Lotus Notes is a crime against humanity. In exhibit 001-K we see how it’s unpredictability is a danger to children and pets.
There’s an “Actions” menu in Notes. In it there’s a promising option called “Fax Address Helper”. I like help. With Notes I often need help. So I click on it.
Whoa! What the hell is that? A mostly blank window with an off-centered blob of red text? Some serious sh*t must have gone down, eh? This error message must be especially important for Notes to make such a spectacular departure from all user-interface guidelines, right? Right?! Wrong.
The message clearly states that “You must be in a mail memo to use this feature…..” (the five periods must be for extra-special, super-duper emphasis). A normal application would have simply greyed out or removed the “Fax Address Helper” from the actions menu when you were not in a memo. Not our defendant however: Notes would prefer to deceive.
The rest of the content gets even better. We get an “OK” button (already highlighted as the default) but are instructed not to click on it. If we do so, we’re told, our highlighted item will be marked “unread”. This means a developer spent time adding a note to this message rather than spending the time fixing the problem. That makes sense. Lots and lots of sense… if you’re evil.
