I’m a little behind Ed Brill, but I’ve been busy ticking off the journeys listed on TripIt. Last week at EdgeGuide’s post-Lotusphere event in Stockholm (over one hundred delegates, well done guys) I spoke about Symphony 3, and within ten minutes of coming off the stage (to rapturous applause of course) I discovered that the beta of Symphony 3 was already available. Twenty minutes later it was downloaded and installed, and since then I’ve installed the Mac version.

What can I say? How about “wow”? This is a major upgrade – it uses the OpenOffice 3 core stream – and the extra work that IBM Lotus have done improves the usability and functionality further. There’s important stuff like support for Visual Basic macros (there goes another deployment blocker), OLE objects and embedded audio and video. In the presentation editor I’m very pleased that resized images get proper anti-aliasing, and the charting for the spreadsheets is vastly improved. I’ve been using it for a week with no problems, and despite it’s beta status so far I’ve found it a better experience than Symphony 1.

The most important thing for any business considering the adoption of Symphony is the file fidelity, as interchange of Office documents will continue to happen for as long as Microsoft’s suite is around (I gave it three years). So there’s been lots of work there.

Symphony 3 beta 2 can be downloaded from the Symphony web site. It’s up to you – it’s your money you’re spending on Microsoft Office, not mine.

In an attempt to completely alienate everyone who just comes to dadams.co.uk for humour and pedantry, here is the third part of our look at Notes 8.x composite applications. Our previous look at integrating Symphony spreadsheets with a composite application was a simple example publishing individual field values. Today we’ll get a little more complex. Just a bit. Please note that this example is hopelessly ripped off from this article from the Composite Application wiki – I make no apology for that as I’ve learnt some things by following that example and building my own.

This example features an employee database with the following details can found in the form and view:

• Employee name
• Country (set to a choice of England, Scotland, Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden)
• Department (Sales, Marketing, Finance and Technical)
• Age
• Salary (recorded in $s to keep it uniform across the countries)

As in the last example I created a blank composite application and then added one form and one view, so basic stuff to this point. I then added a variety of records to bring into the results in the Symphony spreadsheet (which I also needed to create and make available in the file system). The spreadsheet itself can be modified as you build the composite application, there’s no need to do everything up-front. I created individual sheets to hold a table of Notes records, analysis of salaries and ages (maximums, minimums, averages and the size of the record sample), and counts of how many employees in each country and department – and then set up charts to show the results graphically.

As before, open the application in the composite application editor and drag in a Notes View Container – edit the component properties to select the view and set it to Java rendering. Then drag in a Symphony Spreadsheet Container and set the initial file to be the spreadsheet created earlier. Now, as in the previous example, we need to set the Selection Output from the Notes view – the difference this time is that we’ll be using some functions as well as straight field values. For example, we’ll be counting the employees from each country and department, and finding the minimum, maximum and average ages and salaries… like so:

Next we will decide where the outputs will sit in the Symphony spreadsheet. This is no different to the previous example – using the toolbar at the top of the Spreadsheet Container to assign the landmarks – apart from one clever trick. In this example we’ll be able to select multiple Notes records and see them reflect in Symphony. This is what creates the sample to find minimums, maximums and averages, and counts from the sample. These landmarks are created in the same way as before, the results landing in one cell each. But the data table needs to repeat, a spreadsheet row for each Notes record. To make this happen, for each Notes field you need to select a range… the values will then list downwards. Repeat for each of the available fields.

After setting up the Spreadsheet Container you just need to wire the two components together, as in the previous examples. This can be done via the dialog boxes, although with the greater number of wires required in this example it may be quicker to use the drag and drop functionality of the wiring view.

With the wiring done your application is finished, bar the finishing touches of page titles, icons and final layout of the spreadsheet. In previous posts I omitted details of how to set an application icon. This is easy to do, simply add a 16×16 .PNG image as a resource using Domino Designer. You can then edit the properties of the composite application and select the image. Bear in mind that if your composite application has multiple pages you can set an icon for each page.

Here endeth the lesson. As always, here’s a finished application (note the customised icon breaking the 16 colour limit of a standard Notes application icon) – just click on the image to reveal the big picture.

My previous post on composite applications turned out to be a bit of a mix-up because composite application guru Bob Balfe spotted that although I was using the new view container, I was still defining the wiring properties the old way. The good news is that now I’ve found out how to do ‘the new way’ it’s even easier.

So, today’s lesson in composite applications involves taking Notes data and pulling it into a Symphony spreadsheet, all within the neatly-packaged environment of a Notes 8.5.1 composite application. Hang on, I hear you say, I’m an Excel user… that’s okay, the spreadsheet can be an Excel file. Right, propeller hats on? Then we shall begin.

Like our last lesson, you’ll need to start with a standard Notes database with a view and a form. For my demo application I picked a scenario that would fit nicely into a spreadsheet, but would also let Symphony do a few extra calculations and display a chart. So mine contains the name of a sales rep, month and year, and targets and actual sales figures for cogs, widgets and bolts. The details aren’t too important but you should make sure that all of the fields you want to use are added to the view. Bear in mind also that you can do the whole thing in one NSF created as a composite application, or you can start with a standard Notes database, then create a new blank composite application and pull the design elements in. I did it all as one application. You’ll also need to create a spreadsheet – design it so there’s places for the data to sit and set up the chart in advance.

Assuming you now have a composite application and the form and view ready (don’t forget to add some data), edit the composite application and pull a Notes View Container from the Component Library palette onto the blank application. Edit the properties of this component – under Component Settings select the view from your Notes database and set the rendering technology to ‘Java’. Press OK and let the view appear.

Open up the Component Properties again and go to the Selection Output tab to declare the data that you want to pull from the view into the spreadsheet. Add a new property, name it (e.g. Month for the first one), select ‘Formula’ as the type, and then in the Formula column select the Notes view column to grab the data from. Add another property, and repeat until you’ve included all of the Notes view columns. At this point you can go to the Advanced tab and check that all of these new assignments are set to be wireable – by default they should be. Click OK.

Now you can add a Symphony Spreadsheet Container – drag it into the application workspace, place it wherever it will fit best and open the Component Properties. Set the name of the spreadsheet file (including the path) and click OK. Now comes the clever bit… we’re going to specify where the data from the view is going to land on the spreadsheet, and this involves the bar along the top of the Spreadsheet Container. For each data element specify a name and then the cell where the data will land, and then click the cog-shaped button. It will look like this…

Repeat for all of the values. After doing this, look at the Component Properties and go to the Landmarks tab – you’ll see all of your new landmarks created and listed. All that needs to be done now is to wire the two containers together. Click on the yellow plug icon at the top of the Notes View Container. Select your first available property (say SalesRep) – the target component will already say Symphony Spreadsheet Container – set the action to ‘Set SalesRep’ and click Add Wire. Repeat for all of the properties, then click OK.

That’s it… you can now tidy up with page names and making sure your spreadsheet looks okay. In true Blue Peter tradition (us Brits will understand that), here’s one I created earlier with not a scrap of sticky-back plastic in sight… click on the image.

Yes folks, not just released… it’s unleashed (according to the press release). The question is a simple one – which organisation in today’s economic climate would ignore “the chance to save hundreds of dollars on each of their Microsoft Office licenses by providing support for Microsoft Office 2007 with the newest version of Lotus Symphony, IBM’s free of charge productivity software suite”? Maybe not today, maybe not next week or next month… maybe the decision is a year away. The important thing is that there’s a choice. By the way, if you’re a Notes customer, the cost of support is built in.

Symphony 1.3 boasts a number of enhancements – ‘DataPilot’ tables (they’re called something else in Excel and include the word ‘pivot’) for analysing data, some new animation effects for presentations, and widget and live text support (just like Notes 8). Personally I think the new DataPilot tables are the highlight, and they’re easier to use and change than the Excel equivalent. The image here shows the context-sensitive configuration panel which allows you to simply drag and drop the fields to table pages, columns and rows in order to change the way you can visualise your data.

I was also very pleased that I was able to provide the PR team with two customer references for the press release – and there was one more we could have used but it was decided to save that one for another occasion. So, we have information about the plans of leading UK retailer John Lewis Partnership and international property business Cluttons. Note that Mark from Cluttons says “we plan to use the cost saving to further invest in Lotus productivity tool sets”.

I’ve heard people talk about the Microsoft Office ‘tax’ stifling innovation – how true is that? I think Mark’s quote puts the ‘tax’ thought into context – Cluttons are going to use the money they save to implement new capabilities which will help their business… they’re increasing their available functionality with a move to Symphony.

Over the past couple of days I’ve been working on a sales campaign and have a big chunk of customer and product data – 17,324 records to be precise. To make sense of it all, I pasted it into a Lotus Symphony spreadsheet and then used a couple of Data Pilot tables – like Excel’s Pivot Tables but in my beta of Notes 8.5.1 they’re better than Pivot Tables thanks to some new features.

The resulting Open Document spreadsheet file was 1.6 mb – “crikey” I thought, “that’s small”. So I pasted the data into an Excel spreadsheet and re-created the Pivot Tables. Both files now had the same content, format and logic… but the Excel file was now 14.5 mb… nearly 13 mb bigger. I went back and checked I hadn’t accidentally formatted all 65,000-odd rows… nope. That’s one hell of a difference.

Datamation have announced their ‘2008 Products of the Year‘ winners. As it’s only February I feel it might be a trifle early to assess the whole of 2008, but it’s probably like the Brit Awards 2008 where they announce the best of 2007 (but without the booze, drugs and egos).

A few mentionables among the winners… Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 won the Enterprise Linux category (there can’t be that many potential winners there, surely), the Apple iPhone’s mantelpiece gets a shade heavier, and IBM’s Innov8 wins the Business / IT Alignment category “by a landslide”.

However, most notable for me is the winner of the Office Productivity Software category… IBM Lotus Symphony. This win is described as “a major eyebrow raiser” and “a huge upset”. An upset for who? I’m not upset about it. This just shows that some people are prepared to be bold and break free from the perceived norm. If this were just a vote for open standards, you might have expected OpenOffice to grab the honour. The page promises to provide in-depth coverage of the winners over the next few weeks, so hopefully we’ll get to see why Symphony took the crown.

First bit of news… I’ve recorded yet another video, this time for VNU. It was an interview-style video, mainly about the Lotus brand and Notes 8, but also touching on other parts of the portfolio. I did it in one take, but we did another so they could get some flexibility in the final edit. A bit quicker than my ZDNet performance.

Secondly, my frolleague Brendan Tutt is this week’s star of ZDNet talking about social software… specifically, although not mentioned as per the rules, Lotus Connections. Brendan is a modest man, but I think you’ll agree he does a great job, a very polished delivery, on this subject. Click on the piccie to access this masterpiece.

Finally… oh I love this. The power of viral marketing. It’s a bit of a poke at the Redmond giants and an advert for Lotus Symphony all in one. Check out “Tired of Feeding the Machine?” on YouTube. You might be interested to know that there have been over a quarter of a million downloads of Symphony since it was first announced, and those downloads are continuing at a steady rate.

And while I’m at it I might as well mention that I’m now running Notes 8.0.1 (beta 1). A few new things (like e-mailing a Symphony document directly from the toolbar, and the mail quota indicator), it has Sametime 8 built-in (nice) and all-in-all it seems a bit more zippy and responsive than 8.0 (and this is on a old laptop which I’m using while my T60 is being repaired).

Back in June this year I wrote a post entitled “Should Microsoft be worried?” which discussed the open source productivity editors integrated into Lotus Notes 8. The message was clear for Notes customers… pay money for Microsoft Office or start using the editors which are effectively free because they’re already paid for courtesy of the Notes client license.

Let’s face it, Microsoft don’t even have to get out of bed to sell Office… the money just rolls in because most businesses and consumers believe there’s no alternative (and many get themselves tied into a license agreement which looks good value but is often an expensive option). I have a friend who had left her job at a large confectionery company and was starting her own business as a management trainer. She was talking about the cost of buying a laptop, and then having to buy Office to go on it – I asked why she didn’t just download OpenOffice for free, but to be honest her “what’s OpenOffice” reaction wasn’t a surprise. People just don’t know they have a choice.

Starting today, Lotus are getting very serious about competing with Microsoft in this space with the announcement of Lotus Symphony. If you were born in the 1970’s or earlier you may remember that there’s already been a Lotus Symphony, but this is a new offering which is effectively the Notes 8 productivity editors de-coupled from the Notes 8 client. This means that the editors are no longer just a free proposition for Notes customers… they’re free for everyone. Yes, you can download and use them free of charge.

Add to this the fact that IBM joined the OpenOffice.org community last week and you can see there’s a lot of commitment behind this move. What’s also interesting is that IBM (and Lotus) traditionally offer software for businesses, but now here’s something for the consumer market. Don’t forget that this is also an option for Linux users and at some point in the future Mac users. Okay, Microsoft probably aren’t shaking in their boots today, but that’s not the point… the point is that now you have a choice.

Final point – I pay taxes to the UK government and to my local authority. Millions of other people do the same. Some of that money swells the Microsoft coffers, and that makes me unhappy. There is a growing movement in the UK to stop this kind of behaviour and ensure that publicly-funded organisations take advantage of free open source software. Be part of it.

I’ve been spending a lot of time presenting Lotus’ upcoming collaborative solutions over the past few months, and the reaction has been very positive. Perhaps “very positive” doesn’t do the reaction justice – people love the new stuff… Quickr, Connections and Notes 8.

Today was no exception, I provided two stand-up routines at an open day hosted by InfoSys, a Lotus Business Partner. You know me, I love an audience, and they seemed to like my positioning of Mentos Mints and Diet Coke movies on YouTube as an example of community innovation. You had to be there, but it got a big laugh (and I think they got the point too).

I spoke to many of the attendees after my sessions and during the day, and there were three main themes. They love Quickr. They love Connections (and get the idea of social software in the enterprise). And increasingly people are becoming very receptive to the idea that there is a cheaper and viable alternative to Microsoft Office… namely the Productivity Editors embedded into Notes 8.

The premise is simple… Notes customers are already paying for Notes, and we will provide them with spreadsheet, word processor and presentation editor functionality for no extra license charge. In other words, they get the Microsoft Office functionality that they pay for today free with the Notes 8 client. That means that for large numbers of users they can save on the cost of an Office license.

For customers with mixed estates including Linux and Mac client users, the news is even better. No longer the poor cousins, they will experience the same functionality as their Window-using colleagues (Mac to be supported post-Notes 8.0). The thought of supporting the Open Document Format and freeing themselves from proprietary document formats is also very compelling.

There is one interesting perception that I always comment upon and challenge… the idea that organisations could keep Office for their power-users and provide the Notes 8 editors to the rest. That implies that they think the Notes 8 editors are a cut-down offering… they’re not, these are extremely functional editors.

I didn’t expect the battle against Office to be easy, and I’m realistic about the fact that Notes 8 is not going to make a huge impact on their market share in the next year. But I am pleasantly surprised by the number of people who are taking this proposition very seriously and thinking that they could save themselves a lot of money.