<<< those only interested in technical information can press [Del] now. if you enjoy opinion pieces and diatribes, carry on >>> Thanks to Christopher DuBuc for his well spoken historical perspective on the evolution of MapInfo. ----- Chris was overseen ruminating: > line, seemingly to the detriment MI Pro users. But I must > admit I've heard many of these same complaints before- when > MapInfo decided to move development efforts away from their > bread and butter DOS product and devote more resources to > developing on "that silly Windows platform". I've often seen, and been a part of, those same arguments for other programs. I'm curious, how many of those DOS MI users have upgraded and kept pace with MI? How many are still using MI but older versions? How many bet the farm on a different GIS altogether? If my own experience is any indication of the norm, there are few people like yourself who keep pace with development with a single program over the long haul. It seems almost a law of nature that when a corporation gets to a certain size/age alienating a significant portion of the existing customer base is inevitable. > In order for MapInfo to thrive, it must be ahead of the curve > when it comes to new technologies and platforms. The reason > MapInfo is as strong as it is today is because 10 years ago > they "bet the farm" on the idea that computing would be ruled > by graphical user interfaces. And there were enough new incoming users to replace the disaffected. No question that from the corporation's viewpoint, the choice was right (assuming total size of userbase and dollars made are the metric of rightness). I know I feel a sense of betrayal when XYZ Software decides to discontinue a product line or pushes a certain range feature development to the back burner. No, we never signed a contract where XYZ promised to take care of my needs into the future. XYZ never agreed to always support my desired functionality. Nonetheless, the feeling is there. Unwarranted, unjustifiable, but still there. :) My hope is that somebody will figure out how to balance long term support and refinement for the existing clients along with future development and breaking new ground. The noises I hear coming from the Free Software and Open Source movements are encouraging. Perhaps they'll do it. Perhaps not. All I know is that 2 years from now I don't want to be translating my data *again* into another format. I've already been through DXF>HDR>TAB|ARC|SHP. Enough already! anyway, my 2 bits. cheers, -matt ---------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe from this list, send e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] and put "unsubscribe MAPINFO-L" in the message body, or contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
