Fascinating thread. I came here from
the new GemX discount thread and was intrigued enough to download and install DO.
From the thread and website, I would have to say that it is looking a bit like endoflife ware trying to wring the last bit of cash out of the embers of their remaining energy. I saw no sign on the website that the current (apparently reduced) prices were a sale or available for a limited period. I did notice that the 60 day trial only licensed it for 6 days; I've sent them an email, and it will be interesting to see if I get a response.
I do have a lot of experience of developers going missing in action (as we all do). Frequently terminally, sometimes in spasms. Seems to happen to payware, shareware and freeware alike. I do have a certain amount of sympathy; overall income is frequently not that great and never guaranteed, real work is needed to keep things going, and when real life (in any form) intrudes it is the program, its support or community that has to give. I assume that it is the desire and hope that things can be got back on track tomorrow/next week and reluctance to accept or make public the truth that causes the lack of communication. I'm not sure that big companies are really any better, and still remember my irritation when Informix abandoned Wingz.
vizacc's comments on libraries etc really reflects my own (indirect) experience. It seems to me that a lot of programmers start to run into a deadend when their programming environment stops developing as needed and they have to spend more and more of their time trying to code around the deficiencies of their environment/libraries. They really need to start again from scratch, but quite a few years have been sunk into what they have, the program has got very complex in its current incarnation, they have lost the initial buzz and energy, real life has reduced the time available and the community is probably bugging them for improvements. I think Tranglos' description of why he stopped with Keynote is a good description of a situation that many developers end up in.
Of the programs mentioned here, quite a long time ago now, it is interesting to see that Nighthawk is still not out, that Helpmaker 8 is still not out (still development in 7.3 though), and that Yagoon Time/Calimanjaro seems to have been endoflife ware for a long time. SQLnotes, of course, proceeds apace.
In this thread, I notice a lot of enthusiasm for DO as a vision and a lot of references to its being buggy and the bugs not being tackled. Most people seemed to be saying that they were moving away from it because of the lack of support or future rather than the bugs though. A few people said they'd keep on using it because it worked well enough and there was nothing else like it. Having a quick look, I can see the attraction. I certainly would not risk long-term data in it, but I can see that it does a lot of things and might help me not have to use Outlook. It would not replace TreeDBnotes or TheBat! or ToDoList, though it might do instead of Calimanjaro. The lack of development does not really bother me if the program works well enough now; I'm quite used to working around bugs (though the loss of the bug reports that must have been available in the Forum is a sacrilege in my view) and despite all the programs I have, I probably don't have a question for support from anyone more than once a year or so.
Of course, I would need more than 6 days to try it out
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(even though it isn't that much similar.. lol
)
-jgpaiva (July 02, 2008, 01:18 PM)
). License code arrived almost immediately. Still haven't had a response to my email about the 6 day trial. Still haven't managed to exchange info with my PDA (though DO can tell me the OS & battery state 
).
