HUGE Change Coming for non SSL Traveler Customers

This was to go into effect on January 1, 2017 but IBM has relented, edit is from yesterday, so you have 3 months, and not a nightmare on January 2nd to return to from vacation.

IBM published this Technote which lays it all out in black and white: 

IMPORTANT: You must ensure that your IBM Verse Mobile and Traveler connections are secure and compliant with these requirements by March 15, 2017. 

This is not about IBM Connections Cloud users but is about on-premises installations of IBM Notes Traveler.

As the Technote states:

In the coming months, IBM will be enhancing the IBM Verse for iOS, IBM Verse for Android, IBM Notes Traveler Companion and IBM Notes Traveler To Do mobile apps to require that a secure connection be used between the mobile app and the endpoint used for connecting to the IBM Traveler server. 

The gist of it is, without HTTPS and valid SSL certificates you will lose your connectivity.

Please read the Technote for all the details and plan accordingly if you have yet to setup your SSL certificates.

If you need help, just ask. 

Apps That Make Life Easier in Other Countries

On my travels lately we have been using extensively a few apps which some of you may need or want when you travel as well. I am not so excited by any of the lame efforts of gamification, so ignoring this GAM (Game Spam) the apps are:

Everyone knows about WAZE and if you don't, go get it now and never get lost or late anywhere you drive.

Like WAZE, MOOVIT does for you bus users and train users what WAZE does for drivers. A bit confusing of a UI but once you get used to it you will not stop. It handles multiple language inputs as well. Very useful when visiting countries for conferences.

Google Maps, no link, it's on your phone already, yes the basic keeps getting better. We now say in Google we trust as it has bus details as well as traffic.

What's App also has been extremely helpful in helping us in discussions with friends and family, groups or individuals. Cell phone based, needs a phone number, but so much easier and less battery drain than Skype or almost any other IM.

Google Translate app is also extremely useful if you do not speak the local language.

How did we survive before? Well, when you live in the same place for over 10 years you may not have a need. When you move to a new country or just visit for a conference or vacation, best to have as much help, in your native language, as possible.

No doubt there are more useful ones, currency converters come to mind, and hopefully you will all provide more for me and others to look into as well.

When I'm Mobile....Beep,Beep

Continuing on recent discussions from WES, RIM has a bunch of clients for you and your Blackberry friends. Not all available yet, but Sametime has been for a while(I am updating my install doc for it, look for the post this week).

Go to this page for all the details and then get in on the notification or beta for each of the mobile clients.

1) Sametime - You always remember your first..and still advancing.

See this IBM PRESS Room Announcement:

The new BlackBerry Client for Lotus Sametime extends real-time collaboration from the desktop computer to the BlackBerry smartphone, including instant messaging (IM), presence awareness, contacts, broadcasts, file transfer, click-to-call and other features. Traditional landline phones become obsolete through the combination of voice-over-IP with presence awareness via IBM Lotus Sametime and corporate network and wireless routing with the BlackBerry® Bold® smartphone. In addition to IM, presence is seen throughout the smartphone applications. For example, a customer can use instant messaging within their calendar or an email to get an urgent answer in the moment without breaking the work flow. If instant messages aren't fast enough, the click-to-call feature is one button away.

2) Connections - The next generation BlackBerry Client for Lotus Connections, developed by RIM and available May 8!

3) Quickr - Coming soon? But not fast enough for me and my clients

4) Symphony - Coming soon?

Of course you need to move to BES 5.0 for some of these to work with all the benefits. We can help you if you need it.

By the way if you were looking to mobilize your applications and work force to leverage your investment in Lotus and RIM technology, let me know as I will be doing a LCTY event on this topic soon, look for slides.

Going Mobile with Sametime, Why aren't you?

Nope, no Traveller yet :-(

This is about Sametime Mobile. I love it, especially the R8 version. So much faster and more intuitive, and the lookup on users is fantastically fast.

The problem was my Blackberry users could not get to it. My fault, wrong IP address entered. Hey, we all mistype now and then.

But they rally missed having it. I didn't even think they used it.
Taught me a great lesson. Users really like when we are proactive in helping them extend their reach, even if we don't always know how many people it helps or in that one circumstance.

Sure I know that, but many people still deny their user's rights as simple as this.
If you can not do everything from your mobile phone by the end of this year, what on Earth are you waiting for?

Try Lotus Expeditor, enable your apps(within reason) for mobile fidelity. HR apps, vacation schedule workflows, even sales information mashups should be there, if they aren't already.

The cost?
Negligible next to the productivity gained. Talk about ROI, it's a huge winner.

If any of you have not en bled Sametime Mobile, tell me why?

It's just a configuration(yes I know ports on firewalls, etc. but you already have it opened via 1533 anyway if you run Sametime or 80 for http tunneling, so no excuses). Security? If you go via a BES it makes its own VPN so to speak and tunneling. Proxy, not an issue we work with it, reverse proxy, we work with it too.

Next time you are in the airport use it, amaze yourself what you can do. Yes you can call people but this way you do not get a busy signal or vmail.