#Quicken Clone, etc.
54 messages in this thread
I have been given permission to disclose the following information to the
general public:
Intelligent Designs, Inc., the company that now handles AmiBack, AmiBack Tools,
and Tapeworm FS are actively working on an Amiga "Quicken clone". After
speaking with the primary programmer as well as one of the co-owners, I was
informed that a finished product should be available for sale late this
summer.
I an not privvy to any specifications of the product other than it is
being written in SAS C/C++ v6.5x and will be AmigaDOS 2.x and 3.x
compatible. It will fully follow Amiga Style Guide conventions where
possible.
Currently, IDI is not equipped to answer any questions regarding this
product. There is no firm release date and specs/features will not be
released until a product is ready to ship. Please do not call IDI and
ask them there — they're relatively small and the programmers also do
some of the tech support…the more people call the less time for programming
and stuff. 🙂
Any questions can be directed to me, here in the AmigaUser forum. I work
for IMI, the retail store that is owned by the same people that own IDI. We
share a building (this is how I know all this stuff).
I do know that we have Macs & PCs set up for the programmer to play with
PC & Mac programs to see what best mix of features/interface/etc. would be
best.
On another note: Intelligent Designs would like to reaffirm our commitment
to the Amiga platform. Patches & bugfixes will be supplied as necessary for
all current IDI products. Development on new versions of these products is
continuing normally (AmiBack 3.0 most notably) and we are expanding into the
Newton PDA market. More programmers have been hired at IDI recently for both
Amiga and Newton development. We soon hope to have online representation
over in the AmigaVendor forums…our application has been submitted.
Thanks,
-Charles Hill
Intelligent Machines Computer Center, Inc.
Chas,
Sounds good… do us a favor… have these guys look at Black Belt
Systems ApAssist in lieu of AmigaGuide format documentation…
Thank you, Michael. :^)
–Ben
…via AutoPilot
I will, though I must tell you. AmiBack and AmiBack Tools (and as a result
AmiBack+Tools) have all just had their manuals converted to AmigaGuide format
and placed on disk. We will be doing away with manuals for those products as
well as possibly Tapeworm's.
-Chas
>>We will be doing away with manuals for those products as well
as possibly Tapeworm's.<<
Chas,
That being the case, imo, you'd really being doing a dis-service to Amiga
users by NOT using ApAssist. The benefits are enourmous.
I agree. I DO like AmigaGuide, but ApAssist kicks butt for sheer
capability and potential.
I have it as an online manual for Imagemaster R/t and it IS very useful to
me. *B^)
-= Vance =- Image Master
Flying high on Imagine and Imagemaster R/t!
Exactly!
I have AP 1.06. Should I wait to dl 1.72+ or get it now? It's a sizable
download, and I'd rather not dl the same program a few days to a couple of
weeks apart.
-= Vance =- Image Master
Flying high on Imagine and Imagemaster R/t!
I can't tell you what is right for you to do. I know that when there is an
upgrade to AP, I download it.
Oh well… (or is that "Oh h*ll…") *B^)
I might as well risk it. I want the manual in ApAssist format. If another
upgrade comes quickly, I'll just suffer for awhile with a slower manual.
-= Vance =- Image Master
Flying high on Imagine and Imagemaster R/t!
Vance,
I seem to remember that you live in Edmonton. Why not go onto the CIS
node there? It is 9600 baud and would only take 4-5 minutes to download
the latest.
Trent
One of the "Frozen Chosen"
You're correct, I do live in Edmonton. Unfortunately, I don't have a high
speed modem yet, so I can't use the 9600 access. I downloaded 1.72 AP
anyhow. *B^)
-= Vance =- Image Master
Flying high on Imagine and Imagemaster R/t!
I would like to vote against ApAssist until it handles the display database a
bit better. 🙂
-mark=
Mark…
WRT variying display modes? Which modes do you find to be problematic?
>> I would like to vote against ApAssist until it handles the display >>
database a bit better. 🙂
That's the reason I hate it for, too (and for the fact, that ARexx is
expected to be running in the background).
Everytime I press the HELP key in AP, ApAssist will make up it's own
screen, and it will be _FLICKERING_ like hell (I'm on a PAL machine).
The screen of AP (and WB), I've set to EURO72 Productivity, 16 Cols.
– wkc – … via AP from Hamburg, Germany
Yah. I talked to Ben about the display database though, and I think he
has no intention of ever using it. I understand his argument – that only
by using pre-defined resolutions/aspect-ratios available on every Amiga
will everyone's help and illustrations look the same – but there's gotta
be a better answer. A seperate different odd-res screen is a massive pain
in the neck!
Paul
We may use it – but we'll still stick to the set of display modes that
provide the needed aspects/colors.
–Ben
…via AutoPilot
What about text only, though? There've got to be situations where text is
enough, and if ApAssist is to become a system standard, it should be able
to fit as much text on screen as possible. In fact it would be nice to
have a windowed mode, for those people with large screens – run the
program and have the help right there!
Besides, what about resolutions that are simple multiples of others? Like
going from 320×200 to 640×400? Or larger resolutions. You could fit at
least 2 screens worth of help from one such lower res in one such higher
res, maintaining proper aspect ratios.
Paul
Paul,
We don't use low res at all – we begin at 640×200. Currently, the software
supports nonlace/lace(200/400), 640 (or better, depnds on overscan), NTSC
aspect or PAL aspect, 16 color screens.
The thought here is to add square aspect (since PAL is also square, we've
already done this in essence) screen modes which can support bitplane
access, 640 or better. This can be done with the screen mode requester,
and would add some modes like productivity, 800×600, etc.
ApAssist can already do this, we're just wiring the screen mode requester
into it. It would (of course) only appear under 2.1 or better.
–Ben
…via AutoPilot
Ben-
I -really- look forward to that. It's really annoying to be working in,
say, Super72, and to flip to a DblNTSC ApAssist screen which is half off
the screen because my damn monitor doesn't even seem to remember different
screenmode settings. I always thought the NEC 5FG was able to memorize
settings, until I bought it. 🙁 At least it syncs down to 27kHz
horizontal.
Paul
I understand; we'll address the problem.
–Ben
…via AutoPilot
Oh… I missed answering the "text only" question. We have no plans to
implement such a mode – images and animations are part and parcel of the
environment.
–Ben
…via AutoPilot
Huh? ApAssist displays animations? That's kinda neat, though I guess you
could do the same through ARexx with AmigaGuide.
Paul
No, you can't do the same with AmigaGuide. ApAssist displays animations
inside the document, on the same page of the document, with the text
wrapped appropriately around the anim if that's what the author wants to
do. It can (of course) use ARexx to display an external anim if that's
appropriate to the use, but the whole point of ApAssist was to provide as
generally capable an environment as possible for authoring online
documents.
To that end, it has at least an order of magnitude more capability than
AmigaGuide has – and animations are just the tip of the issues we could
touch on here.
Compared to ApAssist, AmigaGuide is primitive.
–Ben
…via AutoPilot
Oh, I agree that AmigaGuide is very primitive. I =do= think though that
it has a virtue in low overhead. Animations in-document are great, but
not that many applications will use them, especially since they require
3.x and are fairly slow.
But don't mistake me – I like my AutoPilot ApAssist help, even if it is
slow. <g>
Paul
If you don't though you'll be in less of a position to define a real
standard in place of AmigaGuide, which I understood to be your goal.
Paul
Our goal was to replace AmigaGuide for our _own_ purposes, because
AmigaGuide simply wasn't capable of doing a good online document with
anywhere near the features we needed to provide to our users. We got that
goal accomplished in spades. An Additional goal was to provide that
capability to developers who wanted it; we got that done also.
ApAssist is a product under current development; we listen to all
suggestions and examine them for feasability.
If ApAssist turns into a standard, that would be great, of course.
–Ben
…via AutoPilot
There is a 'Readme' file in 1.50c which seems to be in APAssist format.
How can I go about using APAssist to read it?
Thanks, Ben.
Well, you should be able to:
(a) double click on the icon, or…
(b) double click on ApAssist and then use the Open menu item to
access the document, or…
(c) go to a shell, CD to the doc's dir, and type "ApAssist Readme", or…
(d) go to a shell and type "ApAssist" and then use the menu Open, or…
(e) locate the ReadMe icon on install disk #1 and double click it there.
But this depends as follows:
This assumes that ApAssist is somewhere in your executable path, which it
should be.
The IM R/t install either puts ApAssist in c: or in the IM R/t drawer; and
it asks you (more like begs you) to let it add a path statement to your
shell-startup so that if you DID elect to put ApAssist in the IM R/t
drawer (which is not the most desirable location, due to the crippled path
facilities in WorkBench-launched applications) then the WB and shell can
find ApAssist when they need to.
If you did NOT let it add the path statement AND you put ApAssist in the
IM R/t drawer, you would have to either launch the readme from within the
IM R/'t drawer (it should be there, I think) using the icons, or launch
apassist from the WB using an icon and then use the Open item. Item (e)
above should always work.
–Ben
…via AutoPilot
Can you pass a suggestion along? Please have a Quicken data import
function in this clone. I have a LOT of data in Quicken (as I suspect
many other people do), and it would be nice to transfer the data from the
PC to the Amiga.
I SECOND that! Definitely include import and export functions and the
program will definitley have added value.
Mike.
Just Multitasking Operating Systems AmigaDos & OS/2.
Charles,
That product announcement is music to my ears! If you can make just
one small, itsy, bitsy tiny, weeny suggestion, ask them if than can allow
import/export of Phasar .reg files….oh yea and an arexx port as well!
Good luck and keep us informed!
…Steve
Michaels suggestion on appassist is a good one also!
(well, thats 3 suggestions and I haven't even thought about it yet!)
CBM: The end of an era (or is that error?)
ARexx is already there, that I know. I can pass on suggestions about multi-
format imports (Quicken, Phasar, etc.) as well as multi-format outputs (Lotus,
ProCalc, SuperPlan, etc.)
-Chas
Do you know if it can call banks and credit companies and so on? I don't
even know if that feature is in Quicken, but I've heard of it and it has
me SALIVATING!!!!!!!!
Paul
I don't know about calling banks & credit companies. Do you mean like
Checkfree?
-Chas
I don't actually know what Checkfree is but I know that some PC (and Mac?)
programs can call to get balance information, charges assessed, interest,
that sort of thing – and also interact with some banks' check-writing
programs – so that a lot of banking tasks are automated. It's a
tremendously useful feature.
Paul
Paul,
Checkfree is absolutely a lifesaver. I use it on my 486 at work but
would rather be able to use it at home on my Amiga.
———————————————-Don- via Whap!
Don-
What does it do?
Paul
PMFJI…
CheckFree is basically an "on-line" checkwriter. Your computer calls up,
dumps your check information, and CF cuts the checks and mails them out…
for a really reasonable fee if I recall correctly.
So you use Quicken, have it generate your bill payments, then it calls CF,
and CF mails them out.
Chris – Fast and Low on my '020!
"If you don't straighten up young man, you'll grow up to be President!"
Paul,
Checkfree automates bill paying. It costs about $10/month & makes
repetitive bill paying a breeze. Checkwriting is done on the program &
uploaded via modem to their clearinghouse which either pays the bills by
mailing them out or electronically wiring the money. I use it with Manage Your
Money which keeps a running total of all tax expenses etc. Since I have 4
rental units and my own home it saves me tons of work each month, especially
since I also pay my business expenses myself which I pay the old fashioned way.
———————————————-Don- via Whap!
Don-
Is there CheckFree software that you have to have, or would it be possible
for IDI's program to do the calling?
Also, how fast is the turnaround on CheckFree's payments? I mean do you
have to do your bills even earlier than normal, or just the same, or do
you have more lee-way?
Paul
Paul,
CheckFree requires that you use their software for access (or at least
when I was using the service they did). You can upload your payment
schedule for the month all at one time with specific pay dates noted for
each payment.
The minimum required lead time is 4 working days (which, IMO stinks… my
bank's pay-by-phone is same day). How fast a payment reaches the payee
depends on how the payment is made… if they accept EFT (electronic fumds
transfers) it is same day… if CheckFree has to cut laser check an mail
it, it takes a couple of days.
You can GO CHECKFREE for more information.
>>Also, how fast is the turnaround on CheckFree's payments? I mean do you
>>have to do your bills even earlier than normal, or just the same, or do
>>you have more lee-way?
Paul, it sounds as you play the same game I do quite often "Beat the Check
to the Bank"!!
…Steve
Why would someone *want* to call a company MicroSoft?
I can't imagine that its too popular with the ladies…
Yes, absolutely… What was I thinking of???!!? I have wished that phasar
had an arexx port since the day I bought it. Why didn't I make that
suggestion too?
Re Quicken clone: excellent idea! I've been waiting for someone to do
that for a long time! Please feed us with details ASAP. By the way, any
idea on price?
No, prices hasn't been set. It'll make a big difference if they do decide togo
with only an "online" manual and no printed one. That is still up for debate.
-Chas
I think it's a good way to go. If the online manual is really good enough
it's fine by me for reading – and it saves paper and shelf space. And it
makes it easy to keep the manual current – which is a BIG plus; I hate
trying to figure out what is accurate and how accurate it really is.
Otoh, especially with a new product, I think it's important to really get
the manual right the first time. ImageMaster's early online manual was
far from perfect. But they had the benefit of existing customers.
Paul
Charles,
It is about time! I am glad to see some one is finally cloning Quicken.
I don't have any suggestions, but after reading the Newsweek article
on Quicken users, I tend to want an Amiga version ASAP.
The Newsweek article related the experience of one user heading for a
divorce because his financial budget did not exist. He started using
Quicken and saved his marriage…HURRY please. 🙂
Craig ——–> via autopilot
czwiener@services.dese.state.mo.us
Charles, If it will be a true Quicken clone I want to be notified the day
it is available! I have been suffering through with Phasar. Phasar is ok
but I really want something more like Quicken. The programmers should make
a Phasar import feature, there are a lot of users out there that will
switch. You guys should start taking names for sales, put me on it! 8)
Darald.
If you make a Quicken clone, I'll buy it!
It would be nice if I could feed it my 8 years of Phasar files for
historical purposes….. Could pass along a suggestion that they provide
some sort of migration/conversion utility for Phasar check reg files?
Thanx!
Charles,
That's great news (re: Quicken Clone). I was using a BridgeBoard and
MoneyCounts but it was way too slow. Then I bought "Personal Finance
Manager" an Amiga product and it does not seem very reliable.
Will there be some sort of upgrade offer for those who own other products
by you?
Andrew
The Gentle HUM of Amiga flying along with AutoPilot…
It's Music to the ears of multitaskers everywhere.
I don't know about the upgrade offer. Anything is possible.
-Chas
Don't mind me, I'm always on the lookout for a bargain. I'm interested in
it even if there is an special offer.
Andrew