IBM and Research In Motion to collaborate on Mobilizing Enterprise Applications to BlackBerry

May 17 2006

More good news for the future of Lotus Notes applications...

With today's announcement, IBM and RIM are exploring opportunities for customers to more easily extend these Web services directly to BlackBerry, redefining the boundaries of their SOA to include mobile access. Extending Web services to the mobile arena creates an array of new opportunities for the over 125 million IBM Lotus Notes® and Domino users to collaborate with colleagues, clients and partners -- regardless of location.  ...

IBM and RIM each intend to continue their efforts to optimize the performance of BlackBerry Enterprise Server for IBM Lotus Domino, further improving efficiency and manageability.  ...

RIM is offering IBM Lotus Domino and Sametime customers a no-charge, downloadable, ten-user version of BlackBerry Enterprise Server v4.1. The software can support up to 15 users with the purchase of additional client access licenses. It can also be upgraded beyond 15 users with the purchase of an electronic unlock key. Beginning May 17, customers will be able to access this promotion at www.blackberry.com/go/mobilizedomino.
Link to press release: IBM and Research In Motion to collaborate on Mobilizing  Enterprise Applications to BlackBerry >

Ed Brill | Karlsruhe, Deutschland Category:  Lotus  Add/View Comments [11]

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  1. 1  dickstag  | 5/17/2006 11:46:25 AM

    Single Sign On, they need to add Single Sign On so that if you PW protect your BB, log into it, you are automatically logged into your entire infrastructure that supports LTPA; Websphere Portal, Notes mail, SameTime, etc....

    That you must configure your ST PW (and change it every 30 days as the real world does) into the BB ST client is a pain. That doing so, still doesn't get you authenticated with the rest of your IBM infrastructure is a bigger pain.

  1. 2  Steven Joseph  | 5/17/2006 12:28:12 PM

    Wow, this is a big change from just last week at Admin2006 when the announced ONE free user CAL with the free download of a 15-user BES 4.1 server. I guess they found out it is not too easy to test ST integration with one user? Heck I can already chat by myself with no server, no software, and no BlackBerry. This will make chatting a lot more fun....

    One sticky point... Did they say you can't use the free ST you get with the integrated IM? Does this mean you have to buy both a ST server license and ST user CALs to use this product onnyour BB???? We still have a lot(!) of ST CALs as 6.5 ST Connect has a number of features 6.5.x IM does not have, but this may be a sticking point for others... Unless I heard them wrong.

  1. 3  Andrew Kennel  | 5/17/2006 12:28:50 PM

    Smart move for RIM. Everyone calls them crackberries, so why not adopt the drug dealers approach to marketing: The first (10 client) taste is free.

  1. 4  Charles Robinson  | 5/17/2006 12:50:10 PM

    This has little to do with Lotus Notes applications, unless you mean companion products. In my experience deploying a Notes app on a BlackBerry is painful, but I'm not a Java guru so that likely contributed to the difficulty.

  1. 5  Sean Burgess http://www.phigsaidwhat.com/ | 5/17/2006 2:46:42 PM

    @Charles - You must not have been introduced to the MDS 4.1 Studio. This allows you to be able to create BB Apps without knowing Java. Just create a Web Service in Domino 7 and MDS will import it and convert it into an application on the BB. There are some other things that need to be done, of course, but it's no where near as cumbersome as it used to be.

    Sean---

  1. 6  Max Nierbauer  | 5/17/2006 4:52:01 PM

    Ron Sebastian showed it at the DNUG. Take your existing (!!!) code, publish it as a web service on Domino 7, import it in MDS 4.1 and you can connect from your BB to a SAP system using Domino as middleware within less than an hour.

    Now, every Domino developper is 'free' to download the BES and the MDS code and to try this on his own. (I'm sure there's already somewhere a BB handheld around for testing ;-)

    This alliance not only brings 250 million thumbs (and stil counting...)of Notes users to RIM it also brings your Notes application right to your user - wherever he is. This is a great added value. Or as Ed says: More good news for the future of Lotus Notes applications...

  1. 7  Ulrich Krause http://www.eknori.de | 5/18/2006 12:35:18 AM

    One small step for RIM and IBM, but a giant step for the notes community !!

    @5: MDS 4.1 Studio is real cool stuff.

  1. 8  Danny Lawrence  | 5/18/2006 10:48:00 AM

    Finally! Hopefully this begins the transisiton of the BB from "let's put everything into e-mail" to a real mobile application client.

  1. 9  Bill Malchisky  | 5/18/2006 2:07:55 PM

    Good news, indeed.

    Now, if RIM would only roll-out clustering and support a non-Windows Domino flavor...they might be able to substantiate considering themselves an enterprise application, rather than just charging enterprise-class prices.

  1. 10  Steven  | 5/18/2006 9:03:23 PM

    @9 BES stated at Admin2006 that clustering was coming in 5.0 which they said had the asme approx release date as Hannover.

  1. 11  Charles Robinson  | 5/18/2006 10:22:22 PM

    @9 - In my discussions with a RIM partner I was told that Windows was the only platform for BES for the foreseeable future. That was in June 2005 and I haven't heard anything to the contrary since.