IdoNotes (and sleep)

Lotusphere 2008 recap - bluntly

Why did I choose do to my recap posting so fast?  Because due to what I have seen, experienced and learned at Lotusphere this year, I have much work to do.  While this was not a year of amazing announcement after amazing announcement (sorry), it was a year of watching Lotus move beyond "Big Blue" syndrome and into the wild world of Web 2.0.  If they understand the leap they are taking and embrace the speed it happens, then they should come prepared for Web 3.0 in 2009.  So let's peek into my head and I will summarize as best I can and try and focus on what I am trying to say.  I have a habit of trying to portray all my ideas as they stream through.  After I typed most of this I found that I had even more to say but trimmed some to get key points out.

Domino 8.5
Let me start with Domino 8.5 as shown at Lotusphere. (as I said, as shown at Lotusphere).  Imagine we began with single copy template (SCT) to reduce disk needs back in version 6.  Administrators rejoiced.  Domino then comes along and announces design note compression.  Saving tens of MB per mailfile and database.  Administrators rejoice.  Next is the consolidating of non-summary data.  Administrators rejoice.  Finally, we hear of the new attachment service to combine those pesky attachments down to save even more.  We don't need numbers and percentages, we understand there is hug savings to be had.  Administrators rejoice.  Lotus understands the needs of disk savings in an ever growing environment.  This is a huge change since the says of shared mail (did I say that?).

Further work in security and directory changes.  ID Vault is officially put out to the public.  The ability to let users obtain their own lost passwords and even id files without helpdesk calls or human intervention outside their own struggles.  Administrators rejoice.  I am incredibly over simplifying the work that Peter and his team have done here.  There is much more to the ID Vault that I may talk about independently from the public information.  Sit and watch this space as more information is shared.

Directory independence.  This will soon be a global holiday.  The ability to walk away from most of your Domino directory to invest in LDAP sources to be the primary point of authentication for your enterprise.  I have been preaching this to you for years and telling you it was coming.  It was not a premonition on my part, it was the way Lotus had to go to stay alive in the increasing world of single directory infrastructures with software independence.  Do not get me wrong, I strongly believe that the Domino directory can be that single directory for enterprise needs, but not everyone took that path and Lotus will now support it. Administrators rejoice once again.

Lotus Foundations (Connectria will be supporting deployment and hosting of this) and the security device
A device is pulled from a DHL package (a la Steve Jobs) by Mike Rhodin.  It looks unusually like a laptop or small tablet device.  Yet it turns out to be a fully functional collaborative environment that will be duct taped to the wall of some SMB and fires us anything from email, instant messaging, document management and others.  All wrapped in what you would expect, a call home function and get help ability to update, add functions and patch.  (ET phone home?)  This could prove to be a major shift in IBM/Lotus' push into the SMB market if they can successfully market the device.  Microsoft has no such offering of a self maintained and loaded device you just plug in.  Unless you have a handful of plugs and know how to stack servers like pizza boxes.  If your SMB target market complained about any resources needed to deploy, manage or obtain all the tools they need, then point them to us as a reseller and they get it all.  No hype, we are ready for this one.  A humorous tidbit I learned today, the device is not yellow, that was construction paper (or similar) on it to give the Lotus yellow.  Darn!

The security device was a bit raw.  Even the one they had over in the IBM Village area.  I talked to the product manager and the developers to get a good feeling for what it offers.  I walked away with a nice list of what it did, soon.  The device laying there had some nice features, but IBM is taking the purchase of ISS a while ago and coming out swinging.  There are lots of choices in the space from numerous providers, lets see what the official box looks like.  Note that I am not telling you all it offers, mainly since it wasn't clear to me.  Can we get a list?

Lotus Bluehouse
I have mixed emotions here, lets just say another attempt for SAAS or AOD or whatever acronym you wish to give it this week.  Lotus' attempt at being the supplier of applications on demand or also known as software as a service.  Lotus needs to step back and see itself for what it is.  A software platform, yes a whole platform, but not a hosting company.  Passing this off to a newly formed group (I spoke to the new sales or marketing dude at the partner reception) that isn't ready to implement (his words not mine) is not their core strength.  Lotus' strength is bringing cutting edge, enterprise software to light through development.  Then letting customers implement or even us host.  This is not me talking as a hosting company, but as a company that sees that we ourselves only focus on what we do best.  We dropped support of Groupcast development for that very reason and are the largest referrer of Lotus licenses to a license reseller.  Licenses are not our core business in our eyes and we grew by not doing it.

Did anyone notice also that they are not using the new Sametime logos but the older, well known and branded blue icons for Sametime?  Maybe just me.


Lotus Mashups
This should have been coming some time ago.  Here is the Lotus page describing the offering.  I am not understanding if this is a purchasable product yet, or an entitlement, but the offering will bring more Web 2.0 into Lotus software.  While this will not be available until Mid 2008, some sneak peeks at the widgets was shown for the Notes client in the OGS.  The catalog ability for sharing and rating the components is a requirement if the catalog is well categorized to show business and for fun components.  The Mashup Server was not well defined outside of supporting a variety of platforms and add controls.

I will say that there are public sites that do this already, I was making lists until I noticed there are too many.  Lotus is playing catch up quick though and should visit and learn from them.

The Unified Communications scenarios
I am so happy to see these movements and advances.  From the Lotus Sametime Advanced Server, to the telephony integrations to the future of the new web based client with no java behind it (see Innovation lab posting later).  Sametime is finally getting the focus is needs.  I have mentioned it before.  We told Lotus almost 7 years ago now that chat should be a commodity and the client interface should be changed to catch up.  They did it.  Now they show integration with Microsoft, Portal, phone systems and presence across the board.  The Sametime Gateway has grown into a mature product connecting you to the public IM networks.  If you missed the demos in the keynote for UC², then you missed the future of enterprise collaboration.  Visit Adam G's blog for a summary of the keynote.  I cant force this down you anymore than to say look at how much of my time and blog postings are on Lotus Sametime.  From praising them to showing you what mistakes they made along the way, all is fair play and open season.  Adam will vouch for that.  He knows once the products are GA I let you know what I think.  And I think Lotus is on the right path in this space.  The strength in the partnerships they formed with the telephony product providers will grow them far beyond Microsoft in this space (sorry Peter).

Sametime Unyte.  I had a great 30 minute conversation with the product manager.  Interesting choice for an enterprise with skinning and branding abilities in a hosted solution.  The solution is only available through IBM hosting, so a no go for companies wanting that in house.  Resellers must pay enormous fees to get in the program in my eyes, but some will jump.  There are quite a few options for billing that you should investigate before choosing one to make sure you get the best deal.  I won't even list them all.

Social Networking (a la Lotus Connections)
Ok, this deserves it own posting (and the one I do on the Innovations lab will go further).  But I will sum it up.  Lotus Connections 1.0 was not what the enterprises needed.  They did need someone large (IBM) to stand up and say we have an enterprise product for you, but Connections missed the first mark.  Now saying that, they have listened and are making good strides.  The next hurdle is getting companies to see why they need it.  I overheard Connections was the fastest selling out of the gates over even Quickr.  Impressive, but are the companies really seeing what else is out there?  Not as in there is better for the enterprise, but there is better in the open world that Connections should be emulating.  I have strong opinions on social networking and I am happy Lotus has listened to some of my ideas and thoughts.  We proudly support and host Lotus Connections and will continue to do so assisting Lotus in growing the product with any input they will take from me.  My point here is not bashing, but letting you know the world of 2.0 is huge and we are entering a new path.  The Innovations lab has much of that path to offer, we just need to have Lotus give them the development cycles to bring it to the front.  Great sessions and talks on social networking took place at Lotusphere, I applaud Suzanne, Ted, Joe, Ronnie and everyone else on the Lotus Connections teams.  This is new I know and you have done great work bringing pieces of products together.  Take this as someone passionate about Web 2.0 and want to see Lotus stand as a leader in 3.0.

blog comments powered by Disqus



On Monday, January 28th, 2008   by Chris Miller        

Next Document | Previous Document