You are quick on the uptake!

One thought I am having is this; A lot depends on the nature of the software and what else it is linked into.

In this case, it is linked into Joomla/Mambo, which is used, as the advertising stresses, by many individuals, organisations and companies across the world, hundreds of thousands of them I guess. There is no attempt by Joomla/Mambo to come over as a kind of programmers experiment, a load of guys having fun with code and seeing what happens next? It is a professional, excellently presented, very reliable piece of software and a LOT of businesses are using it, not just casual users. A lot of people have come to rely on it.

I don't think this is just because it is free, although that may be the case for some. I think it is because, against all the other available software no-one else touches it for reliability, professional appearance and support. My impression is that Joomla/Mambo developers are very interested indeed in how people (endusers/customers) are using the software and seem able to make big improvements on that basis..

My impression is that the people developing Joomla/Mambo are really listening to users, and making adjustments and improvements to the software as a consequence.

CB is produced for those people to use, ie, for the business sector relying on Joomla/Mambo for their customer networking and relationships. As such it is actually serving the Joomla/Mambo community, not just CB users. In fact it can ONLY be serving Joomla/Mambo users as without Joomla/Mambo there would be no CB anyway.

So, the use of CB goes well beyond casual use, people just mucking about and giving things a shot. It is bolted onto serious CRM software which is serving many businesses both large and small, as well as many community organisations, both large and small.

If someone using Joomla/Mambo in this way chooses to use CB to 'improve' on the way Joomla/Mambo organises and displays registered users, then CB has to do that with the same responsiveness and alertness to users experience as Joomla/Mambo does. Otherwise there is no cooperation or mutual support going on.

My point here is that there is a profound and important business relationship happening when people use CB, because many people are using Mambo/Joomla in that way. They don't choose CB to have a mess around with different ways of presenting Client information, they are using it because they expect it to serve their needs.

I think quite a lot of people in this Forum, and elsewhere, have spotted some quite serious 'holes' in CB, one of which is the complete absence of any way of searching, except on the name field. Which is ludicrous, and totally out of step with how people are likely to want to use CB.

If you allow the public presentation of a list of people who have bothered to fill in a range of information fields, then surely it makes sense to allow them to search by those fields?

Anyway, that's an old chestnut and hopefully solved soon. Roberts contribution helps a bit, but is full of holes and I can't use it on any installation of Joomla/Mambo until those holes are addressed. Several other people are developing non-hacking components which allow Advanced Search. Can't wait.

Just some thoughts....


achintya

One thought I am having is this; A lot depends on the nature of the software and what else it is linked into.

My impression is that the people developing Joomla/Mambo are really listening to users, and making adjustments and improvements to the software as a consequence.

This is absolutely correct. The key difference is that the people behind Joomla are making money with it. It is a key complement to their business. This far I have not seen this happening here.

That is a lot of people buy full Joomla installations as professional sevices. The key people behind the project become thus preferred partners, or people making money become key developers.

It is very very different when you can make your living with the code you develop.

CB is produced for those people to use, ie, for the business sector relying on Joomla/Mambo for their customer networking and relationships. As such it is actually serving the Joomla/Mambo community, not just CB users. In fact it can ONLY be serving Joomla/Mambo users as without Joomla/Mambo there would be no CB anyway.

Still I fail to see where is the business with CB? That is, when do the developers get paid? If the core team did, the component would advance much rapidly. It is not that difficult to make the search functionality, for example.

My point here is that there is a profound and important business relationship happening when people use CB, because many people are using Mambo/Joomla in that way. They don't choose CB to have a mess around with different ways of presenting Client information, they are using it because they expect it to serve their needs.

I think quite a lot of people in this Forum, and elsewhere, have spotted some quite serious 'holes' in CB, one of which is the complete absence of any way of searching, except on the name field. Which is ludicrous, and totally out of step with how people are likely to want to use CB.

This amazes me totally! If that indeed was the case, some would have hired a programmer to make this thing. It is not that hard to do it. I am a business user, and our business made a considereable sum of money last year using CB as a key information system. Still, we take it "as is" and understand that it is not professionally developed or supported. Before spotting CB, I was prepared to pay a few thousands to get similar product.

Luckily it was easier to take this component, developed as hobby, and hack it to suit our needs.

I think that this thread is mainly about the differences between software that generates money for the developers and the kind that does not. When you annot financially apreciate the code you make, the incentives are lot less customer oriented.

-Mikko

achintya,

I don't think you are getting the point. It does not matter weather the core software is business oriented or paid for or anything else. Just because CB is part of it does not have any effect in any way as to how it is produced, distributed, licensed, or supported. It is its on software with its own developers that are giving of their own free time. It is up to them if they support it at all.

To be honest I really get sick of people that get something for free then expect personalized support for every little thing that "THEY' think is important. This whole thread started off with the idea that CB is like a car without wheels. Since you started this thread that may be so for you, but for the hundreds or even thousands of us that use it, support it, and find it very useful it definitely has wheels, an engine, and a very sleek design. You your self have admitted that that you use it on your own sites so I think that you are very disingenuous in your thoughts about this application. A car without wheel is useless and this application is far from useless.

Bottom line is if the whole bunch of people that put this together decided to walk away tomorrow there is nothing that you or I could do about it. As a matter of a fact if it were mine and I read comments like yours I would consider walking away because you have no respect for them, their time, their efforts, or their software. They hove no obligation to support this at all for any reason weather you like it or not. The fact is though they do support it very well with these forums and in almost all cases very quick replies. Just because you are not getting the support that you want does not make this application any less useful.

Lets just drop it and agree to disagree, you have your opinion that contradicts just about everything you have said, and everyone else has theirs. The mere fact that not a single other person has come to your defense in this thread tells me that either we are all dumb and don’t get it or you are and don’t. Get it into your head that searching is important but it is not the all encompassing, make or break that you think it is. If you feel that strongly about it you have a couple of choices, pay to have it done or wait for the developers to do it in their own time. They owe us nothing, o, zilch, not one red dime. This is free open source software with no warranty and no support implied or otherwise. On the other hand we owe them a lot and I have to go back to what I said to you in a previous post. The searching capabilities are still good enough to see that you have not contributed to the project. Until you do you don’t have a leg to stand on demanding that your requests be taken into consideration. Donate to the cause and my guess is that your requests will carry more weight and will be acted on sooner. Until then you will have to wait or just go away.

Sorry for sounding so blunt but your whole premise for this thread and most of what you have said is just plain silly.

Post edited by: rick, at: 2006/02/12 20:18

Well thanks for the rant mate... you are making a complete public pigs ear of yourself really by resorting to such a silly schoolboy tone... let's give it a go shall I er...

nya nyu nya to you boo hoo.. is that how this goes???

My friend (well potentially...) If you you had bothered to really read what I am saying rather than getting all puffed up and humpy then you would have noticed that I have quite frequently praised this software for being what it is.

Will you please take a deep breath in, or go for a long run around the block, or have a cold shower or something, then have a really good read and you will find my praise. ok?

Have you found it yet?

If you had also read my threads properly you would notice that I have offered to pay a software programmer good money to produce the advanced search I need, and have asked that this is made available to the community. I haven't got a lot of money, but what I have got, I am donating to this project to try and get this much needed and much missed utility.

I will state again, and it is NOT silly (of course I would say that wouldn't i?) This software produces a categorised database of users which can't be searched. A database that can't be searched, is to my mind a car without wheels. The whole point of having a database made available to the public is that it is searchable.

I have had frequent queries about this from many of my users, it is not just me

Can you tell me what else this is?

You say this is stand alone software. ER... so it runs without Joomla/Mambo???? I don't think so...

I also notice that the forums are full of requests for this function. Have you read them?

Several people are in the process of actually producing something. If I can persuade someone to take up my offer then I am pretty sure this community will be grateful. I am putting my money where my mouth is.

When you have calmed down... please read my threads carefully will you? and I would appreciate some grown up communication if you don't mind ... we are all grown ups here, so behave like one.

I think you know in your deepest grown up heart, that it is highly unlikely you, or I are actually silly?


thanks


achintya


rick wrote:

achintya,

I don't think you are getting the point. It does not matter weather the core software is business oriented or paid for or anything else. Just because CB is part of it does not have any effect in any way as to how it is produced, distributed, licensed, or supported. It is its on software with its own developers that are giving of their own free time. It is up to them if they support it at all.

To be honest I really get sick of people that get something for free then expect personalized support for every little thing that "THEY' think is important. This whole thread started off with the idea that CB is like a car without wheels. Since you started this thread that may be so for you, but for the hundreds or even thousands of us that use it, support it, and find it very useful it definitely has wheels, an engine, and a very sleek design. You your self have admitted that that you use it on your own sites so I think that you are very disingenuous in your thoughts about this application. A car without wheel is useless and this application is far from useless.

Bottom line is if the whole bunch of people that put this together decided to walk away tomorrow there is nothing that you or I could do about it. As a matter of a fact if it were mine and I read comments like yours I would consider walking away because you have no respect for them, their time, their efforts, or their software. They hove no obligation to support this at all for any reason weather you like it or not. The fact is though they do support it very well with these forums and in almost all cases very quick replies. Just because you are not getting the support that you want does not make this application any less useful.

Lets just drop it and agree to disagree, you have your opinion that contradicts just about everything you have said, and everyone else has theirs. The mere fact that not a single other person has come to your defense in this thread tells me that either we are all dumb and don’t get it or you are and don’t. Get it into your head that searching is important but it is not the all encompassing, make or break that you think it is. If you feel that strongly about it you have a couple of choices, pay to have it done or wait for the developers to do it in their own time. They owe us nothing, o, zilch, not one red dime. This is free open source software with no warranty and no support implied or otherwise. On the other hand we owe them a lot and I have to go back to what I said to you in a previous post. The searching capabilities are still good enough to see that you have not contributed to the project. Until you do you don’t have a leg to stand on demanding that your requests be taken into consideration. Donate to the cause and my guess is that your requests will carry more weight and will be acted on sooner. Until then you will have to wait or just go away.

Sorry for sounding so blunt but your whole premise for this thread and most of what you have said is just plain silly.

Post edited by: rick, at: 2006/02/12 20:18

I can see your point, and it must make a difference when there is no money changing hands, which is why I am bothering to put up some money to try and support a programmer to do this advanced search.

I have also asked that this is made available to the community in due course.

Hopefully this will start of a trend for people making donations so that the users of CB can feel inspired to continue in good spirit.

I also made an original donation to Mambo Joe when the software first came out.

Again, hopefully this helped.

I guess at the end of the day money does have quite a big effect on things? Whoever, we are.

But I am also quite involved with plenty of businesses and organisations who pay me 'in kind' and do not involve themselves in money, and whether money is or is not involved, my experience is that customer care and all the other business things commercial people hold up as important, still matter.

The absence of money does not lessen the need for customer care, or end-user care.

Anyway, time for tea. I have enjoyed chatting.


achintya





achintya




mikko wrote:

One thought I am having is this; A lot depends on the nature of the software and what else it is linked into.

My impression is that the people developing Joomla/Mambo are really listening to users, and making adjustments and improvements to the software as a consequence.

This is absolutely correct. The key difference is that the people behind Joomla are making money with it. It is a key complement to their business. This far I have not seen this happening here.

That is a lot of people buy full Joomla installations as professional sevices. The key people behind the project become thus preferred partners, or people making money become key developers.

It is very very different when you can make your living with the code you develop.

CB is produced for those people to use, ie, for the business sector relying on Joomla/Mambo for their customer networking and relationships. As such it is actually serving the Joomla/Mambo community, not just CB users. In fact it can ONLY be serving Joomla/Mambo users as without Joomla/Mambo there would be no CB anyway.

Still I fail to see where is the business with CB? That is, when do the developers get paid? If the core team did, the component would advance much rapidly. It is not that difficult to make the search functionality, for example.

My point here is that there is a profound and important business relationship happening when people use CB, because many people are using Mambo/Joomla in that way. They don't choose CB to have a mess around with different ways of presenting Client information, they are using it because they expect it to serve their needs.

I think quite a lot of people in this Forum, and elsewhere, have spotted some quite serious 'holes' in CB, one of which is the complete absence of any way of searching, except on the name field. Which is ludicrous, and totally out of step with how people are likely to want to use CB.

This amazes me totally! If that indeed was the case, some would have hired a programmer to make this thing. It is not that hard to do it. I am a business user, and our business made a considereable sum of money last year using CB as a key information system. Still, we take it "as is" and understand that it is not professionally developed or supported. Before spotting CB, I was prepared to pay a few thousands to get similar product.

Luckily it was easier to take this component, developed as hobby, and hack it to suit our needs.

I think that this thread is mainly about the differences between software that generates money for the developers and the kind that does not. When you annot financially apreciate the code you make, the incentives are lot less customer oriented.

-Mikko

achintya wrote:

Well thanks for the rant mate... you are making a complete public pigs ear of yourself really by resorting to such a silly schoolboy tone... let's give it a go shall I er...

nya nyu nya to you boo hoo.. is that how this goes???

I think it goes the other way around here

I haven't got a lot of money, but what I have got, I am donating to this project to try and get this much needed and much missed utility.

I saw your post at the joomlancers, nice. Something that you could do, is to collect more people so that you can meet the bid of 700€ for this funtion. I think that a lot of people wold agree to throw in a bit money for this.

A database that can't be searched, is to my mind a car without wheels. The whole point of having a database made available to the public is that it is searchable.

There are several highly successful databases that do not have search functionalities. Examples include several file systems, object databases, embedded databases. Data base can be usefull without search.

The purpose of the component (this far) has been to give "face and personality" to registered users. And it does this quite well.

You say this is stand alone software. ER... so it runs without Joomla/Mambo???? I don't think so...

This is not what Rick meant. What he meant was that the software is an independent project, not tied to Joomla as project.

The differences between this one and Joomla are:
-people in joomla core are most likely professionals that use joomla to make business
-mambo has been developed commercially and hosted by a company for years until the resent fork between joomla and mambo
-CMS is a main stream application, so the business opportunity is lot bigger. Communities are kind of a niche compared to that.
-There are third party professionals for Joomla

Even though joomla is developed professionally, that does not mean that this component is, or needs to be.

-Mikko