Hey Robert, We'd love to blog about stuff like that; there are plenty of good reasons to do so: it satisfies people's curiosity, it sends out a clear signal that you care about your products and the people who use them, and on top of that, it's good marketing by doing both the above and driving traffic to your product website.
The only downside is that it takes a lot of time to author good content. I'd love to publish more, and we probably should. We've had good intentions to do so ever since we started Sofa, but somehow there's almost always something on the to-do list that seems more important. We've been pushing ourselves recently to write more on the Sofa blog, and I'm sure Versions-related stuff will come up every now and then over there. So, aside from saying that you're completely right and that we'll try to write more about what's going on: no promises. ;) - Dirk On Apr 28, 2:42 pm, Robert Kosara <rkos...@gmail.com> wrote: > TL;DR > ;) > > But seriously, that was interesting. I understand that you don't want to > discuss what you're working on, but it can still be frustrating not to hear > anything for a long time. Look at it this way: we care enough about this > product that we want to know what's going to happen next, to the point that > some of us start complaining ;) > > Some other developers have a blog where they don't directly discuss what > they're working on, but what kinds of issues they encounter, etc. So if you > write about "problems you might encounter when trying to interoperate with > svn 1.6" (or even issues when switching using the command-line tools), > that's not directly saying "it's coming" or "we'll release it on April 29th > at 5pm EDT" - it just means you're looking into it, and it feeds people's > hunger for information. > > Same with new features. Maybe you have a cryptic sketch, or you tried > something that turned out not to work so well; when you post those, you give > people something to look at without giving away what's really coming. > > Robert > > On Tue, Apr 28, 2009 at 7:56 AM, Dirk Stoop <d...@madebysofa.com> wrote: > > > Dear Ganesh, > > > I understand that we might send out mixed signals by engaging in some > > conversations, but not openly discussing all of our plans. The below > > is not meant as an attack on what you just posted, but as a > > clarification of our point of view to whomever is interested in it. > > I've tried to keep this concise, sorry in advance for failing at > > that. ;) > > > The purpose of this google group, from our perspective, is to provide > > a forum for people who use Versions to have an open dialogue with each > > other and with us. > > > People in our development team will primarily post to this group when > > they feel they are most suited to address a question or concern posted > > here. The community of Versions users is immensely important to us, > > but Versions is not an open source project. Our primary > > responsibility – one we take very seriously – is to provide you all > > with an application that is *and continues to be* a pleasure to use. > > Listening to concerns, engaging in dialogue about where Versions is > > headed, and continuously improving the app are all part of that > > responsibility. Providing a detailed account of what we are working > > on and when exactly we plan to ship the fruits of our labor is not. > > > It is understandable when someone mistakes our silence about what > > exactly we are working on for an indication that we are not working on > > anything, but it is kind of a stretch. Remember Versions 1.0? We > > added a bunch of new features in that release (Auto-refresh, change > > badges, Info pane, etc.) that we had not discussed anywhere in public > > before. That's more or less indicative of how we, and a bunch of > > other commercial software companies work: We listen to feedback, > > engage in conversation, then lock ourselves up in our offices to come > > up with the best way to mix a variety of feature requests with the > > direction we want to take the application into, and when we have > > something to show for that work, we show it. > > > Work on SVN 1.6 support started as soon as 1.6 was – in our opinion – > > stable enough to actually start work on integrating it, quite a while > > before people started asking about it over here. There was no > > reluctancy in working out how to integrate 1.6 in Versions, only > > reluctancy in knowingly releasing a new build of Versions that > > introduced significant new problems – the ones Koen described in his > > post that started this thread – all of which are directly due to > > issues in SVN 1.6. Releasing an update to Versions that includes SVN > > 1.6 will result in a lot of people who don't necessarily need 1.6 > > right now to switch from 1.5 to 1.6, simply because it's the "latest > > and greatest" and it's just a click away. > > > We prefer not to release broken things, hence the reluctancy to just > > ship it and the 'solution' of posting a beta here. There's no such > > thing as "for people to use at their own risk" when your business > > relies to a large extent on people recommending your products to > > others, but by only posting the build here, at least people who get it > > will know where to come to learn more about any problems they might > > run into. > > > I don't agree with, but respect your opinion that the changes in > > 1.0.4b are underwhelming. It's a 1.0.x update, not a 1.x update, so > > yes, it is intended as a maintenance release, one that focusses on > > fixing bugs. Like we mentioned before on several occasions in this > > group, we are working on new features and bigger improvements too. > > For this release, taking care of a bunch of annoying bugs was more > > important to us, because those prevent people from using the > > application for its advertised purpose and feature set. Of the two > > ways we could make Versions more useful, we chose to prioritize on > > reliability first, new features are great too, but they had to wait. > > > Please keep telling us what you expect from us, especially when you > > feel that we're not living up to it. > > > I hope I've given a bit more insight in how we work. > > > Thanks and sorry again for the rant :) > > - Dirk > > > On Apr 28, 8:41 am, Alberto Ganesh Barbati <albertobarb...@gmail.com> > > wrote: > > > On 27 Apr, 22:36, Koen Bok <k...@madebysofa.com> wrote: > > > > > Exactly. Although these 1.6 issues are eating more time then we would > > > > like :-/ > > > > Up to version 1.0.3 you always released at least one version a month. > > > Now almost five months have passed since then and you come out with a > > > beta with a very unimpressive list of changes. You are blaming SVN 1.6 > > > about that, while you apparently started to work on it reluctantly and > > > only after significant pressure from the user base in the last month. > > > With all due respect, I am a bit worried. I am happy with Versions, > > > but I am starting to wonder whether significant development is still > > > ongoing or it has already reached "maintenance mode". > > > > Ganesh --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Versions" group. 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