Real World Computing

Today's world is all about cloud.  We have email in the cloud, document storage in the cloud, data, applications and even development in the cloud. Why Cloud is Best From one point of view, cloud is an excellent choice. You no longer need to worry about; Physical servers which can suffer hardware failures. Storage and rack space for servers Local services, such as Air Conditioning and the Water Supply in the computer room. Local environmental factors, such as storms which can directly impact your infrastructure. Local backups, which can take hours and require special software Tape management (or streaming backup services) Server failover -- this is managed by the cloud sites. Hotfixes and patches to operating systems and applications. Most of the cloud systems offer some pretty good restore functionality too. For example; IBM Connections has some great version control tools which allow you to roll back to previous versions of your file.  This means that if...

IBM Connections.Cloud is a very powerful set of software and services but using the default settings will result in a community that isn't very pretty, has low usability and will discourage your users from participating. Luckily a few tweaks, some promises and a bit of work on engagement can make a huge difference. The Overall Plan Obviously you need to plan out what your guests and members will be doing in your community. It’s basic marketing. People don’t visit the site for nothing, they are there because of a basic need. You can’t begin to provide a solution until you've identified those needs. The needs could be as simple as, the need to obtain information or the need to collaborate with others . These aren't mutually exclusive needs but they do suggest vastly different requirements. Providing information is usually done via files and/or wikis while collaboration is more of a forums thing.  Understanding the needs will help you to build a community which satisf...

Last September, when renewing our Notes and Domino Licences, IBM offered us a trade-up to IBM Connections SmartCloud.  Essentially, there we were presented with two options; 1.  50%  of our licenses upgraded to the full services (S1) 2.  100% of our licenses upgraded to a subset of the services (S2) I chose the first option, knowing that either way I'd have a struggle on my hands with management when I wanted to take advantage of the full services but also knowing that it's easier to justify getting the other half of the organisation onto the new service than it is to widen services for the whole organisation.  We're still only half there but I'm very hopeful - it's the first time in years that I've had real confidence in IBM's direction.  So What is this Connections thing Anyway? It's weird but IBM seems to have come full circle in the Domino product line. They spent years barking up the wrong tree with ideas like the ill-fated "workp...