End users are cheaper than testers until they fill your site with negative reviews and no one else will buy the product. Unless, of course, you fix the bugs from the initial release and re-release under a different name.
I had a TRS80-3 and -4. How well I remember…. Some of the Model 3’s object code would run on the Model 4, but often it had to be patched. This was usually easy. The M3’s Assembler would run on an M4 with only a couple of patches, and the user source code could be diddled to deal with the larger M4 screen.
(The M4 Assembler was a great product – within the limits of vastly different library modules and object code, the overall function was very close to what IBM released with their System/3 and System/34. Great training aid.)
However, back to topic, an uncle of my wife’s was running a lumber yard using RS’ packaged accounting and order-handling software on a M3, with the $5,000 external HD.
Ran like a bandit until Tandy released an OS upgrade that killed the whole thing. It took me about three hours to fix the mess…. Prior to the upgrade, the Basic would allow you to open and close individual files as necessary – all kinds of good reasons to do that. After the upgrade, if you closed ONE file, they would ALL close. The fix was in finding out what other files were open (active), and where the program was working in those files. Then open them back up and reset the pointers.
I told the uncle to bill ’em for $300 or so, but he declined. I got Thanksgiving Dinner out of the deal, but would have gotten that anyway…. Oh well….
(I’ve got a couple of M100’s here, too. Expensive toys, but I knew a tech writer who got some serious mileage out of one as a portable WP.)
LeoAutodidact over 10 years ago
I remember the Software for The TRS-80 Model 3 and the Radio Shack Color Computer that was “Marketed” like this.
There was even a Customer Magazine every month with Bug Fixes and Patches to type in.
jbarnes over 10 years ago
End users are cheaper than testers until they fill your site with negative reviews and no one else will buy the product. Unless, of course, you fix the bugs from the initial release and re-release under a different name.
sbwertz over 10 years ago
it’s called the bleeding edge of technology LOL
SMMAssociates over 10 years ago
Leo:
I had a TRS80-3 and -4. How well I remember…. Some of the Model 3’s object code would run on the Model 4, but often it had to be patched. This was usually easy. The M3’s Assembler would run on an M4 with only a couple of patches, and the user source code could be diddled to deal with the larger M4 screen.
(The M4 Assembler was a great product – within the limits of vastly different library modules and object code, the overall function was very close to what IBM released with their System/3 and System/34. Great training aid.)
However, back to topic, an uncle of my wife’s was running a lumber yard using RS’ packaged accounting and order-handling software on a M3, with the $5,000 external HD.
Ran like a bandit until Tandy released an OS upgrade that killed the whole thing. It took me about three hours to fix the mess…. Prior to the upgrade, the Basic would allow you to open and close individual files as necessary – all kinds of good reasons to do that. After the upgrade, if you closed ONE file, they would ALL close. The fix was in finding out what other files were open (active), and where the program was working in those files. Then open them back up and reset the pointers.
I told the uncle to bill ’em for $300 or so, but he declined. I got Thanksgiving Dinner out of the deal, but would have gotten that anyway…. Oh well….
(I’ve got a couple of M100’s here, too. Expensive toys, but I knew a tech writer who got some serious mileage out of one as a portable WP.)