If you haven’t heard yet, Xmarks is shutting down due to a lack of funding and profitable channels.

Things that we can learn from Xmarks.

I understand that people who start something expecting it is free have a hard time wanting to pay. If Xmarks were to have at some point converted to a pay-only service, I’m sure they would have seen their user base drop off the charts. Many would complain and go elsewhere, even the majority, however I am willing to be that a few users would have offered to pay, as many are now. (See any comments page on their blog post announcing the closure of their service).

What could they have done before this point? Xmarks started out only as a bookmark syncing service. Their user base which had signed up only expected their bookmarks to be synchronized. At this point in time, Continue Reading

Some comments, information, and a suggestion to DreamHost.

DreamHost was a web host I used once upon a time. I’m not using them anymore, however they do still register a few of my domain names for me.

Their pricing is very difficult to find,… they don’t actually even post it publicly anymore. If you want to see DreamHosts pricing, you actually have to be registered with them for a “free trial”, which actually requires you to transfer a domain name to them, or pay them to register a domain name.

I think this is very frustrating for people who just want to price out their plans, so I’ve taken the time to get the pricing information here and share it with you. If all you want is the pricing information, and the information behind the asterisk “as low as $8.95″ that they say, here is the pricing break down.

• monthly ($10.95/mo, $49.95 set up fee)
• yearly ($9.95/mo, the $49.95 set up fee will be waived)
• every two years ($8.95/mo, no set up fee)
• every three years ($7.95/mo, no set up fee)
• every five years ($6.95/mo, no set up fee)
• every ten years ($5.95/mo, no set up fee)

Note, prices are subject to change at any time without notice, so please contact DreamHost sales department for updated pricing details or to verify this information, as I am not responsible for the accuracy of this. Also, this is the pricing that was available to me as a long time subscriber. It is possible that this hosting plan is not offered to everyone. Again, please contact DreamHost sales for pricing quotes.

@DreamHost, please post your prices more clearly, and don’t require domain name transfers for your free trial. Everyone knows that domain name registration, name server hosting, and web hosting are three separate services. I can keep my domain name registered elsewhere and just use your name servers you have provided.

As I take from the community, I like to give as well. I believe that if we all contribute, both in concept and design, that we can truly help make some of the good web applications out there even better. Such is the evolution of the internet.

My feedback for StrayQuotes extension for the WordPress Content Management System.

For those who may not know, StrayQuotes is an awesome quote management and showcasing plug-in for your favorite quotes and phrases. http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/stray-quotes/

The following is my message and suggestion to the author. We will see if he responds or implements any of these suggestions.

The Suggestion

First of all I want to thank you for your plug-in, which is superb. I do want to provide some feedback in the interest of contributing my synergy towards your project for the betterment of the plugin and enjoyment of it’s users.
Continue Reading

Kayako Support Suite

Update: 2011-03-06. I have since reconsidered my decision to avoid Kayako Support Suite. While I am still not completely satisfied that they are able to assist customers with their unique needs, I do feel the platform is a solid contact center management solution, and actually would recommend them. I will be using them for a few projects for work, and will gladly back their name, despite my not-so-good run in with them the first time around.

Original Post
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When you need something bad enough, you can typically figure out how to get it. When it comes to modifying MySQL table data, it shouldn’t be too hard to work on. However when you’re working with a database that grows by thousands of entries per day, and goes back 5+ years, you’re talking about a lot of data to try and sort through, especially when you don’t know where to start looking and aren’t familiar with the table structure.

That said, I originally thought I made a mistake by merging two unrelated tickets together inside of Kayako’s Support Suite ticket system, a $500 web application that helps in organizing client support requests and staff responses. I thought that I had accidentally merged two tickets which each contained confidential information belonging to each respective client. Knowing that the PHP based application, Support Suite stores data in an SQL database, I had the idea that if I could get information on the general table structure for the Kayako Support Suite program, I’d be able to locate the data and modify it. With that, I contacted Kayako’s support team. I find it a little ironic, that here is a company who makes software for management of support, yet their support team seems to be lacking some much needed management of themselves. The following is a transcript of my short but frustrating encounter with their support team representative, representing the brand, name, and integrity of Kayako. Let’s see how supportive they are!

Paramvir Singh: Thank you for contacting Kayako. How may I assist you?
Tanner: Hello. How do I split a ticket I accidentally merged of a client’s?
Tanner: two unrelated clients / issues, I just put in the wrong ticket ID when merging
Paramvir Singh: This feature is not available now
Tanner: well, there needs to be a way to do it
Tanner: I have two tickets with confidential information in them, that both users can see
Tanner: how can I fix that
Paramvir Singh: I apologize but this feature is not available right now
Tanner: I can edit the MySQL database manually right?
Tanner: that’s a solution?
Paramvir Singh: We do not provide support for code modification
Tanner: Nobody said code modification. I said MySQL database changes.
Tanner: what is the table structure, where do I need to look.
Paramvir Singh: You may check it from ERD diagram under help folder in product .tar file
Paramvir Singh: which you may download from members area

For software creators of support software, their support stinks to say the least. I can’t seem to say I’ll be supporting them in the future with continued business with them.

Below is my suggestion to KSL for their website, and the actual response I received.

The Suggestion:

There needs to be a “watched” or “favorite” adds feature, so that if I want to keep an eye on a Car classified, I don’t have to keep searching it out every time, but that it is already in my favorites. I understand that you’re using a CMS for your classifieds that is developed by another company, but possibly they could implement this feature. Also, someone removed the “M3? as an option underneath of the BMW model’s available to search. It was there a few weeks ago… Thanks!

The Response:

from Anthony Bergen
date Wed, May 13, 2009 at 6:13 PM
subject RE: KSLFORM Suggestion
mailed-by ksl.com

Hi Tanner

Thanks for your message. Your account is listed, and your email and password are as follows. Please note that the password is case sensitive.

Email Address:
Password:

Thanks for using ksl.com
Anthony
ksl.com

Haha, did he even read through the email I sent him? I don’t recall asking for my user name and password, and even if I did, he sent those to me blank. Wouldn’t do me much good either way.