Running IBM ISSI with Microsoft Vista to get Lotus Notes 7 or 8


Now that I am running the AT&T VPN client in Vista to connect to IBM, the next step is to get my work tools installed.

I went to the IBM Standard Software Installer webpage and installed the standard client for Windows XP. It installed correctly, but the only way I could get it to actually run was to run the browser (Firefox or IE7) as Administrator so it could launch the program that installs the application. [Reminder: to run a program as admin in Vista, right click the executable and select "Run as Administrator" – some links won't display this option – find the physical executable if necessary].

Once I run the browser as Administrator, I can launch the ISSI and it begins to grab the packages. The only problem is that when I try to log in using my IBM intranet username and password, I get this error:

ISSI Logon: Server error validating logon information. This error can occur if the time and date on your workstation is incorrect. Check the time and date on your workstation and correct if necessary. Select OK to retry logon or Cancel to Exit.

Of course, my time and date are set correctly (Unless Windows Vista now uses GMT as the internal clock – and that’s causing the error? Maybe?) Most likely, it’s a bug and I’m just out of luck until they write a real ISSI client for Vista.

Screw ISSI – I never liked it. A package manager should never stop the power user from getting the actual files they’re looking for. I’ll just hunt down the executable the old fashion way and try installing Lotus Notes manually.

Waste of time? Maybe.

Updates:

I just read on an internal forum that Lotus Notes 7.0.3 is expected to be fully compatible with Windows Vista.

IBM literally just launched an internal early adopter program for Lotus Notes 8 – which probably supports Windows Vista? Here’s the internal signup page http://reswat2.research.ibm.com/projects/notes8/noteseahome8.nsf

I found the reason for the ISSI error in Windows Vista:

“ISSI cannot work in Windows Vista at the current time because of a bug in
IBM Tivoli Directory Server running on bluepages.ibm.com, which prevents
secure LDAP authentication from working for applications running on Vista
which use the Windows LDAP APIs.”

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February 13th, 2007
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Comment Number:
1
Written by:
Stevious
Posted on:
February 26, 2007 at 11:22 pm

You can get notes 7.0.2 from the Software XL portal internally: https://w3-104.ibm.com/software/xl/download.nsf/ticket?openform

Comment Number:
2
Written by:
Benjamin Chodroff
Posted on:
February 27, 2007 at 10:26 am

I ended up downloading a beta version of Lotus Notes - 7.0.3 - from a friend of mine in IBM. I have this version working with Vista.

Comment Number:
3
Written by:
Michael Halladay
Posted on:
March 19, 2007 at 8:16 pm

Great update, thanks. Now I wonder where I can find out when the Tivoli problem with ISSI will be fixed?

Comment Number:
4
Written by:
Benjamin Chodroff
Posted on:
March 23, 2007 at 10:37 am

I haven’t heard anything about the ISSI problem being fixed. Hopefully soon…

Comment Number:
5
Written by:
Benjamin Chodroff
Posted on:
June 25, 2007 at 2:26 am

Christopher writes: “I found a really sneaky way of installing Notes. I used a Deferred ISSI installation on my Thinkpad. I figured that the program (issi) downloads the necessary files to an obscure folder and just waits for the user to start the install. It does! ISSI caches these things in the C:\SWD folder, and so I copied all files with today’s creation date to my flash drive. I also copied my old Notes installation folder (all 2GB worth!). On my new computer (a Macbook Pro! with Vista!) I setup Notes using the deferred issi install files. After fresh copy of Notes was setup, I copied my old Notes install over the new one, and bingo! worked like a charm. Had access to everything right off the bat.”

Comment Number:
6
Written by:
Michael Halladay
Posted on:
August 21, 2007 at 8:12 am

Finally got around to trying Christopher’s technique. Got the Notes’ files all on my Vista machine, but not sure how to start the ISSI installation process. … Michael