Copy file1 to file2

Mon Jun 14 05:48:48 PDT 2004

Just a comment about the 4.8.latest version thing.  I understand that FP
Tech does not wish to support the older version anymore. That is fine, and I
agree with their logic... although usually companies will support the
current version and one back. That would be 5.0 and 4.8. When 5.1 comes out.
They should support 5.1 and 5.0.

But, the real point I wish to make is this. If you buy a car, an expensive
car... and it has a problem with the fuel injection... enough so that it is
actually broken and not working at certain speeds perhaps.... The car
company fixes the problem and says, yes we have a fix, but we are not going
to let you buy it... you must buy an entirely new car if you want the fix.
I'm sorry, but I just thing this is wrong. If there are people who have
purchased legit copies of 4.8 and the best they have is 4.10 (which has
several flaws in it) they should be allowed to purchase the latest and
greatest version of 4.8 (no matter how flawed or fixed it is).... agreeing
to the simple fact that there will be NO support for the product.  Telling
them they must upgrade when they have already supported you by buying the
earlier product (which had flaws even) and expecting them to buy the next
version when you didn't even let them buy a fixed version of the earlier
one...   well, this is not reasonable and I don't see why people would
_want_ to buy the next version up if the one they already have wasn't made
right for them in the first place.

A company like FP Tech should be enticing people to buy the upgrades with
new and really valuable features.  Who would want 4.8 if 5.x contains
sufficient reason to upgrade?  My thought is that 5.14 with memo printing
and some of the latest bug fixes will be very valuable... but putting in a
couple more really valuable things like a fully working lookup wizard...
something which is  and has been nearly done for quite some time  would do
far more to garner the sales of 5.1 that are wanted...  than anything else.
It is features and usefulness that sell new versions, not coercion.

I have only one working copy of 4.8 for Windows. It is on my wife's machine.
Recently, I had to write an elaborate work-around to a program just to keep
it from getting the Too Many Open Files error which is in 4.8.10.  Actually,
it might not have even been this error that was crashing my program but a
bad configuration on my system... but either way I looked for a copy of
4.8.12 or higher and could not find one. When I bought a _new_ copy of 5.0,
it went on a different machine.  Then, when I bought the latest upgrade to
5.13 and ODBC, it replaced _that_ 5.0 and now I am, of course, locked to
that machine. This is fine, but I consider that I still own two copies of
filePro for Windows. The first 4.8 copy which I never upgraded, and this new
5.13. I am not going to stop using the 4.8... I should be allowed to update
it to the latest version in that series. I might ask FP Tech what would
happne if as a legitimate owner of 4.8 filePro, I had a fire in my
company... the disks got destroyed and I have no other means but calling the
them for a new copy. Would they send me 4.8.10?? No one is asking for a
download version of 4.8, just the ability to buy a CD of the latest version
of it. The charge for this should be reasonable, but reflect the hassle to
FP Tech for having to send it out... I dunno, $150? Anyone, doing this would
be crazy, since that money would be far better spent upgrading to 5.x... but
so be it. You are not going to encourage developers to buy your latest and
greatest, if they can't buy the latest and greatest of the version they
already own.  I think you have to give them this option... and then _compel_
them to buy the true latest version by virtue of its superior and useful
functionality. In the long run this will keep the company and the product
vital. Older, unlicensed, unregisterd copies will disappear eventually.

John

> -----Original Message-----
> From: filepro-list-bounces at lists.celestial.com
> [mailto:filepro-list-bounces at lists.celestial.com]On Behalf Of GCC
> Consulting
> Sent: Monday, June 14, 2004 12:10 AM
> To: 'Fairlight'; Filepro 2 List
> Subject: RE: Copy file1 to file2
>
>
>
>
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: filepro-list-bounces at lists.celestial.com
> > [mailto:filepro-list-bounces at lists.celestial.com] On Behalf
> > Of Fairlight
> > Sent: Sunday, June 13, 2004 12:46 PM
> > To: Fplist (E-mail)
> > Subject: Re: Copy file1 to file2
> >
> > This public service announcement was brought to you by John Esak:
> > > So how does Tony get 4.12???
> > > I believe he has tried over and over and over. He also
> > actually bought
> > > 5.0, but wants to still keep using the 4.8 he has on his
> > first box. FP
> > > Tech has _two_ sales under their belt (not too mention the other
> > > people Tony buys product for...) So, how does he get the update for
> > > the first copy of filePro he bought?  Or, does FP Tech
> > actually think
> > > he only owns _one_ copy... which would be completely wrong.
> > He did not
> > > buy 5.0 to upgrade his 4.8 copy. He bought an entirely new,
> > 2nd copy of filePro.  What is the actual scoop?
> >
> > Indeed.  And lest someone fall back on the, "That version is
> > no longer supported," excuse for the unavailability of
> > patches, I would remind them that Microsoft no longer
> > officially supports Windows 95, but you can still get all the
> > patches up to the EOL point.
> >
> > IOW, that excuse doesn't hold water.  You can do a lot of
> > things to boost sales of newer versions.  Yanking the latest
> > updates to the major version someone is licensed for (after
> > an arbitrary date) and basically forcing them to upgrade to
> > get a working product is not one of the smartest methods,
> > IMHO.  Nobody's explicitly said it (that I can remember), but
> > that appears to be the case from what I've gathered from
> > several wishing to get
> > 4.8.12 if they had 4.8.(N<12).  And I'm betting that EOL
> > notice was never given to them in advance, to boot.  I don't
> > remember any advance warning from -any- channel, official or
> > community, ever hitting this list.  It was noted after the
> > fact that only 5.0.x was supported anymore and 4.8 could no
> > longer be had.
>
> Would someone with a copy of 4.8.(N=>12) be in violation of licensing for
> supplying it to another, with a valid license, who didn't update
> to soon enough
> and can't get the maintenance upgrade from fpTech directly?
>
> Interesting question.
>
> Now I will say this, I had performance issues with native 4.8.10
> and above which
> disappeared with the 5.0 upgrade.
>
> I had reports which had been taking just under 30 seconds to run
> thru 200,000
> records with 4.8.3 take almost 30 minutes to do the same with
> 4.8.10.  I finally
> rewrote the select processes, where I could, to use - lookups.
> For those that I
> couldn't, I ran rreport 4.8.3.  I renamed the program r3report.exe.
>
> Is it necessary to upgrade, No, but many problems will be solved
> with 5.0.  I
> still have an account running my brokerage app on 4.5 with no problems.
> However, he can't upgrade to my latest version of the program as
> it makes use of
> 4.8 and 5.0 features.
>
>
>
>
>
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