Libby Says...
My company, WorkFlow Studios, is hosting two Lotus Collaboration Summit events in San Antonio and Dallas next week. The event offers an opportunity to learn about the Lotus collaboration strategy and technology, network with customers, partners, and IBMers, and have a lovely catered meal. Please join us if you're in San Antonio (November 4) or the Dallas-Fort Worth area (November 6). Full event details, including session abstracts are available at the WorkFlow Studios' Lotus Collaboration Summit page. Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
I know, I know, you're never supposed to apologize for a blog absence. I won't. I'll just say that I've missed writing here, and hearing from you, although Twitter has helped me through. i've got a lot of making up to do - cleaning up the site, updating it a bit, and being more regular about my content production again. Thanks to many of you who checked in on me during Hurricane Ike. (And to Rocky, who also posted to let you know I was ok...) The hurricane itself didn't damage my house or hurt me. In fact, once the power went off, I slept through most of the worst of the wind and rain. When I got up the next morning, the streets were flooded and the wind was still pushing the trees over, but it felt like the storm was winding down. What has been scary and sobering, on the other hand, has been the aftermath. People tend to pay attention to the destructive force and the moment when the storm is hitting, worried about friends and family who might be hurt while nature does its worst. What has hurt Houston, and those of us who live here, even more, however, is the strange half-city we're living in now. When I drive to the post office or the grocery store, it takes more than twice as long as normal, because most of the street lights still have no power or are no longer standing. Of course, there's always the chance that I won't actually be able to conduct whatever business I had in mind, as many stores and restaurants are still without power and are closed. Gas stations are mostly open, but gas is more expensive and at least two stations near me were mostly destroyed by the wind. They won't be open for a while. Grocery stores are scary places - busy (still with people buying ice and other non-perishables), but not quite normal. Driving down the streets in most neighborhoods shows stop and street signs down, street and stop lights dangling from their wires, and a hedge of browning branching and leaves all along the sidewalks where people have piled them in preparation for the debris haulers. Houses and offices still have boarded up windows. Trees are uprooted. Rooftoops are covered with the blue plastic the city distributed to those who lost roofs or had roof damage. The world goes on, but this city is still limping as kids start to go back to school and folks start back to work. I spent last week in Dallas, because my power was out until Friday. I have both power and internet back now, but I'm still one of the lucky ones. Many of my friends are still without. Many of you have been willing to donate in the past - the Red Cross is still operating shelters all over south Texas and can still use donations to help those folks who were not as lucky as I've been. In any case, I've been working hard. Most of you know that I came back to the Lotus biz - I've been to ILUG and CU, as well as a few one-day local conferences, with my new company WorkFlow Studios. I'm going to be working on their marketing and communications, as well as some training, strategy, and consulting when appropriate. I can't promise never to leave again, but it's nice to be back. One of my current big jobs is working on Lotusphere session abstracts for my colleagues, so I've been writing those for the past week or so. I've read Rocky and Ed's advice and am excited to once again be part of it all. Hope Mac remembers his old editor when selecting sessions (wink). Of course, I've got some beliefs of my own on what makes a good abstract - good writing, concrete descriptions of what the attendees get from the session, limited jargon... I've got some Firefox tabs to close, but that will hav to wait. I got a little carried away with my comments about Ike and now I need to get a quick bite to eat before moving on to another set of abstracts and some other meetings. Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
I keep going silent on you. I actually took almost two full weeks off for the surgery recovery -- I was working part time during the second week, but wasn't spending any more time sitting up or on the laptop than I had to. Anyway, as I've said, thanks to everyone who checked in on me, helped me, sent get-well wishes, and etc. It all helps. My mom was the best -- she actually came to Houston and stayed with me for two full weeks, driving me around (I haven't really had full range of motion in my neck and didn't want to kill anyone). Being taken care of is always nice, but mommies take care of you better than anyone. I'm in Atlanta at the Inbox Event for the latter part of this week. I've already covered my first impressions of the show at the Lotus Informer blog, although I'll say one or two more things here:
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In the realm of shameless plug: e-Pro Magazine just announced the finalists in our annual Apex Awards for Lotus. Congratulations to all those who are finalists and my personal thanks to all those who were judges for the awards. Winners will be announced during lunch on the first day of the Admin2004 show in Boston the week after next. Which brings me to part 2 of the shameless plug: the Admin2004 show is in Boston the week after next, and many of us in the blogsphere will be there, either speaking or hanging out. Come to enjoy the show, revel in the company, and say hi! Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
As part of Tuesday's shameless plug for the e-Pro Magazine Web conference, I'd like to make one or two quick clarifications:
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For those who may have missed it, here's your chance to get to a Lotus-related conference without leaving the comfort of your desks/couches/backyards. e-Pro Magazine is holding a Web Conference on Lotus Technologies. We've got Larry Bowden doing a keynote for us (this is free and anyone can sign up to attend) and then 12 sessions by some of your favorite writers/speakers, including:
The full conference, including all 12 technical sessions and the free keynote/webcasts is $120. Sessions run over four days (March 22-26), starting at 11 am EST. The sessions will be recorded, so that if you register but can't attend a session during its time block, you can see the replay. I'd love to hear what you think about this as an idea -- not just whether you're interested in attending this Web conference, but whether this type of offering is useful to you. And I'd like to know if we've pegged the types of sessions you're interested in... Of course, I'd love for you to sign up, too, but hey, that's where the shameless plug part of this comes in! Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
Wow -- reading Ed's blog this morning and there's an implication that the events team at Lotus might be interested in bringing back the Lotus DevCon from years past. I know there was great gnashing of teeth when it went away -- if you're all still into that show, this might be a good opportunity to let your voices be heard. If there's some other kind of show you're interested in, well, this might be the chance to say that too. Comment here if you like, or more effectively probably, on Ed's blog. Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
I just did a Q&A with IBM's GIna Poole, the VP of Developer Marketing and Web Communities for IBM's ISV and Developer Relations group -- the exec in charge of the developerWorks site, among other things. One of the first questions I asked her was whether there was going to be a developerWorks Live conference this year, since although we broke the story a while ago, we haven't been able to find much additional detail other than about the Rational User Conference. Well, here you go: The Rational User Conference will contain some additional sessions and branding this year that will take the place of what had been branded the IBM developerWorks Live conference over the past few years. The Rational group already had the Gaylord Conf. center in Grapevine (yes, in July) set for their user conference, and it made the most sense to them to merge the shows. This year, the merger favors the Rational brand a bit, although Gina promises that there will be a significant number of sessions covering broader developer technologies, such as XML, service oriented architecture, and web services. There will also be content covering Eclipse and WebSphere Studio. So, according to Gina, this merger is to ensure the Rational developers (probably quite as fanatic a group as we Lotus developers) have their user conference experience this year, although other IBM software developers will definitely have a significant place at the show. Next year, she implied that the show might be a bit more general, as it had been for the past few years. I asked whether Lotus developers and WebSphere developers should attend the show. Gina says it's an easy yes for WebSphere developers. For Lotus developers, well, she says this is why we might have noticed a bit more development content at Lotusphere than we might've seen in previous years -- while the show will have content that will have bearing for Lotus developers, especially those who are planning to embrace Workplace development or are working with Eclipse, XML, or Web Service, it won't have the same level of depth on traditional Lotus technologies as dwLive has had, or as DevCon once had. Look for more from my Q&A with Gina in the April issue of e-Pro Magazine. Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
But I know where the Lotusphere 2004 party is! Yep, Universal Studios Florida. At least it's not Wide World of Sporks, right? Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
Thanks to the sharp-eyed Rita-Lyn (of course, that's her job!): IBM plans to hold a world-wide IBM developer conference that integrates its international developerWorks Live! Technical Conference with the Rational Software Development User Conference at the Garylord Conference Center in Grapevine, Texas, July 18-22. The unified conference is intended to give developers an opportunity to grow their skills and learn how IBM is integrating its technology and tools with its latest brand offerings. Not really sure about this. Garland, TX? (i.e., Dallas?). In July? July? Who's up for it? Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
Just to prove that I actually did go to Germany to speak at DNUG, I've finally posted some of those pictures. I'm not nearly the talented photographer that Ed is, but I enjoyed playing with my new camera and seeing all the fall colors -- something we don't have either in San Diego or Houston. Other photos that may be of interest (or may not) are the pictures we took at the Texas Renaissance Festival. I used to work at TRF during and immediately after college, so I have all the costumes and know a lot of the people. Had a good time going back to visit the weekend of November 14th. The day after Thanksgiving, we spontaneously got up very early and drove to Mammoth with our neighbors for a few days of skiing. We had what they call "early" ski conditions -- the nice snow they had had a week earlier had melted a bit. It was still pretty fun and I had a fun time swishing down some blue (and even one black) runs. Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
Chris is over here putting pressure on me to hurry up and get a blog out there, so here I am in lovely Amsterdam... Amsterdam is fine. The flight was long, but not too bad. I changed seats so the lady next to me could sit with her husband, and ended up in the row over the wing that has the double size space between you and the seat in front. Lots of legroom is wasted on someone my height -- I actually have to put my laptop bag under my feet so that they are comfortably flat on the floor when I sit all the way back in my seat. I arrived about 7:30 Sunday morning, had breakfast, checked into the hotel, and went for a lovely run along the Amstel river. Our guess is that I probably went about 8 or more miles -- all the way to the next town, Oude Kerk aan de Amstel. I don't have a working pedometer, so I run by time -- it took me about an hour and 15 minutes -- I meant to only run for an hour, but I got distracted. The day was sunny and not too cool, the river was filled with rowers and scullers (I was jealous -- reminded me that I miss rowing). The other side of the path had nice houses, then some grazing sheep and cows, so also nice scenery. And there were lots of runners out there -- the Amsterdam marathon is next weekend, so I guess some folks are prepping. Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
All kinds of important Lotus-related things happened this week and I've been so heads down with real work and etc that I haven't blogged them. Of course, many of the rest of you took care of all of that for me, but since over half my googles for this week were for Lotusphere 2004, I thought I'd spend just a moment talking about it. LS2004 registration is open. You can register, get hotels, put in an abstract for presenting, and nominate your favorite business partner for a Lotus award (formerly a Beacon award). You can also check out the unoffical Lotusphere page at the Turtle's site -- yes, he's back, and I know we're all grateful for the surely soon-to-ensue hilarity that the Gonzo site always provides. As for registration -- pay attention -- you now have some discount options -- register by December 2 for $1395 and by Jan 23 for $1695. If you're a CLP, if you will wait until October 7th, you can get a $200 discount. Go to the Certification Zone (requires registration -- you must be an IBM Certified Professional for Lotus Software) for details. I think this year's Lotusphere will be an important one -- okay, I probably say that every year -- I've been going since 1998 or 1999 and I love the heck out of it -- but my point is that there are a lot of changes and growth in the Lotus industry this year and we all need to hear from the horse's mouth what their plans are so we know what our plans should be. While you can stay home and get the information from me, you'll get more out of it if you can make the trip yourself. Plus, one of the arguments I've heard in the past against going is that it wasn't technical enough -- from what I've heard and seen in the descriptions of the tracks, you won't be able to say that this year. The Best Practices track looks like it will be expanded and you'll also be seeing some hands-on sessions at the show -- how could you miss it? Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
Some interesting blog fodder in my travels through the Web today:
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Well, I'm finally back from the WebSphere Technical Exchange. Actually, I got back Wednesday night, but I was so busy while I was there that I'm still catching up on mail and other assorted things. Of course, as always, it doesn't help that I'm jetting off again next Tuesday for Houston, but, hey, that's what a busy travel girl has to do, right? :-) Chris just yelled at me for being non-bloggy this week so far, so here's some links and some stuff on the show: WebSphere Technical Exchange There were about 800 people there, which isn't too bad a showing. One good thing is that there were many more non-IBM attendees this year as compared to last year, from what I could tell (and supported by discussions with some IBMers who were there). The sessions were very good, although still mostly done by IBMers -- I'm really convinced that almost all the WebSphere expertise right now is within IBM/IGS/ISSW (software services for websphere). Many of the folks who are our authors in the WebSphere space were speakers at the show, and this gave me an opportunity to meet them -- some for the first time. Of course, there were some friends from previous conferences, like my friends Glen and Steve, both of whom are Loti I've known for a while. Expect to see some more about the show in the September Take Note column -- I don't want to spoil that by saying everything here! People I love it when the blog world and the real world collide in a nice way, which they've done a couple of times over the past two weeks. First was a chance to have lunch with Kathleen McGivney -- she's spoken for the View's Admin show, is writing for e-Pro now, and keeps promising to get a blog going soon. She was in San Diego and we got to meet for a nice lunch. Then a friend of mine happened to be reading my blog, noticed I was planning to be in Houston, and dropped a note to see if we could have lunch while I'm there next week -- sort of a little Lotus/business related and just a good chance to get caught up. Then another friend of mine who I haven't seen in, oh, about 6 or 7 years thought about me, googled me, and found my blog, where she too found I was planning to be in Houston and now we're planning to meet while I'm there. That's the 4th or 5th person from my past who has found me because of my blog, which is really a nice treat -- I love getting back in touch with friends who I've (sadly) lost touch with for various reasons. Links and Misc I've been very interested to read the discussion going on between Ed and Chad Dickerson (InfoWorld) about staying with or migrating from Notes. I found Dickerson's blog response to Ed's blog particularly good, but am happy they've both espoused the same conclusion -- migrating just to migrate is a bad idea -- it has to have a business purpose. All good. Some of the discussion (especially in Dickerson's response blog) sort of dovetailed with a conversation I was having with someone at the conference this week -- that discussion surrounded how companies use and choose Notes/Domino vs. Exchange. In his blog, Dickerson mentions that he would estimate 98% of their use of Notes is for e-mail and that only a few other databases are used. This, to the best of my knowledge, is WAY too common. For some reason, Lotus and IBM decided to sell Notes/Domino as e-mail. They've always called Outlook/Exchange the competition and messaging/mail user seats as one of the measurements of success (at least in the past). People think of Notes/Domino as their mail system. One of the reasons that Lotus/IBM may have used this tactic is that it's a lot easier to explain e-mail to people than to explain all the rest of what Notes/Domino does. So, of course, since they understand it, it's somewhat easier to sell -- especially since it competes so well now in TCO, etc. However, this causes, I think, more problems than it solves, because in many cases then people really only think of it as a mail system -- which means one, it looks like a commodity that doesn't have any particularly distinguishing characteristics from Outlook/Exchange, which means that when someone tries to come in and argue for a migration, it's just one mail system vs. another. And two, it gets misunderstood and under-used. Which means that so much work that could be facilitated by use of a quick departmental/team database gets forced into something else -- e-mail, Excel spreadsheet, word documents, etc. This happens even in my organization and it drives me crazy. Because people don't understand the real paradigm of Notes, they don't think about how it can help them in their projects/work, and so it doesn't get used to its fullest extent, leaving it more open to hostile takeover attempts. Sigh. :-) Also thought it was interesting that Dickerson talked about "one technology that elicits a visceral reaction" -- I think that's sooooo true (and I'm still not sure why -- none of this really seems life or death). Notes, Unix, Linux, Macs, etc.... I had some other comments to make about his original column, but I think between Ed's blog, Ken Yee's post in the InfoWorld forums (you go, Ken!), and Chad's responses that it's mostly been said. As an Editor I have to link to the comments on writing without editors, from Dave Winer and Jeff Jarvis. I'd like to say that from my perspective, an editor's job is not to change what you're trying to say, especially in an editorial/opinion piece, but rather to ensure that your writing does the best job it can of clearly expressing what it is you're trying to say. Of course, it's also an editor's job to choose what goes into a magazine or onto a Website, ensuring that there's the proper balance, correct tone, good quality, and appropriate content. "Proper" and "Correct" and "Appropriate" being defined by the mission statement, as interpreted by said editor. On the other hand, I think many editors are frustrated and/or unsuccessful writers. Sometimes, when that occurs, an editor does rewriting that is not only unnecessary (the piece is right and good, but isn't the way the editor would've written it) but sometimes also a travesty (changing what the author meant, or adding in opinions the author does not espouse) Happily (from my perspsective), Jeff had some additional comments here and here to make on his comments about editors which seem to come closer to how I hope people view editors than his original comments did. Oh, and this just in... (thanks, Ed) -- NetworkWorld links to Ed's blog and mine. Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
Well, if this year hasn't just sped by -- not only is it July already (I hate it when I forget to post early on a new month!), but Rocky is already talking about LS2004. I encourage everyone to comment there (or here) about what you'd like to see at LS04 -- especially in the BP track. And remember - if they don't hear your preferences loud and clear -- no whining later! ;-) Not that you would, of course. As for my wishes for LS04 -- I would like to see a bit more admin in the BP track (which I think Rocky's hearing from many sources), and that "admin" should include QP, ST, etc. Rob mentions "Admin for Dev" and "Dev for Admins" sessions -- I've done an Admin for developers session in the past and it went over VERY well -- I think these sessions would be well suited for a show like LS. Other than that, not too much to report this morning -- I'm way underwater in terms of stuff I *have* to get done this week -- article reviews, webcast stuff, book stuff... Just a ton of stuff, basically. An interesting link or two: Tech news, about blogging from Corante.com An interesting NYTimes article about an executive at Jupitermedia who's blogging Dave Winer's ScriptingNews has been busy the past week or so -- he's been getting flamed, he's been standing up for and trying to explain RSS and Echo... and he had this snide remark that made me chuckle: An old software industry joke. At Microsoft, a new version of Windows isn't ready to ship until it doesn't run Lotus. Read that carefully. And at Microsoft in the early nineties they used to wear T-shirts saying Delete Philippe. That was before they cut off Netscape's air supply. Of course all this michegas is totally against the interests of users because it decreases their choice, and therefore their power. Also via Dave Winer, in the New York Times Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
The editorial conference went very well -- all the folks who came to help worked really hard and we got some great ideas for next year. I spent Mon- Weds in Loveland (where our offices are in Colorado) working to finalize the editorial calendar, have some meetings about various topics, and bring our new acquisitions editor on board. We had a good, if busy, few days. I'd like to go back to some of the comments you all made about our editorial coverage/calendar: First of all, thanks for your comments. Second -- does anyone else have thoughts they'd like to share? My thoughts are below.... From Tom: ... entry level tutorial articles on some of the new technologies, such as portal development. There's a lot of information on portals out there, but not a lot of good entry level materials if you're starting to code your own portlet app Quite right, Tom -- and we've got some tutorials planned, but we're always wondering how much content should be at the beginner level and how much at a more advanced level -- thoughts everyone? From Jon: A little more time and more coffee.... 2 things real quick. - WEA - someone needs to review this beast. Someone who preferably doesn't work for the Fortune 50. It's IBM's strategic platform for handhelds, and I think about 5 people on the planet know what it is. - WebSphere. Stop seeing it as a development environment. It's not. See it as an application delivery platform, and start writing some articles around that. It's complexity is potentially immense, but the possibilities are endless. Edge components (do you still want that?) integrated into pieces of WAS 5 - unfortunately, 5 people on the planet will understand them, but as time moves, we'll become more aware. You always wanted a Notes client without an ID file, didn't you? That could roam, be anywhere? Well - ta da. It'll be there. Building the environment will be tough, but wasn't Notes when you first saw it? It changed what you thought about how things were supposed to work. What's different now? You're older and you're no longer open to new ideas. Reviews... Ah, the joy, the pain. We love product reviews. They are an absolute mother to get someone to write (at all, much less well!). I do however, agree that it's a good goal. Re. WebSphere -- I'd like to hear more about the differences you perceive in a development environment and a delivery platform -- what I think you mean by that is that what most people intend to do is deliver applications already written for the platform, presumably by ISVs, rather than create home-grown ones... Is that what you mean? And that what we should be doing is not teach people how to code but how to deploy? Also from Jon: More on Websphere... Portal really isn't at the point that it is usable with anyone but huge budgets which makes it really difficult to write about (and make work). Of course, I suppose your life would be easier if your authors would actually finish their articles, eh? From Rob: Since the magazine covers both WebSphere and Domino, and most of your audience is probably firmly in one camp or the other, I'd like to see a lot of stuff showing us WHY WS and Domino belong together. IBM made that decision, and your editorial group obviously agreed, but I still don't "get it". And I bet most people feel the same. So I'd like to see a lot of "this is how Domino can help a WS shop" and "this is how WS can help a Domino shop" articles. Hmm, I believe that Domino and WebSphere together is where the products are going. I do see value in it, although I'm not ready to come down on the side of "it's right" -- it just "is." That said, however, I think you're right that many folks are still wondering (probably even more on the WAS side than the Domino) what the other camp can bring to the table. While I feel they should be getting the point from what we talk about in general, you may have a point that folks need to be a bit more... ummm... hit over the head with the arguments. In any case -- thanks much for the feedback -- more is always appreciated. Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
Every year, our group at Penton, which includes both e-Pro Magazineand our sister publication, iSeries NEWS, get together for an planning meeting that takes 2 1/2 days. We call it or editorial conference, and the staff and our technical editors and a few other invited guests spend the time figuring out what it is we should be covering in the next year, planning our editorial calendar, and spending some time together, since we all live so far apart. The conference, which is usually somewhere near our offices in Loveland, Colorado, almost always takes place in the middle of June. Now, that is. So, I'm off to Colorado for a week -- back in San Diego next Thursday. I'll plan the year's coverage, spend some time with our team, visit some friends in Colorado (maybe catch a Rockies game), and then come home. If you have thoughts about what our cover topics should be in 2004, I'd love to hear what you think. Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
Sorry you had to go a few days with no blog, and a whole day without anything to see. I'd actually forgotten what day it was -- somehow when I travel, I seem to lose track of days. ;-) I've been at the Admin2003 show in Vegas since Monday afternoon. Tuesday was the long grueling day -- 2 back-to-back jumpstarts (what ever possessed me to agree to that?) Anyway, so that was Tuesday. Tuesday night a couple of us went to the Strip and walked around. We had dinner at the Ceaser's shops (ok, at a restaurant down there) and then some nummy ice cream at the Ghiradelli's over near the Harrah's. Weds. was the jinxed day. My personal laptop decided to freak out -- couldn't get the screen working with the projector, couldn't get my Notes client to see my Domino server (on the same machine), couldn't get the files list to rebuild in my Domino administrator... and all this about an hour before my morning session. Then, of course, during the session, my microphone went out not once, not twice, not even three times, but four whole times! Ah well. At least the gang got a laugh out of it! :) Weds. night we the meet the experts and the showcase reception, after which a group of us went and ate some Italian food and then hung out at Jason's hospitality suite... Much fun. Thursday was your basic day. Got some work done in the morning. Had a BOF on certification and another session in the afternoon... But. I'm done with my sessions now (yay!). Of course, the big news is the room I got. Somehow I lucked into the mega suite -- they say it's 1600 square feet -- bigger than most of the houses in the neighborhood I lived in when I lived in Houston -- including a jacuzzi tub, huge shower, living room, dining room, 2 TVs, stereo, and windows on 3 sides... :-) Nice. Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
It's such a nice day.... Not only am I looking out at the ocean, but I'm about to close up the laptop for the day and go for a run on the beach, I think. And then tomorrow, I'm going to get up early and go do my beach-front yoga class. I can feel the stress ebbing away just thinking about it. Getting ready to leave for the Admin2003 show on Monday morning. I have to spend some time this weekend going over the slides -- I wrote them months ago (like January/February time frame) and I need to review my demos, etc... Thanks to everyone who commented on the commenting blog from a few days ago. Interesting how everyone assumed that b/c I was unsure about the etiquette/appropriateness of commenting that it meant I'm shy. As it turns out, I am, but I hadn't really thought of that as the reason why I don't just jump in and comment. You'd think that someone who chooses to write a blog would be non-shy by definition, wouldn't you? Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
I spent some time today figuring out my schedule for the next few weeks. The only thing I have to say is: scary. Next week, I'm off to a conference in LA for two days. The show is called The Folio:Show -- it's actually not a technical conference -- it's a conference about publishing. Instead of attending sessions on Domino Designer, JSP tags, LotusScript, and Sametime, I'll be attending sessions with names like:
Sounds interesting --it's the first conference of its kind that I've been to. For those of you that know me, you know that while I do have a background in writing (internship in a newspaper, tech writing, tech editing, writing a couple of books, etc.), and most of a minor in journalism (I switched to a minor in philosophy and history half-way through), I came to my job with the magazine not through journalism, but through the technology. Actually, it's kind of a funny story. I had just written my first two books and was looking around for ways to market them. I figured that writing for a magazine might be a way to get folks to know my name and then maybe buy my books... not too unreasonable. So I was surfing around and found a site called DominoPro.com -- it was a site that hadn't yet been launched - it basically had a statement telling what it would be someday and a name/e-mail address if you wanted more information. I wrote to the guy (his name is Chris Miller, too, but it's not this Chris). I offered to write for him, he made me a technical editor, and we went on from there... Anyway, I digress. This was about how busy I am the next few weeks.
It's at least remotely possible that there may be some guest blogging during that time. :-) Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
Yes, stipulated, I've been a lazy blogger. But. I'm back now. And you can resume listening to me blog rather than my oh-so-kind guest blogger. Thanks, Chris, for keeping my spot warm for me. New Orleans was good. You've heard from Ed (on his Lotus.com blog) already on the basic news from the show, so all that's left for me is to talk about my impressions. There was an interesting mix of people. At first I thought that there weren't very many attendees interested in Lotus. But after talking to some, and having lunch with folks, I decided that while there may have not been that many Lotus attendees, the ones that were there might've been attending WebSphere sessions in addition (or instead of) the Lotus sessions, making it harder to see which users had which brands installed. I'll write about Doug Wilson's (Lotus's CTO) "keynote" in more depth in a column, but one of the things he mentioned include the Lotus Domino Toolkit for WebSphere Studio (now in beta), which promises tools for using Domino objects in J2EE apps. In addition, we saw a demo of the RAD tools for WebSphere Studio Application Developer -- those look really awesome. Bringing so many of the innovations from Domino Designer into the WSAD toolset. I met some great vendors at the show. If you haven't looked at Bowstreet and you use WebSphere Portal Server, you might want to take a look. Of course, as Chris guessed, I drank my fair share of hurricanes, but we didn't get too out of control on Bourbon Street. The beignets were another matter, of course... More to say, but not tonight! Now it's off to dinner... Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
I feel bad redirecting everyone to my site the past couple days but the topic was taking too much of my time reading and pondering. So what did I go and do?? I posted another hot one today. Already had an IM talk about it and can't wait to see the posts. As for Libby herself, she is still at DeveloperWorks in New Orleans through tomorrow gathering tons of technical information and insight for E-Pro Magazine of course. I am sure her editorial comments for an upcoming edition will give us the whole conference picture. I did understand that the Notes sessions were not as packed as I would like to hear for that conference, but then that is from just a few people that couldn't have attended them all of course. Also, I was sorry to read about Ed Brill's escapade with his laptop. I know the pain. Mine just died recently and would not start no matter what you did. I think it was drive stiction. But we booted from CD to a Linux operating system that was compressed, then mounted the harddrive as a local drive and FTP'd the whole stinking thing to a server for me to go through my data. I need to thank Rob here at the office again for that it of magic. So look for Libby to return to a space near you and of course, my web door is always open. Chris Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
Libby continues her escapades down at DeveloperWorks Live in New Orleans. She is repeating her presentation from Lotusphere 2003 with Ed Brill while there. The rest of the time I am sure she is drinking Hurricanes and feeling awful about herself the very next morning. Ok I am kidding about that but let's go with the theory. Make sure if you are down there you see some of our friends and other bloggers. I know Rob Novak is hiding in the halls down there also. Tell him you want to hear about his new Quickplace product for administration!!! My thread on blogging presentation has gotten over 24+ great comments and information. I actually am letting it ride some more to see what else comes up before I change topics. Drag yourself on over and participate!!! Chris (IdoNotes) Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
Libby is comfortably resting in New Orleans (I am sure she had a long night with the college hoops there) and enjoying the rain. As for her blog, well I had a bigger topic that I wrote about over on my site that ate up most of my time. So take a peek over there and participate in the discussion if you want!. Chris Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link
Well while Libby is currently waiting at an airport for her flight, I decided to upgrade her blog design to Steve's new template (2.09b) and hijack her site. Little does she know the abuse one could cause from here :-) LOL If anyone saw her page while it was blank, well that was the fastest loading blog I bet you have seen now wasn't it. I just reverted back to 2.08 while we see what this error is I am getting. Steve is taking a peek for me now. Knowing Libby she went and changed something unique in her code. We shall flog her later for such actions. Steve sent the updates!!! So now we have comments working for Libby also. I bet she will let me rest a few now. Permanent Link to this entry: Permanent Link |
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