Charles on… anything that comes along

I’ve written before (here and of course in the Gdn Tech section) about the amazing outpouring of hate that comes from users whenever you mention Lotus Notes. And here it is again..

We’ve been pretty much told that when the Guardian moves to King’s Place, as it will from September or so, that we’ll be moving to a more collaborative system.

We were definitely told that there won’t be limits on email (presently, officially, 50MB - beyond which you are told by the system that you cannot send email.)

This would be good, because Notes’s web interface has a brilliant trick for those of the Max Mosley persuasion: you write an email - composing it carefully, putting links and careful arguments in - and click Send.

It throws back a screen saying “You have exceeded your storage allowance. Your email was NOT sent. Please delete some messages from your inbox so you can send mail.”

Now, apart from the fact that it’s stupid that you can’t send mail when it’s your inbox that’s full, there’s another wrinkle: if you go off and empty out some emails (a pretty dire thought in these days, though often I’ll find that the offending item that’s pushed me over the limit is a 3MB attachment of some company’s new laptop bag that they could have perfectly easily hosted on their website), and then hit the “back” button on the webmail to recover that long involved message… it’s disappeared.

AAGH!!

So anyway, we’re all hoping very much that Notes will not be in evidence at King’s Place.

But there’s always that nagging feeling it might. But I still haven’t come across such a hated end-user product. Here’s the Twitter search such as “Benefits of leaving TW: no frickin Notes!”

And I’ve just come across a new (to me) site: I Hate Lotus Notes which, um, does pretty much what it says on the tin.

What’s always interesting though is that pro-Notes people who will leap into these pits of hating and try, vainly, to tell people that the fact they’re hating Notes is because (1) they haven’t had enough training (2) it’s not an email program, it’s an application development platform (3) they’re using an old version - the latest version, v. [What you’re using +2] solves all those problems (4) it’s better than Outlook, anyway (5) all of the above.

I think it’s still telling that Notes 6.5.5, which dates from December 2005, still doesn’t support the scroll wheel on the mouse on OSX - which has done so from its start, a mere four and a half years earlier.

But you have to admire the determination of the pro-Notes brigade. They’re like people defending the right to smoke in crowded spaces: everyone else is wrong, it’s just them who can see the right way to run the world.

(Later: I’ve added the “Marmite of the IT world” to the title, since I realised - when I wrote the comment below - that that’s what it is: you love it or hate it. No in-between. No “It’s OK, you know..”

And John Naughton adds his insight:

To me, the product seems so dated and kludgy: it’s the epitome of 1980s, DOS-inspired software. And yet the True Believers are deeply attached to it in the way that Jehovah’s Witnesses are to the Watchtower. They are unfailingly courteous and willing as they patiently explain that Notes can be made to do virtually anything you want; but when one explains that a teaspoon can also be used to dig one’s garden they look blank: they don’t get it.

There, that’s a nice circular bit of referral for Google to chew over..)

These posts might be related (the database thinks..):
• In today's Guardian: a Lotus Notes followup (16 February 2006; score: 70.39%)
• In The Guardian: Lotus Notes vs the end user (9 February 2006; score: 68.95%)
• Ooh, feel the anger: Fake Steve disses Lotus Notes (25 January 2008; score: 65.58%)