Lotus Notes, Domino Boast New Features

To ease its use in such companies, Lotus Notes and the Domino Messaging Server can carry out failover and load-balancing tasks automatically and can work with multiple operating systems in a cluster solution across different topologies. Companies can combine mainframe Z-series, AS/400, Windows servers and different flavors of Unix and Linux into a single messaging solution.

The solution's compatibility with Linux is particularly important because of increased midmarket adoption of Linux, due in part to its scalability, reliability and low cost. IBM Express SMB and IBM Linux offerings now support Microsoft Outlook, allowing customers to continue to use their Outlook client on Domino servers.

Lotus Notes and Domino Messaging Server now work with instant messaging, which significantly improves the collaborative capabilities of Notes. Companies running IBM Sametime servers now can integrate instant messaging directly into their Notes clients. The integration extends to presence awareness, allowing users to track each other directly from the Notes client and be informed when other users are logged into Sametime.

Another key enhancement is the single sign on (SSO)-over-HTTP capability. Once connected to Notes, users do not have to log in separately to other systems in the SSO environment using the SSO servers.

The process of attaching files to e-mail messages is also streamlined in Lotus Notes and Domino 6.5. An e-mail template saves attachments to a separate database, allowing users' mailboxes to hold more messages, and can be customized easily to suit various needs.

Because Domino supports the WebDAV standard for remote clients, users can control the size of the WebDAV database that contains file attachments. Users also can store their attachments locally and can adjust software settings to alert them when a large file might cause storage problems. Lotus Notes' Web client is now indexed so users can easily search through their Web e-mail.

Notes' and Domino's programming interfaces follow most open architectures and natively support many major standards such as COM and COM , .Net, J2EE and Web services. Notes' internal LotusScript adds additional XML functionality when binding with Java, COM and CORBA objects.

Domino 6.5 stores all of a user's contacts in a separate Names database, which makes it more difficult for hackers to gather e-mail addresses and propagate viruses. A set of filtering rules called QuickRules enables users to create their own antispam filters without having to write code. Users enter the conditions under which QuickRules will execute and the server generates the code automatically.

Administrators can track e-mail key words to identify potential spam mail, but the software lacks the ability to identify spam using multiple factors found in the e-mail applications of many smaller vendors. The software supports realtime black-hole lists (RBLs) to track servers that allow third-party relays, so administrators can program the server to avoid connections to those particular servers.

IBM's three-tier PartnerWorld channel program offers varying levels of sales and technical training and support, sales literature and incentives and a dedicated partner Web site.

The price of the software as tested starts at $1,145 per processor for the Domino Messaging Server and $125 per user for the Notes client. Margins of 15 percent to 30 percent are available.

CHANNEL PROGRAM SNAPSHOTS
>IBM LOTUS NOTES AND DOMINO 6.5

COMPANY: Lotus Software, IBM Software Group
Somers, N.Y.
(800) G-LOTUS
www.lotus.com
DISTRIBUTORS: Agilysys, Arrow Electronics, Avnet, Ingram Micro, Synnex, Tech Data
TECH RATING:

CHANNEL RATING:

Note: Vendors can earn up to five stars for technical merit and five for their channel program. If the average of these two scores is four stars or greater, the product earns CRN Test Center Recommended status.