Dave,
Very well said. But one thing I might add, and I've been bitten by this
myself, I think that the reduced file sizes are probably a good enough of a
deterrent to users trying to use the PE version for regular use and you
don't need the expiration date. I have downloaded PE versions, installed,
but didn't have time to use right off, then finding when I did have time it
had expired. Some may think that not many people would be like that but in
my world a month is a day.
Jerry
----- Original Message -----
From: "Dave Taylor" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <u2-users@listserver.u2ug.org>
Sent: Thursday, May 10, 2007 2:00 PM
Subject: Re: [U2] Incubator - News from the board
Chuck,
<Stepping up on my soap box>
As I have said before on this subject, "you never get a second chance to
make a good first impression".
I once spoke with a representative of another mv database who bragged that
they got over 2000 downloads of their eval. product per month.
When I asked him, "how many sales did you make", he had no clue.
If I download an eval copy of something and it doesn't work for me, do you
think I'm doing to say "Well, Self, this is really a good product, but
you're too stupid to figure out how to make it work"?
What we really *don't* need is 2000 downloads a month that result in 2000
disgruntled people who experimented with the product and concluded that
*the
product* doesn't work!
NOTE TO IBM: this is the *last* place you want to refuse to provide
product
technical support - *as you do today*.
This is our *first* chance to make a good first impression, and we're not
going to get another one.
Stepping down off my soap box>
With this in mind, may I suggest that we consider some of the following
ideas:
1. Adding an invitation to contact the u2ug group for technical support
at any time during or after the installation.
2. Ensuring that there are step-by-step tutorials, borrowed from IBM or
contributed by our members, starting with the Readme document, that
attempt
to make it impossible to fail to install, connect and run the product,
including (1) creating a simple application and (2) moving a simple
application to the eval database.
3. Providing a complete listing of authorized U2 Resellers, by name,
address, contact information and areas of specialization, so a person
evaluating a product knows where to go to get pricing and to purchase the
product.
4. Ensuring that the PE release does *not* have a short expiration
date,
because individuals often like to keep a 2-user copy on their laptop to
play
with, even though they have a much larger-user copy on their production
system.
Since many of the new evaluators will come from the generic Pick sector,
and
because neither Universe or Unidata support generic Pick spooler commands,
we will offer to contribute a copy of SpoolerPlus to the u2ug library to
be
distributed with these eval copies of the PE. This will over come the
most
difficult issue faced by most generic Pick people evaluating UV/UD.
Also, since UV and UD do not read generic Pick file saves and account
saves,
we will also offer to contribute a copy of our File Caddy programs,
TAPE.DUMP and TAPE.LOAD, and our data cleaning programs to remove
unprintable ascii characters that will not load onto UV/UD, to enable them
to easily move an entire account from most generic Pick databases to UV or
UD.
I think that the u2ug needs to come up with a mutually acceptable policy
for
licensing these products for use in the PE library.
We will also contribute to a growing documentation of issues faced in
converting to UV/UD as we become aware of them thru out conversion
activities.
I totally support this project and am glad to assist wherever we can.
Rgds,
Dave
Dave Taylor
CEO
Sysmark Information Systems, Inc.
49 Aspen Way
Rolling Hills Estates, CA 90274
800-SYSMARK (800-797-6275)
(O) 310-544-1974
(C) 310-561-5200
(F) 310-377-3550
www.sysmarkinfo.com
Your Source for Integrated EDI Translation, DataSync Integration and
Software Migration
Authorized IBM Business Partner
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