This was how a call I had today went. Let's just say they are not staying on Domino and went looking for a more web based offering.
Details are not important, but what is interesting is a company went through the process to upgrade, etc.. and then wants to move away from the platform.
Not what we are usually hearing.
So is this something new? Is there something missing? And if so, what is it?
While I discuss with them the ins/outs technically facing them, I wonder what led them to this point. Their admins certainly know what they are doing and I presume would have stopped this if they could, so I must presume it came from high up.
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No this is not new, there is missing a lot and this textarea is too small to explain it all.
ReplyDeleteThe most accepted argument in the Yellowverse probably is all stupid management.
It still is a pity but good to hear that this is still unusual in your area.
I've seen several of these in the SMB market. Most of them went to hosted environments, so it was just a matter of cost and supporting on premises email.
ReplyDeleteGoogle has a pretty good story to tell when your a business owner worried about just keeping things going versus the costs of supporting an in house email system. Google acquired Docverse, http://www.docverse.com/ , yesterday, I think this will give them even a better story in larger enterprises.
I know I'm learning a new skill set, my customers are requesting it.
R8 was a horrible release. R8.5.1 is great and is finally a release that IBM/Lotus/ and the rest of us should be proud of. Too little too late? Who knows... What no one is explaining well are the advantages of Notes/Domino 8.5. Another sore spot is little training on R8.5, the HELP documentation is horrible, There is a lot of help on Blogs though. Finally we have a leap ahead with R8.5.1 and can also the cloud!!! Yeah!!! MS is doing a strong push and so is Google. All three offer CLOUD as well, LotusLive is the best offering there though. MS is using multiple side companies with Accenture and others partially owned by MS and Accenture. IBM is NOT doing strong marketing, does not have strong releationships with big service firms like MS. IBM does NOT show up at CIO events but MS does!!! Face it IBM sucks at Marketing and Sales and is not serious while MS is! MS shows up everywhere, IBM only shows up when they are trying to "save" an account.
ReplyDeleteJT
Just one more thing... Remember one of Bill Gates comments: "It doesn't matter that your software is better then mine!". He said that to Steve Jobs.
ReplyDeleteThe same is with Domino vs ms.. IBM just refuses to fight. Well, I've done enough fighting both winning and losing in the ring. Unless you show up to fight, you lose. What I tell people and students every day is that the person that is most determined wins, Black Belt or no, the most determined person wins. I've been at tournaments when I was not the best, but I was the most determined, and I won.
A very basic problem at IBM/Lotus, we've heard this before. They think they are "too big to fail" and MS nips at them a little every day because IBM only blocks, does not show up to kick ass.
Just my view, I think it is true!
JT http://www.recondite2.com
If they just went to R8 and no further, then I would migrate to exchange to... LOL. 8.5.1 is where any upgrade needs to be now.
ReplyDeleteWell, perhaps focusing on the un-initiated or wavering is of more value than pumping huge amounts of cash preaching to the converted like what LCTY is doing. It's a big PR exercise that is very limited in content, and doesn't seem to be attracting new business.
If it were, the global market wouldn't be in the toilet like it is now.
@Bill. There will be ppl who simply want cheap email, and "damn the risks!". Lotus is simply not the product for them. The LotusLive offering is trying to catch that market.
ReplyDeleteAll this is rather meaningless though to developers because there is no future in sites that are moving that way.
But building hostable app's is another story.... lots of potential there. If they have a good experience with their hosted mail, then hosting their apps would be a logical next step.
Not going to argue if R8.0 was good or not, my clients have been through it all with me, each dot release and fixpack.
ReplyDeleteThey don't complain at all, I may on the server side and some odd things did happen in the UI, but you know I still use my laptop daily even though I HATE the color gray.
Not going to argue about what IBM should or shouldn't do. IBM's CIO conferences are well respected and well attended.
Could IBM do more to help the Lotus brand? Perhaps but I believe there is quite a bit coming and while I know you may not believe it, there is strength behind it.
The flip side is IBM is leaner than in the past and it is up to the BP community to help it. While it shouldn't fall to all of us entirely and does not, some feel we are not as strong as the greater IBM and that is true. However the greater IBM makes Lotus look small by comparison.
We all see Lotus as a brand and a company but it's not a company. It does not lead IBM, compared to MS which has Office to lead them in cash flow.
To be fair, I don't live in a big market (South Florida) so we see very little advertising for either company aside from trade magazines which IBM has been all over for the better part of the last year, Lotus included.
Could we use better help? Better documentation? Sure we could but that doesn't sell licenses.
What makes Notes special is sharing and integration so no one feels left out or is forced out. A problem many people in business still can't accept as they are Type A and win-lose people.
I can tell you that after I migrated my company from 7.0.2 to 8.5.x the complaining never stops... The biggest issue is that the Client is horribly heavy. Even users with new laptops running 4gb of memory and a decent processor are still waiting far too long for the client to open when they get in to the office. Then there are little annoyances such as the random screen refreshes that change the focus from one spot of the client to another (or one program to another if you have more than just Notes open). I truly think that if there was someone who was happy with 6.5, and they upgraded just to be sure that the product they used was still supported, and they went past release 7.x, they wont necessarily like what they have on hand. Also to tell the truth, all of the benefits that I've seen posted about 8.5 and up really only make sense and MATTER to "we the geeks" who love to chat about the software and use the most powerful features. My users who just want their email and contacts, really don't care for the other features, and are really annoyed that it takes so long to get their info when they sit down in the morning.
ReplyDeleteScott,
ReplyDeleteAdmittedly the Eclipse client does provide more overhead, but not that much.
My clunky old laptop, even my Netbook with 2GB on them open and close everything reasonably well.
Of course I have tuned my setups to my needs but there are a bunch of settings in the clients that could be changed to speed up times.
Then again I don't connect directly to a server because that is a waste of bandwidth and resources, I use a local copy of my mail files so on start up its very efficient.
Help the users with what you have, it can be done, complaining about it, unless it really is that bad, serves no purpose.
Turn off replication on startup as well since for some people that is a drag.
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ReplyDeleteTips on faster startup can be found here, here and a general search of planetlotus here
ReplyDeleteYou may want to also consider using 8.5 "Basic", it doesn't have all the eclipse stuff that causes all these loading / UI issues.. But you sacrifice some UI features in the process. If people just want email, it may be sufficient for your needs.
@scott i forgot this one as well.
ReplyDeleteIn looking at all the cool "propeller spinning" stuff, it provides some more options for delivering solutions, but has come at the cost of making the notes client footprint harder to support.... IBM giveth.. and IBM taketh away..