News

Lotus Commits to J2EE

• By Scott Bekker
• 01/30/2002

Lotus, a division of IBM Corp., also this week unveiled the next version of its messaging and collaboration software Lotus Domino 6, the server software, and Lotus Notes 6, the client piece. The version had previously gone by the codename "Rnext."

Al Zollar, general manager for Lotus Software, talked about the company's bet on the Java 2 Enterprise Edition (J2EE) platform during a keynote at Lotusphere 2002 in Orlando, Fla.

"This further standardization on J2EE addresses customers' desire to leverage and extend the power of their IBM Lotus Domino investments while at the same time helping to achieve the goal of ultimate integration," according to a Lotus/IBM statement summarizing Zollar's speech. "The move to a J2EE standard is a natural evolution, allowing the opportunity to unleash Domino capabilities virtually anytime, anywhere and to anyone in a mix and match environment."

The Lotus decision, which has been rumored for some time, takes one major software vendor out of participation in Microsoft's .NET platform, the main rival to J2EE.

Meanwhile, Lotus unveiled details of its next generation of Lotus Domino/Notes, which is scheduled for general release in the third quarter.

Enhancements made to Domino 6 and Notes 6 include additional mobile user support, user interface changes, administrative improvements and application development changes.

Lotus claims about 90 million users worldwide.