Extending Lotus Notes

Hi all,

This is a really newbie question. I’ve developed a plug-in for Outlook that processes email messages as they arrive and are sent.

How do I go in doing something similar for Notes? One of my customers is pushing me to support this email client and my company does not have experience with the tool.

There so much to read and I’m really having a hard time finding the right place to start. Would you recommend me a webpage where I can start learning about all this? Starting with what programming languages / IDEs I can use, type of functionality I can customize in Notes’s UI, maybe point me to other plug-in providers for examples, etc.

For example, is it even possible to use Microsoft’s .Net programming tools at all with Notes? Has somebody done something like that before, or does it makes sense at all in the first place?

Thank you all in advance and looking forward to hear your comments. I’m really curious to start learning more about this “other side” of the world…

AP

Subject: Extending Lotus Notes

In Notes, they have something called Agents. There is the ability, out-of-the-box, to process messages BEFORE they hit the mail file or AFTER. This is done in the mail file itself, using the Designer Client. And you have choices:Create the Agent using @Commands/Formula

Create the Agent using LotusScript (similar to VB)

Create the Agent using Java

Create the Agent using a Simple Action

Create the Agent using Imported Java

There should be plenty of examples in this forum as well as other sites. There is a Redbook that will help you, too:

Domino Designer R6: http://www.redbooks.ibm.com/abstracts/sg246854.html?Open

Good luck.

Gregg

Subject: RE: Extending Lotus Notes

Hi Greg, thank you for your answer. This really helps and points me in the right direction.

So, can I rule out Microsoft’s .Net Framework programming languages like C#, for example, altogether? It basically comes down to create Java applets, isn’t?

Thank you again

AP

Subject: RE: Extending Lotus Notes

You can’t rule out C# and .NET.

There are ways to write both server-side and client-side extensions in C (and C can easily work with C# and .NET) if you need to go beyond what you can do in agents. What does your extension do?

We need more information from you before we can advise you. E.g., you said that you write an extension for Outlook – but agents in Notes/Domino would (normally) be server-side extensions, not client-side. (Agents can be written in several languages, of which Java is one.) Does your code need to be client-side (is it accessing client-based resources?) or can/should it be run on the server?

-rhs