I have about 10 pages of notes from Lotusphere that I want to turn into blog entries. However, since Orlando I've been involved in project PDL, been working on some awesome upcoming Socialtext stuff, and had a family party this weekend that brought my siblings to town, so I've not had a spare moment. I don't even want to think about my laundry nor the pile of bills on my desk!
Anyway, I'm going to begin my Lotusphere posts with what I think is the most significant thing I heard at the show. Yes, it is about Project Vulcan, but it may not be what you think. While I'm excited about a potential new user experience for Notes, that is not it. It was the announcement that right from the very start of the beta program, the API would be available for developers. Contrast that to Lotus Notes, where after a decade of promises, there is still no C&S API.
One of the keys to Twitter's success is that from the very start, developers built applications around it. There are literally thousands of tools that enhance the Twitter experience, and the team at Twitter could not have made all of those things on their own. Ask 3 people which Twitter client they use, and you'll get at least 5 different answers.
For Vulcan to succeed, the same thing must occur. People should not rely on Lotus to do everything, especially not right at the start. Instead, developers should get their hands on the API, and start making Vulcan into what they want it to be.
So go forth developers, explore strange new worlds where IBM is open, seek out new integration points, and boldly go where Lotus has rarely allowed you to go before.
Lotus Notes Mail - The Gems And The Warts
Tue, Aug 31st 2010 10:00a Alan Lepofsky Every time I hear some "2.0 evangelist" sing the praises of Gmail my stomach churns a little, my heartbeat quickens and my face tenses as I ponder what could have been if more attention had been paid to the Notes UI years ago. I both enjoy and hate giving the "Lotus Notes did that a decade ago" speech. I enjoy it because I like showing people that these awesome new features are neither new nor innovative. I hate it because it reinforces how IBM was never successful in getting people to like u [read] Keywords: admin
ibm
lotus
notes
rich text
desktop
eclipse
email
openntf
widgets
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Firefox 4 You Had Me At Organize Into Groups
Thu, Aug 26th 2010 10:10p Alan Lepofsky A few days ago FireFox 4 Beta 4 introduced "Panorama" which allows you to group tabs together and switch back and forth between different sets. You can manually do this today with FF3 by having multiple windows open, but this new ability to create the groups and see a visual representation has already greatly improved my web experience. I've created groups for "things I'm doing right now", "email, calendar and social media stuff", "articles to read later", "future to-dos", etc. The UI e [read] Keywords: email
firefox
Understanding The Pecking Order
Thu, Aug 5th 2010 8:30a Alan Lepofsky I'm happy to see Twitter gets the hierarchy right. Now if only my account was verified to prove I'm the real Alan Lepofsky. Thanks for the image Volker [read] Keywords: twitter
The Greatest Vacation Ever
Tue, Jul 20th 2010 11:30p Alan Lepofsky Go to http://www.gapadventures.com , under Region you'll see GAP is offering some pretty awesome destinations, Far Far Away... Packing for both Tatooine and Hoth on the same trip is going to be tough. [read] Keywords:
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Calling All Developers. Extend Enterprise Applications With Social Features
Mon, Jul 19th 2010 9:50a Alan Lepofsky Are you looking to extend your application development knowledge to include open internet technologies such as JSON, WebHooks, Activitystrea.ms and PubSubHubbub? Would you like to help your company or your customers by integrating existing enterprise systems with today's "2.0" social technologies? Are you free next Wed? If you answered yes to any or all of the above, then join us Wed July 21st at 9:30 PST for Integrating Enterprise Applications with Socialtext. Members of our Eng [read] Keywords: application
applications
development
enterprise
integration
Firefox 4 Option For Tabs On Top, Like Lotus Notes
Sat, Jul 10th 2010 10:40a Alan Lepofsky I've been hearing a lot this week about how Firefox 4 will be providing an option to put tabs at the top of the screen. Well, once again Notes which is always slagged for its UI was ahead of the curve. All kidding aside, this is a good video about UI design: [read] Keywords: lotus
notes
application
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