Creately vs. HCL Notes

Creately sells itself as software specializing in a wide variety of areas, which is true in some cases. Visualizing and creating marketing processes, research, user flows, and general flowcharts is an extremely powerful tool. However, in other areas, such as Human Resources, UI/UX prototyping, and Wireframe design, it leaves a little to be desired compared to the competition.

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I often work with teams from other country and regions, hence HCL Notes is a very useful platform for internal company management operations. It standardized organisational work standards in most of the offices worldwide. HCL Notes also enables chat with other team around the world that I find very helpful when initiating conversation or just want to have a quick update rather than sending emails and waiting for replies. However, HCL Notes is not very efficient in web browsing and user still need to use other internet service providers.

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• I like that it supports remote work and that it makes real-time collaboration easy.
• AI-powered diagramming works well and has been very helpful in explaining complex ideas.
• It supports data driven workflows.
• It makes project management easy.
• It effortlessly boosts team productivity thanks to easy alignment with strategies.

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• It has a really strong and robust database that's extremely scalable and holds up well to thousands of users and many different environments.
• It has a really good enterprise-grade framework for development custom database applications
• All of the custom database applications along with the email all have a nice uniform look and feel so their easy-to-use.
• I really like how it's developed and supported on every client OS (Windows, OSX, Linux)! The competitors definitely do NOT offer this (M$).

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• The transition Creately made this year to their new non-Flash platform seems to almost function like a beta release in some instances.
• Customer support sometimes takes a while to return and the responses are not always the best or most helpful. Follow up isn't great, either.

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• Notes' backwards compatibility sometimes gets in the way. Menus are cluttered with extraneous, outdated options and features that modern users will never use, and Preferences are often difficult to navigate for those coming from Gmail or Outlook. We have greatly simplified this via Policies, but users still find it daunting to go through all the options that are available.
• The IBM Notes client for Windows & Mac is essentially the Eclipse Java development platform...so it is HUGE. Performance initially was very slow but IBM has done a good job of speeding things up. As IBM moves more toward cloud-delivered applications, this will not be as much of a problem.
• Notes and Domino can be complex to manage for administrators who are more accustomed to ActiveDirectory, Group Policy, etc. Editing a notes.ini file to add a feature, or working with XML files by hand to create a SmartUpgrade kit can be daunting to those coming from more modern administrative roles.
• Some users claim to "hate" Notes mail. While I have heard this less and less over the past 10 years, we have had 3rd party software offer plugins to Outlook and it's rare to see any for Notes.
• The client update process should be automated more. I would like to see the Notes client update quietly and quickly more like an Adobe software update. If an update fails it should automatically try again without prompting the user over and over.
• Notes multiple language spell checking is a downloaded add-on Java-based resource that has to be deployed in a convoluted way that is difficult for users to grasp. Therefore any foreign language spell check updates must be done individually per Notes client by IT, which is unfortunate. I would prefer to see that be a "live download" update option for users to get directly from IBM (don't make me download it and put it on my network).

I've been in IT business and as a Programmer/Developer for 20+ years with too many programming languages experiences/back ground (C/C++/Visual Basic/Basic Program/Unix/COBOL/Java). Also with 18+ years with Lotus Notes/IBM Domino, I am still and always think Lotus Notes is the best RAD platform available!. When the time where resource is very limited and the expectation is very high and the turn around is too short, IBM Domino/Notes is the platform to use and it's the only choice available.

Creately is one of its Kind. The software has a straightforward interface and very supportive customer services providers. It is very well suited in diagramming and collaboration.

Easy to use for the user, most of the apps we developed, there is not much need for user training. Most of the times, we just do a demo to the users group and they can pick up from there.

It definitely could be better, but it may also depend on the type of license you are subscribing to.

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I've been using the production for a very long time and very happy with it. Also, all the online resources and forums for notes is very friendly and easy/quick for getting help. I found out that compared to Microsoft or Oracle or any other platforms, IBM Notes online forum is the best I have seen.

Implementation is easy and smooth if the requirement is well gathered/documented. Notes is a RAD platform, all projects in Notes is simple in the implementation step.

Creately's folder system is a novel feature that beats its competitors. It helps keep everything organized. In addition, there are many more customization possibilities, especially in the shapes and in the library of templates and drawings. It has an intelligent drawing capability superior to all the competition, allowing more customization and detail.

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A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info

Outlook has been considered for years as a replacement platform. Pricing and support staff made it prohibitive. Our long-time use of Microsoft Office productivity suite naturally led us to consider the adoption of Office365. A recent investigation told us that Azure Cloud services propel an O365 solution to the forefront. Early adopters in international divisions have paved the way for Azure and O365.

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• Helped the team work collaboratively by sharing on the ideas on Canvas
• Boosted the client engagement whenever this tool is used
• Made the work easier by providing the predesigned templates

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Independently Invited by TrustRadius

A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info

• Over the years, we have lost countless hours of productivity from the thousands of crashes we have experienced.
• One benefit of IBM Notes is that it is very simple to train a new user on. Many people prefer and are familiar with Google tools, but those that use IBM Notes have very little trouble acclimating themselves.

Incentivized

Independently Invited by TrustRadius

A de minimis incentive was given to thank the reviewer for their time. The incentive was not used to bias or drive a particular response, nor was the incentive contingent on a positive endorsement. More Info