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Sometimes the trip is as interesting as the destination. This program has now evolved into it's fifth generation, and as always, developing this latest version was by far the most interesting experience
One of the healthy changes in personal computing is the improved mobility offered - both in location and in connectivity. The development of the Desktop and Pocket Sales Manager products certainly has taken advantage of mobility. Large pieces of this application were developed in various home/virtual offices. Other locations included a 35' Beneteau sailboat named Wind Some on Lake Travis near Austin Texas, the awesome libraries of University of Texas (Life Sciences Library and Architectural Library), President Lyndon B. Johnson's Library and the LBJ School of Public Affairs, Schlotzsky's corporate headquarters, Leroy and Ruth Kimmel's kitchen in Portland Oregon, various American, America West, Southwest, Delta, and Continental flights, airports and hotels in Austin, Atlanta, Phoenix, Portland, Washington DC, London, San Diego, Boston, Chicago, various un-named American Airlines Admiral's Clubs, the University of Texas Club, the homes of Rod Kimmel and Glyn Meek, Peter and Eileen Goldberg's house in Havant England, a hotel in Prague, an old Railway Hotel in Sheffield England, various Mozarts, Starbucks, Pashas, Ciscos, La Madeleines, and most assuredly the odd Texas bar-room or perhaps even two.
The application was developed using Microsoft's latest technology - their .NET Framework and Visual Studio. The on-line Help files were created with a collection of tools - Help & Manual, FrontPage, DreamWeaver, Word for Windows and some screen capture programs. Certainly this application would be less powerful without all of these tools.
Sympathetic co-conspirators along the way include (but are not limited to) Sandra and Oliver Meek, Nancy, Max and Sam Kimmel, Lisa Barlow, Paul Weyland, Jef Richards, Terry Jones, Rob Solomon, Chris Greta, Gordon Gallagher, Richard Marshall, Ryan DiDomizio (and all the Los Chevys band members), Roger Hatch, and Fred Klingensmith. No animals were harmed during the creation of this product, but one golden retriever named Abigail's infinite patience and good humor were thoroughly tested, and one very sweet, aging labrador named Augie sat patiently waiting for her dinner on a few occasions during a particularly hairy debugging session or two.
Peace and joy...may your god go with you.
The Testers
...and before we forget, we would like to say a special word of thanks to our beta testing group. Developing any kind of software is an art not a science, and bringing any kind of commercial software product to market is an immense challenge that requires so much more than just 'writing code'. Developers are always to close to the trees to see the forest, and so we rely on independent testers with no axe to grind and no interest in deadlines, to test the living heck out of software so that they can find as many bugs as possible so that the rest of us don't have to.
In the release of Version 5, we managed to recruit a wonderful team of patient individuals to help us in testing and we would like to acknowledge their time and efforts and express our undying gratitude. The beta team was as follows:
Bob Serafini Pharos Scientific Inc.
Donald McDougall Marshall & Stevens
Allen Sanders Associated Mortgage
Steven Jones Write2Data LLC/PortNexus
Charlie Weaver Solutions Plus, Inc
Wayne Robinson HP Solution Sales /C/O/M/P/U/T/E/C/H/
and a special thanks to our most prodigious "finder of errors" with whom we had many late night email conversations about the therapeutic values of good Rum and good Whisky...
Skip Willis Consultant to the Land Survey and GIS Industries