Hi Nolan,
I co-developed Infovox iVox with Acapela and I think you have a valid
point that the expiration of a demo should not get your computer in
an unusable state as a blind person. This is something we clearly
overlooked. For our own products (I am the lead developer of
AssistiveWare) we always make sure that when a demo expires some
basic functionality remains so as not to cut off the user completely.
However, it is not always that easy to determine the right solution
(what should remain working and what should not). In the particular
case of Infovox iVox the problem is that I was already pretty pleased
that Acapela would allow a full 30 day trial without any restrictions
that I never realized that at expiration the software could get a
blind person in serious trouble because the voices would not say
anything anymore. The reason I never really realized this is because
they have another system with application-wide licensing instead of
system-wide licensing where the voice will nag but will then speak.
That's the system I was used to, however those voices won't offer a
full trial when not licensed. Technically it may or may not be easy
for Acapela to do something like this for Infovox iVox, but I will
certainly discuss the issue.
Of course you are free to discuss this topic here and I think it was
a good idea to warn other blind users to take care when using the
demo. However, as you like to speak about what is good and bad form,
you could have first sent an email to Infovox iVox support to bring
up the issue to get the other side of the story before posting the
issue.
Anyway, given that you clearly have well outlined ideas about how
demos should function, what would be your ideal and second to ideal
scenarios for the Infovox iVox demo. I will then take these two
suggestions as a starting point in my discussions with Acepale on how
we can resolve this issue. Though bare in mind that I cannot promise
the solution you suggest will actually be implemented as it may cause
too many technical headaches at Acapela's end (the core code of iVox
is multi-platform and they are very careful when it comes to making
changes to the evaluation system). But, I fully agree they need to
come up with a better solution that going from full use to no use
when the demo expires.
david.
At 4:46 PM -0500 10/13/06, Nolan Darilek wrote:
On Oct 12, 2006, at 9:01 PM, Cheryl Homiak wrote:
I understand how you could be annoyed, but the terms of the demo
are stated pretty clearly. so anybody who doesn't intend to buy
probably needs to switch system voices the day before it ends just
to be safe.
I agree in principle, but in fact I have a hard enough time
remembering the things that *matter* at times, and remembering
whether I began demoing something on the 10th or 20th was classed in
the "not important enough to matter" category. I just think it's bad
form for a demo product advertised for blind users to render the
computer inoperable upon expiration, regardless of its demo terms.
Besides, if I have a 30-day evaluation then I'm going to use all 30
days. I'm not going to start fearing and pulling back at day 29
because I expect the demo to render my computer unusable.
I don't want to start a debate, just thought I'd let folks know, and
as a software developer whose revenue depends on demos myself, I do
tend to get rather passionate when a simple demo expiry oversteps
what I feel to be its privileges to my system. It may be someone
else's software, but it is for all intents and purposes a guest on
my system and should conduct itself accordingly.
--
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David Niemeijer, CTO
AssistiveWare(R)
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.assistiveware.com/
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