It’s 9/9/99 as I write this (you’ll read it on the 10th, when we update the news pages again) and so far, everything seems to be holding up fine. As I’m sure many of you know, one of the "key" Y2K dates is 9/9/99 because programmers have for years used this as a test date. Also, I’m told, there’s some ancient EBCDIC (i.e., Extended Binary Coded Decimal Interchange Code, a precursor to ASCII characters) coding that maxes at 9999. — DG

News.com reports that Lotus stopped marketing and developing its eSuite product. The report says that the move came after eSuite didn’t meet sales forcasts.

Microsoft announced a new hosting pilot called the Certified Commercial Network Services Provider (CCNSP). The program seeks help to commercial service providers (CSPs) host applications that run Microsoft platforms.

Information Week reports that USi will deploy, host, and manage messaging systems based on Microsoft Exchange. USi plans to launch this in October.

Ipswitch conducted a study of its own and according to the results, Ipswitch has 18 million messaging seats. According to this article in Computer Reseller News, Notes still has the largets installed base with 37 million seats.

Thinking about migrating to Windows 2000? Think again. There’s an article from News.com that says that the cost of migration could cost US$3,100 per PC.

Corporate Project Solutions announced GroupProject Version 4. GroupProject is the Lotus Notes/Domino based application for managing projects through the Web, the Notes client and Microsoft Project 98. Version 4 includes resource capacity management, automated task notification to project participants, and agent based warnings for potential slippages, work and cost over runs.

Plumtree Software announced the immediate availability of its collaborative portal, with embedded, interactive applications for displaying e-mail, appointments, and threaded discussions from Lotus Notes, Microsoft Exchange, POP3-compliant mail systems, and IASOFT.COM’s ActiveForum. Plumtree and its partners developed the new capabilities as Plumtree Portal Gadgets, extensions to the product’s modular architecture that existing customers can install in minutes without any changes to the core Plumtree Corporate Portal system.

Assist Cornerstone Technologies announced they have been selected to participate in a 19 city e-business tour sponsored by IBM. The "e-solutions With AS/400e" Road Show will make its mark across the United States and Canada between Aug. 24 and Nov. 17.

Citrix Systems announced at Citrix iForum ’99 that Lotus Development has joined the Citrix Business Alliance (CBA) program. Lotus has joined the Citrix Business Alliance to promote Citrix MetaFrame application-serving software as a way to deploy and manage Lotus’ Notes client and Domino-based applications across heterogeneous platforms.