CintaNotes Developer wrote:Thanks for the advice, I think you're right. We need two mailing lists. I've created a .csv file with all paying customers addresses, so that in case of real emergency I can send the urgent notice to them.
EXcellent! Now we can relax a little, knowing that in the future, if a CintaNotes emergency happens, it won't actually happen, because we'll hear about it promptly and thwart it before it does. Kind of like the sound that doesn't happen in the forest when a tree falls but there's nobody there to hear it. Or the sound of one hand clapping...
A very Zen-like solution, don't you think?
(And the opt-in newsletter is just icing on the cake, allowing us to be able to receive useful CintaNotes information, without having to remember to periodically go look for it!)
The only issue that's as yet unresolved (an issue which someone else raised above) is: What about those not-yet-registered CintaNotes users who are running the free/trial version? How would they hear about an urgent problem that their CintaNotes is causing, if one were to occur?
Well, I have come up with a new idea which solves this problem, and which is actually even better (!) than the solution of maintaining a .csv list of customers' email addresses to be used in an emergency.
Currently CintaNotes is not capable of automatically checking for the availability of a new version - checks for updates must be done manually. But I assume that it would not be difficult to provide that capability. (Are there any good reasons why you should not do this?)
If CintaNotes were to automatically check for updates (e.g., each time it was launched), I assume that it would work something like this: CintaNotes "phones home" and fetches the version number of the current online release, then it compares this to its own version number. If they are different (online version number is higher), this triggers an alert message announcing that a newer version is available (perhaps also asking whether the user would like to download it now).
But what if the online version check found that the current online version number was lower than the version the user is running? (I.E., Developer has withdrawn a previously-released version, because some problem has been discovered with it.)
In that case, couldn't CintaNotes be programmed to then fetch a text file containing an explanation of why the newest version was pulled, and the recommendation for what users should do (e.g., they should temporarily downgrade to the previous version, until the bug is corrected), and present this message to the user? (Perhaps presenting this message in a visually striking way that suggests it's urgency, to grab their attention.)
(Alternatively, instead of doing the version number comparison and then (if lower) fetching a text file, it could simply fetch the current online version number and simultaneously check for an "URGENT" flag, proceeding to fetch the warning message if the urgent flag is found.)
This method would successfully notify every user (whether registered or not) who is currently running CintaNotes about the urgent information, and (unlike the .csv mailing list method) would not bother to notify users who are not currently using CintaNotes (and who thus do not really even need to be notified about the bug situation).
Hmmm... What are your thoughts about this idea?
Have you seen this implemented elsewhere? I can't recall ever having seen such. I'm thinking this might be a good idea to include in every software program that could potentially contain a nasty bug (which is virtually every software program...). Perhaps this idea should be patented and licensed (sold) to vendors who want to avoid potential fiascos, bad publicity, etc. resulting from a faulty release? Want to partner with me on this?
Jon