Every autumn we organize a technical conference with the Czech user group SUTOL. The same was true this year, when we met at a traditional place in Prague.
We have carefully selected topics so that both administrators and developers will find their way. And I think the program was successful because 124 participants were registered and it really arrived.
The conference is a bit specific in that most of the lectures are exclusively in Czech. Even so, there is interest in the conference abroad.
Very pleasing was the presence of representatives of HCL Digital Solution. And what more could you want than when Richard Jefts, Barry Rosen and Uffe Sorensen, Tim Clark, Antony Blake, Rene Schimmer, Michael Florentino, Stephan Wissel arrive with them. Not only pleasant, but even more responsible.
The conference started keynote by Richard Jefts – Vice President and General Manager of HCL’s Collaborative Workflow Platform business. What happened, what was happening, what was going to happen. What we have done, what we are doing less well and what we will focus on. Those were Richard’s keynote themes.
This was followed by a summary of HCL products by Petr Kunc, who represents HCL in the Czech Republic. Petr in his presentation gradually invited to all other sessions and thus started the technical part of the conference.
Jan Valdman (Whitesoft) has prepared a presentation on the latest in HCL Connections and managed to get Rene Schimmer, Director of Product Management for HCL Connections, for a joint performance.
We look forward to the release of Connections 6.5, which should be this year and next year, we expect another big version that looks very interesting in the first screens.
Barry Rosen – Director of Product Management (Domino, Sametime, Verse) summarized the news we can expect with the coming Domino 11 and Sametime 11. The official announcement will be on December 4 in Tokyo and you can watch online. Registration for this event is here.
Questions were asked about the Czech Language Pack, which falls into Group2 and it was promised that it is still true that the LP for Group2 will be for Domino / Notes 10 as well as for V11. Exact deadlines, but they are not.
There followed two sessions for developers, when Mirek Orlík (Downstream) introduced HCL Leap as a tool for easy development of web applications (Low code strategy) and connection with Domino V11.
Tim Clark (responsible for the HCL Ambassador program, for example) also showed a live demonstration of HCL Leap usage.
For me as a pure Administrator, HCL Leap seems like an interesting and fast tool that can be used in minutes without the need for complex programming. I hope to find time soon and personally try it.
Ondra Fuxa (Your System) focused on the news awaiting developers in Domino 11 because he had the opportunity to beta test. And as he said: functionalities or news are shifted more to the status of “Developer Friendly”. For example, he showed practical programming using new classes in LotusScript.
After lunch break we prepared an interesting session t “Ask HCL”, where people from the audience could ask the HCL team about everything. There were repeated questions about language localization or support. This discussion was also open to those who did not have a stand-alone presentation, such as Uffe Sorensen (Global Director of DS Strategy at HCL Software) or Michael Fiorentino, who is Director of Support. The interest was great and the “round table” exceeded the time limit, but that was not to the detriment of the next conference program.
After this interesting part, I had a practical demonstration of how to analyze and configure HCL Nomad for iPad and iPhone using Panagenda MarvelClient. Anyone who is still interested can sign up for the HCL Nomad beta and start testing Nomad for Android.
Stephan Wissel (Solution Director – Products & Platforms Division at HCL Technologies) arrived at the conference. It was an opportunity for a large group of developers to meet and discuss everything they were interested in. And the interest was so great that we had to move another developer presentation to another time.
Not only for administrators Lukáš Doležal (Whitesoft) summed up the news in Sametime V10 and especially showed what we expect in Sametime 11. No more DB2, no Websphere. Simpler implementation, less hardware. What else could you wish for?
In the next block of lectures Jan Krejcarek (PPF Bank) could present his precisely prepared demo (of course everyone had precisely prepared their presentations) on Domino AppDev Pack – what’s new in version 1.0.2. He has shown, for example, the use of IAM Service (Identity and Access Management); access control of documents; work with files.
This was followed by Martin Hansgut (TOTAL SERVICE), who always presents tips for administrators at SUTOL conferences. This time he chose a very interesting topic, showing different possibilities of connecting Domino with Microsoft Active Directory: SSO, SAML and service that will be part of Domino V11 DirSync.
Slowly approaching the end of the conference and for the developers were prepared the latest presentation by Mirek Orlík, where showed how to deal with large volumes of data in Domino. The lecture full of tips, ideas, observations certainly captivated a completely full house despite advanced time.
Finally, I shared with Jan Valdman our experience on how to register for HCL customer programs, how to support HCL, where and how to download installation files. We mentioned information about planned licensing changes, which raised a lot of questions.
The conference was over. Yes, there was a lot of information that has already been presented, but also a lot of new information. However, it is always a good idea to hear and see this information in a comprehensive way. It is always good to have a community of people who have a common interest, to discuss common problems, to show their tips, ideas and achievements.
It’s always good to see a lot of people for whom all of this matters, and if there’s a chance of meeting a team of the most skilled people from HCL, that’s all the better.
It was a difficult day not only for us organizers and speakers. It was a difficult day for the audience. But it was a really successful day.
Thanks again to my colleagues with the SUTOL team, thanks to the HCL team for taking such a long journey behind us. But mainly thanks to all who arrived and stayed with us until the end. See you next time.
ciao Ales, I would be interested to know something more about new licensing. Do you know where I can find some stuff about it?
Thank you very much
Hi Stefano,
About licensing will be discussed at live launch from Tokyo on December 4. There should be more said.