Factory tour 2 in Milan, good to see you HCL !!! 3 Nice days between Domino, Notes , Sametime and Portal.

During last week I had the honor and the pleasure to be invited at Factory Tour2  in Vimodrone, near Milan at the local HCL office.

This was the abstract of the my agenda:

• Software news and roadmap
• HCL client advocacy program 
• Networking

 I'll try to write a recap of some of my preferred news and about the event starting from the Software:

Domino & Notes

Domino and  Notes V11 will be released at the end of 2019 and a beta should be released during July.
V11 will be the first version that will not be branded  IBM  (the software deal between HCL and IBM will be finalized for  1th of June).

Domino

• Simultaneous ship language kits with Domino 11 ( no more wait for G1 language !!)
• Domino directory sync: a new service will runs on Domino Directory Admin server and will keep in sync the address book and Active Directory, with super fast sync included renames!
• DAOS  will keep steroids, and will support Amazon S3 as storage for NLO single copy from all servers of the cold attachments.
• HTTP authentication will use IDVault: YES ! Bye bye sync issue

Nomad ( ICAA for mobile )

• HCL showed us a demo of Nomad for Android on Chrome OS, impressive !.
• Nomad  will be released soon also for iPhone
• Lotus Script extensions for Mobile - GPS, Compass, barcode scanner etc .. NICE !!
• Future release of Domino Designer will have enhanced mobile development support

Verse

• HCL  shewed us a complete demo of the upcoming 1.0.7 : WOW . The new calendar build on react it's really FAST and complete. Will be delivered also the direct .ics import from the inbox.
• Verse for Mobile browser ! HCL shoed us a live demo of Verse on mobile browser ! A fantastic way to see the mail without installed Apps. A tons of the normal Verse functionality will be available from mobile too... EXCELLENT .
• Onf of  Verse goal for 2019 will be a feature parity with iNotes for end of the year than iNotes could be dismissed.

Notes

• Notes 11 will finally have Windows 64 /JVM 11 , mac 64 bit installer
• Modernized look: interface redesigned , cleared of the unused functionality with some of the build-in templates revisited like journal or resource reservation ( details about templates will be discussed in future events like Engage ) .
• Notes light weight client : this will be a light super fast Notes without some specialized functionality (eg customized template) . This client will be in beta starting from V11 and will be released with V12 next year. More about this in next events.
• Notes next gen will be available from the appstore (Win and mac)!

Sametime

• Sametime 10 entry will be released during 1h 2019, sametime 11 full will be released during 2h 2019. Yes the version will be aligned to the Notes and Domino relase.
• Another confirm, ST Entry 10 license will permit to use mobile client, all other "premium" functionality like screenshot and file send still need a license.
• ST Proxy will still run on  WebSphere but the client it's rewritten  using React
• Chat messages will be delivered to all the user devices connected to the service to avoid  misconfiguration of priority like it was on previous release .
• Persistence chat : using a configuration based on a MongoDB chat messages could be retrieved and available as history.
• Starting from Sametime 12+ WebSphere and db2 will be decommissioned

 Portal

• Portal 9.5 will be available around July 2019
• Docker , k8s will be supported to guarantee auto-scaling feature !!
• The future of portal will be similar Connections Pink . With new releases features and functionality will be moved from traditional WAS (tWAS) architecture to the new containerized architecture , that should simplify the deployments . Traditional architecture will be maintained for some versions .
• The service moved to the container will runs on new open architecture, on components like NodeJS. The first component moved will be the Media Gallery , available from Portal 9.5 !
• WCM will be simplified. Like other competitors working on a site will be funny and easy than today.

Advocacy program
I LOVE THIS PROGRAM !!! HCL could provide an Advocate to help customers and partners as technology focal point. He could help with issue, blocked support case and so on..I think this will be a real great improvement .

Networking 
THANKS  HCL !!
Nothing better to start a new marriage than see each others in the eyes and talk. I've feel and high level of competency , enthusiasm and availability from HCL peoples,
I honestly a fan of the deal between IBM and HCL for social software and I'm sure we will have some years of fun ahead, working together. 

Last but not least , my fellas IBM Champions ! I love every time I have the opportunity to meet my colleagues and friends at the conferences ! It's usually one of my preferred part because spent time eating a pizza together could be also an opportunity to inspirational moments. 

In the end , I've appreciated a lot the event and I hope the Factory tour could be replicated in Europe also the next year .