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Monday, November 30, 2009

Updating your Lotus Connections microblog programmatically

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This post is very techie. It comes as a reader recently asked me to share the code that I use to programmatically update my microblog (or status) in Lotus Connections. The following code is using Java and Abdera, but should be easily portable to other platforms like Adobe AIR. The Lotus Connections Profiles API documentation was helpful when I was trying to figure this out.

  1. Initialize the Abdera library
    // Initialize the Atom Client to update the status in Connections
    Abdera abdera = new Abdera();
    AbderaClient client = new AbderaClient(abdera);
    AbderaClient.registerTrustManager();
    try
    {
    client.addCredentials("http://connections.tap.ibm.com", null, null, new UsernamePasswordCredentials(username, password));
    }
    catch (URISyntaxException e)
    {
    e.printStackTrace();
    }
    
  2. Create the Atom entry to post to Lotus Connections


    Parser parser = abdera.getParser();
    String urlText = "https://connections.tap.ibm.com/profiles/atom/mv/thebuzz/entry/status.do?email=" + username;
    // Create the Atom entry with the new status message
    Entry status = abdera.newEntry();
    status.addCategory("http://www.ibm.com/xmlns/prod/sn/type", "entry", null);
    status.addCategory("http://www.ibm.com/xmlns/prod/sn/message-type", "status", null);
    message = StringEscapeUtils.escapeHtml(message);
    status.setContent(message);


  3. Post the Atom entry
    // Send the new status message to Connections
    ClientResponse response = client.put(urlText, status);
    
  4. Check the return code
    if (response.getType() == ResponseType.SUCCESS)
    {
    // yipee
    System.out.println("woo hoo");
    }
    else
    {
    // WTH?
    System.out.println("oh no!");
    }
    

Hope this helps.

Wednesday, November 11, 2009

Tri-State LUG: Extending Lotus Connections to Domino with TDI

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As I mentioned last week, on Monday I participated in my first LUG: Lotus User Group. I was cordially invited to participate in the Tri-State Lotus User Group meeting. I could only stay for the morning. I got to enjoy Bob Picciano's keynote before my session. You can find a summary of Bob's keynote in Chris' blog.

My presentation was about using Tivoli Directory Integrator (TDI) with Lotus Connections and Domino. TDI is a free piece of software that's included with both Lotus Connections and Domino v8+. It's a great toolkit to easily move data from/to Domino to/from Lotus Connections. I used the following presentation to introduce my demo.

While I don't have a formal recording, I do have other blog entries with recordings that show how to use TDI to quickly import data to Lotus Connections. The videos are: How To Load Users from a Spreadsheet and How To Load Photos from LDAP.

To the first person who asked me a question, I gave away a copy of Web 2.0 and Social Networking for the Enterprise, Joey Bernal's new book which includes a foreword by Jeff Schick, VP of Social Software at IBM. I was one of the technical editors so got two copies and decided to give away my extra one .


Enjoy!

Monday, November 2, 2009

IT Superstar of 2009: Luis Benitez

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Thank you all for your support!

If you want to nominate someone else as the IT Superstart of 2009, go here: http://www.ibm.com/vrm/itsuper_etp_recipient_2250IN/LBenitez194164846

Friday, October 30, 2009

Live in NY, NJ, or CT ? Join us on Nov 9th for the Tri-State LUG

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On November 9th, I'lll be in New York visiting one of our customers and will also get a chance to speak at the Tri-State Lotus User Group (LUG). I've never been to the a LUG before, let alone speak at one. Needless to say, I'm a bit nervous about the event.

The keynote speaker for the event is Bob Picciano and my session is right after his, which of course adds to the pressure. Looking at the agenda, I noticed that my time slot also puts me going head-to-head against John Head. Luckily, I'm going to Enterprise 2.0 in San Francisco next week so I hope to pick up some good tips on new stuff (and perhaps how to present).

My session is going to be about extending Lotus Connections with Tivoli Directory Integrator (TDI) by importing data from existing Domino databases. This is actually something that I had to do for the customer that I visited this week in Toronto. I'm going to give a brief introduction of what TDI is and what a powerful tool it is. Then walk through the process of creating an 'assembly line' to connect to Domino, retrieve some data, and import it to Connections.

To register for the event on the 9th, fill out this registration form (and space is limited so register today)!  See you there!

Wednesday, October 28, 2009

Opening bookmarks in a new window

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Today I got to enjoy Toronto again. I was here 3 weeks ago setting up an environment for a potential customer. Last time I was here, they didn't have a Notes 8.5.1 which was released just 16 days ago. It's interesting to see the customer's perception of Connections with Notes 8.5.1. They are completely loving the integrated suite of products all working together in harmony. The 4 hours that I was there, they just wouldn't stop congratulating me for the work that we've done integrating Notes, Sametime and Connections together.

I, of course, don't get any credit for this. All credit goes to the development team for their great work. Not sure if the development team will see this (they are probably heads down now getting ready for Lotusphere), but your work is appreciated.

Anyway, there was one customization that customer wanted: open bookmarks in a new window. Here's the customization that I made in case you would like to do the same in your environment.

  1. Go to the Lotus Connections server
  2. Go to the following directory: <WAS_PROFILE_ROOT>/installedApps\<cellname>\Dogear.ear\dogear.webui.war\h3\jsp\main
  3. Save a backup of bookmark.jspf, currentBookmark.jspf
  4. Open the files with your favorite text editor
  5. Look for this:
    <a id="bmlink_${link.id}" onmouseover....
    
  6. Add target="_blank" before id so that it looks like this:
    <a target="_blank"id="bmlink_${link.id}" onmouseover
    
  7. Save and close the files
  8. "Touch" h3.jsp
  9. Delete the directory: <WAS_PROFILE_ROOT>\temp\*
  10. Clear browser cache
  11. Reload Bookmarks

Enjoy!