Silence from the accordance team. Again.

[A. Smith]

So . . . 

 

I've got a problem with accordance running in Sonoma. I'm not the only one.

 

I've posted to the forum. I've emailed tech support. I've called the office. Several times throughout today. Even left a message. 

 

Absolutely nothing. No one is answering the phone. No one is on the forum. As I've checked throughout the day, I've seen, I believe, two accordance employees on the forum. Briefly (looking at online users). That's it. This never happens. Today is no holiday so far as I know. It's midday on Wednesday in Florida. 

 

Why does this feel exactly the same as when accordance completely flubbed the launch of version 14 last year? 

 

I have never, ever had a bad thing to say about accordance support. I've always used accordance as an example of what support should look like. Until version 14. Then, I thought maybe we were making some progress. Now it seems we're back again. 

 

BTW, I live in a remote part of the world, far away from Florida. It is NOT easy for me to call. But I did. And I am. For what? 

 

[Leopold Green]

Yes the silence is disconcerting. I am a beta tester and at no point did I hear that Sonoma wouldn't work on an Intel Mac... I don't get what is happening - I had only just started trusting that Accordance would run properly too

[Dr. Nathan Parker]

Tech Support is answering phone calls and emails, but they are completely overwhelmed with support at the moment due to the launch of Sonoma.

 

I will likely post a message concerning Accordance and Sonoma today. I'm finalizing the text with tech support first to ensure I have accurate information to post.

[Silas Marrs]

I can't speak for anyone else at Accordance, but the reason I rarely respond to anything on the forums is that I am someone who isn't happy with any comment until I rewrite it like five times, and that effort is better spent trying to fix the issues raised.

 

As for the issue on intel, both me and the other programmer recently switched to using M1 Macs for development.  I've pulled out my previous machine to see if I can reproduce and fix the issues you're seeing.

[mhanel]

16 minutes ago, Nathan Parker said:

Tech Support is answering phone calls and emails, but they are completely overwhelmed with support at the moment due to the launch of Sonoma.

 

I will likely post a message concerning Accordance and Sonoma today. I'm finalizing the text with tech support first to ensure I have accurate information to post.

 

Guys, you have to do better than this! If the problems are so overwhelming that Tech Support is swamped by the issue, then that's exactly why someone needs to hit the pause button and send a message out to everyone saying, "Please do not upgrade to Sonoma if you wish to use Accordance until we get a few issues resolved!" This is the same exact issue that was so frustrating with the launch of 14. If you know there are problems, just COMMUNICATE them to people openly. I have literally not bought a single product since the launch of 14 because I have yet to see the ship being righted. I am invested in Accordance, I don't want to see it fail. But I do need to see it doing better before I invest in it more.

[Dr. Nathan Parker]

1 hour ago, mhanel said:

"Please do not upgrade to Sonoma if you wish to use Accordance until we get a few issues resolved!"

 

I did this today, but your feedback is definitely well taken. In the future, we'll send out the "wait to upgrade" message sooner.

 

In the meantime, I'm also trying to see if we can link the "wait to upgrade" message in a prominent place on our website.

[David Padfield]

Glad I saw this post before I updated my Macs. A problem of this magnitude merits an email to all users — not just a note on the Forums for when users can't use the program and it is too late to uninstall the OS.

[Kristin]

12 minutes ago, David Padfield said:

Glad I saw this post before I updated my Macs. A problem of this magnitude merits an email to all users — not just a note on the Forums for when users can't use the program and it is too late to uninstall the OS.

 

I agree completely. I am also deeply concerned since on that post he spoke of, @Nathan Parker said "Accordance 13 users will want to upgrade to Accordance 14 and install Accordance 14.0.8 (once released) to ensure optimal compatibility with macOS Sonoma."

It sounds like Accordance is not concerned with, or testing, stability of Accordance 13 with Sonoma, and it sounds like people need to not install Sonoma (even though Mac really never has issues OR "upgrade" to v.14, despite the vast issues with v.14 which are absent in v.13. I am just feeling pretty overwhelmed with it, tbh.

I hope the way it appears is not the case, but if it is not the case, why did Nathan say everyone needs to "upgrade" to the problematic version?

[Dr. Nathan Parker]

We will be releasing an email shortly.

 

Concerning Accordance 13, that is the current information I have received from Tech Support, but I will update here with more info as I receive it.

[darrylmy]

8 hours ago, Silas Marrs said:

As for the issue on intel, both me and the other programmer recently switched to using M1 Macs for development.  I've pulled out my previous machine to see if I can reproduce and fix the issues you're seeing.

 

I hate to be overly critical (and I may be making assumptions about the development process), but I can' help but find it a bit concerning that the two programmers (and you seem to imply that you two make up the entire programming team) are not also testing in a development environment that Accordance is supposed to support. When you stated, "I've pulled out my previous machine to see if I can reproduce..." it sounds like prior to that 0% of the development team was testing on an Intel Mac. Shouldn't it have already been a part of the development process?

 

Now, I am on the M1X series, have not updated to Somoma, and am still running accordance 13, so these issues haven't affected me, but the community is clearly unhappy. And although I am unaffected, I can't help but wonder how such practices will play out in the future if not addressed today...

[David Shiflet]

30 minutes ago, darrylmy said:

 

I hate to be overly critical (and I may be making assumptions about the development process), but I can' help but find it a bit concerning that the two programmers (and you seem to imply that you two make up the entire programming team) are not also testing in a development environment that Accordance is supposed to support. When you stated, "I've pulled out my previous machine to see if I can reproduce..." it sounds like prior to that 0% of the development team was testing on an Intel Mac. Shouldn't it have already been a part of the development process?

 

Now, I am on the M1X series, have not updated to Somoma, and am still running accordance 13, so these issues haven't affected me, but the community is clearly unhappy. And although I am unaffected, I can't help but wonder how such practices will play out in the future if not addressed today...

And yet we’re being told that 14.0.83b will be released tomorrow and will address these issues. I’m skeptical, for the reasons you have stated. It’s not as if they just learned of the compatibility problem today. 
 

I hope my skepticism is misplaced.

[A. Smith]

6 hours ago, Kristin said:

 

It sounds like Accordance is not concerned with, or testing, stability of Accordance 13 with Sonoma, and it sounds like people need to not install Sonoma (even though Mac really never has issues OR "upgrade" to v.14, despite the vast issues with v.14 which are absent in v.13. I am just feeling pretty overwhelmed with it, tbh.

I hope the way it appears is not the case, but if it is not the case, why did Nathan say everyone needs to "upgrade" to the problematic version?

 

With the current state of things, I can completely understand not putting time to update v13. That ship has sailed, for better or worse. 

 

But, as @darrylmy has said, is no one testing this on intel Macs? As I've said in another post, was accordance surprised by this problem? I can't imagine that they were. If they were, that indicates a MAJOR problem. If they weren't, that also indicates a MAJOR problem. The first is a problem of testing and lies with backend staff. The second is a problem of communication and lies with the frontend staff. Based on what I'm seeing in the beta forum (which I never wanted to be a part of and I'm only there in a desperate attempt to solve my crippling problem) this issue with Sonoma and intel has been well known. Why wasn't it communicated? There is no good answer. 

 

We were told 

On 11/30/2022 at 9:06 PM, Troy Wormell said:

Accordance remains as committed as ever to offering stellar customer support, and when we stumble, we’ll do everything we can to make things right. That has not changed and will not change.

 

I'm very, very sorry to say, I'm not seeing it. Not that you're not trying to make it right. I'm now getting emails and calls from tech support and everything else. That's great and I appreciate it. Sure. But the best customer support should have anticipated this problem. 

 

[David Shiflet]

8 hours ago, A. Smith said:

 

With the current state of things, I can completely understand not putting time to update v13. That ship has sailed, for better or worse. 

 

But, as @darrylmy has said, is no one testing this on intel Macs? As I've said in another post, was accordance surprised by this problem? I can't imagine that they were. If they were, that indicates a MAJOR problem. If they weren't, that also indicates a MAJOR problem. The first is a problem of testing and lies with backend staff. The second is a problem of communication and lies with the frontend staff. Based on what I'm seeing in the beta forum (which I never wanted to be a part of and I'm only there in a desperate attempt to solve my crippling problem) this issue with Sonoma and intel has been well known. Why wasn't it communicated? There is no good answer. 

 

We were told 

 

I'm very, very sorry to say, I'm not seeing it. Not that you're not trying to make it right. I'm now getting emails and calls from tech support and everything else. That's great and I appreciate it. Sure. But the best customer support should have anticipated this problem. 

 

They certainly KNEW of the Intel problem. They KNEW with plenty of time to warn users.

 

They chose not to.

 

Now two days after public Sonoma release, still no email. No public mea culpa. The Accordance website and X (Twitter) now link to Nathan’s post on the forums that blames Apple, and implicitly blames all Accordance users imprudent enough to accept a major OS upgrade on launch week.
 

But ZERO responsibility accepted by Accordance. ZERO. 

Edited September 28, 2023 by David Shiflet

[Larry Wing]

Glad I saw the warning email they sent out and then checked this forum.  I wasn't going to upgrade to Sonoma until I confirmed my programs would run, never thinking about the CPU.  I run an Intel Macbook Pro and am sure I'd have run into problems too.

 

 

[Rick55]

3 hours ago, Larry Wing said:

Glad I saw the warning email they sent out and then checked this forum.  I wasn't going to upgrade to Sonoma until I confirmed my programs would run, never thinking about the CPU.  I run an Intel Macbook Pro and am sure I'd have run into problems too.

 

 

Newer is not always better I am still running windows 10 on my pc and ventura with an m1 air - no issues so as of yet. 

[parker234]

People using Accordance on Intel Macbook Pros:

 

 

[Dr. Nathan Parker]

I know I'm only one individual, but I've personally been beating myself up this past week concerning this. I've had a couple of health issues lately that's diverted my focus, but I truly believe I would have exercised additional foresight to communicate better. 

 

For that, I am truly sorry.

 

While I can't change the past, moving forward, I will personally take additional initiative and responsibility concerning how operating system updates and Accordance are communicated.

 

 

[A. Smith]

1 hour ago, Nathan Parker said:

I know I'm only one individual, but I've personally been beating myself up this past week concerning this. I've had a couple of health issues lately that's diverted my focus, but I truly believe I would have exercised additional foresight to communicate better. 

 

For that, I am truly sorry.

 

While I can't change the past, moving forward, I will personally take additional initiative and responsibility concerning how operating system updates and Accordance are communicated.

 

 

 

Please don't. If critical communication at accordance depends only on you . . . I don't even know what to say

[Pastor Jonathan]

9 hours ago, A. Smith said:

 

Please don't. If critical communication at accordance depends only on you . . . I don't even know what to say

I do.

 

@Nathan Parker, if the whole company hinges on you for communication, you either need to ask for a MAJOR raise, ask for aid per our discussion on the other thread, or find a company that values your work. 

 

 

I speak as one who worked for corporate before. I worked three months straight with no days off and I was still dinged for not being a "team player". 

 

If you have health issues and Accordance is not making sure you are cared for that does not speak well for a "Christian" company. 

 

I don't know you personally, but from our DM's and emails you seem to be a straight up guy and hard working and smart. There are those who recognize that. 

 

But this goes into what I said about the lack of emails. I posted what I did in the other thread and I am still TWO years without a response. 

 

That is not on you or a reflection on you. That is a company that is circling itself and losing focus on its mission, employees and its user base. 

 

I hear it said they care. Your statement lends otherwise. 

 

If I were the owner, and I had a disasterous V14 rollout. Then followed up with this, I would not be sitting back hoping programers can fix it quick. I would be knocking the doors off this forum, I would be directing emails from my office, I would be hiring, and expanding programmers, if the case calls for it, firing ones who were not carrying the weight. I would be surrendering my days to shore up the company and making sure my WHOLE team has absolute direct control of their departments to make immediate decisions for the betterment of the company and I would handle the face of the company with the marketing team. 

 

To hear you had bad health and that is why no comminication, that is a slap in your face. I feel it and it isn't me! 

 

No sir, you take care of your health. You DO NOT and SHOULD NOT take this responsability on your shoulders beyond what is reasonable and in my mind you have done your job. It is the company that failed you. 

 

Again, take my comments for what they are. I have no bone here as I don't use mac. But if Accordance fails, I lose out as well. So I am trying to help. 

 

Ok. Rant over...or is it?

 

[A. Smith]

12 minutes ago, Pastor Jonathan said:

 

If I were the owner, and I had a disasterous V14 rollout. Then followed up with this, I would not be sitting back hoping programers can fix it quick. I would be knocking the doors off this forum, I would be directing emails from my office, I would be hiring, and expanding programmers, if the case calls for it, firing ones who were not carrying the weight. I would be surrendering my days to shore up the company and making sure my WHOLE team has absolute direct control of their departments to make immediate decisions for the betterment of the company and I would handle the face of the company with the marketing team. 

Exactly. This is the deafening silence I’m really getting at with the OP. 

[David Shiflet]

10 hours ago, Nathan Parker said:

I know I'm only one individual, but I've personally been beating myself up this past week concerning this. I've had a couple of health issues lately that's diverted my focus, but I truly believe I would have exercised additional foresight to communicate better. 

 

For that, I am truly sorry.

 

While I can't change the past, moving forward, I will personally take additional initiative and responsibility concerning how operating system updates and Accordance are communicated.

 

 

Nathan, thank you for your labors. Thank you for taking this seriously. I have prayed today for your health issues. May the Lord give you strength and help. 
 

But this also saddens me. It saddens me for you and your family that you were left alone to bear the brunt of this debacle. It saddens me for Accordance users that we have no reasonable hope it will be better next time. 
 

As I have said already this week, software and development are only one part of the problem. In my mind, the far more significant long term problem is a cultural/systemic malady at Accordance. That has not been addressed AT ALL. Again, I’m grateful that as an individual you have taken this seriously.
 

But you are not the problem. Until senior management/ownership comes out from hiding and begins to rebuild trust with their users, it’s only a matter of time before the next failure. And what reasonable hope do we users have that we will be respected enough next time to give us proactive and transparent communication?

 

 You have no reason to be ashamed. Ownership and senior management, however? Embarrassing should only begin to describe their failures. 

Edited September 30, 2023 by David Shiflet

[JohnABarnett]

13 hours ago, Nathan Parker said:

I know I'm only one individual, but I've personally been beating myself up this past week concerning this. I've had a couple of health issues lately that's diverted my focus, but I truly believe I would have exercised additional foresight to communicate better. 

 

For that, I am truly sorry.

 

While I can't change the past, moving forward, I will personally take additional initiative and responsibility concerning how operating system updates and Accordance are communicated.

 

 

 

Father in heaven, be with Nathan through this trial, comfort and encourage him through Christ to serve you first, whatever men may think. In the name of Jesus, Amen.

 

Nathan,

 

As I'm sure you are deeply in touch with the need to protect your health. As an Accordance user who has shared some of the frustrations this past year, I (and I'm confident this is true) most of the voices expressing frustration would, when it comes down to it, assent that your health comes first. We pray you do not beat yourself up, but I understand it as one who because of health issues has had to let my own family down at times over the years.

 

Again, God be with you, brother in Christ. 

[kcjimmyk]

Way to go Nathan!!! The latest aleph update is usable. Still has some bugs e.g. the seemingly random Chinese characters. That bug has already been reported. BUT the program is usable and I can get back to work now. 
 

Thank you for getting things moving. I was terrified that Accordance would drop support for Intel macs. I have poured thousands into this program over the years and I don’t like Logos and can’t afford it. 
 

Once again THANK YOU!!

Edited September 30, 2023 by kcjimmyk
Spelling again

[robrecht]

Sorry to say it, but Accordance has continued to go down-hill with the current owners. Problems with Version 14 on a PC still aren't fixed, and now this lack of necessary attention to the newest Mac OS. All we get are excuses and false promises. I am truly sorry to see and say this, but there is some virtue in honesty.

[Dr. Nathan Parker]

Thanks for the prayers and encouragement. We are making progress on 14.0.8.

 

Critical communication doesn't depend solely on a single person. However, as one whose job it is to serve Accordance's customers, I have spent time reflecting on this and how I can both personally improve moving forward, as well as I will be collecting all of your feedback this week to discuss with our teams.

 

I won't elaborate on my health here (I direct off-topic discussions to my personal blog), but I will say that I am able to successfully fulfill all of my Accordance duties. I would appreciate your prayers that the Lord will give me daily wisdom.