Need good reasons to upgrade to R6 from R5

[rdannand]

I'm back after a long absence.

I'm currently doing some sideline consulting for a local newspaper. They were put on a "shelf" version of Lotus R5 long before my group of consultants showed up. As a result, we've found a mess, and have been fixing it. Unfortunately, the Office Manager is wary of our help and demands a detailed explanation to everything we do. (this will be stated again in another post I have.)

I could use the help of some who are already advanced to R6. Can you provide me with a list of great reasons to advance to R6 that a standard Notes user would see the value of? I should note that their office solely uses the email, calendar, and address book, so that is all they would consider. No one ever showed them the power of creating databases, and I think they are still not looking to get into that. They also will thumb their nose at any description that refer to "bells and whistles" so it has to be solid reasons.

Thanks!

 

[AmazingDominik]

I give you the number 1 reason why I immediatly upgraded all of my customers:

**The longer you wait the more difficult it will be!**

Indeed: as these people are almost using nothing this is the time to upgrade! No risk involved.

If they are going to wait, they will probably still be on R5 when Lotus introduces R7! The same sad story as so many companies who are now still on R4.

The more changes and additions you make to a Notes environment the more problems you can expect when upgrading. So my advice is: always upgrade as fast as you possibly can or you will soon end up on an island with old and obsolete technology that nobody can support.

R6 has a lot of nice new goodies in the Designer that you can use to create new applications (Document locking, layers,...). These things will not run on R5 however. More and more designers will start using them, so you are better ready for it.

Furthermore there a few reasons for the end user. I mention some:

1. Better interface
2. MUCH better scheduler
3. Unread counter in ALL folders
4. Better support when using web browser

Most benefits will come for the administrator. Much better and easy administration, better quota management, 50% less load on the network when replicating or mailing, much faster replication.



Kind regards,

Dominik Malfait
dominik@amazingit.com

http://www.amazingit.com

 

[gdesmedt]

Hi,

I'm not using notes for a long time but here are two major advances for notes R6.

1. In R6 it's possible to edit attachments. In notes 5 you need to save the attachment, edit it and then save it again before attaching it to an other mail or reply.

2. Notes R6 is running in the background so it doesn't eat so much memory as R5.

Hope this helps a bit.

Regards
Gunther