- Saturday, 28 November 2009
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I don't know what a monopoly is until someone tells me - Steve Ballmer
Lotus Notes to support Ubuntu
BIGGISH Blue has announced that its Lotus Notes 8.5 office suite will fully support Ubuntu Linux 7.0.
According to Computerworld, IBM claims that Linux is ready for the enterprise desktop. By shoving Lotus Notes and Symphony on Ubuntu the Open Sauce Operating System will have a fairly powerful desktop suite sometime in the second half of this year.
Antony Satyadas, chief competitive marketing officer for IBM Lotus, claimed that the package was something that big users had wanted. At the moment, Notes 8.0.1 has only limited support for Ubuntu Linux.
In the past Biggish Blue has claimed that Linux on the desktop wouldn't happen in corporate land until there was enough functionality.
Now, Satyadas said IBM has decided that by sticking its money where its mouth is it could help that come about.
However this is a debatable point. With its declining sales, Lotus Notes also needs a shot in the arm from a new sales source. If it can become established as a Linux thing, Notes might just be saved from the software graveyard it is heading toward.
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Not sure what the big deal is. The usual practice, for other projects like OpenOffice, Apache, the Linux kernel itself etc, is to let the distro maintainers worry about it--you just release the source, and let them figure out how to package it appropriately for their distros.

Why couldn't IBM do the same? Then you don't need to specifically "support" Ubuntu or any other particular distro.
About time, I would say. I work in a company (large multinational) that uses only Notes for it's email and calendaring. Although I hate Lotus Notes, because I consider it to be one of the worst apps ever written, I can't see the company changing it's email-platform anytime soon. It's just stuff like Notes that keeps us locked in to MS Windows, although it's of course not Notes alone. A lot of in-house development is being done with .NET, although as a developer, I'm quickly turning away from lock-in frameworks. It would be great in some years to have the option of a Linux desktop instead. Hopefully BEFORE I'm pensioned! And I'm only 45...
What makes this announcement different is

As for folks who use it for just email/calendaring, try using it for the secure rapid application development platform it is. Take your P.O. purchasing workflow, put it on Notes (securely and so your users can fill out info while disconnected on their laptops) in a few weeks.

Saying it sucks for email is like saying you really hate your spreadsheet because you're using it as a calculator and it's too confusing to use :-)
Not sure why that first paragraph was truncated :-P
Anyways, the difference in Linux support is that it's official...if you have a problem using it on Ubuntu, you can report it to Lotus Support and get help. Otherwise, they'd tell you the platform isn't supported.
For the server platform, Redhat and Suse Enterprise are officially supported, but it does run fine on Debian stable, Sidux (Debian unstable), Ubuntu, etc.