Revenge of the Mail Migration from Hell

Learning about failure from the infamous Elon Musk and SpaceX.
SpaceX did not land all 3 rockets cleanly the other day and have numerous tests that failed along the way. They have even been compiled in one video. Even the great ones fail, that is how they get better.

Once in a while it is nice to write myself, and my readers, the finer point of failures and what we learned from them.

Keep in mind:

• we are all professionals
• we all reviewed the contract
• we all reviewed the specifications
• we thought we knew the people involved
• we had more than enough time to complete this by 12/31...2017

So in the interest of open, honest reporting, let's drop into hell, shall we?

Never get into a mail migration(ok, any serious project) that involves a 3rd party.
If you can't handle it all on your own, get a friend, a resource, someone on your side to handle whatever part you do not know. This alone may save you 1-2 hours A DAY on average during the project.

Date, or No Date, there is no wait and see
If you propose some dates for the cut over and the client is not comfortable with them, you better find out why upfront. And not just the easy reasons but the hard ones, like the training person isn't available for 6 months or the boss is on sabbatical for 2 months or no one explained that they would be giving out new hardware at the same time to people (phones and PCs) or well you get the idea.

Vacations Happen
Mine, yours, theirs and of course once the dates are in motion you look bad for taking vacation at the time they finally want to move everything. Which leads to...

Backups
Not data, that is easy. People. Techs. How many of us out there really have a good backup person in our organizations or that we can work with on minimal notice with enough knowledge of the solution and process at hand? I may be a better troubleshooter and am not talking about that aspect, but I am referring to the ability to holistically look at a solution in motion and keep it going while I/you are unavailable. This is one reason is document everything along the way and store it in Connections or a Notes db or Dropbox so if I can't be there to do it, someone can easily pick it up and run with it.

Caveat Emptor
Migrations of anything come with caveats. Data should be ok, folders, encrypt ions, repeating meetings, large attachments(like over 1GB) and numerous other items should be addressed and explained upfront to the customer.No, it will not prevent that horrible meeting where they claim you never told them, explained them or sent it to them, but you can try. Most clients really do not understand many aspects of the projects and even when explained in non technical terms they just say yes, yes and we all know the end will come back and we will explain it all over again.You are shaking your  head at this one or laughing because it happens nearly every time.

Leap Frog
Planned it all out, everyone agreed to the order in which the data will migrate and which date. Along comes someone and demands to get moved or needs it done before their vacation or just can't wait to be the first guinea pig on the new thing they did not get trained on yet because they hate the old thing.

It happens, in 30 years or so of projects this happens maybe once a year or 2. Acceptable, but frustrating too.

Karma however wins every time.

Next project was quick and easy, unexpectedly.

So here's to all of you far under water on a contract and know when it is done you will at least have good stories to tell your (IT) friends.

18+ Ways to Help Clients Love You

This was my slide deck for today's Israel Translation Association (ITA) Conference in Tel Aviv.
It is more specific than last year's "Worst Translation Practices" session but also more minimal.

You will see no text, just logos and graphics.

It is good for everyone to remember some of these no matter what business you are in or where you work in the world.


18+ Ways To Help Clients Love You from Keith Brooks

Installation and Upgrade for 8.5.1 Who's Ready?

Just got off my twice a month call regarding deployments and we got into discussions which left me scratching my head a little.

I admit to not always being up on the latest policy or piece of code in a version but something on the call I was told has been around since R5 and I was needless to say confused.

So if this great piece of code has been available, where has it been hiding?
Not saying IBM hasn't kept us informed but part of this sub group of design partners is to better understand the issues facing people when they upgrade to the latest clients. Evidently stumbled upon what I think we all meant but use different terminology.

For years we liked to customize client installations per customer sites using the Install Shield Tuner(and it's various versions) and preconfigured items. It made life easy for everyone and only occasionally required tweaking. Usually as more options expanded into the Notes client, but even with these it was a fairly simple enough way, once you built the installer.

Never used it? Read Andy Donaldson's blog post first. He really got it done simple enough to get you started or finished even.

Then see his follow up with slides and an update on Sametime in the R8 client which can be blocked from being installed.

You do need to know a little DOS as it helps for the batch file and commands needed to do some basic save/copy/delete etc.

But how else can you do this? You ask?

Copy the .exe file from IBM and just run it. This is way too manual and time consuming unless you need to do a one off install or for testing.

Upgrade by Email - DO NOT EMAIL THE WHOLE INSTALL PACKAGE. Just in case y ou were wondering. It will kill your bandwidth and server, especially when you send tot he whole company and it's 300+MB! This option can be painful to some on small bandwidth, but this basic process has been around for eternity. If you have created a finely tuned Install Tuner package this can work for you if your people can handle clicking on an icon.(We have worked with customers that claim their staff has no time to do this. We pointed out if we send someone to each desk it's the same time, but costs more, they still want us to do it)

You send the links out via an email and the files sitting on the file server someplace to do the installs. Doing this without a finely tuned package may cause network issues or delays.

SmartUpgrade (and it's relative SU by Wizard)- Works, but requires babysitting as it does not work with FixPack/Hot Fixes only proper releases or so my recent calls have informed me and I them.(If anyone has a more detailed answer let me know and will edit this). Set it up and add the next point release or full update and the server automagically lets everyone know when they can update and gives them options of time or skipping if they are busy.

Some side pieces to think about as well include:
Eclipse, Plugins, Widgets, Feeds, applications or databases and a slew of other pieces that may help your organization.

There are also some tools out there, from Tivoli, Microsoft and other vendors as well as Lotus Business Partners that help push out changes and track them if you are so inclined.

One problem still exists and that is when you find a single user and want to auto update them to multi-user. The below is from the Admin help file:

The Notes installation program does not support automatic Notes upgrade from single user to multi-user within the same release or from one release to another, although it is possible. To upgrade from single user to multi-user, see the Upgrading a Notes single user install to multi-user topic in this guide.

Now it seemed, there are some other built in ways to accomplish these installs and upgrades, but I am thinking it all got lost in the terminology. Transform files, manifests, configuration file, batch files, update sites.

Needless to say it all gets done, but requires one to sit down and WORK a little bit to get it right but you will be so much the happier afterward as will your support staff.

Plus you will never have earned your keep more than when you create this magic.

An Idea that we are thinking about

After my post about it, figured I shouldn't leave you hanging.

Now before you read this keep in mind we were looking for new directions, in business, and speaking to customers and clients and of course for Lotusphere. It is not meant to imply anything about anyone at all, but I am strong enough to accept it's criticisms. This was really meant in the spirit of looking forward, although I am sure some will not see it that way, which is why I decided not to pursue it.

So teflon on, here we go.

Designing Application UI's with Women in mind an unsubmitted abstract

When you read items like these and see the percentages:
Women Graduates More Likely to be working

Women Shoot past men

Fewer Women Graduates lose jobs

Blackberry Exec on women in tech

Women Continue to Outnumber men

Lastly, although from 2003, Perceptions of the Design Process: Gendered Aspects

According to one student, “I never knew there was such a difference in technology for men and women.”

And you see and hear it in the work force, it makes you stop and ask, what if we have been or are writing applications for the wrong type of person? What makes it different? Surely everyone involved provided opinions or forethought as to why or how the application would look and feel and act. What does the younger generation prefer? My guess is widgets that auto update themselves and their owners and auto reply via voice for communications all from their cell phone or Star Trek universal translator Communications link. But do they even know themselves?

Some may argue pink Blackberries are cute and color definitely sells some devices just like cars, although I prefer Miami Dolphin colors. However, a device which is more practical for a woman's hand size or to work with their longer nails in mind, or even have a different shape of the ear piece to avoid earrings might bring a whole new crop of business to RIM. Of course to be fair I'd like my devices to be built more rugged for all the times it falls and my kids toss my phone.

But that's hardware, this is about software.

Apple has made their macs UI easy to look at and work with and continue that with the iPhone and peripherals. Software should be simple, easy and do what you expect.

And so when first thinking about this, I wondered what a Lotus Notes client would look like, and act like, if it was not still thought of as "needing" everything from the last 20 years. The 8.5 iNotes client comes close in this aspect although the UI is still rather formal, to me, to look at in what is a very non formal world, from 1992 when I first saw Lotus Notes. Looking back on it now, it was in some ways a more fun client in appearance than it is now or some might say it was a less serious/corporate UI. Don't get me wrong, Outlook is not here or there and the Ribbon just screams at me,"do what we tell you" because that's how i want to customize my experience.

This is where I intended to go, but couldn't put it all in 75 words of an abstract. What is there now that allows one to customize the client or apps in a way that I or you want, not in the way IBM or Microsoft or even Google wants? What if I want an NFL experience to include my mail client? Just doesn't happen right now.

Why can't it be as easy as Zazzle?
Rebrand my UI with corporate colors, graphics, look and feel. Yes, I am aware one can do some of this, but only to a point and definitely not accomplished by your average every day employee.

You don't think David Butler at Coke hasn't pondered this as well in his plans to stabilize the Coke branding and awareness?

Only to be told no, sorry , it can't or doesn't do that. Why? What is wrong with the way we are designing applications?

The bottom line is if people don't like it, they won't use it, unless forced to do so.

When I asked someone if software should be easier to use or harder. Of course easier is the answer. But if I ask should one require a 20 page instruction manual to program a VCR for example, everyone would say no. Yet how many of these VCRs were really so simple that you didn't need the instructions?

Or to put it in modern times, your home theater, how many buttons on your universal massive remote do you not only never use, but have no idea what they are there for or why?

To return to the abstract,
IBM named a top company where women succeed

At IBM, women represent IBM's largest global constituency. Worldwide, women are approximately 28 percent of the total IBM population, 24 percent of management, 19 percent of executive management, two women are senior vice presidents, and three women are members of IBM's Board of Directors.

\

And from IBM

women now comprise more than 30 percent of the total U.S. employee population.

Indeed last year at Lotusphere there was a Geek 102 session which I attended and blogged about here. Clearly IBM has recognized this need and interest in a growing population of workers that can not be glossed over and in fact is encouraging them from within.

And the Lotusphere team, at least last year I am not privy to LS2010 info of any sort from anywhere, wanted to pursue a line of thinking which I thought was bold, but perhaps unattainable.Still, I am interested to see if Kristin follows through with some of the ideas from last year.

My intention was to pursue last year's information one step further and try to understand the expectations and audiences our customers will have that use their applications, even if they themselves may not envision it. But on a grander scale at Lotusphere 2010 input, so I submitted it as a BoF, in the end, to see what the world is thinking or if it cares at all, maybe UI is out and voice controls are in from now on.

My view was the Notes client is a rather masculine looking and swiss army knife acting client. What if we changed it to be more feminine, whatever that means to each person, and simpler/stripped down yet efficient? What if that affected how we in turn built apps to run in Notes or on the web?

Bad terminology? I agree. But not much came to mind for the comparison. And thus you can see why I ended up not submitting it. Although the few co-presenters I asked about it were interested in where it would lead and the feedback it would garner, if it was a session.

Probably better suited for LoLA, maybe next year, if we get invited, we will bring this up. Or not.

In looking to stay one step ahead, perhaps I took one step backwards, the idea was right but the wording was wrong or maybe it's just too niche or perhaps all the designers out there get it already. Although from apps I saw this week, you could have fooled me.

We now continue with our regularly scheduled blog posts that do not upset anyone except Microsoft and Google folk.

PS- Remember oct 9th is the last chance to submit your abstracts for LS10.

Premier of UC2, from The View

As some may know, I was lucky enough to be among the first writers for Wellesley Information Services,the parent of The View magazine and seminars, for their new UC2 online webzine, called The UCView.

Out of 8 articles in this "issue" only 4 are not from IBM teams. And in fact the other 3 articles are from one firm, Ascendant and then there is mine.

I must thank my editor, Erin Durkin who was a saint to clean up my original article and turn it into the final version. In many ways this was easier than my play writing editing. I have been informed I owe her Chocolate according to Esther and I expect to deliver it at Lotusphere.

You can read the abstract of my article, here on picking a Sametime client(or if you have a View subscription can read it all). I had more listed in the original document but we cut it down to 11 different clients for Sametime.

A non-technical article, but for my first one I preferred it. My next article will be more technical or at least aimed at a more practical solution benefit to everyone.

One thing I learned is my original draft was much more enjoyable to read. Evidently they want a high brow customer so before you think of writing for them, keep in mind it's a formal article. If anyone knows of a "fun" Lotus magazine I can write for as well please let me know.

If anyone wants a copy of it, ask me or if I am allowed, I will post it on my website.

UPDATED:
Under terms of my agreement I can not post the whole thing on my web site but can post the abstract. Apologies as the link evidently drops you to an abstract only view. If you are interested in reading it email me. Sorry about that.