Lotus Notes Client Troubleshooting – 3 Important Databases

Mail database

Internal Mail

Example. Alex k/NL/MyCompany to Danny B/GB/MyCompany

One of the most important applications of Lotus Notes is e-mail.

Internal mail means mail from one Notes user to another and works as followed:

1. User A opens his mail database and creates a Memo for User B. When addressing the memo, he can take advantage of Auto completion or look up the addressee in an address book.
2. When User A sends the mail, the Notes client will contact the server and transfer the mail to it. The Notes server will look up User B in the Public address book to find User B’s Mail server.
3. If that Mail server is the same as User A’s, the server will look up the Notes Mail file of User B and deliver the mail to it immediately.
4. If both users are on different servers, the mail will be stored in the Mail.box on the server. At scheduled times; the servers will connect to exchange mail.

External Mail

Example. Alex K/NL/MyCompany (Alex_K@ MyCompany.com) to DannyB@hotmail.com

External mail (internet mail) is similar to internal mail.

The main difference is that the recipient is not in the address book, and is not on any Notes server in the domain. The mail router will detect that the mail is destined to an external user (based on the address format username@domain.com). The mail will then be delivered to a Notes server and remain in the queue until being picked up and send out on the internet.

The Lotus Notes Databases

The most common database is the Lotus Notes e-mail Database.

Notes databases are basically a collection of Documents and when you open a Lotus a Lotus Notes database, you are presented with a view of these documents. This is the database design.

Lotus Notes database are being designed and used as a tool to ensure all aspects of the business can be stored on the Lotus Notes servers. Therefore a large number of applications like SAP are communicating with Lotus Notes databases sending information to the servers and being viewed by the users.

Catalog.nsf

A database directory is available on all Lotus Domino servers by simply opening the server and the database filename Catalog.nsf. It contains all the databases currently being stored on the server, their filename, their access control list and some other settings.

Access Control

All Lotus Notes databases user’s administration is managed by the Access Control list.

The Access control list is available by > right click on the database icon > database > access control

The Access control list of a database allows the following levels of access:

• No access: if you are listed in the ACL of the database with No access, you have no access.
• Reader: you will be able to read documents in the database. You will not be able to create or modify any documents.
• Author: you will be able to read all documents, and you will be able to modify those documents for which you re listed as an Author
• Editor: you will be able to read and modify all documents
• Designer: you will be able to read and modify all documents + you will be able to modify the design of the database (e.g. create / modify views)
• Manager: you will be able to read and modify all documents, modify the design and additionally, you will be able to modify the Access Control List of the database, or delete it altogether.

Example.

The Access Control list of your mailfile contains yourself as manager.

This list contains all groups allowed access to this database.

Default-

On the right top corner User type is unspecified and access is no access.

CC Hatfield4 / Local Domain Servers / OtherDomainServers

These are server access groups. To ensure for example, that your emails are being sent across the company.

Notes Administrators

This is a person group (note the small icons displayed on the right of the groups names). These groups manage access to the Helpdesk to my mailbox.

As you understand access to the Lotus Notes databases are given through a group or directly by adding the person’s name to the Access Control list of the database. The preferred way is to add a user to a group as groups are managed by the Server address book rather than grant him access to the database as databases are sprayed over the network.

TIP: The “effective access” a person, server, or a group has to documents in a database is not always apparent. For example, if there are two groups with different levels of access to documents, and someone is a member of both groups, you may wonder what access the person actually has. With one click, you can determine a person’s effective access to the documents.

DISCLAIMER: Be aware that these documents are made from information found online, and experience in a large coorporation. This means that the situation you will have to apply this to might be quite different.

The idea behind this however, is to make you aquainted with the most common processes and inner workings of the software.

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