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TeamSite 6 in Production?

System

Wondering how many customers have 6.x in production, if any.

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Migrateduser

We are being told to come up with a plan to go to production with 6.1. We reluctantly agreed to create the plan. We are still unconvinced that 6.x buys us enough to be one of the first to take the plunge, but our fearless leaders think we need to charge forward. There's no way whatsoever we'd go to production with 6.0 - too unstable.

Dave Smith
Sr. Software Engineer
Nike, Inc.
(503) 671-4238
DavidH.Smith@nike.com

nipper

>but our fearless leaders think we need to charge forward.

Ours is not to reason why, ours is to do or die.

Migrateduser

Hi John,

We have had a whole slew of customers who have gone in production on TS 6.0. Their argument being that they absolutely needed the usability and flexibility via the UI Toolkit that they could not wait until TeamSite 6.1 to release. That number is about up to about 15 at last count, with a whole slew of customers who have taken our advice and have been developing on top of TS 6.0 in a development environment and filing bugs and feature requests, and doing user acceptance testing since TS 6.0 released.

Furthermore, of the 15 customers live on TS 6.0 I have heard nothing but praise and no major issues found. Of course little things were found but many have been implemented in TS 6.1 if they were reported earlier enough. A good example of this was a request from Smitty himself to add back in ability to incrementally save metadata on the metadata capture screen when MetaTagger was installed.

This has been implemented in TS 6.1 thanks to Smitty's letting me know that this was a must have for Nike to move forward. Another example of such improvements was gathered from a DevNet post by gfaus who requested the ability to make URL Commands (CCI URLs) behave as they did in TeamSite 5.5.2 where the browser window closed when the user completed the task. Not only have we reinstated this behavior, but we've made it ultimately flexible by letting the coder specify a done page parameter that the UI will use so that you can not only have it pop up our UIs or close the browser, but you could navigate to any URL addressible page after the use completes their task.

We have a team of developers, PM, and Lissa, of course, who are listening to your concerns on DevNet and tracking those to make sure that our product meets your needs. I know that was a bit of a tangent, but I thought it was important to mention.

Cheers,
David Yun

Sr. Product Manager, TeamSIte
dyun@interwoven.com

Adam Stoller

There's a reasonable chance that I'll be working on moving my customer from 5.5.2 SP2b + patches to 6.1 in roughly 6 months (that's how long I indicated we should plan for making sure all our current customizations work and to explore taking advantage of the new features and functionality ... at the same time, another part of our group will have to work on user training...)

--fish
Senior Consultant, Quotient Inc.
http://www.quotient-inc.com

Migrateduser

Of the 15, do you have any idea how many are new customers or projects vs. upgraded from a previous release?

Migrateduser

A good example of this was a request from Smitty himself to add back in ability to incrementally save metadata on the metadata capture screen when MetaTagger was installed.

I did? That's funny, because I don't really do anything with metatagger - my coworker deals with all that. I'll certainly take all the credit, though. Smiley Happy

This has been implemented in TS 6.1 thanks to Smitty's letting me know that this was a must have for Nike to move forward.

Are you sure you're not thinking of something workflow related? I have been a tad vocal on many different things about 6.0 but I don't recall anything about metatagger. Anyway, we are hoping that 6.1 is stable enough for production.

* Does anyone else think a "slew" would be way more than 15? I would consider 15 a "few". If you had 20 customers total, then 15 would definitely be a slew of them. But if you have even 100 customers, 15 is just a few. Let's keep things in perspective.

* = me taking my first steps into not listening to the marketing hype.

Dave Smith
Sr. Software Engineer
Nike, Inc.
(503) 671-4238
DavidH.Smith@nike.com

Adam Stoller

Re: "a slew" - I suppose it all depends on how many were left living vs. being slewed by TS6.0 :-)
Hmm - what does www.m-w.com have to say about "slew" ...:

slew[1] - past of slay
slew[2] - variant of slough
slew[3,verb]

http://www.quotient-inc.com

Migrateduser

A also think a slew is a lot more than 15, even in relative terms (1000+ customers might be a slew, 15 is more like a smattering or handful). I like the axis definition though - sometimes I think Interwoven is going in circles (which often means going backwards).

Yahoo polls on related subjects:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/TeamSite50/surveys?id=11689246

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/TeamSite50/surveys?id=11689247

Migrateduser

I'll have to piggyback on everything the gentlemen from Nike mentioned, and thumbs up to my colleagues that are hesitant to implement the 6.0 version. Our first Teamsite implementation was 5.0 (Win2k) and we're all still working through the resentments with that one... once burned, well learned.

Past experience and thin staffing here tells us to stand pat with 5.5.2 until 6.1 is ready.

Dennis White
Web Developer
Darden Restaurants
dwhite@darden.com

Migrateduser

I'm not convinced 6.1 is going to be enough to make the rework and retraining worthwhile - I expect 6.5 to be my first 6.x.

Gregg Faus

I anticipate moving to 6.1 when it releases. The new URL command features that David mentioned were the major reason why 6.0 was not feasible. Sure an upgrade to 6.x will bring a new interface, but if the general interaction within Templating (i.e. Forms Publisher) remains similar in nature.

I've already done most of the preparation for the move so hopefully I can upgrade within a few weeks after 6.1 releases.

Migrateduser

If you recall me whining about that huge nested workflow project I had to develop last summer, well, that customer decided the workflow was too clunky and still was too confusing for their users, so we scrapped it. We went back to them after last October's Focus Group (the one where IW claimed the entire 6.0 GUI was developed with the SDK) and touted how we can build our own UI with 6.0+. So if it wasn't for that one little promise, I'm betting we'd be waiting till at least 6.5 as well. There's nothing in 6.0 or 6.1 that would compel us to upgrade other than trying to woo this new set of users.

Dave Smith
Sr. Software Engineer
Nike, Inc.
(503) 671-4238
DavidH.Smith@nike.com

Migrateduser

Yes I think 6 is more about attracting new customers than making existing customers happy. Although I'm sure they took advantage of the feedback from existing 5.x customers to develop it, they don't seem to have given much thought to backward compatability. For instance I have been on dozens of projects and I think very few used regex on branch in templating.cfg, which are now apparently required.

Baeck

I'm working with a customer who has been trying to get an IWOV implementation for quite a while now and we're going to go with 6.1. The UI is definitely the deciding factor here over 5.5.2. We have the luxury of not having to re-train any users or move any customizations, though, so me thinks this is probably more of a no-brainer than most will experience.

You 5.5.2 (or earlier) version users out there can definitely play more of a "wait and see" game with this one, since most of the improvements are with the interface. However, it is also important to balance the difficulty of upgrading (retraining, etc.) with the fact that your users are probably going to be happier with the product due to the UI enhancements. User perception of the product is a huge piece of the puzzle.

Aaron Baecker
Senior Consultant
Quotient, Inc.
http://www.Quotient-Inc.com

Migrateduser

We will also be moving to 6.1 after it's released. It took a bit of coaxing to get the powers above to agree to wait for 6.1. I felt that many of the customizations that would be required to get 6.0 Command URLs (CCIs) to work the way that they did in 5.5.2 were too complicated and shouldn't be necessary. I've heard that many of the issues with Command URLs will be resolved in 6.1 (not only from IWOVDave's post, but from support as well).

I actually really like the flexibility that the new UI SDK offers and our organization should have few (if any) problems upgrading to 6.1. The fact that Workflows and Templates are almost completely backward compatible (except for CGI tasks) is a big plus for us. Also, we have only 2 custom menu items which were not too hard to get working in 6.0. I think I spent a total of 2 days to get everything (except for the CCI links) to work in 6.0. Getting the Command URLs (CCI Links) to work took about 5 days of coding, but seems to work alright in our DEV environment.

I agree that some of the dot-zero releases in the past have been less than beta-quality, but I think 6.0 is currently far more stable than than either 5.0.0 or 5.5.0 were.

- Jason

gzevin

we are *hoping* to move to 6.1 to production as well. However, I've decided to gradually move branches one by one, this was supported by the management. So, we hope this transition will be easy.

However, the absence of wizard customisations is seriously affecting our ability to move all the branches to 6, as some of our processes would prefer to have the files tagged in the wizard BEFORE they are submitted, not AFTER. Also, tagging interface is horrible when tagging multiple files, and I hope this could be fixed as soon as possible.

As far as the quality of version 6 (that is, in my opinion, a beta) is concerned, it's Ok, as far as my previous experience with earlier versions of TS is concerned.. However I'd prefer that regression testing IS done to the code that IWOV issues...

so - do we have a date for 6.1 release?

Greg Zevin, Ph.D. Comp. Sc.
Independent Interwoven Consultant/Architect
Sydney, AU

gzevin

also - a question. there are no docs (like user guide) for 6 on the support site.

any idea how the users in production are supposed to learn it? ad hoc? touch and burn? Smiley Happy

Greg Zevin, Ph.D. Comp. Sc.
Independent Interwoven Consultant/Architect
Sydney, AU

skip11

15 != slew

sorry,

RB

Migrateduser

Guess we're not going to get an answer to this question. I would assume that means out of the 15, a slew of them are new customers.

Dave Smith
Sr. Software Engineer
Nike, Inc.
(503) 671-4238
DavidH.Smith@nike.com

Migrateduser

A comment on how to help users learn the new interface. There are a number of options:
1: Interwoven has cyberschool classes on the interaces. They're pretty good. You can check them out here:http://www.interwoven.com/services/training/cyberschool

2: Help and the how do i buttons in the UI themselves

3. The help facility is fully customizable. In the past, IWOV created extensive user manuals. Feedback from customers indicated they actually very rarely gave them to users, but instead modified them to fit their custom needs. As a a result, we have the capability to customize and use HTML for the entire user documentation.

lissa

Migrateduser

1. Doesn't cyberschool cost money?

2. One thing we noticed right away about the How Do I? section of the CCS UI - only a small number of our users would ever want or need this section after the first few times using the UI. But you can't only show this section for specific users - it's either there or it isn't. Eventually it becomes a waste of real estate on the screen.

3. I think often that Interwoven makes a lot of this stuff up - anytime I see someone from Interwoven say "feedback from customers led us to this decision..." I scratch my head because they never asked me about whatever they made those decisions on. Maybe they used the "slew of cutomers equals a quorum" rule of thumb, so therefore if 15 customers decided they didn't need manuals, no one must need them. I am a customer who likes having manuals.

Dave Smith
Sr. Software Engineer
Nike, Inc.
(503) 671-4238
DavidH.Smith@nike.com

Migrateduser

I also like manuals. The day Intewoven gives developers a customizable "How To" section is the day I raise heck. I have to be honest, in my experience, most users just want a quick overview of how to use the product and can figure the rest out themselves. I rarely get requests from users for manuals. I have to admit that it's nice to be able to give it them when they ask for it, though.

I think the cyberschool course is pretty good. It's definately a good overview for the users. Also, it doesn't require me to teach a class, which really makes my day. It does have a pricetag. I think it's $150 per library card, but you might want to check with your sales rep on that one.

- Jason

Migrateduser

Interwoven cyberschool here at Nike is myself and Wally. No way we could justify paying for training that should come in a manual. That's just what I need to tell my management. It's hard enough justifying using this product as it is.

Dave Smith
Sr. Software Engineer
Nike, Inc.
(503) 671-4238
DavidH.Smith@nike.com

Migrateduser

OK everyone is entitled to his/her opinion. But in this particular case the feedback came directly to me and the technical pubs team from customers. You've gotta show some faith here. We had input from a set of customers who all told us the same thing.

lissa