Moving a File

[Dave]

On 7 Mar 2007, at 14:06, Marielle Lange wrote:

> Hi Dave,
>
>> Are you seriously telling us that you believe that the way that  
>> the "rename" works is a good way to implement a "rename" function  
>> in a high level programming environment aimed at novice programers?
>
> I don't disagree with the criticisms being made. I fully agree that  
> more consistent naming conventions should be adopted. I also agree  
> that if a function is introduced that bears the same name as a  
> function very familiar to users, then the same behavior should be  
> implemented to avoid confusions.

Good then we are in agreement, however your post did not say that.

> However, what I know from my own life experience is that if you  
> give as feedback to a person (or company in this context) that they  
> are completely incompetent... do it again and again... and you will  
> be confirmed in your belief.

I have never said they are completely incompetent, nor I do I believe  
they are completely incompetent. I have never even mentioned the word  
on this list before yesterday and I only mentioned it then and I only  
mention it now because it was used in reply to one of my posts.

If people think that I am implying or stating outright that RunRev is  
incompetent then they are mistaken. All I did was to state what I had  
found and make suggestions on how it should be improved.

> They have set up a quality center as well as a Beta exercise that  
> directly involves any user who wish to participate. Bill is putting  
> a lot of his time and effort into this. What I heard from  
> Revolution (Marcus, who I met at the last user group in Edinburgh)  
> is that his work is highly valued and put to good use to try and  
> kill bugs one by one.

That's great. But why do you feel the need to tell me this? I just  
commented on what I saw as a nasty flaw in the system. I really can't  
understand why people get so upset when I (or others) point out  
things that are wrong with RunRev. It's just a piece of code! If it  
didn't exist then the Sun would keep on shining and the the Moon  
wouldn't fall out of orbit! Why defend something that is obviously  
flawed? When I made this suggestion, you posted:

>> I expect you to tell me: If this is that simple, why didn't they  
>> code it like this? Because sometimes you want the ability to  
>> overwrite the file without an error to be thrown. The  
>> responsibility to check for file existence is therefore left to  
>> the programmer so to give him more flexibility.

Which is obviously dismissing the problem and making it sound like I  
am wasting my time by posting my suggestions and warnings on the  
list. Then when I explain more fully, I am accused of calling them  
"completely incompetent"!

> Something that has been said from time to time is that an important  
> problem they have is that the code as it is written for now hasn't  
> been written in a way that allow for easy tracking and bashing of  
> the bugs. Because of this, they have to go through important  
> rewrite and reorganisation of the code, at engine level (well, you  
> will have to ask somebody more knowledgeable than me for details).  
> They have been working on this, in parallel to these partial bug  
> fixes and XP release. Only a part of their team works on bug fixes  
> while the other part of the team works on 2.9.
>
> Many criticisms you made are valid. However, as far as I can tell,  
> they are doing the right thing.

All I know is that it has been well over three years and still the  
old bugs are there while at the same time the level of support has  
dropped and the price has risen. There have been so many promises  
made, like I seem to remember that 2.7 was going to be the one true  
release, we are now on 2.8 and still the bugs are there. In short  
they have broken too many promises for me to trust them very much  
now. That is not to say that I think their product is all bad, in  
fact I think it's a very good product else I wouldn't use it and I  
certainly wouldn't waste my time posting to this list. I am willing  
to change my mind and as soon as they start delivering on their  
promises then I will become more positive. Do you really think I  
enjoy finding out that the "rename" command deletes files with not a  
word of warning in the docs? For one, I recommended the sale of the  
2.8 license I am using for the current project. If one of the people  
here starts to use RunRev, uses "rename" and deletes 300 GB worth of  
data, who do you think this will reflect on? Because of all the silly  
bugs and inconsistencies like this I have to spend a lot of extra  
time checking and rechecking critical functions (such as this one). I  
found that it deletes files and now I can warn anyone here that may  
need to "rename" files to use my utility function instead. I thought  
to post it on the list so anyone in a similar position could act now  
and perhaps save face or a file or two!!!

I don't know if they are doing the right thing or not, I hope they  
are, but from first hand experience I am not counting on it.

> As I have evidence that they are doing the right thing and that the  
> reports filled in the quality center are processed and acted upon,  
> it wouldn't be the best use of my time to clarify on this list what  
> I think of that rename function

But you did in your last post.

> or the absence of warning in the doc on this list.  If you enter a  
> report in the quality center and provide the link to it on this  
> list, I will take the time to comment it... on the quality center.  
> You may  have the happy surprise to discover that most users on  
> this list in fact approve of the content of many of your comments.

I think that RunRev is in general a good product. I also think that  
RunRev as a company is generally good at the development work and in  
coming up with new ideas. I also think RunRev as a company is  
terrible at:

1.  QA.
2.  Release control.
3.  Developer/Customer relations.
4.  Support.

You say that this is changing, well I hope you are right. I will  
believe it when I see it!

All the Best
Dave