Glen Harvy
06.14.2012
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I'm right there with you. Plus the fact I can't easily find the online ASP.NET demos without going through several pages. I still couldn't tell you how to see an example of the different controls. SC 1.0 was better in my opinion instead of this romper room font - everything is so freaking huge - big buttons, big boxes...Ugh!
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Hi Greg - for future reference, all training demos are on this page... http://www.devexpress.com/Support/training-demos.xml
which can be reached off the this page...
http://www.devexpress.com/Support/Demos.xmlSupport Center was definitely better for some and we are working on making Support Center better for everyone. I welcome your feedback.
And yes, romper room font sucks...I hope you've noticed that romper room has been closed and it's no longer available :-)
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Glen, while I think your post title is a little exagerated, I understand how you feel and I share your pain.
Ray, I've said it before and I'll say it again: I believe there's a gap between what you think your customers want, and what they truly want. I wished it would have narrowed down by now, but to my deception it seems it grew even bigger.
I really don't understand what kind of customers feedback you guys expected by taking stuff away from us. No more forum, no more status on feature requests or bug reports, former support center issues not even imported properly (we've put time into this, doesn't that matters to you?)... what the heck?!
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While I’m not thrilled with some of the changes made to the support site I certainly don’t feel that support has been degraded in any way.
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I still get thoughtful and helpful replies from the support engineers in a very timely manner, often with code illustrating the solution to my problem. I can’t recall working with a vendor that provides anywhere near the level of support I get from DevExpress.
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When Ray tells us that they’re working to improve web support I have no reason to doubt him. Based on the support I’ve received to date, I would be very surprised if our complaints and suggestions are not acted upon as quickly as possible.
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Furthermore, I don’t understand the negative ratings given to Ray’s response. IMO, he shows genuine concern and interest in our feedback. Based on my years of experience with DevExpress I’m willing to, as Ray put it, keep the faith. -
Leroy, I too am a long date customer, and while I'm sure that DevExpress is working hard on improvements, I'm much less certain on how "improving" those will actually be. Not that they don't do anything good; it's only that in time somewhere our professional perspectives started splitting up. What they're doing now might be good for some customers, but frankly I don't feel like one of them.
I do my very best to keep the faith as you said, but right now I disagree so much on their visions (Metro on Winform, StackOverflow as a model for support center, fixed issues/new features ratio, etc) that I can't help having doubts on the future. The way it looks from me here, DevExpress became more about what I've built yesterday and still have to maintain today. There's hardly anything ahead, I'm afraid. :/
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Crono, I think our needs do differ. I’m approaching the end of my career so have no interest in Metro or other emerging technologies, at least professionally. WPF will probably be the end of the line for me and I’m very satisfied with their WPF offerings.
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I’d be surprised if DevExpress wasn’t currently working on Metro to some degree, but as a business it makes sense for them to see how Metro adoption shakes out before putting too many resources into supporting it. That’s especially true if they would have to shift resources from the products that provide the lion’s share of their income to do so. I don’t know of course, but I’d guess the majority of their revenue comes from corporate customers, and corporations are notoriously slow in adopting shiny new software technologies.
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If their long-term vision is a purely StackOverflow model I think they’re making a mistake (not that I don’t like SO, I find lots of answers there). I liked what they had before and was surprised at what I found when I followed a link from one of their email replies to the new site to reply.
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I think having others respond to my issues is a plus as long as it doesn’t replace the excellent support I’ve come to expect from DevExpress. I’ll be very disappointed if support waits to see if my issue is addressed by others before they jump in with an answer. -
Thanks for the feedback guys.
Crono - you may not believe me, but I do understand where you are coming from. Based on your comments, I take it that you are a WinForms developer and having seen the tile control and some touch related features in recent releases, you may think that we've gone off the deep end with Metro on WinForms. The fact is that's not the case. I wish we could do more for WinForms and I wish no one used any other platform and I wish I had more resources to call upon...but given the market realities, we are doing the best we can on the WinForms platform....heck, we released a new product (the Range Control) for WinForms in this release and the next release will include a couple of new products we think WinForms developers are going to enjoy (an no, they are not Metro related)
As far as this statement goes: "professional perspectives started splitting up"....That certainly might be the case and unless you share your professional perspective with me, I'm not in a position to confirm whether it actually has...So feel free to email me at rayn@devexpress.com and I'd be happy to engage you in a dialog and address your concerns.
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Leroy
I want to make sure you are thrilled with the Support Center. Our support team wants to make sure you are thrilled with it...Everyone here does.
The only way we can make it better is to engage our customers. The best way to do that, is to write to me. I've spoken with countless people about it and have gotten a great deal of useful feedback. I hate the fact that we've let some of you down.
I'm not making any excuses for what happened in the past. I want to move forward and get it right. I'm available to chat anytime...rayn@devexpress.com
And if you would oblige me....let me echo your thoughts...our support team does a hell of a job and I think they should be saluted for it. -
Glen,
There are definitely some elements on 12.1 that may break your application. It breaks mine a nd it looks that with some of the issues in 12.1 that break our application it looks as thought that I will have to stick with 11.2 even though I have just last month renewed our DXPerience subscription.
It may be that it takes some long and careful thought about migrating your app to 12.1 due to the breaking changes that it appears there may be no workaround for at this time, whether it be an official or unofficial work around.
a quick and easy example is that scroll bars now no longer work in a standard MDI XAF app . The response I got to this was there was a bug in the MDI Manager now used for 12.1 however the link I was provided with to track the bug was dated 2 years ago. I would have thought that something apparently as simple as missing scroll bars would have been remedied before the XAF product was forcibly switched off to the new MDI Manager. (Note that this is not the only issue I am referring to when I talk about changes that can break your app requiring you to possibly remain with 11.2)
Having said that however we almost always get a prompt and helpful response to our questions over the few years that we have had our DXPerience subscription. My main complaint is the sheer amount of time it takes for some seemingly basic functionality to finally "officially" make it into the release product ... inline editing in XAF TreeList anyone??
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Hi Kerry,
I have discovered the hard way to hold off 'upgrading' until there has been several releases as I just don't have the time to find these issues the hard way. Sometimes it's my customer that finds them which is even more concerning to me.
Having taken the above position and delayed 'upgrading' unless there is some pressing new feature included in it, I have also found that there are very few 'new' features being added that affect me. I know there are all the new wizbang features for whatever is flavour of the month, but essentially there's little for me.
I do accept that DevEx have to 'move forward' to stay in business however that doesn't make me feel any better especially when I do a google search for a component that would save me hours of development work only to find that other component vendors already have those components even though those components are not necessarily in high demand.
I think I have made it quite clear that the Support guys have helped me substantially over the years, ditto with the DXSquad guys. It's that level of support that will prompt me to renew my subscription when the time comes. It's also why the new Support System is a critical component for me.
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1 Solution
Ray Navasarkian (DevExpress)
06.15.2012
Hi Glen
You raise a lot of good points, and I'm happy to reply to them all.
You mention that you've not received support or the implication is that you've not received support from us. Can you tell me which ticket you are referring to. Just because there is a new UI for our Support Center does not mean we stopped answering questions as we always have. So please do let me know the support ticket in question and I will get on it.
Regarding customers helping customers....I think this is a great thing. If users can help one another, then what's the harm in that?
Support Center unfortunately was not thrown together in a couple of weeks...it took quite a bit longer and the good news is that we are working to improve it as we speak. I am anxious to hear your input as I've heard the input of many others. I want to make it the best it can be. So please, do let me know of any specific ideas you might have.
As with any release, there are bugs that have been reported and it's our job to fix those. We are doing just that. I'm hoping one day to have a zero bug release but that's not yet happened. :-)
And about blogs, videos, etc. Tell me what you want us to blog about Glen. I'm happy to get our guys to blog again, but you tell me what you want us to write about. Do you want us to provide technical how to content or....?
And though I keep asking Microsoft to pay us cash, they have yet to do so. Hopefully soon :-)
Keep the faith - lot's of cool things for us all to chase in the coming months.
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Hey Ray, your spirit, enthusiasm and clear understanding of both sides of the fence, along with concrete and timely responses to our collective needs, will again allow DX to move forward with managing one very groovy company. thanks.
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Thank you for taking the time and effort to read my comments. Unfortunately, my feelings haven't changed and if anything, your comments indicate to me at least that you have missed the sentiment that I was trying to impart. I will reluctantly comment on each item you have raised however I would have preferred to retain an overall perspective of what I mean by 'warm fuzzies'. I'll reply in the format now used by SC2.
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@Lack of Support: I am amazed that you need to ask me what tickets I am talking about. Frankly, your comment implies that you do not have the ability to quickly ascertain what your paid subscribers are saying. How did you keep track of the previous suggestions? It is now appearing to me to be a falacy that we have, over the years, all fallen for. Up till SC2, I always received an automated reply in minutes and generally an initial reply within 24 hours. The replies were from DevEx staff and almost always the person who was directly involved in the control I was having problems understanding. Since SC2, this has fallen by the wayside. That is my experience and a quick perusal of many of the items in SC2 have not made me change my perspective. I don't want the head honcho to follow up my support requests, I don't even want the head of support to follow up my requests. I don't mind if one of my peers can help me out but I do insist that a DevEx support staff member assit me in a timely fashion. That's what I paid for isn't it? If you can't ascertain what tickets I am talking about then it's time you invested in some software that will. I know exactly what my customers want. I use a note book, pen and a calendar. I have also gained a lot of business from people that appreciate my high service standards. I am sure you have found this in the past as well. DevEx has a reputation for great support.
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@Customers helping customers was previously known as the forums ie peer support. I have tried to help others from time to time both here as well as in StackOverflow. I'm not as clever as others but I do try. I don't understand what this has to do with warm fuzzies though. I actually like the SC2 idea/format. Yes Ray - I think it could work. It's just that I paid for support and expect something a lot better than StackOverflow type responses no matter how well those posters intenetions are. There are several DXSquad members that have gone to great lengths to help me out, some even carrying on helping me via direct email. They deserve considerably more than just a pat on the back occasionally. As a minimum, I would give them free licences but I understand they get sfa.
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@The new SC2: Without wishing to be seen as sarcastic, it looks as if it was put together in a few weeks. It probably took a few weeks more to figure out how to merge the old support site. It looks like you threw the baby out with the bathwater in your rush to give us the ability to comment on SC1 issues. I sat in on the webcast hoping to be able to give my feedback. It was a rushed webcast and gave me little time to compose my thoughts. Looking back on that webcast - what was it's purpose? The big issue which I never raised was what about my paid support channels. I can't believe I no longer have anything. You say we get preferntial treatment but how can you when you can't even identify what my support requests have been. You don't even know that I've been waiting over 3 days on at least one issue and now you want me to tell you which one it is. Why don't you post a list of what suggestions you have already received and a time frame as to when you think they can be implemented. Then I'll add my two penny's worth. I hope to heaven one of the top items on the list is some obvious method of identifing the original poster. How about 'Active' and 'Inactive' to indicate who has a current support contract and 'Guest' for those that haven't paid two bob yet. That will help give me some warm fuzzies that you have the ability to make an effort to raise my questions in the priority order. At present, I doubt whether you have the ability to prioritize.
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@Bugs: Please don't be condescending. I don't think I have ever succeeded in releasing a bug free version of my program and I doubt anyone will ever claim the contrary.
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@Blogs. Try this: go back to the period when you released 10.2, 10.3, and 11.1 . The periods should cover about 1 month before and 2 months after. Now count up the blog posts - all of them. Ok, now compare those numbers with the same periods covering releases 11.2 and 12.1 . It seems to me there has been a substantial fall in blogs posts. You tell me why. What's happened? Has there been a massive outcry from us saying we're sick of all these blogs. I get the feeling somethings wrong. Let's now look at two very recent blogs. One of them wants to get feed back on what we think of tiles instead of a checked list box. Another one starts of with (I paraphrase) "I just want to draw your attention to a little known improvement/feature we relased in version 11.1". Hell, that was a year ago and now your just getting around to telling us about it. Not only that, now you want me to tell you what to blog about! Mate, I'm having enough trouble keeping up with all the changes as it is let alone trying to tell you how to run your business. I want you to set the benchmark so I can try and emulate your success.
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@Keep the faith: I'm frankly sick and tired of hearing that line. It's been done to death. I have no intention of leaving DevEx, I've invested to much of my life into it and it's now to late to change boats. I'd like to get my warm fuzzies back but if you want to call that keeping the faith then I hope you can see why my faith is a mite bit frazzled around the edges at the moment.
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Glen
@Customers - You are right, the guys on DXSquad do an unbelievable job. We are eternally grateful to them. Perhaps you are privy to something more than I, but we actually do give them a free license, and last November, we flew all of those who were able to travel to the DevConnections conference....we spent a day with them going over the 11.2 release, another day in the desert on dune buggies....etc. We can always do more and if you have specific ideas as to how you'd like me to reward them, then by all means, let me know.
@SC2 - What can I say...I see that you are upset and nothing I can say will change that. Glen, I'm not in support - my reply to you was a simple one...it was not meant to suggest you did not have an issue outstanding. If your implication is that SC2 has anything to do with the turnaround of support tickets, then I'm afraid we are not on the same page and again, nothing I say will change that. If your criticism of SC2 is an attempt to criticize our support team and their efforts, that's fine...I'm happy to listen.
@Bugs - I was not being condescending. You implied the release was buggy. Perhaps it was done for effect, perhaps to prod us, perhaps to get something off your chest. I don't know your motives. I simply told you that this release was no different than any other release. Perfection is a goal that is yet to be achieved.
@Blogs - We definitely used to blog a lot more than we do currently...by a wide margin. Here's the bottom line with blogs...very few people read them. Yes...as much as I hate to say it...the reason we stopped was readership. Glen, when about 1-2% of your customer base is reading blogs, what in heaven's name would you do? I know you are busy and if you can find the time to consider what you'd like us to talk about, I'm willing to do it. I just want to increase readership :-)
@Keep the faith - I did not mean blind faith. If we are screwing up and you see no hope, then there's no reason to keep anything...much less one's faith.If you want to engage me, I'm available. the email is rayn@devexpress.com
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You are quite right Ray, my warm fuzzies aren't going to come back and there's nothing I can do about that. Perhaps in time I will forget what DX1 was like. In time, no one will know what I'm talking about any way.
Ray, I used to feel as if I was part of something. Now I just feel like a number. I know you won't worry about it but that's what I meant by warm fuzzies.
BTW: The DXSquad have never to my knowledge admitted that they got anything from DevEx. In fact, they have openly denied it.
You won't get an email from me and I'll hold my comments as I think it would be more time wasted. Like you, I've now moved on. Best wishes for the future and have a nice day.
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