bselande@pinocchio.Encore.COM (Bill Selander) (09/21/90)
We, Customer Services, have been reading the current conversation on this group. I have been nominated to add some information that we hope Encore customers will find useful. It is the policy of Encore to list Known Bugs in the Release notes of any software package. This list is not a list of all the internal information concerning what Development is working on, but it is as complete as we can make it. There are two documents that are distributed by Encore called SPQ, Software Partnership Quarterly, and HPQ, Hardware Partnership Quarterly. Both of these are published out of Encore Computer Corporation Headquarters in Fort Lauderdale, FL. Previously they were oriented to the Real Time customer base (formerly Gould), but are now being oriented to the entire Encore customer base. Both of these documents contain information on problems and solutions. Anyone interested in these publications can either contact their sales rep or call 1-800-TECHAID for further information. The third point I would like to make is that arrangements are being made to allow Customer access to the SPR Data Base within Encore. This will allow both submittal of Electronic SPRs as well as doing status checking of SPRs. I did hear from one person, (exactly who escapes me), that submitting SPRs is gated upon having a Support Contract. Please, if any Encore Customers have any SPRs that they are withholding due to lack of a place to send them, e-mail, US mail, pony express them to me (bselande@encore.com) or to cmc@encore.com, which is the Call Management Center. I, as an Encore Employee, promise to submit the problems into the database. That I receive, I can't guarantee a solution but the information will not be lost and it will be reviewed at the release of the appropriate product until it has been dealt with. Thank you all for taking time to listen. If there is anything that Customer Service can do to assure Encore Customers state of mind, please let us know. Bill Selander (bselande@encore.com) Senior Customer Service Engineer World Wide Support Center Encore Computer Corporation 257 Cedar Hill Street Marlborough, MA 01752
jrm@stegosaur.cis.ohio-state.edu (John R. Mudd) (09/21/90)
In article <12772@encore.Encore.COM> bselande@pinocchio.UUCP (Bill Selander) writes: >Please, if any Encore Customers have >any SPRs that they are withholding due to lack of a place to send them, >e-mail, US mail, pony express them to me (bselande@encore.com) or to >cmc@encore.com, which is the Call Management Center. In defense of Encore Customer Support, I have sent mail about problems to cmc@encore.com (always wondered what that stood for), and have received replies--both through the phone and mail. Of course, I only found about the address by complaining to somebody at Marlborough. Why doesn't Encore advertise this capability a little more? So many times it simply easier to send mail to illustrate the problem rather than trying to explain it over the phone. ... John .......................................................................... John R. Mudd jrm@cis.ohio-state.edu Department of Computer and Information Science, The Ohio State University 2036 Neil Avenue, Columbus, Ohio, USA 43210-1277 +1 614 292 7161
rxxgap@minyos.xx.rmit.oz (Greg Price) (09/25/90)
bselande@pinocchio.Encore.COM (Bill Selander) writes: > There are two documents that are distributed by Encore called SPQ, >Software Partnership Quarterly, and HPQ, Hardware Partnership Quarterly. >Both of these are published out of Encore Computer Corporation Headquarters >in Fort Lauderdale, FL. Previously they were oriented to the Real Time >customer base (formerly Gould), but are now being oriented to the entire >Encore customer base. Both of these documents contain information on problems >and solutions. Do these documents (along with any other relevent information) get forwarded automatically to your distributors? > The third point I would like to make is that arrangements are being made >to allow Customer access to the SPR Data Base within Encore. This will allow >both submittal of Electronic SPRs as well as doing status checking of SPRs. We will be very pleased to see this facility implemented! The recent improvements by Encore and our local distributor are most encouraging. As there appear to be many Multimaxen receiving news feeds, are there any people interested in setting up mailing lists to discuss experiences and issues releating to the machines (if they don't already exist)? Greg ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Greg Price, Computer Centre, Systems Programmer. Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, P.O. Box 2476V, Melbourne. 3001. ACSnet: rxxgap@minyos.xx.rmit.oz (124 Latrobe St., Melbourne.) CSNET: rxxgap@minyos.xx.rmit.oz.au Australia. ARPA: rxxgap@minyos.xx.rmit.oz.au@uunet.uu.net BITNET: rxxgap@minyos.xx.rmit.oz.au@CSNET-RELAY PHONE +61 3 660 2934 UUCP: ...!uunet!munnari!minyos.xx.rmit.oz.au!rxxgap FAX +61 3 663 5652 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
prc@erbe.se (Robert Claeson) (09/26/90)
In a recent article rxxgap@minyos.xx.rmit.oz (Greg Price) writes: > As there appear to be many Multimaxen receiving news feeds, are there any >people interested in setting up mailing lists to discuss experiences and >issues releating to the machines (if they don't already exist)? Well, there's this info-encore mailing list which is gatewayed into the comp.sys.encore newsgroup with an inet distribution... Since it doesn't seem to be too overloaded with traffic, I'd suggest you to use it. -- Robert Claeson |Reasonable mailers: rclaeson@erbe.se ERBE DATA AB | Dumb mailers: rclaeson%erbe.se@sunet.se | Perverse mailers: rclaeson%erbe.se@encore.com These opinions reflect my personal views and not those of my employer.
clyde@emx.utexas.edu (Clyde W. Hoover) (09/26/90)
In article <12772@encore.Encore.COM>, bselande@pinocchio.Encore.COM (Bill Selander) writes: |> It is the policy of Encore to list Known Bugs in the Release notes |> of any software package. This list is not a list of all the internal |> information concerning what Development is working on, but it is as |> complete as we can make it. Which doesn't mean squat once a "package" has gone out the door and users have had a chance to find more bugs. We ran into several UMAX 4.3 NFS bugs that screwed us around pretty royally. None of them were mentioned in any release notes. |> There are two documents that are distributed by Encore called SPQ, |> Software Partnership Quarterly, and HPQ, Hardware Partnership Quarterly. |> Both of these are published out of Encore Computer Corporation Headquarters |> in Fort Lauderdale, FL. Previously they were oriented to the Real Time |> customer base (formerly Gould), but are now being oriented to the entire |> Encore customer base. Both of these documents contain information on problems |> and solutions. Only if you run UMAX V or have a Concept machine. The MultiMax information in SPQ is mediocre at best and most of it is for UMAX V, which some of your customers (include our site) don't run. |> The third point I would like to make is that arrangements are being made |> to allow Customer access to the SPR Data Base within Encore. This will allow |> both submittal of Electronic SPRs as well as doing status checking of SPRs. Applause and hosannas. Sun does this, (the Online Bugs Database) but it is also very mediocre and difficult to access. Sun claims they are revising that service - I certainly hope so. Fighting to get out of my local phone system, dial across country into the OBD and then being subjected to a lousy 1200 baud connection is not my idea of easily accessed bug data. Sun's Customer Distributed Bug List is useful, but still does not give enough information as to the status of bugs. Encore should now have the resources to do at least that good. First and foremost, LIST ALL REPORTED BUGS!!! Do NOT edit or censor or try to hide the really embarassing ones. It gets harder and harder to defend the costs of keeping our MultiMax when Encore shows so little responsiveness to problems. |> I, as an Encore Employee, promise to submit the problems into the |> database. That I receive, I can't guarantee a solution but the information |> will not be lost and it will be reviewed at the release of the appropriate |> product until it has been dealt with. Thank you. |> Thank you all for taking time to listen. If there is anything that Customer |> Service can do to assure Encore Customers state of mind, please let us know. Wait for my followup postings... -Clyde Hoover (Shouter-To-Dead-Parrots) Computation Center The University of Texas at Austin Austin, Texas clyde@emx.utexas.edu ...!cs.utexas.edu!ut-emx!clyde Tip #268: Don't feel insecure or inferior! Remember, you're ORGANIC!! You could win an argument with almost any rock!
aglew@crhc.uiuc.edu (Andy Glew) (09/26/90)
>|> The third point I would like to make is that arrangements are being made >|> to allow Customer access to the SPR Data Base within Encore. This will allow >|> both submittal of Electronic SPRs as well as doing status checking of SPRs. > >Applause and hosannas. Amplified applause. By the way, if, as I suspect, this is an Encore-ification of the old Gould SPR database, I hope that customers will be able to use the SQL database query language interface, as well as the forms driven fill-in-the-blanks menus. -- Andy Glew, a-glew@uiuc.edu [get ph nameserver from uxc.cso.uiuc.edu:net/qi]