2009 is drawing to a close and in less than 10 hours I’ll be in my tuxedo and drinking champagne. What a year from a personal and a professional perspective.
On the personal front the highlight of 2009, by far, was on 22 August where I got married to my lovely wife. 4 months into our marriage we’re having a blast. Not much have changed in our relationship which I take as a good thing. I’m looking forward to January and once again bringing her along for Lotusphere. I think she’s growing used to staying in the Swan and the fact that return guests get some good deals at the spa… 🙂 Apparently some sun and warm weather (crossing my fingers) in January doesn’t hurt either.
On the professional front it’s been a year of both many changes and new challenges. As previously the year really got kicked of at Lotusphere and it was very nice seeing all of my “collegues” again and hooking up. I’ll remember BALD, being part of the blogger program in those yellow bean bags, frost in Florida in January and the associated state-wide “panic”, giving a session with good reviews though having a high fever and missing 1,5 days due to sickness as the highlights of my Lotusphere 2009. Of couse being in the US for the inauguration also made it special. Being “on location” in Florida bar for Superbowl was also a very nice experience.
The rest of the year has been filled with a lot of consulting on Notes and Domino, Lotus Connections and other related Lotus products. It’s been very nice being able to share experience and consult on a wide variety of subjects. 2009 was also the year where I started doing a lot of teaching and we started doing Notes 8.5 Application Development workshops. I’ve been giving the workshop a number of times across Denmark during 2009 and it has always been a good experience. Of course some workshops has been better than others but I have always felt that I’ve given the attendees what they signed up for and all attendees have gone home amazed at the potential of the new Notes releases. If only more would take the time to learn Java – that’s still the Achilles Heel of IBM Lotus…
Towards the end of 2009 I have also assumed the day to day management of some of the developers in the company. It’s been a big change from billing out 40-50 hours a week to mostly managing and planning. It’s also meant spending far more hours in the office which has been weird. I set a personal record this winter by having lunch in the office 12 days in a row. That’s a first in my 2+ years at IntraVision. The change of role has been fun but also a big change and challenge and something that I’m finding myself enjoying very much. I’m looking forward to the new year and getting more into that role.
In 2009 I have also enjoyed still being part of the Design Partner programme with IBM. It’s fun, educational and inspiring to be part of these conference calls and getting the inside story. The calls are something I look forward to attending and the debate is good and lively. Of course it’s also frustrating sometimes when IBM Lotus do something that we design partners just don’t get but that’s part of the deal. All in all I still find it very positive that IBM Lotus listens and lotusknows it makes a difference! 🙂
On the whole lotusknows thing I find it very positive that IBM Lotus finally got the message and starting being offensive. We still haven’t seen much, if any, of it here in Denmark but hopefully it’s coming at some point. There’s still a big need for air cover.
In November this blog turned 5 years and it was a milestone that were reached. As I wrote on that day, this blog is something I cannot imagine not having today. The blog and way it connects me with the community is amazing. Of course more and more communication moves from blogs to Twitter these days but it’s all good.
2009 was also the year where I finally got to finish LotusScript.doc version 2. It’s been a long time coming and it was very nice finally to get the new version out there. Expect interesting stuff to be coming your way in 2009 when I start leveraging the LotusScript.doc Java API in other contexts.
In three months TwitNotes turns 2 years – wow! Has it already been that long? Besides, of course, being my Twitter client of choice it has also served as a very good example in all of my speaking gigs as one of those new applications that are possible in the “new” Notes client. TwitNotes is an application that builds on the Notes foundation but reads and writes data in the cloud. Showing it as an example always raises some eyebrows until people “get it”. I used it as an example for the big IBM Software Day event here in Denmark this fall.
As 2009 draws to a close I’m doing another sidebar application that I hope will be useful for many of you out there although I’m mainly doing it for myself to increase my productivity. I hope to be able to reveal it by Lotusphere. It’s again a cloud-based application that integrates into the Notes experience to showcase just what’s possible with the “new” platform. Stay tuned…
Before I write too much I’ll wrap it up by wishing you all a very happy new year – see you on the other side. For those of you going to Lotusphere – see you there!
Bye, bye 2009…
