Mat Newman 23 January 2012 06:19:06 AMThe slides from my Lotusphere 2012 sessions are now available online... Lotusphere 2012: BP102, User Blast Lotusphere 2012: BP105, tick.tick.tick.tick. #! It's time to Evangelise, Educate and Engergise your users to Get Productive, Get Social and Do BUSINESS! Remember: Every journey begins with 1 step, 1 star can guide a ship across the ocean 1 voice can start a revolution 1 spark can start a fire Be the 1 to embrace social and start the revolution in your organisation! Mat Newman 31 December 2011 11:46:00 PMI don't just mean the roller-coasters at Lotusphere and Alton Towers :-) What a year. It began with outstanding feedback and response from my "where is the love" session at Lotusphere and just kept on going from there! It was the Lotusphere where "The Yellow Suit" made it's first appearance. A year that saw everyone, including television programmes, embracing social; it was a busy time on Twitter, Linkedin, Facebook, Skype and with discussions on the Bloggerverse. For the first time I made it to the UK for the famous UKLug conference where I saw first hand what an outstanding event a user group could be. Three trips to my new favourite destination, with two new customers there embracing IBM Collaboration Solutions to solve real world problems. And the inaugural AusLUG conference. What started as a blurry discussion at Lotusphere 2011 with Barry Sanders became reality in August when Australia finally joined the rest of the world with our own BIG Lotus event. And rumours about a 60,000 seat sale of Lotus Notes in Australia that has been kept pretty quite. I can confirm that this has happened, I did the Admin training for them, although I will leave the formal announcements to the people who are keeping it quite for one reason or another. One thing is for sure, there's life in the old girl yet :-) With two sessions next year at Lotusphere 2012 I'm already getting excited about the year ahead. My mate, Mitch Cohen has a saying: "Lotusphere energises you, it get's you ready to face the year ahead." I'm already energised, I feel 2012 is going to be HUGE! Mat Newman 8 December 2011 08:10:00 PMI really pleased to advise that my session for Lotusphere 2012 got accepted: "User Blast". Building on "Where is the Love?" from LS11 - where you may have seen or heard of "The 10 Minute Demo" - this session is going to be a 50 minute full-on blast, show casing of the power of Lotus Notes (I'm supposed to leave some time for questions). I have a list of items prepared, but with so much content that could be included I thought I would throw it over to you to help decide some of the tips/solutions that I can demonstrate during the session. With a twist. I want you to tell me what Lotus Notes CANT do! You've heard your users complain, you've found something yourself, or you just don't believe that Lotus Notes is capable of doing ... what? Feel free to comment here, or message me using the social media of your choice (some connect options are on http://about.me/matnewman), I can be found on most networks. Of course, you could always go Communications 1.0 and email me: mat at matnewman dot com. Bring them on, I'm looking forward to your input, and to seeing you at Lotusphere 2012 :-) Mat Newman 8 December 2011 01:38:41 PMOne of the questions that came up during last weeks Domino Admin Boot-camp was regarding ACL's on new databases. The Admin in question wanted to know how to automatically include a standard group in the ACL of all new databases based on a Template. Like most things Notes/Domino, the solution is pretty simple. Just add the entry to the Template's ACL, but include it in square brackets, ie: [YourStandardGroup] From the FILES tab of the Domino Administrator client, Choose to show Templates Only, right-click the template you wish to modify and choose Access Control -> Manage. With the ACL open, Add the group name you would like included in all new databases. Again; make sure you enclose the group name in Square Brackets [YourStandardGroup ], then just select the ACL level and rights that you want that group to have by default.  From now on, every new database created based on that template will have it's ACL automatically populated with the entries you put in the Template's ACL that are enclosed in [SquareBrackets]. Enjoy :-) Mat Newman 31 October 2011 09:19:10 AMI LOVE that most of the article discusses predominantly Notes 4.6 / 5 (that's 14 year old technology right there). And that there's a side-note cursing other applications (Outlook, Gmail, etc) blocking HTML scripts and images "for security reasons". And "Mel" - the IT security guy - who apparently is also a big "offender". I like the sound of Mel :-) But the best bit is that comments are closed to this well constructed, well researched and up-to-date post. Well done "Andre", whoever you are. I couldn't find anything like an about me page that discusses your credentials or how to contact you. Oh well. Article HERE: http://emailmarketing.iparkedhere.net/1153/email-marketing/successful-html-email-marketing-campaigns-and-lotus-notes-issues Enjoy :-) Mat Newman 26 October 2011 09:18:23 PMYesterday's #TipOfTheDay was how to access IBM Connections in 'miniature' form by accessing your IBM Connections site with the addition of /mobile at the end of your address, like: http://greenhouse.lotus.com/mobile A little while ago I wrote how many sites designed for mobile/smart-phone/tablet access actually make GREAT Lotus Notes side-bar widgets. Well, combine this concept, and the brilliant mobile version of IBM Connections and what do you have - Lotus Notes fully Connected, right there in your side-bar :-) The following slides show the steps to setting this up: Enjoy! Mat Newman 25 October 2011 10:08:22 AMThat the proliferation of 'Smart' mobile devices - phones, tablets, etc - within the general consumer space has lead to a revolution in the expectations of users is undeniable. Take the iOS experience as an example. The Mail interface has but 4 (four) buttons. "Back", "Edit", "New" and "Refresh". It doesn't take a genius to work out which button to press. Unfortunately, it has also lead to a perception that anything with a plethora of features and options is 'un-intuitive', that the extra features lead to confusion and a lack of comprehension as to their value. Lotus Notes has surely suffered as a result of this 'simplification' of IT. While the acceptance of technology into the lives of many users who would previously not have considered it is a positive step, recognising that there is still a place for powerful desktop applications - especially for knowledge workers - draws a line in the sand between those who need such applications and those who do not. A recent tweet highlighted this concept:
#Thought4TheDay Give a user Windows Paint, they're an Artist. Give them Photoshop, they're Confused. Sound Familiar? Email v Notes | For those who require 'more power', the misconception that Lotus Notes is an Email application is always the starting point of a users 'frustrations'. But it's not that hard to turn around. It begins with the acknowledgement that Lotus Notes is a Database application (or a client framework within which to run databases) and the software interface itself, the Menu's and tools available, are optimised for managing ANY database that is currently open within the Notes client. Demonstrate to users that the "Tool-bars" are the same whether Mail, Calendar, To-Dos, Contacts, Notebook, Blog, Forum or any Custom application that is open in Notes, and they begin to understand the consistency of the interface. Demonstrate that the "Action Bar" contains the options specific to the current application, and users stop looking within Menu's and Tool-bars for commands to perform tasks specific to the current database. Then demonstrate the integration options available via the Eclipse framework ( which I wrote about the other day) and users begin to understand how much more productive and efficient they can be using the Notes client which can bring everything they need together in one place. Finally, demonstrate the operation of the core PIM databases. Note: I always do this as the last step, once the users gain an understanding of the power of the application in front of them. Many power users find comfort within the Notes client and recognise how productive they are with 'all the bells and whistles'. They are also the users who understand the framework, the flexibility and many of the options available to them within Notes. Again, from Twitter:
I thought I'd like going from Lotus Notes to Outlook, but I don't | A little education can have powerful results. Changing perceptions and raising understanding is part of this process. There are always going to be users who need education to help raise their level of understanding of the power of Notes, lest they suffer from: the intuitive misconception. Mat Newman 21 October 2011 07:54:58 AMI have a client who 'lives' in Email. But they never speak of email, they talk about Notes. They receive literally thousands of messages a day. Not bad for a site with only 12 users. When they open an email from a client their side-bar instantly identifies reference numbers/codes in the message and their side-bar widget presents that related information to them without having to cross-reference another system. That leads to efficiency. Due to subscriptions at industry sites via RSS, their Inbox's are less cluttered by newsletters, offers and deals, which are instead delivered into their Feeds side-bar. This means their Inbox requires less monitoring, processing and filing, leading to improved productivity. When an agent answers a phone call, they don't have to sing-out across the office to the person the call is directed to, they double click the person's name in the Sametime list and let them know a caller is on the line for them. Even if the agent is in a meeting with a client they are still aware that a call is on-line and can respond with 'please take a message' or 'ask them to hold' as appropriate. These are just a couple of examples of features that make Notes 'more than email'. Without the eclipse overlay the agent would need to open the appropriate external application to check on the status of an order or booking. That's inefficient. Email is a means to enable communication. Communication is just one part of the puzzle, Notes with eclipse is the enabler that allows user to get their heads out of their 'Inbox', without having to leave their 'Inbox'. Email by itself is simply a notification mechanism to identify that work somewhere else needs to be executed. Lotus Notes with Eclipse provides users with the ability to improve productivity, increase efficiency, and to truly Get Social and Do Business ( :-D ). That is the value of Eclipse in a Notes environment. (thought initiated by a discussion on THIS blog) Mat Newman 13 October 2011 10:02:16 AMThe good news: in Lotus Notes 8.5.3 the performance of Categorised views has VASTLY improved! One of the features I LOVE about Lotus Notes is the "Personal Journal"/Notebook database. It it the place where I store EVERYTHING I need to remember. From passwords to user guides for devices to favourite recipes to handy hint's and tips, everything that I find useful ends up here. If you've every seen the Australian movie "The Castle" you will appreciate the phrase I use often in this office: "That's goin' straight to my Journal". The Notebook database has the ability to Tag entries with "Categories" - a feature that has been around in Lotus Notes forever - which is a great way to add meta-data to any record in any database (including your Mail database) to enable you to quickly classify and search on that information later.  The problem with Notes 8.5.* up until now has been the performance of views in the Java overlaid applications, which include Mail, Calendar, To-Do, Contacts and Notebook, Blog's, etc. Categorised views have been just a little sluggish when compared to the non-java version. You can compare performance by holding down Ctrl+Alt while opening a Notes database to launch it in "Classic" mode, where you will see what I mean by the difference in speeds between the java and non-java variants of categorised views. Thanks to the team involved in optimising this aspect of Lotus Notes in 8.5.3 standard - I really appreciate it! If you too use Categorised views in your PIM apps frequently, it's another reason you MUST upgrade to 8.5.3 Mat Newman 12 October 2011 07:24:00 AMFACT: IBM Lotus Domino IS more efficient at storing data than Microsoft Exchange. I recently did a migration for a small business of 4 users (note IBM - that IS a small business!) that began with 11gb of data in their SBS/Exchange data store. After migrating to Domino, the total size of the Domino mail databases was 9.2gb. For the math inclined, that's a 16% saving in disk space. And then I enabled DAOS. After running compact on the mail databases, the mail files and DAOS storage totalled 5.6gb. Again for the math inclined, that is a 49% disk saving by switching to Notes/Domino from Exchange. What has storage got to do with users? This twitter post says it all really:
Since I've #gonegoogle from Lotus Notes and VPN and 100MB size limit, everybody in the 2000+ company is :-)
| Or from a users perspective:
Outlook is SO much better than Lotus, no more sucky 100meg restriction!
| Users DO NOT care WHY they have a mail quota, or why they can't send an email that contains a 5mb attachment. A quote from TWiL 72 is relevant here (paraphrased): "The computer on the users desk at work is no longer the most powerful machine they use". The same goes for the messaging infrastructure users deal with. Users no longer use email only at work. Users have a plethora of options available to them - especially in the personal space - none of which have a 100 megabyte limit on their storage, or a restriction of 5 megabytes on the size of attachments they can send. What they DO see, is a Lotus Notes client that fails to send a 6mb attachment, or that bugs them every two seconds because they've exceeded their 100mb quota. This is - of course - nothing to do with the capabilities of Lotus Notes. I have a number of clients who carry around multi-gigabyte mail database replica's with them. One client has a 13 gigabyte "active" mail database, which has auto-archiving enabled for everything older than 9 months. From their perspective, users who complain that Lotus Notes's "sucks" due to the limit's imposed upon them ARE complaining about the Lotus Notes client. They do not differentiate that it's the restrictions placed upon them by their IT department that are actually the root of the problem. The first quote above would indicate that the storage available to that company for messaging was restricted to only 200 gigabytes. That may have been justified 10 years ago when the company implemented Notes/Domino 6 and 200 gigabytes was a big deal, but today I can spend less than a hundred bucks and get a pocket drive with the same capacity. Similarly for attachments. Surely your internet pipe is no longer the 1mb link that you implemented 10 years ago (unless you're in Timor-Leste!) and a 6mb data transfer is no longer a significant concern. If you ARE worried about large attachments leaving your organisation, check out the EXCELLENT FileSendR utility by Declan Lynch on OpenNTF. You could also implement Notes/Domino 8.5.3 and take advantage of the amazing Connections Files entitlement now available to you. Your users are not really complaining about Lotus Notes. Users believe that Lotus Notes is the problem because it has pathetic storage restrictions, and is incapable of sending attachments of any significant size. You and I know different. It's time to review the restrictions you are placing on your users. Preferably before the new CEO arrives and demands you give them Outlook, since the CEO had Outlook at their last post and knows that Outlook doesn't have a stupid 100 megabyte limit. Perception is everything. It's time to review the administrative inhibitions. |
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