IBM to Adopt ODF for Lotus Notes

Mike Barton writes to tell us InfoWorld is reporting IBM has announced that the upcoming version of Lotus Notes, due out this fall, will feature an "ODF-compatible version of OpenOffice embedded in the Notes e-mail application." IBM hopes that this large scale distribution of the ODF standard will help bolster their foothold in the marketplace since "standards live or die on how many people use them"

ARRGGHHH

[Mark Gillespie]

Being a end user of Lotus Notes, I am forever wishing it would die it's overdue death. It's horrendous. Running Notes Client 6.5, and I hate it with a vengance. Unfortunatly my IT department forced it onto me :-(

Great News?

[w.p.richardson]

No, not really.

End users HATE Lotus Notes. So by bundling openoffice with it, you get a "crummy by association" reputation. Terrible.

I know the IT geeks love them some Lotus Notes (I guess the IBM salesmen know where all the good strip clubs are?), but honestly, it is simply the worst application ever conceived. Pine (hell, even emacs) is a better email application, and there is nothing the crappy database stuff that could not be better implemented using web based technologies.

Re:ARRGGHHH

[DragonC]

Why was this moderated Interesting?

The Good Thing about Notes/Domino is that it allows anybody to develop applications. The Bad Thing about Notes/Domino is that it allows anybody to develop applications.

I've been a Notes/Domino Developer for 13 years now, and beleive me, I've seen some real dodgy applications. The 6.5 client is defintely the best, but even that sucks when you point it at poorly designed applications. You may as well say that Firefox is rubbish because you're looking at poorly designed websites all the time.

I think you're getting confused with what the client is capable of doing and what the application that you're using does.

Adding ODF just gives the client another tool to use. A very powerful tool.

Re:Inside the email client?

[as400tek]

What are you talking about Bloated? Look at what else is out there. Office? Is that not bloated as all get out? And Open Office is not so light either. If you look at what IBM has done with Workplace and some of the open standards in there with editing docs and power points you will see that they might actually be on the right track. Plus they have completely retooled the client....in reality Notes is no more....long live Notes for now call Hanover. I think we get stuck in a rut thinking that Office and Open Office is the only way to do things. What if you had one client that was your office and did it all pretty well without all the crap? Most users of Office only use about 5% of the features anyway so why not deliver a good tool set to edit things in the email collaboration software and keep the users with one app vs. oh 8 from Microsoft? I think IBM and Lotus are on the right track with Hanover and Workplace. I'll take a wait and see approach to this but a good many large companies run Domino and Notes and they are really looking forward to it. -David

Re:ARRGGHHH

[lpcustom]

"Lotus Notes is not a e-mail client, it is groupware application framework. It is just plain stupid to use it only for e-mail. There is some good reasons to use Notes, but e-mail is not one of them."
Ah, I know this and you know this but my company obviously doesn't. Since my company forces me to use Lotus Notes as my EMAIL CLIENT, I'll refer to it as an EMAIL CLIENT. The fact is a company shouldn't force it's 10,000+ employees to use a groupware app if they only need email. Maybe you'd like to list all those "good reasons" someone would use Notes. How much better is it that phpgroupware and the like. Of course phpgroupware isn't a bloated app that I have to run on my system either. So please enlighten me since you are so wise.

Re:oh boy

[Fahrvergnuugen]

Even though you were modded funny, you're absolutely right. ODF/OOo could get a bad rap by association here. I don't know ANYBODY who doesn't despise notes (and I work for a company with 27,000 employees who lives and breaths notes)

Re:More on OpenDocument

[Jorgensen]

"If If Microsoft ever switches to ODF compliance, you might be ahead of the game!" !?

Sorry, But I cannot see why Microsoft would switch to (or even willingly support) ODF.

Why? Because it is in Microsoft's interest to ensure that customers' data are kept in Microsoft-proprietary formats. This ensures that customers will continue to buy MS Office, and thus prevents the death of the cash cow. This is why Microsoft sees ODF as a threat: It allows customers (and their data) a "way out".

I expect Microsoft to continue

• their attempts to confuse with their Open XML "standard" (I don't think it is an accident that they chose a name so similar to Open Office XML yet with the opposite meaning of "Open")
• to claim that ODF = OpenOffice - regardless of how many applications use ODF (because users understand attacks on specific applications - better than the fuzzy concept of file formats)
• FUD about the capability of ODF
• FUD a bit more: write a ODF-to-Microsoft-Open"XML utility. This will be used in "success stories" of how customers "saved/improved/leveraged/streamlined/${BUZZWORD}" their existing investments.

I know that I'm a cynic. Prove me wrong.

Infoworld disagrees. 8.7 out of 10 rating.

[CFD339]

They rate it 8.7 out of 10 --- very high. Of course, they actually go to the trouble of comparing recent versions of the product with other things on the net, not just some badly done apps in an oversized I.T. department from a guy paid to deal with problems.

http://www.infoworld.com/article/06/05/11/78099_20 TCnotes_1.html [infoworld.com]

FSM save us from yet another rich client war.

You have 27,000 employees who live and breath Notes. Do you have any idea what it would take to put that many employees on Exchange, and if you did, what what happens when a single file became corrupted? What if you had to upgrade versions?

The biggest problem with Notes is that it's easy to design a bad app. Designer is so easy on the surface, that any moron can make something that looks like its a Notes app. Of course, it won't scale because they didn't know what they were doing when they wrote it. The UI will suck, again, because they didn't know what they were doing when they wrote it. Nonetheless, these quick temporary solutions quickly become permenant and critical, and then someone who knows something has to be paid a lot of money to do it right.

Notes will continue to "suck" for people like you for years, but then again, you don't have an alternative because there is nothing to migrate to. Other products do some of the things Notes does. Many do Mail and Calendaring -- some better, surely. None do the kinds of rapid, inexpensive, but secure and portable applications and integration.

And there goes geek's another most hated thing...

[Pecisk]

There is several myths and misunderstandings why Lotus Notes are hated or loved by IT and/or fellow users. First of all, let's claim what Lotus Notes is and what it's not.

First of all, LN is _platform_. Heavy, huge, interesting, effective (yes, it is that word) platform. What is NOT - it is NOT e-mail client. And there comes paradox - Usually, IT dept. will follow hype of CEOs and other managers and will buy IBM promises. However, when implemented, it's usually where it stucks. Why? Because there is NO ONE to port all old apps/functionality needed to abolish all old apps and go fully LN. Using LN alone is nonsense - email client is total nightmare and that poisons all efect of it's usage.

LN is powerful and quite capable of doing great things. Except that there is need for good admins and coders to get to those great things. Usually, it is stuck in the middle of nowhere.

Re:oh boy

[KlomDark]

Sure, it's a great groupware product, but an absolutely pathetic email solution. Ugly fucked up interface. One of the things I ask in an interview is if the company uses Notes. If they do, they get ratcheted down the list as I've found that every company that uses Notes has turned out to be a really crappy place to work. Points out that the company is stuck in the past and cannot embrace change. Chuggy lame greenscreen-using companies. Bleh.

ODF... ok good but...

[Zerbey]

Very nice, I support that. Can we have proper multi-user support, faster performance and more robust databases as well please? No? OK well then I'll continue to ignore this product :) Lotus 7 is just a great big missed opportunity. Maybe Lotus 8 will be better, but I am not holding out much hope.

Re:Inside the email client?

[swillden]

I was criticizing the decision to embed a large office app in an already way-too-large email app.

I don't like Lotus Notes (I work for IBM and I don't use it for my e-mail), but you're making a basic mistake here: Lotus Notes is *not* an e-mail app. Lotus Notes is a programmable document database management and replication system. e-mail is just one application that can be built on top of Notes' database tools. Notes comes with pre-built templates for e-mail, calendaring, address book and simple document store functionality, but that's far from all you can do with it.

If that's all you want to do with it, well, I think purpose-built tools and protocols do a better job. That's why I use a little program that pulls my e-mail from Notes and puts it in an IMAP4 mail server, then read it with a traditional mail client. But I do have to give Notes its due: It's extremely flexible and powerful, if you need what it does. And if you need what it does, it makes sense to use it for e-mail as well.

Further, since Notes, used properly, is a full business document management system, it makes sense to integrate document viewing and creation functionality as well. For many users, that combination can provide all of the application functionality they need to do their jobs. IT can deploy machines with nothing more than the OS and Notes.

I'm surprised the article doesn't mention that IBM is coming at this from another direction as well: IBM is also going to be releasing a product called "IBM Workplace" which is a cross-platform integrated office suite, based on OpenOffice, and includes Notes client support.

I can see that being a killer combination for lots of environments. If Workplace provides all the functionality your users need, then you can dump Office *and* Windows. Since Notes can be configured so that all of the user's data is replicated to a centralized server, deploying a new machine could be as simple as a five-minute install of a custom corporate Linux image with IBM Workplace included. The first time the user connects it to the network, they automatically get all of their stuff replicated to the local drive, and all of the new work they do automatically gets replicated to a server so if their laptop gets run over by a bus, issuing them a new one is trivial and takes no time at all.

Re:ARRGGHHH

[supersnail]

I have said before and will say it again!

As email is the main application for the all singing all dancing groupware/database product, couldn't they make it a decent email application!

And it is bad! It got its own special section on the old "user interface hall of shame" website, there were about 20 pages detailing what was so awful about nearly every aspect of the interface! The standard line from all the Lotus freaks was then as now "..But its not an email .......".

Most people would assume that if the email is so bad every other crud^h^h^h^hgroupware application would be just as bad or worse, and, if my experience is anything to go by they would be right.

I have never understood the Lotus/IBM position on this, other divisions of IBM do feedback and respond (however slowly) to user input. Confronted with a near unamimous loathing of thier interface the Lotus developers respond " you just don't understand .....".

If that wasnt bad enough every site with Lotus installed seems to have a deluded Lotus evengelist who fights every attempt to dump it for something a normal person would enjoy using.