Too many sales emails and not enough bug fixes

[Dr. Nathan Parker]

I want to reiterate (just for the sake of clarity) that I never asked for a donation for a Windows computer (or anything else for that matter), as I would never publicly ask anyone to donate anything to me, ever (I’m not that kind of person). To especially ask such a request on the Accordance forums would be beyond inappropriate.

 

Additionally, and laying aside my Accordance employee badge for a moment and just speaking personally, I’ve always self-paid my way through my life, including my entire education (I never accepted scholarships, and I’ll still be graduating from my PhD debt-free). Occasionally, the Lord has blessed me with extra blessings, probably as a result of my own generosity (there are numerous times I’ve given of myself to others, but I won’t elaborate on them here. That’s between me and the Lord). 

 

The bottom line is, I do have a Windows PC on-site now where I can test all incoming bug reports on Accordance for Windows, and I will personally be doing it. 

 

In terms of the bugs in Accordance 14, one thing to keep in mind that Accordance is a smaller company, but we’ve still managed to resolve a large swath of bugs from Accordance 14’s launch until present, and we’re about to release another bug fix update shortly. Even in “big tech”, Apple and Microsoft have shipped buggy releases of their operating systems and have taken longer to resolve such issues than our programmers have resolved some of the issues in Accordance 14. Mine and my mother’s iPads running iPadOS 16 (which was released before Accordance 14) has a bug where when we reboot our iPads, the keyboard doesn’t appear on the passcode sign in screen. I reported the issue on day one of iPadOS 16’s release, yet Apple hasn’t resolved or even acknowledged it yet. Windows Vista was a super-buggy release of Windows, and it took about a year later with “Service Pack 1” before some of the major bugs were resolved and it was actually usable.

 

Accordance 14 is certainly not perfect, and we’ve admitted and learned from our mistakes, and our programmers are working hard to address the remaining issues, and Accordance 14 is still on track to be an exciting release. We’ve been as clear and transparent as possible in listening to our customers and getting bug reports in the hands of our programmers quickly so they can address these issues. We’re all Accordance users, and we accepted jobs at the company because we love this company, love Accordance, and we want Accordance to thrive. 

 

[Kristin]

17 minutes ago, JonathanHuber said:

his attitude is neither kind nor helpful. I ask you to address others on this forum with the same charity and grace you would want them to show to you.

 

Hi @JonathanHuber,

Not to get in the middle of it too much, but I didn't feel anything @pder3571 said above was intended to be unkind. My impression is that he was just voicing his honest concern of some of the radical changes with Accordance since v.14, a lot of staff changes, v.12 no longer being supported, etc, etc. You mentioned treating others how you would want to be treated, and I agree 100%. In that spirit, I know if someone was aware of issues with a program, I would want to know about it, so Pder asking if issues had also been mentioned to the people receiving the recommendation, seems respectful to me. I think on this thread it is important that everyone assumes the best of each other, whether it is the Accordance staff, or frustrated customers trying to get their work done.

[robrecht]

25 minutes ago, Nathan Parker said:

I want to reiterate (just for the sake of clarity) that I never asked for a donation for a Windows computer (or anything else for that matter), as I would never publicly ask anyone to donate anything to me, ever (I’m not that kind of person). To especially ask such a request on the Accordance forums would be beyond inappropriate.

 

Again, Nathan, I was never trying to imply that you had asked for a donation, just that you were waiting to receive or have set up a PC that was being donated to you. The point I was trying to make merely was that it struck me as odd that an Accordance employee who seemed to indicate that it was his job to test bugs had not been supplied with a computer to do this job. This had nothing whatsoever to do with any kind of implication about what kind of person you are. Your statements were merely concerning to me because it made me wonder about the resources that Accordance was providing to test some of the issues being reported here. I've subsequently read here that you are (or were initially?) a part-time employee at Accordance. So it might make more sense that you were not provided with this equipment.

[Dr. Nathan Parker]

@Kristin The issues Accordance staff has had with @pder3571’s comments is they’ve gone beyond venting, frustration, and constructive criticism. I personally reached out to him a while back asking if he wanted access to our beta test program so he could be in the loop of when we were getting closer to releasing new bug fixes to Accordance. He never took me up on my offer, and now I would be hesitant at re-offering it. He seems to want a specific date on when we will resolve the remaining issues with Accordance 14. I’m not going to make those kinds of promises because it was specific date setting that caused the Accordance 14 launch issues in the first place. What I will say is since I’ve started working here, I have personally had multiple meetings with our programmers, and they are working harder than ever to address the remaining issues with Accordance 14, as well as get syncing enhancements and Accordance Cloud finished, as well as a plan a roadmap for future enhancements to Accordance (including Mobile). Accordance has also made additional hirings this year (I’m not the only one), so Accordance is doing well as a company, and we’re also getting there on resolving the remaining issues in Accordance 14. The other issues we have had with @pder3571 is that he continued to hijack other threads posting off-topic comments, even after I specifically informed him not to. Once he started doing that, I hid any comments he made that were off-topic. We allow venting frustrations and constructive criticism, but it is not helpful to customers to post off-topic comments on other threads and to continue to engage in the argumentative spirit with other customers that this poster has continually shown.

 

By the way, If anyone wants to sit down with me one afternoon one on one over the phone and personally give me their frustrations and see if I can do my best to answer them (so we can engage in real-time instead of back and forth messaging), DM me and I’ll set it up. If that would show a new level of clarity and transparency for our Accordance customers, I’d be willing to do it.

 

@robrecht Thanks for re-posting. I didn’t see your previous post (long week). I was provided a Windows PC to test Accordance for Windows on (maybe I didn’t make that clear enough when I was receiving the machine), and starting in mid-March, I am now a full-time employee at the company, so I’ll have more time to devote to all-things Accordance.

[pder3571]

1 hour ago, JonathanHuber said:

@pder3571, this attitude is neither kind nor helpful. I ask you to address others on this forum with the same charity and grace you would want them to show to you.

My "attitude" is to tell the unvarnished truth. If you don't find that "kind nor helpful," then I ask you to avoid reading anything I write.

[pder3571]

1 minute ago, Nathan Parker said:

@Kristin The issues Accordance staff has had with @pder3571’s comments is they’ve gone beyond venting, frustration, and constructive criticism. I personally reached out to him a while back asking if he wanted access to our beta test program so he could be in the loop of when we were getting closer to releasing new bug fixes to Accordance. He never took me up on my offer, and now I would be hesitant at re-offering it. He seems to want a specific date on when we will resolve the remaining issues with Accordance 14. I’m not going to make those kinds of promises because it was specific date setting that caused the Accordance 14 launch issues in the first place. What I will say is since I’ve started working here, I have personally had multiple meetings with our programmers, and they are working harder than ever to address the remaining issues with Accordance 14, as well as get syncing enhancements and Accordance Cloud finished, as well as a plan a roadmap for future enhancements to Accordance (including Mobile). Accordance has also made additional hirings this year (I’m not the only one), so Accordance is doing well as a company, and we’re also getting there on resolving the remaining issues in Accordance 14. The other issues we have had with @pder3571 is that he continued to hijack other threads posting off-topic comments, even after I specifically informed him not to. Once he started doing that, I hid any comments he made that were off-topic. We allow venting frustrations and constructive criticism, but it is not helpful to customers to post off-topic comments on other threads and to continue to engage in the argumentative spirit with other customers that this poster has continually shown.

 

By the way, If anyone wants to sit down with me one afternoon one on one over the phone and personally give me their frustrations and see if I can do my best to answer them (so we can engage in real-time instead of back and forth messaging), DM me and I’ll set it up. If that would show a new level of clarity and transparency for our Accordance customers, I’d be willing to do it.

 

@robrecht Thanks for re-posting. I didn’t see your previous post (long week). I was provided a Windows PC to test Accordance for Windows on (maybe I didn’t make that clear enough when I was receiving the machine), and starting in mid-March, I am now a full-time employee at the company, so I’ll have more time to devote to all-things Accordance.

Nathan, it was not specific date-setting that was the problem with Accordance 14. The problem was defective or incompetent program writing that was the problem, which continues to be a problem, even after four updates. Add to that Accordance's unwillingness to listen to some pretty smart people in this forum who recommended eating the elephant one bite at a time, rather than the whole beast all at once. Moreover, now that you've admitted shadow banning me or hiding my comments, and accusing me of something that is untrue, and thereby shifting the blame to me, thinking that I'm the problem with Accordance, I really have to wonder if the problems at Accordance are worse than just bad programming. You're claiming that you're protecting the customer by hiding my comments and concerns, all the while hiding the truth of what I've written, which sounds like a systemic issue, and not just a computer code issue. Do you really think that censorship doesn't reek of impropriety? After all, if I recall correctly, Facebook, Twitter, et al did the same thing with certain members that they found were "hijacking" their forums, and look what happened to them. Is that really a practice you and Accordance wish to embrace. Besides, what have the potential customers done to you or Accordance, whereby you feel the need to censor the truth? Oh, that's right, I'm "hijacking," while Accordance is merely being "transparent," and keeping current and future customers in the dark about what is really going on besides being unable to use the product they purchased or will purchase with full, uninterrupted, uncompromised functionality.

[Joe Weaks]

4 hours ago, pder3571 said:

the innumerable problems (i.e. "bugs") in the program, that have existed, now, going on six months (or longer)

Mr. pder,

 

I really am sorry that you've had such terrible problems. It's very unfortunate for you. As numerous at the bugs may be, your level of disfunction is not experience by the majority. These things are most often unique to particular hardware/software scenarios. I've not had a single to speak of in my regular use. 

 

By all means communicate your complaints/bug reports/ideas/suggestions/"unvarnished truth" directly to the software developer.
But don't pretend complaining in a public forum is the same thing, or some noble endeavor.

Edited March 23, 2023 by Joe Weaks

[Dr. Nathan Parker]

@pder3571 As a forum admin, it is my job to read what our customers are posting on the forums so the forums do not turn into an unsupervised “wild west”. I did not “shadow ban” you in the way “big tech” has done to users of their platforms. I patiently listened to your venting and frustrations and did my best to be as clear and transparent in my responses to you beyond what any other forum admin of any other technology company would invest the time to do (and am still doing). You continued to hijack other positive threads and discussions and Accordance announcement threads and posted off-topic comments that did not pertain to those threads. You also argued with other Accordance users on such threads. I specifically requested that you cease from making such off-topic comment posts to those threads and post your venting and frustrations on your own threads. You ignored my request and continued making such off-comment posts on such threads. Previous forum admins for the company would have likely restricted your posting privileges or banned your forum account in violation of our forum guidelines. I allowed your account to remain in the system, but I simply hid the posts that were in violation of our guidelines after you showed disregard for my specific request. You have a right to vent your frustrations with Accordance on the forums, but you do not have the right to derail other customer’s positive discussions, venture off-topic, and argue with other customers who are trying to engage in productive discussions on the forums.

 

@Joe Weaks is correct. The majority of our customers are not experiencing the level of issues you’re personally experiencing with Accordance. As I’ve mentioned in the past to you, we have phone and email support where you can pick up the phone and call our support team (you may need to leave a message and have them call you back), or you can email support directly. They can take a look at see what is going on with your Accordance installation and see if there are certain issues that can be resolved through some tweaks to your Accordance installation and what issues are specific bugs that our programmers will need to address, and if so, they will collect that information from you and pass it onto our programmers for resolution in an update. This would be a far more productive use of your time to work toward resolving the specific issues you’re having with Accordance 14 than continuing to argue with forum admins and customers on the forums. It’s up to you to decide if you want to take advantage of that option. You’re entitled to it as an Accordance user who’s invested in the program.

 

I’m personally solely running Accordance 14 on a Mac and Windows PC. While there are some minor bugs that still need to be addressed (and are being addressed in each update that is released), I can still successfully use Accordance 14 on both platforms, both for my personal Bible study, and for mission-critical work finishing up my PhD research, without any “show stopping” issues. When I experience an issue with Accordance 14, I post a bug report here in the forums asking other users if they’re experiencing the same issue, as I’m just as much as an Accordance user as I am an employee.

[pder3571]

1 hour ago, Joe Weaks said:

Mr. pder,

 

I really am sorry that you've had such terrible problems. It's very unfortunate for you. As numerous at the bugs may be, your level of disfunction is not experience by the majority. These things are most often unique to particular hardware/software scenarios. I've not had a single to speak of in my regular use. 

 

By all means communicate your complaints/bug reports/ideas/suggestions/"unvarnished truth" directly to the software developer.
But don't pretend complaining in a public forum is the same thing, or some noble endeavor.

I'm not pretending anything, nor did you answer any of my questions.

[Dr. Nathan Parker]

I do not believe that @Joe Weaks is employed by Accordance (there is no lamp under his name), so neither he nor any other Accordance user is obligated to answer your questions. I and @Sean Nelson have already answered your questions with the best clarity that we can answer. If you find that unsatisfactory, as I have mentioned to you multiple times, you are welcome to contact Accordance support through our tech support channels.

 

I’ll continue to monitor this thread. If the discussions further become unproductive, I’ll lock it. I appreciate our customers who have given us encouragement and have come to our defense. I have answered and stated everything with as much transparency and clarity that I can possibly provide. I have nothing more to say on the matter, as doing so would be an unproductive use of my time better spent in other Accordance matters. If you’re still not satisfied, then your next resort would be to contact support here:

 

https://www.accordancebible.com/sources-of-support/

[pder3571]

19 minutes ago, Nathan Parker said:

@pder3571 As a forum admin, it is my job to read what our customers are posting on the forums so the forums do not turn into an unsupervised “wild west”. I did not “shadow ban” you in the way “big tech” has done to users of their platforms. I patiently listened to your venting and frustrations and did my best to be as clear and transparent in my responses to you beyond what any other forum admin of any other technology company would invest the time to do (and am still doing). You continued to hijack other positive threads and discussions and Accordance announcement threads and posted off-topic comments that did not pertain to those threads. You also argued with other Accordance users on such threads. I specifically requested that you cease from making such off-topic comment posts to those threads and post your venting and frustrations on your own threads. You ignored my request and continued making such off-comment posts on such threads. Previous forum admins for the company would have likely restricted your posting privileges or banned your forum account in violation of our forum guidelines. I allowed your account to remain in the system, but I simply hid the posts that were in violation of our guidelines after you showed disregard for my specific request. You have a right to vent your frustrations with Accordance on the forums, but you do not have the right to derail other customer’s positive discussions, venture off-topic, and argue with other customers who are trying to engage in productive discussions on the forums.

 

@Joe Weaks is correct. The majority of our customers are not experiencing the level of issues you’re personally experiencing with Accordance. As I’ve mentioned in the past to you, we have phone and email support where you can pick up the phone and call our support team (you may need to leave a message and have them call you back), or you can email support directly. They can take a look at see what is going on with your Accordance installation and see if there are certain issues that can be resolved through some tweaks to your Accordance installation and what issues are specific bugs that our programmers will need to address, and if so, they will collect that information from you and pass it onto our programmers for resolution in an update. This would be a far more productive use of your time to work toward resolving the specific issues you’re having with Accordance 14 than continuing to argue with forum admins and customers on the forums. It’s up to you to decide if you want to take advantage of that option. You’re entitled to it as an Accordance user who’s invested in the program.

 

I’m personally solely running Accordance 14 on a Mac and Windows PC. While there are some minor bugs that still need to be addressed (and are being addressed in each update that is released), I can still successfully use Accordance 14 on both platforms, both for my personal Bible study, and for mission-critical work finishing up my PhD research, without any “show stopping” issues. When I experience an issue with Accordance 14, I post a bug report here in the forums asking other users if they’re experiencing the same issue, as I’m just as much as an Accordance user as I am an employee.

Incorrect, Nathan. This is the first time in weeks that I have written anything. I simply sat back and read the comments, and looking for indications that this nightmare was soon to be over. Prior to that, my comments were relevant and unanswered, since they dealt with selling a defective product, which everyone knows Accordance 14 is. Now, my comments may have gnawed at your conscience, but knowing that a company, especially one dealing with God's Word, is peddling a defective product without telling potential customers about it, grated on me too.

 

Nevertheless, you may rest assured that I have now taken action to request a refund. I would encourage others to do the same, if they are so inclined to do the same. Sometimes, that is only way certain people or companies will listen, when it starts to hit them in the pocket book. I am sorry it has come to this, but enough is enough. For the past 13 years I've been an Accordance user and fan, and thought it was the greatest Bible software tool money could buy. With the recent vain accusations by yourself et al today, along with the same inherent technical problems with the software, I no longer believe that. In fact, and as I was explaining to my wife this evening, I have a gut feeling that something is terribly wrong with not just the software, but with the company itself. I don't know know what it is, and I could be possibly wrong altogether. But, the only time I've gotten similar hunches or feelings in the past, all of which were based on similar types of interactions with those doing things that Accordance personnel are doing right now, those entities or persons were engaged in fraud and/or deceit. I hope that's not the case with Accordance, but I would not be surprised if that turned out to be the case. You may now shadow ban, hide, or whatever you wish to call it, my comments. It is to be expected with your recent confession.

[ReformedDoc]

@pder3571 Have you ever thought maybe its your computer that's causing some of your issues. I was using 13 & upgraded to 14 & only had I few minor issues so far. Have you tried a fresh install of 14, I see you have Mac OS & Windows listed. Does it happen on both operating systems?

Edited March 23, 2023 by jhntruevine

[Paul Meiklejohn]

Nathan, I think it’s perhaps time to close this post from further comments.  I believe you’ve done enough to explain yourself and the company. I reiterate what I’ve shared before, I’m delighted you’re on staff.  You have done a wonderful job since joining the company.  I look forward to the next update.  

 

Ephesians 4:3 Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace.

accord://read/NIV11-GKE#Eph._4:3

 

Edited March 23, 2023 by Paul Meiklejohn

[Gary Raynor]

And we all said Amen and Amen.

[T. Conrad]

Consider this: the people who work on the software are different than the people who promote the software. The devs are not writing those emails. Both things can happen at the same time (development and promotion) because the people do those things are completely different roles.

 

Also, keep this in mind: Software development is a very complicated process and bug hunting takes a lot of hours. And that increases exponentially with the more code you add. You have to find the (potentially) offending code, make a change, hope that it doesn't negatively affect other portions, recompile (which can take a long time), hope you don't get compilation errors, and then test more. Lather. Rinse. Repeat. Troubleshooting is a very tedious and time-consuming process. o make matters worse, there could be a piece of code that has one mistake but still seems to function after things have been changed until a further change comes along down the road. Then you don't just have to look back at what you most recently changed, but you need to dig back even further. (And, all it takes is one single stroke of the keyboard to be wrong--a missing ";" or varOne being typed varOme--and you have a bad day.)

We've been spoiled because, for the most part, Accordance has been rock-solid stable for many years. This was a tough release for them. But their track record over the years should give you a better indication of the future state of the program in terms of stability. I'm positive the devs are hard at work at not just 'patchwork' fixes, but real tangible, low-level, stability improvements. Hang in there!

[Sean Nelson]

This thread has been locked to further responses.