Power to the business user (Sharepoint and Lotus) October 13, 2007
Posted by lotusknots in Sharepoint vs Domino.add a comment
Somebody told the client that Sharepoint is their one stop pill and lotus notes should be on the way out. So, the first question they popped was, would we be able to do our minor changes or get small apps up and running on my own. Initially, you know the sales pitch..yeh yeh you can do all that and more. Well, now the client has been told…”Actions performed in Sharepoint are done by trained stuntmen, do not try it on your desktop”.
Many people like to do that, play around and create their own apps using lotus notes. Basically, I am against that approach. I am more biased to an engineering approach in building any software or application. But that is not always right as I have come to learn over the years.
Customer is right and they need what they want and they need not accept what you think is right for them. And we tailor the engineering processes to ensure productivity as well as compliance.
Wann be fair? Read that link.I am all for it.
But are we comparing apples to apples? I still dont think its right to compare Sharepoint and Lotus Notes, as Lotus Notes is still a one stop shop for many needs. Email, Calendaring, App development, Directory service and more. Dont you need ADS for directory in Sharepoint or any other LDAP setup? Dont you need Outlook for emails? Don’t you need Exchange? Don’t you need SQL server.
The world is truly flat but over there is it over? October 12, 2007
Posted by lotusknots in JustGyaan.add a comment
It could not have been more true I guess. Here I am, an Indian working in N America. Today was more like Christmas and it seemed that Santa visited me (except that my Visa card paid for the fun).
The day started with my cover for the Canon G9. The original pure leather cover from Canon. All the way from Tokyo in just 4 days through eBay! I was like a kid with a new present. It fits my camera like a glove and even has a tripod connector. All ye G9 owners, dont settle for anything less than this. Believe me, its worth the extra 20-25$ you are shelling out. I have a review on the camera over here if you care to read it!
Then I casually checked my buy.com order for the Wireless Router. To my surprise, an order that was placed yesterday is listed as out for delivery today! Isn’t that speedy! And my mail box has another surprise..My 2G B SandDisk Ultra 2 is awaiting me with the Dvorak eZine (I’ll write on my Dvorak later). I cant help but feel like the kid on Christmas day whom Santa has dropped a bunch.
I was mentioning to my friend Satya about how truly flat the world is. His remark was simple and profound:
“You sit there (N America) and the world is flat. We sit here (India) and the world is over!”
Yep, thats true in a sense. Can you imagine a Netflix running smoothly in India. The darned postman in India would not deliver my distance learning material at home cause it was heavy and many a mail has gone missing, only to be recovered when my neighbor moved his car once in a Blue Moon! (Exaggerated…just a couple of credit card statements that went missing like that)
I cant imagine the cops. Here I see a friendly guy in Black who holds the STOP sign for me and my daughter at her school. We wish G’Morning and G’Days. Perhaps in India, it would be a “Kya re…bhaja doon kaan neeche kya”. I still remember the bloke who would not forward my passport verification until I paid him. He even had the nerve to come around a second time. He had his way, but then I threatened him that my daughters passport is in the same address and if he writes anything else, I know what happens to him if he wrote a wrong report. The same guy I saw in front of Domlur ShantiSagar on the rioting day when Rajkumar died. He was just looking at the mobsters with a mocking smile, like one looks at their kids who are having some fun, While I was thinking…Gosh will my windscreen be smashed now, will I be able to pick my kid from the daycare and reach home safely, will my wife at Infosys be able to reach safe? Yikes..I dread it.
Captain Ravi, an army chap turned movie director in his recent one about Rajiv Gandhi assassination has a scene where the hero mentions to such a cop watching the rioting, “Do you know that in developed countries the first thing kids are taught is to call the cops and in India…Its a shame”
Well.. to write about that we need bytes and bytes but I guess it kinda suits the flat world I see (now) and what Satya retorted.
Plugged the ends and I can move on! October 8, 2007
Posted by lotusknots in LS2J, Lotus Domino, Lotus Notes, OOPS in LotusScript.add a comment
continung with connecting wires…Finally I got things moving along. The BluePages LS API did not run on the automated agent. Took me a while to realise that WebRetrieve process cannot function in getting a document handle via the Web. With loads of help from Roshan (Yep! Thanks Roshan) I got the Javabit of it. Then using Java and LS2J (Lotus Script 2 Java , if you are still wondering what that is) the pieces of the puzzle were complete.
Threw in the OPENLOG from OpenNTF.org and it was a smooth ride. So you think? Well the agent went kaput on the server. Cannot find ldap server! Took me a couple of days to get hold of the admin to have access to the server box. It seemed to be a hopeless case, with the server being connected to two networks, it always seemed to go into the other port when a request was raised. Tried setting the order of the networks in TCP/IP properties (earlier both were 1) to 1 & 2 respectively…Power9 gets 1 of course. (Power9..whats that? ask an IBMer).
Now the traffic get routed correct to both networks and so I thought the agent would work and ran home (That was a Friday). Sunday I try again to no luck. Pretty dumb of me..should have restarted the server! RESTART SERVER at the Domino Console and bingo, everythings smooth.
Now I can just sit back and monitor the openLog once a while to ensure that it works fine. OPENLOG, I recommend that you all try it. Save you time and money and its so easy that a caveman can do it (or rather a programmer can do it!)
Canon G9 Rocks October 6, 2007
Posted by lotusknots in Digital Photography.2 comments
Whattacamera! Most of the features of a DSLR without the bulkiness of it. If you would like to buy a high end camera, but do not care to understand about photography, please stick to the SD or ELPH series to make you look Chic! This G9 baby is for the serious photographer and not the casual one. (I belong to the casual one, but attempting to move up the scale).
First let me rave about the camera! Its a must have if you have the dough and understand a bit of what photography is. rest you can learn by trial. A friend asked me why you need 12 MP. Overkill yes, but when you work on editing the photos one would definitely appreciate the quality. I have a 2MP camera on my phone and when you start playing with the images on Picasa, the higher MP is really appreciative. The RAW format is something that I look forward to, but I am not quite there yet. The night /day and other modes are not set through buttons on the camera, but throught the menu. Camera buttons let you set the ISO and Tv/P/Av settings. I love the jog dial! You can browse through the pictures as well as change the othersettings real quick using the jog. Its a quick draw if you want to recompose your shot for a different focal length or shutter speed. Or if you understand it all, then there is the manual mode too!
Carrying it around is another issue. I took it to a restaurant yesterday and most of the time I was trying to protect the camera. A regular case logic type is not recommended for this sweetheart. You need the excluse cover sold by Canon. However, this case is not on sale in the USofA. You have it at their Japanese site, but I dont understand Japanese. Luckily there is a guy on ebay who sells it. I bought it for 77$ including shipping. Just ordered that today. See the pic above.
The case that I ordered reminds me of the Yashica 35mm film camera that I used to carry around earlier. (Loaned by my father-in-law). An old model but still my favorite on the point and shoot film camera. It used to give me such wonderful images that my wife was alway comparing to my earlier Kodak Digital P&S. The kodak ccd conked out at the end of two years and i was always drooling at my friends canon P&S (A530).
If you do a lot of rough riding and want to protect it found a good one here
A lot of other accessories are available from ebay. Canon gets you lenses for .75x to 2X. On ebay I have seen stuff ranging from .5x to 3X and filters too.
Have fun with it!
1/4/08: Now that I have used it for quite a bit, I think I can add a few more cents.
1. Always carry a tripod. Buy one if you do not have it. The camera cannot be operated by a passerby unless you do a bit of composing. If you can do that much you can atleast spare the chore of finding someone to do the click by having a tripod and using the timer. When you shop for one, look for something that can help you lock the center too. This is useful when you want to control the spread area of the legs. I am not sure if you can find one as that, else a normal one would cost between 15-20$ for full length. You get table tops too, but be prepared to carry a table everywhere you go.
DRAWBACK: Wish I could use a remote on this camera to capture the exact moments.
2. Experiment and learn how to shoot in Lowlight. It can be a harrowing experience to see a sony or casio slim as a credit card get good lowlight or underwater pics while you are struggling with this piece of equipment that was to work wonders! Take plenty of pics, learn the settings. I do not prefer the auto mode as sometimes it does a flash in low light that spoils the picture. Your tripod can be handy too. At times you can use it as a monopod to give that extra stability.
3. Flash: Buy a good flash and make use of the hot shoe too.(The flash will be useful when you upgrade to your DSLR!) The normal flash, if you observe fills light, creates shadows and at times reflects only the light and not the subject. Try snapping a subject next to an illuminated tree and you can see how a good ambience can be spolit by flash. If you have a good flash that diffuses the light, you should be able to get the ambience as well as the subject clearly. So I believe 
I am yet to buy the flash.
4. Weight: Yes weight! I now feel that at times it weighs less. With weight I guess we can have more stability and shoot better pictures. If you reached this point, I guess there is only one choice..Upgrade to a DSLR!
Lotus Forms October 4, 2007
Posted by lotusknots in Lotus, Sharepoint vs Domino.add a comment
Just watched a couple of demos of this and I am all excited. Build easy forms, use Domino as a backend store or use anything of your choice. Build forms quickly and deploy them faster on the web. Thats perhaps lotusknots! Will I get to work on it? Well perhaps depends on which client I work for. Right now I do not see any options, unless strategies are revisited. (Current speed is gauged at microknots..which product is for you to guess)
Perhaps you should take a drive… The banking scenario
If you need more demos look to the left Links bar
Testing, whats your scale October 4, 2007
Posted by lotusknots in Professions, Software - Services.add a comment
On my process list, this is the highest priority. I know many folks who sneer at this as yikes testing. Well congratulations, you must be the infallible software engineer writing flawless code. Maybe you should be on the NASA programming team.
The rest of us mortals struggle to keep the defect rates low and eliminate the injection points based on our learning. It takes a personal learning experience for many of us to realise this, but given that the entire community has a large collective experience how do we leverage that for the one’s who are into the initial few miles of the journey.
Think is one thing. If everybody thought, weighed and adopted the best ways we can achieve the perfect release. Sounds like re-inventing the wheel? Then lets Think>Look>Think. Think where you can find relevant information, every organization/community has its share of knowledge bases. Dont say that you can’t find anything in this age of information overload.
Soo Look! Dont find it on the intranet…Google it.
Canon G9 October 3, 2007
Posted by lotusknots in Digital Photography, Hobbies.add a comment
Finally, I own it! Have been toying with the idea of getting one for a long time. The G7 was on my target list when some birdie site told me that the G9 was on its way.
Launched in US on Sep 1, I clicked the order button on Circuit City on Oct 1. With a 24$ discount and an IBMer discount, I just got the inspiration or final push to go get it.
The pictures are fantastic, but I will write more on it once I get some serious clicking done. Right now, I am with the rigors of the regular service industry!
The connecting wire October 1, 2007
Posted by lotusknots in JustGyaan, Nirvana.1 comment so far
I hate being that. To quote my old colleague Thanmaya, you have to make yourself redundant to move on. Choice is yours, make your importance felt by holding the broken ends of the wire and let the electricity flow through you or find a piece of lengthy wire, connect the ends and move on with your life.
Thats what I set out to do exactly last night and ended up with just 4 hrs of sleep. Even the strongest of coffees has not yet woken me up on this cold Monday morning. So whats the best thing to do…update your patches before you get a security warning. I have tons of them to complete.
Couple of processes that were supposed to be automatically run, were being run manually. To me thats like being the conductor in between and something that I never want to do. So I set out to make things right and one thing led me to another.
First, we did not have the rights on the server. Ok, got that. Then the web task doesnt work. Yep fixed that too. But stuck on another error.. Well atleast one of the two processes run on schedule now. Gotta find a fix for the other or I am gonna be stuck with profile updates passing through me.
If anyone has used the BluePagesAPI on LS and have the error on GETFORMATTEDTEXT let me know offline. It hits a deleted employee and gets stuck. But sure does run fine when I call from Agent>Run.
