Interface | matters

Please Welcome A New Voice To The Lotus Notes Community

2008-07-08T15:58:00.000-04:00

Hi All...I hope everyone is well. I'd love to say that I've been heads down working on a super secret project that will revolutionize Notes UI development for years to come but...yeah...not so much. I do have a whole treasure trove of ideas in my brainstorming notebook, though, and with any luck, I'll be completely refreshed after my upcoming, long-awaited (and needed) vacation and will dive into developing these brilliant gems into working prototypes to share with all of you.

In the meantime, I wanted to point you to a new blog and introduce a new member of the community. Dan Lynch has been working with Lotus Notes and Domino since the 3.x days and is currently the Team Lead for Enterprise Messaging at one of my customers. They just so happen to have recently completed one of the competitive battles that Ed was talking about yesterday. Yes... Lotus Notes won out in the end (woot...we rock! ;-) and Dan was an instrumental member of the team doing the evaluation between the Lotus and Microsoft collaboration platforms.

Dan has a lot of great insight into the "Microsoft threat" and the necessary components to evaluate when going through such a process. He also has years of experience that he can share regarding the Notes and Domino platform, and I look forward to reading his coming posts. For now, he has started with a great kick off article discussing the advantages that Lotus Domino brings to the table when you are faced with an e-discovery process.

Please welcome Dan to the Notes blogging community and check out his Enterprise Messaging Trenches Blog (hosted by the fine folks at Bleed Yellow).

Welcome, Dan...Glad to have you here!

eProductivity for Lotus Notes...Want To Be Way More Efficient?

2008-06-27T12:36:00.004-04:00

Many of you have already heard of Eric Mack's eProductivity software, a tool for implementing the Getting Things Done methodology in Lotus Notes. If you haven't, it's definitely something you should check out. If you want to increase your effectiveness and efficiency in dealing with all your stuff, then eProductivity might just be the application to take you over the top. It's an outstanding tool and a great example of the power available in Lotus Notes-based systems.

If you hurry, you might be able to get in on the 24 hour preview program Eric is running right now. Run, don't walk...you'll be glad you did.

Add Tagging To Your Mail (Or Any Other Application) Without Design Changes!

2008-06-23T12:14:00.007-04:00

If you'd like to find out how to add simple tagging capabilities to your Lotus Notes applications without making any design changes, then keep reading...

As a way to increase my productivity in processing e-mail, I stopped using folders for filing a few years ago. This is especially easy in Lotus Notes 8, since the search capabilities are much nicer and have been enhanced in such a way as to make me very happy I made this choice. Basically, when I process e-mail, I determine if the message is actionable and if so, I decide what to do with it and then remove it from the inbox. I don't file it in a folder...I just choose the "Remove from Folder" action. Clean, simple and gets the job done. I did find, however, that quite often the text that is included in the e-mail does not contain the actual meta data that I would later want to search on. Thus, I found myself editing messages and adding the key phrases related to the e-mail before I removed them. Of course, what I was doing is known by most people as tagging and I realized that a simple mechanism for tagging is exactly what I wanted.

In my last job, I had a highly modified mail file that I used for my GTD system as well as for other productivity enhancements (and as a playground for off the wall ideas, I must confess). When I came into the tech sales role at IBM, I decided early on that I should use the generic mail template, since I would be doing so many demos for customers. As a result, my initial tagging mechanism had to morph to something that required no design changes. I thought that whatever I came up with should be useful for others, but didn't want to spend the time building a complete solution in another NSF. So, I decided to see if I could utilize Formula language in a custom toolbar button. The result, while not elegant by any means, is quite efficient and works well for me, so I thought I'd throw it out here to share.

Here's the scenario. I select the document in question and click my "Tag It" toolbar button. To allow for choices from tags I've already used (for continuity and best search results), I pull up a dialog box of previous tags and also allow new tags to be added. Once I have the necessary tags for the document selected, they are saved into a new field on the document. That's pretty much all there is to it from a user point of view. Here are a couple of screen shots to illustrate:

In order to make this work on a per application basis, I save the list of tags used in a profile document. The first line of the code pulls up the list of previously used tags, while the second line retrieves any of the tags that might already be assigned to the selected document. The next few lines provide for a multi-list dialog, along with logic that checks for the selection of "-add new-". If the "-add new-" option is chosen, the user is prompted to enter new tags (separated by commas) and the updated list of selected tags and any newly entered tags are written to the "txt_CustomTags" field. Finally, the last line makes sure any new tag values are written back to the profile document for use next time.

REM {Get tags stored in database};
Tags := @GetProfileField("TagsProfile";"txt_CurrentTags";@UserName);


REM {Get any tags from the selected document};
DocTags := txt_CustomTags;

Selection := @Prompt([OkCancelListMult]; "Select Tag(s)"; "Please select the tag(s) to apply to this document"; DocTags; @Trim("-add new-" : @Unique(Tags : DocTags)));

@If(Selection = 1;
              @Return("");
      @IsMember("-add new-"; Selection);
               @Set("NewTag"; @Prompt([OkCancelEdit]; "Enter New Tag"; "Please enter the new tag(s) you would like to apply to this document.  Separate tags with a comma"; ""));
                "");

UpdatedList := @Trim(@Unique(@Replace(Selection; "-add new-"; "") : @Explode(NewTag,"," )));


FIELD txt_CustomTags := UpdatedList;

@SetProfileField("TagsProfile"; "txt_CurrentTags"; @Unique(UpdatedList : Tags); @UserName)

For completeness, I also include a toolbar button to wipe out any tags on the document (FIELD txt_CurrentTags := @Unavailable).

So, as you can see, while adding a true tagging mechanism would be ideal, this solution makes it very easy for me to tag documents in my mail file and then use the standard Notes search mechanism to retrieve them more easily. While your mileage may certainly vary, it's a great way to give users the tagging ability without changing any database designs.

Collaboration Comes To MindManager

2008-06-19T08:37:00.003-04:00

One last post about mind maps and we'll move on, I promise! :-)

It's no secret that I am a big fan of visual mapping techniques. Mind maps allow you to capture, quantify and organize information in ways that mirror how our brains actually work. They allow you to see beyond simple linear lists to understand relationships between ideas. While traditional mind mapping as developed by Tony Buzan utilizes paper and colored markers, pencils, crayons, etc., the sheer amount of information we deal with as information technology professionals and indeed the medium we work in make electronic mind maps much more compelling. While there are many choices of mind mapping software, my tool of choice is the outstanding MindManager Pro 7 from Mindjet.

MindManager puts the power of mind mapping at your fingertips. I've been using MindManager for a few years now, but I think that MM7 is a big leap forward. Mindjet has done a great job of continuing to progress the tool with each release and the move to version 7 has been no different. I love that I can be productive with the software using the keyboard or the mouse, depending on my desired work mode at the time. It has a lot of powerful features that obviously couldn't exist in a paper-based map, such as task tracking, filtering, integration with Microsoft Office (I know...we need to get them to support Lotus Symphony!), the ability to interact with a map in presentation mode, and many more. MindManager allows the user to very quickly generate maps, certainly much faster than most of us could build a paper map. While the default styles aren't highly artistic, they are perfect for use in the business environment where people tend to be more conservative. That doesn't mean that MindManager can't produce stunning maps. Quite the contrary...the formatting features are plentiful and allow the user to produce very attractive maps with minimal effort.

I'm a big believer in getting your hands dirty in order to truly understand something, so rather than hearing me go on and on about features, I encourage you to check out the Mindjet site and download the free trial version of the software. With a little practice, I think you'll find the ideas of mind mapping to be truly compelling. To get an idea of the kinds of maps people use in the everyday world, check out the Map Gallery.

Before you go, there are a couple of major innovations in MindManager that I want to tell you about. The first is the fluid UI or Ribbon, introduced in the new line of Microsoft Office products. The second is the addition of collaborative and web functionality that is sure to see adoption of MindManager increase.

Let's talk about the collaborative stuff first. Actually just introduced yesterday, Mindjet Connect provides users with the ability to create shared workspaces in which they can share their mind maps and work on them collaboratively with a team of people. The collaboration features include real-time team editing, chat functionality and instant meetings. While I would have loved to see these features as integration points into the Lotus suite of products, just the fact that Mindjet has recognized the need to enable better collaboration is a plus. As part of Mindjet Connect, a slimmed down web-based version of MindManager is available, bringing the major functional points of the software to a browser near you. I look forward to playing with these tools more in the future, but for now I have to say congratulation to Mindjet for the new evolution in mind mapping software.

Now...on to the Ribbon fluid user interface. Although I had read a lot about it, I had not had an opportunity to actually use it until I installed MindManager Pro 7. I tried to approach the new UI with an open mind, as I heard cheers and jeers from both camps...those who loved it and those who hated it. For me, I was immediately enamored by the new way of working. The fact that the multiple layers of drop down menus were now gone seemed to immediately improve my productivity.

Basically, I see the Ribbon UI as a hybrid between the menuing system, tabbed dialogs and the toolbar, but one that is far easier to use than all three metaphors combined. I think that the way related commands are logically grouped together helps speed recognition and the fact that the more frequently used features are larger in scale allows me to target them much faster with the mouse. Another benefit of the Ribbon UI over the traditional toolbar or drop down menu is the fact that the full text of each function is readily visible. Thus, I don't have to worry about memorizing which icon is which or spend my time hovering over the toolbar icon waiting for the popup text to confirm that I've selected the correct option. All of these features are immediate productivity enhancements for me.

I find the fact that the Ribbon is contextual to be very powerful. Elements change, become grayed out or become active based on what I'm actually doing at that moment. In addition, I find that I am saving time by using the Ribbon instead of choosing between right-clicking an element, going to the menus or using the toolbar. I'm not sure if the Ribbon in the Microsoft products work the same way, but I really love the fact that many of the options exposed by clicking on an element in the Ribbon bring up a little submenu that uses pictures. For example, it's easier to select boundary shapes now than in past versions of MindManager, since I can click the Boundary Shape element in the Ribbon and I get a visual representation of all the types.

While it appears that the Ribbon takes more screen real estate than standard toolbars, it still seems reasonable. I actually like the slightly bigger size as it makes it easier to click the appropriate option. A bonus is that you can easily hide the Ribbon completely by double-clicking the menu area of the Ribbon. The options are still only a click away and this allows you to free up the area if you're working on a big map. Since MindManager allows you to so easily move from place to place on a map, however, this hasn't been an issue for me, so I just leave the Ribbon visible at all times.

When I opened the program for the first time, there was probably a minute or two of confusion as I couldn't see any File menu. Then I realized that the big "MindManager Button" replaced this menu. It didn't just replace it, though...it pumped it up several levels. It leverages the same mental model as the Start button in Windows and the fact that it is large and in the corner makes it very easy to acquire (a great example of Fitt's Law). I love, love, love the fact that it is divided into two "panes", one showing the traditional options (New, Open, Save, etc.) and the other changing context based on the option I'm hovering over. It's a very intelligent system and just immediately made perfect sense to me. If I'm hovering over the "Open" command, it shows me a list of my most recent documents. If I'm hovering over "Export", it gives me an easy to read and understand list of my export options. This is really nice...thumbs up for this functionality.

Overall, I find the Ribbon UI to be a big leap forward in the user interface of MindManager. It is similar enough to the standard concepts we are used to in most commercial software, but it has improved the user experience in such a way that I feel I am now more proficient with the software and can perform certain tasks faster than I could before. Although sometimes change is hard, I would encourage anyone hesitating about upgrading because of the new UI to give it a try and allow yourself a little time to get used to the Ribbon. It is a great interface concept and I think most people will come to appreciate it.

If you've stayed around this far, then it's either for my highly engaging and witty writing style ;-) or because you are truly interested in the ideas of visual mapping. If it's the latter (which I hope), then please check out MindManager and let me know what you think. I'd love to hear your feedback and I'd be glad to offer any pointers or assistance as you explore this new path.

Lotus iNotes on the Apple iPhone

2008-06-13T15:27:00.003-04:00

Pretty funny that we are back to calling it iNotes! ;-D

It may not be the perfect soluton (yet), but the new iNotes "Ultralite" functionality on the iPhone is pretty nice from a UI perspective.

Check it out...

Heck Yeah - Of Course I'm Experiencing Cognative Dissonance!

2008-06-10T21:53:00.005-04:00

One of the things I love about reading Tim Ferris' blog is that he gets a chance to sit down and talk with many very interesting people. I have to point out his latest post, since it's a dilemma I identify with...how to be a superstar at work (not doing so hot at that right now) while being a superstar at home as well. Usually, such conflicting demands diminish your performance in one or both domains, so the trick is finding the right path to balancing them as best you can.

In today's post, Tim includes several gems from Dr. Stewart Friedman on this issue. I think it's a great read for anyone that is trying to improve their life and I urge you to read it and then follow up with some Dr.Friedman's books. I know I will be...

Unlock Your Creative Side And Create More Compelling Designs

2008-05-22T09:59:00.005-04:00

Programmers and IT types in general are not usually well known for their creative and spontaneous ways. Most in this profession are very logical and linear thinkers, and often those qualities lend themselves nicely to this field. An unfortunate byproduct of this fact, however, are the thousands upon thousands of badly designed applications that have been forced upon poor, unsuspecting end users. If you've been here for any length of time, you know that I have a couple of sacred mantras. One is that the interface is the application as far as the end user is concerned. They could care less about your SQL backend or cool use of classes in OO to abstract the blah, blah, blah. :-) Another is that because of mantra #1, it is our duty as developers to design everything with the end user in mind. Now...if you are a logical and linear thinker, then this might not be the easiest thing in the world for you to do. The key is to recognize that you need to work on developing your design skills and to continually grow them. One technique that can help in that regard is mind mapping.

Mind mapping is a technique used to visually depict concepts in a non-linear way, with lines radiating out from a central concept that group related items together. They are very useful in allowing you to see relationships in seemingly non-connected information. Mind maps are also great devices for brainstorming. The power of mind mapping comes from the fact that it allows you to utilize both sides of your brain, the creative and the logical. One of the key concepts of mind mapping is including multiple colors and pictures within your map. In doing so, you draw upon those creative tendencies, which just in itself provides value by keeping your brain sharp. Mind mapping began by using the same kind of tools you use for low-fidelity prototyping...pens, crayons, pencils, paper, etc., but you can also now find many mind mapping applications for the computer (stay tuned for an upcoming review of my favorite, MindManager). To learn more about Mind Mapping, check out the definitive work by Tony Buzan (The Mind Map Book) and another great work by Jamie Nast (Idea Mapping)

Click to enlarge

I think that mind mapping provides some great benefits for programmers and designers. One way I use mind mapping is to capture and display all of the little nuggets of information that I come across during the requirements gathering phase. I often find that seemingly insignificant remarks or off the cuff comments that don't appear important at the time make a huge difference to some design aspect of my application later down the line. By having these bits of information laid out in front of me in a mind map, I can occasionally find relationships in the ideas that the end users didn't explicitly spell out or I can identify areas where further interviews and exploration is necessary.

Mind maps work very well for project tracking and managing programming tasks as well. When I get down to the point of writing code, I try to capture the major design points in a map. I know many programmers who do this with basic To Do or feature lists, but by using a map, you can see how the various components of your design are related. It also allows me to visually represent the importance of one item over another, so at a glance it is easier for me to see what I should be working on.

I find mind maps are a perfect way to begin thinking about the hierarchy of a new application design. Items like navigation structure and UI design elements naturally lend themselves to the kind of relationships a mind map is designed to convey. If I'm working on a new website, for example, I'll create a mind map of the taxonomy. When I share this with end users, it's a lot easier for them to understand since they "see" how the website will be laid out. Remember the old cliche..."a picture is worth a thousand words". I think as much as you can simplify the design process for the end users with pictures and easy to read visuals, the closer you will get to meeting their requirements when you deliver the application to them.

Although I have not done this yet, I think mind mapping would be an ideal way to visually see how your LotusScript or Java code is laid out. I remember working on an application for "Really Big Company" that had tons of script libraries. I spent a lot of time when I was first learning the system digging through the various functions and methods and taking notes on what called what, how they were related, etc. I think a mind map could show these relationships much more elegantly. I'm going to try this whenever I get back to writing code.

Beside the applications mind mapping has in a professional development capacity, they can be used for almost anything else. I find that my memory of certain things is improved when I use a map over a standard linear way of writing information down. Mind maps are great for capturing meeting minutes, brainstorming, taking notes on a book you are reading, etc. But the biggest benefit and why I bring this topic up has to do with the creative nature of mind mapping. When you follow the "tricks of the trade", you begin to rely on both sides of your brain and unlock that creative potential that you have inside. In doing so, you'll find that your problem solving skills are sharpened and you can more easily envision the various dimensions of a given issue or task. I believe mind mapping also helps you become a better observer and certainly the act of creating a map helps commit what you are writing to memory much faster than any other method I've used before.

Click to enlarge

Don't just take my word for it. Some superheroes from the Notes community that use mind maps (or have at least dabbled with them) include Bruce Elgort, Eric Mack, Tim Tripcony and Stephan Wissel.

When it comes to designing innovative UIs that your users enjoy working with, creativity is key. I hope you'll consider mind mapping as one possible way to help cultivate your creative side.

P.S. Here's a short little interview on what I do with MindManager.

Collaborate From Anywhere...The Value Proposition of Lotus Quickr

2008-05-14T16:55:00.000-04:00

If I had to pick a common Achilles' Heel among the various collaboration systems I've worked with through the years, I would probably point to the fact that each system usually has a single point of entry. That is, you have to (virtually) leave the place you are currently working in order to go to the "place to collaborate". I've found this to be true of Lotus Notes document libraries and Team Rooms, Documentum, Quickplace and other web-based repositories and even Sharepoint (depending on the tools you are using). This creates a barrier of entry for a lot of people. They just don't want to have to open yet another window on their already crowded workspace in order to use collaboration tools. In addition, having to leave the context we are currently working in in order to share with our colleagues interrupts our flow state and makes us less productive. Just as effective collaboration has a cultural component that is vitally important, so too must the tools facilitate easily contributing to and consuming from the collective knowledge pool. Thus, one way to shore up that Achilles' Heel is to provide multiple entry points into the collaboration tool of choice. Lotus Quickr has introduced such mechanisms and by doing so really provides a compelling value proposition for team collaboration.

One of the driving goals for Lotus Quickr (and indeed the entire line of Lotus products) is the concept of collaborating in context. Collaboration in context is all about integrating content, tools and people (all the important components of the collaboration equation) within your business process. A great example of this is the Sametime presence awareness capability. If I'm in a TeamRoom and have a question about a document, I can immediately see if the author is online and can initiate a new chat session with them all from the place where my attention is currently focused. Quickr takes this idea to a new level through the Quickr Connectors.

If you've seen Quickr out in the wild, you've probably seen the web-based UI. While certainly shiny and new, this UI only shows one facet of the product. If you choose to, you can access all of the collaborative features of Quickr by opening your browser and navigating to your Team Place, but the beauty of the Quickr Connectors means you don't have to. Instead, you can access Quickr content and add to Team Places from where you already are. This includes:

Lotus Notes

Microsoft Office

Lotus Symphony (coming soon)

Windows Explorer

Lotus Sametime

Quite an impressive list! IBM rightly realized that when people collaborate, there is usually some artifact that prompted the collaboration process. For most knowledge workers, this means we are authoring documents, usually in one of the tools listed above. Rather than making users take extra steps to get that content to the "place to collaborate", Quickr was designed to meet people where they are actually doing their work. This is a huge leap forward in my mind, as it removes that big stumbling block that plagues many collaboration initiatives.

Let's look at a couple of simple scenarios so that you see the power of Quickr. I think these will help in articulating the value proposition.

Scenario 1: Jim is an HR employee responsible for updating the company policy manual. This process involves making the changes in MS Word and then getting feedback from his colleagues before the changes are published.

Old Way: Jim has to locate the current, official policy document, copy it to his hard drive and open it in Word. He then makes the necessary modifications and makes sure he saves a new version on his computer. In order to collaborate with his colleagues and get their feedback, Jim then opens the Lotus Notes HR TeamRoom and creates a new document, attaching the Word file to it. This process, while not difficult, is inefficient and requires that Jim do a lot of task switching.

New Way: With Quickr, Jim's life will be a lot easier. If the HR policy exists in a Quickr site, he can open it directly from Word, make his changes, and save a new copy back to Quickr...collaboration in context.

Click to enlarge

Scenario 2: So much collaboration takes place today by people sending attachments back and forth in e-mail. This is extremely inefficient for many reasons. For users, attachments are the single biggest cause of being thrown into "mail jail" (i.e. exceeding quotas). In addition to the requirements from a storage perspective, there can be version angst...you find yourself wondering if the version you have is the most current one. With the integrated Quickr shelf in Notes 8, you can solve these problems. The Quickr shelf allows you to see all of your Team Places and access data from them directly from Notes. You can drag and drop attachments from an e-mail message into a Place. You can also drag an attachment out of a Place and into an e-mail message. Quickr is smart enough to add this attachment as a link rather than an actual attachment.

Click to enlarge

To help you remember to use your collaboration tools when you are sending e-mails, Quickr will detect if you have any attachments in your message and will prompt you to save them into Quickr. You can select the Place to move the attachments into and then the attachments will be replaced with links to the newly added Quickr content.

Many of the other integration points work in the same way, utilizing common actions that meld very nicely with the system we are interacting with (drag and drop into Quickr from Windows Explorer, for example).

In my experience as a collaborative technologies consultant, once you get people on board with the idea that collaboration is important and valuable for them, the next hurdle is getting them to actually use the tools. Lotus Quickr with the Quickr Connectors makes a very compelling case for simplifying adoption and helping your users get over that hurdle. I think we'll see this idea of collaboration in context start to embed itself in more and more collaborative tools and I am really looking forward to that experience. I know for me that working with Quickr has been a pretty enjoyable ride so far.

New Blogger @ Dominoblog.com

2008-05-14T16:08:00.003-04:00

Yo, yo...welcome to my peeps...Andrea Waugh-Metzger is now blogging at Dominoblog.com. She is one of my colleagues, but way, way smarter than me, so you should definitely get over there and visit. Tell her I sent you and maybe I'll get some brownie points. :-D Peace out...

Say It With Me Now...User Focused Design Is KEY

2008-05-01T21:10:00.004-04:00

If there's a particular drum I bang over and over again, it's the "keep it simple, stupid" drum. This term has almost become a cliché , but hey, "if the shoe fits, wear it". (Oh sorry, that was bad...just couldn't help myself ;-)

Anyway, when I was doing project work, I was always the guy advocating for people to "take it slow", "do things in stages", "no big bangs", "Amazon wasn't built in a day", etc., etc. I believe that quick, iterative steps yield better results, less bugs and get you to the end goal faster than big, monumental projects. The problem, it seems, is that companies like to have big, monumental projects. The bigger the company, the more monumental the projects seem to be. I think this is dead wrong. It's not the way our brains work, it's not the way people are most efficient and looking at the abysmal failure of so many IT projects, it sure doesn't seem to be the way to run a business. So why do we keep doing it? I guess if I knew the answer, I'd be running a shop somewhere instead of pushing software. :-)

In my "To Read" stack of magazines, I recently came across a jewel of an article in the April 2008 issue of Baseline. The cover story in this issue was a piece outlining the failure and eventual redemption of Symantec's new ERP implementation. A classic "big, monumental project", it was undertaken without really understanding the needs of the very people that would be using it. As they found out, such an oversight almost completely crippled their business. In the end, what saved them was a new project that put the focus on the user experience.

I don't want to rehash the article here...I highly recommend you go and read it...but I do want to point it out as a prime example of a project gone wrong because the final end goal wasn't made clear. That final end goal always has to answer the question "Who is going to be using this and how will this project help them do their job". If you're not asking this question and getting the answer in your project, then you are doing your users a disservice. Keep their goals in the forefront...that's why you're there.

Unobtrusive JavaScript...You Should Totally Do This

2008-04-28T22:18:00.004-04:00

In my JavaScript session at last year's version of LotusDeveloper (an excellent conference, by the way...you should go), I discussed the concept of unobtrusive javascript and showed several examples. Just as CSS was a blessing to us as we started to shift to the mindset of separating presentation from content (not so hard for us Notes folks really!), so is unobtrusive javascript the next stage of evolution. It's about separating behavior from content. If we can take out all the formatting junk from our HTML, can't we take all the javascript out as well? The answer is a resounding "yes" and it's a great ideal to strive for.

I haven't talked a whole lot about web design subjects here, since I thought the niche of focusing on the Notes client was more important, but this is a subject that I might just tackle more in future installments. In the meantime, there are a lot of good resources out there to bring you up to speed on the concept. I'm not really sure if this practice has caught on in the Domino world, or even how prevalent it really is in the broader world of web design, but it's a technique that I've found has a lot of merit.

To get you started, here's a nice little example. It's very simple, but walks you through the process of making a page of unobtrusive script. Check it out and see what you think. I'm interested if it will change the way you approach your code.

The Phantom Agony

2008-04-28T17:48:00.003-04:00

Ah...cool orchestration, keyboards, a little Cookie Monster, soaring choir vocals, a beautiful mezzo-soprano, metal guitars. Life is good. :-)

Spreading A Little Lotus Notes Love

2008-04-24T23:36:00.004-04:00

Besides Lotus Notes, the other software product I'm most passionate about is MindManager from Mindjet. I've talked about it a little in the past on this blog, but for those unfamiliar with this product, it is an tool for creating mind maps on your computer rather than with paper, pens, crayons, etc. It has a UI that is as simple to use as paper, but with very powerful features that provide results you couldn't expect to achieve in the analog realm. I just upgraded to the new version the other day (thanks, Gaelen!) and you can expect a full review coming soon. The short take is that MindManager 7 rocked my world, especially with the new Ribbon UI.

I was recently featured in Mindjet's Customer Vignette section and wanted to point out that even when talking about another product, I'm spreading the Notes love. Not only did I mention using the Lotus Notes client in one of the interview questions, but I also gave them my Notes URL mind map as a sample of how I use MindManager.

Ah...Lotus Notes and MindManager...two great tastes that taste great together. :-)

Simulating Fieldset and Legend In The Notes Client

2008-04-20T09:25:00.005-04:00

You may have noticed that the signal-to-noise ratio of UI posts on this blog has been rather low the last few months. This is, unfortunately, a bi-product of my current job at IBM. While I'm cranking away on a development project, the ideas are coming fast and furious. When I'm not, it's much harder to come up with ideas. It's really the fact that solving a business problem spurs creativity, while actively trying to come up with new ideas as you stare at a blank page doesn't result in much useful stuff to share. I don't really create applications in this new gig, thus no great interface revelations. I do know that I really miss it, however, and I expect I'll find a way back. In the meantime, I am trying to squeeze in the occasional work on some personal projects, but my free time to do this seems to be ever shrinking. Please stick around, because I do have some ideas to share as soon as I can get around to fleshing them out. I've actually got several draft posts partially done, so it's just a matter of getting away from the wife, kids, horses, chores, work, et. al and doing it! ;-). That said, here's a cool tip but one that is simple too...my favorite kind!

In the HTML world, a Fieldset allows you to group thematically related fields on a form together with a visual line bordering them to denote their relationship. In addition, you can use the Legend tag to give the Fieldset a title. These tags serve two purposes in that they visually show the relationship between the items and they make the form more accessible. Here's an example:

Of course you could get more fancy with CSS, styling both the Fieldset and the Legend.

So...a pretty simple construct, but I think you can see it's usefulness. Great...that's fine for the web, but how do we do it in the Notes client? Actually, there are a whole bunch of ways to accomplish this using standard Notes dev techniques. The two I've found most useful for my purposes are to either create a graphic for my Fieldset and Legend so that they look exactly like I want them to OR use a...wait for it...wait for it...LAYER! :-)

Let's look at the graphic approach first. In your favorite graphic editing program, create the top of the Fieldset with the Legend. Make sure to match the color of the border and text with the visual theme of your form. You should get something that looks like this:

Now go to Domino Designer and create a table that will serve as your Fieldset. Paste the graphic into the first row of the table (you might need to merge cells first) or paste it directly above the table (I'll do that for this example). In order to make everything line up, first size the table so that it matches the width of your Fieldset graphic. Then, turn OFF the top border of the table. Finally, set the Picture properties of the Fieldset graphic so that the Text Wrap is "Don't wrap, align bottom". This will drop the graphic so it fits snugly against the table, appearing to complete the border and giving you a Fieldset with a Label.

If you like using layers like I do, then you'll find that they are an even easier way to add a simulated Fieldset to your form. To do this, you simply need to create a new layer and position it on the top line of your table so that it looks like a Fieldset. This allows for easier maintenance as well, since if you want to change the label, you simply type the new value in the layer. You can also resize it, change the color, etc.

There are other ways to approach this idea as well. Daniel Soares suggested creating an inner table within an outer table. The inner table would take care of the formatting for your field elements and the outer table, which would be a single cell, would contain a background image. This background image would be the entire Fieldset border. You could make some fancy effects with this one.

If I did a poor job explaining this or if you'd just like to explore it in more detail, I've put a Notes client database out there for you to download. There is a single form in the db that shows examples of each of these techniques and you can deconstruct them to see how they are put together.

Let's Help Kick Cancer To The Curb

2008-04-14T22:24:00.005-04:00

A few months back, a little site called Planet Lotus appeared and took us all by storm. If you follow Lotus blogs at all, you know about it already, and if you're like many of us, you probably visit it first thing in the morning or several times throughout the day to see what the Lotus Community is up to. Well the incredibly cool guy behind Planet Lotus is also one hell of a dad and is doing something to help his son and indeed society in general. So, please, if you are a fan of Planet Lotus, head on over to charity.planetlotus.org and do what you can to help Yancy's cause. Thanks...you guys rock!

Free Meeting And Web Conferencing Service

2008-04-14T21:44:00.003-04:00

Hi, everybody...Hi, Doctor Nick! (Whoops...another out of place Simpsons reference there)

Bruce was looking for a web conferencing service today and although I got to him too late, I wanted to share a cool alternative for those of you looking for a "personal" web meeting space.

The service is called Dimdim and it's billed as "the world's free web meeting where you can share your desktop, show slides, collaborate, chat, talk and broadcast via webcam with absolutely no download required for attendees." Pretty cool stuff.

Of course, I still think Lotus Sametime and Sametime Unyte are THE tools for true business web conferencing and unified communications, but if you are looking for a no-cost service that will work great for your personal needs, go ahead and check out Dimdim.

I mean, come on...they get points in my book just for a cool name! :-)

Get The Best Of Lotusphere While In Your Pajamas!

2008-04-11T07:41:00.004-04:00

Besides being a snappy dresser, Lotusphere Comes To You is so nice, it's taken time out of it's busy schedule to make life easy for you. Why leave the comfort of your easy chair when you can get a private showing while still wearing your jammies? For details, see below. This public service message is brought to you from the fine folks at LotusUserGroup.org.

LotusUserGroup.org is hosting Lotusphere Comes to You Online. This is an
online event series featuring updated presentations from Lotusphere 2008
and even one or two new sessions. Designed to bring anyone who couldn't get
to Orlando the critical information and the excitement they missed, this
series will help you get more from your existing IT investment and boost
collaboration across your enterprise.

The first of the series is:

Lotus Notes and Domino — The Road Ahead
Presenter: Ed Brill, Business Unit Executive, WW Lotus Notes/Domino Sales
Leader

How do we top Lotus Notes and Domino 8? Learn about the roadmap for 2008
and beyond, giving you a glimpse into planned innovations for upcoming
releases, intended to reduce the cost of managing and storing your email,
offer additional deployment options, and drive continued optimization of
employee productivity. We'll describe important initiatives designed to
reduce the costs of running Lotus Domino in many areas including security,
identity management, directory openness, storage reduction, administration,
quality of service, 64 bit support and web application server. You should
leave this session with a clear understanding of the Lotus Notes and Domino
strategy and future roadmap, to help you plan future deployments.

April 28, 2008
IBM Lotus Sametime Strategy and Roadmap: The Future of Unified
Communications and Collaboration
Presented by: Dave Marshak

May 12, 2008
The Business Value of Web 2.0 and Enterprise Portal Solutions
Presented by: Jon Raslawski

May 19, 2008
IBM Lotus Connections and Mashups
Presented by: Suzanne Minassian and Nicole Carrier

May 26, 2008
IBM Lotus Domino Designer
Presented by: Maureen Leland

June 23, 2008
Desktop of the Future
Presented by: Ed Brill and/or Alan Lepofsky

All the Lotusphere Comes To You Online sessions are free but require pre-registration. Sign up for as many as you like. You have to be a
LotusUserGroup.org member, but membership is free.

Easily Lookup Books From Amazon At Your Local Library

2008-04-03T12:11:00.003-04:00

I occasionally like to share some of the productivity hacks I use. This is one of them.

If you're a book lover, it's likely that you have overflowing shelves of books at home (yes, Tom...this means you! ;-). I decided a few years ago to pare down on my actual book buying and try to utilize the local library more often. Even so, I find myself on Amazon quite a bit (either via a blog link, a suggestion from a friend or just to see what's new). If I find something of interest but I'm not sure I want to purchase it, I'll check if it's available in the library catalog. Being a tech and productivity geek, I don't want to waste time having to lookup these books again. Fortunately, I don't have to. I've got The LibraryLookup Project bookmarklets for the two library systems in my area readily handy in my toolbar. When I find a book I like on Amazon, I simply select the bookmarklet and another window opens, displaying the book in the library catalog (if they have it).

Click to embiggen

If you're interested in the technical aspect of the bookmarklet, it uses regular expressions to retrieve the ISBN from the Amazon page and opens a new browser window to your library's online catalog system, passing the ISBN to the lookup form via the URL. The LibraryLookup Bookmark Generator allows you to set the base URL for your library system and determines how to construct the URL based on the software vendor that the library uses (hint: you can usually find this by going to the library online catalog...it's generally listed on the page somewhere).

Invoking the bookmarklet is a simple process and allows me to do my library browsing from the comfort of home, all while utilizing the Amazon UI, which is really much nicer than the library's own software.

It's a great tool...you should check it out.

Movie Quotes...I Have A Theory

2008-04-02T20:01:00.005-04:00

Sometimes, when my mind is on overload, I really enjoy the fact that driving lets me pause and get some good thinking done. Often, I come up with my best ideas in this way (and huzzah to Jott for allowing me to capture these so easily). Today, however, my mind was so blotto (translate: fried, frazzled, ready to blow), that I was just daydreaming. And on the way home from taking my son to drum practice, I hit upon this amazing, and most likely completely correct (;-) theory.

The question at hand: "Why do guys always quote movie lines?". Now except in strange instances, this is purely a guys' domain. Usually, but not always, it drives the girls crazy. Not a good crazy, mind you (like when I do my Antonio Banderas impression), but crazy, crazy. But I think I know why we do this. This skill, like many of our lovable traits, hearkens back to our hunter roots. Early man needed to be a proficient hunter in order to survive, and one aspect of this proficiency was the ability to mimic animal sounds. Sometimes it was the lusty moans of a mate. Other times it was the cry of an injured animal meant to lure the hunter's prey. In any case, a skilled hunter was well-versed in the ways of mimicry. This adaptation, long encoded into our DNA through natural selection and survival of the fittest, still manifests itself today in modern man. And that, my friends, is why guys quote movies.

Ah...that's some good thinking for the day. :-)

Collaboration: And Knowing Is Half The Battle

2008-03-25T13:35:00.009-04:00

Yes...I blatantly used a G.I. Joe-ism in the title. Why? Perhaps just to reel you in from Planet Lotus ;-)

In my recent work with customers and all the hubbub around social networking and collaboration, it's quite evident that collaboration is cool again. I'd like to think that Lotus is playing no small part in this, as our offerings in this space are truly exciting. I'm more enthusiastic about Lotus than I have been in years and that's saying something since you know I'm a fanboy! :-)

But one concern I have is an issue that I encountered many times in my career as a consultant, and that is we are spending a lot of time driving home the technology component without a lot of emphasis on what I believe makes up the other half of a successful collaborative ecosystem: the culture.

If you are introducing the idea of collaboration for the first time or are trying to kickstart a stalled initiative, addressing the cultural component of collaboration is critical. It's not enough to have the best technology for supporting collaboration installed in your company...you must have people that will leverage that technology in the context of their business goals.

So what does a successful collaborative culture need to get started? Here are my ideas, but I'd like to hear yours as well.

*Collaboration Champions: Some folks that embrace the concepts right off the bat and serve as the "go to" people when other employees have questions and need assistance. These are usually the employees that "get it" immediately when a new collaborative technology is introduced and quickly become proficient in its use, both from a technical standpoint and from a business focused one.

*Provide Recognition: Many companies overlook the importance of praising a job well done. For many employees, helping others in a collaborative culture is an intrinsic reward unto itself, but they still value when their efforts are recognized. Rewards don't always need to be monetary in nature. In fact, the top providers in a social network or collaborative initiative often find the kudos to be the most rewarding aspect of participation.

*Proper Training: Argh...don't get me started about companies that don't train people on new technology. How often have we heard "Lotus Notes s*cks" because the users were unaware of how to successfully use the software. Yes, we wish all software could be so easy to use that you don't need any training, but with enterprise software we're not there yet. Thus, providing instruction is an important aspect of the collaborative culture.

*How Does This Help Me?: One of the most compelling arguments I've seen in a successful implementation of collaboration technologies is when the company can clearly articulate the vision to employees and answer the question "What's in it for me?". Let's be honest...while the recognition mentioned above certainly is a motivator for some, the majority of employees will just think that this is another one of those things management does to annoy us. ;-) If you can help employees see how this initiative will make their job easier, help them make more commission, not have to work overtime, etc., they'll buy into the movement much more quickly.

There's obviously a lot more to this subject and I've just scratched the surface here. I'll save more for another post, since I think a lot of you are sick of my long essays! :-) However, one point of note. Not many consulting organizations address culture as a significant part of a new customer collaboration engagement. I think there's some good business potential there. Who will tap into it?

In Which I Say "Hallelujah" To Simplicity

2008-03-24T08:56:00.000-04:00

By now many of you have probably seen the great little comic on the "It's Just a Bunch of Stuff That Happens" site about Simplicity, but if not follow the link then come right back...

Pretty true to life, eh? I recognized the bottom example in many, many (many, many, MANY) Notes applications I have seen through the years and I'm sure you did too, which is why we all thought it was so funny in a sad sort of way. But I tell you what my friends, the idea of simplicity is sorely lacking in the enterprise software world and this causes an undue amount of headaches for our customers, for our bosses and for ourselves. Is there something we can do about it? Absolutely. We can say no to complexity in the applications that we design.

To be fair, although the comic is funny, it's not really being equitable as it compares Google and Apple to an enterprise application, but the idea is not so bad. One of the tenants I've tried to instill in younger developers as I've mentored them is that complex business rules do not necessitate complex interfaces. In fact, I think the opposite is true. We need to work even harder to streamline and simplify the interface when the complexity of the business world rears its ugly head. We're all overwhelmed with the amount of data we have to deal with on a daily basis, so we appreciate (and even long for) those things that are easy to use. If we're trying to delight our customers and make their experience in our applications a pleasant one, what better way to achieve this than to employ our skills to craft a simple solution.

Here's an example from my own experience. Some of you have seen this in my talks at Lotusphere or the View conference, but it bears repeating. I worked for a few years for a "global tire manufacturer headquartered in Akron, OH". They had a pretty mature Notes infrastructure that had been around for quite a few years and some pretty complex systems were developed in Notes by IBM consultants there. One of these was a beast of an application called Vendor Billing, but I affectionately called it the Hellspawn. (OK...I didn't really call it that at the time, but in thinking back I should have!). The Hellspan was one of those systems that you dread to come across when you're a consultant. A multi-tentacled, multi-NSF monstrosity that had become more and more bloated over time, since developers just added new features without refactoring or thinking about what future consequences their design choices might make. I don't believe anyone did this out of lack of skill or with any ill will toward future developers, but rather the reality of a complex business process coupled with a desire to make changes quickly and cheaply provided the perfect environment for such a system to come into being.

Vendor Billing...excuse me...Hellspawn, was a system designed to gather up information about all the various IT services an employee at Great Big Tire Company made use of. This was managed through a series of documents that basically captured the services a given person was "subscribed" to. In addition, other databases in the Hellspawn suite stored employee department information, billing codes, rates, etc. It also interfaced with some of the company financial systems that were not in Notes. At the end of each month, some *really* nasty and complex agents gathered up the information from the various databases, determined how large each user's mail file was, spun around twice and sacrificed a chicken to the Gods of Complexity and spit out a document for each user that listed their costs for the various services. All of this was pretty much backend stuff and this far was hidden from the eyes of the users (thank goodness!). Unfortunately, the final result, that cost document, was used in a series of views that the end users would interact with.

For a good 29 or 30 days out of the month, the users were blissfully unaware of the evils that were going on within the Hellspawn, but when it came time to for managers to review their charges for that month, there was no escaping the task to be done. At this time, a manager would open the database and navigate to the main billing view. Within this huge, *horizontally-scrolling* view, the manager could see the totals for each subscription for each of his employees. On average, each manager spent about 30 minutes figuring out their IT charges and it certainly wasn't a fun or efficient way to spend half an hour.

I was first introduced to the Hellspawn shortly after I started at Great Big Tire Company and I'll admit that I was a bit scared of it at first. Certainly the idea of Simplicity was far from the minds of the people that developed it. I've no doubt that they were smart folks. There were custom LotusScript classes to perform operations on linked lists and the like. I'm quite convinced that some programmers make things more complex than they need to be simply to show off their "mad skilz". There's certainly a place for that, but in my opinion it's not in enterprise applications. Thus, my first thought as I looked at this beast was that it needed to be simplified...greatly!

I started, as I often do, by building some quick prototypes that distilled the basic essence of the application down to a single question: "What were the charges for my department?" Once I determined that this was what this system was really trying to tell the end user, the interface became quite obvious and instead of a massive view with the ability to navigate to other massive views, it was just a single field to enter the department number a la the Google search box. When a manager entered their department (which was of course remembered for the next time) and clicked the button, the new code I wrote went out and gathered up the required numbers and showed them on a new document which functioned as the "monthly report". This was formatted in a clean and simple way, such that they really needed to spend no more than 30 seconds checking their numbers. That's a pretty decent time savings per month per manager, eh?

As I worked on the new UI, I also spent a great deal of time under the hood, trimming things, refactoring code to make it easier to read and hopefully more efficient. Even though the business rules were still complex, I strove to make the managing of those business rules as simple as possible. This is our challenge as application developers and is as much an art as it is a science. Based on the hundreds of Notes apps I've seen in my career, here are some ideas to get you started:

1. Not every database needs a three pane UI. As Nathan is fond of saying, "It doesn't all have to look like mail!". Pick the UI layout that makes the most sense for the task at hand.

2. Skinny down your forms and pages. Most developers try to cram too much into a single screen. Instead of this approach, try a more fluid design that brings the most important information for the current task to the forefront of the user's attention.

3. Use views wisely. Not only are views one of the biggest performance hogs, but it's not necessarily efficient to use a view to find what you are looking for. Provide other mechanisms to getting at the data in your app, such as a document search like in my example above.

4. Examine other apps that you find easy to use and try to determine the reason why you like them. See if you can bring some of these themes into your own applications. A great example of this is an ajax-type ahead feature. It was immediately evident when we first saw examples of this technique that it would be useful, but I really feel now that it is almost a must have. It's such a great device for simplifying data entry in many situations and I try to incorporate it into my designs whenever I can.

5. Think outside the box. Yep, it's a cliché but it's still true. Sit down with a piece of paper and make your design as simple as you can, trying to forget the bounds of what you can do within the client. Then, once your design is done, jump in and figure out how the heck you are going to do it. For me, this has been a powerful technique, as I've come up with some great interface tricks by "drawing myself into a corner". :-)

As my life and work gets busier and busier by the day, I am more convinced than ever that simplicity is one of the greatest gifts a designer, engineer, boss or politician can give us. I'm sure many of you feel the same, so strive to make the idea of Simplicity an integral concept in all of your designs and save your users (and yourself) from the Hellspawn.

Gathering of Mustangs & Legends - Flag Jump

2008-03-17T18:26:00.001-04:00

Cool...

Lotusphere Comes To You - Columbus Edition

2008-03-14T13:58:00.004-04:00

Hi Folks...Just a quick note to let you know that I'll be coordinating the Open Labs at the Lotusphere Comes To You event in Columbus, OH, next Thursday the 20th. If you have a chance to come by, please do and don't hesitate to introduce yourself!

The Open Labs give you a great opportunity to sit down and play with our new products, from Notes to Sametime, Quickr to Connections. Hope to see you there!

Direct Note Access...This is Revolutionary!

2008-03-12T06:33:00.003-04:00

(Disclaimer...this is not Notes related)

If you are a musician or music geek (or if you want to be fascinated by the things you can do with music on a computer), you have to check this out:

Wow!

ILUG...The Question of the Day

2008-03-06T10:51:00.003-05:00

So...the question of the day is:

How do I convince my boss to let me go to ILUG?

In my current role at IBM, I'm in technical sales for the Cleveland and Pittsburgh areas. Thus, it seems a little hard to justify that heading over to Dublin in June will help me sell Lotus software here at home. Then again, I would be "expanding my thought leadership". :-)

Hmmm...what do you guys think? Perhaps I could give out his address and we could all spam him! ;-D (Just kidding...I know he's started reading my blog now).

Well...either way, it's going to be one heck of a conference this year. Go if you can!