Notes 8 basic configuration as a deployment weapon

September 11 2008

This has happened too many times to be coincidental.  In the last few weeks, I have heard more than once from a customer that they are "tactically" planning to upgrade from Notes 6.5 to Notes 7 on the desktop, because they aren't ready to move to Notes 8 or don't have the desktop hardware for Notes 8.  In a few cases -- in the US, UK, Canada, and elsewhere -- we've had customers admit to us that they are doing so based on a Microsoft recommendation, while they evaluate whether they are going to continue with Notes or move to the MS platform.

Microsoft seems to be making yet another push to go after Lotus customers -- the red bull is back, I guess -- out of sheer fear that if a customer sees how good Notes 8 is, they won't ever get another shot to convince them that spending hundreds of dollars/euros/pounds/whatever per user to trade a collaboration and office productivity client for an e-mail client makes good business sense.  Thus, the suggestion that the customer move to Notes 7 -- stay supported (though watch for the official announcement around 6.5 end of support extension next week) but not have to bite off on the requirements and testing for Notes 8.  Meanwhile, users still see an older Notes interface and complain that Notes sucks.

Clever strategy, but it overlooks one other option, one which I explored with a customer over lunch the other day.  Customers can upgrade today from Notes 6.5 to Notes 8, and simply run the basic configuration of Notes 8 on those machines that can't support the standard configuration...or run basic until they are ready with training or testing to flip the switch to standard configuration.  And, as I blogged last week, there's now both a command line switch as well as an .INI parameter -- one that can be pushed down through policies -- that will toggle a desktop installation between basic and standard configuration.  Notes 8 basic configuration has the same hardware requirements as Notes 6.5, but adds some new features -- and a single step upgrade path to Notes 8 standard configuration.

I can't see any logical reason for a customer running Notes 6.5 today to consider upgrading only to Notes 7.  It strikes me as odd to even be having the conversation...at least until I read the e-mails I got yesterday that finally confirmed for me that the recommendation's origin is the competition.  I've not exactly fawned over the fact that we're providing Notes 8 basic configuration, but now I see it has a tactical place in the armory, as the logical upgrade for even those customers that aren't sure of their future.  And for us, it's a much better one, because introducing Notes 8 in any form into the environment, and provides the opportunity to start internal selling on the full features, UI, and value of all the integration (Symphony, Sametime, Quickr, composite apps, etc) in the Notes 8 client.

Maybe it's Notes *7* that we should be looking at end-of-lifing sooner.

Ed Brill Highland Park, IL USA Category:  Notes and Domino 8  Add/View Comments [48]

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  1. 1  Jackie  | 9/11/2008 1:26:31 PM

    Ed, it wouldn't be a bad idea to end-of-life 7 sooner. We are not considering a move to MS, but we also don't currently have any plan for upgrading to 8. The reason why many of our users are still on 6.5 (and older - I still stumble accross users on 5 from time to time) is because of the fear of the additional hw requirements for 8 and the fact that many of our users are still using years-old machines. I will definitely be forwarding the suggestion to our admins to consider the basic configuration.

  1. 2  David Jones http://www.bleedyellow.com/blogs/jonesy/ | 9/11/2008 2:01:13 PM

    We're installing Notes 8 Standard but for the majority of the users setting the INI to use the Basic to get everyone on an 8 client initially and then we'll slowing start converting people over to use the Standard client.

    More then happy to be used as a reference if you need one Ed.

  1. 3  Carsten  | 9/11/2008 2:07:40 PM

    I like the speed of the basic client - I installed the standard client and I am using the UseBasicNotes setting.

    The reason for the subject: when I toggle this setting in notes.ini my mail looks different, e.g. the "Show" button in the upper right corner is gone in the basic client and I just have "View all"/"View unread". (My mail is still 8.0.1 and so is my server)

    So my question is, how similar are the 2 clients, and wont 2 different distributions will just confuse every HelpDesk ?

  1. 4  Jeff Picco  | 9/11/2008 2:12:41 PM

    We are deploying 8.0.1 basic for a few reasons; need roaming support and couldn't wait for 8.0.2 with how long our engineering / packaging cycle is.

    Funny part is that the people that have admin privileges on their local machine install the standard client. I'm on of those offenders. I can't stand the basic client now that I've used the standard client. Luckily 8.5 beta 2 is much faster than the previous standard clients. Now if my tool bars would calm down and stay in the same place I'd be a happy man :-)

    Can you do better on naming the clients though? Standard and basic confuse.

    I look forward to the next client you announce :-)

  1. 5  guttedgeek  | 9/11/2008 2:29:45 PM

    Absabloominglutely!!! People shouldn't underestimate how nice a leap Notes 8 Basic vs 7 is. I recently put that under the noses of a division that we moved off Exchange and they took to it like ducks to water. And if you run 5, 6.x or 7 on your current hardware, Notes 8 runs beautifully and is a no brainer to pop over the top (or build into your SOE image and run with it).

    To put it simply;, Notes 8 Basic is FAST and the prettiest version yet. I've been busy skinning some of our larger apps with the Notes 8 look to push that idea further into the org.

    Anyone having doubts should put their entire IT Department on it and listen to the ohhs and ahhs.

  1. 6  Jim Byrge  | 9/11/2008 2:48:28 PM

    I have some spotty issues with the switch.. like when I push this policy down thru $prefUseBasicNotes it doesn't let me switch it to Full UseBasicNotes=0 it stays 1 I looked in the field and it won't update... I opened and saved the policy again and samething... Like would like to hear for you cause Lotus SUpport gave no answers.

  1. 7  Keith Brooks http://www.vanessabrooks.com | 9/11/2008 3:11:34 PM

    Funny, we pondered this with you when you originally posted Lotus Support was going to be busy with R6.5,7.x,8.x,8.5x.

    Haven't seen or heard the maneuver from MS, but can see it happenning. If it helps I push everyone to use standard because I want them to have greater usage and flexibility.

    When you have 2 monitors and can "open in a new window" your sidebar pieces, that goes very far on the productivity scale.

  1. 8  Darren http://www.dadams.co.uk | 9/11/2008 3:29:43 PM

    The thing is though, everyone likes Outlook and uses it at home (including all of you guys), and this factor far outweighs the increased cost of ownership, the lack of resilience, the migration work, the risk caused by the lack of roadmap, and so on. At the end of a migration, users will have a new icon on the button that creates an e-mail, less security and no access to their important Notes applications.

  1. 9  Richard Moy http://www.dominointerface.com | 9/11/2008 3:30:06 PM

    The Basic client is not only faster then the Notes 7 client, but it brings a number of new features that can improve the user interface experience when creating Notes applications even when they run on the Basic client. I have blogged about this before. As a provider of Lotus Notes end-user training we see a number of companies moving to the Basic client rather than the standard client because of hardware issues. Therefore, continue improvement in the user interface for the Notes Basic client is important.

  1. 10  Irv Schor  | 9/11/2008 3:38:56 PM

    We have just about completed our upgrade from 7.0.1 to 8.0.1 Basic on the client side, as the Notes.ini parameter for toggling the 8.0.1 client was publicized. In addition, the 8.0.1 Client 'Standard' Eclipse was definitely slow. The 8.0.1 Basic client flies, however, and is even faster than 7.x! I will also vouch that after installing the 8.0.2 Standard Client, that it works quite fast (I have 2GB of RAM to be fair). I currently have two shortcuts - one for when I want to support end users (Basic) and one for Standard. Both work (1 at a time).

    So while I wish I could have had the 8.0.2 with the Notes.ini option a short bit back, I recommend taking the notes.ini approach if you can. For now, however, we'll be rolling with 8.0.1 Basic.

  1. 11  Stefan Müller http://www.bundeswehr.org | 9/11/2008 4:54:41 PM

    Wonder why one of the biggest Notes/Domino customers worldwide - The German Army (Deutsche Bundeswehr) with ~200 000 seats - is not taking Notes/Domino 8 or 8.5 into consideration and is migrating to Notes/Domino 7 ...

  1. 12  Ed Brill http://www.edbrill.com | 9/11/2008 5:12:37 PM

    @11 I've met with the contractor (BWI) and I understood there to be some Notes 8 in the rollout. For the most part, though, the contract for the rollout was written before Notes 8.0.1/8.0.2 and I think they had to go with the contract.

  1. 13  Keith Brooks http://www.vanessabrooks.com | 9/11/2008 6:48:11 PM

    @8 speak for yourself, I have always used Notes clients exclusively, aside from a brief bit of time when I was in between countries too much and needed webmail and used Netscape mail, that give syou an idea how long ago it was.

  1. 14  Christopher Byrne http://www.controlscaddy.com/ | 9/11/2008 8:00:51 PM

    @8 - Outlook or Outlook Express has NEVER been used in my home.

  1. 15  Tinus Riyanto  | 9/11/2008 8:13:23 PM

    Unfortunately we are on 7 and I have just lost the fight with my manager to install Notes 8 on our new PC which to be deployed at the end of this month.

    He pointed out the following things

    1. Even if the machine meet the hardware requirement for Notes 8 he still unconfortable with the idea that Lotus Notes is going to hog most of its resources (We have McAfee and Office 2003 on the PC too). I countered that we can use Notes 8 basic.

    2. He then added that with the deployment at the end of the month we don't have enough time to throughly test EVERY (50 or so) application that we have, especially mail and calendar function. I tried to haggle saying that even if there is quirk it would be minor, but unable to bring out documented proof of this I may have lost the battle at this point.

    3. He than concluded that we would most likely upgrade to 9 anyway when 7 expires so why bother upgrading the client now when you have to do it again later on. That effectively killed the argument any argument that I might throw at him.

  1. 16  Gavin Bollard http://dominogavin.blogspot.com/ | 9/11/2008 9:11:36 PM

    If you have a maintenance agreement with IBM then there is absolutely no excuse for not running Domino 8. We're on Domino 7 (aaaargh!) but I can't see any reason why a R7 server can't be upgraded to R8.

    The only compatibility problems I've heard of don't affect us and really, most managers wouldn't know (or care) what numbers appear on the Domino server console at the end of the day.

    So... number one priority = get server upgraded.

    Then, as you roll new SOEs out (we all buy new PCs every year right?). What's wrong with loading each of these with Notes 8?

    It's a new PC right? It's fast enough.

    Get part of the organisation there and the rest will follow.

  1. 17  Turtle http://www.weightlessdog.com/shell.nsf | 9/11/2008 9:16:14 PM

    Ed, we bypassed 7 completely, except to the extent we HAD to install it on servers to support Quickr 8 (grrrrrr) on Solaris (grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr). On the desktops, we went straight from 6.5.4 to 8.0.0. And it's good. We saw no reason to go to 7 knowing we'd go to 8 soon anyway. Nora is still running 7.03 for Mac because there's no 8.0.x client for Apple (grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr), but on my MacBook Pro I have the 8.5beta2.

    And it's good. It'd be even better if I had a Designer and Admin client for Mac.

    Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr...

  1. 18  Keith Brooks http://www.vanessabrooks.com | 9/11/2008 9:16:51 PM

    @15 Testing, the good and bad part of life.

    R8 doesn't hog most of the resources, and even if it did, I don't feel sorry because his solitaire game runs slower. :-)Seriously, unless you are doing some heavy A/V work or Autocad, it will not affect his browsing or Office activities in the least noticeable bit.

    Banks, for example, test because tellers and staff can not have problems, but many others use it as a delay tactic. Why not update him or show him yours(you should update yours anyway) once you have everything working the way your staff COULD be using it. Widget column and extended applications or views in the Sidebar is a huge boon to productivity.

    If it's testing holding back for 9, then do the testing and prove it, from your angle.

    Also if you use webmail, that alone is worth upgrading your servers at least if nothign else.

    There is also Traveler to think of if you have many Windows mobile users.

    RSS feeds, used internally, decrease network bandwidth and email usage which reduces mailbox size and disk space usage and thus also reduces quota headaches if you have it set.

    Client side is about working better, really it is, and I wonder sometimes how I ever got anything done in R7.

  1. 19  Turtle http://www.weightlessdog.com/shell.nsf | 9/11/2008 9:18:14 PM

    ...and in my day job, even with the marginally-underpowered goverment machines we're stuck with (only 512M of RAM and 2.x GHz processors) the 8.0x and 8.5x clients run great, even in full Eclipse mode.

  1. 20  Keith Brooks http://www.vanessabrooks.com | 9/11/2008 9:33:53 PM

    @15 I am posting on my blog some more answers for you as part of my FudBuster Friday posts. Available at 8am EST.

    { Link }

  1. 21  Rick Parker  | 9/11/2008 11:15:11 PM

    I like the option to go with both: Basic when I just want things to run the old way, and standard to take advantage of the new capabilities.

    However I wish there was a third option -- email, which simply gives me the simplest email (+ maybe calendar) client I can get. When I moved to the Mac and saw their simple email and calendar clients I thought I would simply hate them; now I feel like they are the easiest way for me to get at my email or my calendar in the quickest way possible, which sometimes is all I need.

    I know folks that use Notes regularly will probably think the previous paragraph is naive on Notes and the power of the platform, but let me assure you I'm not... I simply have a set of use cases which has me in different modes: 1 where I need basic capabilities and 1 where I need to open 1 to many Notes applications, and a simpler client would give me the best of all worlds.

  1. 22  Stuart McIntyre  | 9/12/2008 12:18:06 AM

    @13 and @14: Darren was being sarcastic! As the UKs Notes/Domino's sales lead, he was just articulating the message he hears from certain CIOs and MS salespeople. Clearing not true in the real world.

    Ed, I think IBM is is between a rock and a hard place with supporting old releases. Customers love having the reassurance and flexibility of support for 5 year old versions, but it also hinders rollout of new features, security and user satisfaction. TBH I wish that you had a means to charge more for support of older releases, say anything older than 2 years since ship, particularly for non-enterprise customers. Not sure how this would be achieved though!

  1. 23  Darren http://www.dadams.co.uk | 9/12/2008 1:43:34 AM

    @22 - spot on Stu, I was lampooning what I occasionally hear as a justification for thinking of a move to Exchange.

  1. 24  Darren http://www.dadams.co.uk | 9/12/2008 2:03:28 AM

    @22 (again) re. support for older versions. You're right, somewhere there's a balance but all companies are different. Some will be very quick to upgrade, some will lag years behind, and some will be very content in lagging behind because they have a stable working environment. The main danger of lagging behind is that users come into work each day and look at an older version of Notes and compare it to something more recent that they've seen. We had this situation very recently where we briefed separate sessions of senior management and groups of users, and before we revealed Notes 8 they gave their opinions on the unattractive Notes client - Notes 5, I pointed out, was released over 9 years ago, so you're about to see the results of what we've been up to during those 9 years.

    But consider this... Notes / Domino for all those years and longer (and in the future for as far as we planned) has a consistent and upgradeable architecture - so I would argue that customers feel more comfort in staying on older versions because they know that if they get their timing right they can skip a version (e.g. 5 to 7, 6 to 8) and still be able to upgrade (unlike a certain competitor). This may be a double-edged sword, but I wouldn't want it any other way, and I know many customers wouldn't. Remember how the Domino community felt at the mere suggestion of having to migrate to Workplace (best forgotten). For a certain other e-mail solution migrations are almost business as usual, but their customers just put up with it.

  1. 25  Ben Poole http://benpoole.com | 9/12/2008 2:17:44 AM

    Backwards compatibility is a tricky beast I agree. I've always liked how Lotus have handled it with Notes, and I also think Apple have had the right idea, with the 68x0 > PowerPC and then PowerPC > Intel moves: whilst some compatibility layers are retained, at the same time, rather than ham-string systems (as MS did with Windows, arguably), make the new stuff so compelling that everyone important upgrades within a few years anyway.

    Let's face it, software and hardware cycles are pretty short, so whilst I'd hate for anyone to do out-and-out rip 'n' replace, a phasing of new technologies over a brief period is no bad thing.

  1. 26  Stefan Müller http://www.bundeswehr.org | 9/12/2008 8:22:29 AM

    @12: Ed.

    The customer (some Bw-Admins) was/were forced by BWI to downgrade Domino 8 servers back to 7.

    There is no single Notes 8 Client or Domino 8 Server in the plans of BWI.

  1. 27  Scott Marchione http://scottmarchione.blogspot.com | 9/12/2008 8:43:32 AM

    While I agree that the notes 8 basic can be a useful tool, I can say that I've gotten a glazed over look from my boss when I explained to him it's benefit. We are currently testing 8.0.2 Standard on 4 computers now. In the past couple of weeks on my own computer I've had to do a fresh reinstall of 8.0.2 2 times after the initial upgrade from 8.0.1. I don't find it to be faster than 8.0.1, it's not any more stable (I get the cute Eclipse error box that's larger than my screen at least 3 times a day), and I don't find it any more useful than my old 7.0.2. If I'm going to push out an update to 8.0.X just to have it used in the exact same way with no benefit seem from the new features, at least in my company, of the 8 platform, then I would just as well not do it and possibly wait to see if 8.5 lives up to the hype. In general I'm not going to fight for this product and it's published benefits when I can't observe any of them first hand. Sorry to sound like Volker (*immediatly slaps own face*)

  1. 28  Tom Dobrucky  | 9/12/2008 8:51:07 AM

    Hi All, So anyways I'm doing some consulting and the shop I'm at is at R6.5.5. They were suppose to be going to Outlook (ugh!) but that has been put on hold for at least a couple years if you can believe it. So I'm telling them we need to go to 8.0.2 but as it turns out one of the VIP's doesn't want us to use 8.0.2 because he doesn't want the end users to see the Cooooooool Stuff Notes and is afraid to give out functionality in Notes that we will lose when we go to Outlook. So, for now, we are doomed to just upgrade to 7.0.2 or such. My immediate boss knows that I am an ardent Notes guy and asked me to put together a comparison of 7.0.2 to 8.0.1. I've been out to the www-12.lotus.com/ldd/doc site where it has the readme's for the 2 clients but the information out there is kind of dry. I need the definitives like what is the advantage of 7.0.2 over 6.5.5 and the advantage of going to 8.0.1 or 8.0.2. Also, we will more than likely be adding ST and definitely adding webmail. Now I know off the bat that webmail is much nicer in 8.0.1 than 7.0.2. I just left a shop were we migrated to 7.0.2 and then we were testing 8.0.1. I currently use the 8.5 Beta myself and it is much nicer than the 7.0.2 webmail client. So if anyone could guide me in the right direction that would bolster my case for upgrading and rolling out 8.0.x.

  1. 29  Ed Brill http://www.edbrill.com | 9/12/2008 9:02:16 AM

    @27 you really need to get another test machine. Can I help?

  1. 30  Charles Robinson http://www.cubert.net | 9/12/2008 9:21:24 AM

    @16 - There are perfectly valid reasons for not running Domino 8. Mine is it's not supported on the OS I'm running Domino 7 on. To run Domino 8 I'd have to upgrade to RHEL 5, and IBM doesn't have fibre channel HBA drivers available for RHEL 5 for my hardware yet. I've been pressuring IBM to get the drivers released for nearly a year. Maybe I should be pressuring Lotus to give me a discount on maintenance since I can't use the latest version of Domino, which I'm paying for. :-p

    To bring this back on topic, without Domino 8 it's of little benefit to deploy Notes 8 in any configuration. If I could deploy Notes 8, it would be Basic due to the ongoing bugs/glitches in Standard and the system requirements.

  1. 31  Keith Brooks http://www.vanessabrooks.com | 9/12/2008 9:25:09 AM

    @28 some items for you to include:

    iNotes(Webmail) Lite/Full and its benefits over R7 webmail

    Disk Compression in R8

    Traveler!

    Client Side - Standard and productivity. Do more with less space. Free floating windows, Notes widgets(immediate lookups or views orapps in the sidebar), more efficient ways to upgrade clients on the Eclipse side.

    I am sure there are more items various people prefer to discuss, but these are some of what I stress.

  1. 32  Ed Brill http://www.edbrill.com | 9/12/2008 9:37:25 AM

    @30 "ongoing bugs/glitches in standard"... need to be SPRing those, we're just not seeing the volume of PMRs/SPRs against Notes 8.0.x that would imply there are deployment-blocking issues. I read the stuff on the forums and here, and yet I have design partners or early adopters rolling out, some quite aggressively.

  1. 33  Scott Marchione http://Scottmarchione.Blogspot.com | 9/12/2008 9:44:36 AM

    @29 sure I could build a new computer to test, but in a roll out situation I'm going to be using the current computers that we are testing on, and there isn't a budget for us to buy 150 new computers this year to accommodate a software upgrade. To be fair I have 2 Domino 8.0.2 servers (both VM's) running and they are just fine, but I'm not liking the client at all.

  1. 34  Ed Brill http://www.edbrill.com | 9/12/2008 9:46:46 AM

    @33 my point was you said you are testing on four machines...but only indicated errors you are seeing on your own machine, so I was thinking one machine to test on would be useful.

  1. 35  Scott Marchione http://Scottmarchione.Blogspot.com | 9/12/2008 10:04:11 AM

    @34 I was just giving the examples of errors that I am receiving. The other 3 people that are testing have experienced similar issues with slowness and client crashes, but not to the extreme that I have, mostly because they are just using it the same way they used previous clients, Mail, Calendar, Team room, and an ISO database suite. I on the other hand have tried to use almost everything that I saw included, Feeds (which cause a constant client crash), Activities (which does nothing for me since I don't have Connections), Widgets... Which I do like... etc...

    Maybe it's just process of discovery, but I get annoyed by the apparent fragility of the Standard client, and I would just assume not make the effort to upgrade to a new code stream if I'm not going to get any benefit from it.

  1. 36  Charles Robinson http://www.cubert.net | 9/12/2008 10:07:39 AM

    @32 - I have PMR'ed them, none were converted to an SPR as far as I know. The one that's a deployment blocker for me is the toolbars that move around and disappear. You may say that's minor, my users disagree.

  1. 37  Nathan T. Freeman http://nathan.lotus911.com | 9/12/2008 10:32:46 AM

    @36 - Do the toolbar issues remain with 8.0.2? I know there were some fixes for that stuff in .2.

    @35 - I wouldn't recommend the Feed Reader in 8.0.2 to anyone. But if you want to try out Activities, then sign up at www.bleedyellow.com, and you can use a public Activities service.

  1. 38  Bill Buhl  | 9/12/2008 10:46:05 AM

    We are just one of those companies that is looking at our direction going forward... From everything I've seen or done with 8, it seems like a pretty straight forward and logical step to take, however some evaluations being done got word from Gartner, at least that's what I recall hearing, that as a company we should STAY where we are at and not deploy 8 because if we developed in 8 it would be much more difficult to migrate away from...

    Well, development and client usage and access are 2 entirely different things so our plan to upgrade servers and clients moves forward while our development stays in limbo waiting for a determination of our future direction.

    Is that bad advice? There seem to be so many advantages to development in the new environment it almost seems like it would be EASIER to migrate away on it.

    What struck me was your comment that Microsoft is acting like a friend in recommending that people stay on 7 ... it boy did it sound like that's what someone did to us. Of course if you let someone walk in and show their latest and greatest product releases and they can compare it to what IBM released years ago it will sure seem a lot better. I just never expected that recommendation to come from Gartner. Maybe I'm not remembering what I heard correctly, but I'd love for a way to set it straight. If we ever move away from IBM/Lotus, so be it, but to NOT upgrade for those reasons seems silly.... now a competitor hoping we don't because it makes us an easier target to wow, that makes more sense.

  1. 39  Nathan T. Freeman http://nathan.lotus911.com | 9/12/2008 10:56:39 AM

    "we should STAY where we are at and not deploy 8 because if we developed in 8 it would be much more difficult to migrate away from..."

    Gartner said that!??!?

    I'm trying to parse the meaning of a statement like that. "It'll be harder to migrate away from later." Why? Because you're just getting too much done?

    But even so, it's not even TRUE. If you develop for Notes 8 with Notes 8-specific features, you have to define all your extension points for your apps via WSDL, and all your logic can be ported into Java instead of Lotusscript. How would that make it harder to migrate AWAY?

  1. 40  Ed Brill http://www.edbrill.com | 9/12/2008 11:19:17 AM

    @38 I would be very interested in an offline discussion if it is the case that Gartner made such a recommendation. I could see it coming from Avanade or some other MS-hired "advisors", but an analyst would be very different. Click "contact me" :)

  1. 41  Bernard  | 9/12/2008 12:10:09 PM

    I've just started using a umpc (Acer Aspire One) as my main laptop (it weighs less than 1kg, has a 9" screen, no moving parts), and I am very happy with it (and I'm a touch typist so the keyboard quality mattered). Thing is, it only has 512mb of ram, and runs Linux. But I just can't get by without Notes. What to do? Imagine my sheer delight when I installed Wine on it with no problem, and then installed Notes 8 Basic on it too (with 1 minor problem that was easily solved)! Notes 8.0.1 is running just as well on this tiny machine as it runs on my dual processor Vista laptop which has twice the ram. I'm running Notes, Firefox and my IDE tools in 512mb of ram.

  1. 42  Christopher Byrne http://www.controlscaddy.com/ | 9/12/2008 1:59:01 PM

    @30 - I am not sure what you mean that there are no benefits to running the 8 client against a 7 server. I was doing that with the beta version and I got a lot of benefit.

    8.0.2 has fixed a lot of problems/glitches that I, and customers, were facing and getting agitated about. In fact, one admin for a customer recently upgraded to 8.0.2 and said "I love it now!"

  1. 43  Rob Ingram  | 9/12/2008 5:08:21 PM

    Interesting related story. I gave a glimpse of Notes 8.0.2 to a friend who still uses Notes 6.5 in her company. She loved the new UI and wondered when her IT would let them have it. The unique thing here is that all their employees get new laptops every 2 years, so its not an old hardware issue at all.

    It made me wonder how many users are being artificially held back from productivity gains and satisfaction by not even seeing Notes 8 Standard.

    You could not ever take away that new Notes 8 type ahead email addressing feature or I would scream!

  1. 44  Tinus Riyanto  | 9/14/2008 8:01:24 PM

    @16, unfortunately we don't change our hardware every year. This one will most likely last us 5 years.

    Unfortunately my current machine have only 256 MB RAM so even running R8 basic would be a strech :) I need the new hardware to test it but by the time they arrived, there wouldn't be any time left to do the testing. What a dillema.

    Yes, I am pushing on R8 for the new server and currently testing Traveler on my Sametime Server

    @20, thanks for the link I will read it at home since our internet security filter is too strong :)

  1. 45  Thilo Hamberger  | 9/15/2008 6:30:21 AM

    @43: Not everybody is using Lotus Notes in their core business processes but rather vacation workflow type. It's hard for them to justify a Notes 8 upgrade because the productivity effect cannot be shown in money.

  1. 46  Mark Dowling http://cork2toronto.blogspot.com | 9/15/2008 10:28:33 AM

    Notes 8 Basic UI is different enough from 6.5 that our trainers find it non-trivial. This has put a stop to my putting 8 Basic on our machines for the present. 7.0.3 on the other hand is fine by them, and thus 8 will wait for our backend stuff to be brought to the point where the new featureset like OOO delegation justifies the time investment to document and explain these differences.

    As for those darned 7.x/Basic holdouts *cough* roaming in 8 point frickin 5! *cough*

  1. 47  guttedgeek  | 9/15/2008 2:39:54 PM

    @46 - I guess we work in an environment where we chuck a PC with all the stuff a user needs and let them go for it. We only train users in our ERP system because the rest doesn't make us money.

    If they later call wondering how to use email or OoO, we get hem to box the PC up and send it back because clearly they're too stupid to have a computer :p

    All of thats tounge in cheek of course. A real pitty that its blocking your rollout; Lotus do right by tightening up the menus, get some better terminology in there and it ends up slowing your adoption - can't win :(

  1. 48  lotusknots  | 1/30/2009 7:59:15 AM

    This is a good weapon with the basic and standard configs. However it does have its own challenges. We have a VB application that interacts with Notes and everytime it does a ghost client appears and won't go away until we restart notes. I have seen this happen randomly when the debugger is on too. The only work around we could see now is 8.0.2 with UseBasicNotes=1. However, I don't think that goes well with users since they want to run the standard config.