Do you use 3rd party Tools Poll

[csda1]

When you go out and buy a computer, many people buy Norton Anti-Virus, Zone Alarm, a version of Office and a ton other addins/add-ons for their computer. When you invest in using Alpha 5 (which I think most people here would say is a great program at a very reasonable cost) as a developer, why are you not buying the 3rd party addin tools/utilities ?

There are several 3rd Party Tools intended specifically for the Alpha 5 development environment. Some of the key ones

CSDA Code Utility for Alpha 5 ($59.95/$39.95) - Allows quick restarts, remember's and restores A5 windows, quick debug, development logging, quick backup for development, accurate code timing

Partec A5Doc ($49.00) - A5 documentor

AIMS Group Formatter ($19.00) - Allows for A5 desktop applications to select multiple items in a layout design (e.g. a form) and formatting only specific attributes of the properties, without effecting other attributes that you wish to leave unmodified. AIMS also has others, but this has the highest return if you use it.

AlphaToGo Website Traffic and Audit Trail ($45.00) - Provide real-time statistics on web traffic to your Alpha Web application. Other web oriented products as well

While no single tool will fit everyone's need, many of these will pay for themselves in very short order. There are many other tools available under the other competitive databases, but few for the A5 environment. If sales are not large enough, 3rd party tools may disappear for Alpha 5, and that makes all of us work harder!

There are 5000+ members of the message board (not including those that show up as guests) and 725+ active members, yet less than 1% have purchased any of the tools/utilities. Maybe there's a reason that 3rd party tool developer's haven't addressed. Let us know. If you prefer to be more anonymous, feel free to email me with your opinions.

So the question for the poll is that for ANY Alpha 5 specific 3rd-party tool (including ones not listed above), if you can answer the reason you have not purchased any.

[Mike Wilson]

Re: Do you use 3rd party Tools Poll

Ira,
I read your recent 3rd party utilities post. I prompted me to review the features of the applications you listed. Does the AIMS Group Formatter have the capacity for group formats for field height? If so it's for me.. for sure. Reference:
>
> http://msgboard.alphasoftware.com/al...ad.php?t=67520

[csda1]

Re: Do you use 3rd party Tools Poll

Hi Mike,

I checked, and in fact it doesn't in the current version. However, I spoke with Cal Locklin, and he said it was something he never put into the product, and that there might be issues with the alignment of other side by side objects. But he is thinking about it and the issues of implementation.
I'm sure he'll respond when he sees the thread.

Never-the-less, you really can't go wrong with it. It will save it's price anytime you edit layouts.

To anyone else reading the thread, I'd also be interested in why you haven't considered using some of these (In other words, why are these tools or similar not being purchased by their intended targets). Or, if you have used a 3rd party tool, did it work out for you in your situation?

[gmeredith17]

Re: Do you use 3rd party Tools Poll

I think if these tools were offered via a link from the Alpha website they might be used more. For instance if Alpha set up a section for third party plugins that they endorsed it would give everyone some confidence in the product and a single reference point to look for ready made tools/solutions for common requirements. Maybe a user rating system could be included to offer feedback to potential buyers.

Personally it is taking me time to come to grips with Alpha 5 itself and all its built in functionality. Maybe once I have become more familiar and confident in using Alpha I will then look for other tools that will make developing easier.

Another aspect could be the cost. I think the AIMS group formatter is probably in the ideal price range of $15 to $20. Anything over this and it becomes harder to justify to yourself or others. You think well I have managed to get by without it up until now - do I really need it? Quite possibly yes but once there is some doubt you have probably lost a significant amount of your target customer base. Maybe it would be better to offer these utilities at very low prices with the potential of selling many more of them.

If you have a product that isn't selling you need to ask why? Which is clearly what Ira is doing. You also have to accept that the reason might not be what you want to hear. The product many not be useful enough, overpriced, or just needs better marketing. Whatever the reason something needs to change. I do feel that getting Alpha on board to help promote the third party plug ins is essential.

Regards

Geoff

[CALocklin]

Re: Do you use 3rd party Tools Poll

I finally read this thread.

I believe I can get the Group Formatter to set vertical height but (a) you will have to enter the height as a number, (b) it will not set vertical alignment (maybe it could but I don't see the point - setting vertical alignment would require selecting only one line at a time and you can do this just as easily with Alpha's built-in routine), and (c) it will probably be awhile before I could get to it since I have a few other promised updates that haven't been finished yet.

As for "why they don't sell", I think another reason is that people don't understand the benefits until they actually see them in use. There were a lot of interested developers after I did demos of some of my addons at the last conference.

The one addon that has amazed me the most regarding how little it has sold is my AIMS App Analyzer. There have been relatively few people who purchased it but, in my opinion, it's one of the biggest time-savers when editing an app. It's also only $19 but, knowing how much time it has saved me, I'd happily pay $100 for it because I know it will be worth at least that much in time saved over the course of a single year - possibly much more. Heck, it cost me a LOT more than $100 in development time. (Of course, as a full time developer I use it more than a 'hobby' developer would.) Overall, it saves me more time and reduces "call backs" more than the Group Formatter. Now, if you only build new apps one at a time and never have to go back after a few months to make changes and you don't get new applications from people who want you to modify them, you probably have no need for it. However, having done many updates/fixes over the years I can safely say that there were a LOT of times when I thought I'd fixed things correctly but had actually forgotten about something (an index, form, global variable, function, script, etc.) that was used somewhere else and now, after my "fix" that modified it in one way or another, that other section(s) wasn't working correctly anymore.

The AIMS App Analyzer allows me to quickly find every reference to virtually anything in the whole database and has reduced the number of "1/2 fixes" significantly. It's a bit like being told "There are some needles in that haystack over there. I don't know how many but I want you to get all of them out so these kids can safely dive into the haystacks head first." To guarantee that the job was completely done, it would be necessary to check every strand of hay - and even then there might be a needle stuffed inside one of them or you might get tired and miss a couple. The app analyzer automatically checks "every strand of hay" in your application. It checks every item (script, function, field rule, etc.) I could think of to check in the whole application so, for example, if you want to know everywhere the "User_id" index was used because you need to make changes to it, the app analyzer can tell you and you don't have to rely on the fact that your long term memory is absolutely perfect.

Hmmm, maybe it doesn't save time. Without it I wouldn't bother checking the whole app - I'd rely on memory and maybe a few guesses of "hmm, maybe it would have been used that over here." But it does make my updates more "accurate" and that makes my customers happier. And it does save some of the time required to do the job over again because I didn't get it right the first time.

[Ed Barley]

Re: Do you use 3rd party Tools Poll

Ira and Cal,

In A5ver8 I like the look of buttons and the default looking flyover effects.

I have an app, that was developed from ver 5 through 7.

With the AIMS, would it be possible to use it, to change the properties of the buttons on all of the forms? There are a lot of forms through out the app, with a lot of buttons. I am sure you would have to do a form at a time? If so, I would surely be interested in purchasing it, and learning how to use it.

Thanks

Ed

[CALocklin]

Re: Do you use 3rd party Tools Poll

I haven't added all the new gradient fill types to the Group Formatter yet. (By the way, if anyone writes me with a question, please don't refer to it as the "Formatter" or the "AIMS" routine - there are lots of "AIMS" routines and there is also a script formatter. The one we are talking about here is the Group Formatter.)

I'll add those and the accent colors which, I believe, should pretty much handle all the new button styles in A5v8. However, you would still have to set each setting individually. (Once per form for all selected buttons.) In other words, set each of the following that need to change: the border style, border color, border width, fill style, fill color, accent color, corner style, shadow style, shadow color, font 'stuff', etc.

Depending on how many buttons you have and, therefore, how easy it is to just select the buttons, it might be just as easy to use the built-in Copy/Paste Appearance feature. Set one button the way you want it, copy the appearance, select all the other buttons and paste the appearance. If there are only 5-6 buttons on the form, this is probably just as fast. If there are a lot of buttons, having the ability to do it with the Group Formatter may be faster - I'm not sure.

No promises on when I will get it done. As I said on another post recently, there are a few other updates that have been promised and I need to finish them first.

[Garry Flanigan]

Re: Do you use 3rd party Tools Poll

Cal,
I am now using stylesheets more and more.
It would be very helpful to be able to apply a stylesheet to all forms or forms selected from a list with your Group Formatter.
At present if a stylesheet is modified, it must be re-applied form by form to reflect the changes throughout the application. I have been trying to find a simpler method but have so far only managed to find out what does not work. Maybe someone knows of a workarounds?
As a general comment I have been most pleased with the addons I have bought and will buy more. For me the biggest problem is time not the cost of the utilities - it takes time to learn how to use new programs. This can be due to poor documentation and, having developed an application and written an extensive on-line help system, I am well aware of how difficult and time consuming this is. Do not take this comment as a criticism, it is a general observation.
I do hope that more people will buy tools so that developers will continue to make them.

[georgefurnel]

Re: Do you use 3rd party Tools Poll

Cal,

Did you seen the last post from Garry? I want to second his "wish", being able to apply a stylesheet to all forms will save a considerable amount of time.

Are you thinking of implementing it?

Kind regards
George

[CALocklin]

Re: Do you use 3rd party Tools Poll

Yes, I have seen that message and the thought remains in the back of my mind so it may yet happen - but there just hasn't been enough incentive yet. My biggest incentive has always been my own personal need since at $19 each I'm not exactly getting rich on these addons. Unfortunately for the rest of you, I haven't needed it yet.

I took a look at the idea and it looks possible but it doesn't exactly look like a 1 hour job.

By the way, I am adding the ability to define your own prefixes/suffixes for naming buttons, text objects (labels/headers), and browses to the Group Formatter. This is not something I need but it was requested by a number of people and it didn't take a lot to do. However, I did just find a problem with it and will have to fix that before distributing it. (unless you like the idea of having unlimited prefixes like btn_btn_btn_btn_btn_company_info)

I am also aware of and agree with Gary's assessment of the documentation - or lack thereof. He's also right about how much time and effort it takes to build decent (let alone good) documentation. If anyone has specific comments like "it would really help if you explained how to / what is meant by ....." then I'll try to incorporate that info into future updates somehow. Depending on what it is, I often try to put the instructions in the dialog windows - either directly as text or using an "instructions" button of some sort. (In other words, if you see a "Help/Instructions/?" button or a bunch of text in a dialog READ IT - at least once. There was a reason for writing it and it wasn't just to waste some time.) Unfortunately, since I know how to use my own addons, it's often hard to know what others will have trouble with.

[CALocklin]

Re: Do you use 3rd party Tools Poll

I also added the ability to copy and paste browse appearances from the Group Formatter. This was something I needed to do to a whole bunch of browses recently so the old "personal need" kicked in.

The new release should be out next week. The copy/paste browse appearance has been fairly well tested but I want to do some live testing on the recent changes to the object naming.

[georgefurnel]

Re: Do you use 3rd party Tools Poll

Cal, remember to test your add-on with the Vista-A5v9 combination.

I simply love the formatter due to the time saving advantage.

Kind regards
George