Ed Brill

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1. 1  Ben Poole http://www.benpoole.com | 11/25/2005 2:56:49 PM

   See? Now you know what we're all banging on about! You guys better get that there Hannover thing out and running nicely, I'm telling ya! :o)

1. 2  Michael Braly http://michaelbraly.com | 11/25/2005 9:53:26 PM

   After pretty much removing myself from the Notes world for the last year, in the last week I have now dipped back in twice. First, I got called in to install a QE environment for Notes 6, 6.5 and 7. (My first time seeing 6.5 and 7)

   Then, I started trying to find out more about the 'Appliki' reference from the IBM social software announcement and saw an Ed Brill link on Google. This made me curious to see what was new with Ed and the old Notes gang. It looks like some things haven't changed since:

   { Link }

   What would Google have found if you searched for the error message PLUS lotus notes? ;-)

   I hope all is going well with the ol' Notes gang.

1. 3  Paul Bunnell  | 11/27/2005 6:54:10 AM

   Ed

   So how did you fix the issue? if you have a installer that works...can I have it...Im licenced:)

   Plus are you connecting to IBM from Mac?

   Paul

1. 4  David Vasta david.davidandkelly.com | 11/27/2005 8:46:10 PM

   I think this is a hug issue with Lotus and Mac. Someone at Lotus needs to take long hard look at why they refuse to acknowledge there is a problem there and they really need to get Domino on MacOSX Server.

   I keep saying it and Lotus never seems to want to listen...you need to get it together with the whole Mac thing!

1. 5  Ed Brill www.edbrill.com | 11/27/2005 9:25:17 PM

   Hang on a second... I'm not sure I see any connection to OS X server here. Frankly, I see almost zero market opportunity associated with a Domino port to XServe.

   Not to take this too personally, but there are people at Lotus, myself included, who do understand the issues here. Part of the reason I blogged it was to acknowledge that there's room for improvement. I'm listening, as I have in the Mac space for several years.

1. 6  Thomas Schulte  | 11/28/2005 2:18:26 AM

   Oh that one is not only a problem with the mac client.

   Try to install notes 7 on a win client where there are less then 480 Meg free space on disk C. some people do this because they want to have a system partition C and some other partitions d,e,f for programs, and data.

   You can tell the client to install on d:\somewhere and even to use e:\otherdirectory for unzipping, but it will complain about not having enough space on c: and cancel the installation. Regardless of what you are trying to do.

1. 7  Ben Rose http://www.jaffacake.net | 11/28/2005 2:23:24 AM

   @6 Unzip the installer from the download package first, it's not diffcult.

1. 8  Thomas Schulte  | 11/28/2005 3:39:27 AM

   @7 yes ben i know that.

   But: this kind of i do not do what you tell me but i will do whatever i think is not what i think a product especially one from the big company IBM should work like when installing.

   Sorry but this is a double minus for the QualityAssurance team from me.

1. 9  Ben Rose http://www.jaffacake.net | 11/28/2005 4:03:40 AM

   @8 - I both agree and disagree.

   In Lotus' support, the installshield method that Lotus Notes uses is a pretty standard method and it's not uncommon for software to detach and verify itself from a single file before launching the installer locally. Most commercial software, even games, use this installation procedure.

   Where Lotus go wrong is that they should specify the amount of temporary disk space required by the installer. This is on the box of most software, e.g. "up to 1GB of disk space required for temporary space during installation". I've seen this in the Notes/Domino release notes.

   Disk space may be cheap, and having less than 0.5GB free on your c: drive is not a good plan, but it's no excuse for Lotus not to have entirely accurante release Notes.

1. 10  Thomas Schulte  | 11/28/2005 5:06:27 AM

   @9 - i would agree to that if the installer would not ask me "where would you like to extract the files needed to" (as a good installer should always do)

   But the installer does ask me and i tell him to do it my way "extract to e:\somewhereonthispartition" and he still tries to extract on c:\temp or at last tries to find if there is enough memory available. And that is a point for me where all he fun ends.

1. 11  Simon Barratt http://apps.fmc.com/blog.nsf | 11/28/2005 10:00:23 AM

   Hey Ed, you could of always updated your blog using Firefox, and the web admin client.

   I'm sure Steve,({ Link } can give you some pointers on how to set it up!

   I have not installed Notes on my Mac. I promised myself it was for home/fun only! No M$ Office either!

1. 12  MarvinK  | 11/28/2005 11:25:53 AM

   Lets just get Apple to give away imacs to executives for every major software they want a clean port of... if they get the messages, they'll be more inclined to have them fixed! :D

1. 13  Peter D Cox http://www.tmpl-online.co.uk | 11/29/2005 1:08:36 AM

   Since you seem to have overcome the not enough space issue - could you post an answer here https://www-10.lotus.com/ldd/nd6forum.nsf/ShowMyTopicsAllFlatweb/e018c9a9a8a76158852570980064e903?OpenDocument

   - as you can see I got no response.

   BTW I've been using Notes on Macs for years (and update my Steve generated web site and blogs from Mac machines). Problem with having one in the office is that everyone wants one! Once a switcher you're on a slippery slope away from windowze. And I think you're dead wrong about an OS X version of Domino - it would rock ....

1. 14  Ed Brill www.edbrill.com | 11/29/2005 8:49:35 AM

   "And I think you're dead wrong about an OS X version of Domino - it would rock ...."

   Yeah, but who would buy it?

1. 15  David Vasta david.davidandkelly.com | 11/29/2005 11:58:52 AM

   Your comments seem to be the same as everyone at Lotus on the whole Mac topic. Only problem is I don't think anyone with a brain has looked into it. Why would you only let Lotus Notes run on the most vulnerable OS on the planet?

   Why because that seemed like a good idea and of course MacOS didn't? Not to say the Notes Client on MacOS does not work but I think it is one of the products Lotus spends the least amount of time on.

   Now as for the Domino on MacOSX server topic, again I really don't think anyone has really looked at it, and at the same time it runs on Windows, again one of the most unsecured, crappy servers out there. I know all you out there that run you entire Domino system on Windows and love it but I have one word for you…iSeries.

   If Lotus was thinking about "real" hardware cost and OS stability and I know they do then you would have scrapped the Windows/Intel push many years ago and call Steve Jobs and talked to him about his servers. Next the disk on the xServer is cheap compared to Intel. So if you had to pick the perfect UNIX OS with cheap hardware that is backed by a super company then you would have picked Apple and MacOSX a long time ago. The argument I always get from Lotus us that "They Don't see the Value in it" but somehow you were able to find value in Windows, which it illogical and whom ever did that needs to have their head examined.

   Why not stop spinning you wheels on Windows and Domino integration and get back to some standards too. AD is not a standard. It’s a Microsoft proprietary networking app that is limited in that it is not a standard of an app of protocol as LDAP, of course you could make Lotus Domino LDAP compliant and interface with it on Linux, iSeries, UNIX, and oh, MacOSX and then you would have a better fit than making it work with AD which only runs on Windows Server….seems like again you have limited where Domino can run.

   I am pro Mac and I do see the value of having an easy to administer server OS along with a powerful secure OS running Domino, that is why I run it on iSeries Now...for all those reasons and if Lotus wanted to they could run Domino on MacOSX and make a case for it, but they don't. They don’t because they are lazy and have what I would consider a lacking view of the future. I guess if I keep on after 10 years they will address it like they finally have with Notes, and now we have pictures of Hanover. Maybe in 2015 we will seem them finally realize the value of MacOSX and port it on over and then they can make it look like they were on top of this the whole time.

   Why limit your selves to the platforms you have. Why run it on Solaris? I know Solaris is stable, but what the hell were you thinking? They are direct competition to IBM hardware in most cases. Why because there were a bunch of Solaris Admins that needed a mail solution and didn’t want to run Windows or AiX. So they ported it on over, and now there are a good many Apple shops that have no good mail solution and are turning to Exchange or just using POP and Lotus is sitting on their areses using the same line….we don’t see the value. Well I don’t understand half the crap you all do either but I don’t limit my work day because of it. I try a little harder and I come up with solutions that work. Seeing as how IBM said in 2004 that every desktop at IBM was going to move to Linux and there still is no Notes Client for Linux then I would guess that they feed us all a load of crap to get us to think more about IBM and Linux.

   Why not just port it over and see what happens, and while you are at it port over designer and admin clients too so that I am not forced to use Windows, and Lotus has made me do. Seems to me too Lotus is working from the idea that the server should not mater like it did when Notes was conceived. They (the founders of Lotus Notes) made it so that domino files did not depend on an OS but yet I am forced or limited to the OS Desktop I can run and get to my Notes Apps, Mail and others.

   I think once again IBM and Lotus are going to have to stop and smell the roses and at this point the roses are not Windows but are MacOSX and Linux and after both of them being out and ready to run for over 6 years now and Lotus does not offer anything that we can use other then one Lotus Notes Client for MacOSX? What the hell do you have to do to get IBM to drink their own cool-aid?

   Oh and Ed don't think I am angry at you like some others in the community think I am. I am much like you. I have an opinion and I am not afraid to offer it up.

   -David

1. 16  Peter D Cox http://www.tmpl-online.co.uk | 11/29/2005 12:05:34 PM

   Well, us for a start. Well, that's not quite true because we have our's through the software package ... but, howabout:

   anyone who wants a non windoze server

   anyone who wants to get away from Msoft's bank breaking licencing, and renewals policies

   anyone who wants an operating system that works as effectively as OS2 used to (remember, o remember those days when you didn't have to reboot your server?)

   anyone who wants to slash their support costs for their server (we have a person on standby 24x7 to keep our simple little system running .....

   - and don't even start on ease of, security, robustness, scaleability .....

   In a former life I was a marketing consultant: want me to go on ....?

1. 17  Ed Brill www.edbrill.com | 11/29/2005 12:49:57 PM

   @16 what's the -market opportunity-. How many XServes have been sold? How many customers would buy a Domino server -- net new, not just replacing existing servers -- because of a Domino on XServe port? It costs millions of dollars for IBM to port to a new platform, any platform.

   @15 David -- Your method of offering your opinion is a little raw, though. I'm not going to defend every decision that IBM has made about Domino and Notes porting, but at least a few facts need clarification --

   1) Solaris -- ported before IBM even owned Notes/Domino. There's a solid market here (as I was reminded on this blog a month or so ago), and Sun even promotes it though IBM equally compete with their offerings ( { Link } ). Multi-platform, even vendor-independent, is a good thing.

   2) Notes on Linux -- the porting of this is underway, it was demonstrated at DNUG/IBM Lotus Technical Forum in June and again at DNUG November. It's the Notes 7 code. It will run as a plug-in in the IBM Workplace Managed Client, and that already runs on a Linux desktop.

   As for the Domino on XServe thoughts, see my comments to Peter @16 above. Also, calling Lotus "lazy and have what I would consider a lacking view of the future" is pretty personal, especially since I -have- personally been involved in a number of these decisions, meetings with Apple, market forecasts, etc. These decisions are made based on -business model-, not emotion.

1. 18  Peter D Cox http://www.tmpl-online.co.uk | 11/30/2005 2:38:42 AM

   I appreciate Ed, the business model approach but too often it provides a fall-back for a lack of a vision and - yes - an emotional/gut feeling response to a need.

   Some of the best decisions are still based on "because we can" or "because we should": start with a right notion and the profits can follow. As it happens, Apple has had more than its fair share of those, some failed (the Cube) others created new markets (iPod).

   So would a better Notes Client and Domino on xserve make IBM millions more? Not short-term. But long term it could ensure a virtuous circle that helps Apple propel macs/servers into the maintstream work environment, reduce IBM's dependence on the windows platform - and, hey, enable us all to work smarter. There's an idea ready to come ....

1. 19  Jon Walkup  | 11/30/2005 10:01:42 AM

   Actually, I think I heard some rumblings about IBM working on a Power5 port of domino a while ago. That would get us one big step closer to an OSX server port.

   The XServe has done surprisingly well, given that Apple has not been actively pushing it outside the academic/research markets. I can see, however, that there is not that much market overlap between that market and the traditional big business market that IBM has been aiming Notes/Domino at for quite some time.

   That being said, Peter makes a valid point that Apple has managed to make decisions that paid off rather spectacularly because they were "right" from some sense larger than marketshare. If more technology companies would do the same we wouldn't all be suffering under this Windows hegemony.

1. 20  Ben Poole http://www.benpoole.com | 11/30/2005 4:06:30 PM

   But IBM can't be happy with Apple right now can they? What with the PowerPC thang and all ... ;o)

1. 21  David Vasta david.davidandkelly.com | 12/1/2005 8:26:56 AM

   @ ED- You Said "Your method of offering your opinion is a little raw"

   Just taking notes from you captain. You are the same way are you not? I don't have anything to loose in this fight. I don't see Lotus putting there money where IBM's mouth is. For once I would like to see them actually do what the people are asking for, and I for one have been asking for a full Mac and Linux port since R5 came out. Now I can see that I am not the only one.

   @20 Ben - I would agree with that. IBM should have been able to put the G5 in the PowerBook and come out with chips faster for Apple, but in the same breath the move to Intel has to have a few Microsoft Execs up all night wondering what that will really mean? Now all the apps for Linux/Intel will run nativly on Mac? Oh Yes and porting Intel apps over to Mac will become very easy using xCode and other products like the one from Metroworx too.