If you joined us at Digital Week 2020, you’ve probably heard about the preview of Domino v12. (It was the most popular session of the event!) Now that the release of v12 is around the corner, we would like to provide all current customers an exclusive preview. Today, we’re officially launching the first public beta of Domino v12!
We are inviting you to join this beta program and take part in shaping the future of our product, helping us deliver the best-ever product experience! All existing Domino customers are automatically entitled and will be able to download the required software packages from Flexnet today. (See below for Q&A.)
The goal of the Domino v12 Beta Program is for our community of beta participants to conduct an honest, constructive, and thoughtful review and testing of the Domino v12 beta software, which includes HCL Domino V12 , HCL Notes V12 , HCL Domino Designer & Admin V12 and HCL Traveler V12
In the first phase of the beta program, we are delivering the following components:
- Domino on Docker
- Domino for Windows, Linux, AIX
- Traveler for Windows, Linux, AIX
- Notes Standard for Windows
- Notes Standard for Mac
- Designer and Admin Client
At a later stage of the beta program, we will be providing Domino and Traveler for IBMi.
In v12 Beta 1, we are supporting English and 15 language translations:
- Arabic
- Brazilian Portuguese
- Czech
- Dutch
- French
- German
- Italian
- Japanese
- Korean
- Polish
- Russian
- Swedish
- Spanish
- Simplified Chinese
- Traditional Chinese
Beta participants, please let us know how you think about the product by submitting your feedback in our beta forum. For general input and new ideas or feature enhancement requests, please use the Domino ideas forum here.
v12 Beta 1 Highlights
Domino
- Reduce your total cost of ownership by using DAOS tier 2 objects across servers
- A wide range of security improvements including:
– Two Factor Authentication (TOTP)
– Automated SSL/TLS certificate management with built-in support for Let’s Encrypt
– Implementing IP based blocking of failed authentication attempts based on this idea
– And many more - Automate your Domino server installation and initial configuration
- Domino directory enhancements: A variety of improvements around the Domino directory design (pubnames.ntf) to improve usability for administrators
Domino Designer
- XPages now Bootstrap 4.4.1 – Thanks to Howard for this idea.
- Improvements to build responsive and mobile Domino applications,
- Ability to use DQL in Formulas
Notes Client
- Significantly improved the performance on Windows and Mac, especially on slow networks.
- Improved Search: When searching for a person, an email, or a Notes application, suggestions will now appear in the typeahead. Your recent searches will also be displayed in the typeahead. This is based on this idea.
- Multiple email signatures: If you were bothered by the lack of email signature management before, Notes v12 allows you to choose a signature when you compose, reply or forward an email. Based on this idea from Daniel.
- Choose a different “From” address when composing an email, a feature initially requested by Vlaad in this idea.
These are just a few highlights of the new features of V12. For more details, please refer to the What’s New section of the product:
Frequently Asked Questions:
(1) Do I need to register to get the beta version of v12?
If you are an existing customer, you are entitled to v12 beta automatically. Please contact your IT admin to get v12 beta from Flexnet.
(2) How can I submit feedback on the beta and how would HCL handle my feedback?
Please submit your feedback via our beta forum here.
We will review all the feedback and respond as soon as we can. Note that not all feedback will be implemented into the product; the final decision depends on various factors. However, we will ensure every comment is heard and being taken into consideration.
(3) Do I need to register for the beta forum to provide feedback?
If you have not created an account on HCL Partner Connect website, you will need to register for access. It will take around 1 business day to get the approval. Once the registration is approved, you can access the beta forum. The account will be used for accessing any beta forum in the future. For customers who already have an account, you can login and access the forum directly.
(4) If I am not a current customer, can I be a part of the beta?
Currently, the Domino v12 beta is only open to existing customers. If you would like to try Domino, please contact your HCL sales representative to get access to the trial version of Domino v11.
(5) What is the difference between a beta and trial?
A beta is considered as an early access program to our latest version which is not available to the public. The goal of setting up beta is to collect concrete feedback from users so that we make improvements and bring the best experience when the features go live.
A trial is offered to potential customers who haven’t tried our software before and expressed interest in purchasing the software.
(6) What is the difference between HCL Domino Early Access Program and the beta? If I have already registered for the Early Access Program, should I try the beta too?
The Early Access Program (EAP) is intended to give users a preview of features that are considered for HCL Domino v12. It is feature-driven and iterative, meaning new iterations (code drops) will be made available as soon as they are declared ready for testing by our development team. In the EAP, you are usually be able to test only one or a few features.
The beta is a full-scale preview of features and functionalities considered for HCL Domino v12. Various components including Domino, Notes and Traveler will be offered.
With this beta release for v12, the EAP will be suspended until the official launch of HCL Domino v12.


