User Profile for Otter2

User Name Otter2

Member Since 2000-10-03

Total number of Feedback Posts: 5

Total number of comments: 2

Last 10 Feedback Posts by Otter2 [ Search for All ]

OmniOutliner Pro 3.6.5 (Mac OS X)

Still no servable version or locking of open docs

I'm a licensed user with 8 licenses for OO Pro which I use in my estate planning law office for a variety of tasks, all of which involve project management, process control and checklists to make certain that we don't forget to do anything. I am astounded that after all the years of development, and several requests to make OO docs servable or at least lock themselves to other users when they are opened, that I can open a document on one machine, have another user open the same doc on their machine, make changes to the document on my machine and save them, have the other user make changes to the document on their machine and save them which will overwrite the changes I've made and saved. But for the fact that all the users in my office know about this glaring defect in an otherwise great product, this oversight could create a disaster for us if some checklist item got deleted by a second user opening and modifiying a document that another user had opened first. OO is a great organizer, but only for one person at a time. And I think it's time I looked for a project management package that is servable. otter [alert admin]

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Sunday, May 04 2008 @ 06:35 PM PDT

iBiz 3.1 (Mac OS X)

Kudos for a Really Great App

Version 3.1 appears to have fixed most of the new version blues that are noted in the posts about v 3.0.x. These guys have done a magnificent job with iBiz by giving users a database that allows us to display an extensive description of the work we have done for a client using the NOTE field together with a table format that wraps the text of the NOTE field within a cell of the table. And it can be really extensive. It took me less than two hours of fritzing around with table creation in Text Edit to create a table and copy one line of the table into the invoice template so that I got a beautiful listing of the work we have done for clients. iBiz is one of the few time/billing applications that offers that capability. I know because I have examined about 50 time/billing packages as I needed to replace all of my old OS 9 version of Timeslips with a native OS X app before my legacy machine dies. And the very reasonable cost of iBiz is incredible when compared with the cost of apps that are basically a time/billing Filemaker datafile. These guys have really got it right!! I've installed the server with five clients and within a week have gotten my staff up and running with a served time/billing application that is extremely intutitive and easy to use. In the meantime, I've been able to create a custom invoice template in RTF that lets me replicate 95% of the Timeslips invoice that I used for years. And given the responsiveness of the iBiz folks, I'm sure that within a few months, I'll have a 100% replication of my Timeslips invoice. Both HTML and RTF are available for template creation, and I was thrilled as I am not an HTML programmer. Last year, I asked the folks at Studiometry to create a custom HTML invoice for me for a fee, but they either were unable to replicate our Timeslips invoice or dropped the project as they have not responded to my email inquiries. Bottom line: I'm blown away with the development of this time/billing package which has become a serious contender in this product segment. Harold Harkins attorney/owner of five person estate planning law firm [alert admin]

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Sunday, February 25 2007 @ 05:42 PM PST

Intuit QuickBooks Pro 2007 9.0.3 R4 (Mac OS X)

Damned Nice and Useful Product

I find all the carping feedback really useless. On a variety of application software that I use, I have had flawless experiences and yet some poor creature who doesn't either follow the instructions or doesn't know what he or she is doing comes to this site a posts their vitrolic diatribe about the vendor when truth be told, most of the responsibility for the non-working software lies with the poster. I've worked with Quicken, QuickBooks and QuickBooks Pro, and MYOB's AccountEdge on and off over the last 10 years and all of them have worked satisfactorily. I've had no problems installing them and no significant problems using them. I love and use Quicken for portfolio record keeping, but it's not quite the ticket for office accounting. I own a small estate planning law practice and investment management firm. Probably the worst piece of the puzzle over the years was Aatrix with their expensive and user unfriendly software and difficult to reach customer service. MYOB was not especially intuitive for me, but I'm not an accountant. But QuickBooks Pro for the Mac 2007 is wonderful! My office manager loves the online payroll with Intuit which interfaces beautifully with QuickBooks. It took her just one afternoon to set it up and less time now to use it than it would take to write checks. I'm now treasurer of a 25 person choral group, and I use it to keep all it's records which are for a 501(c)(3) non-profit group and the templates have been great. All in all, it's a very Mac intuitive program that makes a relatively complex subject pretty darned easy to do. I highly recommend both the QuickBooks Pro 2007 application and the online payroll service with Intuit. Harold Harkins [alert admin]

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Sunday, February 18 2007 @ 07:42 PM PST

Apple Safari 2.0.1 (Mac OS X)

Default pdf viewer in Safari 2.0.1

Under the prior version of Safari (available with OS 10.3.x) I believe we were able to select a default pdf viewer. I used Preview for my default viewer because it opened pdfs outside of the browser window and I found that to be more convenient. Apparently this latest version does not give me that option. I have Adobe Acrobat Pro 7.x installed and any pdf files that I open, open in the browser window which is slower and less convenient. [alert admin]

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Tuesday, October 25 2005 @ 12:17 PM PDT

SBook5 Alpha43 (Mac OS X)

WOW!!! FANTASTIC SOFTWARE…

I am blown away by the multi user feature. I migrated my five person law office to OS 10.2.x in late December. iData files were READ ONLY to all users (server clients) and could not be saved except when the files were on a client machine and only by that client, ie, when I installed iData on a dedicated server running OS X Server this past weekend, no one in the office could write to any of the iData files. I tried various system configurations over the last three months, but so far, nothing has worked. Downloaded and installed SBook and WHOA!! First, it flawlessly (actually better than flawlessly) imported all my iData files. Better because it alphabetizes corporate (non people names much better than iData/InfoGenie/QuickDex ever did. My client dex has almost 1500 entries, and it imported so fast I didn't realize it was done - like 1.5 seconds, and that over my network. But the most amazing thing is that it really shares over the net and updates within about 60 seconds. A little work on the envelope feature and we'll have a dynamite combo of the QuickDex-iData app and MacEnvelope in a hot OS X application. Definately a world beater!!! Thanks Simon. You've saved my life, 'cause my staff has about had it with iData. PS I've loved QuickDex - InfoGenie, but if it won't let client users save changes, it won't work. otter that playful, fun-loving water-faerie [alert admin]

Last 10 Comments by Otter2 [ Search for All ]

Very nifty

Hey awaman - Do you sync freeform or field based iData files? I'm setting up syncing using MissingSync and I too have bumped into the inability to sync my iData files. All my iData files are freeform so I'm wondering how I might be able to sync them into a database. otter