Category Archives: Lotus
HCL Domino Online Meeting Integration (DOMI) pre-release demo!
Short notice, but that doesn’t change the value. Tomorrow, 4 May, 2021 at 5:00am PDT (13:00CET) the Nordic Collaboration User Group (NCUG) will be hosting a 3 hour presentation that will include HCL Domino & Notes V12, HCL Volt and Volt MX for end user development tools, HCL Connections V7, HCL Sametime and DOMI.
DOMI is a new feature that integrates Sametime, Zoom, and Teams with Notes so you can schedule those online meetings entirely within your HCL Notes calendar.
Get all the details at ncug.org schedule and registration page.
Updated Zoom Plugin for HCL Notes V11
[blog post update: The new software and documentation from Zoom can be found here.]
HCL Notes users: If you are using Zoom instead of HCL Sametime for your video meetings, you may have discovered that the Notes integration plugin provided by Zoom that made it easy to schedule Zoom meetings in your Notes calendar broke with Notes V11. Well I have good news. Zoom is finally releasing an update that works with Notes V11. See their response in the Zoom support forum. You can find the earlier release of the Zoom plugin for Notes V10 here. The update is scheduled for release on Monday. If that is at a different URL, I will add it here when it is available.
If you want to eliminate this problem altogether, your company should be using HCL Sametime for video conferencing. It is more secure; you have total control of the software; it allows you to keep all of your data inside your company with no harvesting of user data or chats; it is — and always will be — tightly integrated with your HCL Notes and Domino environment; and it’s less expensive.
Congratulations to the 2021 HCL Ambassadors!
This has been a challenging year for all of us. In the beginning of March, I was in Holland attending the Engage user group conference when the pandemic started and I returned home just 2 days before the border restrictions would have left me stranded in Europe. It turned out that was the last time that any HCL Ambassadors would gather this year.
What is an HCL Ambassador? As described at the HCL website:
“HCL Ambassador is a distinction that HCL awards select members of the community that are both experts in their field and are passionate about sharing their HCL knowledge with others.
HCL Ambassadors are exactly that, ambassadors. Importantly they are not employees, but their commitment to sharing their expertise has a huge impact on the HCL community. Whether they are blogging, writing books, speaking, running workshops, creating tutorials and classes, offering support in forums, or organizing and contributing to local events – they help make HCL’s mission of making technology play nice, possible.
HCL Ambassadors are eager to bring their technical expertise to new audiences both in person and online around the world.”
This year it has been exceptionally difficult to contribute in the typical ways, but this group of individuals managed to make the transition, holding several more user group conferences online, which actually made it possible for more people to attend than ever before. Certainly these heroes are the glue that keeps our software community together to make it possible for all of us and the companies we work for, to maximize our success. There is no stronger brand loyalty in the industry. See the entire list of HCL Ambassadors here. I am honored and humbled to be surrounded by such a team of positive, generous, innovative people dedicated to our profession and the HCL Digital Solutions community, I am! If you know or work with any of them, please take a moment to thank them.
Domino Jeopardy! at CollabSphere 2020
I recently had the honor of playing the role of game show host of a Notes/Domino edition of Jeopardy! at CollabSphere User Group Conference. This was the Day 2 Lunchtime entertainment.
The contestants were Helen Mendoza, an HCL customer from Chicago, IL, USA; Roberto Boccadoro, an HCL business partner from Milan, Italy; and Luis Guirigay, an HCL employee from Boca Raton, FL, USA.
Hosted by me, HCL Ambassador David Hablewitz.
Many requested it, so here is the replay of that fun game.
It opens with the pre-game chat to relax the contestants and wait for the audience arrive. The actual game starts at timestamp 5:00 and ends around 38:00 followed by more conversation. Actual attendance was about 60 people. Event organizer Richard Moy (Donna) did have a gift certificate for the winner.
Sadly, on November 8, less than 2 weeks after this event, Alex Trebek, the host of the actual TV game show for 36 years, passed away from pancreatic cancer. It was a great honor and tribute to have the privilege to serve as moderator and will make this event so much more meaningful to me. While you’re watching, please take a moment to view the video in youtube and subscribe to my youtube channel or click the subscribe button at the end of the video.
A few logistical details for those interested:
The meeting was run as a webinar in Zoom, though it could have been done in any online conferencing software. Helen and Luis chose to use the virtual background feature in Zoom. Roberto used the IRL background feature (in real life). For my background, the introduction bumper, and some game controls and audio effects (which were muffled) were managed using Open Broadcaster Studio (OBS Studio) software. The website used to host the online game was https://www.playfactile.com/
The game website does provide for a method of using a buzzer, but I opted to keep this as simple as possible to avoid potential technical difficulties and it really was entertaining to hear the contestants’ voices when they buzz. This also switched the speaker view in Zoom to the person when they buzzed. The recording of the event only shows one camera at a time, but during the live event, the cameras of all 3 contestants and the host were visible at all times. This was really fun to do and it was a great success, especially considering I had only a week to pull it all together. Freddy The Bassett also made a cameo appearance at the very beginning.
Blooper Reel for my CollabSphere 2020 intro
Just a little fun with @FreddyTheBassett as he joins me in creating our promo video for the upcoming conference.
Are you getting the most out of HCL Notes (Lotus Notes)? Subscribe to HCL’s youtube tips
If you support HCL Notes and Domino (formerly Lotus Notes and Domino) environments, you can get many great tips on how to be more productive and discover the wealth of features that only come with 25 years of software development. Follow HCL Digital Solutions’ Youtube channel. Here is one example: How to Delegate a User’s Mail and Contacts https://youtu.be/rEijwzyAshA
Watch for tips that your users might appreciate and share the videos with them.
New HCL Notes, Domino, & Connections content is back on Domino!
I’m thrilled to share that HCL has brought over important content from IBM that was hosted in Domino!
- HCL Connections On-Premise Documentation Wiki:
https://ds-infolib.hcltechsw.com/ldd/lcwiki.nsf - HCL Connections Cloud Documentation Wiki:
https://ds-infolib.hcltechsw.com/ldd/appdevwiki.nsf/ - HCL Notes and Domino Wiki: https://ds-infolib.hcltechsw.com/ldd/dominowiki.nsf
- Notes/Domino Fixlist: https://ds-infolib.hcltechsw.com/ldd/fixlist.nsf
Note these are .nsf databases. Yes, Domino databases. I have asked if they will open it up to anonymous access with Notes clients like they had been in the past. Meanwhile, this is another accomplishment in the process of HCL invigorating the proof of the product. HCL will add the forums too after passing the privacy requirements; not a trivial task.
HCL Domino V11 Webinar: Learn the new way to search
It never ceases to amaze me the incredible pace that HCL is working to advance Notes & Domino products. Case in point: Domino Query Language (DQL) is now an integral part of Domino V11. Taken from Deputy General Manager, Marketing at HCL Technologies, Jan Kenney’s post:
With v11, Domino Query Language (DQL) completed its consolidation of all means of searching Domino data, using full-text indices. Join this webinar on January 30th to learn all about it! https://lnkd.in/eeYYPXw
This is the new way to search in Domino from now on. Don’t let the rapid pace of technology leave you behind. You will want to listen in for this. Be sure to register even if you can’t attend live, so you will get the link to the replay.
A footnote: Once you register, you can also add the event to your Notes calendar. Choose the iCal option. Funny how HCL Notes is the only major email client to follow the industry standard format.
HCL Software Community is Open for Business!
HCL has just launched their community that will serve as our new place to interact with HCL and other professionals that use their software. It’s already fast becoming a useful forum of information. Join the community and post your burning questions and be sure to contribute answers too. Here is the link.
I’m hoping HCL will integrate the aha Ideajam site into this forum (click here to vote for it) so we can have a similar scoreboard feature for contributing product ideas and add a Sametime chat community like we once had with IBM Greenhouse (click here to vote for ST chat) and integrate OpenNTF into this new HCL community. (click here to vote for OpenNTF integration) In an ideal world, this would become the homepage where everything else related to HCL collaboration software is linked. Here are the forums it has so far:
- AppScan
- Digital Experience
- Connections
- Notes/Domino
- Sametime
Last chance for Abstract Submissions to CollabSphere/MWLUG Aug 18, 2019
If ever there were a reason to attend a short conference related to Notes, Domino, Sametime, and Connections, this is the one. It will be the first public opportunity in the U.S. to hear about everything that is happening with the software and the company behind it since HCL acquired it from IBM at the end of June. And this year I will be the moderator for the “Ask HCL” session.
This is also one of the best opportunities to share your own professional knowledge with your peers. But the deadline is August 18th, so get it written up and submitted now! Here is the link. It doesn’t have to be perfect, but it can’t be considered if you don’t turn something in. The benefits of speaking go beyond free entry to the conference. Speaking at conferences and user groups is one of the leading activities considered when IBM and now HCL selects people for IBM Champion and HCL Master recognition. It’s great for the resume too.
It is not that HCL Masters are selected to be speakers.
It is that speakers are selected to be HCL Masters.
Register to Participate in Domino V11 Beta
If you want to participate in the public beta testing for HCL Notes & Domino V11, register here: https://registration.hclpartnerconnect.com/betasignup.nsf/register
Redesigning Base Notes Templates
I want to draw attention to this particular article by Lifetime IBM Champion Gabriella Davis. If you work with IBM Notes/Domino (about to be HCL Notes/Domino), you will want to participate in this quick survey regarding optimizing the Discussion and Teamroom databases to the new mobile clients.
More templates to follow. Be sure to read Gabriella’s post and complete the short survey posted by HCL
The Notes Guy in Seattle 