Actinic Conference

[leehack]

From reading these last few posts one could get the impression that a huge swing of emphasis from designers over to the shop owners is going to happen. I just can't see that happening as there has been almost zilch emphasis specifically for the designer on V9 anyway and the only successful working part for designers in V8, was the DW integration. Did i miss something else?

Improvements in the software benefit all parties for sure, but all a designer needs is a working DW integration and a way to successfully pass a design over to a client. The rest is their own skill, experience and knowledge, which is nothing to do with the software at all.

[RuralWeb]

From what I know the work being done is towards the customer and not the designer - perhaps someone could post a summary of what was said at the conference so those of us who are under NDA know what we can and cannot discuss now V10 is in the wild

[leehack]

Designers don't need anything new though do they, all they need is the functions released in V8 to work correctly. All other problems are experienced by both clients and designers and therefore not designer specific from my perspective. I don't need anything new personally, i just want old things fixed.

[RuralWeb]

all they need is the functions released in V8 to work correctly.

Dont want much do you

[leehack]

Dont want much do you

3 years waiting is my breaking point, I'm safe for 6 months or so .

[Benjamin Dyer]

From what I know the work being done is towards the customer and not the designer - perhaps someone could post a summary of what was said at the conference so those of us who are under NDA know what we can and cannot discuss now V10 is in the wild

Hi Mal,

Regarding v10, its not really 'out in the wild' just yet, we have identified a roadmap for v10 onwards. We are getting there WRT identifying the contents of v10, when its ready we will publish on the community. Hopefully wont be that long! As far as I know this is a big move for us, we haven't done this before.

Something that has really helped is meeting a number of you, obviously you all have slightly different requirements and we need to assimilate the huge amount of notes and emails.

Ben

[RuralWeb]

Thanks ben I'll get back in my box then.

[acompton]

perhaps someone could post a summary of what was said at the conference

Brief summary:
Chris Barling (CEO) opened with an admission of the quality and support problems that had plagued recent releases. He outlined the efforts that had been made to rectify those problems: development effort on bug fixing and an increase in the support team. He also apologised for the lack of communication and said that the conference was one step towards rectifying that. He announced the User Conference to be held in London in 2009.

6 Actinic shopkeepers made their presentations. They came from a range of retail areas and business sizes. Suffice to say, they all had enjoyed success with Actinic and they all highlighted problem areas specific to their business. There was a lively question session following each presentation.

Ben Dyer (Development Director) briefly listed the functional areas being considered for the next three future releases. He gave neither a timetable, nor any indication of what would be included in V10, as this was still under discussion. There was no mention of feature balance for Designers vs. Shop Owners although it could be inferred from recent posts on the forum. The list did not disappoint and each item was greeted with muted cheers (we were being very reserved and British, I think).

Darren ? (Quality Assurance) did his now famous presentation of the integration of Actinic Payments within the Actinic Application. As Goz has stated earlier, this was quite impressive.

After the formal session, informal demonstrations and discussion took place. I noticed that the Actinic staff were taking notes during discussions with us. I took it as a sign that they are listening.

[Goz]

Brief summary:
I noticed that the Actinic staff were taking notes during discussions with us. I took it as a sign that they are listening.

I took it as a sign that they were writing.

[Sean Williams]

Belated Hi! to everyone I met at the conference, from both Actinic and from us gaggle of serfs. It was great to meet you all - I was very taken with just how friendly everyone was - particularly the poor beleaguered Actinic staff!

I thought the openness and willingness of the Staff to discuss both the good and bad points of Actinic as a piece of software and as a company was very encouraging and made me feel much better about everything.
So much so in fact, I'm renewing my Cover

The other thing that was encouraging was that all of us users work long and hard at running the business and using Actinic - this gives me comfort when sitting here at all hours; nice to know it's not just me

Looking forward to next year's Do already.

Sean

[TraceyHand]

Belated Hi! to everyone I met at the conference, from both Actinic and from us gaggle of serfs.

hey! I resemble that remark!

It was a good day though followed by a good evening (of restaurant 'entertainment' )

[Rich Brady]

Sean,

Did you get back to the station okay in the morning or did you have to suffer another long walk?

Tracey, did you have those guys waiting on you at breakfast too?

[Sean Williams]

Lol - I wimped out and took a taxi down to Winchester station.
The Tariffa was very happy - whistling gaily and humming along.
I discovered why when it came time to pay - £18.00+ for a ten minute journey

I should have walked