Using the IBM Greenhouse Sametime Community

If you are not aware, IBM maintains a collection of the Lotus software for people to use at Lotus Greenhouse.  You can either be nominated to participate, or self nominate.  Once you have an ID you can use all of the services it has which includes Connections, Quickr, and Sametime to say the least.  Besides the web interface, you can also make use of their Sametime community with the Sametime Connect Client.  If you are not already a Sametime customer, you can download a trial of the Sametime Standard client here.

To connect to the Greenhouse community with your Sametime Connect client, you need to add a new community.  Select File > Manage Communities.  A large button in the middle of the resulting dialog reads “Add New Server Community…”.  Click on that button.  Complete the Log In tab using the table below:

Setting	Value
Server community type:	Sametime
Server community name:	Enter something unique to identify the community within your client.  Default is typically hostname:username
User name:	Your Greenhouse ID
Password:	Password associated with your Greenhouse ID
OTHER SETTINGS	You can keep the defaults, or opt to have this community remember your password and log you in whenever the client is launched.  Your preference.

Move to the Server tab and complete the following:

Setting	Value
Host server:	sametime.lotus.com
Server community port:	80
Keep allive	I leave the default.  More often then not, the value is appropriate.

Click on the Connection tab and fill out:

Setting	Value
Use global connection settings…	Clear the check box
Connection	Direct connection using HTTP protocol
Log into the community after completing this form:	Leave checked

Click OK and you should be all set.  If you browse the web through a proxy server and are having problems, your Connection tab should reflect a proxied connection instead of the direct connection method illustrated.  Information on that configuration can be found in the help or Information Center.