Good one Karen
You should tell them you will do it for 1/2 of the money they wasted on
other dead end solutions!
Marc
----- Original Message -----
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To: RBASE-L Mailing List
Sent: Monday, August 11, 2008 9:25 AM
Subject: [RBASE-L] - Re: 3 cheers for RBase
Good story, Marc. I have a similar one, and one that lead to me being an
independent developer. I had designed an RBase database for an investment firm
I worked at. A change in ownership, and the new owner hired a business
consultant. He suggested a vertical market app that "could be customized",
and the firm bought it. I was in charge of working with them so they knew how
the RBase program worked. They were supposed to duplicate every single
function that I had in RBase (this was in version 3.1 DOS) because my firm
refused to change their way of doing things.
We went long over the allotted time and the budget, as they were incapable of
doing anything that I told them they had to do. We had little to show above
what the packaged program offered. At a board meeting (of course I'm the only
woman there), the consultant accused me of purposely stalling the project to
protect my database. I explained the problems the other company was having --
he got threatening, I quit. No notice. My sister still works there -- she
told me that he said that NOW the project would leap forward because HE would
work with them.
Got a call about a year later -- they finally stopped that project and paid
me consulting rates to upgrade their database... Hard to go in there without
my "I told you so" t-shirt!
And a big client used RBase as probably THE most important piece of software
that runs their business. Many developers previously had their hands in it, at
the point I came in they just hired me for about 15 hours a week to do
maintenance and enhancements, with no other developers needed. An ownership
change, and they bought a vertical market, customizable Oracle app. One of the
cost savings was my tiny little 15 hours a week bill. My contract was set to
expire at the end of 2006. The project was literally millions of dollars and
went long over time. They didn't have money to design some needed reports out
of that data, and the staff argued to keep me on. I'm still doing work for
them about 10 hours a week -- they bring over ascii files of data constantly
from the database and print reports that are distributed worldwide -- all out
of RBase. They never formally renewed my contract because I think they don't
want to admit that I'm still there ... The good news is that they gave into
staff pressure and bought 7.6 upgrades for other areas of the company!
Karen
Thanks Razzak
I thought I would give everyone a small update on the .Net SQL Exp
program that is trying to replace my app.
They are over 1 year behind schedule to release the program and still
do not have a beta test site working yet.
It seems the son in law of my distributor has a computer consulting
company and said his company could do this.
They pre-sold this pie in the sky program to many of my users so the
longer it takes them to get a working version delivered the more offices
will stick with me and RBase and blow them off.
I know they are going to try to match all the features I have, so I keep
adding new bells and whistles each month. My plan is to make my
program the best it can be and to keep them busy trying to keep up
with RBase.
I know .Net and SQL server Exp is suppose to be a powerful combo
but I do not think they can match the rapid development of RBase.
Now you know why I have so many questions.
Marc
