NotesBook ist die App, um das Lotus Notes oder iNotes Notizbuch (Journal) auf das iPhone oder iPad zu synchronisieren. Nun hat NotesBook auch eine deutsche Webseite: http://youatnotes.de/notesbook.

Dort steht, was die App genau macht und es gibt einige Screenshots. Alternativ kannst du aber natürlich auch direkt im Appstore schauen.

As you can read here, Titanium will support Blackberry 10 in the near future. If that's the case, I expect us to support Blackberry 10 for Domino To Go, too.

We'll keep you posted.

I found a very good comparison between Phonegap and Titanium here at the Titanium developer blog.

While the article from an Titanium employee, it's quite objective and as far as I can see, without sales prose.

From my personal experience, I really can recommend Titanium. If you can write JavaScript, you get fast results and you are able to write Apps that use all the native controls of the mobile device. And with Domino To Go, you can replicate and work with Domino data in no time.

Occasionally we hear the question "Why do you use Titanium as base for your cool Domino To Go framework? Why not using Phonegap?". The quick answer always is: because with Titanium you're able to create real native Apps easily, while with Phonegap you're producing websites that want to look like native Apps.

Nevertheless I was curious what Phonegap really is about, so I spend some time in the last days to dig my way through Phonegap. My leading question was: would it be possible to port Domino To Go to Phonegap?

In theory, this should not be that hard. Domino To Go needs a SQLite database to store data and a filesystem for some simple file operations. Furthermore, it needs an XHR object to do Ajax-HTTP calls. Everything else is pure standard JavaScript and should work instantly on platforms like Phonegap (or HTML5).

Phonegap provides a SQLite database, file operations and the XHR object is part of JavaScript anyway. So I started to play and so far, porting Domino To Go to Phonegap seems to be possible.

Look and feel of Phonegap Apps

Developing a mobile App with Phonegap means to develop the UI with HTML5 and JavaScript. I used jQuery mobile, which allows to develop a basic UI fast and easy. But while I played with my test App, I always thought "this thing does not feel native". The look of buttons, lists and so on is not the very same as in real native Apps. The transitions between "windows" are not the same. In short, the look & feel is not the same.

Maybe I did something wrong. Maybe I overlooked the "make everything look like native"-switch in jQuery mobile. In the end, I only had a couple of days for my experiments.

With Titanium on the other hand, all native controls are used. The App looks & feels like every other native App on the device. From my perspective, this is clearly an advantage for Titanium.

Working with JavaScript in Phonegap Apps

Basically, coding JavaScript in a Phonegap App is not different from coding any other web application, since the Phonegap App on the mobile device is a web application. To access specific features of the device, like the SQLite database or files, Phonegap provides JavaScript APIs.

While working with these device specific JavaScript APIs I came across one major issue I really don't like:  the excessive use of callbacks.

In Phonegap, you cannot do something like this:


var fs = window.requestFileSystem(LocalFileSystem.PERSISTENT);
var f = fs.getFile("somefile.txt");
f.write("some data");


you need to do it like this:


var callback3 = function(writer) {
 writer.write("some data");
}

var callback2 = function(file) {
 f.createWriter(callback3);
}

var callback1 = function(fileSystem) {
 fileSystem.getFile("somefile.txt", callback2);
}

window.requestFileSystem(LocalFileSystem.PERSISTENT, 0, callback1);


You see? Callback calls a callback calls a callback calls another callback. Perhaps I'm not modern enough, or I'm not cool enough, but I don't like this style of coding. And I'm very, very, very sure that every standard Domino developer who knows LotusScript and just made some progress in JavaScript in XPages does not like this style either.

When working with a SQLite database it's the same. You cannot simply get a result set for a SQL query, you need to execute the query and give a callback that gets the result set. I feel this is unnecessary complicated.

Don't get me wrong, there are situations where callbacks really make sense. For example for HTTP requests, because you don't know how long the request will take and you don't want to block the whole App while the request runs. But for small file and database operations, I thinks that callbacks only make the code more complicated.

Is it worth the effort?

As said above, I think porting Domino To Go to Phonegap would be possible. But it would need some creative work to maintain one code base for Titanium and Phonegap while covering the excessive use of callbacks in Phonegap, which is a major difference to Titanium. So is it worth the effort?

At least for iOS and Android, I don't see a reason why to use Phonegap. Coding is more complicated, the UI doesn't look like native Apps and stuff like using an ecrypted SQLite database seems not to be possible with Phonegap. The best argument for supporting Phonegap would be that it is available for Windows Phone and Blackberry.

Your opinion?

Two weeks ago, we thought about changing the licence model for Domino To Go.

Now we finished the new licence model. Domino To Go is now licenced per App, and there are different packages with different options and prices. Click here to have a look at the licence and package options!.

While so far we sold Domino To Go only to early bird customers, we are now open for general business. Domino To Go is ready, and if you want to create native mobile Apps that work with Domino data, Domino To Go is the way to go. And now it's affordable, too. We're looking forward to hear from you, please ask Walfred at support@youatnotes.com for sales details if needed!

Domino To Go, our solution to create native mobile Domino Apps, is released and ready for business.

Regarding licencing and pricing, we had the problem that Domino To Go needs to come with full source code. And that means, we don't have a chance to implement any technical control for how many users or apps a customer uses our product. Therefore, we thought it's not possible to make a price depending on the amount of users or apps.

So our initial idea for pricing was to create a licencing model based on the company's size. Big companies have more users and will create more apps than small companies - simply and fair. At least we thought so :-)
But in the real world, this model does not work very good. There are so many usecases and situations where scaling by company size simply does not work.

Now we think we have found a good compromise. We will be able to price Domino To Go on a per-app basis, and furthermore, there will be different packages. Each package contains a different value regarding support and consulting service.

For example, the basic package will be very affordable, but with very limited support and no consulting. On the other hand, the most expensive package will contain top priority support, the right to get bugs fixed as soon as possible and some consulting work to get you started right away.

Each package will be for one specific app (as I said, pricing will be on a per-app basis). And if a customer has a question or needs support, he need to tell us for which app, and by that, we have a chance to see if the customer has a valid licence or not.

We are well aware that there are various ways to cheat us with this model. A customer could buy one package for one app and develop multiple apps with Domino To Go without paying for the additional apps. When the customer needs support, he could tell us that he needs it for the one app he has a licence for.

But first, when talking to a customer about a support case, there is a good chance for us to learn about which app he is really talking about and then check if the licence is valid. And second, we believe that the majority of customers are playing fair.

We are in the final stage of defining the prices. So when you want to buy and use Domino To Go, you can call Wafred or write him at sales@youatnotes.com.

Some days ago I published a list with features I'm working on for NotesBook.

I already implemented the new "by date" view and the support for embedded images and attachments is nearly finished, too.

Now the password protection is ready, too!

In the settings, there is a new field for a NotesBook password:



And if there is a password defined, NotesBook asks for a login when opened:



Notes:

• NotesBook remembers the login for five minutes, when the App is opened or resumed within these five minutes, it doesn't ask for the password again. Otherwise, the login dialog is displayed.
• The login is a modal dialog with only one field and one button. I don't see any possibility to get around it without the correct password.
• After three false login attempts, the login button is disabled for some seconds. With each other false login, the time the button is disabled increases.
• If you don't want the password protection, simply leave the setting blank.

Next and last new feature for the new version of NotesBook is to edit existing entries on the iPhone or iPad.

Yesterday I wrote about using NotesBook to distribute files like PDF or DOC to corporate iPhone or iPad devices.

In the comments, Tom Mayer asks if the files are stored encrypted on the device and I promised to look into this topic more deeply.

So far, I can report the following:

1.) A developer over at Titanium says that all files should be encrypted on the device as long as the device is locked by a PIN and doesn't have a jailbreak. I will check if that's really the case.

2.) There is an addional module for Titanium which implements a secure, encrypted version of the SQLite database (which we are using for Domino To Go). So that's the way to go to implement additional security for storing Domino view and document data with Domino To Go.

3.) There is one other additional module for Titanium which provides encryption for files. We might use this to provide file encryption in NotesBook.

So in a nutshell: yes, secure, encrypted storage of data and files is possible with Titanium and Domino To Go. Using one of these additional modules will be a piece of cake for every Domino To Go customer.

Bruce Elgort was one of our beta testers. Here is what he says about Domino To Go:

"I have been using and love Domino to Go. It is the perfect solution for Appcelerator devs who want to connect with and take domino data off line!"

Thanks, Bruce!

As you might have read, I'm working on downloading RichText inline-images and file attachments from a Lotus Notes or iNotes Notebook to my NotesBook App.

I made some significant progress on this topic today and beside some final polishing work, it works awesome! I can embed images into the RichText of notebook entries, and I can attach files like photos, PDFs or even Word documents to a notebook entry in Lotus Notes. Then I tap one button in my NotesBook iPhone and iPad App to download these images and files to my iPhone or iPad.

The download happens in the background while showing the progress in a nice progress indicator. When finished, the inline images are displayed in the notebook entry on my iPhone or iPad, just as in Lotus Notes. The file attachments are in the notebook entry, just as in Lotus Notes. I can tap on a file attachment to view it right on my iPhone and iPad.

Here are some screenies from the iPad version:


- inline images in Lotus Notes RichText on the iPad -


- File attachments, tap on a attachment to view it right on the device -


- viewing a PDF attachment on the iPad -


If the notebook entry changes in Lotus Notes, the files belonging to the entry are downloaded to my iPhone or iPad again automatically, and orphan files are deleted automatically. It. just. works.
Furthermore, there is a size limit to avoid downloading too big files (currently at 10MB, but I will create a setting for this).

And remember, the files are available when the iPhone or iPad is offline, too!  

Distributing company related files to the iPhone and iPad

While playing with these new feature, I realized that this is not only cool for getting the Lotus Notes or iNotes Notebook to your iPhone or iPad. It's nice for distributing all kind of company related content and files to iPhones and iPads, too!

Basically, this will be possible by simply creating a Lotus Notes Notebook application on the Domino server, allow a group of people to access it and pointing my NotesBook iPhone and iPad App to this central notebook. Pretty easy and cheap, only 5.99 per user for the App.

But the downside is, that NotesBook can only connect to one notebook at a time. So I'm thinking about creating a new, extended version of the App that can work with multiple notebooks. What do you think, would that make sense?