Clarification (hopefully sans rant)...

HCL Notes/Domino 8.5 Forum (includes Notes Traveler)

Subject:

- I run XP Pro SP3 - 32bit across the board. I've done Domino for only 12 years and I have never had a quarter of the trouble with an upgrade that R8.5.1 has given me. Or if I did I've blissfully forgotten, but I don't consider this level of frustration to be that forgettable. Last time I remember having half this much trouble was when R5 came out. That thing crashed constantly at the start as well, especially if one tried to use multiple windows in Designer, as R4 did without the slightest hiccough.

- You are correct, of course, that the new features are seriously awesome. But Bill is also correct in that using them (for enterprise level application migration) is an insanely steep learning curve, not the simple rapid development it's touted to be. So while it's very nice to have all these spiffy new features, unless one is essentially willing to scrap 30,000 lines of primarily LotusScript OO with some Formula and Java, redoing the entire thing from the ground up using SSJS, XPages are actually an impediment.

- At least that's my experience based on months of bashing my face against that exact scenario: web-enable a very complex R-prior Notes application using XPages. Had I known it was such a heinous amount of work I would have never touched an XPage. I would have done every bit of the work using "legacy" techniques and been done months ago. Instead I'm months late and don't even have viable alpha-ware, after over 20 PMRs. But I have sooooo much time invested in this "most powerful" upgrade that it's nearly impossible justify chucking it all to start over, now. Had I known back when I started that I'd be here now I would have scrapped every one of those 30,000 lines and started over. But days of research into XPages beforehand led me to believe they were The Cat's Meow, quick and easy, so I pulled the trigger. I coulda swore the barrel was pointing away from my head!

- So the real issue is in two parts, and both parts have pretty darned serious negatives. DDE won't play nice with hardly any other software (even in a fully 32-bit environment), making it phenomenally unstable unless it's run on a "machine" by its little lonesome, and migration of enterprise level complex applications from R-prior to XPages is a ridiculously time consuming affair.

- I'm not even touching on the piles and piles and piles and piles of usability issues and outright code-mangling bugs in DDE. I'm trying to be objective here, and if I go down that road everyone will certainly roll their eyes and think "He's at it again!". (wry grin) Hopefully no one has gotten there with this post yet. If they have I sincerely apologize in advance, as it was my intention to relate information and experience, and nothing more.

- I do have an R8.5FP1 instance that's not in a VM, but that instance very, very rarely loads DDE. It use it to access R8.5 applications using the Notes Client, it's what I use to access this Forum, and it runs all day every day. So far it's been fine as frog hair, as Dad says, even with user ID switches. (knocks on head)

But at least when R8.5.1 DDE is put in a VM by its little lonesome, it's relatively stable, and in fact I think for the most part it is "working as designed". Without confidence that code won't be randomly lost, ie, stability, quite frankly nothing else is relevant...

Feedback response number DGIE83FPQ2 created by ~Holly Zekhipisonnivu on 03/11/2010