Through one of my social networks I was introduced to this funny video on youtube.  I hope that you enjoy it!

Click here to view the embedded video.

Working for the leading IBM business partner comes at a price.  The people working in my office don’t get to enjoy street level views of the pavement.  We have to look a long way to enjoy such a thing.

The other day I mentioned that I need Lotus Notes developers who are able to work in New Zealand.  Things seem to be going cray here at the moment.  So, if you want a job doing Lotus Notes development in New Zealand with the opportunity of working for IBM’s leading business partner, then we need to be talking.

Here is a copy of the advertisement I currently have on seek.co.nz

Certus Solutions is one of the largest pure-play IBM Business Partners in the Australasian Region. We specialise in providing consulting and software implementation services to organisations that use IBM software to maintain large, complex mission-critical IT environments.  Certus employs over 80 highly skilled IT professionals and support staff across five locations in Australia and New Zealand.

Certus focus on delivering customer value. We strive to be the experts in what we do and are committed to long-term customer relationships.

We are currently looking for an experienced Lotus Notes / Domino Developer to work on a Contractor basis.

Based in Wellington, this is an excellent opportunity for a motivated professional to join a challenging team as a Contractor and be part of a growing business. There is potential for this role to develop into a permanent position.

To be successful, demonstrating the following technical skills and experience would be advantageous:

• Workflow application development in Lotus Notes and Web Environment;

• Familiarity with Notes supported programming languages such as Notes Formula, JavaScript, LotusScript, HTML and AJAX;

• Experience with Lotus Domino web based development;

• The ability to upgrade legacy applications to modernise and improve usability;

• Testing all facets of applications;

• Understanding of the software development lifecycle and project management framework;

• A minimum of five years Lotus Notes / Domino programming experience;

Personal skills required to succeed in this role are:

• The ability to work independently and on more than one project at a time;

• A ‘can-do” attitude to ensure the job gets done with minimum support from other team members;

• Excellent communication skills, bother written and oral;

• And as a team player you’ll put the needs of the team above your own;

This is your chance to work for an award winning company, recognised for its expertise in enterprise software solutions throughout the Asia Pacific region.

Please submit a written application including a cover letter addressing the required skills and experience with your resume via the Apply Now button.

Certus Solutions is one of the largest pure-play IBM Business Partners in the Australasian Region. We specialise in providing consulting and software implementation services to organisations that use IBM software to maintain large, complex mission-critical IT environments.  Certus employs over 80 highly skilled IT professionals and support staff across five locations in Australia and New Zealand.  Certus focus on delivering customer value. We strive to be the experts in what we do and are committed to long-term customer relationships. We are currently looking for an experienced Lotus Notes / Domino Developer to work on a Contractor basis. Based in Wellington, this is an excellent opportunity for a motivated professional to join a challenging team as a Contractor and be part of a growing business. There is potential for this role to develop into a permanent position.To be successful, demonstrating the following technical skills and experience would be advantageous: • Workflow application development in Lotus Notes and Web Environment; • Familiarity with Notes supported programming languages such as Notes Formula, JavaScript, LotusScript, HTML and AJAX; • Experience with Lotus Domino web based development; • The ability to upgrade legacy applications to modernise and improve usability; • Testing all facets of applications; • Understanding of the software development lifecycle and project management framework; • A minimum of five years Lotus Notes / Domino programming experience; Personal skills required to succeed in this role are: • The ability to work independently and on more than one project at a time; • A ‘can-do” attitude to ensure the job gets done with minimum support from other team members; • Excellent communication skills, bother written and oral; • And as a team player you’ll put the needs of the team above your own; This is your chance to work for an award winning company, recognised for its expertise in enterprise software solutions throughout the Asia Pacific region. Please submit a written application including a cover letter addressing the required skills and experience with your resume.

Today I was able to spend a bit of time with a friend who told me a bit about how to get more out of the settings on my digital camera.  Tonight I have been playing.

I have just come across an article entitled “Lotus Notes dumped in AMP cloud move”.  I am not sure if this is just in relation to AMP in Australia or if it is referring to AMP in other parts of the world too.

What interests me is a comment which states:

Sivathas said the cloud email migration came about because AMP had been undertaking a review of its email, productivity and IT collaboration tools.

IBM is big in the area of email, productivity and IT collaboration tools.  Based on the review mentioned above, I cannot understand why Lotus Notes would be dropped.

Am I missing something?

For many years Microsoft PowerPoint has been the default presentation software which a lot of churches here in New Zealand have tried to use with limited success.   The issue has been that PowerPoint is really not made for a church worship service.  PowerPoint is a good solution for a preacher, but falls short in other areas of a church service.

How many times have you seen people use PowerPoint, then want to show a DVD? They minimize  PowerPoint and then bring up another window with a DVD player.  While all this happens, the congregation see a rather distracting switch between two applications.  Sometimes, the tech person will switch the projector between PowerPoint and an physical DVD player.  All of this is very clunky and annoying.

This is why I use MediaShout along with PowerPoint.  With MediaShout I am able to use a single control point to show DVD’s, Songs and PowerPoint presentations.  All I have to do is load each of these into MediaShout and then run the entire presentation by pressing the space bar.  I am able to move from PowerPoint to a video clip and back to PowerPoint again or to a song without causing an on screen distraction.

I am often asked my people here in New Zealand to demonstrate this software, so if you want to see how MediaShout works, just drop me a line.

Outlook Express troubleshooting can be a problem for most users as typically, people who are using Outlook Express are not the most computer savvy.  They are people who just want to use a computer for basic tasks like simply sending and receiving email.

As basic as Outlook Express is, it comes with its downfall.  A lot of people who are involved in Outlook Express troubleshooting would be able to tell you about one of the biggest problems of all, an email virus.

A couple of weeks a go my father called me to say that his computer was sending out emails to everyone in his address book about things like Viagra.  These emails appeared to be coming from him, however he was not aware of this until a few people emailed him back!  I wonder if this has ever happened to you?

Right away, I put on my Outlook Express troubleshooting cap on as I tried to tell him why this was happening.  People write viruses to infect computers and to take advantage of products such as Microsoft Outlook to send spam to people.  Most Microsoft products are not very secure and this is a common event.

You can spend a lot of money trying to sort issues like this out, along with considerable embarrassment, or you can deal to it in a way which would make it a thing of the past.  The answer is to look for other applications which are secure.  I use Lotus Notes and have done for many years, one of its key features is its security.  I have never had any problem like the one I outlined above.  The other thing to do is to consider using another operating system other than Microsoft Windows.   Most versions of Linux are free and then there is also the Apple Mac OS (but you need to be running an Apple to use it).

Here are some photo’s which my daughter took of me playing the cornet and the piano.

Downunder is embracing the recent revival of interest in Lotus Notes.  As a result, the company which I am working for has a requirement for Lotus Domino developers with a good level of web development experiece for some exciting project work.  I am looknig for people to work as contractors with the possibility of becoming a full time employee sometime in the future.

I am keen to identify anywhere between 5 – 10 developers as this growth is expected to continue for some time.

View the job as advertised on seek for more information

I am not sure where this picture has come from but I thought that it was quite funny so here it is: