Alpha Software Mobile Development Tools:   Alpha Anywhere    |   Alpha TransForm subscribe to our YouTube Channel  Follow Us on LinkedIn  Follow Us on Twitter  Follow Us on Facebook

Announcement

Collapse

The Alpha Software Forum Participation Guidelines

The Alpha Software Forum is a free forum created for Alpha Software Developer Community to ask for help, exchange ideas, and share solutions. Alpha Software strives to create an environment where all members of the community can feel safe to participate. In order to ensure the Alpha Software Forum is a place where all feel welcome, forum participants are expected to behave as follows:
  • Be professional in your conduct
  • Be kind to others
  • Be constructive when giving feedback
  • Be open to new ideas and suggestions
  • Stay on topic


Be sure all comments and threads you post are respectful. Posts that contain any of the following content will be considered a violation of your agreement as a member of the Alpha Software Forum Community and will be moderated:
  • Spam.
  • Vulgar language.
  • Quotes from private conversations without permission, including pricing and other sales related discussions.
  • Personal attacks, insults, or subtle put-downs.
  • Harassment, bullying, threatening, mocking, shaming, or deriding anyone.
  • Sexist, racist, homophobic, transphobic, ableist, or otherwise discriminatory jokes and language.
  • Sexually explicit or violent material, links, or language.
  • Pirated, hacked, or copyright-infringing material.
  • Encouraging of others to engage in the above behaviors.


If a thread or post is found to contain any of the content outlined above, a moderator may choose to take one of the following actions:
  • Remove the Post or Thread - the content is removed from the forum.
  • Place the User in Moderation - all posts and new threads must be approved by a moderator before they are posted.
  • Temporarily Ban the User - user is banned from forum for a period of time.
  • Permanently Ban the User - user is permanently banned from the forum.


Moderators may also rename posts and threads if they are too generic or do not property reflect the content.

Moderators may move threads if they have been posted in the incorrect forum.

Threads/Posts questioning specific moderator decisions or actions (such as "why was a user banned?") are not allowed and will be removed.

The owners of Alpha Software Corporation (Forum Owner) reserve the right to remove, edit, move, or close any thread for any reason; or ban any forum member without notice, reason, or explanation.

Community members are encouraged to click the "Report Post" icon in the lower left of a given post if they feel the post is in violation of the rules. This will alert the Moderators to take a look.

Alpha Software Corporation may amend the guidelines from time to time and may also vary the procedures it sets out where appropriate in a particular case. Your agreement to comply with the guidelines will be deemed agreement to any changes to it.



Bonus TIPS for Successful Posting

Try a Search First
It is highly recommended that a Search be done on your topic before posting, as many questions have been answered in prior posts. As with any search engine, the shorter the search term, the more "hits" will be returned, but the more specific the search term is, the greater the relevance of those "hits". Searching for "table" might well return every message on the board while "tablesum" would greatly restrict the number of messages returned.

When you do post
First, make sure you are posting your question in the correct forum. For example, if you post an issue regarding Desktop applications on the Mobile & Browser Applications board , not only will your question not be seen by the appropriate audience, it may also be removed or relocated.

The more detail you provide about your problem or question, the more likely someone is to understand your request and be able to help. A sample database with a minimum of records (and its support files, zipped together) will make it much easier to diagnose issues with your application. Screen shots of error messages are especially helpful.

When explaining how to reproduce your problem, please be as detailed as possible. Describe every step, click-by-click and keypress-by-keypress. Otherwise when others try to duplicate your problem, they may do something slightly different and end up with different results.

A note about attachments
You may only attach one file to each message. Attachment file size is limited to 2MB. If you need to include several files, you may do so by zipping them into a single archive.

If you forgot to attach your files to your post, please do NOT create a new thread. Instead, reply to your original message and attach the file there.

When attaching screen shots, it is best to attach an image file (.BMP, .JPG, .GIF, .PNG, etc.) or a zip file of several images, as opposed to a Word document containing the screen shots. Because Word documents are prone to viruses, many message board users will not open your Word file, therefore limiting their ability to help you.

Similarly, if you are uploading a zipped archive, you should simply create a .ZIP file and not a self-extracting .EXE as many users will not run your EXE file.
See more
See less

Are you a Forum User or Abuser?

Collapse
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts

    #16
    Re: Are you a Forum User or Abuser?

    I have been following this thread and find it difficult to determine the difference between an "User" and an "Abuser.

    I have been a A5 user for many years and whilst I don't think of myself as a major contribitor I have found the Forum to be an excellent place for new ideas and methods.

    My main gripe is searching for an answer! You can enter a search string and never find a result and then the next day a member will place a link in a forum question that will direct you to the answer I was looking for!

    User/Abuser not an issue. We are all here to learn,some faster than others and at different levels, if you feel you are being Abused then don't respond.

    My position is, when a new member reads this thread then there is a very distinct possibilty that he/she would be too scared to ask a question for fear of being thought of as being an "Abuser" not a nice label.

    I ceratainly could not use this terminoligy in my business.

    Regards

    Alan

    Comment


      #17
      Re: Are you a Forum User or Abuser?

      Hi Alan,

      Originally posted by Alan Lucas View Post
      I have been following this thread and find it difficult to determine the difference between an "User" and an "Abuser.
      It's very easy. A User participates both ways, does the groundwork (searches the help documents and forum area to the best of their ability) for the question, tries to do the legwork (zip's up code where needed to illustrate the problem and/or takes the pointers/examples given, and attempts to resolve the problem) and then gives back (post's the working results). At times, I've seen people post an answer to a problem of their own that they've solved, so that others can benefit from their solution. This is a very

      An abuser asks questions before trying it themselves, or studying the relevant documentation, and/or want's to have it all done for them, and never gives the final results (or at least an acknowledgment/thank you that it worked) so all can benefit. They never contribute when they know the answer, or present "answers" when they know they don't have a clue (don't confuse this with someone suggesting something as maybe a possible solution). They are saying they know the definitive answer, and may not have even tried the solution.

      Originally posted by Alan Lucas View Post
      My main gripe is searching for an answer! You can enter a search string and never find a result and then the next day a member will place a link in a forum question that will direct you to the answer I was looking for!
      Yes, the search engine (and documentation on using it) could be better. I hope everyone knows to use the "Advanced Search" link within the search box to do more complicated searches. But no one is complaining about you asking for help in that case.

      But when someone asks, e.g. about reindexing code, and the answer was on the 1st couple of threads when "reindexing" is used as a search criteria, that shows they haven't even tried.

      Originally posted by Alan Lucas View Post
      User/Abuser not an issue. We are all here to learn,some faster than others and at different levels, if you feel you are being Abused then don't respond.
      It's not just the question of responding, it's that they don't do their cooperative part of being a good forum member. They need to "try" to some degree, and report the results. If they don't want to try, or need an extremely involved answer and no one is responding (sometimes people have the time to answer, sometimes not), then they should consider hiring an Alpha 5 Consultant. In fact, probably the vast majority of forum users could benefit from discussing their application for even just an hour or two, but that's a whole other thread!:)

      Originally posted by Alan Lucas View Post
      My position is, when a new member reads this thread then there is a very distinct possibilty that he/she would be too scared to ask a question for fear of being thought of as being an "Abuser" not a nice label.
      I don't think any major forum contributer cares whether it's a simple or hard question, how many questions people ask (ideally in separate threads if unrelated) and we all realize that some (if not many) new people don't even know the terminology enough to know what to search or how to ask the question. Heck even the best of us (including myself) have asked an answer that was easily derived (typically forgetting to check a specific document!) But abusers tend to do this over and over.

      And when the key words used in the question easily derive the answer when searched in the help file or forum search, they have wasted everyone's time.

      Occasionally people post the same question everywhere in search of the answer. This is annoying only because different people are then answering the question in different threads instead of one. If it really needs to be in both places (e.g. a web server XBasic question), then it's best to put it in 1 area, and then start a thread that has a link to the main thread. However placing the duplicate questions in unrelated forums is annoying.

      I'd rather teach someone to fish rather than give him a fish, but if they are even unwilling to pick up the pole.....they are wasting my time!
      Regards,

      Ira J. Perlow
      Computer Systems Design


      CSDA A5 Products
      New - Free CSDA DiagInfo - v1.39, 30 Apr 2013
      CSDA Barcode Functions

      CSDA Code Utility
      CSDA Screen Capture


      Comment


        #18
        Re: Are you a Forum User or Abuser?

        Just my opinion - I don't really care if users of this forum do or don't try to solve their own problems before asking; and I don't care if the same question is asked a hundred times, or the answer could have been easily found by a simple search. I just don't think of this place as a classroom with teachers and students and a high degree of protocol required to participate.

        Etiquette and appreciation are another matter, for me. I do like to see individuals respectful of each other, appreciative of the effort made by many users, and sympathetic of those newbies not prepared even to 'ask the right question'. Being appreciative does include not purposely wasting everyone's time, but the key word for me is purposely, that is, not if they 'waste' it out of ignorance, lack of training or lacking a 'technical mind' -- there's something refreshing about an innocently asked "but where is the any-key?" (and the 30-post thread that ensues on the subject).

        Alpha Five is owned by secretaries, blacksmiths*, firemen, kids, pastors, as well as engineers, web designers, and technical giants; people in East Asia, Africa, USA, UK, Iran, New York, etc. They can't all be expected to ask questions in a manner that everyone would view as proper.

        I think the forum is self-managing. Snooty or pompous people are told to get off it; those who ask incomplete questions get incomplete answers and learn how to ask better; and those few who are plain rude just make me glad I'm not. In addition, all of us are free to ignore post and responses by particular users we feel routinely aren't cutting it.

        All of this is not to ignore that it is in everyone's best interest to put serious work in to how they ask the question and into resolving the issue themselves -- and replying with a solution acknowledgement. But if a user gets a few free complete solutions at the beginning, I bet their skill and confidence goes up and most of them will come around and be better forum users over time.

        * we got any blacksmiths?

        p.s: I often wonder about the 60% that post one or two questions and are never seen again. What happens to those guys?
        Steve Wood
        See my profile on IADN

        Comment


          #19
          Re: Are you a Forum User or Abuser?

          Hi All,

          I have now been a Alpha user for just over 2 years and without the help of this forum I would have more than likely given up on Alpha. But because of the help received from this forum I am now very confident in my skills with Alpha.

          Steve
          p.s: I often wonder about the 60% that post one or two questions and are never seen again. What happens to those guys?
          In my case I needed a replacement for the D3/Pick programing language we were using and I was determined to learn somthing new as my living and that of my family depended on it, and without the help of this forum I could not have done it why? Alpha is a great tool but when first starting it is very dificult no impossible to get a step by step guide in how to do Somthing/Anything. Alpha is strating to to address this with the use of videos which are much better than a thousand words, a Alpha guide for dummies would in my opinion not only keep people using Alpha it would increase sales for Alpha. Steve you better than anyboby else knows the power of the WAS, more and more people are trialing Alpha becuase of the claims that it is so easy to build a web site in Alpha, and it is untill we try to do more than the basic, but that said with version 8 somthings are becoming easier. Again I think Alpha are missing out by not produceing a step by step guide

          csda1
          A forum abuser is someone who asks questions without even doing a cursory search or trying to find a solution. They expect to have their problem solved completely for them, including the code. They never post back the results of their findings.
          Some body once said something like the the U.S and the U.K are divided by a common language, I agree, I visit the U.S. and even lived there for over a year, we both speak English but the meaning of some words and in what context we use them can be very different, so that is for two nations that speak English, How would we all be if the first language for Alpha was French I am sure that we would all be asking for help on some basic things.

          In finishing I would again like to thank everybody who over the last two years have been kind enough to help me with both simple questions in the beginning and with far more complexed latterly


          Kind Regards to all and I look forward to meeting you in Vegas


          Andy Meer

          Comment


            #20
            Re: Are you a Forum User or Abuser?

            An example of a forum abuser? (Found on another database forum)
            Help me please! I’m not normally one for begging on forums! But this is a desperate time for me..

            I don’t know a great deal about databases. And i stupidly agreed to making a simple database for my boss!

            He wants a database to track how well sales staff are doing against target.

            i.e he enters sales agent name.. the product they sold.. and how much it is worth.. the week it was sold in

            Then at the end of the month he can select their name and the week, then see what products they have sold and a total amount for each product area sold!

            i just have no idea how to do it!

            help me please!
            Last edited by AaronBBrown; 04-17-2007, 09:46 AM.
            "Ollie, remember how dumb I used to be? Well, I'm much better now."

            Pete

            Comment


              #21
              Re: Are you a Forum User or Abuser?

              Originally posted by G Gabriel View Post
              Stan:
              what are you bumped about?
              Not aimed at anything in particular. Just needs periodic emphasis. At one time there was a "sticky" thread "Please read before posting" that most didn't bother to read. I think it must have been removed in the last board update.
              There can be only one.

              Comment


                #22
                Re: Are you a Forum User or Abuser?

                Personally, I think the responsiveness of this forum's members is part of the problem. When you are in Europe, you normally can not wait untill a forum member in the USA has waked up from his earned night's rest, and posts an answer to your question.
                So you just NEED to search the forums for previous answers.
                When you are in the States, just posting a question will normally lead to an answer almost before you can blink an eye.....
                People normally are lazy (exceptions occur though....) and just post the question.

                Maybe you all need to move to Europe......

                I see Ira's frustration but also like Steve's approach.

                Kind regards,
                Marcel

                Comment


                  #23
                  Re: Are you a Forum User or Abuser?

                  My thanks to those individuals that really support this board. I would have been in deep trouble in completing some tasks in the past without this board.

                  While I have many other Alpha 5 developers that have used my services to create some code or solve a problem, I'd be hard pressed to name a single forum user that, because of the forum, contracted for my services for a more complete answer. I'll bet other regular, experienced forum contributors probably have a similar experience.
                  However, I have one comment relative to Ira's remarks about using the consultants. In the past I have needed help and have sent emails to SEVERAL of the "consultants" asking for pricing and if they think they have the expertise for the problem at hand, Guess What??? "I NEVER GET A RETURN EMAIL" (Sorry Ira, I never got far enough down the list to find you) Not to be sarcastic, but do we classify these individuals as "Consultant Abusers"? Is it just a way to have their name listed on the Alpha Website....

                  Once again, my thanks to everyone...
                  Last edited by Phil Rolf; 04-17-2007, 08:56 AM.

                  Comment


                    #24
                    Re: Are you a Forum User or Abuser?

                    Phil,

                    Originally posted by Phil Rolf View Post
                    However, I have one comment relative to Ira's remarks about using the consultants. In the past I have needed help and have sent emails to SEVERAL of the "consultants" asking for pricing and if they think they have the expertise for the problem at hand, Guess What??? "I NEVER GET A RETURN EMAIL" (Sorry Ira, I never got far enough down the list to find you) Not to be sarcastic, but do we classify these individuals as "Consultant Abusers"? Is it just a way to have their name listed on the Alpha Website....
                    I think that there are many that are no longer providing any Alpha services. The consultants list does not look like a valid list of active consultants to me and I expect that this page may change as Alpha updates various parts of it's web site.

                    If you are on the message board (and I know you are), if I were you looking for a consultant, I think would look at what kind of responses the potential consultant's made on the message board to sort of identify their technical credibility. Also, look at any signatures at the bottom of their messages to see if they have email/web links, indictating their desire to be contacted.

                    There are, however, consultants that are rarely (if ever) on the message board, and that does not mean they are not qualified, but then you have to rely on something else for them.

                    Regards,

                    Ira
                    Regards,

                    Ira J. Perlow
                    Computer Systems Design


                    CSDA A5 Products
                    New - Free CSDA DiagInfo - v1.39, 30 Apr 2013
                    CSDA Barcode Functions

                    CSDA Code Utility
                    CSDA Screen Capture


                    Comment


                      #25
                      Re: Are you a Forum User or Abuser?

                      I'd also like to point out that we have a Forum Support forum as well as a Tip of the Day forum (which, admittedly has not been updated since its inception, but does have a few useful articles in there) for those that are having difficulty using forum features.
                      Aaron Brown
                      Alpha Software Development Team

                      Comment


                        #26
                        Re: Are you a Forum User or Abuser?

                        Originally posted by Phil Rolf View Post
                        "I NEVER GET A RETURN EMAIL" (Sorry Ira, I never got far enough down the list to find you)
                        Not sure who you've contacted, but:

                        1. Email is not a guarantied method of contacting someone. A followup phone call is sometimes necessary.

                        2. Notify the Alpha Partners program or Alpha customer service or Richard Rabins if someone is not responsive.

                        3. I don't recall getting an email from you either(or Ira (aka genius):D as you noted). But don't tell us who didn't respond - use option #2.
                        Al Buchholz
                        Bookwood Systems, LTD
                        Weekly QReportBuilder Webinars Thursday 1 pm CST

                        Occam's Razor - KISS
                        Normalize till it hurts - De-normalize till it works.
                        Advice offered and questions asked in the spirit of learning how to fish is better than someone giving you a fish.
                        When we triage a problem it is much easier to read sample systems than to read a mind.
                        "Make it as simple as possible, but not simpler."
                        Albert Einstein

                        http://www.iadn.com/images/media/iadn_member.png

                        Comment


                          #27
                          Re: Are you a Forum User or Abuser?

                          The term Consultant Abusers hits home from the other side of the fence. Sometimes I feel abused by users seeking free assistance. I am pretty liberal with my time, but often I let it go to far. Acknowledging that reminds me that it is ME that controls who has access to my time; and its hard to say no. Normally I push people back to the forum unless I have an established relationship with them.

                          The Consultants List is pretty out of date and I am sure Alpha will be working it over in the near future. It will likely be part of the project to improve the Professional Services offering -- all of this stuff takes time.

                          I agree with Al, some of the best consultants are hardly ever on the forum. Its just not their idea of fun or being productive. I would expect (although I have no knowledge) that at some point Consultants (if they want to have visibility through Alpha) will have to register with Professional Services, maintain their profile and perform certain tasks including getting certified. That may seem like a hassle, but it would improve the prospective clients' overall impression of the consulting body.

                          Also I would bet that the majority of the listed "consultants" are not really full-time consultants, and don't have a set price list. Probably only a handful are full-time consultants whose livelihood relies directly on paid consulting. And there, those guys often can't respond to "little" requests that may come in an email form. From experience, "little" requests take five times longer to resolve than the initial impression. That's because they are always more involved, there's no specification, details are left out of the request, and the consultant may not have the specific knowledge to complete a narrowly defined ad-hoc task. Its hard to respond to a "little" request with "that will cost $1000" and not have the requestor think you are a money-grubbing opportunist.

                          On the other side of the fence, I would say 1 out of 5 prospective clients respond to MY email to them after they have requested of me (from my website) or of Alpha (and referred to me). You have to make a telephone call; that's the only way to be sure of contact. I always try to respond to emails, but I am sure I don't always. A consultant does tend to read into the email and try to determine the dollar worth/time investment ratio of the inquiry. Its good to respond to all, but honestly I've received some email requests where I just know if I answer this email I am going to be on the hook for hours of free services and so I don't, or perhaps I do but word my response to close down the process.
                          Steve Wood
                          See my profile on IADN

                          Comment


                            #28
                            Re: Are you a Forum User or Abuser?

                            I don't know about anyone else, but when I receive an email with a subject along the lines of 'Help Me!', 'Can you do this?', 'I have a problem', etc., with names I never heard of, I relegate them to my spam folder and do not open them. Phil, if any of these could have been your message, I am truly sorry, but with the amount of virus' and garbage being sent via email, I just won't chance it. Subjects lines like 'Alpha Five Question', 'Alpha database', 'Help with Alpha program', etc. are much more likely to be opened and read.

                            Andy Meer makes a valid point in that folks speaking other languages could easily have a hard time phrasing a question in a (to them) foreign language (English) that makes sense to us English speakers. When I write something, I try to let it sit for a while and then re-read it to see if it says what I meant to say. Quite often I have to re-write it to better get my idea across. I would also venture to say that those of us in the US would have a damn hard time writing anything in another language!

                            In my teaching days, I had students that asked questions without ever opening the book and those I directed to the book. The students that read the book and, for whatever reason, didn't/couldn't understand the material are the ones I would help. There are not enough hours in the day to help people who refuse to take the first step in helping themselves.

                            Dave
                            Dave Jampole
                            www.customalpha.com

                            Women and cats will do whatever they want. The sooner men and dogs realize that, the happier they will be.

                            Comment


                              #29
                              Re: Are you a Forum User or Abuser?

                              I am one of those 'consultants' who does not work at it full time. I can't afford to simply because I'm a few years until retirement. Over the years, I've received, oh.....maybe a dozen emails from prospective clients. These were persons in law enforcement, private investigating or banking. I've always responded prompltly to their request, which is nearly always the same; What does your app do and what is the cost?

                              My response: My app does this for me but your needs are different. Some have asked for screen shots which I provided. Not one of those ever got back to me nor would they answer my email. Others pumped me with questions re: "How would you do this or that?" When they quit asking questions, I followed up. Everyone failed to respond.

                              I have also done a pretty fair amount of charity work but even at that, I've had to say, enough is enough. When I told one person from another country that I could no longer donate my time, I never got a "thank you" and never heard from that person again.

                              However, there have been a couple who asked for paid help on the message board to which I responded. I was up front with them, told them I was not an expert and my hourly rate would reflect that. If my level of expertese could not accomplish what they needed, I was quick to tell them.

                              What's the difference? Those in the last catagory had done all they could and the others, well, as Dave Jampole said, they never opened the book.

                              That's my 2 cents worth.

                              kenn
                              TYVM :) kenn

                              Knowing what you can achieve will not become reality until you imagine and explore.

                              Comment


                                #30
                                Re: Are you a Forum User or Abuser?

                                Thought I would offer my point of view as one of the "user/abusers" of this forum. First let me say thank you for all the great talent I find on this board. You guys are great teachers. However some of us are slooow learners!

                                Just this morning, I unzipped my files and edited my shortcut and ran into this error when I went to use it: "Failure to save document". Now what does that mean? 1st I went to the help file and found nothing, so then I came here to find nothing as well. To me, my shortcut and the file it calls look fine.

                                Some of the features that more experienced users are very familiar with are still Greek to me. Like the debugger - which is often a suggestion here. I have tried to use this feature and do not get it, so I do a work around instead with ui_msg_box and the trace window. I can do simple things with the interactive window but that's about it. And I do try the help files and searching here but get frustrated when I am unable to find anything even close to what I am looking for. So how much time should one spend before adding a new post?

                                The program gets more and more complicated as the web becomes the focus over the desktop. I feel like I have been lost in the dust...

                                ps: Hah! Went back and looked at the text file I was using to load my database again, and sure enough a typo in the path statement generated this error. There, now someone else can find the answer too!

                                tryingtobeagooduser
                                Last edited by MoGrace; 04-19-2007, 11:28 AM.
                                Robin

                                Discernment is not needed in things that differ, but in those things that appear to be the same. - Miles Sanford

                                Comment

                                Working...
                                X