Fan/Hate Mail

The mailbag is full; here are some comments, with the newest at the top:

My responses are in boxes such as this.

6 Jan 2006

First,

I would probably have more respect for you if you had the backbone to attach your name to your postings, but you don't.

You're right—I have no backbone when it comes to this issue. Alot of the email comes from England. As I understand it, one can get sick in England not worry how to pay for medical care. It's different in the Unites States where I am. I can't afford to embarrass my employer, lose my job and therefore lose my health insurance. Besides, my goal is just to get this crap fixed.

Regarding your rant about ellipses (#74)...
1. Do you think the average user knows about any ui standards for ellipses or cares about them?
  
  Users care about standards when they notice the hassle that not abiding by them causes AND are aware of it (vs. "ignorance is bliss"). For example, wouldn't it be convenient if all cellphones used the same type of recharger? Because the voltages, plugs and sockets are all different, consumers pay for new accessories they shouldn't need in the first place (because the old rechargers worked just fine) when they get new phones. Standards make things easier to use, even if subconsciously. And they reduce costs. So, does the average user care about ellipses? Yes, but probably without realizing it. Besides, it goes to attention to detail. If the Lotus Notes programmers didn't get the ellipses right, then there was probably no discussion about it either. Are the programmers aware that menus contain two kinds of menu elements: submenus and commands? That menus contain commands that are somewhat related? Or do they just throw commands up there without the vocabulary and the framework to create a coherent interface? I think the results speak for themselves: a sloppy looking program that behaves as though it's been kludged together.
2. You are actually wrong in your interpretation. The ellipsis is correct in that further actions are required when you open those menu elements. For document properties, there are a number of tabs for users to choose from, and they have to close the properties box when done. For print preview, there are options available to the user as well.
  
  No, sir, I am not wrong in my interpretation. An ellipsis indicates that more information is needed to execute the command. The Document Properties command does not need more information to open that idiotic window. The Print Preview command needs no further information to carry out the command to which it is assigned—which is to show me what the printer will print.
There are enough things about Notes that do drive me batty and your list does not come close to outweighing the benefits of the system.

You're entitled to your opinion. I find few benefits by using Lotus Notes. Anyway, thanks for taking the time to write me.

Also, unless you have tested and confirmed a reported behaviour (#59), you should not accept it as Gospel.

You're right. I've replaced it with another thing that irritates me. That's why there's alot of mail between the one below and this one that I haven't responded to; I haven't or can't confirm the problems—yet. These things take time and I am trying to be fair. Thanks for keeping me honest.

So who are you anyway?

I am a technologically savvy power user. I understand things such as relativity, how to make water boil when the water is at room temperature, relational databases and calculus. I have a master's degree in a science field from a highly respected university. I have learned computing and programming starting with the Apple II+. When I first started writing in-house database applications, I took it upon myself to learn what I could about user interaction and software design to take advantage of the research and knowledge that was already out there. I think it is hubris for the Lotus Notes to ignore the results of research that are published, among other places, on the web.

I want computers to work for me—not the other way around.

Best regards, Christopher
15 Nov 2005

I needed your web site after the day I'm having...I HATE Notes. SOOOO tired of dealing with it. Nothing is ever simple.

Keep up the good work :)

Matt
From Alexandr, 6 Oct 2005

To make the long story short, few more examples for you:
1. Try to insert another mail message(s) into current mail message to send. Can you? I couldn't.
2. Do you understand ho to use shortcuts on the left of the LN? I don't.
3. Is window-list (tab-list) simple and easy to understand? (NO!)
4. How can I see plain e-mail address of sender? Suppose, John Smith had sent me a message from address JSmith@smith.com -- how can I, as a user, see the address, not only "John Smith"?
5. Where is horizontal scroll-bar in "Compose message" window?
6. Have you had accidently pressed SCROLL LOCK? Try! Try to use LN with the SCROLL LOCK key pressed, and tell me how fast the ordinary user will find the problem.
And much more...
6 Oct 2005

If you delete an email out of your inbox you cannot undo it. You have to go through your trash, try and find the email and restore it. This is so painful when you have accidentally deleted something and you don't know what it was.

See Undo.
19 Sep 2005

This may interest you. Microsoft have released an update for Outlook 2002/2003 that allows you to use Outlook to connect to a Domino server: Outlook 2003/2002 Add-in: Notes Connector.

This means that you could ditch Notes at work and use Outlook instead (assuming you can persuade your sysadmins to install Outlook, if you can�t then try buying them a pizza and/or some beer).

I hope this helps.

Alastair

Unfortunately, the good old days have passed where users could (legally) install whatever they needed to be productive. My paranoid employer uses Windows XP. Without admin rights, one is pretty much stuck with the Lotus Notes client. Our tech support people are afraid of the Windows registry. I used Outlook before when my computer used the Windows 95/98 operating system. Mail was much less unpleasant then.
8 Sep 2005

Hi,

Great site, great examples. I'm so glad to find out I'm not alone in my frustration in having to use such a pile of excrement on a daily basis. The banal error message in Notes have to be its worst feature, followed closely by its absolute refusal to stick to any sort of convention for layout or menu systems.

My personal pet peeve it the check for new mail functionality (or Refresh the Inbox in Notes terminology). In every other Windows application I use, F5 is the universal command for refresh. But not Notes. Perhaps in another of their twisted initiatives to be 'more secure', the Notes decided that refresh should instead be F9. What kind of twisted developer was thinking 'hmm, when my users are particularly rushed and quickly need to check a mail before rushing off to do another task, and inadvertantly press F5 to check for new mail before they remember that they're using a piece of software that flies in the face of every computing convention known to mail, what shall I make the software do? I know, for their own safety, because they're obviously in a rush, why don't we lock Notes, just to make sure nobody sneaks a quick peek at their mail while they're away from their desk'.

That's right folks, press F5 in a Notes session and you lock your session, returning you to the idiotic login screen to re-enter your heiroglyphics to get back in again. Not only that, but look at the title bar of this screen: Logout Screen!! Why call it the logout screen when you've got no option of logging out, only logging back in again. Another great example of how Notes sucks!

Regards,

Warwick

I feel your pain.
Sept 1, 2005

Hello

If you ubn [sic] Lotus Sucks R5 tries and make an appointment starting at 23:00 and ends at 06:00 next day, Notes gives you the error:

"Appointments cannot span midnight"

After that my calendar says "Variant does not contain an abject" every time I try and open it.

I enjoyed your site, and having been downgraded from Exchange 2000 to Lotus Notes R5, I've very frustrated with all the flaws and the very very poor performance of Notes. Like you I now only uses Notes for e-mail, and not more than I need.

I would like to be anonymous, please.

This problem appears fixed in Lotus Notes 6.5.2?
July 26, 2005

In an email if you type peoples names and let Notes fill in the To field when composing, it will add people who don't have email addresses by using their name with your own domain.

The fun part of this is when one recipient is no good due to this (or any other reason, this is just the most common) and it bounces, Notes goes into overdrive resending to all recipients at about 1/10 second intervals.

We frequently have our internet service cut as our provider believes we are spamming. A single user with a 1 MB drawing bouncing on a single recipient email will create about 5 gigs of traffic in 45 minutes and thousands of hits on the mailserver.

You look in the outbox located in the Notes environment (outside the email client wtf?) and you'll see the email sitting there, no error msg or anything. Stupid Notes.

Ken

I have no experience with this. Has this happened to anyone else?
July 26, 2005

Our office uses Notes as our mail client, even worse though, we don't use Domino! We have regular POP3 accounts and they make us use Lotus! I love that Notes is set to check the mail every 5 minutes but it will only check it once an hour.

I love managing folders in the mail client too, try moving them or renaming them, bunches of fun!

4 years going on Notes 5.0 and still hating it!

I can relate to ALL your banner photos. Keep up the good work.

Ken

I never changed any of those settings, so I can't comment. But if it is a problem, hopefully it dissappears when your company coughs up the money for an "upgrade."
July 26, 2005

Firstly, I must say that I've thouroughly enjoyed your website.

Here's what happened to me:

I created a meeting through the calendar feature. I set it for 9AM weekly, no invitees. The Notes meeting was only intended to take advantage of the popup reminder for the real weekly meeting. A week later, I realized I had the wrong time. I changed it to 10AM, and closed the tab. It asked me if I would like to save the changes. I clicked Yes, and TAAADAAA! Nothing changed, it was still set to 9AM. I changed it again to 10AM, and clicked the diskette icon in the toolbar, hoping that would save. I exited the tab, looked at the calendar and again, nothing changed. It appears the only button that will work is the "Save and Send Invitations", even though there were no invitees. Shouldn't it just say "save" if I'm not inviting anyone?

Just thought I'd share,

Sean

I tried this with Lotus Noetes 6.5.2. I can't reproduce this behavior. Maybe it was fixed?
July 25, 2005

F5: everywhere else in the world, it is REFRESH; in Notes it logs you out! ARRGG!!!

Apparently about 20 years ago when Lotus was a major player, F9 was the standard. Microsoft decided to use F5. Read below for some more on this issue.
July 22, 2005

Have you noticed that the search engine is horrible when you try to get help? It's easier to go through Google.

Catherine

I agree. Alot of software has a lousy help system, but to say that Lotus Notes' help sucks without examples isn't fair—although my experience confirms it.
First of all thanks for the, great website. As a techie, a programmer, and a long suffering Lotus Notes victim it was cathartic to read your comments. I recently "upgraded" to Lotus Notes 6, adding such advanced features as little icons to show that I've replied to mail (wow! only about 10 years behind the rest of the computer world).

Here are some of my own personal Notes gripes:
- My Least Favorite Favorites
- Sorting Mail Messages, Part 2
Keep up the Lotus Notes bashing, and your valuable site. Who knows, maybe some day a pointy headed boss will be trolling the web trying to decide on the next mail client for his company, and your efforts will save his employees from a fate worse than Microsoft.

Thanks, Gary
Switch to X-mouse functionality (using Powertools for Windows XP). It changes window behavior to be "focus follows mouse". For the non-Unix users amongst you, that means that the if you move the mouse outside of the top window, it loses the focus and the window into which the mouse enters gains the focus—but the key is that the newly focussed window stays under the previously focussed window until you decide you want it on top (by clicking). Very useful—for example working on a Microsoft Word document but keeping an IM conversation window visible and just being able to slide the mouse into the coversation to reply (without the need to click and then click back to your real work).

Every single application in my system behaves well (gains the focus without popping to the top) ... except one, which always forces itself to the top when it gains the focus. And guess which one that is!!!

(version 6.5)

Martin

I'm not surprised that Lotus Notes ignores the operating system. I will post this as another example if others can verify this problem.
Congratulations on an attractive and well-laid-out site.

I get the impression from your website that you don't much care for the Notes UI. As a long-time Notes developer, I find your "naive user" perspective -- combined apparently with a lot of experience in evaluating UIs -- interesting and thought-provoking.

I've been going thru your list and thinking about which of the items I agree with and which not.

In cases where I disagree with you, it seems to be mostly because:
1. You don't seem to take into account that Notes is not just an email program. Many of the things you complain about as extra things you don't understand, are there to deal with Notes applications. If your company never uses any applications but mail, I can see where they would seem superfluous.
2. Your information is out of date.
3. Your company is using a weird, nonstandard version of the Notes mail template.
4. You haven't been well trained in using the program. I don't know who's to blame for that.
5. It's different from the way Microsoft does it.
6. It's a matter of personal preference. I won't bother to argue with you on those.
It doesn't matter whether or not Notes "is not just an email program."—I shouldn't be shown the numerous error messages that I've documented on this site. I shouldn't need to be trained to use the email part of any program. As I state in the Lotus Notes Sucks home page, I've used many different email applications. Perhaps Lotus needs a setup option "Clients will only use Notes for email and nothing else. This removes all the crap that has nothing to do with email"?

#33: This is not my experience. This is again, probably a problem with your customized mail application -- "soft deletions" have not been enabled for your mail files. The same goes for one or two other cases where you've complained about what happens when/after you delete things.

Fair enough.

#34: doesn't happen for me -- with which version did you last try this, and how are you attaching it?

I just tried this at appears that this problem is fixed.

#37: Not seeing this. Details?

This problem may be fixed; I have to verify this.

#45: Someone sent you a correction and you posted what they said but apparently didn't try it again to see whether you were right (you're not) or correct your posting. Incidentally, you should be pleased to learn that Notes now offers the choice of an "internet style" quoting.

This particular problem is actually two: Problems with Reply with History and problems with the To box. The latter is still a problem.

#48: Does not happen the way you describe; don't know what you're smoking.

This problem may be fixed; I have to verify this. This is definitely a problem with version 5.

#55: Your colleague is mistaken about what he did. The View action does not execute the attachment, but attempts to display it in a viewer that recognizes various file types. In no case does the View action execute any code stored in the attachment -- it was specifically designed that way to be a safe way to deal with attachments.

This problem appeared fixed.

I also note that in another note you've complained about this dialog, apparently not understanding why there were all these choices instead of just right away doing something with the attachment. Now do you understand why?

Sort of. Wouldn't default actions for certain file types be better?

#66: customized mail file.

I have a lot more but this is enough to give you a flavor of it. Basically, while you have some good points, you also have a great deal of misunderstanding about what Notes is and how it works. I wish you would update your site to contain only the valid and valuable criticisms -- then it would be useful. There's a great deal of it that's pointless or incorrect, and you don't do yourself any credit by leaving it up there after the error has been pointed out to you.

You mention alot of this "customized" this and "customized" that. Why do so many things need customizing?

(From Howard)

Thanks for your comments. I do need to update this site, particularly where the problems have been fixed.
What a hilarious website! I forwarded this to my helpdesk buddies today and we had a riot with it, as we slug their way through an R6 upgrade.

It sucks in ways I never even realized.
I just thought you'd like to know that in response to my rant there on Lotus' forums, they've decided to lock out my account. (I hit both the "send me my password" and "send me my username" links on the webpage, then copied them both into the login field to verify... despite using the correct username and password, it now won't let me log in.)

So it's good to know that not only does Lotus Notes sucks, but they censor people who speak out about it.

(Oh, and even better... even though I can't log in, I can still read the replies. One of the Notes developers typed the following: "I think it would be acceptable for the file to remain on the disk for a limited period of time -- adjustable by policy, default 48 hours -- to allow retrieval in case the user is a fathead." Calling your customers "fatheads!" What a great policy!

So users (paying customers) are "fatheads," huh? Nice....
The company I work for migrated our site from a functional and stable mail system to Notes 6.5, and just two days after I was converted to Notes, I realized my entire work process had been completely broken. I have never been a user of Exchange or Outlook, because I work almost exclusively in a UNIX environment. The Windows-only UI was especially offensive because I spend about two hours a month using Windows. The web interface for Notes is years behind some of the free webmail applictions like Squirrelmail or Gmail. Clicking Send actually sends the mail, but will not keep a copy for yourself. You must select Send and Save.

Since the web based composer is based on Java, the user is subjected to the usual Java and web browser quirks. It has caused me much frustration.

I look forward to the day when somebody with decision authority admits that our Lotus Notes initiative was an expensive mistake. I am very disappointed in the people responsible for making the decision, because they knew all about the difficulties related to Notes, and did it anyway.

I personally find the UI for Lotus Notes to be a technologically offensive piece of software. I would have never picked Notes for mail or collaboration if I had been given the chance to evaluate this software. The Notes UI tries to do too many things, and in the end it does none of them very well.

Some have told me to just get over this Notes issue, because it is just an email client. It is not just email. It is an 300MB overcomplicated Java-based wrapper for "collaboration" that was forced upon the whole company.

-Jon

My Lotus Notes seems to save email messages that I send. I wonder why there is a difference. I wish my employer would admit their mistakes as well. Beyond, the Lotus Notes developers just don't get it. Lotus Notes is difficult to use because of its horrible user interface. I love this entry in the forum:

"I'm tired of explaining to people that Notes is NOT an email system, that its a groupware database management system with email and workflow capabilities."

The Notes people just don't get it. Regardless of what Lotus Notes is, it doesn't excuse, among other things, the lousy user interface and the many error messages that appear.
After having a user lose their data for the sixth time because of Note's shitty interface, I got pissed and actually posted this on IBM's messageboard about the product. It turned into a 60+ response thread that a developer even participated in. (Mostly just to say how Notes is perfect and it can't be made any better.) Anyway, somebody else who participates on that forum pointed me to your site.

http://www-10.lotus.com/ldd/nd6forum.nsf/DateAllThreadedweb/35f083d507e5d5788525700e007e9aaa?OpenDocument

I share your pain, man. I'm also in the same position where I have to support Lotus Notes, but I have absolutely NO say in switching to another product. And, the REALLY shameful part is that they ALL suck. Exchange/Outlook sucks. Novell Groupwise sucks. Domino/Notes sucks worst of all. I'm waiting for a company like Adobe to enter this space and just wipe the floor with all these guys.

James
Hi,

I have read through some of the comments - man, most of the guys who log complaints are really thick. Most of the issues they complain about are actually user issues - the old RTFM should apply. I have worked with many mail systems and wish all of them were as good and stable as Notes. It may not be the prettiest, but you don't get an indepedent ranking as no1 for uptime by being lousy. Tell the guys who complain to read some help files and get a life! If the best they can do is complain about Notes, they probably complain about the weather, their dinner, etc.

Good site idea though!

Mike

Thanks for the comment. I should not have to "read some help files" to use email. Electronic mail is a simple enough concept for anyone who has mailed a letter. Notes might be "Number 1" in uptime, but as a user, I don't care about that—I care about using software that helps me get work done. 100% uptime is useless if the software deletes my messages without my knowledge.
Hi

I very much enjoyed reading your Lotus Notes article - thankyou.

[Mart points out a typo in Mail Message Bloat.]

Regards

Mart.

Thanks for the correction. I appreciate it.
God... please help me from this awful program. Our company made the "wise" decision to convert us from Outlook to Lotus this year. We are a company of over 5,000 people spread around the world. I estimate they spent well over $1 Million in conversion and training costs. However, no figure can be placed on the "loss of productivity" factor. I have even considered quitting because of this "cluster" they call a program. It has totally distracted me from my real work.

Thanks for your great website, it has made my day. It also reaffirms to me that I'm not just a "complainer".

Regards,

David

Think of experience of using Lotus Notes as continually striking your thumb with a hammer. Eventually, you realize something is wrong, but you don't feel the pain anymore. Good luck.
Dear webmaster@lotusnotessucks.4t.com,

First of all thank you very much for the work you've done to summarize all "pleasant" features of the Lotus Notes. Great job! Really.

I would like to contribute a little bit to your investigation.

Lotus Notes creates problems even for those mail users who do not use neither client nor the server of Lotus Notes for mailing purposes. If you use the normal mailing system and send a message to the correspondent which uses Lotus Notes with delivery receipt then you have a chance to bother YOUR mail system administrators. Lotus Notes server sends back delivery receipt not when the mail message is physically delivered to the server (as all other mail servers and what you expect in normal case) but only when your correspondent accesses his/her mailbox. We have spent a lot of time to investigate why the messages from our users are not delivered in time to some recipients before found this "nice" feature of LN. So Lotus Notes not only has it's own very high total ownership cost but it also contributea to increase the TOC of other systems.

Lotus Notes is really sucks!

Best regards,

Sergey, IT professional (lucky enough to be able to survive with local MS Exchange/Outlook mail system under the heavy pressure from the corporate IT to migrate to newly established corporate Lotus Notes mail system since 1998) ;)
I read through a couple of your problems with notes and I think you should purchases a "Notes for beginners" book. It appears that the majority of issues you have are common sense or what I like to call ID10T errors. A good example is your attachment problem. Are you trying to send the memo to an attachment? Why would you try to attach a file in the To: field? I get issues like these all day and all I can think about is that I share the same road with you and your opperating a motor vehicle!!! scary isn't it?

I am not trying to attach a memo in the To field. I am trying to attach it to the message. What does the position of the cursor have to do with anything? You are thinking like a programmer, not a user.
Hey, something I didn't notice on your LN Sucks site, when I get an email with several people in the "to" section, if you click; "reply with history -> reply to all" You'll find that YOUR email address will be added to the new To list.

So unless you want a copy of the email sent to you you have to delete it.

From my time with Outlook, it didn't have this absolutely pathetic "feature"

This applies to Notes R5 and R4.

Mark.

So not only do you respond to yourself, you also get another copy in your sent box. Nice.
Hi,

I have been a Lotus Notes user for almost 4 years now. Yeah, Im not a big fan of it, but I got use to it and have learned a lot of little tricks that help me out. (Im not sure how long you have used it, so the below may be greeted with a "no shit" from you :) ).

Anyway, I noticed you didnt like them calling, in their properties pop, the mailbox a "database". I 100% agree this is often confusing and just about every new user will raise an eyebrow when they see this. However, it really is correct to call it a database. Lotus notes is a database system while most other email programs are file based.

So, while it is confusing to call it a database, that really is what it is.

Mike

To discuss whether a "mail box" is a database or a collection of files is to think like a programmer, not a user. The user does not care if it is a database or a collection of files, nor should he have to. Thanks for the comment.
What is better?
That's a good question. It's an open ended question, though. Better from who's point of view? As a user, I'd say Outlook, because, in my opinion, it's easier to use. But no matter the answer, Lotus Notes still sucks.
Just found your site. Love it!

You'll be pleased to know I've discovered another great feature when trying to click on your mailto: linky. It brings up Notes, but fails to start a new message with it.

WTF.

Anyway - you made my afternoon, thanks :)

Richard

Your welcome.
Lotus Notes Gripe #934: The Document Properties Window

Got another one for ya. I have a dual-monitor setup as my main workstation. I keep the main Notes client in my larger, secondary monitor. Whenever I open an attachment, the document properties window pops up -- on my primary monitor. If I try to drag the window over to the secondary monitor, Notes won't allow me to; it stops at the edge of the primary monitor, as though there were no more screen space. Come to think of it, all of my windows open in the primary monitor, including Rules and Preferences, even though I keep Notes in my secondary screen all the time. Outlook handled my dual-mon setup with aplomb; can't say the same for Notes!
Lotus Notes Gripe #452: Unread Marks

Hi, I work for a company who just recently migrated everyone from our beloved Outlook over to Lotus Notes 6.0.3. MY department was one of the last to migrate, but that only delayed the inevitable.

One of my biggest complaints with this software is the non-intuitiveness of Unread Marks. In outlook, if you want to change a message from Unread to Read without opening it, all you need to do is select it, right-click and choose Mark as Read. Just two simple, easy to learn steps.

You'd think that such a paradigm would carry over to all email products, given that it has been in Outlook for at least 4 iterations now. But no, not Notes. To accomplish the same in "Lostus Notes", you need to open the Edit menu and drill down to Unread Marks > Mark Selected Read.

Oh, and on a related note, instead of being able to select multiple emails as you can in Outlook, in Notes you have to click in the leftmost column to make a checkmark appear.

No, Lotus, don't make Notes intuitive and easy to use; that'd make toom much sense!
I ran across your site while looking up a Lotus Notes issue. I love it and agree...Lotus Notes sucks!
Hi Mr Lotus Notes Hater.

Thanks for your WebSite, I'm in the same situation as yours - no other choice but this piece of crap.

I have 2 examples to submit related to message deletion:

Example 1

You want to empty your Trash folder (contains your deleted items)

You would think that right click on the Trash will give you an "empty Trash folder" type of message uh?

Well...no! Only gives you useless menu option I've enclosed a screen capture for the fun.

Example 2

You want to restore a deleted item from Trash to any folder. So you would normally drag and drop the email from Trash to whatever folder in your Inbox...

Nope you can't!

Instead you have a message telling you "You cannot drag and drop out of Trash with Soft Deletes enabled. Please use Restore instead." What is Soft Deletes? I never asked for that option! Can't it just get my email back!!!??

I've also enclosed screen capture of that beautiful message.

We have LN 6.0.3 not even your upgrade (poor us)

Please feel free to use the examples and wish you the best!
Enjoyed your site immensely. You may find it odd that I just said that, when I tell you that I'm actually a Notes developer with over 10 years experience of ithe product!!!

So, I guess I should be emailing you to rant and rave about how you're too stupid to understand the product, and that if understood what it could really do for your company, you'd forgive it's interface glitches, blah, blah, blah.

But I won't.

Yes, the product does have many other uses, which for people like me, are the real deal. But there�s no getting around the fact that as an email client, it's unnecessarily hard to use. See the post if you want to know where I�m coming from:

Most of the examples you cite are all too true, and made me cringe. A lot! However, there are quite a few examples where I�d take exception, and several where you�ve got it plain wrong. I hope you don't mind me pointing these out to you, and I�m interested to see what you�d do about it on your site, if anything.

Here we go then!

Example 55 � The Attachment window part 2

Your friend is mistaken. There�s no way in the world that he triggered a virus by clicking the View button. I don't care what he's told you; he clicked the Launch button. The View button works exactly as you say it should. It attempts to open the file in a viewer. It never, and I mean NEVER runs or opens a file with an outside application. Don't take my word for it though; try it out yourself.

I just might do that. Although the person who suffered from the virus promised me that he clicked View.

Example 45 � Reply with History

Did you test this out for yourself? It�s easy enough to do so. Do it now.

Type out the phrase "horse shit" and copy it to the clipboard. Then do a Reply with History on a Notes email. Now do a Paste (any application will do). Are we still talking "horse shit"?

When you�ve finished this little exercise, repeat after me, "I shall not lift examples from now defunct web sites without verifying them for myself".

Fair enough. It appears this problem is fixed. It also works with "bull shit" and "dog shit."

Example 48 � Send and File

You've got this one slightly wrong, although the true situation is scarcely much better!! Send and File doesn't delete the response. It does actually send it to your recipients; only the filing part is cancelled. You'll only know this though by checking your Sent Mail, assuming that you're saving sent mail in the first place.

This one's been fixed in Notes 6, where it works exactly as you say it should.

It's about time it's fixed!

Those three are the only examples that I can find that are, IMHO, are flat out wrong. I�ve some comments on Some Final Thoughts section though.

First off, the car analogy doesn�t hold up at all. Gas and brake pedals always in the same place are they? Come rent a car in Britain, Japan or Australia, to name but three countries. You're going to look pretty fucking silly searching for the steering wheel on the passenger side. You�re also likely to find the car has 3 pedals, whereas most in the US come with only two. And what about all the other controls, such as lights, wipers etc.

Maybe they�re always in the same place in your country, but they�re not in mine. E.g., the wipers are nearly always controlled by a stick coming out of the steering wheel column, but sometimes it�s the right hand stick and sometimes it�s left.
So when I get into a rental car, do I spend 5 minutes working out where everything is? Damned right I do!!

The analogy holds up pretty well in for a particular country. I am sure that Ozzie's have their gas pedals somewhere consistent. The fact that the lights and wipers are all over the place makes my point. If they were all in the same place, we wouldn't have to spend twenty minutes figuring out where the hell everything is.

Alot of differences don't matter, but to be different for the sake of being different is stupid. Does it matter the clockwise tightens a bolt and that counter clockwise loosens it? No, it could be the other way, but what matters is that it is the same everywhere; I don't have to guess. Imagine the number of car accidents that wouldn't happen near the Chunnel if the English and the French drove on the same side of road.

From what I understand, one of the benefits of the European Economic Union (I think that is what it is called) is that all sorts standards that were immaterially different were harmonized so that a manufacturer could now sell his product across Europe instead of having to manufacture a slightly different product for each country; the Union eliminated differences that didn't affect the performance of the product, but just added cost. Standards do make a difference.

I�d also like to see you try and plug in your 120 volt fridge over here.

Tip: have a fire extginuisher handy when you do.

You can't. The shape of the plugs and sockets make it impossible; it protects "stupid" users from killing themselves. Lotus Notes' design makes it easy to delete mail that you don't want to delete.

The F5 Vs F9 thing is very old hat. Some background: the "market leader" in the early nineties was Lotus 123, a spreadsheet package, and it used F9 as the refresh key. (Yes, you actually needed one for spreadsheets in those days!) It was the then upstart Microsoft that came along and broke the de facto standard by using F5 instead. Microsoft have "used F5 consistently"?

Try hitting F5 in Word or Excel and see what happens. Did anything refresh? Guess what the refresh key actually is for those two products. And yes, refresh does still have a use in MS Word.

Finally, you seem to be a fan of Mozilla Firefox; good on you!! Have you tried F5 in Firefox? Go on, do it now. Anything happen? No, it's not F9 either; it's actually CTRL+R. But hang on a minute. Isn't CTRL+R supposed to be reserved for replying to an email? Starting to get a bit messy isn�t it!

Actually Firefox 1.5 uses F5 and CTRL+R for Refresh.

Cheers,

- Mike
I feel the pain, I use to be the Microsoft Exchange Admin for an organization for 12 sites. Unfortunately we were inherited by a large company and were forced to use "NOTES", so i performed the migration, figuring it would be a learning experience. If i only knew. I have never ever spent so much time managing, maintaining, fixing, supporting email. On a system with individual DB's how does a corruption in a full text index of a single mail db crash an entire mail server? Anyways, I was wondering why you havent noted on your website, how by default the out of office "AGENT" sends ooo replies 6 hrs later. Lotus Suppport stated "Decreasing the time window could increase the chances of a server crash or overload depending on how many OOO agents are running" Excellent. What about the builtin dictionary, I think my 3 yr old knows more words than it has. Hmm, personal address book doesnt automatically synch to server, so when using webmail, sorry INOTES, your personal contacts are not listed. anyways keep up the good work.
I agree with everything you have written, but I think that it barely scratched the surface of the putrid pile of defecation that is Lotus Notes Email/Calendaring/ToDo/SoulDestroyer.

Try making a todo entry. try setting it to repeat. assuming you figure this mess out and it in fact does repeat, when you no longer want the to do item to appear, try deleting it.

you can't can you? apparently, it repeats for eternity, and because Lotus Notes has a God complex, is unwilling to let you delete the item, even tho' it says it is being deleted. I now have a to do list in Notes filled with an item I set to repeat from four months ago.

cheers

"SoulDestroyer" -- I like that.
Far be it from my intent to defend Notes, but you should try to avoid spinning off into wild hyperbole there. There are *LOTS* of valid criticisms of Notes, but you come off like a ranter, and it tends to reduce your site to a perceived joke. Actually, I think it was a joke link that led me to it in the first place.

My own criticisms are based on several years of using Notes on a workdaily basis. My strongest fundamental criticism is that the program suffers from the worst case of freeping creaturitis I've ever seen. As much as I dislike Microsoft and all their works, at least they have the sense to restructure their user interfaces more sensibly from time to time. Notes is full of misplaced features that historically developed in one place and never got moved to more reasonable locations. In general, I'm a kind of tool freak, and I normally achieve power user status almost at once, followed by rapid mastery, and often even guru status among my coworkers--except in the case of Notes. I really don't believe I have ever worked with a program so extensively and remained in such a "fairly tolerable semi-power-user" status. I have basically dedicated one computer to keep Notes happy and off my back...
Now for a concrete comment about your site. In the very first example, you are ranting about the hieroglyphics on the logon window . Your suggestion that they are there to distract observers is kind of ridiculous and certainly reduces your credibility among people who know the real answer. It's actually a rather clever feedback system to help you know if you've typed your password correctly before pressing ENTER. The hieroglyphics (in R5) or keyring (in R6) use a fairly sophisticated algorithm to respond to your password without actually exposing any of the characters. If you type your password correctly, you'll always wind up in the same state with the same figure, a yellow key on the left side in my case. However the transitions are not directly related to the characters typed and are also related to the user name, so even with a film of the changes it would be very hard to get a password from it. Okay, so it really doesn't matter for most people these days, but a few years ago for people with a slow network it was usually much faster to backspace and correct the password than to wait for the server to tell you you'd messed it up.

Fair enough. I tried typing different passwords and the keyring appears the same no matter what.

I basically agree that the fudging of password length is kind of useless, and obviously useless if an observer can see your fingers--but nothing helps in that case. I guess they are concerned about over-the-shoulder snoops, who can usually see the screen more easily than the hands. In those cases the number of characters is an important aid for dictionary attacks. However, you're so hyperbolic there I was expecting you to attack the idea of hiding the password on any display--except that is a "distracting" feature of almost every program that uses passwords.

I looked at a few other pages, but mostly I noticed a number of places where your criticisms are not particularly Notes-specific, but mostly suggest you've come from a Macintosh background. Notes certainly deserves criticism, but I kind of wish you could hit it harder and more directly...

I used a Mac once in 1988; I've been using Windows ever since. But anyway, thanks for the insight.
Thoroughly enjoyed your site... let me add a few:

#71: Create a new email and try to copy'n'paste some text from an IE window... you will probably get a "Cannot open the Web Navigator database" error. I find it hard to credit that something as essential as pasting text is broken. Pathetic.

I couldn't duplicate this problem!

#72 : New emails get "New memo" headings, then stay like that until they are closed and re-opened. It should reflect the subject field as it changes... if you're working on a bunch of new emails at once, it's very annoying.

Yes, it is annoying.

#73 : Saving a draft email closes it. Since Notes occasionally crashes, and has no automatic save feature (jesus!) it is obviously handy to be able to save work so it can be retrieved later. But when you save it to the Drafts folder, it closes it too, so you have to navigate to the Drafts folder to go and re-open it again.

#74: No keyboard shortcuts for custom commands. If you create custom commands, as masochistic users sometimes have to do, you can bind them to a button on a toolbar, but never to a keyboard shortcut. V. annoying.

There is so much more...

And re. #28 Creating A Hyperlink, Notes has absolutely nutso UI, true... what the hell were they thinking... but I dimly recall that Microsoft hold at least one wide patent on creating automatic hyperlinks from freely-entered text ... It may be that they can't do much here cos of infringement concerns, though of course developer stupidity is a far more likely explanation.

Cheers,

-- Reuben
Hiya,

I can't work out how to set a 'TO Do list' item's status to 'done'. I can only delete it. I've tried everything, and the only thing that works is to not use the To Do list.

I'm doing just fine with Post-Its...

-J.

That's what I use.
AWESOME site! Thanks for the link. I had great fun sending this to all of my friends at IBM.

Thanks,

Jeff