Posted by: Mike in Untagged on Jul 28, 2009
Please note:
We built each of our components for our internal use based on our clients and our specifications. After many requests, we prepared releases of each component to the public! Our components are sold AS IS. Any features and functionality that are not currently part of these components that you need can be developed for an extra fee or as these are all open source, you can use the components as a basis to build your version on.
Often our customer come back to us and want features and functionality added
that is not currently built into the components. Although we did our best, and
we are constantly developing our components, there is no way to foresee what
everyone of you want, need, or expect. A function that you want is not an
omission or a bug. The components work AS IS based on the original specs.
Refunds are not given because you want a feature or function that is not
included, and we do not do further development specifically to meet your specs
for free, as we need to pay staff also.
We use all of these extensions on our own sites and our clients sites, so we
find bugs before any of you do, but, if you find bugs (and a bug is not a
feature or function that you want but is not available), please let us know
about them as we are constantly working on improving our components for their
next releases.
So what does this mean exactly. Here are some instances:
The contact book has had 318 downloads to date; 315 people are very happy and
are successfully using it. We had to help with about 25 users, which we did
successfully. The issues were always component conflicts, hosting issues, and of
course the very popular mootools/java conflicts, not were issues with the
component themselves, as we use them on our own sites so we have debugged them
ourselves..
The next issue is that they want it to work differently or it does not have a function or feature that they want. Our terms of services specifically state that any modifications and customizations are extra. WHY!, because I need to pay a programmer to do it and many of these changes are not cosmetic, they require complete rewrites. I wish I could do all of these, but it is just not financially feasible to spend 40+ hours on customizations for one customer when all they paid is 50.00 and it will cost me hundreds or thousands in programmer fees. And it is not an investment in the future of the component, as we do not make any money as it is. As you have read, very few component developers are making money. I know that none of the companies that I purchase components for would do free work for me either. When I do not do these customizations, that is when the attacks occur on our products, which are working just fine for everyone else.
There is no way to foresee all of the features and functions that you may
want or need, but our components do give you a great foundation to build on and
are loaded with many functions.
There is one review that states that I would not customize the component for the
customer. That is just not true. I offered and quoted the project. That was up
to him to accept or reject, but his review makes it sound so nasty that he had
to get another developer to do it. we offered, but he choose someone else, and
that is fine.
So, at this point, i jump through hoops only to get flamed by the 2 or 3 out of
a cumulative thousands of happy customers. Features and functions that you want,
and either could not have been foreseen or only needed for you unique site, or
just cannot technically be done, are not bugs, and are considered to be
customizations. I don't think i ever bought a component from any other provided
that fit the bill exactly, and i never beat them up to do free work or flamed
them because it was not exact. That is impossible to do.
I will keep developing these components and do the best I can to service your support tickets, but bear in mind, no one component will ever suite your site EXACTLY as you envision them to work without customizations.