Why The Silence?
Wow. More than 2 months since I last blogged. Which is the longest period of silence this site has ever seen. What gives? Is codestore dead? Does anyone care? Well a couple of you do. Enough to email me and ask if I'm ok. One even to say it's like he's "missing a friend", which was nice. One asked if I was still alive and I had to resist temptation of replying in the guise of my widow.
The simple reason is I'm just way too busy to find the time to write on here. I'm working weekends and setting the alarm for 6am each day.
The bigger reason is probably a waning interest. It saddens me to admit it but, after nearly 11 years (or is it 12?) the driving passion I once had is now in question. Kind of. I still have the passion for technology and for sharing. I just don't know where I am right now. I'm in that strange place between knowing which technology my future lies in. Is it Domino? I doubt it, long term. Is it SharePoint? Perhaps. More likely, for at least the foreseeable future it will be Microsoft Dynamics CRM.
Dynamics is quite a nice product and feels like a much more natural technology to migrate to than SharePoint ever has done to me. In fact, as a Domino developer, it feels like quite a familiar way of developing.
I have a few more Domino-based things I will definitely make a point of sharing, but I also plan to talk more about what I'm learning in other technologies. I can't see myself ever not running a blog. It's just going to have to wait until things quieten down for me.
Don't give up on codestore completely. Not just yet anyway.
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Thank you for the update. Codestore is the only Domino-related blog I'm following. You're making it interesting. Looking forward to your "technology future".
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Going from Domino to .NET myself, I am very interested in your switch over..even though I don't do Domino I still follow your blog because of your ever changing career. That being said, whenever you blog, you blog...it's all good.
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Hey Jake..
Good to have you back. Would you, if possible, post more on MS Dynamics? Am a Domino developer myself and would like to know what options I have if in future I need to move onto a different platform.
Cheers
J
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Hi Jake, good to hear recent news from you. It's been a long time since I've started following your blog and I'm still enjoying it. Surprisingly, Domino is still alive and generates ongoing demand despite we only hear about migration plans to Exchange and Sharepoint.
About Dynamics, I've read a paper from a SalesForce guy comparing SalesForce with Domino and at that time I was quite surprised. Do you think that Customer Relationship Management is the continuation of Collaboration?
Thanks and Best regards,
Lionel
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I'm an on/off/on blogger myself and like you I'm really busy (which is nice).
I like the idea of blogging when I want to, and have something I really want to share. Search engines will make the stuff I share available to people that need it.
We'll be adopting MS Dynamics later in the year as a replacement for SalesForce. So if you do happen to post anything.... :-)
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Jake,
I'm glad to see your post - I've been away from Domino development for the past 3-4 years, but I still follow your blog.
After switching from 16 years on the Domino platform to Salesforce, I'm amazed at the similarities. You can build custom applications on the Salesforce platform (Force.com), and they tend to have the same sweet spot as Notes applications - departmental workflow-type applications that are incredibly quick to build and deploy - we've got one client who's a medioal practice that uses Force.com for their applications, but doesn't use CRM at all. You should definitely give Salesforce a look as well.
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Jake -
I think your comment "I'm in that strange place between knowing which technology my future lies in." is fairly typical today of just about everyone (but especially Domino folks). I guess my point is I think we will all feel that way for quite a while.
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Hey brother! Good to hear from you and really glad that you are busy. Good day's for Rockall ahead!!
Now all you have to do is get your junior staff ready to start coding and you can be a true executive :)
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Good to hear from you. I was starting to get worried.
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Glad to see you are still alive!
'I'm in that strange place between knowing which technology my future lies in.'
A bit awkwardly phrased, but I completely agree with the feeling. I have it too.
I am in no doubt that there will be a permanent need for good developers/programmers. The issue, for me, is being able to deliver whole projects being a one-man show. With Notes this is feasible, with other technologies, it seems to me one needs at the minimum a small team to be able to deliver a software. It's definitely the case for Sharepoint. There are too many simultaneous learning curves for this.
I enjoy being independent too much; going back to being an employee is something which I really want to avoid...
And Jake, I come to your site not only for the technology, but also for these candid glimpses into your mind - it's nice to see that I am not alone with these thoughts!
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Hi, I'd like you to post more on Dynamics too. My work seems to be leading me away from development to testing and I feel that when the straws were drawn I never got one (never mind the short straw!).
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Hi Jake
Nice to hear from you again. I myself have not been involved with Domino for last 7 years but I still like to follow your blog, so please keep it up. I developed for Notes for 9 years previously so I like to keep up with current trends. More recently I have been writing small apps using AutoIT to interface different systems, there seems to be a useful UDF to suit everything.
Keep up the good work.
Alan
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Wouldn't you know yesterday was the one day in the last 2 months I hadn't checked in. :-) I have been watching your twitter feed though just to assure myself you're still alive but from that, or what limited (sometimes frustrated) posting I figured you were probably up to your eye-brows in it.
Thanks for the comment on your last post about Dynamics - I followed that up and have circulated the info here. So far, crickets. It sounds interesting to me. But like you, the future is always in motion, as Yoda says. Groovy on Grails looks promising though it's data source limitations are a potential problem. Great language so far as I can see - Ray Ozzie's thumb print is on it.
Usual advice applies: follow your passions, be your own man. Thanks for posting!
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Welcome back Jake!
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Keep it up, Jake!
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Hello Jake
Great to see you are busy!
Yeah, love Domino and I see xpages is doing some great stuff, but we should get to know other technologies/languages as well.
I think Java is also a very good space to be in. Sharepoint possibly as well, and now I will look into the Dynamics suggestion as well.
Thanks for posting.
Steven
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Jake
Glad your busy, and thank for the update.
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Well, reading through your readers comments shows one thing staring you in the face: it's you Jake, your blogging and opinions that people are following, not the technology that you write about. Maybe after a brief spell in that strange place you describe you will be able to take a view on which technology best suits which business requirement, allowing you to join us who make a living as solution architects, waving our arms around and speaking in vague truisms.
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Always good to hear "never a dull moment", Jake. I was indeed wondering what was going on as I have my bookmark on I thought something was wrong or moved sites :-) In your wording about SharePoint versus Lotus Notes I hear the same sound as relects in my brains. Last month we had developed a webpart which took 0.5 day, it took 3 days to deploy and now the cluster is not in sync anymore...that reminds me the Lotus Notes days....SharePoint is a beast.
Looking forward to your new journeys and leanings...
Keep up the good work !!!!!!
Jaap
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Hi Jake,
You never give up right?
My first reading of your post is that Sharepoint was not enough to cover your working time.
I never heard about a programmer for Dynamics, but it sounds interesting.
I mean, there is a lot of people programming for SAP, none company adopts SAP without consulting services (and Dynamics is CRM and ERP too)
So, good luck, keep fighting !
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Hi Jake,
If you were a bit put off by SharePoint 2007 & 2010 (I know I was), take a look at 2013.
Whole new ball game, and full of the stuff that I know you love...We're talking HTML5 and Apps, Apps, Apps.
I think MS might have got it right here.
I reckon you'd have a ball!
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Glad you are keeping busy!
Hope the family is well.
Just to let you know, I'm once again getting ready to check out your postings today for a Sharepoint/Notes-ODBC project. (SP2010)
I appreciate you for still keeping it alive here...
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