IdoNotes (and sleep)

Warning and request to these awesome Notes 8 sidebar app developers

by Chris Miller at 11:10:35 AM on Tuesday, July 22nd, 2008

I have seen some excellent sidebar applications for Notes 8 being generated recently, all with the developers starting their own update sites. Before I list them, here is the issue and warning:

I need you to create these in one of two ways:
1. as a downloadable feature in a zip file
2. or in a siteupdate database I can import.

One of the below sites I visited today gives specific instructions on how to change the client to allow remote site updates. Unfortunately, policies will revert and disable this for all the users. By providing me with one of the 2 options above, I can guarantee my users will get the plug-in and I can control distribution, security and resigning. I also do not allow them to go to outside update sites from those that I specifically list in my configurations. I really want them to use your apps, but it has to be controlled on this end. If you need help in building a site, let me know. I can easily assist.

Some cool ones:

SideLog by Jeff Gilfelt - awesome tool for working with the Notes log files
Formul8 also by Jeff - a developer tool to write formulas
SecretAgent again by Jeff - see all the agents in a database
TwitNotes by Mikkel - unfortunately I think it is broke for 8.5

Update: John Head in the comments mentions the widget. Unfortunately that is now a requirement for your site to work, Lotus broke plug-in control and I won't allow foreign widgets that pull sites either and no one else should. Good comment John.

Location: St. Louis, MO

Category: Domino 8 Technical
Tags :Domino 8 View blog reactions

1) Warning and request to these awesome Notes 8 sidebar app developers
Created by John Head at 7/22/2008 12:00:32 PM email | website

well one of the things Andrew Davis showed off at ILUG was using the Widget database to install sidebar plugins. So maybe we just need them to post the sidebar apps to the public widget database.

You also forgot DocViewer, the best Sidebar app period :)

2) Warning and request to these awesome Notes 8 sidebar app developers
Created by Carl Tyler at 7/22/2008 12:17:48 PM email | website

The real problem for sidebar developers, especially when it comes to Sametime, is that Lotus keeps breaking them. The whole Domino backwards compatibility thing seams to have gone out of the window for plugins. So far, every plugin I have written for Sametime since 7.5 had to be updated to run on 7.5.1, 7.5.1 had to be updated for 8.0. 8.0 had to be updated for 8.0.1 etc.

It's making development for the Domino platform very expensive.

3) re: Warning and request to these awesome Notes 8 sidebar app developers
Created by Chris Miller at 7/22/2008 12:17:54 PM email | website

Good comment John and I updated the post to reflect that this still won't work. What Andrew showed was how Lotus 'fixed' what they broke and I had been stating on the calls. Provisioning was to be in policies and they placed it where no users sees it nor can it be controlled properly, in the server configuration document. So you use w widget to point to your update site that then pulls the features. Sucks. So I will not allow foreign widgets now to keep security

4) re: Warning and request to these awesome Notes 8 sidebar app developers
Created by Chris Miller at 7/22/2008 12:20:23 PM email | website

Another freaknig great comment Carl. I didnt cover that in this posting, I am having enough headache with the update ability itself first

5) Warning and request to these awesome Notes 8 sidebar app developers
Created by Carl Tyler at 7/22/2008 12:43:02 PM email | website

Plus, wouldn't you like the ability as an Admin to say, only give this update to Sametime 8.0.1 users, and this one to 7.5.1 ?

6) re: Warning and request to these awesome Notes 8 sidebar app developers
Created by Chris Miller at 7/22/2008 12:48:33 PM email | website

uh yeah

7) Warning and request to these awesome Notes 8 sidebar app developers
Created by Jeff Gilfelt at 7/22/2008 1:32:48 PM email | website

Not to speak for other developers, but here are the reasons why I distribute my Notes 8 plugins using a remote update site:

* Remote update sites are how plugins are distributed in the (non-Notes) Eclipse world.

* All of the free plugins that I provide are targeted at the admin or developer. I assumed (perhaps incorrectly) that if anyone was going to be excluded from policy restrictions in their corporate environment, they would be.

* Using an NSF based update site or managing separate feature archives adds an additional step to the release cycle, one that has to happen outside of the Eclipse PDE.

* I am a developer, therefore I detest all forms of workstation restriction :)

That said, I would be happy to provide my applications in whatever form you require. I echo the earlier comments regarding the backward compatibility and provisioning concerns with the product. Feature provisioning has been enhanced even further in Eclipse 3.4 (Ganymede), but I don't recall seeing any of this in the 8.5 beta.

8) re: Warning and request to these awesome Notes 8 sidebar app developers
Created by Chris Miller at 7/22/2008 2:05:42 PM email | website

You are right that yours are aimed admins and developers. I listed yours as great ones, but issued a general wanring for people writing these. Importing the exact same feature.xml's you have into the siteupdate database would allow me to import them (or even as downloadable zips of just the features.

Sure, the sites could be non-nsf but I dont want to manage raw xml anymore and love the way Thomas wrote the template. I was going for an overall general statement of provisioning, good points for everyone to know

9) Warning and request to these awesome Notes 8 sidebar app developers
Created by John Head at 7/23/2008 7:54:58 PM email | website

sorry Chris, but that ins't a fix to your issue, its a new feature. They know about your issue.

I love the idea that we can use the Widget catalog to provision sidebars

10) re: Warning and request to these awesome Notes 8 sidebar app developers
Created by Chris Miller at 7/24/2008 11:11:20 AM email | website

Actualy talking to them it was the immediate fix to the problem they know about. That isn't showing in 8.5 the proper way either. I think this is a longer term solution that one would want.

Discussion for this entry is now closed. Please email me instead

Title	Duration	Size	Flash Player
IdoNotes Episode 51 - Lotusphere 2008 picture review	00:03:35	25.88 Mb
IdoNotes Episode 50 - Building a Strong Foundation	00:40:11	36.80 Mb
IdoNotes Episode 49 - 1 Fish, 2 Fish, Red Fish, Bluehouse?	00:31:38	28.97 Mb
IdoNotes Episode 48 - Protect Me o' Lotus	00:27:32	25.22 Mb
IdoNotes Episode 47 - the Bloggers interview of Mike Rhodin at Lotusphere2008	00:44:33	40.79 Mb
IdoNotes Episode 46 - Doing the LS08 OGS (part 2)	00:24:37	22.54 Mb
IdoNotes Episode 45 - Doing the LS08 OGS (part 1)	00:30:05	27.55 Mb
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IdoNotes Episode 42 - The Ed	00:13:01	11.92 Mb
IdoNotes Episode 41 - The Bob on Lotusphere2008 Jumpstarts	00:15:26	14.14 Mb
IdoNotes Episode 40 - We are all modular	00:18:24	12.64 Mb
IdoNotes Episode 39 - Glance the other way	00:06:32	20.45 Mb	Listen Up! IdoNotes Episode 39 - Glance the other way
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