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Are Lotus and Microsoft Ready to Play Together?

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Lotus and Microsoft have had an ambivalent relationship for many IT generations. Sometimes these two companies have interfaced with each other like a two pit bulls in a fighting ring: buy Exchange or Notes—period. Sometimes they’ve been forced to get along with each other, as in the case of running Lotus Notes on a Windows 9x or NT desktop. Both companies claim to adhere to industry standards, but the truth is in the eye of the beholder.

Lotus designed Domino with an “open” architecture that will run on all major platforms and support most industry-standard clients, such as HTML, POP, Internet Mail Access Protocol (IMAP), Network News Transfer Protocol (NNTP), personal digital assistants (PDAs), and, of course, Notes clients. Microsoft also adheres to many industry standards but has a proclivity to make up its own standards when needed. The majority of shops using Domino are currently running it on NT server farms, but, with the announcement of the powerful new AS/400 Dedicated Server for Domino (DSD) models coupled with Domino R5.0x, the AS/400 could well reverse current trends and become the Domino server of choice for midsize enterprises. Domino R5.03 has added a new level of integration with Windows 2000 and Office 2000. Lotus and Microsoft seem resigned, if not excited, about this new relationship. While the new threads connecting Notes/Domino to Microsoft 2000 products don’t extend to Microsoft Exchange right now, there are some indications that Exchange and Domino could become playmates in the future. Right now, Microsoft wants to keep Exchange out of the loop of Lotus/Microsoft integration for strategic marketing reasons. Although this integration is still in the formative stages, the fact that the two most influential purveyors of collaborative software are starting to play in the same sandbox could mean big dividends for Notes/Domino developers.

Lotus is using a two-pronged strategy to integrate Notes/Domino with Windows 2000: first ensure that Domino 5.0x runs reliably on Windows 2000, then obtain the coveted Microsoft Logo Certification for Windows 2000, which could come with the next release of Notes/Domino. Lotus calls this a “leverage without dependence” strategy (see www.lotus.com/news/news.nsf). For the most current release of Domino, 5.03, running on Windows 2000, Lotus wants to ensure the following aspects of integration:

• Windows 2000 support for the Notes client and Domino server, Administrator, and Designer


• Windows 2000 support for LotusScript, JavaScript, and Component Object Model (COM)

• Integration with the Windows Event Viewer, Performance Monitor, and IIS Web server

• Inclusion of Microsoft’s clustering technology

These capabilities are actually the result of a quiet evolution. The two companies have slowly begun to play by the same rules. Starting with Domino/Notes 5.0.2b, support for Microsoft’s COM for Domino objects was added. With Windows 2000, Microsoft’s new COM+ services, including load balancing, queuing, and event notification, have been added. The next feature release of Domino will purportedly add even more powerful integration channels as long as they don’t affect the performance or scalability of the product.

For a comprehensive list of Lotus’ plans check out www.lotus. com/home.nsf/welcome/newsviews. While some of Lotus’ stated integration objectives already exist in some form, the final cut of its Microsoft 2000 interfaces should be more stable, flexible, and manageable.

An even more intriguing prospect for developers and users of these two new playmates is a project code-named Bluejay. Partially based on iNotes, Lotus’ new Web- based email solution, which doesn’t require a Notes client, is really a suite of products designed to ensure better interoperability between Notes/Domino and Microsoft products. iNotes is probably the most powerful and flexible component of the suite because it extends the bond between Domino and Microsoft Outlook. Another aspect of Bluejay, Domino Net Store, will allow users to read, save, and store Windows applications directly from Domino. Domino Collaboration Objects is the COM negotiator in Bluejay, and an OLE DB connector links Domino to Microsoft SQL Server 7 and Access 2000. Slated for release in Q3 this year (an optimistic target), Bluejay will turn Outlook into a full Domino client that can access email as well as perform calendaring and task management. Bluejay will also allow users of Office applications to store Microsoft Office document libraries and any file created by a Windows application seamlessly in Domino with all corresponding Domino security and access control. While Lotus and Microsoft seem to be playing together much better, it’s not a coincidence that Bluejay and Microsoft Exchange Server 2000 are being released in roughly the same time period. While most pundits are giving Lotus high marks for its integration efforts, Bill Gates isn’t ready to concede the groupware market to Lotus yet. We’ve yet to see what Exchange 2000 can serve up in conjunction with Windows
2000. The bottom line is that Lotus has thrown the first horseshoe and it’s a ringer. Whether Microsoft will top it or will miss the stake entirely will be determined by the end of this year.


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