Month: March 2022

Tech Support #2 (Mar 28)

Last week, a user asked about training videos. The answer is: yep, that is the plan. Videos will replace the hands-on training classes that we gave for many years, covering our estimating/accounting software. Here’s more background on that.

During the 1990s, TurtleSoft offered about 150 classes. They were in 31 out of 50 states, plus a few in Canada. Classes covered MacNail estimating software in the morning, then accounting software in the afternoon. I personally taught 90% of them. Attendance varied from a few to over 50 users.

When Goldenseal came out in 2000, we also had classes for that. However, attendance was much lower. The software was easier to use, so fewer people wanted hands-on training. Classes became serious money-losers, so we ended them in 2012.

Besides the travel costs, a big problem with the hands-on classes was the single-day format. It was a huge amount of info. No human brain can absorb that much detail in a day. By 2 PM, most people were totally glazed over. It became a room full of zombies.

As a substitute, we looked into making training tapes. Unfortunately, back then they required a professional videographer. It took 20+ hours of filming and tape splicing to get one hour of finished product. Our user base wasn’t big enough to justify the cost to produce, duplicate and mail out videotapes.

These days, the process has become so much easier. Last year I shot a dozen short movies on a smartphone, to help sell my house. One tour per room. Most needed just one or two takes. Editing was simple. So were the uploads to YouTube.

So, we soon will whip out short how-to videos for the new accounting software. How to get started. How to pay a vendor. How to reconcile a checkbook. If we chop six hours of classes into five minute segments, that’s about 70 different clips. They’ll be easy to find via our website or search engines.

I miss the classes. Teaching is kind of fun. But, showing an app in front of a group of people is a magnet for software bugs. Most classes had at least one show up. They were embarrassing, but otherwise a good thing. Software testing is boring, so every bug catch is greatly appreciated. It’s better that we find them, rather than users.

Aside from the learning and testing, the classes were also a great way to get all sorts of useful feedback. I learned a lot about regional construction quirks, and met many interesting people.

Maybe we can find some other excuse to travel and meet folks.

Meanwhile, we’ll still have website pages for more specific tech problems. Most only need some 1/2/3 instructions. Hopefully it won’t be too hard to translate the existing Goldenseal support pages to the new app. It’s the same basic stuff, only with buttons instead of menu commands. Most of the work will be redoing screen shots with the new appearance.

The Answers button on our website will link to all types of help: videos, web pages, pdf downloads.

Dennis Kolva
Programming Director
TurtleSoft.com

Tech Support & Manuals (Mar 21)

As our staff gets closer to finishing the new accounting software, it’s time to start thinking about release details. We will make some big tech support changes.

TurtleSoft started in 1987 with Excel templates for construction estimating. Later we added accounting. The software started out for use in our own construction company. It worked OK, but it was pretty rough at first.

As sales accelerated, our staff gradually learned how to design better software, and how to be a software business. A big part of that was phone support. Early users averaged more than two hours of phone time apiece. Partly because the interface wasn’t great. Partly because the first manual sucked. Partly because everyone was new to computers back then, so everything was confusing. A lot of the support was about Excel or hardware basics.

For a while I took all the phone calls, often while at job sites. As sales volume increased, we needed to hire support staff. It was a disaster. Training took about a month, then most folks burned out a month or two later.

Tech support is hard work. Nearly always, callers are frustrated and confused. Sometimes they are angry and impatient. Staff can’t see their screens, and often have to guess at the actual problem. It can be very draining. Good customer support requires patience, people skills, and technical competence. People who are good at it usually find more pleasant work that pays better.

After much turnover, we decided to only hire programmers, and have a support rotation. During the week, each of them spent a day or two on phone duties. There was one main support person (rotating), plus one more for roll-over calls. That worked better: most folks enjoyed the break from coding. However, it still was rare for anyone to last more than a year or two.

Eventually, we figured out how to write better tech manuals. That reduced call volume by half. Then, in 2000 we released Goldenseal accounting software. It had an easier interface, so support time decreased some more. Putting an Answers button on the website also helped.

Since then, most users have gradually switched over to emails instead of phone calls. Often they send screen shots: diagnosis is much easier that way. We can reply with a link to detailed instructions, including pictures.

Most other software companies have migrated from phone support to web + email. I think it’s time for TurtleSoft to follow their example, and end our free phone support. We will still give unlimited free support by email.

I have mixed feelings about the change. Talking directly to users often gives us useful feedback. It’s a good way to hear about bugs, locate unfriendly interface, and get ideas for new features. But, email has less emotional impact, and it’s easier to schedule. We publish a phone number for pre-purchase calls, so instant support is still available when it’s really needed.

For TurtleSoft Pro, we also will skip the printed manuals. The change is for similar reasons. Website support pages are easier to access, update and maintain. You can click to see related info. Paper does have some advantages, but not enough to justify the time it takes to produce a printed book. The TurtleSoft website is due for a major overhaul, and our time will be better spent on that.

Dennis Kolva
Programming Director
TurtleSoft.com

TurtleSoft Pro Progress (Mar 14)

Last week we started testing the new accounting software with our own company data.

It took a few days to fix all the bugs caused by rewriting the money and text classes. Most of the problems happened while moving data from the screen (text) into record storage (64-bit money values).

Oddly, the C++ standard library does not have good ways to convert text to numbers. Stack Overflow gives some work-arounds, but all have risks. We tried them anyhow, then gave up and rewrote the current Goldenseal code. It’s ugly and old-fashioned, but it works. The most recent C++ update adds better number formatting, so we can switch over to that when Qt supports it.

Next on the agenda was getting buttons and the rest of the interface to work. That means connecting Qt code to existing Goldenseal classes. The new app already showed records and saved changes. Now it also can add, duplicate, revert and delete records. Our staff is gradually working on the rest of the interface.

We also tried updating to the newest version of Qt (6.2). Version 6 is a major rewrite for them, but it’s still in beta. The conversion mostly worked OK, but it had a few mystery problems. So, we will stick with Qt 5.15 for a while. We can switch over when TurtleSoft Pro is ready to ship. With luck, their code will be more stable by then. Hopefully it also will run native on Mac M1 chips.

The new TurtleSoft interface is gradually coming into focus.

Last week we added a block at upper left, with room for 4 buttons. Still deciding what else to put there. All the commands in Goldenseal pull-down menus will be somewhere in the main window: either in the green bar across the top, or in the outline view on the left. It’s just a question of how best to organize everything.

Besides the main window, you also can use separate windows as in the current Goldenseal.

Still plenty left to do. Many small details to finish.

Dennis Kolva
Programming Director
TurtleSoft.com

Event Loops & Dialogs (Mar 4)

These days, computers are amazingly fast. They zip through a few billion instructions per second.

Computers also have a dirty secret. Most of that speed and power is wasted. The typical PC is just sitting on its butt, waiting for something to happen. It’s called an event loop. Did the mouse do anything? Nope. Any key clicks? Nope. System messages? Nada. Did the mouse do anything?…

The reason I mention this is because our staff has been working on dialogs. About 20 were concentrated in one file, so we did those first. The other 100 are scattered everywhere in the code.

The app has a main event loop that runs most things. But dialogs need their own event loop that takes over until you hit Cancel or OK. StDialogHandler was the CodeWarrior way to start the loop. Also the best search word to find dialogs in our code.

When we set up dialogs and windows for Goldenseal in the 90s and early 00s, most only took an hour or two. CodeWarrior had a drawing window to lay out the fields and text. Then we had to write prep work code, plus an event loop with more code inside. Once a few dialogs were finished, the rest could be made with copy/paste and some tweaking.

For TurtleSoft Pro, dialog setup is taking more than twice as long. We had the same problem with Cocoa a few years ago. It’s mostly because newer frameworks hide the event loop. You can run a dialog with just two lines of code, which sounds great. But it requires a control class somewhere else to do anything. That adds complexity, with code in three different places instead of one. Even worse, Qt makes it very hard to copy/paste layouts. Most need to be built from scratch.

Our staff has adapted. Many dialogs are now multi-purpose, covering several functions. Changing text and showing/hiding fields is easier than making a whole new dialog. We probably can whittle the current 119 down to 20 or 30.

After a week’s work, most of the dialogs are done. The ones that are unfinished are big and complicated. We probably can do without some of those, or redesign to make them simpler. The goal is to make the new interface less of a monster. KISS.

Testing TurtleSoft Pro on our own business is next on the agenda. Finally.

Dennis Kolva
Programming Director
TurtleSoft.com