I am new to Documentum, I have to upgrade one code from Documentum foundation class to Documentum Foundation Services. Can someone provide the pros and cons of each, and good source of information to get started with it.
btw, I am writing code in Java to get information from documentum.
On
IMHO they are not comparable because they are not focused on the same. DFC is an API to access Documentum while DFS is a service framework with some predefined services providing some functionality to interact with Documentum.
Thats important: I never used DFS :-)
DFC = Do-it-yourself. Traditional Client-Server programming. Faster.
DFS = Use predefined services or do it yourself for non-trivial tasks. SOA. Probably you need to deploy your services in a new server or purchase more Documentum licenses (not sure about that). Slow but I will feel more comfortable using this if I want to access Documentum from some legacy systems.
Thats my grain of salt I hope you find it useful.
DFS is an abstraction layer on top of DFC.
SourceRebels is partially right, except for the detail that EMC is now treating DFS as a primary model of integration for external applications (API). You no longer need to use a compiled language (Java or .Net), since you can do everything via SOAP webservice calls. DFC remains available for low-level interaction, but with every Documentum release there are more services added to DFS.
One of the key differences is the object model. In DFS, you can create a batch of operations to send to the server for execution (for instance, create 10 objects). There are also some complex operations in DFS that would take much more code to accomplish using DFC. DFS also allows you to deploy your code to machines without the DFC installed.
Your best resource for Documentum-related questions is http://developer.emc.com.