Lotusphere 2011: Preview and goals

January 28 2011

I arrived in Orlando yesterday, a total waste of a day as we provisioned the hotel room for the baby, forgot a suitcase at the airport, picked up a rental car, etc.  The sun isn't quite fully up as I write this this morning, but it's looking like the usual beautiful Florida January day as we head into Lotusphere.

There are probably a hundred different highlights and objectives I could call out for the next week, so inevitably I'll miss something.  My team and I met the other day to review our plans for the week.  Here's what we are looking forward to:

  • Beginning the public conversation about a next major release of Notes/Domino.  We've already approved our internal plan for the release, but that is really the start of the process.  While we'll work with the Design Partners throughout the cycle to build the release, there are several topics that we're researching and taking input on during Lotusphere.  Look for Jason Dumont to talk client vs. web, operating systems and hardware configurations, and other specs on the Notes client; Collin Murray to talk about priorities for the Domino Server.
  • Checkpointing success on LotusLive Notes, and driving objectives for 2011.  Being in the SaaS space is awesome because we iterate so often -- we launched and did three external releases of LotusLive Notes in 2010, and expect three in 2011.  We'll be talking about the Q1 release, but also plans and concepts for service updates throughout the year.  Scott Souder, Chris Baker, and Collin Murray are the three product management musketeers on LotusLive Notes, all on stage this week.  Worth checking out to see a different side of what we're working on, and some amazing engineering work across Domino and the LotusLive environments.
  • Mobile, mobile, mobile.  We're increasing our investment in mobile in 2011, no surprise given the explosion of smart phones and tablets.  Still, we are looking for input on what devices and mobile OSs are going to be your priority this year and beyond, and will be announcing new support.  Jan Kenney from my team will be part of a Sunday partner roundtable and has chaperoned a customer session from General Motors on Notes Traveler; you can also find her at the peds.  We have a mobile strategy session on the agenda for the first time.
  • Symphony and Project "Concord".  A year ago, we demonstrated technical concepts around productivity editors in the cloud.  We have much to say on the topic this year, and Jeanette Barlow has a Project "Concord" session to go into details on why this is more than productivity editors reborn on the web.  On Symphony 3, we shipped in November and have customer deployments to highlight and discuss.  Eric Otchet will show how you can leverage Symphony 3, including the plug-in installer for Notes, the new multimedia library, and other deployment tools.  In both areas, we're looking for insight on your requirements and deployment/management objectives.
  • Lotus Protector had a great 2010, adding Protector for Mail Encryption to the family and progressing Protector for Mail Security.  Sean Brown will go deep on these products and show why we have great solutions in this space and our plans for 2011.
  • Obviously, there's a whole track of application development sessions at Lotusphere.  We'll be talking XPages, of course, and how the IBM Project "Vulcan" vision ties into app dev in the future.  Pete Janzen from my team is in three app dev sessions, a good resource to get a view on the best route to building successful apps on Notes/Domino today.
  • On business development day, there's a session in every time slot that is relevant to my and my team's mission.  It starts after the keynote with Jeff Schick's Exceptional Work Experiences at 10:30 AM, with your first opportunity as partners to hear the vision of the combined Messaging & Collaboration, UC2, and Social Business solutions.
  • I'll be wrapping all of this up in my debut at the reins of the messaging and collaboration business, INV105 - Messaging and Collaboration Strategy, Monday at 2:15.  See you there!

Ed Brill | Lake Buena Vista, FL USA Category:  Lotusphere 2011  Add/View Comments [18]

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  1. 1  Paul Senior http://www.bermans.co.uk | 1/28/2011 8:54:59 AM

    Mobile, mobile, mobile.

    I would like Lotus Traveller, please. To run on IBM i.

    It is very annoying that this is available to Microsoft customers and now on Linux, but not to customers who use an IBM OS.

    Thanking you.

  1. 2  Ed Brill http://www.edbrill.com | 1/28/2011 9:25:22 AM

    @1 let's talk about that. Does it make more sense to invest the budget in another back-end platform for a no-charge add-on, or in more front-end capabilities for multiple mobile OSs? I think we are better off doing the latter. Now you at least have a non-Windows alternative.

  1. 3  Paul Senior http://www.bermans.co.uk | 1/28/2011 9:35:58 AM

    That's all very well when you say "another" back-end platform. Surely, if you are IBM, your own platform cannot be dismissed as "another".

    A lot of IBM customers don't really understand the logic of this. We spend on your products, then find that you don't join up the dots for us.

  1. 4  Serdar Basegmez http://lotusnotus.com/en | 1/28/2011 10:02:49 AM

    Ed,

    Keep some announcements for Istanbul :)

    My bets are on N/D 8.5.3 and Sametime 8.5.2. Lots of new features are on the waiting list I guess...

  1. 5  Dusan Mataruga  | 1/28/2011 10:49:12 AM

    I hear you Paul. We have the same problem with BES server too. We had to install a Windows server (and buy a Domino messaging license although we have a plenty of licenses on i5) just because of that.

    Looks like IBM i is a dying product. It is too bad, it is such a great system.

  1. 6  Mike Robinson http://www.invcs.com | 1/28/2011 11:29:44 AM

    It's dying b/c traveler is not back-ended on iSeries? That's a bit of a reach...

  1. 7  Timothy Briley  | 1/28/2011 12:04:58 PM

    @5,@6 - I agree that it's a stretch to say that iSeries is dying because Traveler and BES won't run on it, but over the years dealing with 3rd party product support usually becomes an issue as soon as you say iSeries. You find yourself looking for solutions to your business issue that won't require software running on a server.

  1. 8  Chris Miller http://www.IdoNotes.com | 1/28/2011 12:47:17 PM

    Good to see you arrived safely with the family.

    I have some time with Jeanette Barlow right after the OGS. Look for a podcast interview on more on her news.

    Also, Sean Brown just did a video interview talking some in advance of Lotusphere about the Protector family everyone should see.

    { Link }

  1. 9  Dusan Mataruga  | 1/28/2011 1:07:57 PM

    We have 4 co-op students right now. None of them has heard of iSeries. Once this generation of managers retire, nobody will know how good this system is.

  1. 10  Bill Geimer  | 1/28/2011 1:56:59 PM

    Help. I am sealed up in your suitcase [bump] endlessly riding the belt [bump] around MCO's luggage [bump] area. That will teach me to stow away!

  1. 11  LongLiveLotus  | 1/29/2011 8:33:14 AM

    The Notes Client needs to Die.

    Let the browser be the client and give us a plug in/framework for functionality currently in the client menus etc.

    We need apps to work unmodified too - so run them in a 'shell' inside the browser.

    And if the client is to stay the UI needs a complete modern rework - senior execs see it and puke..

    just my 2 penn'orth

  1. 12  Vincent Yeung  | 1/30/2011 3:57:26 PM

    Ed, is live streaming available for the General Opening Session (think this is what it's called)?

  1. 13  Gerry S  | 1/30/2011 5:59:54 PM

    @11 - Exactly. Workspace needs a overhaul into something that is insanely userfriendly a la Apple. As a developer I work near the admins and I still hear them talking with customers who complain/don't understand how to find databases. Also as an aside...i heard one person say that the reason they know lotus is dead is because the bags are the worst in years - lol.

  1. 14  Brian Parker  | 1/31/2011 12:12:48 AM

    Hi Ed,

    You need to know about the following. They were doing fine until the line about Lotus Notes and Crossover. The truth is, with a stable Lotus Notes client on OS X nobody needs Crossover any more.

    Cheers,

    Brian

    { Link }

    "Not being a company with unlimited resources, though, CodeWeavers needs to be picky about what Windows apps into which it pours its engineering time. "Our officially supported list still includes the big hitters like Microsoft Office and some of the others," Parshall said, "but we're taking some of them off, like Lotus Notes. I hate to say it, but who cares about Lotus Notes anymore?""

  1. 15  Bill  | 1/31/2011 7:42:57 AM

    @14, For most users, there is little need for Wine/Crossover Office to use Notes.

    I've been running a Linux as primary OS system for work for six years. In the beginning, I was forced to use VMWare to run a Windows guest to do all of my Notes work. Now I spend very little time with Windows even started, only when I need the Domino Admin client or Designer or I find some web site that just doesn't work unless your using Internet Exploder. The Notes client on Linux works very well.