January 31, 2005
Lotusphere - The Sessions
Posted by Jess in
Tech Talk
- I went to the Advanced Web Development Techniques session by Scott Good, and I can’t WAIT to go home and start playing around. This was the perfect session for those (such as myself) who needed a good place to start learning how to get going in webifying a Notes app (at least to a point where you’d not be embarrassed by the way it looks to put it live), but didn’t really know how to start.
- I also went to Bill Buchan's Best Practices using Object Oriented Lotuscript, and again, I can’t wait to change some of my existing code around. It definitely will be hard to see these skills from all the sessions (web, Java, Lotuscript) duking it out which one I play with first when I get home. Oh, and what a great speaker! Entertaining and engaging. Aside from being a lot of fun, when the sessions are fun, it makes it so much easier for what you are learning to actually sink in. This is another reason why I remembered everything from Joe and Duffbert's Java session also.
- I was bummed out about the Developing Applications Using the C API Toolkit session, which had a really misleading title, and I let them know in the evaluation. This is was the session that I was the most excited about going in. However, it should have been called "What's new in R7 in the C API Toolkit." Basically the entire session was the speaker reading out loud the new functions, and what they did. But the speaker, Judy Ash, was just so genuinely exited to be there, and dearly loved her toolkit, so I thought it was worth it just to see that. It made me happy to see her happy. But I'm usually happy all the time anyway, so I'm not sure what that’s telling you…
- I did have a bit of a laugh with myself, there were definitely two types of languages of people speaking to each other over the course of the week. I heard words like momentum, clarity, decisiveness, strategy, value, etc. And then I'd hear the person on my left talking and I'd hear words like release date, upgrade, platform, SPR, standards, etc. Maybe this is why I have so much trouble understanding how things fit together, because I have to lean a little towards both sides to do my job, and yet there is a very obvious language barrier.
- Alan Bell made a great point in the Ask the Developers session to plead to please allow us to exclude databases from debugging. The example he gave was when he had code that involves the mail file, but when the debugger is on, he doesn’t want to debug the mail file! His line, which I (and Lotus) loved: "My code doesn't work. The mail file works. I don't want to debug the mail file!"
- The Birds of a Feather Blogging session was great. Everyone in one room talking about why they blog, what they get out of reading blogs, and helping new bloggers get started. Even Chris Toohey (aka Domino Procrastinator) and Derik managed to skip away from the Product Showcase for a bit to attend. I do wish it was a bit longer, though. In a discussion-like setting, it's easy for things to run long, and it was really engaging.
- I also wished I had enough sense to ask for a group picture of all of us that attended the Blogger BOF. I can see it now, the long black-and-white shot of us all standing there, similar to those nostalgia pictures you see of baseball teams while "this used to be my playground" softly plays in the background. Maybe we could have put a little flash thing together with that, and next year send it to the Radicati Group, with a big "NOT!" at the end of it. But, at the end of the closing session, Greyhawk did manage to get a nice group shot, which is posted in the Lotusphere 2005 Flickr site.
- The closing session had a "Disney moment". After the revelation of the "Here's Pluto" anagram from John Cleese, it was announced that in the spirit of Lotusphere, here's Pluto! And up on stage he walked. Richard Schwartz posted about who was secretly wondering if Ambuj was going to pop out of the Pluto suit. I recall hearing a few comments like that myself. I think Disney has this policy about never allowing the line to be crossed between people and the characters… something about permanently scarring children for life, I think.
- I definitely would have liked to have seen some more info for us smaller shops, ie. "Other Alternatives When You Don't Have a $70k Budget For Websphere". I understand there is something called Services Express that’s targeted for small business, but that's about all I heard of it. Nothing concrete, no "here's how you buy it", "here's how much it costs", and "here's what you can't do if you don't get the regular version". I did speak up about it on the evaluation, but I will take responsibility and say that it might have been discussed in detail in a session that I didn't go to. If anyone has any further iformation, or can at least point me to a link, I would appreciate it very much.
- It was definitely tough trying to get to everything I wanted to get to. I was equally as interested in the Business Development sessions, the Administration sessions AND the App Dev sessions. In the end, I forced myself to stick to my policy of choosing the session that I had the biggest weakness in, and it seemed to work out. At least I have the slides, which I'm downloading now.
- I would have liked to evaluate the evaluation form, actually. Some of the questions should have allowed for multiple selections (ie. Are you an admin or a developer? Choose ONE. Sorry, can't do that). Also, they allowed room to free-text comment on all the sessions and product showcase questions, but no comments on the Birds-of-a-feather, of which I wanted to write that they should have been longer.
- The Product Showcase was great, except on the evaluations I also wrote that it was a little confusing (regardless of the fact that I'm well aware that sometimes I live in a solid state of confusion), as I did not realize quickly that each side of the pedestal had *different* vendors on each side. So I realized I had missed quite a bit of vendors and had to start all over again, walking up and down each isle twice, each time facing a different way. And what was up with Gayle not being nominated as one of the best booth babes on the Gonzo Lotusphere site, if I say so myself? I demand a recount!
- I finally understand. For years, it always seemed like everyone was so *informed* about things like release dates, what's in new versions, what was fixed, how products work, etc., and I never knew how everyone seemed to know all this. Now I do. You have to be at Lotusphere. I feel so much better about the year to come now. I still can't believe I missed it all these years.
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The "Express" product line usually has per-user prices, in the very affordable range ($40 per Domino/Notes user, for example, I think) - and no per-server cost at all. So the Workplace Express option should be priced the same way. Which is not to say that I ever claim to understand how to buy software from IBM - if there was ever a company more interested in making it difficult for people to give them money, I've never heard the story... The real answer is to ask Alan (Ed's evil twin) - he knows how this stuff works.
I like your idea about evaluating the evaluations - I stopped filling them out years ago because they're so useless (there are rare exceptions - I will fill one out if the session is either outstanding, like Joe and Duffbert's, or horrendous [none this year]).
IBM Workplace Services Express is sold two ways:
20 User blocks for $2,200
per CPU for $38,000 (I think)
I tried to nail down differences between IWSE and IWPS. As I understand it, today they have different functionality. In the future the underlying product will be the same and WSE limitations will be strictly due to licensing.
Holy crap! This doesn't appear to be a cheap solution :(
Holy crap! This doesn't appear to be a cheap solution :(
Jess:
Although the only time I saw you was at the Blogger BOF, I echo your thoughts about how nice it is to see everyone, at least once a year.
See you at Admin 2005!
- Rob
Hi Rob! Luckily the quarters are closer at Admin2005 (ONE hotel, lol) so we'll all get to hang in the pub in the lobby. :-)
Oops! I should have said $2,200 per 20 users OR $38,000 per cpu. The 2,200 for 20 users is not bad -- $110 per user -- but the 20 user increment is a big deterent for a small company that needs 3 or 22 seats.
I hear that. It's common to expect at least a 5-user block traditionally, like Quickbooks, OS servers, etc.
Jess - you're going to Admin2005? Fantastic, I'll see you there! Rob W., I already knew you'd be there.
Andrew, yes, I had one session last year, and this year I'm doing three! :-O
What's REALLY cool is that because it's so close (RI to Boston, I drive up) is that Matt comes with me!! So he'll be able to meet you. :-)
Great meeting a fellow Rhode Islander at Lotusphere! Do you know if they are having Admin2005 in other cities this year? I can't make it to Boston :-(
