benpoole.com

IBM Redbooks for Lotus: what’s the story?

It would appear that Redbooks are going, at least as far as Lotus technologies are concerned. At a time when we’re looking at Notes 8, Connections, Quickr, Symphony et al that decision would be madness, surely? Here’s hoping there’s another reason for the Lotus centre closure.

… you can imagine my surprise yesterday when I heard that the Lotus Software Redbook center in Cambridge, Massachusetts is dismantling its lab and shutting its doors. While other members of the IBM Software family will, at least for now, continue to have dedicated Redbook centers, the IBM Lotus Software community is losing theirs. There are some fundamental questions surrounding this decision.

Chris Byrne: Does Losing Lotus Specific Redbooks Really Matter?

Update Ed has written a good post about this for those interested in continuing the discussion.

Posted at 15:10 GDT on 22 Sep 2007   |   Categories:    |      |    lotus notes domino redbooks

Comments

1. Which redbooks did you read in the last 4 years?
   I read zero.
   on 24 Sep 2007 by Axel (#)
2. I have to justify myself now do I? OK, here goes...
   • Building Composite Applications in Lotus Expeditor v6.1
   • Lotus Instant Messaging/Web Conferencing (Sametime): Building Sametime Enabled Applications
   • Extending Sametime 7.5 Building Plug-ins for Sametime
   • A Portal Composite Pattern Using WebSphere Portal V5
   ... and some others. Can't remember all of them, but bound to have read the Domino performance one again.
   
   (And yes, I know not all of these are Lotus-related)
   on 24 Sep 2007 by Ben Poole (#)
3. Thanks a lot. I was just curious about statistical relevance.
   My question was a bit blunt. Sorry for that.
   
   
   on 24 Sep 2007 by Axel (#)
4. Ben - What did you think of the "Building Composite Apps..." redbook? Does it seem like a good place to start with composite apps? - Ben (the other)
   on 24 Sep 2007 by Ben Langhinrichs (#)
5. No
   on 24 Sep 2007 by Ben Poole (#)
6. OK, that one word is facetious. I should elaborate: I read through parts of it, and it was OK. But I read this shortly after completing a workshop on Expeditor development, which definitely helped, i.e. I had some of the concepts down.
   
   The redbook goes into quite a lot of detail re remote portlets and wiring together portlets in general—features which I find less compelling personally. I’m more interested in wiring Eclipse components to other bits and pieces (e.g. Notes components, although I realise that’s not within the scope of Expeditor).
   on 24 Sep 2007 by Ben Poole (#)
7. Our very own Thomas Duff has a thoughtful post about all this. I was particularly intrigued by this bit:

   O’Reilly has their Shortcuts series, which are PDF files between 50 to 100 pages for prices under $10. The investment on their part is significantly less than going to press with a full book, and niche subjects can be covered in more depth than a single chapter in a book. Imagine what might happen if a number of the writers in our community started pitching Notes titles to O’Reilly for short cut offerings.

   http://hostit1.connectria.com/twduff/home.nsf/d6plinks/TDUF-77B332
   on 25 Sep 2007 by Ben Poole (#)