A big thank you
Yesterday, I did something I hoped I would never have to and I asked a favour of you guys. I then went on a bike ride. By the time I got back, just over an hour later, I was overwhelmed with the amount of help I'd been given. I thank you all.
In the responses given I was accused of taking myself too seriously and that I should allow myself to ask questions. The reason being that you guys have taken so much information from this site it's only right that you get the chance to return some. Good point. What I have to do is keep the balance right, between giving out and asking for information.
Anyway, I am just about to go through all the ideas and see if I can't get any of them to work. It's getting to the point of absurdity. All I want to do is say yes or no to a client. This is before I even put in a quote! Surely this should be really easy - not to have a secondary address book appear in type-ahead messaging. Child's play? It appears not. All I want is the following change the Directory Assistance document:
Next Friday I am going to London to visit another potential client who wants a complete new dynamic website for their recruitment agency. Job postings, mailing-lists etc. They are leaving the hosting down to me and, to be quite frank, I'm not even going to consider using Domino. It would be easy to do so for the initial phases but it's when the customer starts getting fussy. I hate having to say "We can't really do that". I would rather have the pain of developing "from the ground up" in something like PHP and feel safe in the knowledge that, when the going gets tough, there won't be any obstacles in our way.
Was that a rant? Sorry, it wasn't meant to be. I just wanted to say thank you ;o)
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What ure probs Jake u should be using domino ans u know it makes sense. This is a good advert to stop using domino is it not
Why would you say that a site like that would be easier to do in PHP than in Domino? In which areas would you forsee problems ?
I didn't say it would easier. In fact I said it would be harder. The one thing Domino has going for it is that it's easy to create a dynamic site. It's just no way near as flexible as a site you create with a language like PHP, designed from the OUTSET, as a web tool. Don't really want to get in to the argument anyway. It's just my opinion.
Not getting into an argument, but if u given the opertunity to develop using domnino , is that not easier for u
I don't care what's easy and what isn't. I care about what is good for a) the client and b) my mental state of mind. Things like this drive me mad with Domino.
With PHP and an RDBMS it's my code and my db structure. Things are more than likely to do what you want and, trust me, you can do whatever you like.
*shock* your not going to use Domino??? Guys, maybe he fell off his bike and hurt his head.....
I'm joking.
Its good that you are understanding the requirement and selecting the best product to do the job. I have dealt with too many "consultants" who clearly use a certain product because its all they know rather than being the most suited tool.
Jake, when you are in London next Friday give me and PK a ring if you fancy a beer.
I'll try Matt but I am coming with Karen (she's on school holidays for 6 weeks then) so we can make a weekend of it.
Karen is welcome as well, I can ask her what a lovely young lady sees in the likes of you ;-)
I've been a Domino developer for many years and have recently begun work on a side project using MySQL and PHP. I know EXACTLY what you are referring to! Hey, I love Domino and it's given me a good living but my new client is extremely impressed with PHP - I haven't had to say 'I can't do that' yet! And besides, he hates paying for Domino licenses. Keep up the good work on this site though - who knows, perhaps you'll share some PHP nuggets in the future too.
I've converted over to the Microsoft dark side as well. Too easy of a conversion to ASP.NET and SQL Server from Domino.
My 2 cents.
First, nice call on not using Domino on a net new application. It takes guts to step away from something you know well for something that is a little less familiar.
As a former Domino developer, I understand your pain with the product.
If it were me and I could choose and non-Domino platform to develop on for a recruiting application (I've just finished one), I would not choose PHP. It's too tightly coupled with the database, too much embedded SQL. Give this some thought on your next bike ride:
Jakarta Struts front end, Castor for your persistence framework and mySQL on the back end. Complete open source solution with a true enterprise architecture. All running on Tomcat.
I've done worse than go over to the darkside, I've co-conspired. I participated in a Lotus email to outlook migration and wound up writing the calendar migration tool. Did I do it in lotus script? Yes and no. I wrote a lotus script agent that output .vbs files that were run inside the proper outlook mailboxes to push in all the data... what a mess.
But it was the only way - the big expensive consulting firm couldn't figure it out because they were only considering MS centric technologies. Having broken from being a Domino biggot, I was able to see the bigger picture as well as all the possible answers (and do it for my affordable independent rate).
There's no shame in doing what needs doing in the best way for the project and the customer. Rock on, Jake ( and Clint and Darryl ) :-)
Just a question for your webdirectory problem.
How many server did you use ??
Did you have a dedicated server for the web?
If yes, no problem (it seem)!
+ On "notes" server set the standard names=privatePAB
+ On web server use the old cascading scheme "names=privatePAB,WebPab.
+ Avoid notes access on the web server for non admin user (firewall or access group etc).
CQFD (French acronym in the text)
UnclePhil
Yeah, wot Jamie said. We're moving from Domino to struts + oracle here... I would have preferred MySQL on tomcat, but I don't write the budget.
The upfront dev time is more intensive, but if you do a nice job of making buisness objects and data access objects behind your struts, there seems to be much less pain later - plus all the disparate dev groups within the megalithic firm I work for are moving this way, increasing compatability betwixt apps.... not a bad way to go.
me too, in re the move to j2ee.
1) there is virtually no work here in chicago for notes/domino developers; but there are a few things for j2ee & mixed skill sets sort of people...
2) imho, too many kludgy workarounds with domino apps; when doing a webapp from the ground up its nicer to work with technology that's more recent and written to do what's expected of a web app.
3) for me, domino apps always felt like a 'cheap' one-stop shopping solution for clients that had notes 3/4 apps in place and wanted to keep these 'legacy' apps around by strapping on a web interface. the obvious problems will appear after awhile with this approach: scalablity, data integration with an RDBMS, "increasing compatability betwixt apps", etc.
He guys, telling me that J2EE is simple...am I missing something after my recent course here...?????
Hi Jake,
What are you using to create your php files? Just a text editor (like ultraedit or phpedit) or an ide?
Cheers
Darren
To all the previous Domino zealot posts: "When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail".
Domino is a great technology - BUT - shouldn't be used blindly for absolutely everything. Understand the requirements, then objectively select the best suited technology. Domino has never done complex data relationships well - to satisfy this requirement alone you must use a relational database server (or write a heap of very ugly agent code to duplicate the data).
OK, start the flame war now.......
Brendon.
There u are jake what a discussion.
So it looks like the dark side is taking over but we will be back,
I use both Lotus Notes, and ASP. I have to say that I find the ability to create dynamic websites easier and quicker in Lotus Notes... but as soon as something gets complicated you just know there's a whole heap of workaround that you'll need to get it to work in domino.
I need to start learning PHP now though... get my thumbs in other pies. Anyone know any good resources?
Re the secondary address book question. Do the "internal users" actually need access to the external server for mail etc ? If not then what about a different Notes domain cross certified with the internal one - that way the Address Book's are completely separate
We do not have the type-ahead problem with Directory Assistance. We have several application-specific address books supporting web-authentication, and none of the names from the sub-address books drop in when using type-ahead, as they do from the main NAB. Perhaps it is a Domino 6 "improvement"? (We're on 5.)
--Jeb