Yes, you do continue to carry on parallel conversations (pun intended partially). Send your directed comments re: the beta and its process to beta@parallels.com. Keep comments HERE relevant to the other users on this forum -- please.
That is profoundly illogical and trends toward megalomania. I have no beta issues to discuss. Please review the thread. I've mentioned beta and production issues only as evidence to support my point which you have ignored. To recap: I have no problems with the Parallels production and beta code. I have a problem with their process which has been carefully outlined herein. There is no process address or forum, but since process checks are a technical issue I can't imagine a better place to raise them than in a technical forum. Have that megalomania looked at. It's unbecoming.
Actually it's perfectly logical, accurate and appropriate. This is NOT the place for your "process comments" about Parallels and their development process; rather, those should be addressed directly TO Parallels.
Now just how do you know any of this? Are you inventing it or did you see a reference link for process issues? Or did you empower yourself to make this determination and assign yourself the responsibility to be traffic cop on issues routing? Perhaps it's just a best guess on your part? A discordant 'Rhythm for Living' moment? Can you tell I'm out of patience with you?
Given you haven't discussed at all the topic at hand in all your writing perhaps you could use that question in a bit of retrospection. Or go hear Val's voice at zengar.com. Now there's a talker. Actually this thread is shot. Hopefully it got some attention in the back office. Keep up the good work, Don - you've helped quite a few people here. It's just a shame this one was over your head and you couldn't follow it. Bigger shame you couldn't offer useful dialog, but somethings just go that way. Cheers, friend - have a good new year.
By helping with a BETA test I feel that I am giving something back in return for all the pleasure I get from the software A little bit like being a blood donor I donate my time and machine to testing if you did it to get a freebie too bad Hugh W
Sorry - I clicked one of the links on your web page but don't recall which. But to recap - I'm very interested in your Morse interface and how it may be applicable to a disabled friend of mine - it seems a perfect solution. I'll dig out the message if I can relocate it. Edit: Please excuse the sidebar, friends.
What I know is what I've seen by looking at the comments at the "Contact Us" information listed above: viz, "If you are interested in submitting CUSTOMER FEEDBACK, media or analyst inquiry or you have a question on sales - please click here to contact us."
Val - I'd hoped for a meaningful dialog on the topic with fellow beta testers and interested end users. I didn't expect to have my words and intent twisted and distorted as has happened. What is especially interesting to me is that I've heaped praise on the Parallels team here, and have declared time and again that I'm hugely happy with the product. But as a professional in this business for several decades and with not just a little experience in process management, I see glaring problem in the Parallels process. I'd hoped very much to be able to speak to those problems and see if something positive could come from it. And I thought it could be a community effort. What I got was asinine suggestions and assumptions of what I was thinking that are in no way related to anything I've said or would like to discuss. We know them as knee jerk reactions. People responded without ever bringing up the topic I opened. Time and again I attempted to drag things back to topic and it just wasn't working. That was followed by the standard pack mentality and the thread degenerated. That's a damn shame, don't you think? There are so many improvements that can be discussed in this group but there's clearly not the will or skill or sophistication. Who knows. So Val - please. Go in peace - I wish you well in all things.
^I think you made some excellent points and suggestions in this thread. You only have to glance at the thread list to see something is seriously wrong. Unfortunatly these forums seem to have taken on a very strong scent of "eau de Fanboy", and any comment(s) that have even the slightest critisism get beaten down with a stick. On another note, i installed VMware fusion last night, and these guys seem to have really got there stuff together. I'm sticking with that until parallels release a "proper" final release (i don't consider any previous "final" finished).
For some reason, everyone responded to the initial post as if it was another "the beta doesn't work for me" thread. It's clearly not. I think this forum is an invaluable resource for Parallels users and discussions about the general development priorities could be of great value. Parallels' has revolutionized the way I use my computer and this forum has been an invaluable resource in helping me use it. Some of the most valuable information to me has been the meta-discussions of Parallels' strengths and weaknesses. I'm sorry to see the amount of misdirected hostility directed at a forum member trying to engage in productive community discussion.
I have no problem with constructive dialogue and I'm certainly not a "fanboy"; however, it is also clear that the discussion didn't happen -- perhaps it didn't happen as it was intended or perhaps it was never intended to actually happen as a dialogue. My only point was that comments about the "process" of Parallels release(s) should be directed TO parallels directly -- as they have also indicated. The reality is that 3106 IS a beta relase. It has NEVER been indicated by Parallels to be anything other than a beta relase. Hence, those using it need to understand what it means to use a beta release and to provide feedback and/or ask questions relative to 3106 being a beta release. It seems that some members of this forum have forgotten at some various points what it means for something to be a beta relase. It also seems that some have forgotten to direct (or at least ALSO direct) their "feedback" specifically TO parallels. I am a professional developer and appreciate the technical information that is available via forums like this. What I find useless is the opinions of others about what "should" or "should not" be "in" or "out" of a particular relase. Those ideas may be interesting -- or they may not be interesting -- but the primary focus of forums like this ought to remain IMO providing technical support to users of both the official release (now build 1970) as well as the latest beta (viz, build 3106). I honestly don't understand why this idea seems to be so upsetting to some. Send your specific comments about how Parallels is handling beta relases (or whatever other process comments seem appropriate) directly on to Parallels, in the way they've indicated to do so. Perhaps even make a note of it here in some fashion, and then move on. Let's stay focussed on the task of supporting the use of Parallels's as it continues to be developed. Now I for one will make no further comments on this thread.
It would be interesting to have "qualified" beta testers. Of course qualify can be a slippery term. However, overcoming that, it would be nice to have some sort of bug tracking system that people could put real, reproducible bugs into that the Parallels team can check and fix. Having worked in hardware design and software testing, the larger the test base the more bugs show up, and can also be addressed. However there are priorities on which bugs are fixed when etc. Whats important to me, isn't necessarily important to someone else. Overall my I have been satisfied with parallels, it works for me, on those one or two apps that I need to run under windows. But thats my need - run the oddball program(s) under windows. Other folks are looking to run full VM OS for some other need, perhaps production environment, other testing requirements etc. Thats their need, whether I agree with it or not. People running beta really really need to understand (and its obvious they don't) what that means and what you get. For me, its been great, and I have a backup image, just in case. I also don't jump on the newest beta, let some one else lose their image, system etc and have problems.
I think this thread somehow got way off it's intended purpose. I found it interesting on how people can miss the intended point of the conversation and redirect it into what it is not. I think the topic creator tried to put some substance into a process issue and other have taken into a Beta issue. I agree that there should be a little more organization put into these forums. There should be sub categories for the different releases not just a "Parallels Desktop for Mac" forum. Because what happens is that the general user comes here and see that hey this feature/function that I can't get working is addresses in this download. The user will tend to download and install the update regardless of the fact it may break something else. Even though it states "Beta" all over. It does not help that there are posted news bulletins on Macworld about all the features the Beta contains http://www.macworld.com/news/2006/08/08/parallelswwdc/index.php This is just a free invitation for everyone to come and install the Beta. Again I stress in my opinion, this was never meant to be a topic about the Beta release and its potential drawbacks. It appears to be a post on a possible better way to save some of the poor souls who do not have the technical background to evaluate the consequences of installing these releases that may or may not be ready for prime time. Should it have been a direct email to Parallels? Maybe. Does it possibly need some support from the community? I would say yes. That is if the community can see the real issue and not get sidetracked on "key words" that can get pulled from the context. Just my 2 cents.
Let me say something here. First, I'M EXTREMELY GLAD that Parallels decided to add the ability to burn CDs in their VMs and add USB 2.0 in their version 2.5. That means Parallels first customers like me can upgrade to 2.5 for FREE. Second, I think that dkp only meant that Parallels should organize these forums more. Also I think that he's saying that Parallels should have their betas disclaimers at the very beginning and make it bigger on the beta announcements. Which are good ideas to me.
i agree...but a simple email to the developers is all the original poster needed to do. posting his ideals regarding dev process is outside the scope of the forum. don
Maybe dkp did e-mail Parallels about his ideas too. Since when is this subject outside the scope of the forum????? I wished everybody on here a Happy New Year. Now that's definitely outside the scope of the forum.
