notusCSDB
notusCSDB is a structured Common Source Database (CSDB) for managing S1000D technical publications and authoring projects. It enables governance, validation (including BREX/Schema rules), traceability, workflow control and compliant content publishing in aerospace and defence environments, with SaaS or on-premises deployment.
Features
- Supports all issues of S1000D
- SaaS or on-premises deployment
- Customisable dashboards with secure login
- Workflow tracking
- Project metadata setup
- Bulk import/export with automatic related item management
- Fully integrated with Eclipse S1000D (FrameMaker, Arbortext, oXygen)
- APIs and plug-in support for 3rd party integration
Benefits
- Faster Setup: Deploy quickly and start projects without IT bottlenecks
- Lower Costs: Reduce the expense of running and maintaining CSDB
- Compliance: BREX validation, full version history, and role-based governance
- Seamless Publishing – Direct integration with notusBookBuild for compliant PDF/IETP
- Deployment Flexibility – Choose SaaS or on-premises secure silo separation
Pricing
- Free trial available
Service documents
Request an accessible format
Framework
G-Cloud 15
Service ID
4 0 6 5 7 9 2 9 9 4 9 0 5 9 9
Contact
CONTIEM LIMITED
Joe Girling
Telephone: 02087228400
Email: girling@contiem.com
About your service
- Service categories
-
Applications
Content workflow and management
Content services
- Enterprise Content Management Applications
- Multi cloud support
- Yes
Service scope
- Software add-on or extension
- Yes, but can also be used as a standalone service
- What software services is the service an extension to
- RSuite Enterprise
- Cloud deployment model
- Hybrid cloud
- Service constraints
- Contiem notusCSDB may be subject to the following constraints. Hosted deployments may require planned maintenance windows for updates and upgrades, which will be notified in advance and may temporarily affect availability. Standard support is provided during agreed business hours unless extended support is separately contracted. On-premises deployments must meet Contiem’s specified hardware, software, and infrastructure requirements. Some integrations depend on compatible versions of third-party authoring tools. Bespoke configurations may require additional consultancy.
- System requirements
-
- OS: Windows Server 2019 or Later (x64)
- Processors: 4 Cores
- 32 GB RAM
- 100GB Minimum Storage
User support
- Email or online ticketing support
- Yes
- Support response times
- 9 to 5 (UK time), Monday to Friday
- User can manage status and priority of support tickets
- Yes
- Online ticketing support accessibility
- None or don’t know
- Phone support
- Yes
- Phone support availability
- 9 to 5 (UK time), Monday to Friday
- Web chat support
- No
- Onsite support
- Yes, at extra cost
- Support levels
- Standard Target Response and Resolution Times, which are included within the licence price of the service. Contiem will respond to Customer within the time periods below and according to the Priority Level of the issue, Contiem will make best efforts to return a call within the Initial Response Time and will resolve issues within the target resolution times set forth below. Monday through Friday 9:00 am (●UK Timezone) - 5:30 pm (●UK Timezone). 1. System failure/System down. Response within 1 hour. Resolution within 48 hours. 2. Critical issue – Software failure where most users cannot proceed normally. Response within 2 hours. Resolution within 5 days. 3. Urgent issue – Software failure but workaround exists. Response within 1 day. Resolution in next release. 4. Not urgent / Enhancement Developer pre production enquiries. Response within 1 day. Resolution as mutually agreed. - Customers can easily track/log all customer support questions. - A dedicated technical account manager or cloud support engineer can be provided on request. - Enhanced support services can be provided.
- Support available to third parties
- Yes
Onboarding and offboarding
- Getting started
-
Contiem helps users start using notusCSDB through a combination of onboarding, training, and support:
Initial setup and configuration: Assistance with system access, user accounts, roles, permissions, and integration with authoring tools.
Training: Guided sessions for different user roles, covering content creation, workflow management, and best practices.
Documentation: Access to user guides, tutorials, and API references.
Support: Ongoing help from the Contiem support team to resolve issues, answer questions, and provide advice during early adoption.
This ensures users can quickly become productive while using the service securely and effectively. - Service documentation
- Yes
- Documentation formats
- End-of-contract data extraction
- All data is stored in XML and can be easily extracted, if required, at the end of a contract.
- End-of-contract process
- The end-of-contract process is supported by our ability to provide a complete data export of all content and metadata for archival purposes. Contiem’s contract transition activities ensure data integrity and service continuity throughout the offboarding phase.
- Documentation accessibility standard
- WCAG 2.2 AA
Using the service
- Web browser interface
- Yes
- Supported browsers
-
- Microsoft Edge
- Firefox
- Chrome
- Safari
- Application to install
- No
- Designed for use on mobile devices
- No
- Service interface
- Yes
- User support accessibility
- WCAG 2.2 A
- Description of service interface
-
The notusCSDB service interface is web-based and accessed through a standard browser. It allows users to securely manage, search, create, and update structured S1000D content, with role-based access controls, versioning, audit trails, and workflow management.
The service also provides integration interfaces to support connectivity with external systems and Eclipse-based authoring tools, enabling controlled import, export, and content synchronisation. - Accessibility standards
- WCAG 2.2 AA
- Accessibility testing
-
Contiem conducts accessibility testing as part of the notusCSDB development process to ensure compatibility with assistive technologies. This includes:
- Keyboard-only navigation testing to confirm all functionality is accessible without a mouse.
- User feedback sessions with individuals using assistive technologies to validate workflows and address barriers.
Testing is ongoing, and accessibility improvements are incorporated into regular updates to maintain compliance with WCAG 2.2 AA standards - API
- Yes
- What users can and can't do using the API
- The notusCSDB API allows users to configure integrations, manage authentication, and create, update, or synchronise S1000D content and metadata. Users can automate workflows such as content validation and status updates. Actions are controlled by role-based permissions. System-wide changes, schema modifications, and some advanced workflow operations must be performed via the web interface or with Contiem support. API usage is subject to security policies and rate limits, and not all UI features are available through the API.
- API documentation
- Yes
- API documentation formats
-
- Open API (also known as Swagger)
- API sandbox or test environment
- Yes
- Customisation available
- Yes
- Description of customisation
-
Buyers can customise notusCSDB to suit their organisation’s workflows and requirements. Customisation options include:
Configuring content structures, metadata fields, and templates
Defining workflows, approval processes, and status management
Setting user roles, permissions, and access controls
Integrating with external tools (e.g., Eclipse-based authoring tools, publishing systems, or enterprise applications)
Customisations are generally configurable via the web interface or API and do not require changes to the underlying software code, helping buyers tailor the service without impacting core functionality.
Scaling
- Independence of resources
-
Contiem ensures that notusCSDB users are not affected by other users’ demand through a combination of scalable architecture, resource isolation, and performance management:
Dedicated resources or tenancy: Cloud deployments isolate customer environments to prevent one customer’s usage from impacting another.
Scalable infrastructure: The service can automatically scale compute, storage, and database resources to handle varying workloads.
Performance monitoring: Continuous monitoring detects and mitigates potential bottlenecks before they affect users.
Service-level management: Workloads are prioritised according to role-based access and system policies to maintain consistent performance for all users.
This ensures stable, predictable performance regardless of overall system demand.
Analytics
- Service usage metrics
- Yes
- Metrics types
-
NotusCSDB provides service usage metrics to help organisations monitor activity and system utilisation. Metrics typically include:
Number of users and active sessions
Content creation, modification, and deletion statistics
Workflow progress and status tracking (e.g., approvals, validations)
Module or project-level activity reports
API usage and integration activity
These metrics can be accessed via the web interface, reporting tools, or API, enabling organisations to track productivity, monitor compliance, and optimise system use. - Reporting types
-
- API access
- Regular reports
- Reports on request
- Resource tagging
- Yes
- FOCUS resource tagging
- No
Resellers
- Supplier type
- Not a reseller
Staff security
- Staff security clearance
- Conforms to BS7858:2019
- Government security clearance
- Developed Vetting (DV)
Asset protection
- Knowledge of data storage and processing locations
- Yes
- Data storage and processing locations
- United Kingdom
- User control over data storage and processing locations
- Yes
- Datacentre security standards
- Complies with a recognised standard (for example CSA CCM version 4.0)
- Penetration testing frequency
- Less than once a year
- Penetration testing approach
- Another external penetration testing organisation
- Protecting data at rest
- Physical access control, complying with another standard
- Data sanitisation process
- Yes
- Equipment disposal approach
- In-house destruction process
- Data sanitisation type
- Deleted data can’t be directly accessed / Cryptographic Erasure
Data importing and exporting
- Data export approach
-
Users can export their data from notusCSDB using several methods:
Bulk export: Structured content modules, metadata, and related objects can be exported in standard S1000D XML format.
Selective export: Specific modules, collections, or content sets can be exported individually via the web interface.
API export: Users can extract content programmatically, including metadata, statuses, and related items, using the API.
Integration exports: Content previously integrated with external tools (e.g., Eclipse-based editors or publishing systems) can also be synchronised or extracted. - Data export formats
- Other
- Other data export formats
- XML
- Data import formats
-
- CSV
- Other
- Other data import formats
-
- XML
- S1000D
Data-in-transit protection
- Data protection between buyer and supplier networks
- TLS (version 1.2 or above)
- Data protection within supplier network
- TLS (version 1.2 or above)
Availability and resilience
- Guaranteed availability
- NotusCSDB server as a hosted service provides an availability of 99.9%. All servers and services are monitored for both system and server availability on a 24/365 basis. Automatic alerts will be generated in the event of server or service loss which is detectable by remote polling. Network and Infrastructure outages will be responded to within two hours of notification within normal business hours, and four hours outside these times. Note that such notification is normally generated internally from our operations centre and that response times are typically much faster. Individual server outages and server hardware failures (for rented or facilities managed servers) will be responded to in four hours and eight hours respectively. Planned Outages will be notified to you wherever possible on a minimum of 2 days notice. We will make best efforts to ensure there are no more than two planned outages in any month, no more than six in one year, and that the cumulative time does not exceed six hours in any year.
- Approach to resilience
-
The service is designed for resilience using highly available cloud infrastructure with redundancy across compute, storage, and networking. It is deployed across multiple availability zones to protect against datacentre-level failures. The datacentre setup includes resilient power, cooling, physical security, and environmental controls.
Automated backups, continuous monitoring, and defined incident response processes support rapid fault detection and recovery. Elastic scaling and load balancing help maintain availability and performance during demand spikes or infrastructure issues. - Outage reporting
- OtusCSDB servers are monitored using the Icinga application. This monitoring software can also be installed by the customer should they want to monitor servers this way. Outage reporting can be via email alerts, API and/or custom dashboard.
Identity and authentication
- User authentication needed
- Yes
- User authentication
-
- Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA)
- Identity federation with existing provider (for example Google Apps)
- Username or password
- Other
- Other user authentication
- SAML 2.0 supported
- Access restrictions in management interfaces and support channels
- NotusCSDB server support roles and groups for user permissions. Roles can control available functionality within a portal, and also access to specific content.
- Access restriction testing frequency
- Less than once a year
- Management access authentication
-
- Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA)
- Identity federation with existing provider (for example Google Apps)
- Username or password
- Other
- Description of management access authentication
- SAML 2.0 supported
Audit information for users
- Access to user activity audit information
- Users have access to real-time audit information
- How long user audit data is stored for
- User-defined
- Access to supplier activity audit information
- Users have access to real-time audit information
- How long supplier audit data is stored for
- User-defined
- How long system logs are stored for
- User-defined
Security governance
- Named board-level person responsible for service security
- Yes
- Security governance certified
- Yes
- Security governance standards
- ISO/IEC 27001
- Information security policies and processes
- Our processes follow and comply with ISO/IEC 27001:2022 standards
- Software Security Code of Practice
- Yes
Operational security
- Configuration and change management standard
- Complies with a recognised standard, for example CSA CCM v4.0 or SSAE-18 / ISAE 3402
- Configuration and change management approach
- Contiem’s approach to configuration management is led by a dedicated IT Integration team that defines security architecture and system setups. We utilize an Agile Software Delivery Lifecycle where requirements are subdivided into two-week sprints to ensure high-quality software releases and rapid issue resolution. All code changes undergo mandatory security scanning and software quality assurance testing before being released into production.
- Vulnerability management type
- Complies with a recognised standard, for example CSA CCM v4.0 or SSAE-18 / ISAE 3402
- Vulnerability management approach
- Contiem follows recognized vulnerability management processes aligned with our ISO 27001 certification and NIST 800-171 compliance. We subject all code deployments to intensive security scans to proactively detect and remediate potential viruses or injected threats. Our IT infrastructure is also audited annually by the Defense Counterintelligence and Security Agency
- Protective monitoring type
- Complies with a recognised standard, for example CSA CCM v4.0 or SSAE-18 / ISAE 3402
- Protective monitoring approach
- Contiem maintains rigorous compliance with ISO 27001 and NIST SP 800-171 standards, incorporating mandatory code security scanning and annual IT infrastructure audits by the Defense Counterintelligence and Security Agency. We utilize real-time resource monitoring for memory status and garbage collection alongside weekly audits of access logs for all highly controlled content.
- Incident management type
- Complies with a recognised standard, for example, CSA CCM v4.0 or ISO/IEC 27035:2011 or SSAE-18 / ISAE 3402
- Incident management approach
- The Contiem incident management process is defined by a Service Level Agreement that guarantees 99.5% uptime for all hosted environments. Upon receipt of a support request, our team acknowledges the issue and assigns a severity category that determines if work starts immediately or within a specific business-day window. We provide users with real-time updates via our online portal and maintain culturally and technically aligned regional support teams distributed across the U.S. U.K. India, and Australia.
- Post-quantum cryptography secure
- No
Secure development
- Approach to secure software development best practice
- Independent review of processes (for example CESG CPA Build Standard, ISO/IEC 27034, ISO/IEC 27001 or CSA CCM v4.0)
Public sector networks
- Connection to public sector networks
- No
Pricing
- Discount for educational organisations
- No
- Free trial available
- Yes
- Description of free trial
- Pilot or POC applications can be built for larger projects. They will feature: Flexible but limited content set. Flexible but limited time period. Limited number of users.
Discount percentage by annual call-off contract value (excluding VAT)
- Less than £250,000
- 0%
- Between £250,000 and £500,000
- 0%
- Between £500,001 and £1,000,000
- 0%
- Between £1,000,001 and £2,500,000
- 2%
- Between £2,500,001 and £5,000,000
- 3%
- Over £5,000,001
- 5%
Non-mandatory Standards and certifications
- ISO/IEC 27001 certification
- Yes
- Who accredited the ISO/IEC 27001
- ISOQAR
- ISO/IEC 27001 accreditation date
- Monday 18 December 2023
- What the ISO/IEC 27001 doesn’t cover
-
Scope of Registration:
The design, development, consultancy, training and support of electronic publishing solutions. - ISO 28000:2022 certification
- No
- ISO 9001 certification
- Yes
- Who accredited the ISO 9001 certification
- ISOQAR
- ISO 9001 accreditation date
- Saturday 15 June 2024
- What the ISO 9001 doesn’t cover
-
Scope of Activities:
The ISMS cover system administration and security of the Contiem Client/ Server LAN, software development, and deployment of products in the accordance with SoA v1.0 - Quality management systems (QMS)
- Yes
- CSA STAR certification
- No
- PCI certification
- No
- Cyber essentials
- No
- Cyber Essentials Alternative
- In relation to the services you do not have a current and valid Cyber Essentials certificate which has been awarded by one of the government approved Cyber Essentials accreditation bodies but you are working towards gaining it, and will be in a position to confirm that you have been awarded a current and valid Cyber Essentials certificate by one of the government approved accreditation bodies within 12 months of the date of award.
- Cyber essentials plus
- No
- Cyber Essentials Alternative
- You do not have a current and valid Cyber Essentials Plus certificate, or will not have in place within 12 months of the date of award but have an IASME certified equivalent.
- Other security certifications
- No
Social value
- Section B - Commitment for Future: Delivery
-
-
Mission: Kick start economic growth. To secure the highest sustained growth in the G7 - with good jobs and productivity growth in every part of the country making everyone, not just a few, better off.
Policy Outcome 1: Fair work: That offers fair wages and good working conditions. Help people get a job, stay in work, and progress in their careers, with good employment opportunities across the country. Notes: Where there is a large proportion of labour costs in the contract, commercial teams should consider MAC in Outcome 1 as a priority
- New or retained jobs on the contract workforce in the relevant area that meet the criteria set out in MAC 1b, 1c and 1d
- Providing opportunities for, and measuring and monitoring of, staff workforce conditions over time, including employee engagement, involvement in decision-making and satisfaction and adapting to any changes in the results, with clear processes for acting on issues identified
- Plans to engage the contract workforce in deciding the most important workplace issues to address
- Monitoring of employee engagement rates (by protected characteristic) and, where necessary, the development of actions to ensure all voices are heard across the diversity of the workforce
- Employment contracts that reflect actual hours worked; steps taken to ensure employees understand their contracts and have the ability to review and adjust them if actual hours regularly exceed contracted hours
- Activities that support an environment where staff are educated about, and feel empowered to, address their physical wellbeing
- Activities that support an environment where staff are educated about and feel empowered to report and address bullying and harassment
- Activities to cascade good practice on fair working conditions throughout the supply chain
- Offer a pay and leave entitlement to all eligible staff who become kinship carers, ideally equivalent to statutory adoption pay and leave
- Payment of more than the National Minimum Wage or National Living Wage (as appropriate) to the contract workforce
- Entitlement to sick pay for the contract workforce, with provision in place for any staff who do not meet the earnings threshold for statutory sick pay, payment of sick pay from day one of absence and payment of staff on the contract workforce who are off sick a replacement income of 100% of their usual earnings for as long as possible
- Measures to support in-work progression to help people in the contract workforce, to move into higher paid work by developing new skills relevant to the contract
- Support for educational attainment relevant to the contract, including training schemes that address skills gaps and result in recognised qualifications
- Understanding of the modern slavery risks and issues affecting the market, industry, sector or country (of origin or of source) relevant to the contract, and the workforce in the supplier’s own organisation and those of its key subcontractors
- Measures to identify, mitigate and manage modern slavery risks relating to the contract and how these will be implemented
- Outline policies and practices to be applied to or put in place for the contract to mitigate and manage modern slavery risks, including: Pre-employment checks, recruitment practices. Workplace conditions, safeguarding plans and processes in place and regular monitoring with relevant groups considered, which may include sampling
- How to ensure business decisions re: price/cost, short lead times, payment timescales do not create modern slavery risks in the supply chain
-
Mission: Kick start economic growth. To secure the highest sustained growth in the G7 - with good jobs and productivity growth in every part of the country making everyone, not just a few, better off.
Policy Outcome 2: Skills for growth: Supporting growth sectors and addressing skills gaps.
- Understanding of employment and relevant skills issues, and of the education and training issues relating to the contract. Illustrative examples: demographics, skills shortages, new opportunities in high growth sectors, geographic/local community and skills/employment challenges
- Support for educational attainment relevant to the contract, including training schemes that address skills gaps and result in recognised qualifications
- Activities to support relevant sector related skills growth and sustainability in the contract workforce. Illustrative examples: careers talks, curriculum support, literacy support, safety talks and volunteering
-
Mission: Kick start economic growth. To secure the highest sustained growth in the G7 - with good jobs and productivity growth in every part of the country making everyone, not just a few, better off.
Policy Outcome 3: Resilient, innovative and flexible supply chains: Support economic growth through enabling resilient businesses, opportunities for small businesses and voluntary, community and social enterprises
- Understanding of the types of businesses in the market and the level of participation by new businesses, entrepreneurs, start-ups, SMEs, VCSEs and mutuals
- Activities to identify opportunities to open up sub-contracts under the prime contract to a diverse range of businesses, including new businesses, entrepreneurs, start-ups, SMEs, VCSEs and mutuals
- Plans for engaging a diverse range of businesses in engagement activities prior to appointing subcontractors (including activities prior to award of the main contract and during the contract term)
- Activities that demonstrate a collaborative way to work with a diverse range of businesses as part of the supply chain
- Advertising of supply chain opportunities openly and to ensure they are accessible to a diverse range of businesses, including advertising all subcontracting opportunities on Contracts Finder
- Ensuring accessibility to contracting and subcontracting opportunities for disabled business owners and employees
- Structuring of the supply chain selection process to ensure fairness (e.g. anti-corruption) and encourages participation by a diverse range of businesses, including with regard to new businesses, entrepreneurs, start-ups, SMEs, VCSEs and mutual
- Understanding of local demographics, needs and opportunities for the co-design of the goods, services and works to be delivered under the contract
- Methods for engaging with different parts of the community (including the education system and charities representing the community) and how communities come together to inform decisions, strategy and projects to leave a positive legacy for future generations
- Measures to engage users and communities and build relationships to increase community integration build trust and influence how the contract is delivered
- Plans to respond flexibly and adapt approaches to community engagement and initiatives
- Collaborating with anchor institutions and community groups to make facilities available for education, training or community events
-
Mission: Make Britain a clean energy superpower: To cut bills, create jobs and deliver security with cheaper, zero-carbon electricity by 2030, accelerating to net zero
Policy Outcome 4: Sustainable procurement practices: Reducing carbon footprints, minimising waste, and promoting the use of clean energy and green technologies.
- Understanding of opportunities for additional environmental benefits delivery in the performance of the contract, including working towards net zero carbon emissions and use of clean energy and green technologies
- Collaborative ways of working with the supply chain to deliver additional environmental benefits in the performance of the contract, including working towards net zero carbon emissions and use of clean energy and green technologies
- Delivery of additional environmental benefits through the performance of the contract, including working towards net zero carbon emissions and use of clean energy and green technologies
- Understanding of how to influence staff, suppliers, customers, communities and/or any other appropriate stakeholders through the delivery of the contract to support climate and nature protection and improvement
-
Mission: Break down barriers to opportunity: By reforming our childcare and education systems, to make sure there is no class ceiling on the ambitions of young people in Britain
Policy Outcome 6: Employment and training: For those who face barriers to employment
- Understanding of employment and skills issues, and of the skills and employment shortages of high growth sectors relating to the contract
- Creation of employment opportunities particularly for those who face barriers to employment, such as prison leavers, care leavers and/or who are located in deprived areas, and for people in industries with known skills shortages or in high growth sectors
- Delivery of training schemes and programmes to address any identified skills gaps and under-representation in the workforce for the contract (e.g. prison leavers, care leavers, kinship carers, disabled people)
- Understanding of the issues affecting the representation of disabled people in the workforce in the market, industry or sector relevant to the contract, and in the supplier’s own organisation and those of its key sub-contractors
- Collection of the views and expertise of disabled people and their representative organisations on successfully supporting disabled employees or applicants
- Inclusive and accessible recruitment practices, and retention-focused activities, including those provided in the Guide for line managers on recruiting, managing and developing people with a disability or health condition
- Working conditions which promote an inclusive working environment and promote retention and progression
- Other measures to provide equality of opportunity for disabled people and those with health conditions into employment, including becoming a Disability Confident employer and inclusion of supported businesses in the contract supply chain
- Understanding of the issues affecting inequality in employment, skills and pay in the market, industry or sector relevant to the contract, and in the supplier’s own organisation and those of its key sub-contractors. Measures to tackle inequality in employment, skills and pay in the contract workforce
- Inclusive and accessible development practices, including guidance for line managers on recruiting, managing and developing people with a disability or health condition
-
Mission: Break down barriers to opportunity: By reforming our childcare and education systems, to make sure there is no class ceiling on the ambitions of young people in Britain
Policy Outcome 7: Creating a pipeline of opportunities: For the contract workforce, reducing barriers to entry for under-represented groups.
- Understanding of the issues affecting the development of new skills by target cohort
- Understanding of the underlying factors affecting improvements to reduce barriers to entry and training schemes for the target cohort(s) related to the contract workforce
- Understanding of issues relating to entering the contract workforce
-
Mission: Build an NHS fit for the future: That is there when people need it; with fewer lives lost to the biggest killers; in a fairer Britain, where everyone lives well for longer.
Policy Outcome 8: Increasing productivity through physical and mental wellbeing: In the supply chain and communities in the relevant area.
- Understanding of issues relating to health and wellbeing, including physical and mental health, in the contract workforce
- Understanding barriers to access to health and social care services or employment opportunities e.g. digital inclusion
- Inclusive and accessible recruitment practices, development practices and retention policies that support-focused activities including those provided in the Guide for line managers on recruiting, managing and developing which support people with a disability or health condition
- Actions to invest in the physical and mental health and wellbeing of the contract workforce
-