Icetips Blog

I apologize for the very long time without blog posts and a very quiet first quarter of 2012 from Icetips! No, it hasn't exactly been quiet time for us

After CIDC 2011 I spent quite a bit of time working on product updates that were subsequently sent out to beta testers. My goal was to start releasing new updates and couple of new products in mid to late January and was trying to get as much done as I could before I started pushing things out.

Well, that didn't quite work out as planned. Around the middle of January my main development computer started flaking out. At first it looked like the main drive was going bad, so I got a new drive. That looked like working until the day after I got it done, I could no longer boot the computer. At that point I couldn't get into the BIOS setup so I suspected the motherboard was dead. Decided to get a new motherboard and CPU for it. Got that set up and got Windows 7 installed on the new drive. Everything looked good. Installed the NVIDIA graphic card that I bought last summer and everything seemed to work fine, until about 10 minutes after Windows 7 booted, the monitors went blank and the computer turned off couple of minutes later. I replaced the video card and I finally had a working machine again – with everything replaced except the power-supply, which I had replaced last summer along with the video card to try to eliminate the flicker in Clarion 8, as well as the DVD drive.

On the plus side I have basically a brand new machine with an ASUS P8 P67-M Pro motherboard and Intel i5-2500K quad core CPU and stuffed with 16GB of ram. It runs very, very nicely On the negative side, all this messing about had taken almost 3 weeks!

Oh, and in the meantime the power-supply in my server was flaking out so I had to replace that as well. A bit later my old development computer starting having issues, but that was fixed by doing some cleanup on the drives and in the registry. And in the meantime I had to go on antibiotics for a stomach infection – always fun!!!

When I had finally got my main machine back up and running I got a call from a long time client who needed some data conversion done ASAP as well as some programming - urgently - is it ever any other way? Well, it started out as a one week project that ended ended up taking just over three weeks. At that point all my schedule for the first quarter of 2012 was completely shot!

For the past month I have been playing catchup with the various projects I have been working on and had to leave when things went haywire in January. I also decided to re-organize the office and that took about a week but it came out really nice and works much better for us

Sue has been very busy as well. Last year she took on a conference manager job for the Association of Software Professionals - ASP. The conference, ISVCon will be in Reno Nevada, July 13-15, 2012. For more information please look at http://www.isvcon.org. The ISVCon is for ISVs (Independent Software Vendors) who market their products on the internet. The goal is helping ISVs learn about marketing and sales. Sue also went back to school last week and is now studying at the Peninsula College in Port Angeles and she is going for a 4 year bachelor degree in business management.

Right now I am working on getting a new product out the door. It will be released to beta testers this week and since it's fairly simple I expect it to be released very soon after that. There is a new build of the Utilities coming out later this month, mostly added documentation.

Releases of Magic Locks, Outlookbar, Powertoolbar, Xplore and Taskpanel will follow in late April and May. Build Automator 2.0 will be released in the second quarter (Q2) as well, probably towards the end of it.

I will blog in more detail about the schedule once I have the new product out to testers and I've had a chance to inhale and figure out what's next.

Make sure that you follow us on Twitter and Facebook as well as I often post short comments there about what is going on.

We at Icetips are happy to reveal some major changes in our website as well as in our subscriptions along with the re-release of our Xplore Browse Templates!

• NEW! Icetips "Solo" Product Subscriptions
• Re-release of Xplore Browse Template
• Icetips website: Massive update
• Arnor / Icetips at CIDC
• Freebies

SOLO PRODUCT SUBSCRIPTIONS

You can now buy any Icetips product by itself, as a "Solo" subscription. The cost for each Solo Subscription is $99 for any Gold Subscription product and $49 for any Silver Subscription product. Included with each Solo Subscription is one year of support and updates, and low-cost renewal option at the end of a year. You can add Solo Subscriptions to your Gold or Silver Subscriptions at any time in case you need an additional licenses for a single product. You can mix Gold and Silver products any way you want. For example if you have a Silver Subscription you can purchase one or more Gold Solo products in addition. Each Solo Subscription has its own expiration date independent of any Gold or Silver Subscription you may have.

However, if you will use 3 or more Icetips products, you might save money by buying a Gold or Silver Subscription, rather than buying the products individually. Now, the choice is yours!

For more information about the Solo Subscriptions, please see http://www.icetips.com/solo-subscription.php

RE-RELEASE XPLORE BROWSE TEMPLATE

The Xplore Browse Template, an extension to standard ABC browses (now compatible with Clarion 7 and 8), has been updated and re-released. The Xplore Browse Template adds functionality to the standard ABC Clarion browse, including header-click sorting, on-the-fly filtering, hiding/unhiding columns, exporting, printing, and more. Documentation has been completely rewritten and is included as 65 page PDF and also in both CHM and .hlp formats. Documentation can also be accessed online at http://www.icetips.com/manuals/xplore/index.html if you want to check it out.

The Xplore Browse Template is included in your Icetips Gold & Silver Subscriptions, and is also available as a solo product subscription for just $49. For more information, please see http://www.icetips.com/xplore.php

ICETIPS WEBSITE: MASSIVE UPDATE

The Icetips website has a massive update, with the content and organization of every page updated and improved, and changes in the order processing, as well. The website's primary graphic elements have remained the same, such as the header and logo images, but there have been small graphic tweaks, like a shaded right column, enhanced login box, updated menu styling, new buttons, etc. You'll also see testimonials from happy customers showing up in the right column on some pages.

Order processing has undergone a few changes. Renewal processing has been completely automated, and renewals will be activated immediately. Build Automator licenses and Maintenance Plans are still processed manually and will be emailed to you separately. There are discounts easily available for multiple copy purchases of Gold Subscriptions (for multiple copy discounts on solo subscriptions, please contact us). And we have a new credit card processing company, FastSpring, whose modern system and fantastic support have helped us implement these changes.

Some of the biggest updates, though, are in the content. The Home page content is all new, we've added an About page, and all the Product pages have been completely rewritten and redesigned. They have better information, clearer organization and new, updated graphics. Most other pages have been redesigned to make them easier to use. The home page has a dynamic list of all the latest product releases and blog entries for an easy overview of what we are doing. Every page has a "Share" button where you can share comments about the page with your friends on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google, Yahoo and multiple other social media sites

Sue gets credit for all the designs but I worked on the programming. We hope the new website will work well for you and we appreciate any feedback you can give us! If you run into any problems with the website, please contact us as soon as possible!

ARNOR / ICETIPS AT CIDC

I will be in Orlando, Florida at CIDC, September 26-28. You should be able to find me at a table in the Solutions Room most of the time. I will be there to answer any questions you may have about Icetips products, help you with implementation, or just shoot the breeze. Please stop by and say hello.

FREEBIES

CIDC: We will have a special software freebie for CIDC attendees, so be sure and stop by the Icetips table in the Solutions Room to get your copy.

ANNIVERSARY PRESENT: Icetips' 10-year-anniversary of being in business is coming up at the end of this month. We wouldn't be here without our valued customers. To show our appreciation, we have a little something special for you! All Icetips customers should look for an email at the end of September with a little gift enclosed.

Arnor Baldvinsson