I believe Xojo web is a very good tool, but why Xojo official website is done by php but not Xojo?
I remember when Apple Store opened several years ago, staffs use windows pocket pc in the shop, I have the same question.
Because Xojo creates web apps not web sites. Big difference.
Right. Still, I’d like to see Xojo using it for a web version of Feedback or something. Good for marketing, good for eating your own dog food. Hopefully something will come in time.
Right. Can’t disagree with you there. It took them almost two years to get Eddie’s Electronics up for people to see which is inexcusable.
Looking back, I wrote this in December of 2011 http://www.bkeeneybriefs.com/2011/12/bugs-are-in-the-eye-of-the-beholder/ where I said “Part of the problem, in my opinion, is that RS has NOT created enough Web Edition applications for themselves. If you dont thoroughly exercise the framework you just dont see the things youd see in a big, complex application (like we are creating). There is ONE real world example of Web Edition on their website. While I dont know how many examples are enough, I know that one is definitely not enough.”
I can extend that to say since none of Xojo’s projects are using a database it’s a large reason why the Database Editor is so weak (read useless). And since none of their products do reporting why their reporting is pretty much useless (for most).
In the city where I live, if you go to see what’s on the screen of the checkout iMac used by sellers of the main Apple Reseller Store here, you will see a Windows App to register and control the sales running on a bootcamp Windows partition. It’s an Apple Premium Reseller; how funny is that?
There is no reason that WE should not be used for Xojo’s forum. Is this not the perfect case study for a WE app? I understand they didn’t like the old forum software they were using and picked EsoTalk to get something fast. But if they can’t develop a forum using WE it kind of speaks to the capabilities of the product.
More than one person has asked the scalability of WE and it always is answered with “it depends” then the discussion quickly goes into load balancing, etc. etc. Tech stuff that the intended user has little hope of mastering, or doesn’t have the time. Having the Forum developed in WE would be proof positive that WE is ready for prime time. Having one sample and a few lower usage examples is simply not enough to convince people it is a real tool yet. I haven’t seen one enterprise level application that is used by more than a few casual users. If they exists it usually is protected and not available for general use.
I understand that resources are constrained but if they can’t do it in house contract it out to a competent user to develop for a lifetime license for PRO or something. I would argue that developing the product is only half of the battle. Why would you spend so much engineering time and effort and release a product without spending a little more time to show user’s what can be done. To me this is proof positive the product is ready and would go a long way to increasing sales. Using the excuse that is a resource issue is just an excuse for we can’t do it (to me anyway).
The Forum is a perfect proving ground for that. Many users throughout the day who will report issues. It will either prove out the product or break it and Xojo will have to fix it and make it more viable. Run the thing in parallel to EsoTalk until it is solid.
I just don’t get it and that is the reason I have never tried WE.
But, that is just my opinion and impression of the situation.
[quote=157465:@Joseph Evert]I just don’t get it and that is the reason I have never tried WE.
But, that is just my opinion and impression of the situation.[/quote]
Reasonable opinion/explanation, IMO. The fact that Xojo does not use it for any external, public facing, uses is disconcerting. I believe they use it for some internal things but that’s, what, a dozen people? They need something, like Feedback, that would get exercised by hundreds/thousands of users a day to make a real impact statement of how good WE is.
Even with all the web apps I’ve done most are, at most, a couple of hundred users a day. IMO there are no good cases of load sharing examples.
Feedback was created before Web Edition, so it wasn’t really an option at the time. When debating between a desktop and web version, desktop development was more appealing, partially due to the “eat your own dog food” argument. A web version would have been done with PHP.
So creating a WE version of Feedback now amounts to a complete rewrite. I imagine they just don’t have the time. Though I did design some mockups while with Xojo of what a WE Feedback would look like, and what kind of features would be needed to make it happen.
[quote=157465:@Joseph Evert]There is no reason that WE should not be used for Xojo’s forum. Is this not the perfect case study for a WE app? I understand they didn’t like the old forum software they were using and picked EsoTalk to get something fast. But if they can’t develop a forum using WE it kind of speaks to the capabilities of the product.
[/quote]
Speaks more to “investing our time where we thought it was valuable” which was in the product itself
We could use the forums software without having to invest a lot of time (Thom can vouch for that)
Sure, but Web has been around a long time now and Feedback has been updated multiple times. While I think the desktop Feedback app has a use, there are still people that, for whatever reason, can’t/won’t install it and use it. Create a web version of Feedback would solve some problems and be a critical piece of the Xojo infrastructure and, I suspect, receive some critical updates based on how it gets abused. Not that it’s a perfect solution but it’s something that could be used today.
The problem with Eddies Electronics is that it’s used by only a few people at a time and it’s not critical. If it went down would anyone even notice for days?
And therein lies the problem with selling Xojo web apps.
[quote=157475:@Bob Keeney]Sure, but Web has been around a long time now and Feedback has been updated multiple times. While I think the desktop Feedback app has a use, there are still people that, for whatever reason, can’t/won’t install it and use it. Create a web version of Feedback would solve some problems and be a critical piece of the Xojo infrastructure and, I suspect, receive some critical updates based on how it gets abused. Not that it’s a perfect solution but it’s something that could be used today.
The problem with Eddies Electronics is that it’s used by only a few people at a time and it’s not critical. If it went down would anyone even notice for days?
And therein lies the problem with selling Xojo web apps.[/quote]
I don’t disagree with you, but it’s a matter of resources. It’s a hard sell to spend the 6-12 months necessary to rewrite it. Would it pay off in the long run? Probably. But the benefits are not immediately tangible.
But isn’t this a management decision? Someone consciously saying “we are going to spend time on this rather than that”?
To me, and this is my opinion, they put a ton of effort in developing WE and released it to the public. I could be way off base but the time to develop an APP to replicate a forum is miniscule compared the actual amount of time and effort put into developing and marketing WE as a product. If it is not, then something is fundamentally wrong with the product. Why would you not put that additional time into producing something meaningful to validate the product which would go a really long way in driving massive sales.
WE as a product and concept represents a fundamental shift in the way Apps are developed and delivered. The concept should be a watershed event for the industry and if the product works should be VERY successful, I would argue even more so than iOS because it is not platform specific. It seems too good to be true and based on the lack of real world apps my gut tells me it is, Xojo’s resistance to do anything meaningful with it supports my gut feeling.
From a potential user evaluation it takes a significant time to invest into WE just to determine if it will work. To my understanding you have to have a license and hosting in order to prove it out, then you still have no way of testing scalability until you develop something, learn the idiosyncrasies of Xojo then hope when 100’s or 1,000s of users connect it works. These are time and money investments that most people aren’t willing to undertake without a high level of certainty the product will work, all of which are roadblock to sales.
So if Xojo is not willing to invest in developing something real world and has reasonable scale of use, why should I?
This is a case where the company doesn’t have a strong enough marketing team or person to convince whoever is responsible to allocate the resources to get this done. Or, the product simply can’t do it, in either case it does not instill confidence in potential customers.
I want Xojo to be successful, but this is nonsense.
That’s a telling statement - rapid application design in one of the major strong points of Xojo. 6 to 12 months to write forum software? Then what would we expect it to take for a WE-based multi-office client scheduling app? Or a records access app?
Sorry, my estimates are a bit high. It took me roughly 3 months to develop Feedback, if I recall correctly. A web version should be in the same neighborhood. Added time due to web behaviors, but reduced because the overall design is already complete, so they may negate each other.
Sorry - had to play Devil’s Advocate there. I had no doubts that your estimate was a bit out there :).
I know why, I can just see it now:
<what_would_have_been_said>
Why don’t Xojo spend less time developing and maintaining the Xojo forum and more time working on bugs. They have someone working full time on maintaining, developing and debugging the forum software and it seems such a waste of resources. They could have easily used an off the shelf forum software such as the one developed by EsoTalk and put the resources where they where required.
</what_would_have_been_said>
You wouldn’t be wrong. 
Of course, there is a developer community (duh) and could put the project out to bid. All they would need at that point is a requirements document and someone that can review the code. But then they’d have to let go of control over development.
Historically they’ve not been keen to letting go of control. There are good developers out there that could do a good job at a reasonable price. We’re getting WAY off topic but it seems a shame that Xojo doesn’t trust it’s developer community to produce things for them.
Exactly. OTOH, showing off real solutions built with the technology is a great marketing and PR investment. Maybe, an outside source producing the app would provide salve for both extremes?
Yes - what Bob said 
Sorry, I have to disagree. Investing in the product is great but to what end? The ultimate goal is to develop a product that sells and generates income for the company. This cannot be fully achieved unless the product can be demonstrated to accomplish what goal it set out to achieve.
In your world you believe you spent 100% of the necessary time (10,000 hours) to complete WE and called it good, you achieved x sales. In the real world you should have spent another 5% of time to develop something that demonstrates the product and quite likely would have generated X times ten sales. Or during the process you would have realized WE is not up to the task or needs product improvements that everyone could appreciate. In the end you would have had Forum software or Feedback software that would have 1) showcased the capabilities of WE and driven sales, 2) Updated and improved the Feedback application for use on the web.
Is Xojo really that resource constrained it cannot dedicate a few months of development to creating something? Or, so constrained it cannot partner with a trusted developer? Or, is the product just not capable of doing something like Feedback?
I’m sorry I am coming across somewhat aggressive or perhaps confrontational. It’s just I can tell you I’m not buying into WE and suspect many aren’t because of this. I truly want Xojo to be successful!!