ace@tidbits.UUCP (Adam C. Engst) (05/29/91)
Greetings!
TidBITS is in the process of reviewing Retrospect from Dantz
Development. In keeping with our philosophy of providing
information to the people from the people (after all, who else
knows better?), we and the readers of TidBITS would appreciate it
if owners of Retrospect would complete the following short
questionnaire. Any comments you have are also welcome, though we
can't guarantee to reprint them. Unfortunately (or not, if you're
shy or in hiding), we will not be able to list your name in the
article due to space limitations.
Please respond whether or not you read TidBITS, and for those of
you who do not read TidBITS currently, keep an eye out for review
issues that will be appearing periodically. As with all TidBITS
issues, they will be completely searchable and archivable, and
they too will be issued in text-only format when we switch. And in
case you aren't interested now, remember that sumex-
aim.stanford.edu and rascal.ics.utexas.edu both archive issues of
TidBITS for you to retrieve later on when you may be more
interested.
Thank you!
-----------------------------------
All questions are on a scale of 0 through 10, where 0 is mean,
ugly, and nasty, and 10 is the ultimate in goodness and light (in
poetry, we call it love and butterflies). Please only use integers
(for you non-engineers, that means no decimals) since it makes the
data entry much easier. If we were using a 5 point scale like
MacUser's mice rating, then decimal mice would have to be
acceptable, but we don't have to since we have a full 11 point
scale (it starts at 0, like all good computer thingamabobs, and it
gives us that extra little push when most surveys run out of
steam. If you don't get the last joke, we highly recommend the
movie "This Is Spinal Tap." You won't regret it.).
Please feel free to just return a mailfile that gives your rating
next to the question number. We know what the questions are, and
doing so will save you much hassle (and increase the probability
of you responding). It also makes the data entry much easier on
our part.
Send your answers to ace@tidbits.tcnet.ithaca.ny.us
or ace@tidbits.uucp
or reply to this posting.
0. Please rate the ease of installation of the product. Confusing
dialogs or "hand waving" that puts files in places you don't
expect (or want) will lower the score. A simple Finder copy of the
files accompanied by a reboot is nice and simple.
1. Please rate the ease of learning the product. It is good if you
can jump right in and have everything react as you would expect.
If you can't figure something out without referring to the manual
immediately, the score goes down.
2. Please rate the ease of use once you've become familiar with
the product. This is the score that will reflect most on the user
interface. If the interface is clumsy and difficult to navigate
even after you have learned the product, that's not good. If you
find yourself wishing that other similar products were as clean,
give the product a good score.
3. Please rate the power and usefulness of the product. If it does
exactly what it claims to and doesn't leave you wishing you'd
bought its main competitor, that rates highly. If on the other
hand you feel stifled by the product, it's probably not so hot.
Note that this is relative to other products as well. WriteNow
isn't nearly as powerful as Nisus, but it doesn't have to be
because they aren't in the same section of the word processor
market. We can't be comparing oranges and golden apples.
4. Please rate the documentation. It should be well written,
interesting to read, informative without being condescending, and
concise without being too short. Every manual should have a
complete table of contents and index; without them it is next to
useless.
5. Please rate the company's technical support. If you haven't had
to deal with tech support, great, but still give an answer. Things
like 24 hour toll-free telephone support with next day replacement
by an apologetic CEO are good. Low scores should be given to
companies whose pay-per-minute tech support line is staffed by
people who answer the phone with "What's your beef, moron?"
6. Please rate the product as a whole (still on the 0 to 10
scale). Things such as your subjective feel of the usability of
the product, the price and frequency of upgrades, and how upset
you would be if you couldn't have the product anymore all affect
this score.
7. If you wish, any written comments will also be appreciated. The
best and most interesting of them will be included in the review.
Many thanks for all your help!
Adam C. Engst & Tonya Byard, TidBITS Editors
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Adam C. Engst Editor of TidBITS, the weekly electronic Macintosh journal
ace@tidbits.tcnet.ithaca.ny.us The best way to predict the future
pv9y@crnlvax5, pv9y@vax5.cit.cornell.edu is to invent it. -Alan Kay