I find the info I need?? 
In de SDK examples there are constants, resultsets,…  If I try to find info about the constants used I can't find anything.

If I attempt to make a custom Query I can't seem to search on less than 4 chars.  Does that have something to do with this LUCENE const?
I can search for "TEXT:'<searchstring>'".  Which other specs can I search for besides TEXT? Where do I find that?  The API is far from clear on that one.

This is not making things easier for me to try and understand this whole framework.  I have a bunch of API documents: Core, Web, remote, repo.  It's not there.  And why isn't all this info bundled and available?  Or am I just missing it?

[dhalupa]

Well, it can be pretty overwhelming at the beginning . If you are using java, you will be managing repository from java code using different services (NodeService, DictionaryService..). Therefore, the good point to start is to get familiarize yourself with those services which are usually injected as part of spring configuration.

Although, the documentation is getting better, my advice would be to start using the source code as soon as possible, that way you will get a better understanding of the system itself

Kind regards,

Denis