[JustDoug]

I’m starting this thread to talk about the real issue, which is Whether or not the upgrade is by serial or is it Random. This is not about whining because we don’t have it, and this is not about whether or not Ben should remove the “Replay†from his name http://www.avsforum.com/ubb/wink.gif …


Replay has said repeatedly that it is random, but has not given out any details other than that. Replay is on their 3rd major release now and it seems that they haven’t quite seen that there is a group of loyal fans who don’t like the random upgrade process.


People here begged and begged for Manual record and now we got it (well, we’re in the process of getting it) And the 3rd time around people are begging and begging again, but this time the feature they’re asking for is to KNOW when they are going to get upgraded. TiVo keeps hinting that they are going to upgrade the AVS forum users early… Replay should see this as a competitive feature for loyal users.


There are lots of things Replay could do to the Net connect option to keep people from dialing in. One thing they could do is remove the “checking for new software†part of the code for manual connections. That would keep it working for tech support but render the feature useless for upgrading.


But they could also look at that the reason people are forcing net connects and instead fix the problem, which is that people on this forum want the upgrade. Or at least know when!


We all know the reasons why the upgrades don’t happen overnight for everyone: The load on the servers, the trickle method to make sure nothing’s broken, etc. But it seems like ReplayTV in the future could put together some program where the relatively small base of loyal users here could get the software on a schedule. I’m not suggesting everyone get it in one day anything like that, but something so that there’s not this constant guessing.


Yes, it’s a minor thing. But so was key repeat, and paging up and down in the Replay Guide.


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-JustDoug


[This message has been edited by JustDoug (edited 10-25-2000).]

 

[fubie]

JustDoug,


Your post just goes to show that you do pay attention to your customers needs & wants.


I applaud all of you ReplayGuys for all of your help, and for asking us what we would like in the products that we use on a daily basis.


Again Thank You.


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If only she could be paused like my ReplayTV.

 

[TexasCap]

Right on, Doug!


There are what... maybe 50 people on this forum who really care about upgrading to 3.0 right away? This forum is a very vocal minority who can tend to stress out a lot of the Replay staff. We don't mean to make life difficult, Replay guys, but you're like family to us; we feel really close to you. We want you to feel close to us, too, and give us some special attention. We feel we've earned special attention because we work hard at making ReplayTV better and spreading the gospel.


Just realize that a lot of people on this forum feel just one step removed from being an actual Replay employee. We don't get all of the employee benefits, but we'd like a little more than the average consumer.

 

[just_mike]

Quote:

Originally posted by JustDoug: ... it seems like ReplayTV in the future could put together some program where the relatively small base of loyal users here could get the software on a schedule....

to interject another buzz-word or two into the mix, what doug's talking about sounds to me like Early Introduction (or EI). EI happens right before General Availability (GA). GA is what's happening right now with 3.0 (however quickly or slowly).


basically, an EI group is a known "friendly" http://www.avsforum.com/ubb/smile.gif group of normal users of the product. they use the product anyway, they just happen to (agree to) be more tolerant of any potential last second bugs. EI gets the product, evaluates it for a period of time (day/week/month) and feedback is solicited. features don't get added; big bugs get fixed.


now, you're thinking "this sounds like beta testing". nope. (in my experience) beta products are not-fully-tested and code is definitely still going to change. EI is the "we're confident we got everything we agreed to, lets try it in the real world and hope we don't have to fix anything" phase. the company i work for happens to be the recipient in an EI program with another company. it's great! i'd tell you more, but NDA forbids.


so, the essential timeline is: development... beta... EI... GA


now, i'm sure i'm about the 11,730th person to say "please make me a Beta tester. seriously." (seriously!), but maybe most of us could actually be in the EI group, if RTV was willing to add this step. it would certainly "solve" our problems and i would think our group size is about right, (but probably too large, believe it or not).


i'm sure there are many issues like "how does just the EI group get the new S/W?", but that could be done many ways, e.g.: we enter a unique phone number/zip code that has us access a special phone number, (which may even be a toll call http://www.avsforum.com/ubb/eek.gif ) we do this only to get access to the new S/W, the special server checks to make sure our unit s# is in the EI group, then we reset back to our old phone/zip so our channel lineup, etc. is ok.


ReplayGuys? do you know if there has ever been any talk about adding an EI phase?


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...mike

 

[Michael Gwynn]



Oh, for crying out loud...


(I'm sorry, but that's exactly what you guys are doing!)



See, ReplayGuys.... I'm the GOOD child, making fun of those guys for begging to be upgraded first.


Does that mean that I can be upgraded before them, please?

 

[The Robman]

Did the "other" thread get deleted? I for one, surely won't miss seeing it around, nor it's creator.


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Later,

Rob.
http://www.hifi-remote.com/

 

[kcl]

I agree with just_mike. We have software that, when rolled out to all of our customer's end-users, can have hundreds of thousands of installations. We've been doing this for over twenty years now, and we've evolved a release system that seems to best suit both ours and our customers needs.


Our releases go through four stages: Unit and regression testing, one or more beta test releases, an early adoption release, and a general release. Our EA release is equivalent to what just_mike called an EI release and, in reality, is the first part of the general release. We've found it useful because it not only tests the final release, it allows customers that need and/or want the release early to obtain it.


Like ReplayTV is doing now, we used to not have anything between the final beta and the general release. And, like what's occurring here, we used to get hammered by some because they couldn't get hold of the release "soon enough". (This isn't an unusual phenomenon, by the way. I've been in the software business for almost 35 years, and its been around for as long as I can remember.)


Just thought I'd pass along some of our hard-won experiences.


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Ken

 

[PRMan]

What's even better is that they don't need to do anything to do this. Just have everyone that does a 243-Net Connect get the software. We are the ones that would use this method. The average user doesn't even know that 243-Zones exists. For extra security, they could take a list of our serial numbers, just so we don't tell all our friends about it and quadruple the group.


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PRMan

 

[billmcf]

Speaking of the random upgrade process, I'm reminded of how WebTV handled upgrades. Basically, they had a limited number of ports on their upgrade server. Each time a user dialed in, the system would check to see if an upgrade port was available. If so, the user would get the upgrade. If all ports were busy, the user would not get the upgrade. This process would continue until all users had been upgraded.


Perhaps ReplayTV does something similar.