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Category Lotus Notes and Domino Issues
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This is a follow-up to my blog entry from Nov 7, 2008:
QueryDragDrop and PostDragDrop bug in Notes 8 Standard

Recently, I opened a new PMR to find out if this issue has been resolved by IBM-Lotus developers, and this is what I got in response:

"SPR CJON7L73CK (NotesUIDatabase.Documents method returns incorrect information.) has been closed. Apparently there are no plans to fix this issue."

This does not seem to be the case, however. I did the same test in Lotus Notes 8.5 today that I did back in Nov 08 with Notes 8.0.1 when I blogged about this issue. I used the same "PostDragDrop Bug Sample Mailfile" that is available on my blog in downloads section. I discovered that the issue has been resolved and the number of documents reported by NotesUIDatabase.Documents is now correct. Perhaps IBM developers have no plans to address this in the 8.0.x code stream..., but in 8.5 it is working as it should.

Posted by Bodek Frak At 10:16:30 AM Location Windsor - U of W | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Category Lotus Notes and Domino 8.5 DAOS
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Just recently we implemented DAOS on our three clustered mail servers, and our lone mail archive server. The implementation went without any problems, and the outcome is really amazing. Here's why...

As a real life example of the difference that DAOS makes, let's examine the mail file size of one of our typical users. This user, just like others here, has his mail file replica on each of the three clustered servers. Yesterday, there were 18,740 documents (many with attachments) in each replica. While the replicas on servers ZEUS and VENUS were already converted to ODS 51 (required for DAOS), I noticed that the replica on server TRITON was still using ODS 43, hence DAOS did not do its magic here (see fig.1).

Mail file size on ZEUS was 1,354 MB with 97.5 of space used (ie. 2.5 % white space).
Mail file size on VENUS was 1,345 MB with 97.8 of space used (ie. 2.2 % white space).
Mail file size on TRITON was 3,156 MB with 99.2 of space used (ie. 0.8 % white space).

Do you see the difference? 1.3 GB on a server with DAOS versus 3.1 GB on a server without DAOS. Just by converting the mail file replica on TRITON to ODS 51 and enabling DAOS on it (compact -c), I brought the size down to 1.3 GB (see fig2). I just recovered 1.8 GB of disk space from one mail file.


Fig 1. DAOS at work on ZEUS and VENUS mail file replica (ODS 51), but not TRITON (ODS 43)


Fig. 2 DAOS at work on all three replicas of the mail file after the replica
on TRITON has been converted to ODS 51


How was this possible? This user had a lot of attachments stored in his mail file, that were also stored in other user's mail files. When DAOS went thought that mail file, it stripped duplicated attachments from the documents and replaced them with pointers to those same files that DAOS already stripped form other mail files and stored in one central location on the server.

Overall, we recovered about 200 GB of storage space on each clustered server after implementing DAOS. 3 x 200 GB, that's 600 GB of space back to the pool.

Now, the mail archive server. We have about 2,700 users with mail files. Each user has a replica on each of the three mail servers in the cluster. Any mail file that exceeds 400 MB, is eventually included in scheduled server-side archiving to a dedicated mail archive server called HADES. As you can imagine, HADES needs a lot of storage space to accommodate all these archives, especially because we do not have mail file quotas in place and users are allowed to keep anything they want in their mailboxes. Before we implemented DAOS on HADES, the server was using 1.7 TB of space on our SAN for mail file archives. After we implemented DAOS on all mail archives on HADES, we recovered 600 GB (thanks Patrick...) of storage space on that partition. That's more that 1/3 of the space previously used to store these files.

And here is the final proof that DAOS is just amazing. Take good look at the pictures below. This is Chris, our SAN and backup administrator. The first picture was taken just before DAOS was implemented. The second picture was taken after DAOS was running. What a difference!

Fig. 3 Chris before DAOS.


Fig. 3 Chris after DAOS.

Posted by Bodek Frak At 04:17:43 PM Location Windsor - U of W | Permalink | Comments (5) | TrackBacks (0)

Category Google
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http://news.cnet.com/8301-17939_109-10260879-2.html?tag=newsLatestHeadlinesArea.0

"CIOs invited by Google to a press event in San Francisco were naturally bullish on Google's version of cloud computing, and downplayed any concerns about security, reliability or the loss of a competitive advantage when it comes to giving up control of their IT."

Posted by Bodek Frak At 02:17:41 PM Location Windsor - U of W | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Category Opinions
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Worth reading, especially for IT Managers:
http://www.wissel.net/blog/d6plinks/SHWL-7QYDNV

Posted by Bodek Frak At 02:44:21 PM Location Windsor - U of W | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Category Lotus Notes Tips
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I've been asked by my colleagues if there is a way to insert a link into a Lotus Notes document that points to a file stored somewhere on the network drive. Once this link is clicked by a reader of the Notes document, the file (for example a Microsoft Word document), that this link points to will be opened.

I found two ways of accomplishing this. One involves turning selected text within a document into a "hotspot", specifically a "Link hotspot of the type URL". The other method involves creating Windows shortcut (.lnk file) and attaching it to your document.

Method 1
Create a URL link hotspot

When you hear the term URL, you probably think of an address of a Web site/page (a file accessed remotely though the HTTP protocol) But in this context, the term "URL" means an address of a file that you want to link to using one of many available protocols. Please note that URL consists of two parts: protocol + path to your file. You should also know that in Lotus Notes, the following protocols are allowed inside the URL hotspots:

http://
https://
ftp://
notes://
file://

To create your hotspot that links to a document, we will use "file://" protocol.

1. Make sure your document is in edit mode.
2. Select the text to act as a link.
3. Click Create > Hotspot > Link Hotspot.
4. Select "URL" for the link type.
5. Type in the full URL to your file in the "Value" field. See URL examples below.

URL Example 1
The file "test.doc" is located in a folder called "temp" that in turn is inside a folder called "consult" on a network drive mapped as "M:" on everyone's computers. The path to this file is "M:\consult\temp\test.doc".

You would use the following URL for your hotspot:




URL Example 2
Since network drive letter mappings may differ between computers on the same network, it is safer to use a different method for specifying the file path. The same file used in example above, is stored on a Novell server called ALPHA. When it comes to drive mappings, "M:" actually points to a folder called "common" that is stored on a partition also called "COMMON" on that server. Those names are not case sensitive, I just used lower case for the folder name and upper case for the partition name to distinguish them from each other.

You would use the following URL:




NOTE: This is applicable to both Novell and Microsoft networks, although I only tested it on our Novell network with Notes 8.


Your Notes document will look like this:






Method 2
Create Windows shortcut (.lnk file) and attach it to your Notes document

1. Open Windows Explorer and browse to a folder where your file is stored.
2. Right click on your file and select "Create Shortcut" from the menu. You will see that Windows created a new file. If the original file was called "test.doc", your shortcut will be called "Shortcut to test.doc" in Windows XP, or "test.doc - shortcut" in Windows Vista.  Note that Windows hides the file extension ".lnk" which is appended to the shortcut file name.




If you wish, you can rename your shortcut file and take out the "Shortcut to" prefix (Win XP) or "-shortcut" appendix (Win Vista).


 
3. Attach the shortcut file created in step 2 in one of the three possible ways:
a) drag and drop shortcut into your Notes document, or...
b) copy shortcut to the clipboard, switch to Notes document and paste it from the clipboard, or...
c) use File > attach from Notes' menu and browse to the shortcut file

Your Notes document will look like this:

Posted by Bodek Frak At 09:38:11 AM Location Windsor - U of W | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Category Lotus Notes and Domino 9
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I did not get a chance to attend Ed Brill's "Lotus Notes and Domino Strategy 2009" at the Lotusphere, but I did look at the slides from his session. There are some very exciting things in works. Some will be delivered in 8.5.1 (1st half of 2009?), some in 9.0

• Lotus Notes productivity enhancements:
  - Accept/decline meetings from Inbox preview pane
  - Drag e-mail to calendar to schedule e-mail
  - Easier (?) inclusion of vCard in e-mail signature
  - Right click on trash can icon to empty trash
  
• Directory Independence: "People" will no longer have to be stored in Domino Directory, they can come from Active Directory. Initially, only Active Directory will be supported but more may be added in the future.
  
• File Server Roaming for Mac and Linux clients will be added. Right now, it is only available on Windows platform.
  
• Integration with LinkedIn
  
• Domino Designer, now Eclipse based as of 8.5, will get new LotusScript and Java editors, both Eclipse based.
  
• Improved search - "Total Recall"? (Notes 9)
  
• Group Calendar (Notes 9)
  
• Big improvements to archiving, some in 8.5.1, some in 9, incl. cut-off date for archive files and turn-over to the new file, truncating messages and inserting a link to the archived document in the original copy, searching archives form the main mailbox.
  
  
  

Posted by Bodek Frak At 10:15:29 PM Location Windsor - U of W | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Category Domino Development Domino Administration Lotus Notes and Domino Issues
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I have just discovered an issue that I would like to share with other Domino developers and administrators.



The ACL of each database has a setting on the Advanced tab that specifies an action that should be performed by the server listed as the Administration Server on the ACL (the one with the gold key icon next to it) in the event of the user name change. I discovered that a default value for this setting is "Do not modify Names fields". This can create lots of problems if you use Readers or Authors (aka Names) fields in your design to restrict users' access to individual documents inside your application. When a user gets his/her name changed (marriage, divorce, etc.), the Administration Process task running on the designated Administration Server for your database updates his/her old name to the new name on anything that it can find, including the Names fields. However, with this setting configured to "Do not modify Names fields", the update will never happen and the user will be locked out of the documents he/she previously had access to. This is bad. Nobody wants that, I'm sure...

Another issue can arise if you do not have any server on the ACL designated as Administration Server, or if you designated a server that does not host a replica of your database. Your Names fields will not be updated even if the above setting was set correctly.

I would like to urge you to go through all the applications that you developed where you made use of the Names fields, or even restricted the access to views using view properly settings (security tab) and ensure that the ACL of those databases is configured correctly:

• always list one of the servers as the Administration Server
• make sure your database has a replica on that server
• make sure Administration Process is in fact running on that server (check with your admin)
• always set "Action" to "Modify all Names fields" to allow user names in Readers/Authors (and other) fields to be updated by the admin server when any user gets renamed.
  
  I will also suggest to IBM that they change the default value for this setting to make things easier for us.
  
  

Posted by Bodek Frak At 12:14:55 PM Location Windsor - U of W | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBacks (0)

Category Lotus Live
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Source: ComputerWorld Canada. Jan 20,  2009, IBM's Lotus in the cloud

LotusLive is a cloud-based integrated portfolio of social networking and collaboration services tailored for business that will be offered in a hosted, software-as-a-service model. (...) LotusLive includes tools for networking, e-mail, file sharing and Web conferencing. (...)

Various versions and bundles of LotusLive services will be rolled-out during 2009, tailored to specific verticals and markets. The first offering, expecting to ship in March, is dubbed Engage and includes Web meeting, network, instant messaging, file-sharing, charts, forms and activities tools. (...)

IBM acknowledges LotusLive and the SaaS model won’t be a fit for every business. While large organizations will be better served by optimizing their existing on-premise implementations, Poulley said IBM sees LotusLive being a money-saver for organizations in the 100 to 10,000 seat range, and organizations with so-called “boundary workers” that are often mobile or located remotely from the main office. For these business cases, Poulley said LotusLive can deliver the benefits of a large-scale implementation with the cost-savings of the SaaS model.

One member of the early adopter program for LotusLive is Toronto’s Nortel Networks Corp., which recently filed for protection from its creditors.

Posted by Bodek Frak At 09:10:52 AM Location Windsor - U of W | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Category Lotusphere 2009
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Posted by Bodek Frak At 07:49:15 PM Location Windsor - U of W | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Category Lotusphere 2009
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We had a few exciting announcements at the Lotusphere's opening session on Monday, Jan 19, which I was very lucky to attend.

• Jim Balsillie (Co-CEO of RIM) had some great news to share on the day that marked 10 years since the BlackBerry was born. The latest maintenance release of the BlackBerry Enterprise Server (BES) will offer support for Lotus Notes/Domino 8.5 which was released and officially launched only 10 days earlier at MacWorld (see this story).
• New Sametime client for the BlackBerry will offer several significant improvements over the existing one.
• Symphony (free open-standards office suite) will now be available on the BlackBerry devices.
• The 2 year old Quickr will also be available on the BlackBerry devices.
• Lotus Connections client will also be available on the BlackBerry device.
• XPages, a new feature in Domino 8.5, will be supported on the BlackBerry platform. This will be a nice alternative to the RIMs MDS. You can use XPages to give a new front end to your existing Domino databases/applications (nsf), and as long as your new page works in a browser, it will work on a BlackBerry device.
• What was known as Bluehouse, which was announced at Lotusphere 2008, is now available as Lotus Live (IBM's hosted software-as-a-service model). This seems to be IBM's response to Microsoft's Office Live. LotusLive includes tools for networking, e-mail, file sharing and Web conferencing.
• Lastly, IBM will now promote, distribute and offer support for OpenNTF.org , a move that was very enthusiastically received by the Lotus community.

Posted by Bodek Frak At 01:16:18 PM Location Lotusphere 2009, Lake Buena Vista, FL | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)