@Rob isn't this what OpenNTF is for?

I agree with Bruce. I think that is where OpenNTF comes in. You could offer to work on the OpenNTF Mail Experience project to implement your ideas for the Mail template and you could even work directly with IBM to improve the Discussion template by joining the Discussion NextGen project (as I did). Contact Niklas Heidloff or Steve Castledine at IBM and I am sure they will welcome your (or anyone else's) assistance with open arms.

As Bruce and Peter point out, there is already an avenue available to anyone that wants to contribute to the improvement of Notes. Further, IBM's position on Lotus Redbooks has changed, which means that you could also contribute to the future of documentation (like the wiki's) remotely. Because of that, I am demoting this.

@2 Although my samples were mainly based on the mail-template I was thinking more on extending the core code.

My perseption of OpenNTF is more of a community that comes up with applications rather than modifying the core code. In principle these applications can be made without the cooperation of IBM, since it only requires the current available development environment. You could wish some improvements on the existing documentation. With the introduction of Eclipse the openess of the product has shifted a little bit, because Eclipse is more open than the propriety code of Notes. Still, as I posted earlier, it should be possible to have updates on older releases of Notes too, since there are so many users that are still using the older versions.

And, yes with the usage of the C API you could do some work in line with this Idea, but that is only marginal. And the Extention Manager could help you a little too.

I will have to checkout whether or not NextGen comes in line with my Idea. I will come back on that soon.

PS @3 Great Comment Greg. Some time ago I introduced the Idea that people could (were forced to) to comment when they demote an Idea. There is nothing wrong with demoting an Idea, but the author of an Idea is very interested, at least I am, why somebody does not support the Idea.

As promised I checked out NextGen. Again it is a template. So this is not what I am aiming at.

I'm not in favor of allowing the community to alter / interfere with the core of the application.
Other then for template development, I see some big issues here:
- first of all, IBM should make their complete Lotus core code public, in order to use the classes, methods, ... that run the applications (I'm sure MickeySoft would will be in favor)
- above of that, the community might encode parts that interfere with future plans or roadmap of IBM
- I'm not sure about this, but I do hope that IBM has some coding standards for Lotus applications. Are the community members willing to follow these standards instead of their own.
- What about support/bug-fixing afterwards?

I don't want to be all negative here. I do support OpenNTF and the impact it has on improving templates and additional tools (such as a NotesPeek), but I do think that allowing core development outside of IBM would have more cons then pros.

@Rob: I've felt that if I demote something, the author deserves some reason for that vote. However, an Idea to force that behavior isn't a good idea - it may make some people not vote at all. I feel that if more people demote an idea AND post a reason, there would be some social pressure on the overall community to do the same.

But I could be wrong. :-)

@Gregg [7] It should not be forced, but it should be easier to add a reason than to skip entering one. So you are not forced, but you are pointed on the importance of adding a reason. And there should be a selection list available (including a free text entry) for the demotion reasons. So in most cases it only requires one extra mouse click.

I may be wrong too, but I cannot imagine that an author is not interested why his/her Idea is not liked by others. It is of course no exact sience but it would give you some idea of the motivations of the voters. At the moment I write this down I am thinking the following: the idea of adding a reason could be useful during general elections too. It would enlight many candidates.

I don't believe there's a lack of resources at IBM. I just think they sometimes focus on the wrong things ;-)

A lot of pain in these lines...

@ 6) Tom Van Aken
> I'm not sure about this, but I do hope that IBM has some coding standards for Lotus applications.
Judging from the mail template, it appeared that his students wrote: haphazardly named variables, a lot of global variables in each library, and even a few NotesSession and NotesUIWorkspace within one library ... about any standards even the question.

> Are the community members willing to follow these standards instead of their own.
This is not a problem if they were...
When something interesting was this question, because I developed my: { Link } (at the bottom there is a link to continue). It's the old standards, and, sorry, they are in Russian, but Googlle translate can give at least some idea..
The main thing in the standards did not even name the variables and elements of design, and the presence of logic.

Now I took as a basis for "OpenNTF Mail Experience (R8.5)" and corrected:
- Fixed an old bug: when BackEnd-creating (from another database) of letters and opening of his on-screen field Body overwrited signature. Written for the class hierarchy to insert a signature in the FrontEnd and BackEnd.
- Fixed a bug cleaning Quick Stuff.
- Many improvements in the contacts (Person card).
- Unification of the main global variables, some libraries.
If it's someone needs...

Previous link was to part 2, sorry. Part 1 here: { Link }

@ Rob
> 1) I have started (but not finished) the implementation of a multiple signature in the mail-template
Is ready (based on ONTF code).

@0 You have some good ideas and the has been discussed quite a bit here. Not much else I could add, at this time, but state I am in agreement with many of the comments here. Overall, IBM has an obligation to maintain the core application and we can enhance the add-ins and templates. Keep up the good work with your development efforts (as listed in the body).