Talk:IBM Lotus Notes

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[edit] Page reads like a commercial

This page is a commercial for the product! It has strengths & weaknesses. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 134.67.6.3 (talk • contribs) 17:08, April 23, 2003 (UTC)

Then add some please! Your comment suggests you know more than you're telling - I don't, since I'm not familiar with the product. Stan 22:13 Apr 23, 2003 (UTC)
Yes, it's more consideres a ADS rather a real reviews-wiki. In fact nobody tell that this product is SLOW AS HELL and eat a lot of resource, while in the "client layer" it can be acceptable, for the administrator it can be a nightmare. I don't understand why many corporates use it, they don't remember "time is money" ?

"for the administrator it can be a nightmare" is a strange and very uninformed remark. Administrators LOVE Lotus Domino. Particularly when compared to Microsofts Exchange. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 65.173.228.59 (talk) 15:35, August 23, 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Number of installed seats

"Since that time, the installed base of Lotus Notes has nearly tripled from an estimated 42 million seats in September 1998 to more than 120 million in 2006."

I don't see a source for these figures. The number seems rather inflated - - are these 120 million seats counting R6 and R7 upgrades twice? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 70.109.196.222 (talk • contribs) 10:45, April 12, 2006 (UTC)

[edit] NPOV

This page features many NPOV statements and expressions; "robust" and "strong" factor in prominently in many paragraphs, but without the necessary quotations or citations of where such an opinion is derived. I'm therefore marking this page NPOV, and hope that somebody with more time can clean this page up and deliver an even-handed article on Notes (believe me, there are two sides to it). —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 69.209.104.244 (talk • contribs) 10:34, August 3, 2005 (UTC)

Consider that Banyan VINES [1] and other products featured in Wikipedia have strong statements of virtue and flaws. However, robust [2] and strong [3]are unmessured qualities. If the user made statements of unbreakable [4] or ironclad [5] then you would have a case for NPOV. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Jskelley714 (talk • contribs) 14:52, August 8, 2005 (UTC)

18/8/2005 I've removed most, if not all, occurences of "robust" and "strong", including two "extremely strong" references. Sorry, but I have no idea of how to remove the NPOV marker though. Can whoever has this ability, please consider removing the hand? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Chilly Penguin (talk • contribs) 14:40, August 18, 2005 (UTC)

Prior to the anon's edits today, I recall only seeing two instances of the word 'strong' period and feel the NPOV case was marginal and overblown. Since the edits were performed. I've removed the tag. Autiger 21:21, 18 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] User perspective

I recall Notes being considered revolutionary, and recently encountered mention of it in a book on productivity ("Getting Things Done" by David Allen) so I was looking for a description of the user experience with this product. How does it assist in producitivity? What was originally different about it? Can it be effectively used by one person as well as a group? Having these kinds of questions, I was disappointed to find that the description here is rather low-level and technical, with no real attempt to describe anything about the product from a user perspective, other than to mention that it is groupware. If someone can fill in some of these details, that would be very helpful. RonaldHayden 17:53, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] response to: What was originally different about [Lotus Notes]?

Organizing and linking related information was a holy grail prior to the internet, and still is. The largest problem being the large maintenance effort of separate links (paths) to a data item. e.g. moving a document required updating known links and the posibility of unknown links which will be broken. To me, Lotus Notes jumped to the fore-front by placing the link information inside the document as a category, which is available in multiple orginized views (paths). The addition of "allow multiple values" allows consolidation of duplicate information where now the same master document can be displayed [linked] under multiple topics. Alowing end users to control categories [view links] in a simple GUI interface made Notes the killer app of it's day [in my humble opinion]. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 68.164.158.12 (talk • contribs) 20:30, February 13, 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Someone please edit "Nowadays..."

"Nowadays Java is also integrated in Lotus Notes, as is JavaScript." This sounds horrible. I'm not a writer, so please, someone fix this sentence. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 155.201.35.50 (talk • contribs) 16:15, January 27, 2006 (UTC)

Fixed. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 130.36.62.148 (talk • contribs) 11:40, February 1, 2006 (UTC)

[edit] DominoWiki

It is definitely a cool tool to build a Wiki with...! —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 194.127.8.19 (talk • contribs) 12:20, March 23, 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Elided comments about Notes as an email client

The comments don't seem to be supported except by reference to the site http://lotusnotessucks.4t.com/index.html - hardly NPOV. Added http://lotusnotessucks.4t.com/index.html to list of external links. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 12.32.89.97 (talk • contribs) 16:13, March 28, 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Elided comments about Notes as an email client (again)

"Lotus Notes is commonly deployed an end-user email client in larger organisations despite widespread and well-documented unpopularity among those end-users."

One site does not constitute 'widespread and well-documented unpopularity'. A site whose name is 'Lotus Notes Sucks' is hardly a neutral venue for a balanced POV about the product.

"Common criticisms of the product are:

  • It is built by developers, for developers without consultation with end user groups;"

Cite?

"* Its interface contravenes established usability standards and guidelines and behaves in ways that most users would not expect;"

Cite? Details? I suspect 'established conventions' here means 'microsoft conventions'.

"* Error messages often give too much of the wrong kind of information;"

That's hardly unique to Notes: 'man why did you divorce your wife' 'man: too many arguments'

"* Users are expected to know about the technical details of its operation and are not shielded from information that they do not need to understand;"

It's not sufficient to state that. At best the above is subjective.

"* It frequently destroys data without the user's knowledge or permission;"

Again, this is an accusation without argument.

"* There are cheaper solutions available which far surpass Lotus Notes in relaibility, intuitive user interface design and function sets."

Name them, list their capabilities, describe (with reference to some rigorous HCI studies preferably) what makes their user interface more 'intuitive', and add research demonstrating higher reliability.

Please reference your sources and don't simply make unsupported assertions. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 12.32.89.97 (talk • contribs) 16:49, March 28, 2006 (UTC)

Read the site, read the contributions, read the links from the site. The information is documented in great detail and is supported by a huge volume of users. This supports that assertion of 'widespread and well-documented unpopularity'. As for the individual assumptions, again, read the site. If you can counter any of them with rational, I will support your revert. If not, it looks like ad-hominem rhetoric. I'm reverting.

--Dazzla 09:40, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

I've given the site a look before and just did so again. Broadly, its a collection of error messages and emails from frustrated users. Some of the error messages are rubbish - i.e. Lotus Notes Sucks. Some reflect a complete lack of understanding of the product on the part of the site owner. In particular, error messages that appear to originate from either customizations of the Notes mail file or perhaps custom databases are intermixed with ones that come from the product itself.

To criticise the product because a third party wrote a bad application or didn't handle an error appropriately seems misguided. Bad code can be written on any platform.

I think you've misunderstood the reasons I elided the original text: you make several strong statements about Lotus Notes and end user perception of Lotus Notes without providing factual support. By way of example, the sentence "widespread and well documented unpopularity" is given as fact. However the site provided as a reference is not sufficient to support that. Firstly, what do we mean by "widespread"? IBM asserts 120 million Notes seats - "widespread... unpopularity" to me would imply that (at least) a significant minority of end users have expressed dissatisfaction with the product - yet there is no evidence of this (that is, no evidence that the number of end-users emailing the site constitute a significant fraction of the set of all Notes users, no evidence that the end-users emailing the site constitute a representative sample of Notes users.)

The people expressing a dislike of Notes on the lotusnotessucks sites constitute evidence that some users of Notes dislike the product - nothing more. Moreover, given the nature and, indeed, name of the site, it's reasonable to assume that a majority of those emailing will be of a particular group: those who do not like Lotus Notes. I'd recommend you read about selection bias.

So what do we have: evidence that some users who don't like Lotus Notes are prepared to write emails to a site that's about not liking Lotus Notes. I've tried to be as reasonable as I can here: I'm personally willing to allow that Lotus Notes may, in fact, suck. That's not the point though. The point is that the statements made in the 'Use as an email client' section are not supported factually. I tried to detail some of the information you'd need to include to support those statements my original comments.

I'd resent the accusation of 'ad hominem' argument if I believed you'd used it correctly. Strictly speaking, an ad hominem here would be attacking you. I don't think I've done that. Rather, I've questioned the factual basis for the statements made. I think it's perfectly reasonable to, at a minimum, ask someone making a statement like this:

"* There are cheaper solutions available which far surpass Lotus Notes in reliability, intuitive user interface design and function sets."

1. To state exactly what cheaper solutions these are. 2. To demonstrate that they are in fact cheaper (ROI, purchase, maintenence costs etc.) 3. To define what exactly they mean by 'intuitive'. 4. To prove that the 'cheaper solutions' mentioned in (1.) are in fact more 'intuitive'. 5. To compare and contrast function sets between the product being criticised.

You may disagree but to me, to simply throw the sentence out without at least trying to support it, is lazy: argument by assertion.

If you must hate Lotus Notes (and you may have good reasons to do so), then hate Lotus Notes. Don't try to palm your *personal opinions* or those of some unspecified 'huge volume' of others as established fact. For that to fly you'll need a pretty rigorous survey of a significant proportion of the 120 million users of Lotus Notes and a lot of statistical analysis.

I'd like to avoid an edit war so perhaps we can come to some agreement as to how to present this? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 12.32.89.97 (talk • contribs) 17:42, March 30, 2006 (UTC)

Sorry I haven't replied to this yet - I'll come back to this over the weekend. I've been busy, although it seems to me that if you applied the same standards to the body of the article as you wish me to apply to this particular section, most of the article would be cut. --Dazzla 16:07, 31 March 2006 (UTC)

Is Elided a typo for Edited? it appears in the body of this section as well as the title, elided appears to be a word, but I don't understand how it applies http://www.answers.com/topic/elide 212.140.160.123 14:55, 10 April 2006 (UTC)Alan Bell

It's not a typo. I was thinking in terms of the second definition at the site you reference ('To strike out (something written)') cf.: "The downside of this method, though, is that daring, challenging, opinionated or controversial statements tend to get softened or elided out of articles" (http://wikitravel.org/en/Wikitravel:WikiWiki) - not actually sure the usage is correct but didn't like 'edited out', 'cut out', etc. 12.32.89.97 17:05, 17 April 2006 (UTC) MMM


Sorry I haven't had time to come back to this - I think the current article is a credit to the Wiki method and is very well balanced. At the risk of appearing pedantic, I must take exception to a couple of points made above:

"To criticise the product because a third party wrote a bad application or didn't handle an error appropriately seems misguided. Bad code can be written on any platform."

The email client is provided 'out of the box' by IBM and cannot in any way be described as a third-party addition. In fact, this is so close to IBM-Lotus rhetoric that it makes me instantly suspicious.

The mail template (email client) can be modified by your local developer, in which case, it's hardly 'out of the box'. The context was provided by this sentence: "In particular, error messages that appear to originate from either customizations of the Notes mail file or perhaps custom databases are intermixed with ones that come from the product itself." BTW, I'm not an IBM shill, and have my own set of gripes with Notes. 'On error resume next' is f'ing appalling really. 68.252.212.149 17:30, 11 May 2006 (UTC) MMM
"I'd resent the accusation of 'ad hominem' argument if I believed you'd used it correctly. Strictly speaking, an ad hominem here would be attacking you."

No. The hominus against whom the attack was directed was the owner and maintainer of the site under dispute. It cannot be described as a professional web development effort, and certainly not an unbiased critique but I think it displays more balance than IBM's PR material that masquerades as technical exposition.

I guess I'd disagree that there was an ad hominem attack in anything I originally wrote, and certainly not against the site and it's maintainer. The points made were rebuttals of the arguments advanced. At no point did I attack those making the arguments. I did not, for instance, accuse the owner and maintainer of the site of being a Microsoft shill. You, however, stray pretty close to making such an attack on me above. 68.252.212.149 17:30, 11 May 2006 (UTC) MMM

But as I say, pedantic pettifogging. Thanks to all whose efforts have incorporated my admittedly raw initial material.

Agreed. Like any complex product Notes has negatives as well as positives and the rewrites reflect that. 68.252.212.149 17:30, 11 May 2006 (UTC) MMM
"Cite? Details? I suspect 'established conventions' here means 'microsoft conventions'."

Unfortunately, we live in a software world where Microsoft has set the conventions for user interfaces. If you look at openOffice, KDE, Gnome and *shudder* Linspire, you'll see that even many open source developers will agree.

And some do not: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Symph-032.png
I agree with your point (broadly) but what is the point of respecting Microsofts conventions rigidly if they themselves are so willing to abandon them: "F5, which some Microsoft applications (Outlook, Explorer, Internet Explorer) use as a refresh key, actually logs users out of Notes. Notes uses F9 as its refresh key. However the F9 preceded F5 as the PC's refresh key, dating from the days when Lotus 1-2-3 was the PC's default spreadsheet application, and that some Microsoft applications (Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel) have always kept with F9, rather than F5 as the refresh key. Microsoft has also added F9 as a refresh key for Microsoft Outlook with Microsoft Outlook 2003."
The wonderful thing about standards is that there are so many to choose from? 68.252.212.149 17:30, 11 May 2006 (UTC) MMM

Success in fighting this desktop monopoly will be acheived by adopting and improving those standards, not by denying that they exist.

I disagree but it's off topic. Apple seems to have done OK though, with their one button mice and all. 68.252.212.149 17:30, 11 May 2006 (UTC) MMM

--Dazzla 21:24, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

Does anyone still have a problem with the email client section? It seems pretty well-balanced now, and I just updated it to reflect advances in Notes 8. If no one has any objections, I will remove the pov tag. --Jlin 06:12, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

No objection from me Rhsatrhs 10:56, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Criticism

Just added...

Many end users, particularly those mainly using it for emailing, have complained about the graphical user interface being non-intuitive with a lack of usability incorporated into its design.

If something like this doesn't exist under the criticisms section, i don't know what should. It's like having a criticisms section for Bush and not mentioning the Iraq war.

Ok who removed "Many end users.."???? It's unbelievable if this isn't mentioned in criticisms. I don't know if there is some Notes PR group out there changing it, or die-hard Notes advocates. I'm going to keep re-adding it everytime it's removed. It's vague and not specific enough apparantly? It is very specific - USERS complain about the INTERFACE. If I wanted to go into to every specific, I would have to add 5 pages of points in this article. How about an article "Lotus Notes Criticisms" be created?
I removed it. It is not specific, and it is also poor English. What should exist in the criticisms section are documented citations of authoritative sources making specific criticisms or scientifically conducted usability study results with statistical analysis. That's asking for a bit much, and we're not going to get it... but items should at least be specific and they should not use the term "many users" since it creates an impression of authority but in reality could mean "two" or "two million". So, first change "many" to "some". Then change the awkward construction "have complained aboth the graphical user interface being..." to something more appropriate for an encyclopedia article, like "have complained that aspects of the graphical user interface are...". Then change "non-intuitive" to "unintuitive", as there's no need for a hyphenate when a perfectly good prefix can be used to say the same thing. Next, illustrate your position with at least one concrete example of an aspect of the UI that is unintuitive, otherwise you only demonstrate that a complaint has been made, not that it is a justifiable criticism. And finally, get rid of the "with a lack of usability incorporated into its design". It's redundant with the claim of unintuitiveness, and it is poor English. rhsatrhs
rhsatrhs - how specific is specific? In Outlook wiki entry there is a line "This most recent release has been well received, and regarded as the primary driver of Office upgrades among business users." By your logic this is wrong because there is no statistical analysis and no citations. It's a generally accepted fact. I think it is also generally accepted that many users don't like the Notes interface. The Guardian even wrote an article about it. Maybe I should reference that. How about I change - "Many end users, particularly those mainly using it for emailing, have complained about the graphical user interface being non-intuitive with a lack of usability incorporated into its design. " to "Many end users, particularly those mainly using it for emailing, have complained that aspects of the graphical user interface are unintuitive with a lack of usability incorporated into their design." I still think *many* is better than *some* because I know many people that hate it - just have a look on Google and you will find a lot of people writing bad things about the interface - I would classify that as many. I don't think you have to have citations for every single thing you have in a Wiki entry - does anyone else have any thoughts on having a line critical of the interface in criticisms section? I don't think the stubborn opinion of one person (either way) should decide on this.
Anonymous friend: (How about logging in and giving yourself a name!) You've made it a little better, but not enough. I left it in, though -- and believe it or not I've been trying to help you make a contribution that will stay. I've changed "Many" to "Some", and I've gotten rid of that last clause -- for the reasons stated above. Someone else might take the whole thing out, though. It's still pretty weak as it stands now. Without a concrete example of a criticism, or some other supporting evidence, I strongly suspect that someone else will remove your contribution.
Regarding the Guardian article: that's hardly authorititive. It's been established that the writer of that article only had access to a very old version of Notes on the Mac running on a poorly maintained infrastructure. That article spawned lengthy debate in long comment threads on many different blogs. Here's a thread that started with a tongue-in-cheek response (by me), but which then got serious in the comments: http://www.rhs.com/web/blog/thenewblack.nsf/d6plinks/RSCZ-6LULZA The crowning issue for me about that article is that it quotes Stowe Boyd, whom I have met and who should know better, making a blatantly false claim that Notes users can't collaborate with non-Notes users when the Domino web server has been enabling that for close to a decade. For another reference here's Ed Brill's post with more than 80 responses: http://www.edbrill.com/ebrill/edbrill.nsf/dx/the-guardian-uk-survival-of-the-unfittest And unfortunately I can't find a live link to Ben Rose's response. He was interviewed for that article and then tore it apart.
Regardless of all that, if you look at the history of this page, you will find that although I am a very long-time Notes supporter and do not hide that fact, I have been one of the people who have defended the presence of the "Lotus Notes Sucks" link on this page -- so long as there is appropriate neutral language accompanying the link. I'm doing my best here to strengthen your contribution because I have no problem at all with listing valid criticisms. I said somewhere else on this talk page that I think this article really struggles to maintain balance, and valid criticisms with neutral wording will help keep that balance.
rhsatrhs
rhsatrhs - ok I got myself a user name. But I have changed "some" to "many" again. I've also cleaned up a lot of the futures section because frankly it sounds very biased and slightly hysterical. I think it is good that someone who dislikes Notes like me can check on this entry, because frankly, Notes supporters tend to be in ivory towers and have no concept of the average user experience of Notes. I had to go throught a period of using in Notes, and while I agree that Notes may be fantastic in regards to data replication and collaboration - a lot of users have experienced frustrations with the interface like me. I don't pretend to know what is going on on the backend of Notes or Domino, but the experience of the average user and criticisms there-of must be a valid entry in criticisms. I fully support a challenger to Outlook, but I wish IBM would get its act together on the usability and front-end of Notes - then maybe I will start liking it. My last blog entry - http://greengiraffesolutions.blogspot.com/


A couple of weeks ago, I added the following criticism to the article. This criticism is based on 3 years of working in a company where Lotus Notes is used by 100% of the users, even those who would have preferred not to (e.g., Linux users):

When an organization employs a Lotus Notes server, it usually means all its users use the Lotus Notes client for reading mail and for using databases (which are often used for filling company forms, collaboration between users, and so on). Users are unable to choose different mail readers, spam filtering programs - or others programs to automatically process your mail except those written especially for Lotus Notes. Other mail-server products use common standards (such as IMAP) to communicate with any mail client, and other "web application" or "servlet" engines use common standards (such as HTTP and HTTPS) to securely communicate with any Web browser.

This criticism was "improved" by someone to something much more mild, saying that a POP3 and interface actually exist and removing the mention of HTTP. This is a copout, as anyone whose organization uses Lotus Notes can tell you. It may be possible to use POP3, but nobody in the IT department gives you the appropriate addresses and accounts. Worse, as I explained in the above paragraph, when an organization decides to use Lotus Notes, it usually does this for more than just mail: meetings are scheduled through Lotus Notes, and Lotus Notes "databases" are used for dozens of daily oraganization needs - from ordering supplies and filling progress reports to cooperation with your team members. You cannot do these things with POP3 - what you'd actually like is an HTTP or HTTPS interface which will allow you to use any client. Again, maybe this is possible with an additional product, but I'm not aware of such a product and my organization doesn't use it - or I was never told how to use it. There are other issues as well: with Lotus Notes deployed, while the entire world speaks with SMTP addresses (me@department.organization.com), you are forced to use Lotus Notes addresses, like "My Full Name/Department/Organization", and if you don't know the SMTP short addresses (because nobody uses them), you're out of luck.

The end result is that 100% of the people in my organization use Lotus Notes every day. This also includes people who wish they didn't have to use Notes - like Linux users which until very recently were forced to use bizarre workarounds like "Notes inside Wine" or having a separate computer - and recently this was changed to a resource-hogging Java application. If these users had any choice not to use the Lotus Notes client, believe me, they would use it. But they don't really have an alternative.

Nyh 06:25, 20 April 2006 (UTC)


Well, your comment was kind of incorrect. This is an article about Lotus Notes, not about the predilection of IT departments to disallow use of non-approved software. I don't know what kind of company you work for, but the IT department is usually SG&A in the budget. That means there's a pretty strong incentive to minimize costs. Supporting every individuals pet mail application usually isn't on the cards for that reason.
Incidentally, IMAP, POP3, SMTP and HTTP/HTTPS interfaces to Notes mail exist. The fact that you're not aware of these interfaces and the fact that your IT department doesn't support their use, that's your issue and theirs. Neither your beef with your IT department nor your ignorance of the product's feature set has any place in a description of Lotus Notes: I'm sure you can see the distinction between the statements 'I don't like beef.' and 'Beef is a product which is made from cattle'. 12.32.89.97 19:33, 20 April 2006 (UTC) MMM


Agree with previous comments here: this article about a product, not about what your IT Dept does or doesn't allow you to do. Not only POP3, but the far superior IMAP protocols are built in to the Domino server. If your IT Dept refuses to load those services and/or refuses to tell how to use them, that's for you to sort out with them.
"What you'd actually like is an HTTP or HTTPS interface which will allow you to use any client".
You display further your ignorance of this product. HTTP access to databases is built right into the Domino server. In fact, the name Domino originally referred to a server add-on that translated Notes databases into HTML on the fly. This is described in the main article (did you read it?) All Notes databases are web enabled by default. You just need to know what the URL is most of the time. You will, at the very least, be able to read and navigate your way around the database via a browser. Whether you'll be able to create or Edit documents over the web depend on whether that database was designed with the Web in mind in the first place, or whether it was based on template that was designed with the web in mind. Once again, if your IT Dept has chosen not to load the HTTP service on your Domino server, and/or has not told you how to use it, that's for you to sort out with them.
Chilly Penguin, 5 May 2006

Changed some users back to "many users". Doing some googling on some phrases I came up with thousands of hits (see below)

"i hate lotus notes" - 1150 "lotus notes sucks" - 9970 "forced to use notes" - 1220 "lotus notes is terrible" - 298

it's not scientific. But you can definately say that there is more than a handful of people that don't like the notes client.

LOL! Been there before. See this post about using google numbers. But letting it stand as is, for now. I think "some" is more accurate/more NPOV, but I don't care about it that much to change it.
rhsatrhs

I have removed this:

   * The development environment is designed around the idea of documents and forms. As such, applications (databases) built on Lotus Notes often tend to tightly couple the applications functionality with the user interface, by mixing code in user interface elements, which tends to make maintenance of such applications very hard.

   * Some people consider the software as very slow and highly resource consuming.

   * The databases does not support transactions and are not relational.

Reasons: You can design crappy applications in any environment. Notes/Domino is no exception. If you understand the design paradigms in the platform you can design applications that are a breeze to maintain. If you don't understand it you write crap. Just like in C or Java or whatever.

"Some people consider the software as very slow and highly resource consuming." Please stop...

"The databases does not support transactions and are not relational" This is already explained in the Database section. Non relational has it's disadvantages and advantages depending on what you are trying to acheive.

The UI critisisms are justified and should be left alone imo. But this latest additions are not well founded.

Dear ip "201.10.187.14" and "200.103.49.244" - Get a tag, explain and support your critisisms by references.

Thank you /Patrixx

I have removed this:

  • Many Microsoft Outlook users have found Lotus Notes very difficult to adapt to.
  • Many users (not necessarily Outlook users) state Lotus Notes is not very user-friendly and it has very unusual quirks. They state it is also incredibly slow.
  • Microsoft Office products (i.e.: Word, Excel, PowerPoint, etc), are not compatible with Lotus Notes. For example, in Word, a document can easily be attached to an email by going to File-Send-to Email Receipent. Another example is with Excel. If a series of cells are copied from Excel and then pasted into a new memo in Lotus Notes, the format is lost and the pasted cells become a picture that cannot be edited.

It's biased, anonymous and unreferenced and to some extent just stupdid - If MS Office does not support mailing with Lotus Notes, then that should be entered in the Critisisms section for MS Office.

/Patrixx

When IBM/Lotus, a minority product supplier in the email client market, fails to support the technical or usability standards of the majority suppliers (not just MS), then surely the criticism must stay on IBM/Lotus's desk. -- Ralphbk 12:02, 20 June 2007 (UTC)
I agree with what you say in principle Ralphbk, but I did some searching and found this
http://www.alanlepofsky.net/alepofsky/alanblog.nsf/dx/converting-text-into-a-table
http://www-12.lotus.com/ldd/doc/domino_notes/6.5.1/help65_client.nsf/f4b82fbb75e942a6852566ac0037f284/3572cfcc6d544a4185256dff0061fd36?OpenDocument#292642076829234343
So both pasting and sending mail from Office/Excel is supported.
patrix 21:51, 20 June 2007 (UTC)
If cut&paste of Excel data into Notes was the only technical or usability problem in Notes, then the world would be a happier place. (I'll pass over the fact that you had to do "some searching" to find a solution to a problem that other applications simply don't have).
-- Ralphbk 07:14, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
Wow, cool down :-) The reason I did some searching was because I am at home, and I don't have Notes installed on my home computer, but I was pretty sure that you can paste from Excel and Alans blog confirmed that. Same thing with the Excel mailing, and if I'm not mistaken you have to do the same configuration with Outlook. patrix 21:50, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

as someone working on the field of computers for some time and being forced to use lotus notes I must say that after using it for a year I can say that the problem with the program is that it appears to be old. an old program that was retrufitted to work on modern computers and operating systems. you can see it all over the place, the menus, options that are hidden in submenus, non user friendly interface, a user interface that is completely different then other modern programs. I did found a link to post feedback about the program but the response right on the feedback page is that you won't get response due to them receiving lots of responses/feedback. I however recommend that you send them a direct feedback anyway. the url is: http://www-12.lotus.com/ldd/doc/cct/r6_core.nsf/enduserUsability?openform&Context=H_TROUBLESHOOTING_OVER+7 every little thing that bugs you in this program send them —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 80.178.60.134 (talk) 07:58, August 23, 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Link to NotesSucks site

Please don't remove it. It's there for balance. It's there because people are going to keep putting it back if we take it out. The comment I put on the link characterizes it correctly as ascerbic but constructive. Keeping it here with a balancing comment lessens the likelihood that some Notes-hater will come along and decide to add something worse.

Not removed the link, but don't think that there's any way that this site can be described as "constructive". That's not to say that the guy doesn't make some (still) valid points, and I've said as much in my change. But no way are his motives "constructive", no matter what he says on the site. (Chilly)

Well done, Chilly. It is my understanding that there are people at IBM who are treating much of the content there as constructive, but apart from some grammar issues I like what you did.

It depends on how you define "constructive". If you define it as "intended to further the interests of the IBM Corporation" then strictly I'd have to say that it's not constructive. If you define you think think that "contributing to the efforts of software developers to improve user experience" is a higher priority I'd have to say that it's highly constructive.
What is the aim of a software developer? to make profits for other people by producing software at the cheapest price which will be made popular by devious marketing strategies or to make software that is useful and pleasurable to use?

Edit - moved the block below into its own space - not my comment.

--Dazzla 21:33, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

Your comment that "some Notes-hater will come along and decide to add something worse" is not a fact but only a fantasy that may or may not happen in the future. If it does happen in the future then it can easily be removed. I notice that "Exchange haters" or "Oracle haters" have managed to avoid "adding something worse" to the respective entries in Wikipedia. In regards to balance, I don't see any links to any "Lotus Notes is the best" sites, so adding a link to only one side of the story is hardly taking a balanced or constructive approach.
I've reviewed the history, and much to my surprise that link does not seem to have made as many appearances and disappearances as I had thought it had, nor has there been as much anti-Notes vandalism as I thought, so point well taken.
Regarding balance, the article in general struggles to maintain neutrality. The people with the most incentive to contribute are Notes/Domino professionals, including myself. Even within the recently-created "Criticisms" section, contributors can not seem to keep themselves from responding to each and every one with a defense of Notes. Still, the development of that section has done a lot to make the article balanced and the link to the Notes Sucks site no longer seems as appropriate as it did a even just few weeks ago.
--RhsAtRhs 7 May 2006
Restored Lotus Notes Sucks link. As the creator of this discussion section said, there is no point in removing it. It will come back as many times as you remove it. I still dispute the point about it being a "constructive" site, however. I think I've made that clear in the link's description.
--User:Chilly Penguin 10 May 2006
Agree. It's pointless to deny that some people hate Notes, and that they have subjectively valid reasons for doing so. I do see the site as constructive, if only because it makes some rather horrible UI decisions made by IBM open and public and shames them into fixing them: somewhat similar to how the OpenNTF mail template seemed to get IBM dealing with issues they'd been ignoring. 68.252.212.149 17:25, 11 May 2006 (UTC) MMM
You say that this link keeps coming back but the two of you seem to be the ones putting it back in. I stand by my original comments that the Sucks page is not constructive or balanced. I haven't removed the link yet but the LN pages now has two links to the Sucks page and still a rather large criticism section. I think that this is too much criticism and it needs to be refined.
Not I catboy. I chopped the whole 'Lotus Notes is a horrible email client' section, including the link to the 'Sucks' page. I think the Dazzla person hasn't yet forgiven me that. I also added the link to the 'Sucks' page in external links or under the heading 'Criticism', I can't remember which and I'm too lazy to look it up. Regardless, my reason for objecting to it wasn't the site in itself, rather it's characterization. The current text links it, says what it is, and moves on. I have no problem with people having opinions different than my own. There are two links to the OpenNTF site too, but you're not objecting to that I notice. 68.252.212.149 06:07, 15 May 2006 (UTC)MMM

The Lotus Notes Sucks site is definitely constructive, because it offers concrete, undeniable examples (complete with screenshots) of the many, many, many, MANY problems with this absolutely vile piece of shit software. A while back there was a request for citations of the problems users have with Lotus Notes. "Lotus Notes Sucks" is the definitive source for those citations. As for the lotus notes sucks section in this article, it would be hard to make that "encyclopediaeic" (speling?), but seriously, that huge sucking sound is about half the Lotus Notes experience. My personal favorite is my mail archive disappearing and reappearing at random. I use a hex editor to search my archive file, because the regular search function literally does not work (I search for a word, I know it's there, it finds nothing.) Seriously, no one asks for features like making you reboot after Lotus Notes crashes or search that doesn't work. You can't spin that as subjective.

I'm not editing this article, because it's too emotional for me. The most desirable feature I can imagine for Lotus Notes would be that it was a living, breathing corporeal entity that I could murder.

12.205.149.45 18:36, 23 August 2006 (UTC)


"Concrete"? "Undeniable"? "Definitive"? Do you have any concept at all of what Wikipedia is all about, Mr Gutless won't-leave-my-name-dickhead? Let me clue you up. It is NOT a receptacle for recounts of your personal problems that you likely experienced because you don't know your arse from a hole in the ground. Neither is it a receptacle for recounts of your personal problems that you even more likely experienced because your IT department doesn't know ITS arse from a hole in the ground. Thank you, at least, for not editing the article, although any edits you might have graced us with would have lasted a day, at most. Search in Notes works, by the way. And the "reboot after Lotus Notes crashes" on Windows problem was fixed in 2002. (And you only ever needed to logout of Windows, not reboot the machine - 1 minute vs 5 minutes).

Chilly Penguin 07:35, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

haha, yes, I should identify myself just like you, Mr. "Chilly Penguin." Anyway, I don't care if the comments on the Sucks site are constructive or not, the fact is that the site catalogs problems with Lotus Notes and therefore is a good (probably the best) source for that information. Again, no one can spin an application crash or "wrong formula" error message as a feature, so I don't see what your gripe with "concrete", etc. is. Your re-iteration of why I should not edit the article was not necessary, why did YOU figure I wasn't editing it? Maybe, I know what Wikipedia is for. I'd hope so, I've been editing articles (anonymously! Horrors!) since mid-2001. Only having to log out after a frequent crash rather than reboot is only better in the sense that getting a papercut is better than being punched in the nuts. Are you referring to Zapnotes as the fix, by the way? Hahahahahahaha--I hope no. Why am I talking about this? I'm not sure, all I really want to do is see useful information in Wikipedia. Have a nice day Mr. Penguin, or can I call you "Chilly?" P.S., just upgraded to Lotus Notes 7 and I no longer have to press "archive selected documents" 3 or 4 times before it gets most of them. That's so cool!

12.205.149.45 21:23, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] New Differences Section and reduced Criticism section

On reading this entry again the first thing that stood out was that the space taken up by criticisms was disproportionate to the amount of information about the product itself. This is not in keeping with other similar entries in Wikipedia. Take a look at other entries for products like Oracle, Microsoft Exchange and Microsoft Outlook. None of them contain a criticism section at all. I acknowledge that there are criticisms of Notes, like there are for all products; however I don't support this becoming the main focus of the Wikipedia entry. I have three main issues with the criticisms listed. Firstly they are mostly differences (from Outlook) and that's why I created the differences section, which I'm sure needs some editing and I have no doubt it will get it. You can list all the differences you like but the criticism "It's different from Outlook" is really only one criticism. Secondly, to claim that certain criticisms are common, or that most users think something, does not seem to be based on any facts. If you have hard facts then provide them. Otherwise leave opinions out. Lastly, providing criticisms of old releases, like version 4, is pointless. Version 4 finished years ago and 80%+ (This figure is straight from IBM) of users are on version 6 or higher.

I haven't finished with editing this yet but I'm happy to discuss these changes.

Moved a chunk of the criticism section to differences section (nice idea btw). Also corrected some typos, replace two instances of 'emphasize' with 'assert' and 'argue' and removed some text about the practices of Notes admins - seemed irrelevant to a description of the product. 68.252.212.149 06:26, 15 May 2006 (UTC) MMM

[edit] this might be a stupid question

What's the difference b/tw Lotus Notes with Messaging User License and Lotus Notes with Collaboration User License? Like the subject reads, this might be a stupid question, but I've never encountered this software, and I'm one of those non-techy types.

Messaging user license seems to require your have a server license as well for each CPU, Collab. User Lic. license covers both server and client, but is limited in size of userbase and some of the notes multi server features are not available. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 128.194.249.170 (talk • contribs) 14:35, June 6, 2006 (UTC)

http://www-142.ibm.com/software/sw-lotus/products/product4.nsf/wdocs/dominoexpressfaq2

--RhsAtRhs 19 Aug 2006 -- You are confusing two questions. First there's Messaging vs. Collaboration licensing. Second, there's regular vs. "Express" licensing. Messaging lets you use mail, calendar, and some simple IBM-supplied application templates. Collaboration lets you use everything just mentioned, plus custom applications developed in-house, by consultants, or by ISVs. Customers can buy either Messaging or Collaboration liceneses in either of two ways. Anyone can buy the regular way, which involves paying per server CPU and per client. Customers with 1000 or fewer seats can buy "Express" licenses (either Messaging Express or Collaboration Express), which involves paying only for client licenses because servers are free in this license model.

[edit] Companies Using Lotus Notes

Should IBM be added to this section? I believe they are the largest Lotus Notes users around! —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Thfcme (talk • contribs) 12:57, July 7, 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Really needs fixing up

This is one of the worst written articles on Wikipedia. Can someone who knows something about Notes shift this really HUGE paragraph in features about security into a 'security' sub section? Any non-technical reader reading this article when encountering all that crap about cryptography in the first section will just give up.

Also there's stuff littered all through the article about future/history aspects of Notes which aren't in futures and history section. And Richard, why do you have to go into all this explanation of CAL and how unrealiable these stats are, only after I mentioned another Forbes article being critical of Notes. Why not create a CAL wiki entry and point to that.

Seems Notes Administrators were never really good at writing English essays in school.

I'm going to concentrate on NPOV mainly. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Frank rizzo99 (talk • contribs) 07:36, October 4, 2006 (UTC)

Yeah. I went into this article to find out what Lotus Notes does (it should be explained in the first sentence; nobody wants to scroll through to parse it out the tough way). I was confronted by such stuff as "client" and "server" and God knows what else. And don't ask me about "collaborative software"; I am lost, and I have a master's degree, too, so I am not reckoned to be a dumb guy. Sincerely, GeorgeLouis 01:53, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
It's always been difficult to define. I've revised the heading to reflect IBM's own definition of the software. There's no denying that it's primarily client-server, collaborative software, but this may make it clearer. --Happylobster 14:59, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Can Lotus Notes be used at home?

I am told that the drawback to using Lotus Notes at the office is that some people can't access it from their home computer. True? False? What are the details on that? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 24.118.222.165 (talk • contribs) 00:14, October 22, 2006 (UTC)

--RhsAtRhs 23 Oct 2006 --False. Notes was explicitly designed for remote access and off-line work. It has a very long history of offering multiple solutions for support of users who are not connected to the same network as their servers. It had its own dial-in mechanism, its own encrypted network connections and its own indirect access (called "passthrough servers") long before LAN dial-in, VPN solutions and reverse proxies were generally available for other solutions. And Domino has supported web access to mail and applications since 1996. So, the only reasons someone wouldn't be able to use Notes from home are: (a) they don't have a computer, and (b) their company won't let them.

[edit] What exactly is Domino?

As a complete Notes ignoramus, I am reading this article to get started. Apparently Domino is the database technology within Notes, or is it a separate entity or product with other uses? At any rate, whatever it is seems to be so important to Notes that this article often says "Notes/Domino" or "Notes and Domino" as if they were conjoined twins, but the name is slipped into the article without a proper introduction. --best regards DSatz 13:37, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

Domino is the server, Notes is the client. Compare to Microsoft's email products, Exchange and Outlook. Originally, Domino referred specifically to the implementation of HTTP technology on the (then) Notes server. AUTiger ʃ talk/work 03:27, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Spyware?

Someone removed the link to the notes sucks page, on the grounds that the page contains spyware. It's not our favorite page, naturally, but we've been through the debate over whether or not it belongs here before, so let's not rehash it. If there's spyware on the page now, it should go, but I've restored the link -- for now -- because it's too easy to throw spyware charges around, and I'd like to see further explanation before we ban the link. I can see that it generates a popup, but exactly what spyware does it contain, according to whom? RhsAtRhs

I did not remove the link but I don't think it is justified anymore - It is anonymous, it is badly hosted (The page spews popups all over, and ZoneAlarm indeed gives a warning), and it has not been updated in well over a year.--patrix 14:35, 12 April 2007 (UTC)
The anonymity and out-of date stuff has been ok with me since we added the comment to the link; but if Zone Alarm is indeed giving a warning, then that's good enough reason for me to agree it should go. But I do think that removing the link will hurt us a bit in terms of perception of this articles NPOV, and lead to more anti-Notes types making inappropriate edits. But we'll deal with that if we have to. Rhsatrhs 21:44, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Suggestion re Comparison of email clients page

Comparison of e-mail clients has multiple tables of data on many mail clients, including Notes. The information about Notes there looks to be accurate (more or less), but some of it could use explanatory remarks because Notes' approach to some features (e.g., "Search Folders") is different than many other clients. Footnotes could be added to that page, but you can't do much explaining in footnotes. I think it would be useful to add explanations to this page devoted to expanding on the answers for Notes in the various tables, and then put links into the table to direct readers to the appropriate section here. So, my suggestion is that we rename the existing "Features" section as "Overview of Features", and then start adding "Feature: xxx" sections that correspond to the table entries. Of course, we could also add sections for other features that aren't referenced in the table. This would take some time and effort, but who knows? Maybe maintainers of pages for other mail clients would follow our example. What do you all think? Rhsatrhs 22:04, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] History

The History section correctly puts the origin of Notes at PLATO. Should it also mentioned VAX Notes? That predates Lotus Notes, and a number of people were involved with both. Paul Koning 18:22, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

Seems reasonable. OTOH, there's a whole slew of other systems that were also inspired by PLATO Notes, including Usenet. Should we just mention VAX Notes, or a variety of other precursors? This article by David Woolley (creator of PLATO Notes) lists several. Rhsatrhs 22:37, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
I thought of VAX Notes specifically because of the overlap in people. Usenet was "inspired" by PLATO notes, but VAX Notes and Lotus Notes both were created by some of the same people who worked on PLATO Notes. Paul Koning 00:08, 25 April 2007 (UTC)
I understand the closer connection between VAX Notes and Lotus Notes through Len Kawell, but it's not really clear to me that Kawell (or Ozzie for that matter) actually worked on PLATO Notes. Is there any documentation of the fact that they were more than just end-users of Plato Notes? I think maybe we should add the following to the end of the third sentence: e.g., "which thrived for more than 20 years on the PLATO System and served as an inspiration for Usenet and VAX Notes as well as Lotus Notes." That should be footnoted with a ref to the Woolley article. I think that we should also put in a sentence just before the final sentence of that paragraph that says something like "Ozzie was joined at Iris by Len Kawell, who was one of the authors of VAX Notes, and two additional co-founders Tim Halvorsen and Steve Beckhardt."
Also, I'm wondering if we can actually put firm dates on VAX Notes. I'm aware that it was in use as an internal tool by DEC engineers as early as 1983 or 1984 (no reference on that - just personal observation. My ex-wife worked at DEC at that time and was using Notes), but I'm not sure when it made it out as a product. Rhsatrhs 03:36, 25 April 2007 (UTC)
Good question about specifics. Len Kawell was a PLATO system operator, but I don't remember if he worked on PLATO notes. I do know that he wrote the original VAX Notes, in PL/1 (as a PL/1 programming exercise). Ray Ozzie and Tim Halvorsen both were PLATO system programmers (as was I). Tim wrote the underlying data storage machinery (a named data record store called "namesets"). At least I thought that's the storage machinery... need to verity. I don't remember the details of Ray's involvement in this. Will have to look if I can find anything. Paul Koning 10:59, 25 April 2007 (UTC)
My memory was giving me bad data. PLATO Notes was first released in 1973, and Dave Woolley was the main developer on it at least through summer 1977. The only other name I can find associated with it through 1978 is Jim Matheny; I don't currently have any data showing Ozzie or Halverson involved. Also, the "namesets" were used in other parts of PLATO but not for Notes, again faulty memory. Paul Koning 15:37, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Blog Link

I am again restoring the link to Alan Lepofsky's blog. To answer the claim that it is "about self-promotion" for Alan, I have changed the link to point to the category index page containing only Notes tips.

The presence of this blog link does not mean that we have to list every one. I have not listed my own blog or any others of the several hundred blogs with Notes-related posts, and I don't even think Ed Brill's blog belongs here. I have not listed the re-aggregated feed of tips from the "SnTT" project that I maintain on my site. Alan's blog is notable in that he is an IBM employee and evangelist for the product that is the subject of this article. It is useful to the audience for this article, the vast majority of whom are likely to be end-uesrs because his tips are aimed at them, whereas most other blogs that post Notes information are aimed at developers or administrators. Rhsatrhs 15:08, 3 June 2007 (UTC)

I have changed the name of the blog link to be just the title of the information, thus removing any reference to the individual that could be construed as self-advertising. The web page itself is a reasonable and useful description of Lotus Notes features, so it is appropriate to have the link, even though Wikipedia policy discourages the use of blog entries. Truthanado 15:29, 3 June 2007 (UTC)
I have removed the link again. The site is good, no argument there. But at the end of the day it's still Alan's personal site, and will always be self-promoting - not the url and author of all the entries. Nothing against Alan here but I don't believe that we should have any personal sites or blogs on here. Who is to say that Alan's blog belongs here but Ed's doesn't. Or what about BuzzNotes (http://giuliocc.dominodeveloper.net/) or any of the other hundreds of Lotus related blogs/sites? Unless you can put forward some objective criteria then for determining inclusion and exclusion then the only fair course of action is not have any personal sites.
I have researched the Wikipedia policy pages (ex: Wikipedia:Citing sources, Wikipedia:Manual of Style) and I can find nothing that clearly states that blogs are not allowed. The purpose of Wikipedia is to provide useful information to its users, and this link does that. Therefore, the link should remain in the article ... it adds value. If the blog information were on an accepted website (say, www.ibm.com) there would be no argument ... it would remain. I dislike edit wars ; I would like to resolve this via discussion. However, that is difficult, because the changes are being made anonymously as IP address 210.49.61.205. Please create a Wikipedia account and join the community; and please sign your comments with ~~~~. Note: While editing this, I noticed that another Wikipedia user has reverted so the link is back in the article. Using normal Wiki policy, it should remain there, since there are several Wikipedia users who have voiced an opinion that it should stay and only one person who feels it should go. Truthanado 14:36, 4 June 2007 (UTC)
I am that other user. The blog link looks OK to me. It appears to contain genuinely useful info rather than self-promotional. I'd prefer it if it didn't use those horrible snap-shot preview pop-ups, but what can you do? IBM-staffers apparently get no GUI-design training. Witness the shambles of Notes itself. Ralphbk 15:38, 4 June 2007 (UTC)
I'm not sure why you're going off on a tangent about the comments being anonymous because that certainly doesn't stop us from discussing the issues at hand.
I agree that if the site were www.ibm.com then I wouldn't have a problem. Let me state that I like Alan and think that his blog is great , although IMHO there are more useful/important blogs around like EdBrill, Codestore. But as useful as these sites are they are also about self-promotion. Look at the names of the url's, the "About me" sections and so on.
Having an entry on this page suggests that the site is of significant importance to Lotus Notes. If someone comes to this entry and finds only one personal site listed, then this can impart a skewed impression of the importance of that person in relation to Lotus Notes. There is also an issue of promotion in that Wikipedia entries are often placed highly in search engines – this page ranks about 3 or 4 on a Google search on “Lotus Notes”. This can drive a lot of traffic to the sites listed here.
My point is that I don't believe that it's fair to allow one person's web site in the list while not allowing others. Again, show me some objective criteria for determining which personal sites should be allowed in this entry and which should be disallowed. If we use the logic that the site must be considered “useful", then virtually any persons (Lotus Notes-based) site can be added here, because there are sure to be some users who will find it "useful".
Could we create a separate wikipedia entry called "Lotus Blogs" or similar? Then people could run riot and do as much self-promotion as they like. Would this be an acceptable entry in Wikipedia? EzyNotes 00:11, 5 June 2007 (UTC)
I reverted an anonymous edit because it removed a link that appeared to contain useful information. I see no "self promotion" in either the link or the website - except for the "about me" link. If such "self-promotion" is banned then just about every other link on Wikipedia would have to go. I'd further say, if your suggestions of "EdBrill" and "Codestore" are equally modest and even more useful, then add them too. Ralphbk 06:52, 5 June 2007 (UTC)
I find it hard to believe you are serious when you say that there is no self-promotion in the url www.alanlepofsky.net? I disagree with your idea that "if self-promotion is banned then just about every other link on Wikipedia would have to go". Take a look at the other links in the Lotus Notes entry. They are all very useful non-personal sites. Then look at some others entries like Microsoft Exchange, Oracle Database etc. They do not have any personal sites in their entries. Pick a few more random entries; Ferrari, Opera, Peanuts. None of these have personal site listed as external links. So your argument does not appear to be valid. The evidence shows that Wikipedia entries can and do survive without links to personal web sites. If Alan's blog is listed then why not list every Lotus blog out there? Why not? Because this would crowd out the Wikipedia entry. How do we decide whose personal blog gets in and whose doesn't? I don't see an agreeable way of doing this, so in my mind the best way to be fair to everyone is not to include any personal blogs. EzyNotes 14:04, 5 June 2007 (UTC)
OK. Here are objective criteria. (1) The blog page must be about Notes. (2) It must not be about Notes/Domino development. If there were a wikipedia page about Notes and Domino programming a link to CodeStore might be appropriate, but there is not. (3) It must not be about Notes/Domino administration. (4) It must not be about the Notes business, and that rules out EdBrill. (5) The content of the page, or of articles that it links, must be overwhelmingly devoted to the subject of the Notes client or be likely to be of significant interest to people who are interested in the Notes client. I don't have a specific threshold in mine, but maybe 10:1 is a good ratio. (6) The editor of the page, whether a person or an organization, should be a credible source of reliable information about Notes, as measured by published (non-blog) articles, speaking engagements, press mentions, and yes... even mentions by other bloggers. So... how does the category index for articles about "Notes" in Alan's blog stack up? (1) It is definitely about Notes. (2, 3, 4) It is not about Notes development, Domino administration, or the Notes business. (5) By my count, which is admittedly subject to interpretation, it has 127 links to content that is about Notes (104 articles, 5 downloads, 18 out of 20 resources), 52 links to bloggers who are likely to write articles about Notes or that are likely to be of interest to people who are interested in Notes (though, no, I didn't check them all), 8 links to analysts or social software gurus who are likely to occasionally comment (positively or negatively) about Notes, 2 links to companies that compete with Notes, and 9 links that might be considered personal or company promotional -- and I'm including the link to his host, the template that he uses, and the designer in that total. That's better than 20:1 ratio, although it might need to be reduces a bit if some of the blog roll links aren't really relevant. And (6) the editor of the page is a frequent speaker about Notes at industry conferences, has been occasionally quoted regarding Notes in the press (by virtue of his employment by IBM, but that should not count against this being a sign of his authority on the subject), and he is linked by lots of other bloggers. If these criteria are objective, then I believe this page clearly passes.Rhsatrhs 21:06, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Notes is a DBMS

The authors lack RDBMS knowledge. DBMS means ANY db mgmt system, not relational, and Notes has a DBMS. I also removed mistaken descriptions of RDBMS. "Relational" has nothing to do with parent-child or index/key, it means that tables are RELATIONS or TUPLES.

I added Notes/Domino to the Database category. I would love for somebody to figure out exactly what KIND of database Notes NSF is - I know it is one, but does it fit into any academic category? Certainly it's multi-value and object like.

Charles Ross —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 66.161.157.240 (talk • contribs) 12 June 2007, 07:44 (GMT).

[edit] Comparison to Groove

Notes is also interesting in that Ray Ozzie kept the company IRIS associates incorporated, as provided the Notes technology to Lotus Development/IBM, then started Groove Networks, which was purchased by Microsoft.

But the article should have a link to the article on Groove (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Office_Groove) Wikip rhyre 13:31, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

Ozzie's Groove and Iris tenure's didn't overlap as it appears you're saying. Iris became a subsidiary of Lotus(then IBM) and Ozzie left the company (Iris/Lotus/IBM) a few years later; after that he started Groove, which stumbled along for a while before finally being purchased by Microsoft. That info is covered in Ozzie's article here. I don't know that a Groove link is really necessary here. AUTiger » talk 14:19, 6 August 2007 (UTC)
Agreed. There's no logical place in this article where one could insert a sentence about Ozzie --> Groove --> Microsoft. Not without transforming a piece of the article into a mini-bio of Ray, which is unnecessary given that there's already a link to his bio page. Rhsatrhs 02:00, 7 August 2007 (UTC)


[edit] Multiple

I've developed advanced applications using Notes and Microsoft technologies for over 10 years. A few comments:

There is indeed a lot of very good information. That said, I would elaborate more on three of the unique strengths of Notes: 1) Its power as a collaboration tool - see some of the advanced applications at large companies, e.g. FDA approval process apps in pharmaceutical companies, insurance claim and lawsuit management 2) A powerful IDE integrated at the heart of the product and that makes it easy for developers to build complex functionality without having to use other applications, includes other technologies, etc. (you can ultimately achieve the same functionality using competing technologies but most reviews have concluded its a lot more laborious 3) Replication: CAN REPLICATE DESIGN AS WELL AS DATA, EVEN SELECTIVELY: I'm amazed more people do not emphasize this. Notes makes it so easy to update the design of a form/view/macro etc. and propagate that to users around the world. Not to mention that the design replication can be selectively controlled i.e. different replicas can be made to use different designs (imagine a doctor and a patient/claims examiner sharing much of the same information but each needing a workflow design specific to their needs/profession.)

Notes has its weaknesses of course and they should be pointed out. An enterprise considering Notes vs Exchange should explore the differences very thoroughly, they are significant and one can be much better suited that the other depending on the king of company and its uses of collaborative applications and sharing of data. But instead of discussing what those are across the many things Notes is, the "differences" section focuses on about 5% of the functionality of notes - frankly it smells a lot like an anti-Notes person made a point of trying to find negatives to list and turn people off. Its fine to make the points made, of course, but to have 20% of the entry focus on 5% of the product is not, instead I would have more info on some uses Notes is well or poorly suited for.

BTW in "criticism", the entry "It is difficult to read your Notes email from a standalone NSF file with any other software" is useless - you cannot read an Outlook .Pst/.Ost file without the Outlook client, or Groupwise email without their client, either. (BTW quite often people don't like the UI of one because their first experience was the UI of the other - a little like growing up in flat vs. mountainous vs seaside country and feeling that's where you are comfortable).

One last comment: the entry on Microsoft Outlook (surprisingly short) is organized in a manner completely different than this one. To me that raises the issue of whether (or not) there is benefit in having a bit more consistency in entries on topics that often compared... Best wishesScgart 21:38, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

Well... some of us think that selective replication is evil and don't want to promote it as a strength of the Notes platform ;-) Don't get me wrong, it's a very powerful feature, but it is all to often used in ways that create situations that are difficult to support. The people who inherit applications that rely on selective replication of data often curse the original designers under their breath because it's nearly impossible to diagnose problems. And people who inherit applications that rely on selective replication of design... they rarely bother keeping it under their breath. On top of that, I've observed some weaknesses in the underlying implementation. In particular, unexpectedly long replication times pop up at seemingly random times due to Notes thinking that it has to do (yet another) one-time replication setup. (The root cause of this is, I believe, unresolved save conflicts in the notes that store the replication formulas.) As to your other points, re #1 I think it's a great idea and you're welcome to contribute -- but you'll need verifiable references for specific applications to make it truly worthy of being in wikipedia. Re other points, I'll leave those for later, or for others to comment on.Rhsatrhs 03:24, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Organization

This page should be seriously reorganized. A lot of the information about the various features and aspects of them can be merged into a singe section. History should be moved up, it's usually the second or third section. I'm not sure if there's a standard template for software, but if there is, it should be consulted, if not, other software articles, especially those that made feature article status, and there are quite a few, should be consulted. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.82.227.246 (talk) 17:51, August 28, 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Lotus Notes Locks

As a developper I wonder why Lotus Notes locks always.. Why it is not multi-thread? It tries something in background and then you can do nothiing.. What is the logic? Should I disconnect the cable to read my email? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 212.154.22.58 (talk) 14:52, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

This page is for discussion of the content of the IBM Lotus Notes article here on Wikipedia. It is not a Q&A forum about Notes. If you have questions about Notes, a better place to ask them is on the forums at http://www.notes.net. (But basically, the answer to your question is that the Notes client still contains too much code that was written between 20 and 10 years ago -- before all of the operating systems that it ran on provided the necessary support for true multi-threading; and the division of the unitary Notes client into separate end-user, designer, and administrator UI was done at a time when memory constraints were much more severe than they are today so to make it work they built it on top of shared services which are still there and still single-threaded.) Rhsatrhs (talk) 03:55, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Fair use rationale for Image:Dd7.jpg

Image:Dd7.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to ensure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images lacking such an explanation can be deleted one week after being tagged, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.

BetacommandBot (talk) 21:26, 13 February 2008 (UTC)


[edit] External Links

Should http://www.planetlotus.org be listed? Seems to me like it would be valuable, and might help reduce the number of times we have to go in and remove links to personal blogs. Rhsatrhs (talk) 18:13, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Criticism section yes, praise section no for this article?

One particular strength of Lotus is scalability, a single big iron iSeries AS/400 or zSeries mainframe will happily take 15.000 Domino clients. Anything over 1.000 crushes Exchange, so you have to have cluster and distributed architecture to serve a big company. This causes a lot of hardware and OS maintenance work for the IT department (e.g. reboot every one of those Windows servers at least once a month for security hotfixes), while AS/400 and mainframe uptimes are commonly one or more years between reboots. 82.131.210.162 (talk) 09:50, 28 April 2008 (UTC)