compare Powerstore2/Powerstore3 features?

First off, the unchangeable title should read "Powerstore2/Powerstore3" but I could not change it. Nonetheless, it could still be a posed question if the release "process" is neither amended nor the documentation and details therein improved. Take this with a grain of salt. I am a 28 years in SQA (de-employed engineer thrown on the banker-run economy's scrapheap of valueless humanity. I detest feeling that from companies I am attracted to, so this has motivations that can be prominent but forgiven and apologized for if proven unsound.... So, the best intentions are laden with emotional fervor. Continue....

Comparing Powerstore to eCart fails miserably to describe what has actually changed as being a fix, an addition, and/or a modification. It tells me absolutely nothing about the difference between Powerstore2 and 3, and me being poorer for the loosely-defined "upgrade" process.

Frankly, as happened here and also with Roxio and Irislink, new releases come in just after a purchase of an old one is encouraged, and no mention is made during that sale process so that the infamous "Osborne Computer" scenario (where a pre-release "truthful" announcement faltered income from current products, killing the company's capital-flow) is not repeated 'for ONLY the seller'. What about my capital-flow; today, it flows out of me like an open and uncared-for wound.

The contract in Contract Law has two parties. While all humanity is privatized and vaulted away, we slay each other so that bankers may rejoice. That is a contract with mass suicide. It will kill "the company" as surely as it will kill "the customer". The banker will win with the death of either or both.

In the drive to bring in money to the company, the "customer" is sacrificed and in some cases intentionally or systemically, to and in the process. That's the exact opposite of the once referenced historical "the customer is right" model. A "gas station" in California, where you must get petroleum distillates all over your allergic hands to pump your own gas, once had a "service station" where your gas was pumped by an attendant (as still in Oregon), your windows were cleaned, your water and oil levels were checked, where the attendant knew how to read maps and give directions, etc.

There once was a quality assurance/testing department in the software process. Microsoft fixed that human frailty by denying responsibility to this enemy called "the customer". Attack! War! Deny plausibility. Limit liability to one year, then 90 days, then never. Charge extra for answering questions. Sorry, liability is law. So are contracts.

So, systemically, the "Big Lie" told over and over as if to make it sound and true, is that deceit, obfuscation, and posed questions necessarily must win out (as with the Kerry, Gore, and Hillary campaigns where "plants" and "spontaneously-unfiltered crowds and questions only reaffirmed the drivel and banality oozing from the candidates' puppet-mouth). And why? Because the folks who it protects know best and deserve that option. We are nothing "down here". Yep. We all take turns saying that Big Lie to ourselves and getting it from others. That is indeed the bullet fired in the engineered "war of all against all". Only those on the very top win. The rest of us just take turns bleeding.

I do hope that I am just missing the obscured view of truth here, that I have misperceived, that I have mis-looked for a much better "writing on the wall".

I called today at 8:28am (on a Tuesday) and there was not even a recorded message stating hours where support or queries could be given. Sending everything to a Forum, may make the queries "measurable" and cheaper to coral, but it is quite short of the concept of robust "customer support". I'm sure it's because the quality and support team is overloaded and expected to work 60-80 hour weeks to keep their job(s). Typical ploy!

Where then does all the extra cost of upgrading and paying extra to get basic bug fix releases go to? No doubt to a Porsche car payment and good medical insurance that covers actual health (versus drug pushing idiots from the John D. Rockefeller created AMA), and to pads on the beach and in the mountains. Ah yes, the good life stolen from the those creating wealth "at the bottom": the worker and the customer; these two interchangeable roles are our only "freedom" left.

I looked again for a downloadable, example-and-stepwise filled, single manualized PDF of Powerstore documentation, and found nothing!

I was sold, explicitly after inquiring of any current effort to work on a new release) Powerstore2. Two months later, Powerstore3! That tells me that I was NOT told the truth, or that the release was minimal.

Where are all the bug fix release (maintenance) version that should be free?!

In the software release cycle that is standard in the world of CMM, ISO, ACM, and IEEE, there is a M.m.u <M=major; m=minor; u=update) release cycle wherein between Major releases (2 to 3) you release fixes, promised but schedule-cut features, etc.). It is what an auto industry is held to. Look at all the recalls for every company all the time. Why is there a jump from a "major" to a "major" here? WHERE WERE 2.1, 2.2, 2.2.1, ETC.?

That warrants telling the truth about what is apparently a feature-weak or non-robust Powerstore3?!

Apparently, getting me to sign up for free upgrades that cost me even more money is a learned "marketing" trick from the folks who bring you promises in the multi-level-marketing world (renamed to "network marketing" to obscure the "pyramid scheme" scam).

Where is the comparison between Powerstore2 and Powerstore3?

Before I plop out another bloody sum of money I must know what changed besides the referencing to a number in a sales-and-marketing film?

Where is the contiguous printable documentation manual that should have been there for Powerstore3?
What exact bugs were fixed?
What exact features were added?

The software standards are sorely lacking and I am definitely miffed at how I am being treated just like the global bankers treat me, on a micro scale. I am open to effort made to explain, and am also able to release my anger.

That is a contract that requires both parties coming to the table of truth.

I anxiously await working links to documents and tables....

Thanks.

best wishes,
chris

As this is not a forum for political discussions, i'm going to only address the questions you have posted regarding PowerStore. I also updated the title for you.

  Where is the comparison between Powerstore2 and Powerstore3?  

Comparing the versions of any of our new products with their predecessor is easy. We list all new features at the top of the Features page for each product.
powerstore#features

  Comparing Powerstore to eCart fails miserably...  

There is no comparison to be made between the two products. eCart is a Dreamweaver extension that adds shopping cart functionality to a store, PowerStore is a pre-built online store. Both of these products do their own thing, and solve someone's needs differently.

  I looked again for a downloadable, example-and-stepwise filled, single manualized PDF of Powerstore documentation, and found nothing!  

All PowerStore documentation is found here: powerstore/.
If there is some documentation you are requiring that is not documented, you should ask your question here and get a response. Or, request that tutorial in the Wishlist forum here: forumdisplay.php?f=8

  What exact bugs were fixed?  

We address bugs in two different ways, we release dot releases of products when a series of fixes have been included, and when that is not possible, we release Known issues fixes for those products. Although they sometimes slip through the cracks, we aim to not have any bugs in our products, and we do our best to fix these bugs in their current versions. If there were any bugs in PowerStore 2, they should have been accommodated for in PowerStore 2, and fixed in PowerStore 3. If you are currently using PowerStore 2 and experiencing a bug, you should make sure we know about it.

  Apparently, getting me to sign up for free upgrades that cost me even more money is a learned "marketing" trick....  

Just to clarify, we do not have an offer available to any of our customers for signing up for free upgrades with our Solutions. Our Extension Library subscription program applies only to extensions.

  Before I plop out another bloody sum of money I must know what changed besides the referencing to a number in a sales-and-marketing film?  

I totally agree, you should review all the marketing before making a purchase. After reviewing, you then get to choose if there are new features available that you would purchase. If you determine that isn't the case, then you may want to wait and see what is in store for the next release. We have no expectation that all PowerStore 2 customers would purchase PowerStore 3. We assume for many PowerStore 2 customers, that they bought PowerStore 2 because it solved their problem, and would only purchase PowerStore 3 if it was necessary to them.

With that said, we work very hard to accurately market our products and give you all the information you need to determine whether the purchase is worth it.
For PowerStore, in addition to the Upgrade Email you should have received, we also detail all the features on this page powerstore/ and also provide frequently asked questions, system requirements, feature tour, and most importantly, a live demo of the actual product powerstore-demo.com.

Of course, 'why' one thing is fixed and another is not IS POLITICAL since there is no democracy in the decision; it's based in hierarchy and it's based in squeezing out of employees and customers what one can. So, we shall skip that argument about the accepted falsification of social reality.

I did explain that I was getting tired of seeing the climate of "support" change to a more capital-extractive one; it is decision-making, afterall, that comes in the same world where banks are sucking the life-force from every crawling sentient being....

Thanks for re-stating, in part, what I posited.

The documentation would be very nice to download in one manual, like when I get a phone book. I do not need to download the A's, then download the B's, etc. It all comes as a single entity. The world of hyperlinks fragments everything into chunks that once printed do NOT re-connect in the printed world. It makes reading impossible unless your face is glued to a screen and your fingers are bopping you back-and-forth across the hyper-real. That is NOT intuitive. It's why a published book will continue to triumph in form over the spaghetti of hyperlinks. Nonetheless, it is no more difficult to provide an un-fragmented PDF. That was a suggestion I made back when I first bought the Super Suite.

As one who actually spoke with customers in high-tech )Intel, Mentor Graphics Corporation, Tektronix, etc.) and who conducted user testing (recording the problems of drop-down menu logic, documentation, tutorials, interface hopping, etc.) it is considered cheaper and cheap support to not avail full documentation, whether costing extra or not. I recommended to Lynda.com that they should contact you to write online/interactive tutorials for WebAssist tools. It would help us as users, you as a pennywise company in tough times, and them as well. Please consider it if they call, or better, call them. It's a win all around and I will shut up, applaud, and be your fanatic-advocate.

So, I will look for the feature comparison table I requested between v2 and v3 of Powerstore. I do not think it exists. Support would do themselves and us all a favor to create a table like one finds on sites comparing themselves to other products or at Adobe where they compare what comes in each of their variant CS4 suites. It really helps to not have to infer what changed when you guys know exactly what changed and how. We would rather do our jobs than marketing tasks.

So, thanks for replying. I would also like to know if there will be a v3.1 and what criteria makes that differ from a 3.0.1, and in both cases if I am expected to pay for every bug fix. Remember, bugs are not what I am buying, so why should I pay for them getting fixed either!

best wishes,
chris

  I would also like to know if there will be a v3.1 and what criteria makes that differ from a 3.0.1, and in both cases if I am expected to pay for every bug fix. Remember, bugs are not what I am buying, so why should I pay for them getting fixed either!  

WebAssist does not charge for bug fixes. Like i said in my initial reply, the fix to a bug may come in one of two ways: a new "dot" release, or a Known Issues fix.

Dot releases are free upgrades, and Known Issues fixes are in the Download Center with instructions on how to apply the fix.

If you have encountered a bug, you should create a new thread in the forums to make sure we know about it, and we'll see what we can do about getting it fixed.

Thanks for bearing with me. I shall purchase the Powerstore3 release in a little over 2 weeks after I ready the Cloud VPS CentOS server I have been modifying lately. I am grumpy from lack of sleep so please forgive my terse and past-clouded perspective.

I do have one last question.
Can you tell me what has been suggested that best dovetails into Powerstore3 to handle all of the taxes withheld of others, the expenses we incur, and the net income upon which we ourselves will be robbed, I mean "taxed"? It is a messy area that I bet has been smoothed out somewhat by Powerstore and by the back-and-forth between Support and Powerstore users.

Any detail of the mechanisms that might interface with the database and if (and how) the relevant data can be accessed-and-pulled into our outside tool (e.g., Quicken, or something like that on our client system)?

Thanks again,
chris

[note: I have never been able to install Powerstore2 yet because the server was hanging us up, and will needing to get the new version w/o ever having gotten to install. That is a contributing headache that motivated my brashness, so, sorry again.]

  Can you tell me what has been suggested that best dovetails into Powerstore3 to handle all of the taxes withheld of others, the expenses we incur, and the net income upon which we ourselves will be robbed, I mean "taxed"? It is a messy area that I bet has been smoothed out somewhat by Powerstore and by the back-and-forth between Support and Powerstore users.  

If you are asking "How does PowerStore handle taxes?" Here's the answer we provide as an FAQ on PowerStore's detail page:

"PowerStore allows you to specify the tax rate for the state in which you do business. However, any purchases made by customers outside of the state your business operates in, do not have to pay taxes - this is automatically accommodated for within PowerStore. Those who do not wish to charge a sales tax at all, or include this tax in the price of their products, can simply set the tax rate to 0."

You can see how you can configure this in PowerStore 3 by checking out the demo. powerstore-demo.com.

Some people want more custom tax rules, so PowerStore may not be the best choice unless they want to get in deep with custom coding. This hasn't really changed from PowerStore 2.

  Any detail of the mechanisms that might interface with the database and if (and how) the relevant data can be accessed-and-pulled into our outside tool (e.g., Quicken, or something like that on our client system)?  

PowerStore is not set up to interact with Quicken or any other 3rd party tool. This is also not something we currently support with our documentation or will support here in the forums. If you would like you can post this request in the wishlist forum.

  [note: I have never been able to install Powerstore2 yet because the server was hanging us up...]  

I would recommend that you look into why you weren't able to get PowerStore 2 to work before buying PowerStore 3.

I also advise you to be more direct with your questions on the forum in the future. The more specific, and less "wordy" you are, the easier it is for someone to know how they can best assist you.