Mimarsinan InstallAWARE - Read before you buy!

[theintrepidfox]

Dear Group

My personal review of MimarSinan InstallAWARE Studio 2005 SE as a
courtesy for everyone considering evaluating or buying this product.
There are many reviews out there praising the products features so I
thought I may add my own review, information collected while creating a
project in a live environment.

I've to say, at first glance this product has a lot to offer and seems
to be a better choice than InstallShield Professional which I evaluated
at the same time. InstallAWARE's pricing is also very competitive.

On overall, this is a product with some quirks. One will get used to
them quickly. I appreciate that no produt is perfect and apprecite when
a software vendor takes a greater emphasis on robustness rather than
the UI and I hope that this product becomes more UI compliant as a user
would expect over the years to come.
It's most powerful feature are with no doubt the script editor as well
as the flexibility in designing dialogs.

However, I've reservations and serious concerns about the level of
support being available and having received and if I had this known
before I certainly would not recommend this product despite its
features and price unless there's reassurance by MimarSinan that they
will improve in this matter.

The company seems to consist of only its founder, Sinan Karaca. At
least that is my impression as all support emails I receive come from
his email address. This raises concerns what the situation will be if
that only person becomes ill.

Another disappointing experience was the quality of support received.
As I mentioned, as a developer I appreciate that no software is perfect
as long as this is backed up by keen and pro-active support striving to
resolve any issues.

From my emails to support I didn't get the impression that the company

is actually too interested and an 'error by trial' policy seems to be
in place. I could tolerate this for complex problems and sure would try
this myself before contacting support but if it was in fact the company
founder who provided me with this level of support regarding issues
that seem to be obviously a malfunction in their application then I
start wondering how much they really appreciate their customers apart
from just paying for the product.

Before you contact support one might however consult the InstallAWARE
Help or Support Forum. Help provides basic information to most common
questions but I found that many object properties which I came across
on a regular basis are not listed. One of the biggest drawbacks after
support in my opinion. Consulting the support forum did not yield more
answers to my questions apart from not very detailed replies or the
information that this has never been reported before and therefore must
not be the products fault.

In general, most issues seem to be the customers problem and any of my
suggestions that it migt indeed a problem with the product and any
offered assistance in investigating this issue further were turned down
by InstallAWARE with the response that I can either pay for
professional consultancy or that I can find the answer in going through
their sample applications. May I point out that I never expected them
to do my project for me and as having worked in support myself very
well know what falls in the category consultancy/training or support.

Not satisfiying but tolerable if the sample I'm directed to actually
had addressed my problem. However, in one instance for a Button.click
event a Checkbox.Value sample was suggested.

Summed up, InstallAWARE support email responses might be quick, on
average instant to 8hrs but the quality of support, the help and online
forum has to be questioned.

Just as final point to add, one might stick to email requests as any
call to the company I made was answered by an answering machine and the
one request for a callback was never returned. Despite InstallAWARE
providing the option of phone support on their website.
I might also add, that I tried both numbers, the one in San Francisco,
California and the one in Turkey which can be found on the MirmarSinan
website during the countries respective business hours.

I hope that this is informative to anyone considerating or using
InstallAWARE. I certainly will keep you updated should I have more
information in the future and let you know of any improvements I
notice. Please note that my case might be just an exception and I
invite everyone to try for themselves.

Best Regards,

Martin N Feuersteiner
Invent2b - Innovative Property Business Solutions

[mimarsinan]

Dear Martin

Unfortunately, we do not have a free service that builds and debugs
setups for our customers at this time.

Since you seemed to be unable to invest any time into the product (as
evidenced by the gross misunderstanding of some of the support emails
you were sent), we thought outsourcing your setup might be the right
thing for your time constraints. I am sorry if it was inappropriate to
suggest our consulting services for you.

Seeing that you do not appreciate our prompt support replies, we will
withdraw the courtesy of free support that was extended to you three
months after your 30-day support period had already expired.

Sincerely,
Sinan

[John Timney \(ASP.NET MVP\)]

I'm not sure if your response was worse than Martins post or not.

He was actually fairly complementary of your product. However - his now
very valid criticism of your support approach appears to have been more than
justifed in your unprofessional response.

Regards

John Timney
ASP.NET MVP
Microsoft Regional Director

<mi********@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:11**********************@o13g2000cwo.googlegr oups.com...

Dear Martin

Unfortunately, we do not have a free service that builds and debugs
setups for our customers at this time.

Since you seemed to be unable to invest any time into the product (as
evidenced by the gross misunderstanding of some of the support emails
you were sent), we thought outsourcing your setup might be the right
thing for your time constraints. I am sorry if it was inappropriate to
suggest our consulting services for you.

Seeing that you do not appreciate our prompt support replies, we will
withdraw the courtesy of free support that was extended to you three
months after your 30-day support period had already expired.

Sincerely,
Sinan

[mimarsinan]

My reply to Martin may have been a bit harsh, but it is intended to be
so: Our customers receive near instant pre and post purchase support.
Sometimes this is seen as license to abuse the support system, and can
rapidly evolve into a situation wherein the customer expects
InstallAware to code and test their setups for them.

No installer vendor will do this. On that note, I would also encourage
you to try and find installer vendors who provide free support, well
beyond the end of the support contract, and do it in 24 hours
consistently (save 8 hours, or instantly, as Martin himself admits).

[mimarsinan]

My reply to Martin may have been a bit harsh, but it is intended to be
so: Our customers receive near instant pre and post purchase support.
Sometimes this is seen as license to abuse the support system, and can
rapidly evolve into a situation wherein the customer expects
InstallAware to code and test their setups for them.

No installer vendor will do this. On that note, I would also encourage
you to try and find installer vendors who provide free support, well
beyond the end of the support contract, and do it in 24 hours
consistently (save 8 hours, or instantly, as Martin himself admits).

[theintrepidfox]

Dear Sinan
May I first post the reply of yours you sent to me and graciously
allowed me to ammend to this post so everyone can form their objective
opinion.
I'll comment on your reply to my post following this.
From: Sinan Karaca [mailto:[e-mail]]
Sent: 09 October 2005 20:38
To: 'M N Feuersteiner'
Subject: RE: For your attention

Martin
You are entitled to your views, and publicly sharing them.
Unfortunately, your post, and nothing else that I can conceive of, will

cause me (or any other person working at InstallAware) to spoonfeed
you.
If you still have questions - review the license agreement you accepted

when
installing the product, specifically the section on support.
Please feel free to add this email message to the end of your post, I
would
be happy for others to see it as well.
Sincerely,
Sinan
--- Message End

Unfortunately, we do not have a free service that builds and debugs
setups for our customers at this time.

At no time did I ask you to build or debug a project for me. The case
is that I actually offered you a project for reference to investigate
an obvious bug in InstallAWARE.

Since you seemed to be unable to invest any time into the product (as
evidenced by the gross misunderstanding of some of the support emails
you were sent), we thought outsourcing your setup might be the right
thing for your time constraints. I am sorry if it was inappropriate to
suggest our consulting services for you.

May you please post details of my gross misunderstanding with your
software as I believe that lack of information in help files as well as

bugs do not justify your choice of words. I'm happy for you to post my
messages in full and give you permission to do so. May in return will
you grant me permission to publish your replies to those requests so an

objective view for other users is maintained?

Seeing that you do not appreciate our prompt support replies, we will
withdraw the courtesy of free support that was extended to you three
months after your 30-day support period had already expired.

As you may have seen in my original post, at no time have I disregarded

the speed of replies to requests and actually have thanked you and
pointed out that fact in emails to you. However, the quality of support

was not satisfactionary in my opinion.
You may withdraw support at your discretion but strongly believe that
the initial 30-Day period for the company to which I''ve recommended
your product and who has made a purchase has not ended yet. I'll check
this with them.
I hope you will be pleased that I've passed my spoonfeed age a couple
of years ago but if something is just not working I'll start crying and

hope that its put right.
All I can say dear Sinan, I'm grateful for you entering into this
dialog but sense some hostility in your reply. Maybe this is just my
perception but certainly not one most customers will appreciate.
Anyway, I'd be grateful if you can comment on the other points of my
post such as the content of the help file and the answering machine
when calling the corporate number. Do you have a receptionist?
Best Regards,
Martin

[theintrepidfox]

Dear Sinan

I fully understand and share your view that customers often take
advantage of support and expect free training or coding.
However, I never asked you to do so but offered my project as a
reference to you for investigating a bug without expecting to being
returned to me in working order. That was simply a curtesy on my side
to improve your product for the future as I think it's great in
functionality but needs some work done.
This is different and for a developer and someone who has obviously
been in the business I'd expect that you can see this distinction.

May I also mention that I sent you requests for a company which has
actually purchased your product and now has problems meeting client
deadlines because of infunctionalities in InstallAWARE which were
apraised as great features on your website.
These include problems with .avi files, problems with .bmp files,
problems with .fla files and patching products and objects missing or
displaying incorrectly.
I appreciate that I might have asked you questions besides these issues
but that was purely because the support forum and help didn't provide
an answer. Otherwise I had not contacted you.

Believe me, I've spent more than enough time evaluating InstallAWARE
and think you are not in a position to criticise me for being to
careless trying to get the project in question to work. May I just say,
without sounding full of myself that I've a sound background in .NET
development, Software Quality Assurance and technical authoring and now
what standards I can expect.And I'm not alone as two other very
experienced developers share my views.

May I repeat myself and say that InstallAWARE is an excellent product
being put at a lower rank because of the support and Help File content.
I can understand and know by myself that building up a company is not
easy and I am sure that you must have all hands full and only can
concentrate on the most pressing issues, that is placing the product in
the market. But please don't make the same mistake so much other
companies made and had to learn the hard way. That support is as
important as the product itself. I'm happy to work with you on this if
you can accept objective criticism rather then to reject it.

Now, putting everything aside, are you willing to work with me on the
issues that are obviously a malfunction in InstallAWARE and sort them
out, not only for your customers satisfaction but for the benefit of
your product?

Beast Regards,

Martin
Invent2b - Innovative Property Business Solutions

[Andrew Neillans]

Hi Martin,

I think you are being a little harsh; I've been using InstallAware for
some time (over a year now), and haven't had major difficulties.
Granted, some parts of the documentation could do with some improvement
(at least, that was true for the pre-2005 edition, I haven't looked a
the help in the 2005 edition yet - haven't needed to!), however,
whenever I have had a question I've either posted on the support
forums, or e-mailed the InstallAware support team - I've always had an
informed response, that has given me direction in looking for a
solution.

I've only found a 'bug' with IA once, and after submitting a small
example project (not a full project, but one that was cut down to only
show the bug in its own right), it was rapidly fixed - and a new build
made available. I think if you are able to create a very simple example
of the error your are receiving, in a new project, with no (or little)
additional code, you will find the IA team willing to investigate - I
am sure you can understand from a software developers point of view, it
is better to be given a small case that simply shows the problem,
instead of working through a large project looking for the cause.

Unfortunately I can not comment on the telephone support issue you
mention - I personally stick to e-mail / web based support, as
calling abroad from the UK soon adds up!! Maybe it was an issue brought
up due to time differences?

Regards,

Andy Neillans

[John Timney \( MVP \)]

Sinan,

Dont get me wrong, I'm not criticising you product or your support
approach - only your reply. I dont think a public forum is the correct
place to air this type of dispute. You would be better off taking this to a
private discussion, or not responding at all rather than make your company
look bad.

--
Regards

John Timney
ASP.NET MVP
Microsoft Regional Director

<mi********@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:11**********************@g47g2000cwa.googlegr oups.com...

My reply to Martin may have been a bit harsh, but it is intended to be
so: Our customers receive near instant pre and post purchase support.
Sometimes this is seen as license to abuse the support system, and can
rapidly evolve into a situation wherein the customer expects
InstallAware to code and test their setups for them.

No installer vendor will do this. On that note, I would also encourage
you to try and find installer vendors who provide free support, well
beyond the end of the support contract, and do it in 24 hours
consistently (save 8 hours, or instantly, as Martin himself admits).