IdoNotes (and sleep)

Live Blogging: Ed and Mary Beth talk about Hannover

Ed started out telling the audience that some screenshots/slides were changed since the product has changed since the time the slides were updated.  Ed covered marketshare and where it stands now.

Mary Beth took the stage and did a quick hand count of versions being ran.  There was 5.0.12 up through 7.0.2 in the room.  However, the overwhelming majority ran 6.5.x.  When I say majority, like 85% of the room.  She also asked who customized their current mail template.  A good half the room raised their hand

One of the objectives was Functional Themes

• New User experience
• Composite application support
• Stronger integration with Portal, Workplace, DB2 and 3rd party

• First the bookmark bar is gone and replaced with a "open" button.  You can then doc that open list and get the old icons/bookmarks from previous versions.  I think most people for upgrades will choose to dock the bar.
• The toolbars in the Actions and Tools changed quite a bit.  There is an advanced ability for power/business users that comes disabled by default.  You will have to enable this.  Context sensitive toolbars will only be on by default.  You will need to enable the rest.  Even custom ones will need to be reenabled in the client.
• The darn thumbnail bar was more than cool and helped find windows faster, even with searching.  I loved that new feature and had not seen it yet.
• The ability to move the preview from bottom to right was a nice Outlook touch.
• A new Filter/Clear All Filters button
• There is a new mail8.ntf mail template.  Message markings are on by default and the sender and subject are brought together.  With this being in a template, you can still make and modify what you wish.
• Size of messages is still in K but is now rounded numbers
• The lightening bolt in the bottom left still exists!
• Mail threading shows in the inbox and shows the thread count to the far left
• The right side bar includes activities, day at a glance and even the Sametime contacts enabled as plug-ins for you.  With policies you can even control if users get the sidebar or not.  Then even which they get as part of the policy.  There is even a RSS reader you can float and open feeds in browsers (see below)
• The Sametime contacts includes the full Sametime 7.5 client since the Eclipse base is the same
• You can then write any of your own Eclipse plug-ins
• The Notes embedded browser is gone, gone I say, gone!!  You get whatever rendering engine you have as default
• A lot of the calendar UI looks the same from first glance.  Saying that, action buttons are moved to the left bar so everything you need to do is on the left.
• The ability to see/manage others calendars is moved to the lower left including group calendars
• The personal address book has had the UI changed and some of the functionality
• Inline spell checking

• can I select which address I use when I have multiple addresses listed for personal contacts?  Not in advance, but while composing?
• Can I prepopulate RSS feeds to users?
• Is the Workspace gone?  I saw bookmarks...

• All applications will run in Notes 8, repeating, yes all applications will run in Notes 8 he had on the first slide
• This is one of the first to be Eclipse based product
• They recognize that it is now a heavier rich client than before (this means eats memory)
• There seems to be a Sametime Next server in the slide, not sure what that was
• They are planning a Win32 client that will be a bridging the gap client to go from Notes 7 to Notes 8 giving you some of the new functionality, while not making the jump to the Eclipse platform
• More usability testing has been done on this release that any previous release
• Public beta looks like first quarter 2007, while there is the private beta now
• This is the foundation for Notes for the next 16 years.  They say this meaning Notes has been around for 16 already, not that things won't change and grow for the next 16
• A strong statement about "openness" using the Eclipse and WCT base
• Productivity tools will be rolled in for the ODF support.  Integrated menus, lightweight
• Activity-centric collaboration is back.  I didn't get it a year or more ago when they started down the path and struggle to follow what it means now.  I see it as a conglomeration of documents, chats, emails and such grouped by activity or project.  Glorified TeamRooms that have been properly managed?  It is just me, but for once, ok, more than once, it is an area I have not gotten the term or drive yet

• Tighter integration into Portal
• Client provisioning for Eclipse
• Optional message retraction (server-based)  How they snuck that in is funny
• Instantaneous Out-of-office responses
• Spamguru
• Holy cow Batman, it is DB2 once again with general availability
• tons of other security, directory and admin enhancements (according to slides)
• Expeditor is the new client and Notes is the plug-in to the client
• Sametime integration and licensing.....  the Sametime 7.5 client is a plug-in but they are unsure if the IMLU carries forward, but the plan is chat and presence

• Allow Notes users to be defined in non-Domino LDAP
• more admin enhancements
• Native 64-bit Domino Beta at Domino "Next" GA.  32-bit will continue on
• Each 64-bit platform will be a new Domino platform?  planning issue

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On Wednesday, November 29th, 2006   by Chris Miller        

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