Part I
Getting to Know Notes

(The online version of this Part has been abridged.)

Groupware and Notes

Groupware is software that enables you to work with a group of other people. That was easy, wasn't it? Unlike a spreadsheet program, which you toil away with by yourself, Notes can help you do the following things:

• Send e-mail documents to individuals and groups
• Create databases and put information into them that you, everyone, or only people you choose can read and edit
• Ensure that the same information on a particular subject is available to everyone who is supposed to see it -- regardless of where they are and without having to worry about what kind of computer or network they use
• Retrieve, view, and share pages and files from the World Wide Web
• Enable everyone in the organization to communicate with each other as quickly as possible, whether the communication is gossip, news, or vital corporate data (assuming that you can tell the difference)
• Prevent prying, unauthorized busybodies from rummaging around in places where they have no business
• Combine data, graphics, text, and tables from many different places, such as spreadsheet programs, word processors, and even the World Wide Web and the Internet
• Hold information and e-mail for users who are only occasionally connected

For more information about groupware, Notes, and their capabilities and limitations, see Chapter 1 of Lotus Notes® 4.5 For Dummies® (also written by us and published by IDG Books Worldwide, Inc.).

Databases

The most important concept in Notes is the database. In fact, the entire program is organized around databases. A database is essentially a bunch of information that is assembled in a way that makes it easy to retrieve. You can think of the Sears Roebuck catalog as kind of like a database -- it's organized in alphabetical order, with the name, description, picture, and price of each item neatly arranged. But the only way to find an item in the Sears catalog is to turn the pages and let your fingers do the walking. That's where electronic databases are much more useful.

When you use Notes, you create documents: memos, company policy statements, sales records, or listings of baseball statistics. These documents are all stored in databases with other documents so that you can select information from a database without turning pages or scanning long lists. If you ask your database to show you all sales contacts in Alabama, for example, as quickly as the electrons can arrange themselves, the list of Alabama sales contacts appears on-screen.

A good example of a Notes database is a discussion database, which is the electronic equivalent of the backyard fence. You can express your opinion on a particular subject by composing a main document. Then someone in the Singapore office may compose a reply to your statement telling you that you're all wet. People anywhere in your organization can respond to these opinions.

Remember: You may write your opinion using Notes working in Windows, while the response can be created on a Macintosh; others may be using UNIX or OS/2. Everyone can read all of the documents, regardless of what kind of computer the documents were composed on. All of you can share not only your sought-after opinions but also drawings, enhanced text, and even information from other sources such as Excel or the Internet.

In Notes, databases contain views. Views contain documents. Documents contain fields. And fields contain individual pieces of data. See, the whole concept is based on data, and that's why it's called a database. Don't let all these new words bog you down. We get into what they mean and how you can put them to good use in other parts of this book -- we just want to give you the big picture for now.

For more information about using databases, see Chapters 8 and 9 in Lotus Notes® 4.5 For Dummies®.

E-mail

You probably already know that the e in e-mail stands for electronic. Sending e-mail is better than sending p-mail (the p stands for paper) because it's fast, cheap, and fun.

Most people prefer e-mail to p-mail because it's so fast; you can get a five-page e-mail message to a coworker in Japan in just a few minutes. The post office can't compete with that! You send e-mail right from your desk, without leaving your chair.

To send e-mail, you simply put a name at the top of a memo and click the Send button. If you put several names at the top of the memo, the memo goes to everyone.

In Notes, the e-mail that you send goes to everyone you address it to and only to those people. If you write a nasty note about the boss and send it to a friend two floors down, you don't have to worry about whether the boss will see it.

In Notes e-mail, you can add text enhancements, such as boldface, italics, or underlining; you can change colors and fonts; and you can add tables, links, and graphics. Instead of sending messages that make people yawn, you can make them sit up and take notice! And, when you use Notes to send a message, the recipient's computer beeps the minute the memo arrives to notify him or her of your all-important correspondence.

More people around the world are now connected with all kinds of e-mail programs, and now you can "talk" to them via Notes. You can send an e-mail message to your friend (who works at another company), your cousin (who's studying art in Paris), or even to your kid (who's at home using America Online).

(The online version of this Part has been abridged.)