Microsoft: "High-availability e-mail is still too complex"

January 20 2005

From the ZDNet coverage on Exchange 12:

While e-mail has become a critical component of most businesses, the software needed to manage the communications has struggled to keep pace. Microsoft has achieved the goal of high availability, Thompson said, but the software is not as easy to manage as it should be.

"High-availability e-mail is still too complex," he said.
Shouldn't that be "High-availability e-mail [from Microsoft] is still too complex"?  I met with a Lotus customer in November who had 100% availability for their Domino servers -- hundreds of them -- for the prior month, just as a snapshot.  Shared-nothing clustering, Domino's availability architecture since R4, is not complex.  It is infinitely flexible -- clustering can be done at the per-database or per-application level, not simply on a per-server basis.  Clustering on Domino can span operating systems, Domino versions, and physical locations.  When I talk to Exchange shops, this has to be the #1 latent pain for them -- they simply don't realize that better alternatives exist in the market, because Microsoft is telling them that this is the way it is.

Ed Brill Highland Park, IL USA Category:  Microsoft  Add/View Comments [45]

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  1. 1  David Racicot  | 1/20/2005 9:20:41 AM

    "When I talk to Exchange shops, this has to be the #1 latent pain for them -- they simply don't realize that better alternatives exist in the market, because Microsoft is telling them that this is the way it is. "

    --- so after you talk to them do they switch????

  1. 2  Ed Brill www.edbrill.com | 1/20/2005 9:24:46 AM

    It has been known to happen, yes... ;)

  1. 3  Jon Johnston http://bingo.cbsol.com | 1/20/2005 9:29:34 AM

    This has to be one of the most asinine statements I've seen in a long time. I cannot believe that someone was quoted from Microsoft saying this.

    I may be a Lotus Domino guy at heart, but for crying out loud - there are many alternatives to Exchange and Domino if Domino isn't the right fit.

    Wow.

  1. 4  Jan Van Puyvelde  | 1/20/2005 9:50:29 AM

    I'm sure I saw someone (on a blog or forum) asking for IBM to better market Notes/Domino. Maybe you saw it too ? ;-)

  1. 5  Danny Lawrence  | 1/20/2005 9:53:19 AM

    I have to mention this, Ed. Remember the article I wrote that was referenced by you in your Oct 11th posting? ({ Link }

    I just ran into one of the IT guys who still works at that company (he is called "Dee" in the article). We were talking about how things were there and he said to me, "You know, those servers just keep running. The only time I had to take them down was when we moved the hardware to another floor, but other than that they haven't gone down at all".

    I left that place early in 2002. I know we had the servers up early in 2001 and I think the RAID controller failure was that summer. So, let's see that makes it, what 3.5 years of routine uptime? Is that high enough availability for you?

  1. 6  David Racicot  | 1/20/2005 9:57:37 AM

    I just read the link to the article. For God sakes (or whatever your beliefs) put the boots to MS. They are now self admitting that they have produced NOTHING of late and are now trying to convince there current customers to keep paying. Good grief. How about a tv add with a kettle on the stove with a Microsoft label on it and a bunch of steam coming out of it? Maybe you should start a challenge where the Notes community submits ad ideas and Lotus uses them in a campaign (paying for the ones they use of course :-)).

  1. 7  Simon Barratt  | 1/20/2005 10:00:25 AM

    100% mail server availability is taken for granted now in our office.

    Last problem we had was when the gig switch used for cluster traffic failed. Just plugged in a new one and everything was synched up within minutes. No-one ever noticed!

  1. 8  David Racicot  | 1/20/2005 10:15:47 AM

    Ok, while I'm on this "kettle/steam" thing. Now the camera pans to the left to fridge. You reach in and pull out a cool beer with a Lotus/Domino label on it. Hmmm, now I need a slogan... How about "Lotus/Domino, gives you time to enjoy the things that matter ... "

  1. 9  Alan Lepofsky http://www.alanlepofsky.net | 1/20/2005 10:32:27 AM

    Ok, at risk of embarasing myself, once again this was the point to my fake TV commercial a few years ago. Two IT admins, one Domino, one "other". The "other" gets paged and has to go in and fix the servers, while the Domino guys stays at the park and meets the girl! { Link }

  1. 10  Nathan T. Freeman  | 1/20/2005 10:41:24 AM

    If I had a dollar for every Lotus commercial I've suggested, IBM would be a rich company. :)

  1. 11  Ben Rose http://blog.jaffacake.net | 1/20/2005 11:00:16 AM

    It's domino high availability that allowed me to board my flight to Madrid today without worrying about the infrastructure I left behind.

  1. 12  Darren http://www.dadams.co.uk | 1/20/2005 11:14:21 AM

    In my role I've spoken to many Exchange customers in the last year, the vast majority of them looking to change because they're pee-ed off with Exchange in one way or another. The Domino clustering story is the one that raises the eyebrows most - the realisation that you can do off-site clustering, that there is flexibility, that you could use a low-cost Linux box in the equation rather than wasting money on a Windows server licence.

    One Exchange customer in particular sticks in my mind. I asked them what their plan was for disaster recovery - they said they had another server off-site. Clustered? No. Will it have historical data / messages / calendar appointments in the event of losing their main site? No. What will it have then? Answer - a directory. Is that disaster recovery, or just a disaster? By the way, they didn't make the switch. But another customer who did lose their main site during 2004 (and lost e-mail service for nearly a week) are making the switch. I can't to have that one as a reference.

  1. 13  Philip Storry http://www.not-so-rapid.com/ | 1/20/2005 11:42:01 AM

    Oh, Ed! Now we have a blog clash!

    Today's entry from myself was going to be on how easy it was to get back up and running after my problems last week - including something on how easy & smart Domino clustering was. Dagnabbit, now it'll just look like I'm chasing your coat-tails!

    Oh, by the way...

    "Among the other features planned for Exchange 12 are support for 64-bit computing and a "smart meeting picker" that can look at a number of people's schedules and choose the best possible meeting times based on a variety of criteria."

    It would be unfair of us to remind the world that 64-bit means nothing for stability and performance - the X86 architacture is still never going to be as robust as the big iron that Domino can run on. So let's be big and not mention that. *grins*

    But I could swear that I just used an R5 client to pick a time suitable for all my invitees to meet, based on their free time profiles. From a list of times, no less - which is quite handy. (I picked a morning slot, as I wanted to get everyone before they went to lunch. That'll prevent over-run.)

    Was this feature added in Notes R5, or was it an R4.6 addition? Or has it always been there, since R4.5 when C&S was added? And why is Exchange only going to offer it in the next version, when we've had it for... Well, frankly, so long that I wouldn't have even noticed this had I not used the feature myself this afternoon... :-)

  1. 14  Darren http://www.dadams.co.uk | 1/20/2005 12:16:25 PM

    5.5 ... 2000 ... 2003 ... 12

    Well, I've failed the IQ test because I can't work out how they sequence.

    Interested by Philip's point about the 'smart meeting picker'. I dare say Microsoft will be congratulated on that feature, even though Notes / Domino have provided it for many years. Don't believe that can happen? Well, here's a link to a story on the BBC site that pats Microsoft on the back for introducing e-mail that can't be forwarded or printed. Now, isn't there a mail client that's been doing that for years...?

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/3205080.stm

  1. 15  Darren http://www.dadams.co.uk | 1/20/2005 12:17:35 PM

  1. 16  Alan Lepofsky http://www.alanlepofsky.net | 1/20/2005 12:30:41 PM

    Annoying part is that if IBM introduces a "catch-up" type feature people say "well so what MS has been doing that..." yes MS is applauded for the same thing!

  1. 17  Chris Whisonant  | 1/20/2005 12:45:07 PM

    @16 - Yeah, I hate that Alan. It really is ridiculous to hear people comparing Notes mail features to Outlook but the same people will tell you not to compare Notes and Outlook when you point out all the things that Notes does already. When the ND7 mail template is released we will have a sortable subject column. Detractors will say that this has always been in Outlook. So what, I've always had it in Notes for my users because I can actually customize the product!

    Wait, is there integrated IM in Outlook? I didn't even realize that you couldn't schedule meetings with Exchange - more fuel for my fire! We get complaints that Notes is "not intuitive". If you're in your mail then all your buttons are there and it's fairly straight forward. All the menus are fairly irrelevant for users anyway - just like Outlook. But that's they type of issues I have to deal with sometimes.

    OK, out of vent mode now... ready to leave for LS Sunday!

  1. 18  Christopher Byrne http://www.controlscaddy.com/ | 1/20/2005 2:46:16 PM

    @17 - but sorting by subject should not have required customization. It is such a no brainer!

  1. 19  Simon Barratt  | 1/20/2005 3:25:12 PM

    When I look at this thread with IE now, it is all screwed up! Looks ok with Firefox.

    Not sure what has happened to it!

  1. 20  Chris Whisonant  | 1/20/2005 3:26:51 PM

    @18 - I agree, that should have been there all along. Possibly the reason it wasn't in the past is that the extra sort would mean more for the indexer to maintain. This would not be such a hit on the newer hardware.

    My point was that the mail template is easily customizable for Notes. You can't do that with Exchange.

  1. 21  Chris Whisonant  | 1/20/2005 3:29:11 PM

    @19 - Same here. In Firefox mine does get some of the referer links overlapping the response text but in IE the navigation menu is completely overlayed on the post and comments.

  1. 22  David Racicot  | 1/20/2005 3:30:53 PM

    IE probably automatically upgraded itself with a new non-standard HTML spec.

  1. 23  Darren http://www.dadams.co.uk | 1/20/2005 3:33:24 PM

    That's just a myth put forward by Outlook lovers to protect themselves. Anyone who's used an e-mail client should at least be able to create, send and read mail. I've used Outlook a fair bit since the release of DAMO, and there's several elements of Outlook that are totally un-intuitive.

    However, to be balanced, I would like to add that to be a power-user of Notes you need a bit of training to get to the finer points (e.g. the proper use of sending a view as a table, or correctly managing replication with trunction in low-bandwidth situations). But is there such thing as an Outlook power-user?

  1. 24  Ed Brill www.edbrill.com | 1/20/2005 3:36:00 PM

    Fixed the broken link, this page displays normally in that non-standard browser too ;)

  1. 25  Simon Barratt  | 1/20/2005 3:37:50 PM

    ahhhhhhh - so darren bust it!!!!!

  1. 26  Alan Lepofsky http://www.alanlepofsky.net | 1/20/2005 3:39:52 PM

    @18, not to defend why "sort by subject" has not been in the product for so long... but it is more complicated than a simple alphabetical sort. The variety of "fwd" and "re" tags that are placed in front of subject lines, especially in a global company where the templates may be in multiple languauges do make it a bit more complicated, but not undoable. Not an excuse, just some background for you, and as said, the best thing about Notes is you can customize it to do whatever you want! Don't like the default mail template, than change it yourself, use OpenNTFs, or anything else you want to do!

  1. 27  Bruce Elgort http://www.bruceelgort.com | 1/20/2005 3:43:42 PM

    Stay tuned for some announcments about the next version of the OpenNTF Mail Template. :-)

    { Link }

  1. 28  Simon Barratt  | 1/20/2005 3:44:28 PM

    @26, Alan, does that mean the subject sorting feature in ND7 takes into account all the Re: and Fw:?

  1. 29    | 1/20/2005 4:14:10 PM

    @9. Bravo! I think I've come up with a whole series, kinda like the Taster's Choice ads a few years back ...

  1. 30  David Racicot  | 1/20/2005 4:18:41 PM

    @29. That was me.

  1. 31  Alan Lepofsky http://www.alanlepofsky.net | 1/20/2005 4:18:59 PM

    @28 - I don't think so, but that is what the message threads are for!

  1. 32  Simon Barratt  | 1/20/2005 5:05:19 PM

    @31, i know, but it would be cool!

  1. 33  Josef  | 1/21/2005 2:23:40 AM

    Why we need to sort by subject anyway? We have got a full-text search! I think that the need to sort by subject in Outlook is because they have nothing like that...

    ..or am I wrong? (never been using Outlook)

  1. 34  Darren http://www.dadams.co.uk | 1/21/2005 3:29:51 AM

    @33 - agree totally. Outlook searching sucks, and it doesn't have the concept of an All Docs view (that I know of).

    I can't say I've ever wanted to sort by subject, and I've tried the message thread and that's a whole lot more useful.

  1. 35  Jan Van Puyvelde  | 1/21/2005 3:31:01 AM

    @33: I agree.

    Sort by subject will make the complaining users shut up, but IMO is almost worthless because of what Alan said in 26.

    And you need the first letters of the subject anyway. I don't, in most cases. I search subjects using CTRL+F.

    Heck, even full text searching WITHOUT index works very, very fast compared to Outlook.

  1. 36  Roberto Boccadoro  | 1/21/2005 4:25:50 AM

    @14 - Darren

    12 is the number of releases Exchange will have to go thru before being somewhat powerful as Domino has always been :-)

  1. 37  Mike Brown  | 1/21/2005 4:56:32 AM

    @9 - So, why was this commercial only a fake, Alan? Why aren't there real commercial slike this in existence? Or, if there are, why do I never see them?!!!

    It certainly looks very real, for a fake, by the way. Right down to their saying IBM's name over and over again, but neglecting to mention Notes, Domino or Lotus even once (apart from the slide, tacked on at the end).

    Cheers,

    - Mike

  1. 38  Alan Lepofsky http://www.alanlepofsky.net | 1/21/2005 6:08:24 AM

    @37, why was it fake, well because me and my friends shot it in a weekend! As we've stated a dozen times, IBM does not advertize specific software products. Instead it the brands (DB2, Lotus, WebSpere, Rational, Tivoli) or an overall theme (on Demand, Linux, Security, etc) that get advertized. Love it or hate, that is the way it is. Also, my acting sucks!

  1. 39  al  | 1/21/2005 6:20:58 AM

    @13, @14 - Exchange has always supported Free-Busy lookups when scheduling meetings, auto-picking the next free times. The Exchange 12 feature will be to do it based upon more criteria such as location.

    More interesting is the comment on naming. Don't forget that Exchange started at v4 (becasue thats what Domino was at, or arguably because it was a replacement for MS Mail 3.5), then we had 5, 5.5, 2000, 2003 and now Exchange 12. I can only guess that Exchange 12 suggests they are aligning the product with the Office suite, for which Office 11 became Office 2003. Very bizarre but I guess a good sign of how MS can take anything and turn it into a arketing opportunity....

  1. 40  Chris Whisonant  | 1/21/2005 6:45:08 AM

    @39 - Thanks for the info on the Exchange free-busy lookups. I have never been in an Exchange environment - only an Outlook POP user.

    @23 - Sure the copy as table and other features may be "unintuitive" (if you call a right-click menu unintuitive!) but I know I use that feature a LOT in generating quick reports to send to my boss. How many times have I sorted by subject? Maybe once per year! I generally won't know the subject so I go ahead and use the FT Search. I especially like the "Find Memo" feature in OpenNTF - keeps me from clicking that extra time.

  1. 41  Chris Whisonant  | 1/21/2005 7:49:11 AM

    Random Outlook thought - I'm setting up a pop account with Outlook 2003 and I noticed that the Send/Receive is no longer F5 that it is now F9. Hmmm, seems like they stole that little refresh button from another Mail app!

  1. 42  Darren http://www.dadams.co.uk | 1/21/2005 7:57:55 AM

    @40 - ah, Chris, I didn't mean that copy as table is unintuitive. Absolutely not, I love the feature. What I was trying to get at was this... if you're a bog-standard e-mail user you ought to be able to create a mail, reply, foward, stick things in a folder, etc. I can't believe that anyone who's done these things in another e-mail client wouldn't be able to do it in Notes. However, some things, like copy as table, don't appear in other mail clients. If you came from an Exchange background, the idea of having content available to send to other users in that manner would be totally alien to you... so you wouldn't necessarily understand the concept and what you could achieve with that feature. Same with replication - the actual process and features are (in my opinion) dead simple, but it sure does help that we understand the basics of the .NSF sitting on the local file system. Having that knowledge separates users who will excel from the users who'll just do the basics.

  1. 43  David Racicot  | 1/21/2005 10:14:46 AM

    @38. I'm with Mike. I think that advertising money would really help if commercials specific to Notes were made. Sure IBM can make their abstract commercials (aliens), but now is the time to specifically target the advertising directly at MS's chaotic past, present and future. Like I said above, they are staggering all over the ring so what are we gonna do?

  1. 44  Tony S Lee www.peripheral.ca | 1/21/2005 11:48:21 AM

    @41 - Chris, you are right! After all the grief that F9 has caused to "people who prefer Outlook over Notes" this is just too ironic...

  1. 45  Chris Whisonant  | 1/21/2005 1:51:44 PM

    @44 - Definitely! We have an application that management just did not want the users to have to refresh on. Thankfully Lotus has fixed a bug in the client that was causing the refresh to not work b/c of a NotesTimer bug. This has been fixed and I don't have to force them to "F9 it" anymore...lol