Migrating 20,000 Exchange users to Notes?

I'm sure there's some good marketing material in here for IBM/Lotus:


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The Cobbler wears no shoes

Since there might be a few people visiting my website to follow up my previous blog post, I figured that I should finally do something about fixing up my lack of a security certificate. I have previously registered with CACert but never finished the paperwork to install one of their certificates.

When I went there today I discovered that the cobbler wears no shoes...

What to tell a CEO who wants to migrate off Notes?

There's been a lot of useful stuff published over the last few years about how to best counter the "Move to Microsoft" mantra that sometimes comes down from senior management. I figured it would be a Good Thing (TM) if all of that information was readily accessible from one place.




Filling the application with useful links is the hard part since I won't be writing much of this stuff myself. My emphasis is on providing links to other peoples work (with proper accreditation of course). If you've got some information you think should be available through this application then please send me a LINK (not the original material) via email: gdodge at bcd dot net dot au.


BTW I did consider writing this in XPages but code re-use won out over innovation and the whole box of dice wound up taking only a couple of hours to recode from an existing application. I'll look at making it look pretty further down the track.
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It's going to be one of those days :(

First, my Lotuslive account stops working.
Then I receive the following reply after I emailed Lotus asking for assistance to fix the problem...

Maybe Comcast had a quiet word with Lotus after my last blog post?
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Comcast profits win over Net Neutrality

It's wishful thinking to suppose that corporations have a conscience or a desire to 'Do no Evil'. Sure you might get the occasional industry Titan who charts a benevolent course for their company but they will eventually be succeeded by time-serving executive seat-warmers beholden to no-one except the shareholders demanding bigger dividends. Given that market dynamic we should not be surprised at the Comcasts of the world insisting on their 'right' to discriminate against people who don't give them maximum revenue.

Comcast's recent success against the FCC's demand for net neutrality is indeed just the tip of the iceberg. I don't blame Comcast for trying to exploit their dominant position since they are just another soulless automaton trying to ensure their own economic survival in a 'dog-eat-dog' world.

However I will be mighty peeved if the lawmakers don't stop them.
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Can anyone explain this security failure in Domino?

I've never seen this problem before and I hope I never see it again.

A customer's branch office based in Sydney, Australia sends out a daily industry newsletter to their customers but for reasons specific to their industry they doesn't want any of the customers to realize who the other customers are. Consequently the author mails the newsletter to himself with all of the customer addresses in the BCC field.

Two days ago he mailed the newsletter out as normal but it bounced at one address (let's say for 'Mr Smith') because Mr Smith no longer worked at the target organization. After that all of the other 100+ customers listed in the BCC field received the Non-Delivery Report for Mr Smith addressed to themselves, and since they were given the original email encapsulated within the NDR then they could see the contents of the BCC field and thereby understand who all of the other 100+ customers were. So somehow the Router task had taken the contents of the BCC field and used that to address the NDR.

The customer had been getting random corruptions in their mail.box file on a monthly basis for over a year but Lotus support hadn't been able to determine the reason for this. Recently the corruptions had been hitting mail files also but Fixup never found a problem. I have a sneaking suspicion that the files weren't actually corrupt, and that a wayward Router Task is somehow to blame for all of this, but the server has been taken up and down more times than a Bride's nighty and there is still no end to the problem. The next step is to completely reinstall the server and patch it to R7.04 but that still doesn't answer the question of what happened.

The customer is standardized on Notes across the world and is unlikely to abandon the platform. They are looking at upgrading to R8.5 later this year, but for now they would like some reassurance that the problem won't occur.

Anyone seen this kind of problem before?

The server is an unclustered R7.02 FP3 running on Windows 2003 server. A PMR has been raised for this issue and if any Loti wants to investigate it further then I'm happy to give them the reference.
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"Microsoft's" new mailing list

I had an interesting email this morning which concluded with...

About this mailing:
You are receiving this e-mail because you subscribed to MSN Featured Offers Microsoft respects your privacy. If you do not wish to receive this MSN Featured Offers e-mail, please click the "Unsubscribe" link below. This will not unsubscribe you from e-mail communications from third-party advertisers that may appear in MSN Feature Offers. This shall not constitute an offer by MSN. MSN shall not be responsible or liable for the advertisers' content nor any of the goods or service advertised. Prices and item availability subject to change without notice.

©2010 Microsoft | Unsubscribe | More Newsletters | Privacy

Microsoft Corporation, One Microsoft Way, Redmond, WA 98052

Funny... I don't remember subscribing to "MSN Featured Offers". Ten seconds of detective work showed that the return address was in Russia and the "Unsubscribe" button would take me somewhere that anti-virus filters feared to tread.

I'll give them an A+ for innovation and simultaneously wish that the fleas of a thousand camels would infest their armpits.
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Google Gears shifts into reverse

eWeek have published another piece on the Google push to overtake IBM and Microsoft on the desktop, with the obligatory ten piece Death-by-Powerpoint slideware (PCMag had a similar article). I admit that I'm a little jaded after 20+ years of seeing vendor slide sets but this one really pushed the limit on feature beat-up e.g.

• The Google Drawing Editor supports Copy and Paste between applications.
• Google Docs have Rulers with Tab stops plus Spell check.
• Google Spreadsheets have a Formula editing Bar and simultaneous editing for fifty users.

You can have fifty people editing the same spreadsheet? I can understand the need for multiple people to view a spreadsheet within the context of an on-line meeting but once you open the spreadsheet up to multi-user editing then who's going to clean up the mess and verify the data afterwards? Consider that once you get more than a dozen people into a face-to-face meeting there is a high risk of the agenda being abandoned UNLESS you have a very capable chairperson. It would be unimaginably worse with an on-line meeting based around a spreadsheet ... hey, that number doesn't look right... I'll just change it while no-one's looking...

Then there was this wonderful (but totally meaningless) slide with no external references. I'm intrigued to know what measurements Google used to set the scale on the X and Y axis but I don't think there's an answer to that question.


However once you pass over the fluff and bubble there were some interesting snippets in the articles.

• Google is disabling Google Gears for Docs. It intends to rewrite that component so it can handle HTML5 and modern Web browsers. Now I don't have a problem with a software company rewriting their code to include new technologies, but it does show that the Google architecture is no more future-proof than Microsoft Exchange. In other words, Google has some good ideas but there was nothing extraordinary about their initial implementation of those ideas. On the other hand, Notes/Domino continues to provide backwards compatibility even while it evolves to include new technologies eg X-Pages. Score one for IBM.
  
  
• Google is implementing this change in three weeks time. Your company may have made a significant investment in learning and applying Google Gears to your applications but after May 3rd you're back to Square One. That's another big gotcha in the cloud computing scenario - consumers are completely disenfranchised in their preference for software versions.

Google has some interesting ideas and a ton of money to fund research into those ideas, but I'm starting to think that they just don't understand collaboration. It's not about giving everyone simultaneous editing access to the same spreadsheet - email - Wave - other file type, its about providing your people with transparent access to the aggregate intellectual property contained in your organization so they are empowered to better perform, and refine the process of, their own work. Sometimes that work occurs within the context of a meeting, but more frequently it is an individual activity reinforced by easy access to team knowledge.

Leaving aside the multi-user access, I'm thinking that all of the 'new' features Google are crowing about have been standards in Microsoft Office and Open Office for years. I'm glad to see Google providing competition in the Office arena but IMHO they need to lift their game.

I'll stick with Symphony.
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Spring cleaning the software library

Today I threw away my last stack of floppies... you know... those small plastic things that would fit inside your shirt pocket and carry less than one hundredth of one percent of the data that you can fit on a 2gb USB. I discovered these refugees from the 20th Century hiding in the back of a desk drawer and had little hesitation in consigning them to the dustbin. The only problem was finding a device to read them first to ensure that I wasn't throwing away something essential (like the certifier password to my Notes infrastructure). Fortunately I still have an old laptop with a floppy drive and ten minutes of disk shuffling showed that the disks were disposable.

The next step is going through my CD collection and tossing out all of my Notes 4.x and 5.x CDs along with the R5.x Redbooks etc. I'd be impressed with my spring-cleaning efforts except that I live in Sydney and it's certainly not Spring in Australia. Maybe I need a six month sabbatical in the USA to get my body clock back into sync.
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Something free from IBM?

IBM/Lotus have provided some excellent self-paced online software tutorials at no charge to Business Partners. Some of the tutorials need to be updated with current software versions but there's more than a few nuggets of gold in Them There Hills for the Business Partner who wants to get a toehold into a previously unexplored Lotus technology. Some examples are:

• IBM Lotus Quickr 8.2 Workshop: The Workshop will provide you with an understanding of the features of Lotus Quickr 8.2, both those that are new and those that were introduced earlier. The course will show you how to operate and manage Lotus Quickr Activities and tools. It will illustrate how to install and configure Lotus Quickr 8.2, how to use connectors to integrate productivity applications and customize Quickr themes and places, and how to manage a Lotus Quickr environment.
  
  
• Lotus Notes/Domino 8.5 Building Collaborative Applications Workshop: The Workshop will show a student how to use the Lotus Notes client to write collaborative applications that use the features of the Lotus Notes platform. The student will also learn how to package applications and deploy them to the Notes client through the Domino server. The XPages technology will be introduced and the student will learn how to develop XPages applications. After completing the workshop the student should be able to describe the primary features of the Notes and Domino platforms, describe how these platforms can enhance an enterprise’s business, define common terms used with this technology, and write a composite application and an XPages application that will run in the Notes client to provide additional capabilities. The student will be able to write Eclipse plug-ins which extend the user interface of the Notes client and deploy them to the client platform, and be able to incorporate widgets for use in collaborative applications.

• IBM Lotus Connections v2.5 Workshop: This technical skills hands-on workshop will show you how to leverage the eight integrated services for social networking delivered by Lotus Connections 2.5. You will learn how to use the functions and features that capture, communicate, share, collaborate, organize, and deliver social software for business. Setup and use of Lotus Connections features, how to integrate them with each other and incorporate them with other applications and Web sites. Learn how to use the tools and underlying servers to configure the products for use. All reinforced by hands-on labs.

These courses won't take you from from Zero to Hero but they will give you the ability to talk confidently to your customers about the products.
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Hey IBM... how about running Salestalks on a Pacific time zone once in a while?

I have a customer with c.300 Notes seats who has specifically asked me to get him information on Web Content Management. With perfect timing I received an IBM News update advising me that there will be a Lotus SalesTalk on this topic and then I realize the call is scheduled for 1:00am Australian time.

10. Lotus: Lotus SalesTalk: Put information to work at customer sites with Lotus Web Content Management
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Customers and prospects are increasingly looking for ways to reduce costs, maximise value, increase ROI, and enable top-line growth. This call provides valuable information that can help you talk with your customers about the solid ROI they'll see with Lotus Web Content Management.

Date: Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Time: 11:00 a.m. EDT (90 minutes)

We all know that IBM has historically had the majority of its software market on the North American continent and in Europe, but the markets in Asia have a significant proportion of the worlds population and a much higher growth rate than the USA. I concede that Australia and New Zealand have only 3% of the world IT market but what about India, China, Korea, Japan etc etc.

Lotus Knows that Asia wants to be in on the action also.
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Needed: An off-the-shelf Notes based CRM

I've had a request to recommend an off-the-shelf Notes-based CRM which supports mobile devices. The product would be involved in a shootout with the Microsoft Dynamics CRM so it would be worth knowing how well the recommended Notes product has scored in previous product comparisons and what its key features are v. MS Dynamics.

The customer is running Notes 6.5 and not looking to upgrade to R8.5 in the near future so no XPage applications please.
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A wakeup call for the Australian Lotus Channel

Yesterday we completed the third of our free two-day Domino R8.5 Proof of Technology seminars which takes the cumulative total of attendees to well over fifty, and we've had some interesting feedback about the seminars:

• Customers love getting two full days of technical training and product positioning for free. I think the most popular session in the last seminar was the one about the best methods to counter the suggestion that their organizations should move to Exchange and Outlook. We'll be expanding that session for our next seminar in June
  
  
• Some of our competition admire the idea and at least two of them are now putting on their own free Lotus-centric seminars (according to friends of mine who work in those companies). I've heard that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery so thanks for the compliment guys.
  
  
• Some of our competition hate the idea and claim that these seminars causes 'disharmony' in the Lotus sales channel because their present customers might wind up attending a seminar put on by another Lotus Business Partner. Well, Bollocks to them! IMHO the Customer is King and is entitled to talk to any and all Lotus Business Partners and to pick and choose between them to get the best mix of services. If our efforts in running these seminars makes another Business Partner feel 'disharmonized' then perhaps they need to ask themselves what are *they* doing to offer a better service to their customers.
  

These seminars will continue as long as the customers want them. We have our first Sametime/Quickr seminar running in May and the fourth Domino R8.5 Proof of Technology will be running in June. Now maybe those Australian IBM/Lotus Business 'Partners' who have been ignoring the Lotus portfolio will start talking to their current customers about the Lotus product range.

Because if they don't then we will...
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But do you get manuals with it?

I should know this answer but since I've accessed all of my learning and research on-line for the last few years so I don't know the answer. Does the following Domino media pack contain printed manuals? It costs c.$170 so I suspect it does... but I'd like to be sure.

IBM LOTUS NOTES AND DOMINO FOR MULTIPLATFORMS VERSION 8.5 ENGLISH DVD 128 BIT ENCRYPTION MEDIA PACK Vendor stock code: AH0ZDEN

The customer is upgrading from R5 so they have a bit of a learning curve...
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I'll admit it... I was wrong.

I thought Master Appliance Service of Hornsby NSW had the world record for bad customer service but they have been comprehensively beaten into second place by Whirlpool - the company whose appliances they were called in to fix.

A month ago I posted about our woes in trying to get our dishwasher fixed. My main beef at the time was that the repair technician didn't know which of the circuit boards on our dishwasher *might* be faulty so he wanted us to replace both of them. I objected to paying a non-refundable $950 plus service call for replacing two circuit boards when there was no guarantee that those new parts would fix the problem, so I went to Whirlpools web site to tell them of the situation and I received an automated email in reply thanking me for my input.

Fast forward to today and we receive a voicemail from the appliance repair company asking whether we still want the circuit boards. This reminds me that I haven't heard back from Whirlpool so I ring their customer support line and am told by John that they don't read the feedback they receive on their web site. However, as a consolation prize, he assures me that they do read their snail mail and offers me a postal address for Whirlpool so I can put my complaint in writing ...

Amazing stuff, but it does explain why I haven't heard back from them.
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Guess the identity of the Faceless Consulting Company

I'm always intrigued to find faceless consulting companies popping up to service the Notes market. You know the sort... "We're experienced in Notes yada yada and you can email us at 'support@newconsultingcompany.com' to talk to our expert technicians"..., but there's no names, no IBM certifications and certainly no 'feel-good' factor about who you might be dealing with. Sure, they may have a cool web-site but you can check here to see what I think of consulting companies who have cool web-sites. They say they are 'certified for IBM Lotus software', but there is no information about their certified software package.

Hey, it's a free internet and people can build whatever sites they like (subject to IBM's permission to use the IBM + Lotus logo), but would you as a customer ever contact such a site? Even if they had the most skilled Notes people in the world I wouldn't use them. I find there is something disturbing about people who won't back up their claims of competency with their own name.

So go and check out our new competitors in the Sydney market and add your two cents about their identity. My guess is that it's a full time employee of another consulting company who's about to jump ship and is putting their stake in the ground. When the day comes in a month or three then they'll add the face and name. I could be wrong, but it's fun to guess.

If you are currently managing a Notes consulting company in the Sydney market then perhaps ask yourself if any of your employees who live in Randwick and have worked for Qantas, Accenture, HSBC Australia, Lumley General Insurance, MasterFoods, Lloyds of London, Ernst & Young and Star City Casino (as claimed on the web site) have been a bit twitchy lately. It may be time to call them into your office for a quiet conversation.
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The new Lotus Advanced Collaboration Certification

There have been recent rumors and whisperings and 'delete-before-reading' emails talking about a new Lotus Certification stream which will arrive in the next few months. We will still have the old faithful Domino AppDev and SysAdmin certs plus the Lotus Portal stream and now apparently there will be an Lotus Advanced Collaboration certification requiring any two of:

• Lotus Sametime Administrator certification
• Lotus Quickr Administrator certification
• Lotus Connections Administrator certification

I think technical certifications are good things because (among other benefits) they separate the part-time cowboys from the serious players. What will be interesting is to see how the Business Partners living on the trailing edge handle the challenge. You know the sort - still certified only on Domino R7 and who think PlanetLotus is all about sports cars.

Of course, if we carry this through to the logical conclusion it means that Business Partners without an Advanced Collaboration certification soon won't be able to sell or renew Sametime, Quickr or Connections licences and individuals like me who are certified for both Domino AppDev AND SysAdmin need to have a long hard think about their career direction.

All of this is not confirmed yet. Does anyone have some hard facts about when?
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How Microsoft could achieve a 'Notes-free' planet

Perhaps Microsoft could install a software version of the LG gadget in a Windows 7 patch to detect when Notes is running on a Windows PC and then automatically delete the Lotus folders. That's one way to achieve 'Notes-free countries'.

"AN ELECTRONICS manufacturer with a history of making false environmental claims has been caught doctoring fridges to make them appear more energy efficient.

LG Electronics has agreed to compensate potentially thousands of consumers after two of its fridges - models L197NFS and P197WFS - were found to contain an illegal device that activates an energy-saving mode when it detects room conditions similar to those in a test laboratory.

The so-called circumvention device was discovered last month by the consumer advocacy group, Choice.

The device detects test conditions - typically 22 degrees - and activates the energy-saving mode, creating the impression of lower running costs and energy usage. The devices have been banned in Australia since 2007."

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How do you divide your Passion between five lovers?

I had a meeting with an IBM Business Partner last week who works in one of the non-Lotus IBM software pillars. Now I personally can't understand people having a passion for anything except Notes, but I can respect that they do and they certainly came highly recommended by IBM.

What I found interesting was our similarity of viewpoint around the impossibility of keeping a consulting mindset on more than one software pillar. Sure you can dabble in other technologies to keep your customers happy and your own curiosity satisfied, but if your company is to succeed in understanding, implementing and supporting the software you sell your customers then how the heck can you spread yourself across five IBM software pillars?

You might have staff (or contractors) with the appropriate technical certifications - a Lotus guy in Brisbane, a Rational guy in Adelaide, a Websphere girl in Perth, the Tivoli guy resigned last week but we haven't told IBM etc etc., but how can your sales and implementation teams find a passion for their product when management blows hot and cold on each software brand depending on their perception of how the market is shifting? My guess is that their passion is not with the software - it's with their sales budgets and with whatever new 'Shiny Monkey' they read about last week and that they think will bring in extra revenue of the next six months.

Call me old-fashioned but I'll stick with my first love. She may be Yellow with Big Blue on top but since I first met her some twenty years ago she's always excited me.


OMG!!! I've fallen in love with Marge Simpson!!!
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Lotus software - The Other Sister.

eWeeks article entitled "30 Reasons Why Software Rules at IBM" didn't mention Lotus until slide 25. Even then, the slide focused on Vulcan, with the rider that Vulcan's features "...would appear in upcoming versions of LotusLive, Lotus Notes and Domino, Lotus Connections, Quickr and Websphere portal." Websphere had the lions share of the slides while Tivoli and Rational had cameo appearances.

'Lotus Knows' has a long way to go to win the hearts and minds of the media.
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