It's all gone a bit quiet here.

 

Sorry, real life just caught up with me.  Hopefully I'll be back later in the week...

 

 

This is part 4 in my Future of Notes series.

 

The M word. Marketing.

 

I really have had my reservations on this one. It's easy to criticise, especially as I'm treading into an area where I have NO EXPERIENCE whatsoever. 

 

I don't want to simply be whining, nor do I want to be one of the people asking for IBM to deliver the marketing equivalent of the moon on a stick. And I especially don't want to have this turn into some kind of strange passive-aggressive rant that lambasts IBM whilst frequently apologises to Ed Brill, who has been open and frank throughout. 

 

Believe me, I've written and re-written this one a few times in my head before committing it to a keyboard, let alone putting it out into the ether.

 

So, my thoughts on marketing generally are... Selling Notes as email is not healthy long-term, because it massively undersells the product.

 

Short term, however, it has been massively beneficial. The focus on email, in both IBM's development resource and in marketing terms, has put Notes firmly back in the frame.

 

But when you look closely, IBM's brief description of Notes doesn't actually sell it as just email. IBM's website for Notes refers to it as Collaboration Software.

 

WRONG.

 

Collaboration tools don't do email. They get email systems to do email for them. Collaboration tools' email prowess ends once the SMTP connection is dropped - something else does the delivery, storage and serving of email.

 

Take a look around the market, and you'll see that this is true. Collaboration solutions send emails, and sometimes slurp them via POP3. Nothing more.

 

Notes is more than email.

Notes is more than Collaboration.

Notes was, is, and will always be... Groupware.

 

Remember that term?

 

IBM's long-term direction for Notes should be to move Notes back to a place where it defines its own category. Where reviewers looking at it as email cannot forget that it's more than email. Where reviewers looking at it as an application platform cannot forget that it provides email too.

In some cases, that additional capability is a weakness. Usually, the acronym "SaaS" is seen in those cases...

But everywhere else, this is an advantage.

 

In fact, SaaS is a huge problem for us. I suspect that SaaS will be a "race to the bottom" that threatens all Collaboration and Email software equally.

Which is why the value of Notes, in being both email and applications, must be pressed.

 

That is all I'll say on marketing, as I've already vastly overstepped the mark that is drawn by my experience and (lack of) education in the subject.

This is the third part of my ongoing discussion of the Future of Notes.  We're about halfway through the points I want to make, I think.

 

I've been using Notes for a long time.  Not as long as some in the community, but long enough to remember upgrading Notes R3.x environments to Notes 4.0.  Folders!  LotusScript!  4Gb maximum database size!  Gosh, that was a long time ago...

 

But the thing that's struck me recently is that Notes was so much more AVAILABLE back then.

 

By which I mean that you could just drop by the Notes.Net website, pick your version, and download.  Client packages, server packages, incremental installers.  All freely available.

 

Let's all admit it.  We ran (run?) unlicensed installations of Notes and Domino Server at home.  Or on a few machines in the corner at work.  Or wherever.

Speaking to people in the Notes community, it's an assumption that was always just made.  You turned up to a User Group meeting or a beer meeting, you're passionate and dedicated about this, so you must be making use of those free downloads.

 

And then the Notes.Net downloads disappeared.  Now to get a version I can run, I have to go through the IBM download site - a poor thing in the first place.  This usually means I need to have an account, and have purchased licenses, and so forth.

 

Speaking personally, I work in a locked down environment.  I'm only given the "approved" packages for my employer's chosen platforms - specific versions for AIX and Wintel.  So even if I could take the packages home on a USB stick (which I can't because they've blocked that), it would be useless for my little Linux server in the corner...

Not to mention the fact that whilst my employer may be licensed for R8, I'd like to look at R9 when it comes out.  Or maybe even just R8.5.2. Neither will be very easy for me to do, unless I resort to the time-limited evaluation copies - and a time limit just puts me off doing that.

No wonder I haven't run a version of Domino at home for over three years.

 

And this harms the community.  I had ideas I'd like to see available at OpenNTF, but can't do that now because I can't easily (and legally) run Domino/Notes at home.  I wonder if I'm the only one in that position?

 

IT folks fall into two broad categories.  The ones who are just doing a job, and the ones who feel that they're very lucky to be doing a job that they find interesting and enjoyable.

The latter are usually also tinkerers.  The kind of folks who, if they installed a Domino Server, would be impressed by it.

 

Yet IBM have hidden their light under a bushel.  Then buried the bushel under concrete.  Then built a big sign on the concrete that says "No Trespassing".

Yes, getting hold of a usable install of Domino/Notes for an IT professional really is just about that pleasant and simple.

 

We now have a Notes Designer free download.  OK, but where do I test the app?  On what server do I run it?  In which clients can I test it?

A free Designer client is to Notes what a free slice of cheese is to a sandwich.  A nice start, but it rather needs something else around it to make it a useful whole.

 

And no, the newly released Amazon cloud image for the server isn't useful here - it may be free, but using it doesn't appear to be.  I can see how it would be useful, but I'd rather use that server I have in the corner, thanks.

 

If IBM is serious about getting Notes noticed, then it needs to put up a Community Edition that features the Client-Only install, the  All Clients install, the Domino Server.

(And on all of the Windows, Linux and Mac platforms where appropriate.)

 

The Developers who were discussing the future of Notes were right in that IBM needs to draw more people to using - and developing, and administrating - on Notes.

But that requires the platform to be available to the casual passer-by.

 

Making Notes available to the casual passer-by obviously had a powerful "network effect" back in the 90's.

Most people that will ever read this blog probably just read sentence that and thought "yes, I was part of that network effect".

 

We need that back, because it works for everyone that's working with Notes.

 

The DB2 Community Edition shipped in 2006, so this can be done.  Come on IBM.  Pull your finger out and do the same for Lotus Notes/Domino!

 

This is the second part of the Future of Notes Series, which stems from the recent frank discussions in the Notes community.

 

One of the big ideas that keeps coming up is just how people are going to get Apps. And perhaps understandably, people keep going back to the idea of an App Store.

As a concept, it's fine. But it's become painfully obvious that this discussion is going nowhere, probably because the people discussing it are very technically adept.

To be blunt, THERE WILL NOT BE A WORKING CENTRAL APP STORE FOR LOTUS NOTES.

It won't work, for one very good reason.

I won't let it work.

 

Not just me. Every Administrator.

Go ahead, try and make an app store. It's not going to work.

 

Your first problem is the signatures on the templates. I'll have to re-sign everything, or it won't work in the anvironment I administer.  And I won't sign it unless I'm pretty certain it won't harm the environment I administer, so I'll probably need to investigate the App.  Which takes time.

 

But that's a trivial issue compared to the next problem: Provisioning.

 

People discussing the App Store seem to have this wonderful idea that it's going to be like it is on a smart phone. You pop along, pick your apop, it's downloaded, installed, and then ready to run.

Which works because it's your device, and you're the only user of it, so its security model is based on physical access more than anything else.

 

Notes is a multi-user client/server system, and is a bit more secure than the average phone.  This security will get in the way of the App Store idea.

 

There are other issues with an App Store as people are currently thinking about it. Like how does my company meet Regulatory and Compliance demands? As a user, I may not be allowed to use certain types of App, because there is an existing system that I'm required to use for that. An App Store potentially allows the bypassing of this.

Which is why a central App Store would probably be blocked in most large companies. It will not be allowed to work the way people are saying it should work.

That's a huge problem.

 

The Notes App Store is not something on the Internet. That's an Application Catalog, for businesses and Administrators to use to determine which applications they offer their users.

 

The Notes App Store, as far as a user is concerned, should be an Application on the server. For the sake of argument, we'll call it "Applications", and it's regular Notes database with a special template from IBM.

 

As an Administrator, I have populated this database with a range of Applications. Each Application is a document which contains a correctly signed NTF file, prefixes and suffixes for ACL groups, whether a mail-in database record is required, and details of the target destination for the App (e.g. Apps\Discussions\$appname$).

 

As an end user, I am unaware of this. I just come along, open the database, and say "I want a discussions database, and I want it to be called "Project App Store Discussions". I fill in some details as to who has Reader and Editor access.

When I hit save, the application checks that the name does not conflict with any existing Apps, mail-in database names (if required), and group names. As a user, I am unaware of this unless there is a conflict.

 

Once saved, a new task on the server - a binary task just like the router or http that we choose to load or not load as Administrators - spots the new document (almost immediately, as it watches the DB for changes) and goes to work.

It creates the Application NSF file, creates the group documents, populates the group documents (including adding the requestor on as an Owner/Administrator if required), creates a mail-in database record if required, and then fires off an email to the user with doclinks to the App and, if required, the groups it created.

(If the App is a web App, the links are obviously URIs rather than doclinks)

 

So the net effect for the user is that I create a new "request", and moments later I get an email saying "yep, that's done", and my App is ready to roll.

 

For the Administrator, this "App Manager" task also checks daily for apps that no longer have a valid owner/requestor, and produces stats (from Activity Trends?) to show which apps are used and which aren't. Apps can be marked for removal via the Apps.nsf database. The server task takes care of removal, using the Application document as a reference for what to delete.

 

If we don't have this kind of automated application provisioning, then a shiny online catalog of Apps is going to be useless.

It'll be a nine-foot ladder in front of an eighteen foot wall.

 

"App Stores", as the end user thinks of them, must be local to the organisation. They are controlled by, and for, the organisation that pays for the Notes licenses.

This allows organisations to offer as wide or as limited a range of apps as they like, without fear of apps getting too out of hand - the whole process is controlled and audited, and gives basic lifecycle management for applications.  Which may not sound important, but I invite you to look over any long-running Notes Application Server and count the number of Apps being used on the server versus the number of Apps on the server...

 

Any solution that doesn't include Provision is merely window shopping, because you know you won't be able to actually walk away with usable goods.

 

This doesn't mean we don't need a central catalog of applications. The business still needs to know what it can put in its App Store(s) in the first place. But to imagine that an App Store will be of any use without some automated provisioning is just wishful thinking.

 

Because without automated provisioning, the App Store experience works like this:

You find this site on the internet, find an App, and download it.  Then you log a call, mail the App to someone, and wait for them to get around to setting it up.  Which takes a while, as they have to go and check that the App is OK, so you're not going to get your App within the next week or so.

Meanwhile, you've given up and are thinking about switching to Sharepoint, because you heard that works out of the box.

 

Domino/Notes 9 needs to address this provisioning problem. Without it, we'll end up with an App Store that's pretty much a cart without a horse.

 

(I trimmed a lot of text out of my last blog entry to make sure that it's something people would read, rather than fall asleep during. Hence this "number 1.5" entry - with something that was too important to leave out, but too long to leave in.)

 

I mentioned that a Notes Light endeavour is doomed, and that we should pick iNotes instead. And I firmly believe that is the best use of everyone's time and effort here.

I think it's very important to say that I'm discounting the idea that a cut-down consumer version of Notes will do any good - becaus ethat cut-down consumer version is what some people think of as "Notes Light".

Most people I know are using webmail at home now, and the few that aren't are on Mozilla Thunderbird - which is better suited for light home use than any other (cross-platform) mail client I know of.

The personal email client battle is still raging, but webmail is winning by miles. Outlook is a holdout for people that have Office and never use more than one computer. Thunderbird is a distant third that's popular amongst the more literate.

We should not get into the personal email space.  It's a waste of time and effort.

 

So I'm going to address the issue of a Notes Light client from a corporate viewpoint.

 

I mentioned that we need to improve the portal experience. I know that IBM have provided an iNotes Web Access redirection database, but that's not really much of a portal.

However, not everyone wants a portal. Maybe you do want each application to be somewhat seperate.

 

In which case, I have a solution for you.

Mozilla Prism.

 

Prism is best thought of as an embedded version of the Mozilla Firefox browser, except it has no browsing controls. Prism gives your applications:

• Its own icon both for start menu/dock/Applications menu
• The ability to handle file associations and URIs Its own icon in the Task List/on the window decoration as it runs
• Process seperation - if one Prism application dies, it won't take out other running Prism applications with it
• Extensions to allow system tray notifications and minimizing to the system tra

Basically, Prism does its best to make web applications first-class citizens on the desktop. See their Features page for good visual examples.

 

Prism is currently a beta, but it's very much a beta in the long open-source tradition of "more stable than some company's gold code".  I've used it in Ubuntu for Facebook, GMail and others and had no problems.

Based on the discussion that Developers were having last week, I've come to a conclusion that's bordering upon conviction:

IBM NEEDS PRISM.

 

They need to get involved with the project and get it to a stable place on Windows, Mac and Linux. They need to offer a simple wizard-based kit ("Prism for Lotus Applications") that allows you to make a deployable package so it's easy to drop Prism applications to desktops in locked-down environments.

And they need to amend iNotes and other Notes applications so that if they detect they're in Prism, they use those integration features properly and feel "more native".

Prism is the Notes Light client. It's the best possible option, and it's something we could have very quickly too.

 

This doesn't mean we don't need a better portal, as I also mentioned in my last blog entry.

 

But in MY ideal world, IBM would be involved enough with Prism that it has a Greenhouse project soon, and an actual product shipping early in the Notes 9 timeframe. 9.0.1, perhaps?

If they don't, then I think that IBM are missing out on a huge trick here. They're missing out on an opportunity to clarify that Domino Server is for applications, regardless of whether they're through the Notes client or the web browser.

And that the web browser applications do not have ot be second-class citizens. With xPages, they can be capable and scalable, and with Prism for Lotus Applications they can be like any other desktop application.

 

And that's got to be a good message for Notes Developers, for IBM's customers and for the end users.

 

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