Its Workplace package is catching on with clients, and more software makers are signing on. Still, it’s no Windows smasher. IBM launched a bold foray into desktop computing last spring, when it took on Microsoft’s desktop monopolies — Windows and Office — with its own Workplace product. Now it looks like Big Blue’s package of collaboration, communications, productivity, and desktop management software has struck a chord.
IBM’s Solid Stake on the Desktop
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Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
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Big Blue, geee, we all remember the happy 80’s when you demolished competition and charged twice as much as MSFT for half the support. And yet today you charge far to much for pretty much all your services which are based on selling more and more and more to the same company who doesn’t have the need.
Seriously, I’d even prefer sticking to MSFT rather than working with whatever products you offer, especially one named Workplace.
Seriously, I’d even prefer sticking to MSFT rather than working with whatever products you offer, especially one named Workplace.
Totally agree with you pal, want an example??
Lotus Domino = WAY TOO EXPENSIVE
Is that what they call “solutions”???
WAY TOO EXPENSIVE
Totally agree.
In dutch there’s a pun that says, IBM stands for
“I Pay More”
(the verb “to pay” starts with a B in dutch)
I was real happy with many Lotus and IBM products. I agree they they could have chosen to market to the common user a bit more instead of corporate users. Wish I had held IBM stock from 1963 to now too.
“Lotus Domino = WAY TOO EXPENSIVE”
Too expensive compared to what? Oracle, ColdFusion….
Get a clue….
Client software is dead…or will be soon. WorkPlace won’t/doesn’thave a place with the way things are going.
What are you on? Do you really think a browser is the last word in usability? The future could hardly be more different than you imagine. Modem speeds were like floppy disk access and obviously had to change. The browser as a UI is not that much different from a dumb terminal. Thick clients are a-coming – though I am not sure that IBM have got it right with Workplace, thick clients are necessary.
How can IBM pretend to compete against Microsoft when they recommend Windows XP and Office to their customers ? This is utter crap. If you don’t believe me, check their website for yourselves. It’s yet another mouthpiece for Microsoft, beside Dell, HP and most big vendors. So, IBM, try at least to walk the talk !
Um, have you ever heard of market segmentation? No? Go away and read something educational. Spot’s Big Book of Corporate Theory might be a start.
Hi,
I deal with Lotus software everyday, so allow me to explain what Workplace is all about.
Lotus Workplace is a collaboration platform based on open standards. It’s almost completely developed in Java/JSP/Servlets and it runs on IBM Websphere and DB/2. It’s a tool which can integrate which many exisisting packages like Exchange, Domino and other mail-servers, groupware applications and databases.
Lotus Workplace focuses on collaboration : document-management, CRM applications and e-learning. Especially its document-management functions are impressive : you can edit word and powerpoint documents straight from your browser… not just IE… also with FireFox running on Linux.
IBM is also developing a richtext-client, which is programmed on top of Eclipse.
Lotus Workplace is not a replacement for Lotus Domino, but we can expect lots of integration between those two systems.
On Lotus Domino being expensive : Domino is not just an e-mail server. It is a groupware platform which offers e-mail, a database system, and even an integrated webserver so you can deploy your domino apps on the web (in fact, my site is developed as a Domino web-app). The web-server also has a built-in servlet-engine, which makes it a lot easier to integrate existing web-applications with domino.
Let’s summarize : Domino offers a complete development environment, a database package, a webserver, a servlet engine, powerful replication services which allows users to work offline even with your home-grown applications (not just email) , and a powerful mail-server.
What do we need to build a similar system with microsoft technology :
– Exchange (mail-server)
– IIS (webserver)
– Visual Basic/ASP (developer tools)
– a JSP Engine (ex : JBoss)
– MS-SQL (database)
– a MS-SQL replicator (ex : Starquest data replicator)
Maybe you should reconsider the “price” argument…
Greetings,
Jeroen Jacobs
Note, IIS 5.1 (webserver) is included in Windows XP Pro.
>What do we need to build a similar system with microsoft
>technology :
Refer to “Microsoft Windows Small Business Server 2003 Premium Edition” + VisualBasic.
> a JSP Engine (ex : JBoss)
Refer ASP For the substitute i.e. server pages.
On the IBM web site, Domino Utility Express comes in at about $2500 per server. On the Microsoft site, SBS 2003 Premium is about $1500. SBS 2003 does not have the security frameworks that suffuse Domino, nor the replication system – to my mind the two most important reasons for using Domino. I don’t know how far someone will get in programming SQL Server or IIS without e.g. Visual Studio, so maybe you need to buy that to bring SBS 2003 up to the level of Domino. Visual Studio .NET 2003 looks like it costs about $1000.
So, by the looks of it Domino starts at about the same cost range as SBS 2003. Sure open source solutions could be cheaper, but there is no product that comes close to Domino (the nearest is Zope, but it is far more complex to build apps in Zope than it is for Domino).
Next time you run into a Big Blue employee ask him/her what they run on their laptop(s)……. The takeup rate inside Big Blue is extremely slow to non-existent.
Coopetition? I think that can sometimes be read as two rivals working together on a limited basis to ensure that the market or territory remains between the two (or few); or two friends working together to maintain the status quo in an apparent ‘false friend/enemy’ fashion… Hmm.
Looked at another way, it’s just IBM diversifying. Can’t blame them for that.
I did stop in to read this because I saw ‘Workplace’ and it made me think of Amiga’s Workbench, and the ‘WorkSpace’ idea I had presented them a couple of years ago. Although IBM’s package seems to strictly relate to an office suite.
–EyeAm
http://s87767106.onlinehome.us
> Visual Studio .NET 2003 looks like it costs about $1000.
One could go for ‘MS Visual Basic .Net 2003’.
> SBS 2003 Premium
Win2K3 SBS 2003 Premium comes with ‘SQL Server 2000’.
As for SQL replication, refer to
http://www.google.com.au/search?hl=en&safe=off&c2coff=1&q=SQL+Serve…
Ok, so maybe you can cobble together multiple MS tools and provide a tokenistic feature by feature comparison with Domino (and possibly even come in a little cheaper). How well do you think that is going to stack up against an architecture that has been tried and tested on multiple platforms for the last 20 years (parts of Notes can even be traced back to a 1973 tool at the University of Illinois) How well is the cobbled-together MS solution going to compare to Notes, a product that was predicated on a distributed architecture, secure communications, detailed control mechanisms, AND rapid application development?
Instead of having the burden of designing my own security and replication framework, I prefer to get on with building my applications and trust the security and robustness of my architecture to a product with the pedigree of Notes/Domino, and the persistence of IBM. I’m very glad to see my competitors using a Microsoft solution 🙂 I’ve been running Notes email for years with no anti-virus software, and have never had a single virus infection (about once a year I scan my machine for viruses). The last company I worked for also used Notes email with no anti-virus – they only introduced anti-virus software after the IT Director (who insisted on using Outlook) got infected and emailed large parts of the company and outside contacts with a virus.
There has been no known security breach in Lotus Notes/Domino in that history. Compare that with the whole history of Microsoft – a company where security is consistently of lesser importance than market share.
For a decade Notes was providing in a proprietary format much of what we now take for granted from the internet, web technologies and the web experience. When the rest of the world started to catch up to Notes the product was extended and embraced the open standards. Domino is still ahead of everything else. There is no product with the pedigree and the adaptability of Notes. If you compare it to the technologies that were around in the mid 80s (Oracle, Excel, Hypercard, Visual Basic) there is none that has provent itself so durable and adaptable.
Where is Lotus SmartSuite?
Jim
Refer to http://www.dominosecurity.org/