Dennis' Domino Blog

Module x: References

Dennis van Remortel — Wed, 09 May 2012 09:52:00 +0000

Module x: References

*1 The History of Notes and Domino
*2 Introducing IBM Lotus Notes and Domino 8.5
*3 IBM Lotus Notes (wikipedia)

Module 4: Installing Lotus Notes Admin/Designer Client

Dennis van Remortel — Wed, 09 May 2012 09:44:00 +0000

Module 4: Installing Lotus Notes Admin/Designer Client

We've now setup our first server and now we need to install one of 3 versions of Lotus Notes clients. IBM kept it "simple".

IBM Lotus Notes Basic Classic "Lightweight" client
IBM Lotus Notes "new" fully functional Eclipse based client
IBM Lotus Notes Designer/Admin client Same as previous, but with possibilities to install Admin/Designer functionalities.

More information about this here. We have to download the following file:

Before we go to install the Lotus Notes Admin/Designer client, let's stop the Domino server. Enter the Command quit in the Domino Console screen, and press Send.

Wait for the text "Server shutdown completed" to appear.

Now exit the Domino Console screen, checking the "Also stop server controller and server testsetup/TST".

Now we can install the Lotus Notes Admin/Designer client. Doubleclick the executable, accept the UAC

After the unpack is complete, the actual installation is started

Accept the default path for now (remember, we are not supposed to install it on the server anyway ;-) )

Make sure you check the items as I just did. You do not want Symphony on a server.

Accept the defaults, now the install starts. This can take a while.

Now the install has been completed, let's start the server first (start the service or double click the icon on the desktop). When the server's running (check via the Lotus Domino Console), start Lotus Notes so we can fill in the details.

Double click the Lotus Notes icon. You'll get prompted by the configuration wizard.

Enter your Admin name + servername here.

Enter your password.

Accept the defaults and click Finish.

Congratulations, you've now installed your first Lotus Notes client. In the next chapter we'll explain the usage of the 3 clients, and get into administration for our server/users.

Module 3: First run configuration

Dennis van Remortel — Wed, 09 May 2012 09:38:00 +0000

Module 3: First run configuration

Now that the installation has been completed, we are going to get ready to start Lotus Domino for the first time. On the Desktop of the server you now see 2 icons. 1 is the actual server, the other is the management console. We start by starting the Domino Server.

When you click that, you'll get the following prompt (UAC):

You now get the Domino Server setup screen. Click Next to advance.

The next screen allows for 2 choices:

Setup the first server or a standalone server This option is used for your first server, to begin building you Domino environment. If you reinstall the first server, also choose this option, and provide the "existing" ID files.
Setup an additional server You'll use this option when installing a 2nd/3rd etc server in your Domino environment.

We choose to "Setup the first server or a standalone server". Click next to continue.

In this screen we have to enter a name for our server. In this case we are going for something generic like "testsetup", which is fine for now. Name your servers to integrate with your current naming conventions. Domino server and usernames are built using a Hierarchical structure. So this server is going to be named testsetup/<name>. The <name> part will be filled in later. Click next to continue.

This screen is one of the most important screens in configuring a Notes/Domino environment. As I explained in the previous step, the names are Hierarchical, and here is where you define the "Organization" part of the name. all names will be under this "Organization". Also this will give you a file (cert.id) and the password you enter here. Keep this password + ID very safe. It's the most important part of your future empire!

The next screen will prompt you for the Domino Domain Name. Common practice is that you use the Organization part for this, but it can been random. Click Next to continue.

In this screen we'll register an administator account. Please make this a "unique" name, but not your own! Doctor Notes is an example IBM uses in their documentation, but anything goes.
We'll also save a local copy of this ID file, as we will use that later on. Click Next to continue.

The next screen allows us to enable/disable various services we want to load on our server. We'll uncheck all for now and click Customize.
Here you can see the variety of tasks (we'll explain them later on in the series) Domino has to offer, but also shows you the ones that will be loaded with the server. For now click Cancel, and continue with Next in the previous screen.

We can configure the network settings from this screen. Make sure the hostname listed is pingable on both the server and all clients in the network. Click on customize to configure this.

Enter the hostname in both highlighted fields and click on Ok to close the dialog.

Click Next to advance to the next screen.

Accept the defaults in this screen, as it increases the standard security level.

Review your settings and click Setup to continue the configuration setup.

Wait untill this process completes.

Congratulations, the installation has now been completed.
We now have 3 very important files, that are the base of a Lotus Domino environment.

The Certifier ID (cert.id)
The Server ID (server.id)
The Administrator ID (admin.id)

These files should be kept safe at all times, as they will allow you to do all the interesting things.

Doubleclick the Lotus Domino server icon on the Desktop

When you click that, you'll get the following prompt (UAC):

The following screen display's:

We choose "Start Domino as a Windows service" and we check both checkboxes at "Always start Domino as a service at system startup" and "don't ask me again" before clicking OK.

The server is now started in the background, so we doubleclick the "Lotus Domino Console" icon on the desktop. When you click that, you'll get the following prompt (UAC):

The Lotus Domino Console application let's you view the Lotus Domino server console, and allows you to type in commands directly on the server.

Before we shutdown the server, give it 10-15 minutes to complete the initial tasks it needs to do.
In the meantime, we'll go to the next chapter.

Next: Installing Lotus Notes Admin/Designer Client

Module 2: Installing Lotus Domino first time

Dennis van Remortel — Wed, 09 May 2012 09:36:00 +0000

Module 2: Installing Lotus Domino first time

So, we are going to get our hands dirty now. We start by installing the Lotus Domino server. For this we will use windows 2008, instructions vary a bit per OS ofcourse. See the references for materials on installing on AS/400 or Linux. We are going to install Lotus Domino as is, without preparing. During the course of the chapters, we'll redo it the right way, but as this is just our introduction, we'll go through the steps first, without throwing you in the deep end.

THIS IS NOT THE WAY TO DO IT FOR PRODUCTION, PLAYGROUND ONLY

So for now, get yourself a Windows2008 server (can be a VM) with about 40Gb of C:\ drive, and the Lotus Domino Server software (we'll use Domino 8.5.3 for Windows 64bit, also named lotus_domino853_w64_en.exe ), and follow the install steps.

When you doubleclick the executable (rightclick + run as administrator in Windows 2008), you'll be prompted for UAC, followed by a location for the temporary files to be extracted.

Accept the defaults and click Next. The files are now being extracted for install.

The install wizard is now started. Click Next to advance to the following screen.

Read the EULA and accept it to advance.

Now it get's more interesting, we are going to enter the Domino server program files File path. We'll explain this in more detail, but as a general rule of thumb, never use spaces in paths. So we'll remove the default path, and put our own in place. The "partitioned server" checkmark can be discarded at this moment.

The path where the datafiles get installed is also updated to reflect our new path. Accept the current setting and continue.

This next screen, let's you choose what kind of Domino server this will be. As there are many different license forms out there, there are 3 defaults, and a customize option.

Domino Utility Server: Install a Domino server that provides application services only. As we've seen in the Introduction chapter, Domino can provide Mail and Application services. This license type will only allow you Applications.

Domino Messaging Server: Install a Domino server that provides messaging services. This license type will only allow you Messaging.

Domino Enterprise Server: Install a Domino server that provides both messaging and application services. This license type also allows for clustering. We'll come back to that.

Customize Domino Server: This allows you to select the features you want to install.

We'll now use the "Enterprise Server" version, as this allows us to view the most of what Domino has to offer. Please make sure your entitlement allows this before you go to production. You can add/remove tasks after install. Most times, customize will be your choice, because this will allow you to install only what you need.

A screen is now displayed that shows the choices made. After this the actual install is done.

Now we wait for the installation to finish

Congratulations, you've now succesfully installed your first Lotus Domino server. Let's move on to the next chapter to actually start using it.

Next: First run configuration

Module 1: Introduction

Dennis van Remortel — Wed, 09 May 2012 09:31:00 +0000

Let's start this chapter explaining the IBM Lotus Notes and IBM Lotus Domino products. The screenshot below (1) shows the various components.

IBM Lotus Notes is the client of a collaborative client-server platform. IBM Lotus Domino is the application server. Lotus Notes provides integrated collaboration functionality, including email, calendaring, contacts management, to do tracking, instant messaging, an office productivity suite (IBM Lotus Symphony), and access to other Lotus Domino applications and databases. Lotus Notes can also be integrated with additional collaboration capabilities including voice and video conferencing, online meetings, discussions, forums, blogs, file sharing, microblogs, and user directories. In addition to these standard applications the organization may use the IBM Lotus Domino Designer development environment and other tools to develop additional integrated applications such as request approval / workflow and document management.

Lotus Notes was originally created by Lotus Development Corp. in 1989. In 1995 Lotus was acquired by IBM and became known as the Lotus Development division of IBM and is now part of the IBM Software and Systems Group. IBM describes the software as "an easy-to-use, single point of access to everything you need to get your work done quickly, including business applications, email, calendars, feeds, and more".

Prior to release 4.5, the term Lotus Notes referred to both the client and server applications.

Whereas typical email applications are programmed to be an email client, Lotus Notes is an application that is part of an application development platform, where mail is just one of many possible applications. Lotus Notes and Lotus Domino have spawned a great deal of third-party software, including applications, add-ins, add-ons, widgets, plug-ins and more, such as document management systems, discussion forums, and numerous other business applications.

In 2008, IBM released XPages technology, allowing Lotus Notes data to be displayed to browser clients on any platform supporting standard web standards. (2) (3)

Next: Installing Lotus Domino

Installing Lotus Domino from Scratch

Dennis van Remortel — Wed, 09 May 2012 09:24:00 +0000

Being in the community for a while as a "consumer" of all the knowledge the smart people share, I made this post on my blog last year after Lotusphere.

I feel I haven't done enough since, so I'm going all out for this. I'm going to try and make a complete Installation and Configuration manual, based on the best practices, security and tuning I've read/seen over the years. I hope this might get us some more starting admins/devs interested in the Lotus Notes/Domino scene.

Today (9-5-2012) I'm releasing the first 4 chapters. Not much in them if you know the product, but they are a basis I will expand on in later chapters.

So here we go, first off, the legal bit:

This document may contain the following copyrighted, trademarked, and/or restricted terms:
IBM® Lotus® Domino®, IBM® Lotus® Notes®, IBM Lotus Symphony®, LotusScript®, Microsoft® Windows®, Microsoft Excel®, Microsoft Office®,Linux®, Java®, Adobe® Acrobat®, Adobe Flash®

Then, the thank you's for the people I borrowed the information from, or who educated me and the community over the years (in random order):
Paul Mooney,Chris Miller,Gabriella Davis,Bill Buchan,Kathy Brown,Jess Stratton,Andy Pedisich,Rob Axelrod,Daniel Nashed,(list to be completed)

The content isn't new or mine, I've just bundled it.

Now for the content.
I've split the process up to make reading/writing easier.

Completed Chapters:

(Please ignore the low quality screenshots in the first 2 chapters, I lost my screenshots and had to make screenshots of the screenshots in the browser I had open)

The content is undergoing updates all the time, but if you have any suggestions/tips/improvements/complaints, please let me know.

'Set Config' parameter does not alter the parameter in the Domino server configuration document

Dennis van Remortel — Tue, 24 Apr 2012 06:14:00 +0000

One in the category: "I didn't know that notes.ini setting":

Technote (FAQ)

Question
When you issue a "set config" command at the Domino™ server console (for example, "set config server_restricted=2") to change the value of an existing Notes.ini parameter, the value change for the parameter is not reflected in the Configuration document. The Configuration document parameter stays the same, and soon afterwards the parameter reverts back to its old value.

Answer
This issue was reported to Lotus software Quality Engineering; however, it was determined not to be a software problem. To have such console commands be reflected in the Configuration document, you need to do one of two things:

1. Set ENABLE_SRVCFG_NAB_UPDATE=1 in your Notes.ini; or

2. Pass in the keyword "update" on the SET CONFIG command, such as "set config server_restricted=0 update"

IBM Lotus Notes Client v8 for Beginners

Dennis van Remortel — Sat, 31 Mar 2012 07:08:00 +0000

I saw this link last night via @Drenth. An excellent piece of information for users by IBM.

You can find it here