keith@knproductions.com
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Keith Nolenkeith@knproductions.com
As of last week, my most recent article for The View is available on-line and in the print edition. It's called "Notes client application makeover for the Web, Part 2: Improving the user experience with AJAX" and is the second of three articles. I am pretty proud of this series of articles, as they describe the most complex Domino web app I have ever created for my own purposes. The series describes how to take an R7 Notes client app and move it on to the web. The database (which you can download even if you are not a subscriber) shows how I used AJAX, JavaScript, LotusScript, Java, and CSS to create a single-window application.
I have been writing for The View for eight years now, and have published 10 articles with an 11th currently in edit. I have really enjoyed it, and am already planning my next article. My articles have gotten longer and longer, and each one has been more work than the last. Considering this last three-part series was originally conceived as a single artcile I think you can see the trend. I hope this next one will be a little shorter and less complex.
Keith Nolenkeith@knproductions.com
Yesterday was Memorial Day here in the U.S. The holiday was first established to honor Union soldiers who perished in the Civil War, and has since been expanded to commemorate all who have perished while in military service to the United States.
I have always been a patriot, a lover of my country. I believe that the United States is unlike any other country, never having has a king, and having been founded as a place where government serves the people, not vice-versa. Is it perfect? No, but it is mine, and I will serve it as best I can.
Freedom is not free, and it is both precious and fragile. Many, many men and women have died to preserve, protect, and defend my right to live how I see fit. I can work at any job I can attain. I can travel without papers, anywhere in the country. I can spend my money as I like. I can vote how I like, or run for office myself. I and my wife can raise our daughter however we like. We can send her to any school our means allow and teach her anything we like.
In most of the world, for most of history, this has simply not been the case. A hudred years ago, in this country, women could not vote. Fifty years ago, practically speaking, blacks could not vote in large parts of the country. If you fail to pay a fine in Switzerland today, the police show up on your doorstep in force. If you're female and don't wear a hdead scarf in much of the world, you risk stoning. And we've seen how China views dissent, as a threat to be crushed.
This Memorial Day was particularly poignant for me because we visted my father. He has been struggling with Parkinson's for three years now. Last month he fell ill and went into the hospital. He's now out, but is in a nursing home, and his return home will probably never happen - he can no longer care for himself and needs more care than my mother can provide.
Anyhow, Dad is a vet. He served five years in the Navy, inlcuding Operation Deep Freeze. He was one of the first men to winter over in Antarctica. Now he is frail. His speech is slurred, his vision is failing, and he needs help just to get up out of bed and into his wheelchair. When I think of him, one of the things I am reminded of is how each generation stands on the shoulders of their predecessors, and what our predecessors have handed down to us. We hacve freedom, and prosperity, and peace at home. These are things I want to pass on to my daughter and her generation, and her children as well. While I never served, I will do my best to impart those values to her and work through the political processes to make sure the America she inherits will be one where freedom is still a reality.
Keith Nolenkeith@knproductions.com
I realize that Bleedyellow.com is a tech site, but I'm gonna discuss some politics anyway. To give you some context, I am a Republican and consider myself a conservative. I also am really unhappy with the current administration and believe that civil liberties must be preserved.
So here are some random thoughts on the candidates.
Hillary Clinton
First off, how can she say she's experienced? Yes, she has spent 30+ years in public life, but her presence in the public sector was a result of her marriage to Bill Clinton, not a result of her winning elections. Rosalynn Carter did that too.
Her key achievement as First Lady was the failed health-care plan. She also managed to embarrass herself and her husband several times by saying the wrong thing at the wrong time. Then she got a lot of sympathy for the Lewinsky affair.
Once she and her husband were forced to move from Pennsyvania Avenue, she really did accomplish something, winning the open New York Senate seat. And by all reports she's ben an effective senator.
But I don't consider her career one that qualifies her to be President. She's never been chief executive of anything. Six years in the Senate does not a good chief executive make. She has a good understanding of capitalism and the law, having worked as a lawyer and made good money through her work and investments. But she still seems to think it is the government's job to create jobs. Lousy idea. I think she might, perhaps, make a good cabinet-level staffer, as policy and politics are her strong points.
But I can't see her as qualified to represent the US to, say, China, or to make the best decisions for us in energy policy. I'd like to see some Senate chairmanships, some sponsoring of significant legislation, and perhaps a better understanding of how taxes really effect the economy.
Barak Obama
OK, I understand he's popular and different. And he speaks well. But the guy's a paper tiger, and one with bad judgment to boot.
He has less time in the Senate than Clinton, and fewer accomplishments.
While an Illinois representative, he basically did nothing.
His three most prominent acquanitances are Rev. Jeremiah Wright (a flatly ant-American, divisive preacher who promulgates a polically motivated distortion of Christianity), Tony Rezko (a Chicago political manipulator/real estate developer currently on trial), and Bill Ayers (a terrorist who made bombs in Greenwich Village).
He has no grasp of the realities of international politics. He has never been chief executive of anything. He does not understand most of America, as he has never spent any time living, working, or governing anywhere except in wealthy enclaves. He thinks he can change things with words alone. Ideas and actions are needed, and much better decision-making than this young man has shown.
I doubt he has any significant grasp of economics. His policies, to date, are not significantly different from those the Democrats have offered over the years. The last time we had Democratic economic policies in the White House (the Carter administration - Clinton was an economic moderate who mostly ride the doc-com boom to prosperity), we had double-digit inflation and a withering economy. Those ideas don't work.
Frankly, I'd like to see much better judgment and a hell of a lot more experience in a candidate for mayor, much less for President.
John McCain
McCain can knock the experience ball out of the park, as a long-term Senator with a record of military service.
He also has significant Senate accomplishments, some of which I really admire. McCain-Feingold was an OK attempt to tackle a thorny issue. His key role in the Gang of 14 broke a terrible Senate logjam.
His vocal (and, to date, correct) positions on the Iraq and Afghanistan wars show that he has both the judgment and experience to be an effective commander-in-chief, a key requirement at this point in history.
I'd like to see a better grasp of economics, and I suspect he is working on it. I like his center-right positions, and I think a McCain administration would, for the first time in years, result in a truly smaller, more effective government. I disagree with his tax plans, and I suspect, if he is elected, he'll have to contend with a very Democratic legislature.
Summary
Truth be known, I voted for Rodolph Giuliani in the Florida primary. I am not truly excited about McCain, but I think he is the only qualified candidate left in the field. Neither a former first lady nor a one-term junior senator have the experience, the clout, or the judgment to be President, so McCain is my choice.
Happy Memorial Day!
Keith Nolenkeith@knproductions.com
Are you one of those "bitter" people that Barak Obama seems to so deeply mis-understand?
Keith Nolenkeith@knproductions.com
Last night I attended my local IIBA chapter's May meeting. This meeting was formatted as a 'lightning round' information exchange workshop. The room had five tables, each with three discussion questions on a topic relevant to BA work. We each rotated around the room in 10-minute sessions and, during each session, discussed the questions at each table. Ground rules similar to a brainstorming session (safe environment, respect privacy, everyone is allowed to speak, etc.) created an environment encouraging honesty and openness.
Topics included scope management, requirements elicitation, managing stakeholders, tools, and career management. Some questions were obvious ("what is your favorite tool for BA work? " ), while some evidenced a good understanding of the challenges of BA work ("how do you manage a stakeholder who dominates a brainstorming session? " ).
I learned a few things about myself and my area.
- There are a surprising number of BA's in my area. Disney, Wyndham, Marriott, credit unions, banks, they're all employing significant numbers of BAs.
- With 15 years of consulting experience I am one of the more experienced analysts at the table. I'm not used to that, as most of the team I work with has tons of experience.
I also learned some things about the software marketplace.
- Just about everyone uses Word, but most users aren't happy with it. The chief complaints seem to be the complexity and, over time, the messed-up file format. There's a real opportunity for Lotus Symphony, this tells me.
- Just about everyone struggles with document and information management. There's a real need for a lightweight, cost-effective document management system for departments and the SMB space. I can see a stripped-down version of Lotus Domino Document Manager filling this space quite nicely.
- SharePoint is starting to get to the place that Lotus Notes has been in for years -- if you don't assign plan and resource your deployment adequately, you get a lousy implementation and the product does not perform as advertised. My employer is a big SharePoint shop, so I think I see an opportunity to sell our SharePoint expertise.
Keith Nolenkeith@knproductions.com
Are you a business analyst? Do you perform business analyst activities? You may do BA stuff and not know it. If you...
- Gather requirements
- Interview users
- Run workshops
- Create specifications
- Perform prototyping or JAD sessions with users
- Participate in or facilitate brainstorming sessions
- Design test plans
...then you are performing BA tasks. Most software developers, whether they know it or not, perform some BA tasks at least part of the time. It's pretty hard to get anywhere as a developer without understanding business requirements, after all.
So what is a Business Analyst?
A business analyst works as a liaison among stakeholders in order to elicit, analyze, communicate and validate requirements for changes to business processes, policies and information systems. The business analyst understands business problems and opportunities in the context of the requirements and recommends solutions that enable the organization to achieve its goals.
The role of the BA differs from the role of the Project Manager in that the BA is responsible for defining and managing the scope of a business solution, while the PM is responsible for the work necessary to implement that solution.
Last year the International Institute of Business Analysis (IIBA) founded a chapter here, and I have been a member since. As someone who has been doing BA activities for over 15 years, I think the establishment of a BA professional organization like the IIBA is long overdue.
If you do BA work, or check out http://www.theiiba.org ASAP!
Keith Nolenkeith@knproductions.com
I have been running my own Domino server out of my home since about 2001. We run our family e-mail and web sites from it.
I started with an old HP Pavilion back in 2001. In 2003 I upgraded to Windows 2000 and moved to a new box with a gig of RAM and a huge, for the time, 20Gb hard drive. This server is still up and running today. It's gone from Domino R6 through 6 and 7, and currently runs 8.0.1. In, I think,. 2005, I added a second hard drive (30Gb). The transaction logs go on C: and the Domino data goes on D. I also upped the memory to 2 GB. But other than that, service packs, and a new LAN card, it hasn't changed much in years.
The neat thing about this server, aside from its longevity, is that through all the version permutations and my experiments with Tomcat, DB2, and other products, it has always met my needs. Windows 2000 has, overall, been a great OS for me. I'm planning to finally retire this server this summer, and will (reluctanlty) probably move to Windows Server 2003. I'm sticking with Windows primarily because I know it, it works on my hardware, and I own the licenses so it's free. If I knew Linux I would consider it, but since I don't know it I can't be bothered to learn it unless there's a good financial reason to do so.
So this Windows 2000, 2 Gb RAM, 2-disk server has pretty much been an ideal solution for me, perfectly balancing out cost and performance while being extremely low-maintenance. If you could picture the perfect server for an SMB organization, what would it be? And remember I don't mean "the most powerful server"-- imagine you are paying for all the costs out of your own pocket, so you'll need to balance cost, performance, maintenance, utility, and longevity.
Keith Nolenkeith@knproductions.com
If you've worked with Lotus Notes and Domino for any length of time, you understand the meaning of the magical number 1352. That's the TCP/IP port number reserved for Lotus Notes and Domino communication. This port is reserved strictly for communication bwetween Notes and Domino servers and clients. In many corporate environments, this port is either restricted or completely closed. While there are a lot of things that can be done using web versions of apps (over the commonly open port 80), sometimes only client access will do. And if 1352 is closed, you're often out of luck if you want to access a server you have set up at home or anywhere outside the corporate environment...
...or not. Most people don't know that It is possible for Notes and Domino to communicate over any available TCP/IP port. Domino can monitor multiple ports for TCP/IP traffic, but it takes some configuration changes to make it happen. These requirements are poorly documented, and nobody has ever published a single procedure for setting this up, so I thought I would fill that particular gap.
Note that this is not recommended or supported by IBM. Making these kinds of changes generally requires some admin knowledge, access to the router/firewall that protects your server from the Internet (you do have a firewall, right?), and direct access to the server in question, inlcuding its operating system files and Domino Directory. Do so at your own risk, your mileage may vary, do not violate company policies, etc.
In this exercise I'll assume that we're using port 80 and Notes and Domino 8.0.1. The server is publicly accessible via myserver.net and has an internal IP address of 10.12.2.2.
Step 1: Determine a TCP/IP Port to Use
The first thing to do is identify an alternate port that you want to use. This port needs to be open in both your corporate firewall and unused by your target server. If your target server is not a web server, port 80 is a good candidate. if it's not serving SMTP mail, try port 25. If you don't do SSL, try 443. In this example I'll use port 80.
Step 2: Server Needs a Fixed Internal IP Address
The second thing you'll need to do is assign a fixed internal IP address to your server. This is required for this solution to work. For the proper steps, check your OS. You may also have to make changes to your router to route all appropriate traffic to this address. Again, I'm using 10.12.2.2 in this example.
Step 3: Modify the Server's Notes.ini
Third, you'll modify the notes.ini of the server in question. You'll need to make the following changes. MAKE A BACKUP COPY OF YOUR NOTES.INI BEFOREHAND, and if you blow up your Domino server, don't come crying to me, I warned you...
A. Name a new Domino TCP/IP port by adding the port name to your PORTS entry in the notes.ini. In this case we're creating a new port called TCPIP80.
Old entry:
Ports=TCPIP
New entry:
Ports=TCPIP,TCPIP80
B. Create the port definition by adding an entry like the following.
New entry:
TCPIP80=TCP, 0, 15, 0,,32800
The numbers in the line above have some meaning, but they almost never need to be modified. When in question, copy an existing port definition and modify the name.
C. Tell the server to direct the new port to listen on TCP/IP port 80. This makes use of the little-known notes.ini setting <TCPPortname>_TCPIPAddress, which is nominally used to define the IP address and port number for a partitioned server. But as an alternate usage, it can tell your server to listen on an alternate port (even if the server is not partitioned).
Assuming the internal IP address is 10.12.2.2 and you're workinmg with port 80, you'd make an entry that looks like this.
New line:
TCPIP80_TCPIPAddress=0,10.12.2.2:80
You can find more information about this notes.ini entry here. The best thing about this is that your original TCP/IP port still listens on 1352, so standard connections will continue to work.
Step 4: Modify the Server Document
Now you'll need to modify your server configuration document to enable the new port. In the Domino Directory, open the server's config document and go to the Ports tab, then the Notes Network Ports sub-tab. There you should see a new entry for your new port. If there is no entry for the new port re-start the Domino server process.
The new port's "Enabled" entry will probably be empty. Change it to Enabled and re-start the server. Watch the startup process. If you get no error messages the port should be active.
Step 5: Re-Direct Router Traffic
Use the admin settings on your router to direct port 80 traffic to the Domino server. The procedure and exact settings will vary based on your hardware.
Step 6: Create a New Port on the Notes Client
Now you need to tell your Notes client to talk to the server via the new port. This is easier than you might think.
A. Using File-Preferences-Notes Ports (or File-Preferences-User Preferences-Notes Ports for pre-8 versions), create a new TCP/IP port.
A1. Click New...
A2. Give the port a name (i.e. TCP80), select the TCP/IP protocol, and click OK.
A3. Make any other changes you like to the new port. I recommend encryption and compression.
B. Create a new connection document to use the port. Open your local Names.nsf to the Advanced view and create a new Server Connection document.
B1. Connection type: Local Area Network
B2. Use LAN Port: Select your new port.
B3. Server name: If you don't know you hasve no business doing this.
B4. Click on the Advanced tab...
B5. Locations: Select as you see fit.
B6. Usage priority: Normal.
B7. Destination server address: Here comes the magic. Enter the name or IP address of your server, followed by a colon and the port number. Example: myserver.net:80
C. Save and close the connection document.
D. Create any location documents you might want. This depends on how you use locatuions to manage your client configuration. Make sure the location document makes use of the new port, and that the new connection document makes use of the port as well.
Step 7: All done!
Now re-start your Notes client. Log in, select your new location, and try to open a database on the destination server. If you've done everything right, your Notes client will be able to reach your server from behind the firewall. I recommend testing this without the firewall first, to make sure everything is working.
Keith Nolenkeith@knproductions.com
OK, I will be the last to jump on this meme, describing how I came to be involved in Lotus Notes.
I started my career as a technical writer, working for companies such as System One and Blockbustrer Video (I wrote their store operations manual). Having done that for a few years, I observed that most managers were (and are) not especially competent. I also saw that my chosen profession had a glas ceiling when it came to salaries and promotions. So, looking for a career without a glass ceiling, I decided to get into management. The golden gateway to management is an MBA, so I got one in 1994.
However, I had always been a tech geek. I had job offers from Arthur Anderson and some other companies, but they required me to move. I did not want to for personal reasons, so without experience, a business plan, or cash, I started my own consulting company. I struggled by for a while, then finally closed up shop in 1996 and took a job at a medical services company as an MS Access developer. in mid 1996 I got a call from a grad school friend. His employer was opening a branch in my town and wanted to add some staff. I'd have to learn this Lotus Notes thing and get certified. Grumbling about how this weird product was not relational, I took the job anyway - they 60% pay raise helped a lot.
We had a Novell Netware network in the office. Our main Notes server (R4) ran on OS/2 Warp and replicated four times a day with the home office via dial-up. I went about getting certified as a developer and admin on R4, then on 4.5 when it came out in 1996. Our clients included Olive Garden, Siemens, and AT&T. LotusScript was easy -- a lot like MS Access BASIC. Formulas were not too bad, as they reminde4d me of my old 1-2-3 days. Admin - now that was hard. But I still managed to get certified on every version from 4.5 to 7 on both Admin and Dev, and have been a LotusScript pCLP since R5.
I've been involved with Notes in some way or another ever since. I've done work for manufacturers, retailers, hospitals, government agencies, telecom companies, banks, restauranteurs, and shippers. I've spoken at conferences, published artciles in The View, met some great people, and attended at least three Lotuspheres. Plus I run our famil e-mail and web server using a Domino box that sits under my desk at home. After over 8 years of service, and upgrades from 5.0.8 all the way to 8.0.1, it is time to retire that box. The new box will, of course, run Domino.
Ironicaly, I am no longer professionally involved in Lotus; I just do it as a hobby. So why am I in the middle of a three-part series of Ajax articles for The View? Well, because I can, I guess.
Keith Nolenkeith@knproductions.com
I have been using the Mac 8.5 beta client on my Macbook for about five weeks now, and I have some initial impressions. FYI, I am running on Leopard on a version 1.1 Macbook (Intel core duo) with 2Gb of memory.
- At this point, the Mac client is a lot more stable than I would expect from a first beta....
- ...assuming you have a clean install. I started with an upgrade and it was pretty crashy.
- Performance is OK. I am sure it will pick up in production.
- The Lotus team has a challenge in balancing the Mac UI guidelines and Lotus UI tradition. I am glad I don't have their challenge.
- I'd like to see the InfoBox be dockable and re-sizable.
- About the only thing I deperately miss from the Windows environment is menu keyboard shortcuts. Pressing Alt-F for the file menu is a lot more efficient than reaching for the mouse.
- IBM really needs to update the home page creation tools. They are basically unchanged since R5. One enhancement I would love to see would be an accordiion-like interface for controlling content display. They've done it in the sidebar, so it is obviously doable.
- When the migrate Administrator and Designer to OS X I will be able to delete my Windows partition.
Keith Nolenkeith@knproductions.com
I am currently in the process of converting my family from a Windows environment to a Mac environment. We have two Macs in the house, my Macbook ('Platon') and my wife's Mac Mini ('Vesta').
My wife, for the time being, is getting all of her mail via Mac mail (mail.app). She connects via IMAP to our home Domino server, and she seems to be pretty happy with it. Here are some observations.
- There is no way to tell mail.app which folder to use for junk mail. It just goes ahead and creates one when you establish the connection and turn on junk mail filtering. So now Pam's mail DB has more than one junk mail folder.
- Ditto for Sent. Dumb.
- The LDAP directory settings don't seem to be working. I think this has more to do with my Domino server than anything else.
- The Mac client does an excellent job of rendering e-mail regardless of format - rich text, plain text, HTML. Wish I could say the same thing for Lotus Notes.
- We have a Logitech trackball attached to the Mini (and all of our other PC's in fact). Pam finds the use of the right mouse button to be pretty straightforward. It blows my mind that Apple stubbornly stuck with a 1-button mouse for years. Sure, Jobs is brilliant, but when he is wrong, he is wrong.
I'll have some observations on the Mac 8.5 beta client later.
Keith Nolenkeith@knproductions.com
Well, after a several-month absence, I have returned to the blogosphere.
I shut down the original Yellerdog.net because I felt I had nothing more to say, and because my employer at the time was keeping a close eye on my blogging activities. I felt very curbed by this, probably because there are two things I like to do on blogs: brag and complain. I could not brag without revealing company secrets, and I could not complain very much without airing dirty laundry.
Plus the blog was a pain to maintain. I was interested in communicating, but not in writing a blog template, experimenting with Blogsphere, etc. So I killed it.
But now I am back. BleedYellow makes it very easy to blog, and I find that I still do have some things to day -- about Lotus products, about politics, about religion, and the other topics that interest me.
More ti come.
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