Kategorie: Lotus Notes

Learning XPages … got „The book“…

Ok, I got the book „Mastering XPages“ and it is pretty good. I got it from Amazon as a Kindle book. What puzzled me first, was the size of the font. All my IT-books are rather big and fat, good for throwing after lions and kill them instantly. It looks like this one is a small size paperback in real life. Wouldn’t kill my cat.

The Amazon price is slightly lower then the IBM Press price, but if you buy through IBM, you get a watermarked version of the EBook with your name in it. Makes it your personalized copy … mon oeil! Why don’t IBM tells us, that they don’t like it, when you copy your Ebook for your „friends“? That would be OK, no? If I wrote a book, I would not like that either.

I have registered my copy with IBM press to get the download-able extras. AFTER registering the book using the ISBN number, I got a 35% off coupon. Argh. Now I have to buy the next book, too.

Now, somebody with lower moralities then me, could find out, that he (or she) could register the ISBN at the IBM Press site, get the coupon and THEN buy the book from IBM Press for 35% less… personalized for you if you wish. But that would be unfair, wouldn’t it? IBM makes it extremely easy to cheat.

The Kindle for Mac, is lousy. It hangs once in a while. On the iPad it works pretty good.

I run the Designer in Windoof 7 in Fusion. It isn’t very stable. Once in a while, it crashes while saving. Fortunately after the saving.
If I click on web preview button, it opens the text editor. I have to click on Internet Explorer but the settings are correct. Any idea what causes this?

Now back to learning XPages. It starts to make fun.

 

 

 

Trying to learn XPages … and fail … probably not?

First of all. Thank you for your comments (apart the ones from that very annoying spammer. Need Nike or Lacoste?), they are very encouraging.
It helps a lot, when things get recommended and what it showed again, Google is not always your friend. Several things did not show up in my searches or I did not find them, because they where too far down in the list.

XPages TV: I am watching the first two hours of if right now. This does help a lot. There are several information’s I did not get anywhere else, but are very important for me to understand the structure behind it.

TLCC: I am doing the free course right now and I will be in the webinar today. I did only realize that the webinar is the course, once the confirmation arrived. It will be interesting.

The books: Once through all that stuff I am doing now, I will probably buy the Mastering XPages Book.
As I mentioned before, I have downloaded the Redbook and I am not too happy with it.

Others: Sonia Malik from IBM promised to drop me a few things from Lotus Education in a DropBox. I am looking forward to this.

In the news: Nicklas Heidloff has updated the link for the Learning XPages blog of Declan.

Bruce Elgort asks, where my problems are: Wanna talk about it?
No seriously, when you start something new, the problem are the mountains of information you know are there, but you can’t see them through the fog. Everybody has to find his way of getting the right information absorbed to make it work.
I am a top down person. Which means I go from a big picture to the detail. Or in other words, I take things apart, to find out how they work (drove my parents crazy). The other half of the population is bottom up, which means they build things up from parts to the whole. Now I have to find a book/tutorial/webinar and so on, that is done top down. David Leedy looks like to be my kind of guy. His presentations made it much easier for me to connect the dots. But I can not tell you a specific problem right now. I have to wade through the mud by myself, until it becomes clearer.

Where I go from here? Continue the TTCL course. Looking through the NotesIn9 presentations and start the little private project I am carrying around in my head for the past few month.

If it works out, I keep you posted and thanks again. That’s the spirit of the yellow universe.

 

Trying to learn X-Pages … and fail.

I am frustrated. The last two weeks I try to get into X-Pages. I looked at the different free tutorials, I downloaded the Red Book Wiki and now I am stuck.

First I refreshed my knowledge about JS and HTML/XML. Then I tried the first tutorial:

http://www-10.lotus.com/ldd/ddwiki.nsf/dx/Tutorial-Introduction-to-XPages-Exercise-1

Did anybody realise, that the first two screen shots are the same? Looking at the comments, some did, but the error got not rectified since 2009. Does it make sense to follow a tutorial that is not up to date and uses a Domino Designer that is two versions behind? I don’t think so.

Next I tried that one from Declan Lynch:

http://www.qtzar.com/blogs/qtzar.nsf/%3C/font%3Ehttp://planetlotus.org/44f9e4

If you see nothing, me neither. That’s the problem. Is it going to be fixed one day?

My last try was a Red Wiki example. I tried the second one. I got to the point where I had to import the .png files from the domino server. They are not there. Stuck again. It sucks.

A few month ago, IBM Switzerland asked if any Bussiness Partner was interested in X-Pages training. But they offered the advanced course, where you need X-Pages experience. How silly is that.

With all that bad experience behind me, I wonder who else gave up on X-Pages and moved to other pastures, just because they did not get the training they needed. OK, Switzerland may be the worst country you can be for Notes, but it is never too late to learn something new and since I don’t like web developement too much, X-Pages would be nice for my purposes.
Is there somewhere I real good tutorial that works and is up to date?

 

Lion eats the Snow Leopard

I can’t believe it, but Lion is definitely better then Snow Leopard. It is possible, that it solved a few problems I had, I wasn’t aware of.
For example:
Finder is fast. It was extremely slow in Snow Leopard. It took about 10 seconds to build the list for „Programs“. This is a lot better then before. It takes probably a second now.
Notes seems to be a bit faster. Not a lot, but at least I can click that stupid „Notes is starting“ window away. Notes comes in the front, when I click on the icon and it stays in the back, when refreshing a view. Man, that was annoying.
Launchpad is cool.
Mission Control is a winner.
The new gestures come almost natural. I don’t have a lot of problems to scroll the other way. It is more natural, for sure.
The update process went flawlessly. Nothing to click, no questions to answer. Took about an hour.
Happy camper over here.

The best and the worst in France

My parents in law invited the whole family for a weekend to Crest in the department of Drome. A town I wouldn’t put on the list of the 100 must see towns in the world, but everything holds surprises. As always, family outings are mostly about good food and good wine. The first evening we ate reasonably well. The next day we visited Crest with the highest dungeon of France. In the evening, we went to the Pizzaria Di Angelo … If you ever happen to be in Crest, avoid this „restaurant“ at all cost. We were greeted with the information, that only half of the guests were allowed to eat a pizza, the others had to eat something else, otherwise we would no be served. Woha (brain to blood preassure – rise)! Finally we ordered only two pizzas. Me and my parents in law ordered Raviol – a local speciality, basically small raviolis – which came clearly from the micro wave. It was disgusting. What happened to the pride of France, the kitchen. I would be ashamed to serve food like that. The pizzas would be a reason for Italy to declare war. They put french Emmentaler (which is an insult to the Swiss) on it instead of mozzarella. Yucks.

The next day we went to Saoû. Now that was something else. We enjoied local specialities under the trees on the central square (if you need soft drinks, you are out of luck here, no Coke or anything like that … but the wine was incredible). Since every meal starts late and takes at least two to three hours, we skipped supper and went to a vocal jazz festival in Crest.

Monday was the absolute highlight for me. The town of Cliousclat is almost to nice to be true. If you like pottery, that would be haven. My haven was La Fontaine – It’s about as close you can get to the perfect french restaurant. I don’t mean the expensive places with Pierre as your waiter (who wants to know the first name of the waiter anyway). No, sitting in the street in the shade, talk to other guests, kids running around and everybody is just extremely friendly, because they like what they do. Regional and seasonal food (mostly), perfect wine. That’s life. If I ever happen to have a big company and need a new headquarter, I would go to a small french town like Cliousclat, just to get lunch every day in small restaurants. Who cares about free fruits, massage, gym or meeting rooms, designed to the latest scientific findings in face-to-face collaboration, if you just could meet somewhere in the shades of a nut tree to discuss the next project? Customers would always come back to me, just because of the food they get during meetings (and I truly hate this new mode of standing during lunch, „Stehlunch“ they call it in German. Horrible. Where will it end).

The only setback was the nuclear power station a few kilometers down the valley. That really spoiled the view. That should be reason enough for France to get out of nuclear power.

I think we should do the same thing somewhere in Italy. Could be fun, too.

I even had time (while driving the sleeping family back to the hotel – don’t volunteer to drive and do a good job) to muse about Notes. Where is that Beta for Vulcan? There aren’t any news since LS11. It’s Q3 already! I am really curious about it. It is a crossroad for me. Either it has the Wow factor or it’s time to move on. We are looking into Zimbra, too, which looks promising as a Domino replacement.

PS: Notice to IBM Suisse Romand or SNOUG SR. Where is the Connections Account you promised at Givaudan? I am waiting to get more into this social stuff.

Holiday Season – Time to reflect on Notes, IBM and other stuff….

I have been away for a while. We went on holiday in Sigri on the isle of Lesvos, which is kind of the end of the world. 300 habitants. Not what you would call a vibrant holiday resort, but we had perfect conditions for windsurfing and a lot of fun, I mean really a lot.
My wife did beat me in a regatta and won a Lycra surf shirt. She will look to it, that I am not going to live that down.
The surf station is owned by a young austrian couple, Martina (the one with the bikini collection) and Marcel (the one with the camera that made me look like an overstuffed sausage in a wet suit), which does everything to make your holidays as relaxed as possible. If you are into windsurfing, have a look: www.sigrisurf.com
I had my iPad with me and that was just perfect (free wi-fi on the beach) to be in touch with the rest of the world and send my friends at home pictures to make them green with envy.

I had time to reflect on the things that happened in the yellow bubble after that now infamous call. Today I think it was nothing new. We had that before. Notes is dead … yeah right. No marketing from IBM … Yawn. Lousy communication from IBM … we would do the same thing with that kind of legal department looking over our shoulders. But, we got some news out of it. Ed said, they haven‘t decided on a name for the next release. I think that is great news, as long as „Notes/Domino“ in the new name is finally going away and the new product is really a major step forward. Faster, more reliable and new ideas is what we and customers want. This should be the last version that allows backwards compatibility.
I would not be angry, if IBM added MAPI to „TSFCD (The Server formally called Domino)“. If the customers want‘s Outlook, let them, they don‘t care about the server. XPages will give us enough opportunities to build jaw dropping applications.
Go for it IBM, give us the WOW. It‘s time to milk the last drop out of the cash cow (she will retire on nice pastures for a few years) and bring in the rising star.

But (and that is a big BUT), I get the feeling, that the yellow bubble is unsettled, if not outright afraid about the future (not people like Nathan Freeman, who knows probably lot‘s more then the common business partner).
It wasn‘t that bad, when Notes 8 was announced, because we were all involved. We had the beta very early and were able to contribute. Made us proud, didn‘t it? This time we are out of the loop, that‘s what makes us nervous. We see ourself as a loyal bunch, but not really respected. We get all kinds nice sales talk, how important BP‘s are for IBM but don‘t see anything coming from IBM that proves it. We loose customers we found, because IBM takes the deal away or IBM reps bring in other partners, who make the deal with IBMs blessings. Why should we be loyal to a single IBM product? We should not. Every shop owner has several products in the shelf to give customers a choice, but the shop owner has preferences as everybody else and will try to convince the customer, but sometimes the product of his choice just does not fit. Therefore, if you want to make customers happy, get more products in your portfolio. Get for example Zaraffa as an alternative for a mail server. If a customer wants something new, it‘s better that you get the contract, then somebody else. There are a lot of products out there, that are not as versatile as Notes, but do the job and are easier to learn. That is perfect for you and me and gives us a lot more power as BPs. Don‘t count on IBM for your survival, it‘s up to you. If Vulcan is the hell of a product we expect, great. If not, move on.
Loyalty is not something that is held in high regards nowadays. IBM employees who apparently love Notes move to the dark side without so much as an explanation. Who cares? IBM will start to care, if more and more Business Partners look for other products. Loyality is something IBM has to earn, not something we have to give.
The village of Sigri is a school book example for bulk risk. For years they relied on a single british tour operator, which filled the hotels and apartments every year (with bird watchers…) and then he went belly up. Now they try desperately to diversify in the middle of a crisis which affects the whole country. Don‘t fall into the trap of bulk risk. Learn new things now.

Another thing that came to my mind, why Notes does not sell good in the SMB market, is: IBM lacks a face. Apple has Steve Jobs, Microsoft has Steve Balmer – even though the videos on YouTub make me wonder about his mental sanity – IBM has … nobody. If the Lotus brand had a person who radiates confidence, it would sell like hot cakes. You could even take somebody from outside. William Shatner would be a good face. But since IBM has the marketing mantra „We don‘t do this (or any) kind of marketing“ my expectation for the future of IBM marketing is somewhat limited. But one never knows.

Notes on Mac … still not something I should have done.

Could somebody please explain that to me?
When I open a contact document in my CRM system by clicking on it, it takes about 10 seconds to open and another 2 to change it to edit mode.
If I open it with cmd-e, I get there within 2 seconds. Now that was on the mac. With windows 7 in Fusion, it takes about 5 seconds by clicking on it but it is not as fast as the mac, if I use the keyboard.
We are talking about the mac being faster with the key board then with the mouse and the mac is known as the machine for the mouse addicted. I would really like to know, where the big difference comes from, between using the keyboard and the mouse.

That’s what IBM should have done with Lotus Foundations …

Starting tomorrow, Collax offers it’s SMB solution Collax Business Server and Collax Security Gateway free of charge for up to 5 users. Yep, not just testing. You can actually use it for your company.
OK, support is extra, but the server AND the documentation (!) got high marks in a test from Computerwoche and TecChannel.

It’s not rocket sience after all.

… and BTW. There are several Domino installations on Collax. That works, too.
I think it is about time to throw out LF and get something with a future. LF is making more and more problems here. Collax Business Server runs happily on a LF appliance. I couldn’t make the DOM work, though. Anybody an idea, how to access a DOM?

Going Collax – The next step and a surprise

OK. The press releases are out and we are the new distributor for Collax in Switzerland.
What does it mean for us? We have to concentrate mostly on marketing. No more server installations (Good, very good). We have to recruit new resellers. We will find customers and connect them with resellers. There are allready installations in Switzerland, therefore we don’t have to start at the bottom like we did with Lotus Foundations.
And you know what? Collax is doing many things, what we (I mean all of us in the LF community) told IBM over and over again what should be done with Lotus Foundations, but IBM in its universal wisdom was polite enough, not to tell us, that we are complete morons. Collax does it all different. We got flyer’s – printed ones – on glossy paper! Can you imagine? We get rollups. Cool ones even. They do press releases. They do roadshows (look here, that’s going to be fun … for Collax). You will not believe this, but they want, that people know about their products. From an IBM marketing perspective, Collax must do everything wrong, but Collax products sell.

Stay tuned, there is another annoucement soon. Something else, that would have pleased the LF reseller community (but is completely wrong from an IBM perspective).

Surprise, surprise. Collax is growing and LF is history. They must do something right.

Our next step is to build a hosting offering with a partner and we are in the works for bringing Domino as a standard package on the Collax CBS, preferably alongside Zarafa. Domino runs allready in different companies on the collax platform and as far as I can see, without any issues.
I have a Collax CBS running on a LF Box here. Unfortunately I couldn’t use the DOM, but hey, you can’t have everything. Funny enough, Collax has an interface for the USB display. It’s not activated, but that would not be hard to do. Next step is to move a domino server in there and get the grips with Postfix. Should work soon I hope.

It is amazing, what you can do in a short time, if you actually want to sell a product. BTW, more Collax products have been sold in Switzerland in January 11 then LF in the whole 2010.