My goodness! Somebody has had the temerity to post an actual document on a thread! WOW!
All I ever see here is 'send me a copy please' multiplied by dozens and dozens. 
I have never understood why documents cannot be posted openly on a thread in this forum.
Is there a logical reason?
JohnL
At some point in the next few weeks, I intend to post documents on another part of the forum to show how mailmerging can be used to produce letterheads, invoices, mailshots and household window cleaning bills. I also intend to show how I lay out my spreadsheets and databases - using dummy data of course. Not trying to detract from the excellent software on here but I suppose that some will prefer to do these things themselves. Maybe it could be like the software version of Matt's D.I.Y waterfed pole tips. It will only be the way that I do it - not necessarily the best way for others.
I think that this would be a great help to many users who are computer savvy and have the time to create, maintain and run these kind of documents. Where a system like ours comes in is for people who are not so sure about how to use mail merge and cannot be bothered trying to incorporate new features all the time like PDA integration.
Just out of interest have you tried our software as I would really appreciate your thoughts given that you use a technical based solution already and would have faced similar problems?
Cheers
Ian
I haven't actually tried your software Ian though I did give a trial version of George a spin some while back. When I first adapted MS Works for my own use, I did so because the packages out there that I knew of either seemed to lack flexibility or seemed like a sledgehammer to crack the proverbial nut. I hadn't come across this forum at that time. I ended up trying trial versions of packages that also had such things as stock controls or payroll management. Such things could get in the way of the stuff that I wanted from a program. Most window cleaning businesses are sole traders or partnerships that are quite happy to stay that way so packages with the above features were too large and unwieldy and it could be difficult to pick out the bits that were needed for use with a smaller window cleaning operation. This is not a criticism of the other packages that I tried, as a generic software solution for running a business is inevitably going to contain many parts that a lot of businesses will not use. Usually, the problem with having a program for a specific industry is that the target audience will be much smaller. This can make it financially unviable to develop such software or mean that the cost of purchasing it is prohibitive. This is why I loudly applaud what both yourself and George's author have achieved. You have both developed software that is (a) affordable (b) will meet the needs of most window cleaning businesses and (c) where it doesn't meet a particular need, you are both prepared to get your heads down and do some more coding.
Not that I'm particularly up on programming but which language do you use for your software development? I did used to tinker around with the old Basic (á lá Commodore 64) many moons ago with it's inevitable peeks and pokes and even did a few very minor routines in machine code (assembler language if truth be told
) . All the continual moving stuff around due to the shortage of registers (and only 8 bit ones at that) meant that it could be time consuming and irritating to do anything worthwhile and I never took the trouble to learn anything too useful. Also, the built in operating system nicked most of the zero page memory for its own routines as speed was more critical with a clock speed of around 1 or 2 mhz.
Some time later I used Amstrad's Locoscript and had a play with CP/M but I think that language must have been developed for Martians
It was quite funny when I first got a PC with Windows95. I had bypassed MSDOS and Windows 3.1 completely and never seen them never mind used them. I switched on the PC with Win95 and I thought that the pictures (desktop icons) were very pretty but wondered how you were supposed to make the computer do anything. I had never used a system with a mouse before. I had to phone someone up to ask where I typed in the commands LOL - though I did later become aware that there was a command line of sorts. Although I dislike some of the "dumbing down" employed on most modern operating systems, I do accept that it was necessary in order to mass market them. Also, it usually saves a lot of time for the end user.
