What are Actinic's long term goals?

[gabrielcrowe]

This is a great discussion, thanks all.

I want to make something clear before we all eat each other.

I love the offline nature of actinic. Its THE primary reason its used by myself and the umpteen people I deal with. So, I want to have you all imagine something for a moment.

If Actinic were released now, as a fresh tool, for offline web shop management, it'd be mental to choose an uneditable online storage mechanism. I love the building of html (though it could easily be done in perl with a db), and I love the template system. Its very versatile.

It's also true that most people are happy with the way things work. I'm not suggesting at all that we rip out all the guts and change the universe. Far from it. I'm suggesting only simple additions, to allow greater flexibility.

Access for example, could be replaced with sqlite. Something infinitely better. This would mean the end to fiddly odbc.

cat files, for example, could be made with xml, something so much more useful, and also great for perl.

We WOULDNT NEED mysql at all, if Actinic provided a simple API for fetchinig data.

I understand that we dont want to change what works, and I'm also for that. But there are myriad ideas that could make the whole show more fun.

[Darren B]

so we are saying the same things darren. Is that a first

LOL stranger things have happened at sea

[RuralWeb]

lees analogy with ford is interesting as they are on the verge of going bust because they cannot compete. I would compare actinic to a small uk car builder eg Caterham thier design is fifty years old and has changed little over the years yet they have a very loyal customer base and profits are up year on year. By maintaining thier specialist design they have actually expanded.

[leehack]

lees analogy with ford is interesting as they are on the verge of going bust because they cannot compete. I would compare actinic to a small uk car builder eg Caterham thier design is fifty years old and has changed little over the years yet they have a very loyal customer base and profits are up year on year. By maintaining thier specialist design they have actually expanded.

But Mal when you bought your Caterham, you opted for a host of added extras available, some people want bog standard, some want the boy racer model like you - choice and options is key.

Rumour has it after your last adventure, Caterham have Gabe working on an amphibian addon anyway .

[gabrielcrowe]

Caterham have Gabe working on an amphibian addon anyway .

goddammit man, you signed a non disclosure agreement!

[RuralWeb]

I've just had another developer add an armoured fuel tank mod after a recent conflict with a mysql toyota supra

[leehack]

LMAO Mal, you're a walking disaster since you got that car.

[heavenlygirl]

My experiance of actinic has been one of sheer fustration. It is not a product I could recommend - it is inflexible, unforgiving of errors and has a steep learning to get the most out of and if it was not for the Forum members Malcolm ,rural web etc who has provided help when Techincal support deemed to baffle more than help I doubt I would have a working web site.

Those at Actinic Tower should view the future with Trepidation other suppliers of shopping carts software are rapidly updating thier product. Open source product like ****** are sweeping all before them. I admit this is not for everyone - but its free.

I do not see this dynamism with Actinic, with the exception of those resident forum members who I think Actinic should reward.

[parklifeclothes]

My experiance of actinic has been one of sheer fustration. It is not a product I could recommend - it is inflexible, unforgiving of errors and has a steep learning to get the most out of.

I would completely disagree and have happily recommended Actinic to loads of people.
From experience if you are trying to do things that you don't really know much about you are far better employing someone who does than complaining about the software, the money spent will free up your time to package the extra sales and you'll get a lot less headaches.

I spent 2 years thinking I could build & run the website as well as travel all over the country buying, work 7 days behing the counter, package orders, do the accounts, photograph new stock 4 times a year, write descriptions and be dad to 4 young kids. I couldn't do it all and the one thing that always got left was the website and when sales dropped I did the same, moaned about the website/software.
Since finding a designer I still do most of the above but what work I do on the website is done knowing what is worth doing and what isn't, I must have spent weeks thinking I needed to do this and that when none of it helped sales, now I have loads more time to do the things that will make a difference, better images, descriptions, thinking about what people actually type in when searching and sales are growing and for the first time ever have dropped all advertising (approx £10k pa) because the site is being seen and we have the products people want at the prices they want all in a very simple and easy to navigate site and sales can only get better as we continue to work on whats needed and forget the rest.

I know of several people that between them have spent £60k+ on websites hoping to make money and none of them do 1% of my sales because they have sites that might look good and all that but don't have the key ingredients, the right products, easy checkouts (people don't want to create an account to buy a pair of jeans) and targetted seo. You find the sites that don't have a clue but think they do are the ones offering free gifts, packaging with bows, and signing up with the 'we'll get your site top of the page' conmen, etc in a desperate bid to grab the odd sale, again spending money you don't need to. Our orders go out in white jiffy bags with the invoice and our repeat's are fantastic, the vast majority don't want the bulls**t extra's as they think thats why delivery costs so much!

One stupid things many sites do is have the delivery set low on some items and then say on heavier items we will contact you to discuss the extra cost. People want to browse, shop, leave the site and wait for their purchase, not have to wait for a final amount, the sales this must lose surely outweighs the extra the sites are hoping to add to the delivery cost.

I would recommend sitting down and thinking do I have the time to learn (and keep learning as things are continually changing) or would I/my business benefit from getting someone that earns their money from knowing what works, it has been one of our best decisions.
Just my opinion by the way...

[Darren B]

Open source product like ****** are sweeping all before them. I admit this is not for everyone - but its free.

Hmmmm i have look at (****** is a character) And fine it can be very heavey on server resources, it might be free be and has some great features but from here the jury is still out as to how good it is. And remember you cant desing you site if your not on the internet with these open source products

You comments about a steep learning curve are valid, but it is still the best out of thr box shop package on the market. If you want a full customised site then you will spend many hours trying to do things and Actinic has the flexibility to do this but you also need to have an understanding of more than just actinic. In a post somewere i mentioned i have been using it for 6 years and im still learning stuff, a lot went out the window with V8.

ps your three products wide breaks your layout http://www.craftyaddicts.co.uk/acatalog/Craft_CD_s.html the images are too big or change to two wide

[guccij]

I would completely disagree and have happily recommended Actinic to loads of people.

Same here. I've used other ecommerce software (two different ones over a period of 7 years) and have trialled all the other major players. None of them comes close to Actinic.

It shouldn't be a steep learning curve - the 30 day trial shows you in uncompromising detail what is expected of you. If you can't get your head round it, don't buy it or get a designer to do the job for you.

[RuralWeb]

all software has a learning curve and actinic is no different. It's competitors of which most I have tried are just as hard to use/learn IMO and many are significantly worse so I don't think there is any problem with actinic. Software like photoshop and dreamweaver make actinic a walk in the park and word for example is way beyond me although many will sway it's easy.

Yes many of the others are free but just checkout the prices of the support contracts and you will see actinic is cheap as chips. Things that are free always look better and I used to always get the argumet from poptential clients that they can build a site themselves for little or nothing and that's true. But will you make any money from it is the question they should be asking and usually the answer is no - websites are the same as anything without investment they will fail and I use actinic because I know it works. I had a call from a client last night who was over the moon because he had been told by his supplier that his site was selling more stuff than Argos, john lewis and homebase. I his wildest dreams he never thought that would be possible but if you use actinic correctly then it can be done.

All software takes years to learn ime - I'm a keep it simple person so I make it easy for myself but there is no easy way with websites just as there is no easy way with a b&m shop. It's also going to get harder as the credit crunch bites and real shops open more and more websites - business has never been better for designers because websites are seen as an easy option by many ie build one and you will make a fortune BUT they are all wrong - Market and website and you will make a fortune is possibly the better plan. The problem with that is that marketing is a thousand times harder than building a website and that the problem people alwyas hit - the advantage with actinic is that it makes the marketing ie seo easier and that's why it's worth the tiny cost of the software.

[parklifeclothes]

Another thing that makes seo and marketing even more important is maybe on the high street you may have 1 or 2 competitors in the town, on the web there are thousands upon thousands all wanting the browsers custom, what is paramount is the conversion from browser to customer and this is where so many of us (myself included) fall down, it is a complete minefield and for a small fee you are better to get someone that knows what is what.

Maybe you should install analytics as this will give you, if done right, such a clear view of your sites performance, having these figures meant we could test dropping adw**ds and proved doing so was the right thing to do and saved us thousands, money now spent employing more staff giving me free time and time to do the things needed better.

The initial cost of Actinic is IMO peanuts and the back up of the forum and its members combined wealth of experience, the KB and the 'how to' button on v9 is superb and is worth the cost alone, something the open source carts don't come near to and that is why for me, Actinic is King!!

[chris ashdown]

My experiance of actinic has been one of sheer fustration. It is not a product I could recommend - it is inflexible, unforgiving of errors and has a steep learning to get the most out of and if it .

Why would you not recommend it, it does exactly what it says on the label, Load up the software, add a couple of products (with clear instructions on how to do it) and you have a shop up and running.

As to advanced use then yes it is a hard slog but so is excell, word for windows and many more popular software items,you learn as you go or you pay someone to do it for you.

You can break any software with inexperience, or with Darrens case with skill

[IanSaunders]

Dunno whether my 2 cents count, but as a relative newbie expected to delve into advanced use, I have my opinions.

Actinic is...different. To me, the interface and the concepts are not immediately intuitive, but I can forgive that if I can get used to the application. What does fry my brain is the lack of internet exposure. A google search for Actinic pulls back a handful of forum posts alongside pages and pages of medical references to similarly named complaints. Not a great start. Search for *****, *****, ***** (never heard of it before today) and there's a deluge of documents, tutorials, tours, screenshots. The Actinic website looks like a sales tool and nothing more.

I know Actinic isn't open source and free, but if there were similar exposure, I'd expect a bigger customer base, more opportunities for developers, and a wider reaching community.

Actinic has it's USP, but it feels like it's hiding it's light under a bushel. Microsoft don't have such concerns and people will still choose MS Office over any number of free alternatives.

I think I'm just rambling here. Feel free to ignore.