Lotus Nut

Another great addition for Notes Client usability is an easier way for users to create hyperlinks! Finally there is a quick way to do this! Previously, you would have to go through several menu levels or remember ALT+C+H+L and then fill in a properties box that may be confusing for the casual user. But in 8.5.1, this should be easier to accomplish.

After selecting the text you would like to use for the link, you can either choose the Create > Hyperlink menu item:

Or you can choose a toolbar option:

This will then bring you the following dialog when you're creating a new memo:

This will be a welcome improvement for Lotus Notes users!!

Disclaimer: Notes 8.5.1 is still in Beta and therefore subject to change between now and its ship date.

There are two quick things I would like to highlight with the Lotus Notes 8.5.1 Client that's currently in beta.

First of all is the ability to resize table columns from the rich text editor. I love using the "Copy Selected as Table" from within views and then pasting the table into a new memo. Then I like to do some formatting - which would always involve resizing the columns. With 8.5.0 and earlier, when I would want to do this I would have to open the Table Properties and then resize each cell width. Lotus Notes 8.5.1 now allows you to just click on the column separator and resize it via dragging. Very cool!!

The second thing is related to view navigation. How many of you have ever had calls from users who say "MY EMAIL HAS DISAPPEARED! THE SKY IS FALLING!!!" Only to find out they just inadvertently pressed the "end" key and it navigated the view all the way to the right past the visible text. With Lotus Notes 8.5.1, the home and end keys (currently) will navigate to the top and bottom of the view (this is to be more consistent with other Windows navigation behavior).

Disclaimer: Notes 8.5.1 is still in Beta and therefore subject to change between now and its ship date.

A little known ECL setting for Domino is "<ECLOwner>". Adding this in as an entry to the ECL will allow you to control exactly what the workstation user can do with code signed as himself and running on the workstation. More information can be found here. Recently I have seen where -Default- has allowed all of the methods (please, do NOT have your ECL configured this way!!!) and when it was previously removed in testing the users were prompted to add ECL entries for themselves when opening folders (or doing other such things). The solution is to grant <ECLOwner> the proper rights first and then to begin the process of revoking rights for -Default- and "No Signature".

And if you haven't looked in a while, please go review your ECL (carefully, don't just go revoking people and make sure the account you use has access to modify the ECL within the ECL so that you don't have users receiving those prompts!)

This blog post from the Notes Design Blog by Mary Beth Raven states that unread marks will now work for iNotes folders with 8.5.1 (along with automatic inbox refreshing)! This is something that I've been wanting to see since I first used iNotes in Domino 6.0. Actually, back at both Lotusphere 2003 and 2004 the company I was working for was told by IBM that this would be coming with DWA 7. I even posted an idea for this.

Thanks to IBM for finally enabling this. I can say that this was one of the reasons that iNotes wasn't rolled out as the only mail option for many people at that time. This will be a big success as now iNotes users can get the most out of their email and use rules more effectively since they will now know in which folder that new email lives. :)