After a second reboot, the ScanToNotes software launched successfully when I opened the Lotus Notes R5 client. The moral of the story is make sure you're using R5 on Windows before you install the product! Figure A below shows the About screen for the application.

FIGURE A


The About screen that's visible when you launch ScanToNotes is very informative. Roll over picture for a larger image.

Once I had the software up and running, it ran very smoothly. I chose to use my scanner's software while scanning so I could crop and rotate the image, but for people scanning documents in large stacks, the ScanToNotes software provides a more-than-adequate array of scanning options, as shown in Figure B.

FIGURE B


ScanToNotes provides a nice array of scanning options. Roll over picture for a larger image.

In my first test, I scanned a photograph to the file system, saving it as a JPEG. This worked without a hitch, and the scanned JPEG was in perfect shape when I viewed it. For my next step, I scanned in a magazine ad and saved it as an attachment to a Notes document, choosing to save it as a PNG (Portable Network Graphics) format. This also proceeded flawlessly. Figure C shows the document. The PNG attachment is in the lower left corner.

FIGURE C


Scanning images as Notes Rich Text attachments went smoothly. Roll over picture for a larger image.

What I didn't like
All in all, I was pretty happy with this software. I did run into a couple of points of ire, however.

The ScanToNotes software is, as mentioned up front, designed strictly for Windows machines. This was inconvenient in my environment, but it's not uncommon in the software world.

There's a typo in the installation routine. The installation program for the software mistakenly reads, "For Lotus Notes 4.5 and higher," in the upper left, but installing the software with Notes 4.6 caused the start-up routine to throw a DLL error. This tripped me up a bit, as mentioned above. The DLL error that was spawned--"This application uses CTL3D32.DLL, which is not the correct version. CTL3D32.DLL is designed only for Win32s or Windows 95 systems."--was not very helpful.

The technical staff at ImagingGroup was very helpful, however, in getting me what I needed to troubleshoot my problems, including sending me the newest version of the CTL3D32.DLL when I emailed them for help. Undoubtedly, the erroneous text in the installation routine will disappear in an upcoming revision of the software; after that's accomplished, I could recommend it with absolutely no caveats.

What I found eye-catching
The ImagingGroup exposes the LotusScript under a button to trigger their software from a Notes form in the SCANTONO.NSF database. The software also has a number of hover-over pop-ups that describe important features, including the various image formats. See the "Replacement for GIF" pop-up circled in Figure D.

FIGURE D


The software has great informative pop-ups. Roll over picture for a larger image.

I was delighted with the customization information provided in the SMANUAL.PDF file that comes with ScanToNotes. Figure E shows a description of low-level customization available to developers working with the software.