Tech Focus
Exchange vs Lotus
 While Lotus excelled in ease of installation, interoperability and customization, Exchange scored in performance and features
Microsoft’s exchange server really came of age with the release of version 2007. Exchange 2007 offers a solid and complete messaging platform. The beta release of Exchange 2010 serves up even more features and functionality and looks like it may be the most robust Exchange offering yet.
Exchange has long enjoyed the lion's share of the business messaging platform market. Does this mean that it is the best e-mail platform offering out there? Some would argue that isn't the case.
IBM's Domino platform with Lotus Notes still has a strong following. Die-hard Lotus Notes fans cite stability and security as the primary benefits for eschewing Exchange for Notes. The CRN Test Center took a side-by-side view at the two latest releases of each platform: Exchange 2010 and Lotus Domino 8.5, and their respective clients—Outlook 2007 and Lotus Notes client 8.
Installation and deployment
E-mail servers almost always require some sort of preplanning before actual installation and deployment. Launching the setup.exe file of Exchange 2010 brings up a splash screen with links to useful information.
There are several components that must be installed before embarking on an installation of Microsoft Exchange 2010. The setup.exe splash screen lists and links to each component; all are available as free downloads from Microsoft's Web site. Pre-requisites for installing Exchange 2010 are the .Net 3.5 Framework, Windows Remote Management 2.0 and Power Shell v2. IIS components.
Of course, having to download each component and then reboot the server after each is installed adds to the length of time it takes to get Exchange installed. Once that is done, Exchange can be installed with typical settings or with customized settings. Custom settings refer to the installation of Unified Messaging, an Edge Transport server role or the Exchange Management Console.
Another time-consuming yet necessary part of the Exchange installation are the Readiness Checks. The system will check for additional pre-requisites needed to install Exchange. Any Active Directory or DNS issues could really set back the installation time during the Readiness Check phase. However, the time it takes to do the check is worth it. This is a big improvement over legacy versions of Exchange.
Installation of Lotus Domino Messaging Server moved like lightning in comparison. To install the core Domino and Lotus Notes platform took about two minutes, although the process was not completely glitch-free.
After installing Domino, attempting to launch Domino as a Windows Service gave a "Notes.ini file for this server is invalid error" message. There seemed to be an issue with the installer. It appeared to be configured to write files to a directory path that did not exist on our Windows 2008 Server. Modifying the .ini file to the path containing the appropriate files corrected the error.
Domino installed with the following features by default: templates, certificate management, Web services data files, Dojo, XPages, Lotus iNotes, Sametime integration, performance monitoring, plus a host of other features. You get a lot of extra goodies with a Domino install.
After installation, the server had a database replicator, an agent manager and other tasks that can be added to customize the environment. Each task is listed in the interface with a description that explains what that task is.
For deployment, we tested connecting each e-mail client to each e-mail server. Outlook is a snap to configure. Once a user has a mailbox set up, the client also needs to point to the server. The Lotus Client configuration is a bit more involved; not only does the server name have to be specified, a mail file and User ID file must exist for the user.
For Installation, points go to Lotus. The process is smooth because the installer contains all of the necessary files to get Domino up and running in a relatively short amount of time.
Interoperability and customization
Lotus Notes as part of the Domino platform supports a multitude of operating systems. A 32-bit or 64-bit version of Domino can be installed on Microsoft Windows Server 2003 and 2008, Linux, Sun Solaris or IBM AIX.
In contrast, not surprisingly, Exchange Server 2010 is a single unified communications system designed to be run as part of the Windows ecosystem. Exchange 2010 also requires 64-bit architecture.
Although there are a vast amount of granular controls and varied configuration options, Exchange is pretty much a straight-out-of-the-box software product, and there isn't exactly a lot of room for integrating custom components.
Lotus Notes, on the Domino platform, is highly customizable and there are modules for developers to integrate custom components. Lotus Notes supports the integration of mash-ups—Web applications that integrate data from multiple sources into one single interface. Composite applications are another way to customize the Notes environment and are weightier than mash-ups.
IBM also offers a Lotus Expeditor Toolkit. It is used to create custom plug-ins for not only Lotus Notes but for Lotus Sametime, the unified communications platform from Lotus and for its application suite, Lotus Symphony.
In terms of interoperability and customization, Lotus is the clear winner over Exchange. However, all of that customization horsepower can lead to a level of complexity for Notes administrators. An added plus for Lotus Notes is the ability to install on multiple platforms and OSes.
Feature set
A big advantage Microsoft has over IBM with unified messaging is that all modules necessary to create a true unified messaging solution are incorporated into Exchange 2010. To get that same level of functionality with IBM's solution requires the installation of multiple IBM products.
Exchange is so feature-rich that a lot of customization is not necessary for most organizations. For example, incorporating mobile messaging into Exchange only requires enabling ActiveSync. ActiveSync is also supported almost across the board by the major mobile platform vendors.
Exchange 2010 also comes with a lot of enhancements to legacy Exchange. One of the major new features is the ability to integrate voicemail into Outlook Web Access. In fact, voicemail preview is a new feature that provides a text-based preview of voicemail messages.
Yet another new feature is Exchange federation. This allows for the cross-premises sharing of resources, including federated message delivery and calendar sharing both within and outside an organization. Exchange 2010 also lets users share calendars with users outside the company. Access permissions and controls are available to keep such communication secure.
There is now also support for SATA. Exchange 2010 can utilize Serial Advanced Technology Attachment (SATA) desktop-class hard disk drives.
With Exchange 2010, e-mail administrators can opt to give end users quite a bit of control over that user's own messaging environment. The Exchange Control Panel (ECP) is a Web-based interface that enables users to "self-help." Users can perform tasks as varied as running delivery reports to managing distribution groups.
There is even enhanced device security in Exchange 2010. Per-user mobile device policies can be set, such as allowing attachments to specifying PIN requirements. Administrators can also deem which mobile device can sync to Exchange and which to block.
Many Exchange users will welcome the introduction of Mail Tips. This feature walks a user through checking a message before sending to avoid potentially embarrassing sent messages. Unfortunately, Mail Tips is not supported in Outlook 2007—only in Outlook 2010 or the OWA that comes with Exchange 2010.
The Management Console has the same interface introduced in Exchange 2007. Almost all major tasks needed to get Exchange up and running are done through user-friendly wizards. Active Directory is also tightly intertwined in this version of Exchange; end-user mailboxes are created directly in the Exchange Management Console rather than having to go outside to the Active Directory Users and Computers module.
Lotus Notes and Domino 8.5 also have feature enhancements. However, some of the features are ones that have long been in Exchange and Outlook. In the latest Lotus 8.5 client, a new feature being touted is auto-completion of an e-mail address while composing a message. Another feature, the ability to forward contacts as a vCard, is also one we have already seen in Exchange.
Still, some of the new features are quite innovative and really take advantage of the customizability for which Notes and Domino are known. One such feature is the ability to mash up your calendar; you can add activities, private or public Google calendars or other Notes calendars to yours.
Notes 8.5 also comes with built-in social networking capabilities, as Lotus Connections can be integrated into Lotus Notes. With it, users can create blogs, communities, bookmarks and more. On the security side, Notes share log-in now lets users start Lotus Notes and use their Notes IDs without having to provide Notes passwords.
Notes 8.5 has an interface to manage the Domino server. It's not Web-based—it's an actual client that gets installed onto a machine independent of the Domino server. Both this interface as well as the Notes client, although perfectly acceptable in how they run their features, have a dated, technologically primitive look to them.
For features, we are going to give Exchange the win. Exchange 2010's new features aid in bringing a user an entire new experience. In Lotus, not as much. Lotus client 8.5 resembles pretty much the Lotus clients of the past.
Performance
We were simply blown away with the performance of Exchange 2010. Microsoft has achieved about a 70 percent performance improvement over Exchange 2007. The client fires up quickly and mail routing, internally, is fast.
Lotus Notes, on comparable hardware, gave us slower performance. The client took almost 40 seconds to load as opposed to the 10 seconds it took to load Outlook. Internal mail routing speed was on par with Exchange. There was some latency also with the Domino Administrator console syncing up to the Domino server.
Pricing
Although Exchange 2010 pricing is not yet available, based on pricing guidelines from Microsoft, deployment of the Enterprise Edition of Exchange 2010 for a 100-user shop should cost $3,999 for the server software and 100 CALs will be another $3,500. That's about $7,500.
To deploy Domino Enterprise Server in the same-size organization would be $137 per user. That's a total cost of $13,700. But wait, as they say, there's more.
It would seem that IBM's pricing far exceeds Exchange. Yet, considering Domino is a platform upon which Notes and virtually limitless applications can run, it is economically reasonable. Also, the fact that Domino and Notes can run in an open-source environment can really reduce the amount an organization would otherwise have to spend on operating systems and other proprietary software licenses.
By the time an enterprise has purchased Exchange and the CALs for it, plus the Windows Server license and CALs for Windows Server, costs begin to snowball.
The edge in pricing, when all is factored in, goes to Lotus. You simply get more bang for your buck.
The bottom line
Both Exchange and Lotus have their pros and cons.
We felt Lotus excelled when it came to installation, interoperability, customization and what you get for the price. Exchange, we believe, is superior in performance and feature set. The deciding factor was the edge in pricing value that Lotus has over Exchange. |