The insurance company I work for, as a Notes developer, was 100% on Notes R5 until a year ago. The users are slowly moved over to Notes 7.0.2 now (at the same time as we are switching to Citrix), currently just one small branch office and the largest office are still on Notes 5, as are about 20-25 mobile users.
I think we will be 100% on Notes 7 in the end of this year.
The servers are all 7.0.2, and by using Citrix and the improvements in later server versions we have cut down the numbers from 12+ (one per branch server plus a few) to soon just 3 or 4 servers.
Why did we not upgrade earlier, and why not to Notes 8.0/8.5? Several reasons:
1) We were not on maintenance. The previous CEO did not want to pay for it, and he said if an investment could not be proven to pay back in 18 months, it was not going to happen. 400 x $140 is still a big chunk of money. TCO/ROI is complicated to prove.
2) The standard computer is a 4-5 year old desktop with 512 MB memory. They were originally delivered with 256 MB, upgraded when a document imaging system was purchased a few years ago. 2 x 256 MB, and two memory slots. Buy 350 times 2 GB, just to run a later version of Notes? Not gonna happen.
3) Notes 8? Exclipse? Java? 15000 files installed on the harddisk? Operations Manager/Sr Network Admin is convinced it is slower with Java, as it is an extra layer. And yes, Notes 8.x in Java is slower than the C++ client. His comment: "what does it help me that Notes is rewritten in Java? We don't use Mac. We don't use Linux. We don't use plugins. Facebook, twitter, social networks are firewalled/blocked anyway."
Now the Operations Manager is seeing the advantage of the Domino 8.5 server, we are probably going to 8.5.1 this fall. His rule is to wait at least 6 months from release to implement a new version.
And he is actually even talking about going to Notes 8.5 for the clients through Citrix, but I am sure he only want the Basic client (if it still exists in 8.5.1).
So there are many customers on older version.
IBM have been told for a long time that they need to improve the interface, and they are finally doing it. But it may be too late. It's nice that Notes 8.5.2 get nice database^W application icons, but that should have been in Notes 7... People like shiny new things.
I just deployed a new version of a database/application here, just bu fixing the fonts in some views and updating a few icons to more modern looking ones, I already had several users saying "oh, it looks really good". No change in functionality...
Perhaps Notes 8.5.3 should be ONLY UI design changes and pretty icons? :-)
The insurance company I work for, as a Notes developer, was 100% on Notes R5 until a year ago. The users are slowly moved over to Notes 7.0.2 now (at the same time as we are switching to Citrix), currently just one small branch office and the largest office are still on Notes 5, as are about 20-25 mobile users.
I think we will be 100% on Notes 7 in the end of this year.
The servers are all 7.0.2, and by using Citrix and the improvements in later server versions we have cut down the numbers from 12+ (one per branch server plus a few) to soon just 3 or 4 servers.
Why did we not upgrade earlier, and why not to Notes 8.0/8.5? Several reasons:
1) We were not on maintenance. The previous CEO did not want to pay for it, and he said if an investment could not be proven to pay back in 18 months, it was not going to happen. 400 x $140 is still a big chunk of money. TCO/ROI is complicated to prove.
2) The standard computer is a 4-5 year old desktop with 512 MB memory. They were originally delivered with 256 MB, upgraded when a document imaging system was purchased a few years ago. 2 x 256 MB, and two memory slots. Buy 350 times 2 GB, just to run a later version of Notes? Not gonna happen.
3) Notes 8? Exclipse? Java? 15000 files installed on the harddisk? Operations Manager/Sr Network Admin is convinced it is slower with Java, as it is an extra layer. And yes, Notes 8.x in Java is slower than the C++ client. His comment: "what does it help me that Notes is rewritten in Java? We don't use Mac. We don't use Linux. We don't use plugins. Facebook, twitter, social networks are firewalled/blocked anyway."
Now the Operations Manager is seeing the advantage of the Domino 8.5 server, we are probably going to 8.5.1 this fall. His rule is to wait at least 6 months from release to implement a new version.
And he is actually even talking about going to Notes 8.5 for the clients through Citrix, but I am sure he only want the Basic client (if it still exists in 8.5.1).
So there are many customers on older version.
IBM have been told for a long time that they need to improve the interface, and they are finally doing it. But it may be too late. It's nice that Notes 8.5.2 get nice database^W application icons, but that should have been in Notes 7... People like shiny new things.
I just deployed a new version of a database/application here, just bu fixing the fonts in some views and updating a few icons to more modern looking ones, I already had several users saying "oh, it looks really good". No change in functionality...
Perhaps Notes 8.5.3 should be ONLY UI design changes and pretty icons? :-)