Lame. You're linking to a page about Lotus Notes 4.6. That version is so old, it's not even supported by Lotus. Even 5.0 has an end-of-life in May-2004. If you're going to talk about Lotus Notes, then look at version 6.0 or 6.5.

I linked to a page about an older version of Lotus Notes because I wasn't able to find a page with newer screenshots. I would have taken my own screenshots, but I didn't want to have to contaminate my home PC by installing Lotus crapware.

I have used Lotus Notes 6.0, and it is a thin UI veneer on the same old shit. Lotus Notes 6.0 STILL doesn't have proportional scroll thumbs! Lame.

Notes sucks. R5 sucks.

I ran down the hall and when I came back, Notes had decided it needed my password. It didn't give me any indication whatsoever why it needed my password...it just wanted to get it. (Rant #1).

Now, as it turned out, that Notes password did not have keyboard focus. Oh, it looked like it did, but it did not. So when I started typing, the characters were all going to whatever window DID have focus. Turns out I had a DOS box running with focus. Thank God my password wasn't "FORMAT C:", or I would have been mad enough to jump out a window. (Rant #2).

So I got focus on the Notes password window and entered my password. Then the password window went away. That's it. First it didn't tell me why it wanted the damned password, and one it got it, it didn't do anything with it. Jesus! How f*cking stupid is that?!? (Rant #3).

I wasn't sure what version I'm running here, so I went to the About box. It pops up a nice graphic. No buttons or anything. Lovely. I wanted to go back to Notes, but no matter where I clicked, I just got a beep. Turns out I had to click on the graphic to get it to go away. If the damned thing wanted a click to close, then why in the hell wouldn't you put a f*cking OK button on there or something?!? There wasn't one indication of what to do, and not only that, the one thing I had to do was the last thing I ever though of doing. (Rant #4).

And that sums up my opinion about the Notes UI...whatever you'd think it ought to do, it does just the opposite.

Arrrrggghhh!!!

I agree.

I have over 300 users and over 400 systems to manage for a company using lotus notes. My point is simply this: If the programmers, firmware and mechanical engineers and all others have a hard time learning how to do simple things like moving address books and archiving (who knows where it's going 30% of the time??) than the program is simply not practical.

The users who are good with it have used it for at least 2 years. That's a little too long of a learning curve especially when everyone's got better things to do than fill up the ticket que with IT requests asking for help with notes.

I've read lots of valid arguments as to "what" great things notes can do but none of the lotus fans want to offer a decent reason to explain the complexity the user is faced with. "They're just all stupid" doesn't cut it anymore.

Janet, R6 still suffers from many of the problems listed on that page. There are a whole host of new things that suck (i.e. the Meetings "tab" in Calendar not actually being a tab).

Well I don't want to fill the whole site with what I hate about notes (R5) but...Is it just me, or can't you advance to the next msg. while reading in the inbox without closing the msg you're in or clicking on something else? Very ANNOYING!. p.s. davey-bob, I'm with ya on that "about" box, pretty stupid. Also, if you don't have it configured to use from a browser all your users are screwed if they don't have their own box handy! Unless you go through this laborious process to move their user id. Yes Lotus Notes really does SUCK!

I've heard it said that Lotus Notes is, unfortunately, the best groupware product of its kind. I agree there are many Mail/Calendar improvements that need to be made. (btw, you can move to the next email message by pressing Enter, or to the previous message by pressing Backspace, and if you don't see a scrollbar you can just hit the right-arrow to make it appear in the view.) Something I really like, if you don't like something in the standard mail template, you can open the design and change it. We have many custom applications written for Lotus Notes. Some are polished and look very professional. Others haven't been changed for 4+ years, and they're terrible. Granted, those older apps still work and that's great, but they don't have any GUI features now available in version 6. Our administrators like some server-side features. Like how our mail server is clustered with 1 Windows2000 machine, and 1 Linux machine. Guess which server in the cluster goes down? And then there's the great security model that even works from "local replicas".... but I digress. The Lotus Notes interface is just weird compared to other Windows applications. F5 is for logoff? F9 is refresh?

Three years ago the private company I worked for sold out to a corporate giant. I'm one of the IT guys who helped migrate about a thousand people from MS Outlook to Lotus Notes R5 about a year ago. We had to align our company to our new parent company’s standard for messaging. Notes doesn’t use common logic for any functionality. I’ve been in tech support for 15 years and it took me two hours to figure out how to get a users missing toolbar back. When speaking to people that have been with our parent company their whole careers I’ve come across many so say they hate Notes. Calendaring and meetings are a nightmare for us and the IT corporate Gods decided to use a third party vendor for scheduling. UGH! Outlook did it all, Outlook had it all with familiar, user friendly functionality. The parent company is globally licensed for Outlook but won’t setup Exchange servers. They’d rather waste more money on an additional product, license it for over 500,000 people rather than use an application they already paid for that serves all the user’s needs.

Their logic is as messed up as the morons who created Notes.

> I’ve been in tech support for 15 years
> and it took me two hours to figure out
> how to get a users missing toolbar back.

And you call the creators of Notes morons?!?

the genius of notes is the stuff under the covers. the flexible unstructured data store. replication. security. the rapid application development environment. etc...

many people in the notes community have complained about the UI in the email application, developers and admin people. not just users. we know all too well the pain you guys are talking about.

but the email part of notes is an application, and can be customized. in other words, it isn't compiled like Outlook, it is an application just like any other Notes application that any developer might write. you can open it up in Notes Designer and look at the code. there are a few undocumented api calls here and there, but for the most part it is very standard stuff. although it is tightly integrated with the server in many respects.

not everything can be changed of course, but a lot can. some interesting stuff is going on at openntf.org - open source code for notes, and they have a mail template that is (imo) leading the way in terms of UI for Notes mail. in fact many of the improvements they have made are appearing in the new notes email UI in 6.x.

all that to say, Notes does not suck. the UI is not very intuitive for some things, for others it is as good as anything else. but it is getting better. with 6.5.1 there is presence awareness / chat built into the email application as well. which is way cool. a lot of neat stuff is happening around this technology. personally i'm quite happy to be using it and developing for it, and moreso all the time.

I defy any of you to show me a product with
a) the longevity of Notes
b) the cross platform support of Notes
c) the performance of Notes
d) the scalability of Notes
e) the distributed features of Notes
f) the security of Notes
g) the ease and sophistication of programmability of Notes
And if you can come up with such a product, show me the ways in which it is easier to use.

If you follow the link to the Interface Hall of Shame and wander round the site, you will find that lots of different pieces of software are condemned for bad design features. You will also see that that web site is pretty much as bad as the lists of software that it castigates.

Woo-hoo!! After our entire division complained long enough about Notes, we are moving to something that is is intuitive and functional...Outlook!!

Tell you what Bernard...you show me another product where the engineers are absolutely certain they've built the right thing, that the beauty is "under the covers", and where the engineers are as completely out of touch with their users as Notes engineers are, and I'll show you a product that people are moving away from...just like we are.

Let me expand on that a bit. I have this nifty tool. I can hook a plow up to it and plow my field. I can hook a cart up to it and pull stuff around with it. I can get onto it and ride it around, even up a hill. I can teach it tricks, like putting its front part up in the air. I can get a variety of attachments and accessories for it. Everything revolves around this tool...there is nothing I cannot do with it if I am willing to spend the time to understand how to use it. But I must accept any shortcomings in the tool because I can do anything with the tool.

Problem is, the tool is a freaking donkey!! It is temperamental. It is slow. It frequently falls over and refuses to move. The steering mechanism is too coarse-grained to be effective in all situations. And so on.

Can I plow a field with a donkey? Yes. Can I do it better with, say, a tractor? Hell yes! Can I dig a hole and pull the dirt away with a donkey? Yes. Can I do it better with a dump truck? Hell yes! Can I get onto a donkey and ride it around? Yes. Could I even put skis on its feet and ride it down a mountain? Yes. Is it going to work well? NO!

IMHO, Notes is a donkey. The engineers are so impressed with all the things one can do with Notes that they have lost sight of the fact that it doesn't many of them very well. There is a point where a one-size-fits-all-problems tool is good too have. But invariably, these tools break down in their common denominator approach to problems that are not always common.

Uh yeah. OK Davey Bob. It's just software.

Another one.

I have a CD in my drive. It's a music CD, but I'm not playing it right now. Don't want to. I go to Notes to check my email, and it prompts for my password. I type in my password, and Notes checks for new email, but doesn't find any.

Then MediaPlayer gets started, and my music CD starts playing. It does this all the time. Why in the world would Notes make the assumption that I want the CD in the drive to start playing just because I want to check for new email?!? Oh wait...I know. Because the Notes user experience is so pathetic, they play any music available in hopes of making the experience better. Yeah, that's probably it.

There are many things that suck about Notes, no question.

So, given the strength of feeling about it, I wonder why no-one has yet developed a worthy competitor? Preferably one that doesn't require Windoze.

As far as UI issues go, that iarchitects site is poorly put-together, mis-informed, and out of date. People in glass houses and all that...

I am one of the stupid end users who cannot stand Lotus notes. Why? Because no other tech companies support it - I cannot use a Sprint Treo because Sprint only supports 4.0 which causes a "memory leak" and crashes my system. The new Palm Zire 31 does not support it - just outlook. I know there are 3rd party software patches I can buy but it pisses me off that I have to use work arounds for notes.

How about a skin or seamless interface so I can run Outlook on my laptop and feed it via Notes? Then I could use Outlook and the cmpany doesn't know :-)

Joe: you can. Both Lotus and Microsoft make connectors for Notes / Outlook so that, for example, you can use an Outlook client to connect to a Domino box.

I just wanted to comment positively on Davey-Bob's insightful and funny analysis on why something that does everything but does none of any of it well can really suck the big one. Your comment should be incorporated into programming books as a canon of sorts.

And as for programs that can be modifed to do things better, the question remains -- why didn't they incorporate an interface to allow lay users to modify the program in a convenient and intuitive way -- and -- who actually will have the time to make all these modifications at a non-GUI level -- and -- why didn't they put in all these optimizations in, in the first place?

As for my gripe, I'm using Notes 5 and sometimes it tells me I have new mail but if I opt not to use the pop-up dialogue box, because I'm busy doing something like reading other mail, I can't click on anything obvious on the interface afterwards to bring the new mail entry up unless I exit the app and reenter it. I click on "Refresh" and sometimes it works, other times not. Sometimes, though, the new mail entry will show up on its own, which makes me a bit bewildered and also paranoid. Lotus Notes is inferior.

I will be laughing when, like all other outlook users, another virus hits your company big time and everyone is running all around trying to stop the damn thing from spreading your address book all around the world... BTW there is a product called Lotus Domino Access (iNotes) for Microsoft Outlook Home that lets you use Outlook with a Domino server. Notes is by far the best COLLABORATION tool around. If you're only using the email related functions of Notes, you are missing the most of what it can do. Collaboration is the keyword here. The integration with WebSphere and WebSphere Portal is giving another twist to this great tool.

We have been forced by our new parent company to move to "S"Lo"w"tus Notes .

Main gripes from users are

1. Lotus Speed its just too dam slow
2. PC's often require rebooting to access client
3. Poor UI
4. Crap address book
5. Replication not a patch on Outlook sync too complex
and the list goes on & on & on & on .
So what if its good for development of apps . As a mail client it's just bloody awful.

- "I'm busy doing something like reading other mail, I can't click on anything obvious on the interface afterwards to bring the new mail entry up unless I exit the app and reenter it"

Er, what about the *mail icon* in the bottom right hand corner of your screen? If that isn't "intuitive" enough, then... well.

- "PC's often require rebooting to access client"

Not here they don't. When it crashes, Notes 5 sometimes leaves errant processes behind (very annoying, but gone in 6.x). That still doesn't mean you need to reboot though. Just use one of the utilities out there to fire up Notes for you again (yes, I know, shouldn't need them, but still, there it is) or kill the process(es) yourself in Task Manager.

- "Replication not a patch on Outlook"

Now that's just plain funny. You surely aren't serious.

- "why didn't they incorporate an interface to allow lay users to modify the program in a convenient and intuitive way"

Well, to a point they did: it's called Domino Designer. But if that's too much for users, and it's just views they want to modify, or simple "agents" they want to create, users don't even need to use the design client. Notes lets them do it.

- "So what if its good for development of apps..."

Well, that's what Notes is *for* (repeat after me, it is *not* an Outlook competitor), so that's a ridiculous point to be trying to make.

Our company has used "Blotus Notes" for ~5 Yrs. It is the running joke of all our users, and even IS staff. It is bloated, slow, and crash prone. When we have to actually do work, or open 2 other programs, we must close Blotus first.

And Yes, the address book is lame, and the UI is awful. I won't even get into Websphere, and how God awful that product and expensive it is.

But I will say this about IBM... they have learned well how to market & sell their products.

Notes SUCKS
Our company had to develope a "Lotus Notes Force Termination" button due to Notes crashing at random times. But at least Notes forces the user to reboot at least once a week.
I will never say a bad work about Exchange again.
Sorry Bill

There once was a grave misdeployment
of software that caused disappointment
It could not interact as a matter of fact
in a way that would aid one's employment

Bloats proponents seem to argue that due to the fact Notes is powerful Groupware, good database, etc. that everything is ok. I would argue that perhaps that is good from an administration perspective, but on a day to day basis trying to use Notes an a calendering, to do list, email client is just awful. It is slow, the UI (whether configurable or not) is horrible and unintuitive, general windows standards (not only supported by microsoft) are not adhered to, the list goes on. To all the notes administrators out there that reckon it's a good program, I say look past the end of your own nose - survey your users.

We've run notes since version 3. It has always been stable and a great environment to work in. If you are having speed issues then someone in IT is not doing their job. Our mail template has been customized and works seamlessly with our 300+ custom applications. Notes mail is a basic solution, our calendaring is custom built to interface with the users' individual mail calendars. Every feature has been customized to unit specifics. If you need a dumbed down mail template then have one built. By all means if you only use notes for mail then migrate to an inferrior product. Otherwise, hire developers to do what notes was designed to do.

NOTES SUCKS!!

-End Of Comment-

NOTES SUCKS!!

-End Of Comment-

I guess the users here have forgotten all the crashes of their home computers due to the "blue screen of death". They seem to forget having to reprogram the blinking time on their VCRs or having to turn knobs on a TV.

Technology is a constant evolution and some will embrace it while others will fight it. Each step is a progression towards perfection. Why do you think there are always new upgrades?

I will tell you now that Notes whether you like it or not is there because people wanted and needed it. It has provided solutions where there were none. Other products may be better now but you can bet that they piggybacked on what Notes created.

Spend your time wisely and aim your complaints towards the software manufacturer. The squeaking wheel always gets the grease.

Jack above puts it rather succinctly.

Developer says that their "customised" mail template is great. My question is: Why don't Blotus provide a great standard template that isn't slow, that doesn't have non-standard functionality, etc.

Developer: ask your users this question- if you could use the software you run at home for email or Notes for email (note that I am not referring in any way to the so-called "database" functionality Notes has) that you use at work, which would you choose?

As a basic, non-technical user of Lotus Notes -- and head of regional PR / employee communciations for a large company -- I have to say it is the hardest to use, most counter-intuitive piece of software I have ever encountered. My employees hate it, the technicians / help desk people hate it (IBM employees!!) and my vendors hate it. I could go on and on about all the minor irritations and idiosyncracies of Notes -- especially the Frankenstein version our inmplated IBM tech people have cobbled together -- but bottom line: it's expensive, takes an inordinate amount of time for employees to learn and effectively use and drags down productivity. Half the time when something goes wrong with it, it requires a 'deskside' visit, which IBM charges $180 a pop for. When I ask sr mngmnt "why Lotus Notes" I get the response that there's too much invested in it (sunk costs) to change now or that it's "Shareware" -- whatever that is -- and that if only people would learn how to use it properly we would reap its true benefits.

My paranoid conspiracy theory: IBM makes a fortune off of help desk / desk side service charges, so it's to their advanateg to keep this horrendous software addicted to this horrendous software.

Just an opinion of a frustrated user.

Umm.. you guys, if you hate notes that bad. Then ask the IT dept to run POP3 and run the freakin outlook client.

Asking for password all the time? change your security settings. Could be a policy setting but more than likely it was set up that way at the beginning and needs to be changed.

Though I do agree that notes is a memory hog. It is slow. I wish they would create a "LIGHT" notes client that would just do email.

As a Notes administrator I find myself in the strange position of loving the server side (Domino) and hating the client. I know Domino is brilliant, I know there's NOTHING to touch it but I also know the client is pretty awful.

It's such a crying shame because so many people struggle so much with the client and end up hating Notes and lump Domino along with that.

The only way forward as I see it is to dump the client completely. Get users to pick up their mail using iNotes (Browser or Outlook) and move your applications over to being browser based.

The client is awful but the server is just brilliant. If you guys are struggling along with the client you'll just have to take my word for it. Theres nothing like a Domino server. It runs on practically anything, security is second to none, replication is slick as hell, clustering takes seconds to set up and is rock solid, the servers just run and run. I could go on and on here but just wanted to make the point that Domino (the server) is really really good and that's why a lot of people choose it.

Notes suck but as Bill Hume put it at Admin Developer UK, we all make some money from it. Nobody will disagree with Ben that the server, Domino, is outstanding. It is multiplatform and can handle tens of thousands of users concurrently and supports immensely important databases.

Why can't IBM get the client right? Easy, Ben should know as he works for a very anal retentive organisation that feels obliged to tell clients to upgrade to V6 but at the same time will force IBM to continue supporting R5 because they don't want any change for changes sake. Catch 22. We want great things on the client but big corporates, which pays for the BMW's in IBM, steadfastly refuse to budge on simple issues such as upgrades to the next version. There ARE NO technical reasons not to be on V6 these days but ask the big guns if they are and lame excuses like retraining etc etc comes out.

Why do people not like the V6 client and databases. Easy again, the best feature of Lotus Notes is that anything can be customised and the worst feature of Lotus Notes is that anything can be customised. If you have quality guys like Ben and Mike and many more you're Notes investment will not only pay for itself but also give you the competitive advantage while at the same time being slightly more pleasing on the eye. If you don't have quality guys or developers that insist on deploying the r4 look and feel then you will also say Notes suck cause it can and does in the wrong hands.

What is the answer?

Easy again! Bill Hume showed the eclipse client AKA Lotus Workspace in action, live, displaying his mail file and a database. This is bigger than anybody imagines at this stage. The only person that seem to be able to navigate the IBM marketing quagmire is Andrew Pollack that in one enlighten moment explained the whole Lotus Workplace mess by describing it as the IBM UNIVERSAL RICH CLIENT IE, a better browser! Eclipse gives us the ability to completely customise the user experience, the notes client really, while still using the great databases on the excellent Domino servers. So, if YOU don't want Notes to suck anymore take a keen interest in IBM Workplace Client Technology - Rich Edition, read Andrew's blogs about the stunning technology and push your organisations to start some pilot projects to look at deploying Domino databases using the IBM UNIVERSAL RICH CLIENT (Andrew has started a campaign to get IBM to rename IWCT RE to what it should be)

How will this help?

We all know the server is great. There is nothing quite like it and with Version 7 and DB2 it is even better. The Notes client sucks and as I suggested above IBM would rather not annoy the 130 million users of Notes so no radical changes will ever be made to the Notes client. IBM Universal Rich Client gives us the ability to completely change the look and feel of the information without reengineering the apps. Hooray for the IBM Universal Rich Client. Notes no longer sucks!

Most complainers are looking for an email client. If that's all you want, why would you use Lotus Notes?

If you want robust features and rapid application development -- some slick ones I might add -- then get Lotus Notes and SAVE money. I can run Lotus Notes on Linux, Windows, AS/400 and I don't have to upgrade hardware every time there's a new release.

Any machine that meets the requirements for Windows 2000 or XP should have NO problem with Notes being slow, or care much about the memory. I've got a test machine thats a 700mhz cpu and it's not that bad. Or maybe it's that you admins who hate Domino haven't got your server's runing right. My default installation, with no tweaking, has sub-second response time for mail users.

In terms of memory, have you looked at what other apps grab? My IE is currently holding 28 MB of RAM. For 1 browser window! Excel 2000 grabs 19 for 1 simple spreadsheet. Word 2000 grabs 12 for 2 one page documents. Crystal Reports grabs 33 just to get started.

And the best reason in the world to run Domino servers with Notes clients: Exchange and Outlook are virus havens. The cost savings to a corporation in not getting the next great virus that comes along is worth all your complaining.

Only saw one person mention the support personnel needed for Bloats. Takes on average 3:1 over what Exchange requires. Yeah the domino server might be slick but taking that many people to support it doesn't fly from a budgetary / management perspective.

Not being able to automatically deal with multiple time zones in calendaring is a serious shortcoming. Oh sure someone will come up with some slick way of dealing with it in Notes but I'd point out that Exchange/Outlook do it automatically. How many meetings have you missed today because of Bloats???

Damn, I've been a Domino admin for the last 3 years and I do say it's crap. I mean IBM made "Zap Notes". Have a look at it, IBM knows Notes is crap, that's why they had to make this application.

Go ahead, look for it, it's made by IBM.. ;)

Peace

I have over 10 years experience in Lotus Notes development and admin, so I know what I'm talking about. I have worked with versions 3,4,5 & 6. Being a consultant, I am a technical whore (billrates used to be good) and will work on whatever is required by the client, which can be good and bad.

In the case of Notes ... that's bad. I have experience in several technologies and platforms. I thank God everyday that I have finally shook off Notes and am now doing .NET/SQL for the last two years.

Plain and simple ... Notes is crap.

NO enduser likes it. That should be the end of the argument. Endusers learn to tolerate it. The UI is the most unintuitive thing ever invented and despite numererous releases (attempts) at making it a real UI, IBM has still managed to make this thing uncompetitive with the rest of the products on the market.

The MASS majority of the people that like this are one-trick pony developers and admins that don't know better. Some of them have experience in other technologies, but are not technically capable of understanding them. Many don't even have a technical degree, Notes was just something they picked up or went to a class and 'poof' they were a developer.

I have always contended that the hardest thing to learn about Lotus Notes was to pick up all the work-arounds around the limitations of the tool and environment. Hello???

And for anyone that still refers to this thing as a 'database' should have their heads examined. The database is just a frickin flat file, with a pretty poor indexing scheme.

Notes is dying a slow painful death because of the investment major corporations have put into this technology. They are basically stuck and can't afford to replace all the junk that companies are running their business on. However, the transition is occuring but will take several years.

If you are a Notes developer, I have one suggestion, pick up a book and retool. You'll be out of a job within ten years otherwise.

Later

Notes truly does suck. Read the post from Dick Fitzgerald. He is dead-on about this POS.

Those who think it is a crappy end-user app, but offers a good development environment are fools who have never worked in an actual development environment.

The damn thing was invented to leverage corporate investments in big iron on huge, rudimentary networks in the days before the internet (and a bunch of better solutions for delivering communications and applications over a wire).

Notes is a Frankenstein monster -- a bunch of features loosely stitched together, dragging its limp, nearly useless legacy around behind it. IBM keeps it around because it is easier than killing it.

Nobody wants this thing because it is good - its advocates are just trying to keep paying the bills despite thier obsolete skill sets.

I offer proof that LN sucks.

http://lotusnotessucks.4t.com/index.html

As a long time notes developer, I will agree that notes has it's frustrations but the rantings of some of you clowns really demonstrates alot about your "analytical" capability ... "Crap Address Book", "Poor UI"

It doesn't surprise me that a person that has a difficult time putting their password in would have a difficult time with anything more than just an e-mail client.

I have also noticed that many 'programmers, firmware and mechanical engineers' tend to have a difficult time with Notes, while most others are able to figure it out quickly. I don't think it means that mechanically inclined people are stupid, or suck, it just must be a difference in the way their brains are wired.

Why is it that so many of the complainants here can't get past the basic concept that Notes is not just an e-mail client?

It's an application tool that happens to have a mail application. It can be used for mail but that's a secondary purpose.

I've worked with Notes for over 5 years, and now work with other technologies such as PHP/SQL/Java etc, and they all have their arguments, but for rapid application development nothing beats Notes, and it's in-built security features are outstanding too.

The fact that Notes/Domino can be used to create web apps negates all this crap about the UI. I've hardly written anything for the Notes client for years, and the mail client can be easily re-designed for a browser to improve the UI.

Get it into your heads people, Outlook is for mail, Notes is for software applications!

I was going to jump into this discussion, and as a Notes Admin/Developer for over 8 years you can guess what side I will be on, I love the product. But rather than a long rant I would just like to say that....

I have built applications that support thousands of users, both in the Notes client, and through a browser, and my customers have been very happy. Even Notes client apps can be easy to use and very functional, as long as you design them right (Like anything).

True the Notes client is bloated, yes it can be a processor hog, but apps designed correctly can be very functional, I wont defend the client much more except that if you need to take data on the move securely there is nothing better.

The Domino server thats a different matter, its pure class, clustering on different platforms, rock solid etc..

Now with Domino 7 we get an optional DB2 store ,and the IBM Rich Client, so peoples 2 major gripes (client and non-relational store) are sorted.

Domino has a road map through to Notes 9/10, and IBM have plans for it, Exchange, well just look at all the "tools" MSFT promised and NEVER delivered...

If you want just mail, DONT choose Notes, hell dont choose Exchange/Outlook, just use pop and Firebird.

If you want SECURE, STABLE, application development, and collaboration... Choose Notes/Domino

Whoa! This thread has been going on forever. That should tell you something. Yes, Notes does alot of things, but the primary day to day needs are email and calendaring. This is the portion of the program that people live in. Here are a couple of glowing problems:

1) highlight a group of messages, drag and drop to folder or archive (impossible)
2) Calendar entries along with attachments go against quotas
3) removal of repeating meetings causes corruptions
4) folder compression does not take place immediately
5) quota hits do not allow you to send mail from web interface, and you won't be released from the quota until a compression is run.

and on and on and on.

This program has serious usability lapses that take away from someone's ability to do their job. A simple pop3 email server, and a basic calendar application would serve better. As far as a location to store and track projects, I believe a blog would serve as a better place for that, or in the past this was accomplished through newsgroup servers.

I hope the rumor is true, that our company is switching to Exchange. The funny thing is that I believe Exchange to be bloatware, but it does not even come close to Notes.

I've been developing in Lotus Notes/Domino for about five years now. I am happy to admit that the Notes client has some extremely bizarre and useless "features" - many of which are stated here.

However, many of them are ill-founded. A lot of people on this board are asking Notes to be something it's not. When I first started developing with Notes, maybe I didn't have enough training or experience, but I made some stupid mistakes. Now I am at a stage where I can write a very complex application in a very short amount of time.

I can integrate the application with email with little effort, interface with our DB2 systems easily, and provide a stunning interface to the users.

None of this would be possible if Notes' architecture was not as it is - the whole views, documents, folders idea. If it didn't work like this, sure you might have a simple email program ... but you'd be missing out on so much more.

Notes Sucks. Repeat after me, Notes Sucks. Database? You must be kidding! If Notes is a database, then notepad that ships with windows is a database.

I work for a 10,000+ corporate that extensively uses Lotus Notes (we are still on V5!). My main job is web development, and I must say, LOTUS NOTES can be ok for quick application development, but, in the main, it's RUBBISH!

There are better technologies out there and I can't believe that any company would adopt Notes unless it's given for free (in fact they should pay you!) aaaaah, I have spent HOURS making Domino render HTML and even more finding out how to send HTML emails into Notes. aaah. I have Lotus Notes!

I have used notes now for over 10 years. I have development massively in it. i really like Notes, but i hate what has become of it. someone mentioned the F5/F9 thing. after years i still mess up and lock myself out, would it have killed them to switch to the windows standard. I wish that they had bothered to redesign it. the designer is a joke. And the Single thread of the UI. Ever Do a File open database in the client, and CTRL+TAB to developer, you cant. One thread for all. And for years the adding and adding of new stuff. As a developer I know is much handier to write a new section of code as opposed to fix something. but did they have to do this as a major development strategy for the last 7 years. i really wish they would spend 2 or 3 years, and just redo the whole thing.
Though lookout, if you think notes is bad, wait until your manager comes in and says he just bought a really exciting new groupware product, WORKPLACE. ha after a few weeks you will be singing songs of notes, and the good old days.

Also the word database is used a bit too much. A notes database is not relational, it never was meant to be, its documents not records.

I don't care what the back end is like! All I know is the client sucks- it is slow and user un-friendly and filled with useless information the user doesn't need to know about. I'm a developer and would be laughed at if I wrote an application for "in house" use that was so clunky.

Lotus Notes sucks. The only reason my company keep using it is because they spent too much money on it. It's an email client.. there shouldn't be any learning curve. When I first start using notes, i had to look through all the options just to find how to attach documents.

gmail all the way! Google, now that's a company that can innovate.

ben poole: i'm surprise there are people like you out there. i haven't meet a person that actually like notes.

"Outlook is for mail ... Notes is for software applications."

I agree. Unfortunately, IBM keeps selling Notes to corporations (like mine) where 90%+ of the users are only using it for mail ... and it's too slow and confusing for that use. I used to respect the label IBM before we got Notes.

Notes is like using a backhoe to dig your pool; and then keeping it around to pull up dandelions (let the flames begin about my simile).

Notes/Domino provides my company with an extremely productive and flexible business collaboration and communication platform that incorporates as solid an e-mail server as I have worked with, a perfectly acceptable email client with Notes version 6.5+, a very capable web client with Domino Web Access along with the ability to support most other e-mail clients that are out there. And I firmly believe Domino provides a more secure and reliable location for our semi-structured data than just about anything available.

We have one Domino server for applications and it has hundreds of databases on it, each one cataloged, each one access controlled, each one indexed where required (and the index maintains access rights) and each one able to be replicated onto another server or a Notes client for off-line use with just a couple of mouse clicks. All of our other similar data sits on a 'collection' of file and web servers largely acting as islands of data with little or only very basic security. These islands have been cobbled together by a variety of developers who have shown how little business or strategic knowledge often exists within IT staff and how short term an approach is often taken.
With Domino you have the option to purchase off-the shelf solutions, develop things in house, tweak what comes in the box or exchange data with external systems in many different ways. As has been said many times here already if your company is using Domino/Notes just for e-mail and has no plans to utilise the many strengths it as a collaboration and information management environment then by all means have a moan but try and keep things in perspective since your complaint really ought to be with your company or its IT dept. Those companies using Domino properly see e-mail as just one part of an integrated set of software applications that should be there to help staff do their job well.

By preference would I run Notes on my PC at home for e-mail. No chance. By preference would I ever again want to run Outlook/Exchange and a collection of web, sharepoint, sql etc servers and try to deliver sustainable secure business applications that deliver business benefits and roi. Hell no.

I use ticketing, email, calendar, and database functions of LN, all day, every day. In fact I even get a random red error box that pops up on my screen at 3:35 every day, that forces me to shut down my computer. Does anyone know why this happens, of course not. It's realy commical when I'm on the phone with a client. What's even better is that my email refuses to refresh itself like it's supposed to, or when a ticket straight up vanishes. However, I must say, if it wasn't for the crashing, the breaking, the tempermentalness, the searching that crashes, the lack of support for it, the fact that only IBM will allow it on their machines, the random loss of data, then I'd love it.

I just now read Perry D's message about the blue screen of death. I'll admit that it was a huge problem with Windows. That is why Microsoft fixed it. They reengineered windows and now brought you WindowsXP. They gave up on adding another patch or version of the crap that kept breaking and figured out a way to make it solid.

I think many of the problems with notes stem from the notes administrator. Every person that walks in my office with a task, he wants to build a freaking database for. Since they are not relational databases at all, it's like we are back in the days where companies had 50 access databases all over the place. And our admin thinks the product is so great when it crashes a system, he blames the system.

So here is a few of my favorite notes 6X features.
1. In your inbox hit f6 and then press your over arrow keys....why? How lame is that?
2. Personally I like the fact that I have notes check for new mail every 15 minutes, only to see that I have a new message, read it, delete it, and be notified 10 minutes later that I have new mail. That's a great feature.
3. It's so secure that someone can keep 10 copies of their id files and depending on which one the notes.ini file is looking for, it needs a different password.
4. With Lotus Notes, the cumbersome days of resetting users passwords are a thing of the past. I mean, right click reset password? What administrator could remember that? With Lotus Notes, you simply call up the user, ask them what they set their original password to 7 and a half years ago when they started, you copy that password file onto their computer replacing the forgotten password, and the user is back in business quick and easy, and the best part is, no one had to remember anything.
5. Don’t you hate when you hit the printer icon and something prints right away? I mean, how many times do you really want to print with the default settings? 8.5 x 11??? With Lotus Notes, the print icon does the same thing as going to file, print. Now that’s consistency.

Jim you're a legend! You have summed up my frustration with notes extremely well! I would like to add a point however- why is it that notes admins, etc. excuse the crapness of notes by saying it's not an email application? If it's used for email, with an inbox then it's an email application, so why must it be utter shit? why can't it be useable? why must you click remind me when you set up a reminder (it's a reminder!)? I could go on, but I don't think my fingers can handle the pressure typing about such a shit application.

Maybe slightly off topic, though still thinks its relivant. Anyone using Groove net? The Ray ozzie brain child? It looks good and it looks the way notes should have been redesigned to be. Just curious if any of the notes haters would see Groove net, and say, "well actually that fixes those problems I have".

As I say, just out of curiousity.

Well, I am in the minority here. But from what I have been reading it sounds like most of your issues are caused by poor implementation from IT staff who do not know Notes well enough to support it. Additionally, Preference settings and policy settings will pay a large role in how your notes client behaves.
At our company we have 2 Notes developers who do the support and app dev for our 650+ employees. Humm, perhaps we have done it right? Yes, the mail client is not as robust as Outlook and the address book may be less then desirable, but it's GROUP WARE, not E-MAIL and CONTACT MANAGEMENT.

A word of advise... Do not customize the mail template.

It's really quite sad to read all of these comments from supposed IT "professionals". I'm amazed that the majority of these commnets knowingly refuse to see beyond the "Notes is not just email" factor.
Sure Outlook may look prettier, but to reproduce the functionality of one Notes database could take up to 5 different MS applications. How's that for value for money?
And by the way a database is defined as "A collection of data arranged for ease and speed of search and retrieval". In no way does it have to be relational.
And if you are whingeing about things like entering passwords and preference settings, get a clue and investigate them. It's not that hard it's just a menu option...you know something similar to "Tools...Options" as in any MS app.

Brad Stammers,

It's really quite sad to me that notes developers, ibm employees, etc. use the "just because outlook is pretty doesn't mean..." argument. I am not comparing notes to outlook, what I do say is notes is crap from a front end user perspective. I work in IT and would like to explain from my perspective what notes looks like to me (please understand I am not referring simply to email I am talking about interfaces to notes, eg. email, calendaring, to do, help, "databases" designed with notes interfaces)- it appears to me this is an application that could do with a complete rewrite. My first impression of notes six years ago using 4.something and now using 6 is the same: it looks like an application written and fixed, corrected and updated on the fly, an application that has had no thought put into the development of interfaces (a common just get it done approach found in many small IT teams where pushing product out the door as quickly as possible is the only priority). People like yourself can continue to argue that it is fantastic because administration is so simple, etc., but until IBM takes a long hard look at the front end people will continue to complain about its crapness. I agree with your definition of a database, but do not agree that notes is a database of speed. If you think that notes is a database of speed then notes and access are possibly the only "databases" you have used.

Finally !! I am free of lotus notes!! Gone I tell you, Gone!!! I've even got outlook using the address book on our notes server!! Gone are the days when i want to attach a file, double click a shortcut and LNs attached the shortcut!! Gone are the days when a crash means completely restarting my whole computer.. Gone are the days when all you can hear is STUPID LOTUS NOTES!! Follow this link, to my friends at the Mighty Microsoft, and install the software http://office.microsoft.com/en-gb/assistance/HA010739021033.aspx

Is it called Domino because it falls over with the smallest nudge?

David,

Fortunately I have a wide range of exeprience in a multitude of applications and systems. Without a doubt every application and system has trade-offs...i.e. may be deficient in one way but superior in others compared to a rival. The thing is though that the comparison is usually between comparable products.
Most professionals handle this with a degree of objectivity and can debate the differences rationally. Then we enter the Microsoft world where dissension is ridiculed and no-one dares utter anything positive for a rival. People seem to conveniently forget how ridiculously buggy and bloated any software from MS has become, not to mention that backwards compatibility between versions is almost non-existent...probably to force total upgrades an get more bucks.
It's all well and good complaining about the front end, but in the long run is that really more important than functionality? I think the major problem that people have is that it doesn't look like Outlook, which is really just a user training issue.
In my experience, people who have been properly trained on using Notes have no beefs with it at all. Add in the fact that once they have these basics under their belt, they can understand how to use most other databases simply, then it really is a better user experience all round.
Custom Notes databases don't need to look like the standard ones...they can come in any shape or form at all. There is very little you can't do with it, and the added bonus is that it is very little extra work to push it to a browser.

Version 6:

1. Open Calendar
2. Click New
3. Click Reminder
4. Type Reminder
5. Set time for 7am
6. Select Repeats
7. Repeat Reminder every day for one month
8. Click OK
9. Reminder set every day
10. Day one- reminder pops up at 7am
11. Day two- reminder pops up at 7am
12. Day three (in late- hangover)- log into notes at 8am get late reminder.
13. Day four- no reminder
14. Day five - no reminder
15. Day six - no reminder
16. Get the picture?

Yes I'm bitter, and it's not because I'm at work at 7am either! Lotus notes is the suckiest program ever designed... It probably has good features, but the suckiness outweighs any good features three billion fold. Every time I notice something crap about notes I will post it (can I type that fast?) and I dare any notes admin out there to counter it- come on, any of you three guys!

Version 6:

1. Receive email
2. Double click on email
3. Wait ten seconds
4. Read email
5. Click delete
6. Receive message "Notes cannot instantiate UI document"

Thanks for that notes.

Version 6:

1. Right click on message tab
2. Click open in new window (so can alt tab between two messages)
3. Successfully (a word not mentioned much in notes cnversations) alt tab between emails
4. Close email opened in new window
5. Original window exits back to "welcome screen"

Fantastic...

Version 6:

1. Notes "new email" sound and icon appears in system tray
2. Check email
3. Oooh- there's two emails!
4. Read email one
5. Read email two
6. Go back to work
7. Notes "new email" sounds again and another icon appears in system tray
8. Check email
9. Nothing there- oh, that's right... Notes was telling me about the second email I have already read- how wonderful is this software.

I am really starting to feel that notes is the best software around- if it wasn't for notes, then what would I do with my time? My life would be so empty with nothing to complain about...

I must admit to being more impressed for it. I've even recommended it to all my friends.

Version 6:

1. Send important email to a number of people on Friday morning asking for response on something by Monday
2. Arrive at work Monday morning
3. Over the weekend notes has sent an "out of office" reply to me from one of the people on the email I sent Friday
4. Realize I won't get my answer by Monday and now it's too late to do anything about it
4. Ask myself some questions: Why doesn't notes send out the out of office replies within a few minutes (even hours would be good)? Why is notes so shit?

Well i've been happily using Outlook again for a few weeks. (thanks to the Notes / Domino Connector from Microsoft see above) It's not great because I've always used outlook, it's not great because i have bias towards microsoft software. It's great because during the development of outlook, it's plain to see that proper usubility testing has been carried out and this has been taken into account when creating better designs and functionality. Notes really is hard to use - ive just read a blog above here telling us that it takes up to 2 years (!) to completely learn the system. This, my friends is madness. A truly intuitive software program (especially as simple as an email client) should be immediately usable. Training?! It's being used as an email client for god's sake, please. So, all you notes systems managers are you really so convinced of Note's simplicity? Do you really believe what you're saying or are you scared? Scared that if your company forgets notes then they won't only be making a time / cost saving in support time, but also a saving in redundant Domino Server engineers? Oh and one last thing: Microsoft Outlook Security! Yes all those notes managers who claim notes is more secure than Outlook... Well, who really knows if this is true? There are so few viruses and hacks at the moment targeted directly at the notes platform that you can sit there blissfully unaware of some shocking risks - no doubt discovered by Microsoft and fixed in Exchange Server years ago ha ha. For outlook, just run Windows update - you notes managers know how to update windows, right?!

Task: Save mail attachments to a new folder.

OUTLOOK:
1 Select message
2Select File-->Save Attachments-->All Attachments
3 In the fileopen dialog box, browse to correct directory
4 Click "Create New Folder"
5 Save files in new folder

NOTES:
1 Open mail message with more than one attachment.
2 Right click first attachment and chose "Detach All"
3 Bang head in frustration as there is no "Create a new folder icon"
4 Click Cancel
5 Right click first attachment and chose "Detach..."
Now you have the standard windows openfile dialog box...
6 Browse to desired folder
7 Click "Create New Folder"
8 Click Cancel
9 Right click first attachment and chose "Detach all"
10 Browse to new folder
11 Click OK

Why in the hell is there a different dialog box for "Detach..." and "Detach all..."? WOW Love the consistency here!!!

And for the people praising the backend and saying that Notes is not supposed to be a really good email program, it's the OTHER features that are so cool.... WELL OUR BOSSES HAVE DECIDED THAT THIS WILL BE OUR EMAIL PROGRAM! We don't get to choose! And Yes, 90% of us have no other use for notes besides email (and for occasionally forgetting our calendar appointments and reminders). Unfortunately some of our companies just aren't as enlightened as yours in the wonders of the ass-end (DONKEY?) of Domino/Notes...

Richard Baxter,

Who really knows if Notes is more secure ??? anybody who actually can use it !!.

Even if you are stupid enough to launch a file attachment that may be suspect, you will immediately be prompted with an execution security alert with yet another confirmation on executing it.
I'm fairly certain that Outlook won't do this...this sounds like an extra layer of security to me.
I won't go into the rest of Domino security...too many feeble brains here. If they can't even cope with non-MS menu structures their brains might melt down with any actual technical concepts.

Brad S,
You take the piss out of users by saying "can't handle non MS-menu structures".
How about addressing some of the bugs that have been mentioned here? Or are applications with "non MS-menu structures" exempt from scrutiny?

I'm not saying that the application is perfect...far from it. No software application on the market is perfect and bug-free.
My main objection is that people are highlighting relatively trivial issues as world-stopping problems, yet are prepared to forgive Outlook for similar issues.
Also, the primary reason for complaining is for visual and layout differences from the MS norm, and not on areas of functionality. And even when there are complaints about areas of functionality, it's primarily that the functionality is different, not necessarily worse.
I will agree that there are a few things Outlook can do that Notes can't, but on the other hand is anybody here willing to admit that Notes can do a hell of a lot more than Outlook?
At the end of the day, if you can send and receive email and schedule meetings, anything else is just window dressing as far as email is concerned.
If you're looking to go beyond that, then Notes is far superior to Outlook.

yeah, i don't know anyone stupid enough to run a .exe from an email attachment in outlook either. (I really don't think either would allow those through at either the server or client ends to be fair.)

Also, I don't know anyone clever enough to run an attachment from notes hahaha (sorry that was a bad joke)..

I'm feeling generally more relaxed of late about the whole issue - i've not used notes for ages now. In my travels though i've met many people who feel the same way about having to use the notes email client.

"It's total rubbish!" is what they say. "Stupid Lotus Notes!".. over and over and over and over again..

I just don't care anymore.. Also it must be said that the newer version 6(?) mail file, the one that changes the look and feel of the UI does improve a lot of the very basic failings of notes. Someone showed me how to do this but hell, i don't think i can remember how to do it now because the process seemed a bit weird - lots of strange inconsistent menus and completely unintuitive options to select... I think a lot of notes managers have chosen to keep this quiet because the influx of calls relating to new crazy notes processes would cripple them..

Let's analyze a comment posted here:
Brad says, "...people are highlighting relatively trivial issues..."
Obviously, Brad, because Notes had such wonderful "security" and "scaleability", in your mind it should be forgiven for not reminding people of meetings that have been entered into the calendar, not showing repeating reminders for some unknown reason, continuing to use rules that have been deleted, etc... This is like saying my car is the best ever even though it has no engine, because you can't break in to it. The security might be really tight but if the application is not fit-for-purpose then surely the security is useless - please don't patronize people by saying they are simply pro-microsoft or this is not primarily email/calendering (if it's provided it should work, simple).
Finally, I think it is telling that this site is ranked second/third in Google under the exact search term "Lotus Notes Sucks", and there are another 700-odd sites listed. Amazingly, typing "Lotus Notes is the best product ever" only lists one site and it is actually a site detailing how crap notes is. Enough said.

David,

"not reminding people of meetings that have been entered into the calendar, not showing repeating reminders for some unknown reason, continuing to use rules that have been deleted, etc"

Obviously you haven't created your meetings correctly. The mail database gives you all the functionality to do this, but if you haven't done it properly the immediate reaction is "this software sucks". Try getting some training...in fact try RTFM, it works wonders in resolving all these pesky little issues.

Intestingly enough you ask me to stop patronising people by calling them pro-Microsoft, yet the inverse happens throughout this entire board with regards to Notes specialists. Also no-one has responded with an ascpect of functionality that Outlook has that Notes doesn't. Care to add any?

You need training to use an email program?

If there needs to be training in order to use email and calendaring then its probably safe to say there are issues with this software...

If Notes where a car...
If you know how to drive a car it doesn't matter if you sit down in a jaguar, volvo, ford or a truck - you know the basics.

Then you sit down in a Lotus Notes - the break pedal is to the right, the gas pedal to the left, the steering wheel is where the stickshift use to be and works but in reverse, and so on.
What a success!

Sort by subject, Keyboard shortcuts inline with other applications, Key board shortcus to forward or reply to an email message, Multiple signature lines, User definable (e.g. without training) inbox rules. Mail messages opening in a new window by default. being able to delete a message that is in the preview pain even though i have it open in another window. Adding a from title to the address book, pictures of contacts, integrate with MS IM etc etc

The lotus notes help is so helpful. Here are two examples:

First:
Recovering your userid

If you lose your User ID, damage it, or forget your password, you can recover your User ID as long as your administrator(s) set up recovery information for you. If you are not sure whether your User ID can be recovered, check with your administrator.

*How do you damage your userid???

Second:
I want to get notes to prompt me to issue a return receipt to the sender of an email if the sender has requested one- just like any other email program can do. I look in help. Gloriously I find the section titled Return Receipts. The only help I get is what it is and how to add one to an email.

RTFM??? How about WSFDS (Write some ******* decent software)...

I find most of these complaints amusing because many of the things you complain Notes doesn't do, it can, or things it shouldn't do, you can turn off. It's seems like 90% of the complaints you have are caused through not knowing how to use Notes properly, or your Administrators are poorly trained.

To which you reply, Notes should be easier to use! Yes and that's the same complaint I hear from people who buy PC's and expect it to be like their Television, you plug it in and it works without having to understand it. But as you know, PC's are not like that, there's so much more than can do than a TV so of course they can't be as simple. Then why can't you understand that Notes is the same, it's so much more powerful that you have to actually make an effort. But no, most noobs just cry "It's crap" as an excuse, and that's all it is on their part, Ignorance.

I'm sure Notes has some fantastic features. I have to use Notes for email and calendar because my business invested in Notes many moons ago and obviously cannot justify the cost to now drop it. From where I sit, the email and calendar functions are deficient in UI and usability- I don't think I need to list anything, because many people have done that before me. I think the payback's analogy makes sense, but there is also another way of looking at it:
I can use a wordprocessor, therefore I can use the everyday functions easily of any wordprocessor, eg. word, openoffice, amipro, etc. I may have to learn the specific "extras" of each package, but I can easily get by with no training whatsoever. When it comes to sending an email and the associated settings I can use Eudora, Outlook, etc. but when it comes to Notes everything is different. I think this is because the UI and usability were give a nanosecond of thought after the product was finished.

Payback,
Tell me how I get notes to prompt me, if an email has a return receipt, with "Do you want to send the return receipt?"
If this is not a standard notes feature, doesn't that mean your argument falls over?

Payback,

Even though your line of reasoning makes perfect sense to most people, you won't get any rationality here.
Virtually without exception every person posting here cannot wrap their heads around the fact that email is an application database that sits on top of the Notes client. As such it needs to follow the standards set in the Notes client that are used by other, far more complex application databases. Changing some of the functional aspects solely to suit the mail database would be counter-productive as that is only a small fraction of what Notes is used for.

And to Sense, the basic functionality of any word processor is to create a document and format the text correct? so that implies that the basic functionality of an email client is to create, send and receive email as well as calendar entries. Are you saying that Notes is too difficult to use because you can't do that simply?

Brad S: You're right! How could those millions of complainy-pants loser users out there be so stupid. If only you came in "wizard" format!

My company switched to Lotus Notes last year. Let me say, I am in absolute AWE of just how bad this thing is as a mail client (which is all I use it for - I couldn't care less what else it can do).

I have lost more data to Notes in the past month than I have to all other mail clients I have used since I started using mail clients in the mid 80's.

I honestly do not think there is *even* *one* *single* engineer in my entire company who likes this. Maybe, just maybe, that's a sign that something is wrong with it. Upper mangement got conned into buying it, apparently. The rank and file engineers loathe it.

But hey, if a few hundred people, many with PhDs, some of whom have been using email for more than 20 years now all hate this thing, it must be their fault, right? They must all be stupid. It couldn't possibly be that LOTUS NOTES SUCKS.

Coming from Outlook and going for Lotus Notes is like leaving a Toyota for a Lada...
I can't believe how bad is this software. Probably made for the people who created it. User-hostile I call it.

Here we are again talking about Lotus Notes. We have just recently upgraded from RC5 to RC6.5.1 and I would have to say that the UI is better then the last but still not great. Notes is one of those things that if you have a Domino admin in place forever then it works "ok". Get rid of the admin and move somebody else in and have him try to figure out what changes the last admin had made and you our in for a large bucket of shit.

Lotus Notes is the only thing that has prevented us from upgrading our AS/400 system it seems and it does run on everything. That is not to say that it runs on everything "well". I do have the same issues with slowness that I never did with exchange/outlook and that sometimes I will get a new email popup and there will be no email there. I hate having to refresh all of the time and I wish that Lotus could run on POP3 because I hate IMAP. I just hate the admin side of it. There could be problems with the archive feature within someones account on the client and it cannot be fixed since it has to do with "account" so their frickin account must be recreated in Domino.

Notes does give us to many choices and functions we can setup and I do agree that if you only want an email system then exchange\outlook is the way to go. I want to know all of these apps. that are great and can be wrote with the help of notes that could not have been written within something else. You do have better security in Notes and that is a fact but once Exchange comes out with its Longhorn "Vista" server solution then so will outlook. If you are a Windows shop then I recommend Outlook but if you are running an AS/400 or something to that effect then Notes is really your only choice for something that works (sometimes) without upgrading HW or OS's

Anyway you take it or use it Lotus Notes is probally here to stay for awhile since so many large Corporations have dumped huge amounts of money into this email monster that it just isnt viable to turn back. You can make the switch however but if you are talking 5,000 notes accounts then I would start looking for a new job before I took the conversion to Outlook on with that.

Either way I see it..........Outlook sucks due to security issues and the overall ability to not really do anything but email and Notes on the other hand gives us so much but takes so much from us. Either way we unfortunately have to spoon feed ourselves the amount of SHIT the Corporate boys give us.

Looks like Brad S and PayBack are battling it out for IBM employee of the year.

Brad S.,

"Database"?!?!?! Bahahahaha! See my earlier comment.

Only "developers" who have a vested career in Notes like it. EVERYBODY else hates it. Get a clue and wake up.

Dick

Correct............I said database but of course it is a true flat file system that so many mainframes loved to use back then.

Does anyone else get a bad taste in their mouth when even talking about Louts Notes? I sure do and it tastes like despair and hatred. Maybe IBM could transfer the flat file system to a 10G or compatible DB. They have the money to gobble a DB company up.

Jeeze where do I begin....well how about a simple one that irriates me once in a while.

I realy love the "handy" restore ALL button thats right beside the Restore button in the trash folder. Good thing, you never know when you might want to restore each and every one of the hundreds of items in your trash bin. Hours of fun figuring out which items you'd previously read and deleted.

Heaven forbid if you were able to do somthing simple like drag and drop the item you want ouside of the trash folder.

Every "pro-Noteser" posting on this site seem to have one thing in common: they all say "Notes was not meant for email". Well guys and gals, that's what everyone here is complaining about. Hardly anyone seems to be complaining about the back end or the collaboration of Notes they just hate it for email. Everyone that complains have got one thing in common: they all say "Notes email interface is crappy". Therefore, I'm not sure there is an argument. Notes proponents say "Notes is not for email", complainers say "I hate Notes for email".

Correct. Notes is not great for email but IBM bills it as that. "Great for email" which causes our VIP's and uppers to see that and say "Hey what a great email client" and then we have to implement it and use it. The argument is that IBM and the industry markets Lotus Notes as a Email Client/Server package. Now Notes contains allot of other erroneous crap to it but the email feature is its biggest feature that they market. So if you are going to choose that for the largest part to market it better be user friendly and not be a big pain in the ass. I dont know anyone in the Notes field of admins who actually use the back side of Notes for anything. Sure it may be able to be integrated with so many development tools and programs but for what? I still have never come up with anything that would be good to intertangle with Notes since the email client sucks and the calender interface makes me cry. The only thing I see to add would be to make changes to the email client part of it and if I am going to make programming changes to that then why even purchase Notes in the first place.

Notes is good if you want to run email on a AS/400 and it better be since the AS/400 is IBM's baby. That is the only viable reason I can see to run it or to even speak of using it. Plus it is a good find if you like to run the IMAP email protocol which makes me puke but whatever floats your boat.

James,
I agree with you wholeheartedly. I was just trying to point out that pro-Notes fanatics only argument for why Notes shouldn't be rubbished is because email isn't what it was originally intended for. This is a ridiculous argument, but seems to be all the Notes people can come up with, "Notes is crap at email, so if we say it wasn't meant to be an email client then everyone will stop complaining". This site has people posting for why they don't like Notes. To have Notes admins post and say "but it's good for the things no one ever uses it for" is patronizing in the extreme.

Notes Rocks!

As a Notes Admin for arround 10 years, I currently work for one of the largest user bases of Notes in the world (400,000 + seats.) The thing I hate most about Notes is that people just slag it off all the time and are all too willing to jump on the MS Bandwagon, who wrote in the rulebook that the MS way is the right way, so IBM do things differently, get used to it or go work for a company that uses MS Products, A well known CEO once said "Tap Water is free, so why then do people drink Evian?" consider Lotus Notes the Evian of Messaging, Outlook is the Tap water, Non portable, non Scalable, Inconsitent and prone to polution (Viruses)

>> As a Notes Admin for arround 10 years
You have my deepest sympathy- how your life has been wasted.

Microsoft Outlook: I'm sure that users the world over can take heart from your water analogy while they struggle to use lotus notes' crap interface to send an email...

Can any of you notes admin then tell me what my idiot notes admin is doing wrong.
We have users getting e-mails that are not addressed to them. So if we have a user named Bob Dole and his e-mail address is bdole@mycompany.com. Anyway e-mails sent to dole@mycompany.com go to him (if he is the only dole). I found out today if he is the only Bob in the domino directory then bob@mycompany.com would go to him too. My notes admin blames just spam in general, and our spam filter, but it would be easier for our spam filter if notes would only except e-mails addressed to the users EXACT e-mail address. Is that just what notes does, or is this a "feature" that can be turned on and off. If so I'd like to know why that "feature" is in notes to begin with. What benefit could ever come from allowing random names to go to the person. And more importantly if any of you notes experts can tell me how to turn it off.

bdole, this is what notes does at our company as well. such an extremely intuitive application, that it assumes djones@blah.com should go to ejones@blah.com because obviously the person sending the email does not know as much as notes does. couldn't someone sue ibm (was that international business machines or intentional bloody mess) for assisting spammers in this way?

LMAO.......this is the first time I have ever heard of Notes doing that by sending it to wrong people as well. That would be seen as a huge issue if dfran@whatever.com emailed the payrool excel spreadsheet to hsmith@whatever.com and it also went to fsmith@whatever.com and Frank Smith is a disgruntled employee who dumps it to everyone on someone elses account. Imagine all of the happy people in the office that day.

I am not an IBM basher or a Microsoft basher but I do think Exchange\Outlook is much better at email then Domino\Notes. I know that all of the Notes admins and I know a few and they love Domino but they still even say that the Notes client sucks. They agree that the client portion of it sucks and I ask them again what is the main purpose of Notes. Imagine my surprise when they say "Email". Now if email is the most important function and the client software sucks then why is Lotus Notes good. They always go back to saying how much they love domino. Well it is to bad that Domino cannot run and manage outlook clients.

If the only arguement is that Domino is great and the other part is crap then why by something that is 50/50 crap. Why not go to exchange where it might be be the greatest on either end but good enough that it is easy to admin and the users actually like using it because it is easy. That is why outlook was created to be an easy to admin and use email. Why cant IBM and Notes Admins get that point???

>> Why cant IBM and Notes Admins get that point???

James: I think IBM and Notes Admin don't get the point because they don't have to. IBM is well aware that the companies that use notes have a multi-squillion dollar investment in notes so they can't easily (or cheaply) dump it.

I'm happy to be proved wrong about notes. The notes admin don't address any of the concerns raised here though- they just say notes has great features, or it's better than exchange (maybe but not from the front of the store). Instead of moaning about how bad we are as users to dare and question notes, why don't these admins put the time into telling why all these bugs exist in notes.

i agrre.the admins are so hell bent on proving all their users are just morons shows how scared they are to face reality about this p.o.s...

John, I hear you. My corporation has dumped so much time, hardware, money, upgrades and administration costs that there would be no way to justify getting rid of it unless it just falt out stop working and no one could fix it. They got caught up in the trap that Notes was great (as you hear the echo from the Notes admin) and once they get it and it is still doing all of this crap..............slowness is terrible here and I dont know about anyone else's place of work but everyone hates Notes where I am at except for the admin that controls it.

It is pitifully slow here, unless you run it under citrix (then is only twice as slow as any other application to drag and drop). Running it under citrix, however, opens a whole 'nuther can of worms...

I can only imagine since I believe Citrix runs like windows terminal services where you are accessing the application physically on the server thru thin clients or client. The speed was way slow when we had RC5 and when we went to RC6.5.1 and it became even slower if you can believe that. I can say the the changes made in RC6 to speed up the application are about effective as a one arm, one legged man in a Twister game.

Whoever posted that Lotus Notes does not contain any security holes like Exchange is a liar, because you can find and IBM even posted holes and patches to the application. Look how many different versions of RC6 there are!!!!

Most Windows-based software (microsoft or otherwise) seems to be designed by people who are concerned with product usability. Lotus Notes seems to be designed by someone with a PhD in urinary tract infections.

Notes sucks. Nothing is EVER easy. Things that are simple to do on every other platform are arduous tasks with Notes. A user deleted her ID file the other day, and we restored her old copy. That ID file wouldn't work, so we spent all day screwing around with it, trying to get it to work, trying to re-certify it, etc. We ended up having to delete it. Over a deleted ID file. I have an idea: How about a button in Domino Administrator labeled "Regenerate ID File." I guess that'd be too complicated.

I feel your pain Matt. I always read networkworld and the head of the Notes division has just left and the new one takes his place soon and they are not even for sure what to do with Notes yet. It also gave a number of 120 million people are using notes worldwide. I feel sorry for each and every one of those poor souls. If I ever get the chance to drop this Domino platform then it will be gone in a milisecond.

Here is the link to the article.

http://www.networkworld.com/news/2005/111405-lotus.html?t5&story=111405-lotus

I just started consulting for a $30 bil company and had to start using Notes. On the 2002 laptop they gave me, outlook ran fine & fast (I had the same model at the old company) but notes takes 60 seconds to open, 20 seconds to open an email, 30 seconds to drop in any kind of file, and way to many fucking steps to schedule anything on the calender.

I have resorted to creating my own calendar in Access utilizing the timer functions & msgboxes as it is much quicker than scheduling anything on this awefully designed system.

I wish someone would crash the damn thing so I would have an excuse to trash it.

John,

I feel your pain as well. Lotus Notes has like a million damn options and you only need like 12 of those. It has to be the worst email system ever and the Email admins are the only ones keeping it alive that have it already. Due to the fact that lets say you have 10,000 email accounts thru Notes. I am sure that would be a nightmare switching over to exchange so they just keep on buying the newest version of Notes. IBM has stuck it in the ass of these large corporations because it is harder then hell to migrate over with that many uses. I hate having to suck it up for bad and very slow ass software.

I feel pain every time I log in to this POS. Someone jerk-off (sorry notes admin) decided it would be a great idea to turn on password synchronization between XP and notes. Guess who handles it? Notes does. Does it do it well. Not at all. Most times people end up not being able to get into Notes. If you choose not to synchronize your passwords Notes comes up with a really helpful message every time you log in informing you that your password aren't synchronized. There really was only two minutes thought went into the development of this "software"...

hmm. controlling notes via the COM objects to send an email from within a custom application.... could well be easy, buggered if I can find the documentation though.

Result: I've configured one of my *home* email accounts, which i can connect to via normal means, I now just send email reports out via that.

Notes sucks? probably not, but it does suck *more* than the competition. I hate outlook with a passion, but it is easy to use. Notes *MUST* have an easy to use email client, since thats what it gets used for. Most users don't care what else it does, I don't care if it can do a zillion other things, unless it does them *well* whats the point?

as for needing to go on a training course... um yeah well personally if you are 'computer literate' these days this mans microsoft, face it, people can *use* microsoft products. it would be worth while having something that computer literate people can use *without* training. plus this would cut down on lost time and reduce the workload on the support people.

domino may indeed rock. frankly ask most notes users what domino actually is... how many know?

bonus question: how many care?

if i want to send an email, *thats* the task in hand, not learning how to use a program that works like no other on my machine.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to everyone and I hope that 2006 is far less Notes filled for all...

I hear you David. I wish I could switch from Notes to outlook but we have around 6,000 email users and it would be a hug project so the corporation just throws money at upgrading notes. It is slower then molassess and I have just read that IBM is wanting to take Lotus Notes past email. PAST EMAIL!!!!!!!!!! That is the primary #1 of Lotus Notes. What in the @#$% is IBM thinking. It is the worst client for email ever and now they are wanting to turn it into something else again that no one will ever use and the email client portion of it will still be terrible. I also hear you if you are a Domino Admin that you like Domino and that is how you make your living. I just want fast and reliable frickin corporate wide email without the damn slowness are hassles. I dont know what in the hell is wrong with our Notes 6.5 version with giving you a message that you have new mail in the inbox and there is nothing there. That really chaps my ass when that happens. Has anyone ever received the RED message box of Death in Lotus notes??? If you encounter it then Notes has to be shut down and the machine needs to be restarted.

God I hate Notes.

Here is a joke for you.

What does Windows ME and Lotus Notes have in common?

a. THEY BOTH SUCK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Lotus notes sucks!!!!!!!!!!! I hate it so much. The software has been designed by complete morons.

Re, this moron :

>I defy any of you to show me a product with
>a) the longevity of Notes
>b) the cross platform support of Notes
>c) the performance of Notes
>d) the scalability of Notes
>e) the distributed features of Notes
>f) the security of Notes
>g) the ease and sophistication of >programmability of Notes
>And if you can come up with such a product, >show me the ways in which it is easier to use.

h) usability anyone?

I am an end user of notes. I don't care for anything from a) to g) ... well except for c) which is wrong anyway.

I only care about how little time I need to spend on using a piece of software to achieve something. I don't really get hard-ons thinking about Notes's distributed, groupware, data storage model.. whatever the fck is behind it. I just want something that does the job.

It's like customer service. If a bank teller starts speaking to me in Russian, some people might be really impressed, but not me.

BTW - I am using R 6.5

pissed off notes user.

Doesn't what version you are using it is all shit. Each version (including the latest) is just a new veneer on the same old piece of shit. I agree with Erwin the person that came up with this list is a moron living in a vacuum (probably making huge sums of money from corporations stupid to still be using notes):
>I defy any of you to show me a product with
>a) the longevity of Notes
>b) the cross platform support of Notes
>c) the performance of Notes
>d) the scalability of Notes
>e) the distributed features of Notes
>f) the security of Notes
>g) the ease and sophistication of >programmability of Notes
>And if you can come up with such a product, >show me the ways in which it is easier to use.

Hopefully a nail in the coffin...
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060117/tc_nm/microsoft_software_dc

and here:
http://australianit.news.com.au/articles/0,7204,17859510%5E15306%5E%5Enbv%5E,00.html

Microsoft needs to buy out Lotus Notes to save me from this hell known as Notes 6.5.5.

ALL I WANT IS BASIC EMAIL FUNCTIONALITY. Why is that so hard to achieve? NSD errors, slowness, etc......If you are going to be error prone, atleast make the error dialogue boxes understandable to end users.

I hear all this talk about "agents" that need to be run. Never have I seen an application so dependent on other "agents" to perform simple functions.

Notes needs to die.

Today I was on the phone with someone while looking up some information from a previous email. We talked about how much Lotus sucked, and we were curious who owned Lotus. (We thought IBM, but we weren't sure.)

So I went up to the Help --> About option and the little window came up with all the About information. And stayed there. And wouldn't go away.

Brining up that About window crashed my Notes. I had to reboot.

My friend and I got a kick out of that.

http://www.networkworld.com/news/2006/013006-lotus-social.html

Here is a geat article on what Lotus whats to start doing. After reading all of the crap I could not find the one thing I was looking for...............FIX THE GOD DAMN EMAIL PART of Lotus and make it work fast and consistent.

Give me a damn break..........they still have no fricking clue that the Notes email client sucks bad and needs to be overhauled.........but NOOOOOO!!!! they want to add more Wiki functionaility or more god damn worthless pieces to the already bloated email client we call NOTES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

A message to any IBM Lotus Notes Software Engineer's out there...........you guys are some sick bastards.......we get the damn point. Corporations will continue to swallow you load of shit as long as you have the IBM name behind it. FOR GODS SAKE ALREADY..........FIX THE DAMN THING.

- Read email
- Hit 'reply'
- start typing
- realise there is no history
- close email
- click reply and select reply with history
- start typing.
- attempt to reply to individual lines in previous email, but give up in frustration.

Guys,
we need to do something about this.

I think the way to go about this is to complain to high up managers, to your CIO if you have to. They don't like it if you complain about Notes, but if you complain long enough they'll get the picture.

The only way to drive Notes out of business is if we keep up the pressure. Threaten to leave you job if you have to use Notes. In job interviews, ask if they use Notes, and say that Notes would be a deciding factor if you join or not.

amen

AAAaaarrrrggggghhhh!!!.

Sorry to admit this, I work in IBM, used to work in Lotus (until it got bought out). After being a developer for 6 years, have finally given up, and moved into admin. There are developers in here that would love to rewrite the whole thing, to be given 3 years from stratch. But no it never happens.

Its always lets add more shit instead of fixing or rewriting, and if a customer complains lie to him to the point where he buys the next version.

I think the key issue is IT managers in our customer companies. They believe the lies, and never see the day to day arse involved in the products.

SOOO its up to you all, to press your managers, convince them that the latest fad, corporate speak thing is not needed, or bein able to plugin into the new latest pointless wiggly wonder.

We just want applications that work, that at there heart, they are understandable and easy to use. That when someone goes wrong, you dont need to phone an arse in support, or trawl through the web. Simple F1 contextual and simple. i know it exists, I have seen products that do this.

I would love to be able to develop again, so help me i enjoyed it. but until there are some nice products available to me in here to develop on, its admin for me. Though admin is great, products are soo clumsy, am in a job for life.

Anyways, theres my two cents worth.

highlighting text :

- type something
- look around for tool to highlight it red
- Find something which looks like it would do the trick under Text --> Highlighter.
- Can't find red
- decide to use pink from the THREE (yes THREE) options given.
- accidently highlight text that i didn't want to
- Press CTRL-Z. Nothing happens of course.
- Look under Text --> Highlighter. GET THIS: There is NO option to disable the highlighter.
- I have no idea how to remove these pastel colours from my email now. Have to delete and start again.

I work in messaging - Domino /Exchange / SMTP / LDAP etc.

If you are using / relying on Domino for just email - then I agree Exchange is better - BUT most corps that buy it use it for far more than that. Its collabaration / groupware AND email.

As for the ones of you who complain about how slow it is and crashes - I reference the other post on this page - your machines / installations / setup / configurations are note correct.

I have worked for a number of orgs,m who HAPPILY have used and are using Domino for mail and MORE (the emphasis on MORE i,e collbaoration tooling - collabaration DBs etc).

These companies include Ernst and Young , Price Waterhouse , ABN Amro - DaimlerChrysler.

Summary - your company just needs email - go use Exchange - you need more of the above - use Domino - for now.

I hate the "notes is not just for email argument". Just because Notes does more than email is no excuse for the email portion being shit. For example, the primary focus of Excel is numbers/mathematics. Excel is not a presentation tool, but you can produce some damn fine looking documents from Excel.

Blah Outlook, Blah Exchange. They are both crap pieces of software. You can't upgrade from one version of exchange to another - its a very costly and full scale migration. In contrast I just bung the Domino CD in the drive and upgrade nice and simple.

I had to spend an entire weekend rebuilding one Exchange server because of one corrupt message which trashed the server for 100 users. In Notes only the 1 user is affected and I have a full range of tools available to fix his mail file.

All that crap about market share is rubbish. Yeah MicroShite has more seats but they count every Outlook client sold as a seat and since corporations with Notes tend to buy Office Suite that gets them Outlook and hence each user is counted as a seat. In fact Notes is used by more Fortune 500 organisations that Exchange.

I did a "Live" demonstration to a customer the other day using Lotus Notes 6.5 replicating to the server using my GSM phone at 9.6Kbps whilst having a Sametime instant messaging conversation.
Could the competing organisation demonstrate the same with Outlook - Could they Fook!

Notes just works - It works differently to Outlook sure It might not look the same as Outlook, and sometimes the logic is not all that clear. But for 90% of users who want to read edit send mail it works. There are more features in the product, which you will have to look hard for but they are there.

In terms of applications, if you bet your business on Exchange then you will need Windows Servers supporting IIS, SQL server, You'll need VBA Developers - but with Notes I only need er Notes I can run it on any O/S even Linux and if I hire cleverly I only need one person to support the infrastructure and write/deploy the apps, TCO is a very commanding proposition.

The problem cited with password sync is because Windows authentication is inherently insecure. That is to say if you change your Notes password it will propagate to Windows. If you change the Windows password it cannot propagate to Notes because only the Notes API can access the ID file. This is as intended so if you use pwd sync then don't change your password in Windows - problem solved.

BTW: Have you heard about Exchange 12 coming out only for 64Bit Itanium CPU's. Looks Like ND7 has an even greater opportunity to mop up those Exchange organisations who just spent a fortune on New hardware for Exchange 2K3.

Mike, Please see my comment prior to yours. I do not care what is under the hood. I want it to work and be easy and non frustrating to use. I think it is very telling that the only proponents of Notes are the ones to whom Notes provides employment. How many users have posted here saying it is a great product? What was that Mike? Oh... yes... Good TCO? Great. Easy upgrades? Fantastic. Excellent replication? Wonderful. Do I hear a user friendly, intuitive application anywhere? Thought not...

Guys, please get real.
> I hate the "notes is not just for email >argument". Just because Notes does more than >email is no excuse for the email portion being >shit
1 - The email portion offers so many options that something must suit you.
There is iNotes, notes web mail, notes client , notes client with at least three different templates for the mail file, pop3 and smtp for using your favourite client with. Add to that all the templates created by third part users, lack of viruses and really sweet replication and it is an excellent mail client.
Me, I use the notes client, inotes, thunderbird and a home brewed VB app to get my notes mail, depending on what laptop / pc site i am working from.
I also have one of the IBM apps (free) which checks notes mail and then reads me the subject line in the background so I can hear what mail is coming in and who it is from without stopping what i am doing.
Too many pop up messages? Not for me. I turned them off!!. I also like my shared calendar and todo list which allows me to have people book meetings, reminds me where to be and is replicated to my iPaq so I am in synch everywhere.
Did i mention the neat rules systems, ability to make your own folders / munging agents and speed of Notes?

Still moaning about notes mail? comparing it to Outlook? Well then use outlook to connect to Notes. It even provides the help file on how to do that. End of story.

We had an exchange server at a clients site. 2Gb of memory later it was still slow, fell over a lot (bad message formats) completely left me unable to drop and drag a message from one users file to another, was a pain in the britches for tracking messages and had me sweating with every new security flaw.
Domino on Linux, with 1GB and no swap file usage. It really peeves me off as I am no longer making money doing the support.

Oh, you guys claiming some ridiculous cost of ownership for running domino like 3:1 in favour of exchange? Get real. The worst