Brainstorm Technologies launches new Lotus Notes system administration tool for Notes 3.x and 4.0 environments; Continues expansion into Notes third-party market with technology purchase from Mauby Technologies

Business Wire, Oct 23, 1995

CAMBRIDGE, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct. 23, 1995--In a move to expand its position as a leader in the Lotus Notes applications and tools market, Brainstorm Technologies Inc., today announced it has acquired a systems administration tool product from Mauby Technologies.

The new updated product, soon-to-be released under the Brainstorm name of ServerAdmin Plus v1.5 for Lotus Notes, eases the administration of Notes 3.x and Notes 4.0 as well as Notes running in mixed-mode environment.

The all cash deal, valued at an undisclosed amount, gives Brainstorm an initial presence in another segment of the fast-growing Lotus Notes after-market -- the systems administration tools category -- complementing Lotus NotesView and Notes 4.0. Brainstorm's current products fall into three general areas of Lotus Notes integration at the enterprise level: Notes-4GL development tools, Notes-RDBMS integration tools and Notes-desktop integration; collectively used by over 20 percent of all organizations that use Lotus Notes worldwide.

"The acquisition of Mauby's `industrial-strength' Notes systems administration tool further poises Brainstorm to capture increased marketshare in the Notes' third-party space; and more importantly, gives our customers a single vendor point for buying a wide-range of superior software products that fill critical needs within their Notes' environments," said Rizwan Q. Virk, Brainstorm's president and CEO.

Brainstorm's ServerAdmin Plus (SA ) solves a number of critical problems currently facing Notes systems administrators working in Notes 3.x environments: user access control list (ACL) management, replication and database management, and server statistics control. More importantly, SA is an essential tool for organizations migrating to Lotus Notes 4.0 and is designed specifically to address the needs of organizations to manage Notes server administration in a mixed environment of Notes 3.x and Notes 4.0 servers.

Brainstorm's SA employs an extremely easy-to-use, point-and-click Windows interface. SA features four key administrative workbenches: ACL Management Workbench, Replication Management Workbench, Database Workbench and Server Statistics Workbench. Unlike NotesView, which is a passive monitoring tool for viewing the health of Notes servers, mail status and Notes networks, SA continuously polls Notes servers, and administrators can actively update and interact with these critical Notes `sub-systems.'

The ACL Management Workbench solves the problems of maintaining and updating the access control lists of Notes users across a Notes `enterprise.' It significantly reduces the time it takes to perform frequent database maintenance tasks such as search, modify, update and sort all Notes users. Currently these tasks need to be done at every Notes server every time. For example, SA provides a unique "Nuke User" button which automatically removes terminated employees from all ACLs and groups across an entire organization potentially spread out across hundreds of Notes databases.

"I find ServerAdmin Plus to be an excellent tool for administrators. The GUI interface for performing system monitoring and administrative functions from the administrative workstation is a big advance over Notes native facilities," said Richard Schwartz of RHS Consulting, a Lotus Notes business partner. "The Nuke User feature alone makes the product a must for the hub of any mature Notes network."

The Replication Management Workbench addresses one of the key challenges for Notes system administrators -- understanding the status of Notes replication across the network. Notes replication is a very expensive network operation, often occurring unnecessarily within large Notes networks. At a mouse click, SA can provide administrators with a list of all active and inactive replicas of any Notes database located on all servers. Additionally, through direct manipulation of Notes replica IDs, SA can efficiently delete, stop and re-establish links among any number of Notes databases.

The Database Workbench is a critical tool which helps administrators easily manage diskspace usage and improve system performance. As Notes databases continue to grow with use, it becomes essential that over time administrators can easily compact, re-index and sort all databases on any server by size, usage, "fattest," etc. The Database Workbench is as essential to Notes administrators as a file manager is to Windows users.

Lastly, the Server Statistics Workbench provides administrators with an easy and efficient method of determining Notes server performance over a period of time. SA provides six graphs and charts which let administrators see trends in server memory utilization, swap file performance and other trends. As Notes 4.0 begins to support more users per Notes server, it becomes critical that administrators have an easy way to view the "vital signs" of any Notes server.

Unlike all other system control programs, including the base Notes 4.0 administration set, ServerAdmin Plus is client-based and therefore supports all Notes server operating systems including Windows, Windows NT, WFW, OS/2, UNIX and Novell NLM. In addition, client-based administrative tools are quickly becoming popular because of their non-invasive and interactive method of administration, and hence help ensure system stability and reliability in the event of a crash. With SA , the Notes server will continue to operate in the event of program downtime, since only one Notes workstation will be affected rather than the entire server.