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Lotus vs. SharePoint
daria42 writes "An article at ZDNet pits the software collaboration kings against each other. IBM's Lotus Notes/Domino 7 goes head to head against Microsoft's SharePoint Portal Server 2003. 'If you don't have the resources dedicated to developing collaborative applications, don't have complex application or integration requirements or if you are focused on the Microsoft solution stack, SharePoint Portal Server 2003 is going to be hard to beat,' the review concludes."
MS has the advantage in that EVERYONE knows (more or less) how the office products work - Sharepoint is the same. No need to start from the ground up to learn the product. Market saturation has it's advantage - Get's me to thinking - is there a point of no hope in competing with Microsoft?
I've not user the newest Lotus Notes, but I use Scarepoint daily. I hate it. God forbid anyone use something other than IE. And if you want to view a document quickly, forget it. My department mandated that all our documentation get migrated from a fairly vanilla but searchable PHP site I built into Scarepoint. Since Scarepoint doesn't support html with linked images, I had to convert everything into Word docs. Now viewing frequently used information takes upwards of a minute where it used to be nearly instantaneous. Thanks a friggin lot.
You are not the customer.
Or lotus workplace which are the real collaborating software. comparing notes to portal server, is like comparing outlook to sharepoint.
An armed society is a polite Society
> Given that I spent the last four weeks designing and implementing a Plone intranet site
No, no, no. If it doesn't have per seat and per server licensing it isn't a solution. I also loved the way they mentioned the existence of other products (because they knew readers would know about them and wonder) then promply blew them off to concentrate on the two most expensive and infexible offerings on their way to a conclusion that was a no brainer.
One paragraph summary of the review:
If you are already in bed with IBM, stay there for now and if you are a Microsoft Slave(tm) buy their stuff without question. If you haven't picked yet you should probably buy Microsoft because IBM costs more (it does) and trained monkeys can operate it (the stock excuse for buying any of Microsoft's junk) and anyway, we all know Microsoft always crushes all opponents so skilled Lotus people are going to be rare exotic creatures (read expensive) in the future. But whatever you do, DO NOT look over at those free offerings, they will only lead you from the One True Path, paying out the ass for licenses and consultants.
Democrat delenda est
A lot of the UI functionality in Sharepoint depends on MS ActiveX controls. God help you if you use a non-microsoft browser. *VERY* painful.
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:: diatonic
It's very good for what it does out of the box, but the extension capabilities suck.
Three different programming models(Web parts,CAML,Sharepoint object model) for extensions, wacky directory structure, SQL server dependence, windows authentication, a stupid markup language with no designer support, and a whole lot of inadeuqately documented features.
Working across firewalls? Do you use the whole gamut of office integration features? Such as MS Project publishing, Outlook sync, and document storage for Office documents. I suppose there's always a way(reverse ISA proxies and all), but the bang-for-the-buck factor seemed to be pretty low, for such requirements. I'd be interested in knowing what kind of hacks/duct-tape you had to apply.
Next version promises to change all, as do all MS products. Let's see...
Now, why can't it be both? Inappropriate an bad.
I have actually used a wiki for this type of thing. It takes a bit more technically savvy set of editors but the markup is easy, versioning is tracked and everything instantly indexed, searchable and cross linked. Works really nice for documentation. If you want your docs written in word format though go with Sharepoint. You will not find a good GPL system for Word format. Subversion, and others like it will treat it like a binary file and just record new copies. No way to see diffs, etc.
Or lotus workplace This would be a better comparison.
The article should compare Lotus Notes to Microsoft Outlook OR Lotus Domino to Microsoft Exchange.
Maybe ZD can compare apples and oranges next for citrus content and determine apples are the true winner if you have an apple orchard.
Slashdot +1 funny -4 Insightful +1 informative -2 Redundant
Karma: Somewhere between SCO and Microsoft
It has been my experience that if [you] are already an all MS shop, MS products are less expensive, but only if you are an all MS shop
The Oracle products I used (in 1999 I admit) were hard to install, used a nonstandard GUI and were programmed with PL/SQL, a crappy nonstandard language that I despise to this day.
So while MS products are friendly when you're an MS shop and hard otherwise, it's a step ahead of the competition, which is hard on any platform. I hear Oracle improved the quality of the database and replaced PL/SQL with Java, but I still hear complaints from time to time. And IBM/Lotus products seem to be no better.
and may the gods have mercy upon you if you ever need to integrate with other platforms or do anything beyond those limited capabilities because it will truly be a hellish experience.
While that's true with their desktop applications, Microsoft's server software is built on open standards like everyone else. They use TCP/IP, and XML everywhere. Also, MS's products are very programmable and If you know a bit of C++ and COM you can make the software work with almost anything.
The MS motto should be, "you're already locked in, so suck it up and pay a little more, cuz we're usually 'good enough.'"
Their motto is, unfortunately: "If you already use one of our products, using any other product we make will be easier than using our competitors' stuff". Yes, it leads to MS automatically gaining market share in their new products by exploting familiarity with old products, but that's not neccessarily "cheating" since other vendors can work a bit harder and make their software as easy to use as Microsoft's offerings.
While that's true with their desktop applications, Microsoft's server software is built on open standards like everyone else. They use TCP/IP, and XML everywhere. Also, MS's products are very programmable and If you know a bit of C++ and COM you can make the software work with almost anything.
Disclaimer: I haven't administrated and Windows servers for several years, just used them and listened to gripes
You must mean open standards like Exchange, Active Directory, FAT, .doc, .wmd and the like? They only use TCP'/IP because they were desperately playing catch-up on having internet access at all and because they haven't grabbed enough of the server market. They abuse XML more than use it, using patents and embedded binary data to describe structure to remove all of the main advantages, like interoperability and tool reuse. As for programming, everything is closed source and as such cannot be truly customized. Using MS products is an exercise in work-arounds and trying to jump over roadblocks they intentionally constructed to lock you into only their products.
Doing something as simple as running a mail server using MS tools becomes a huge pain in the ass. Try serving mail to Windows, Linux, and OS X clients and still allowing all users to use all the features available to that client. Then try implementing ClamAV to filter the viruses. You're better off skipping AD and Exchange and implementing all open source and standards. Otherwise you'll spend all your time fighting the fact that MS products won't play nice and can't remain stable serving POP, IMAP, and Exchange.
This is what I experienced and the same story I've heard from admin after admin who runs a mixed environment. How you got a different impression is my question. Have you ever administered a mixed environment with MS server products and other servers?
Yes, it leads to MS automatically gaining market share in their new products by exploting familiarity with old products, but that's not neccessarily "cheating" since other vendors can work a bit harder and make their software as easy to use as Microsoft's offerings.
It is cheating if they use secret or undocumented protocols and formats, which they do. It is also illegal if you're a monopoly, which is why MS was convicted of it in the EU.
YES YES YES...I agree that this is not an apt comparison at all. I worked for a company that used both. I loved and loathed them both. But each did something very well - and those "somethings" were very different. I think it is pretty unusual to use Notes solely as a rapid development platform for web-based database apps with workflow and granular security, but that's what we did with it - no email...no groupware. It completely blew anything else we had out of the water at doing this.
SharePoint? Well...it was great for little web sites using default web parts, which is what most clients wanted it for. But the doggone things multiplied like tribbles in the hold and if you have any kind of serious change management system in your company, SharePoint likes to thumb its nose at working within those types of guidelines (Head of IT: "What do you mean the users change the content of the site LIVE? We need to lock that down!") (sigh)