What's the point of rating an addin "ZERO"???

[cmercier]

I am the author of Spamihilator E-Mail Report. For whatever reason, people have rated my addin a big ZERO! Why?

I would at least expect feedback by e-mail from those people who rated it so low. I have put time and energy writing this FINE PIECE OF SOFTWARE. If those people don't need the extra features it offers, that's fine, just uninstall the software and don't use it.

However, some people (like me) find its capabilities very useful. It does exactly what SpamButcher does... send a periodic report of deleted spam. I am waiting for the next version of Spamihilator to implement the "restore from mail client" feature.

What can I improve in the addin to at least get a decent rating? It is quite disapointing to put time and efforts in something and pretty much getting spit in the face for it.

Carl

[BillyX]

Hallo cmercier!

Ignore the rating and listen to the feedback in the forum.

Gruß
BillyX

[Bob Loeffler]

I would at least expect feedback by e-mail from those people who rated it so low.

Hi Carl,

I agree that everyone should give you their feedback. That is why I start a topic in the forum whenever I post a filter or plugin. (e.g. see "Filter Statistics 0.9.9 is now available!") It makes it easy for people to let you know what they like and don't like about it. And sometimes they have new ideas of how to make it better that I haven't even thought of.

I really don't like the voting feature on the website because you never know what people are thinking when they vote. For example, someone might not like only one feature of your plugin, but they might vote a ZERO. Or, someone might not like the general idea for the plugin, but does that deserve a zero? Or, maybe someone doesn't like Americans (me) or something else about me that is personal. Or, if you fix a major bug in it and now everyone likes it, there are still all of those zero votes. In that case, I think you would need to delete it from the "plugin authors" page and then add it as a new plugin to "start from scratch". I think that is possible, but I haven't tried it. Maybe there should be more than one rating category for each plugin:

Ease of Use (including documentation)
Usefulness (i.e. Is it a useful plugin/filter?)
Performance (i.e. Does it perform as expected?)
.
.
etc

And then the "Overall Rating" that we already see on the website now.

Just a few ideas. Don't kill me, Michel!

Regards,

Bob

[cmercier]

Bob

That's definately a good idea to post in the forum when you release a new build. However, since this board is mostly German, I never know which forum is what so instead of being off-topic, I just don't post. I think it would be nice to make the forums completely bilingual.

Take it easy!

Carl

[BillyX]

I agree that everyone should give you their feedback. That is why I start a topic in the forum whenever I post a filter or plugin. (e.g. see "Filter Statistics 0.9.9 is now available!") It makes it easy for people to let you know what they like and don't like about it. And sometimes they have new ideas of how to make it better that I haven't even thought of.

I really don't like the voting feature on the website because you never know what people are thinking when they vote. For example, someone might not like only one feature of your plugin, but they might vote a ZERO. Or, someone might not like the general idea for the plugin, but does that deserve a zero? Or, maybe someone doesn't like Americans (me) or something else about me that is personal. Or, if you fix a major bug in it and now everyone likes it, there are still all of those zero votes. In that case, I think you would need to delete it from the "plugin authors" page and then add it as a new plugin to "start from scratch". I think that is possible, but I haven't tried it. Maybe there should be more than one rating category for each plugin:

Ease of Use (including documentation)
Usefulness (i.e. Is it a useful plugin/filter?)
Performance (i.e. Does it perform as expected?)
.
.
etc

And then the "Overall Rating" that we already see on the website now.

I think 11 votes with zero have other reasons. And cmercier you are not the first one who is tried to made disappointed this way. Ignore it otherwise this idots will reach their goal.

@All Please dont start a discussion about this, our time is to valuable for this childish things.

[Bob Loeffler]

However, since this board is mostly German, I never know which forum is what so instead of being off-topic, I just don't post. I think it would be nice to make the forums completely bilingual.

Hi Carl,

There really isn't an easy way to make the forum completely bilingual. Michel re-structured the forums and I think it made everything easier (e.g. several plugin forums instead of just one). If you still don't know where to start a topic, you can put it in the English Forum since you speak English more than German. Then one of us can move it to a more appropriate forum if needed.

Regards,

Bob

[Dieter]

However, since this board is mostly German, I never know which forum is what so instead of being off-topic, I just don't post.

That should not be a problem for you. Just use the English forum if you are not sure where to post.


But I have one problem with your add-in. In the description you are writing

Don't forget! You need the .NET Framework in order to use this add-in. If you get a MSCOREE.DLL missing error message, that's why!.

I checked my system, and there is no mscoree.dll. Perhaps that is the reason why only few people (165) downlowded your add-in. Why should I install a new feature to my system without knowing what happens if I do so, just for testing your add-in where I don't know if I'm going to like it or not.

Regards
Dieter

[cmercier]

You need the .NET Framework, available from Microsoft:

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=262d25e3-f589-4842-8157-034d1e7cf3a3&displaylang=en

[Chactory]

Hi Carl,

respect for your tool!

For me, its the same hindrance as Dieter describes it.

Could you perhaps explain (for a dummy like I am unfortunately), what purpose is your e-mail-report for? Reason: For a user like me it is very comfortable to use the training area for all the refinement which has to be done. So I did not understand yet the additional intention of your program.

Please don't feel offended by my question. And, by the way, I don't believe that a voting of 11 zero ratings is plausbible. This looks like somebody did an unpleasant joke on you. This is not the first time to watch abusive ratings.

IMHO, ratings should only be possible when the rater gives his name, e.g. forum members or guests who type their name. So it would be easier to recognize some abuse by the forum admin.

Regards, Chactory

[cmercier]

Like many people, I just don't have the time to remember to look at the Spamihilator recycle bin 5-10 times a day to make sure no false-positives were deleted.

Instead, SEMR sends me a daily report (configurable, can be every hour if you wish) of what has been caught as spam.

I can, directly from the e-mail client, mark a sender as Friend or Blocked, and even restore false-positives to my inbox. (The restore feature will be implemented when Michel releases the next version of Spamihilator. The Friend/Block feature already works fine. Because of the way Spami currently works, there's no easy way for me to restore a message right now. However, Michel agreed to add a feature to allow this in the next release.)

I understand not everyone will need a report of caught spam, but some people do! That's a feature I missed a lot when I moved from SpamButcher to Spamihilator and I just wanted to recreate it. When I get in the office every morning, I just take a quick look at the report to make sure no false-positives were deleted.

Carl

[Chactory]

Hi Carl!

Thank you for explaining this. Now I understand the usefulness of your plugin.

Regards,
Chactory

[Bob Loeffler]

Hi Carl,

Thank you for explaining your plugin for us. Now maybe more people will understand and use it.

Regarding the Microsoft .NET Framework that this plugin requires, I thought I might explain it a little for users who don't know anything about it:

Microsoft .NET Framework allows a programmer to write an application using standard code and standard ways of coding. For example, the programmer can use some pre-written code so he/she doesn't have to rewrite certain pieces of the code every time he/she wants to call the same function. It makes writing software applications easier. Installing .NET Framework on a computer that is going to run Carl's software will not cause any problems. It has been tested by Microsoft and beta testers around the world for several years, so you don't have to worry about problems it may cause. The main reason for this is that most of your applications won't even know that it's installed. They won't use it unless they need it. Also, it's possible that you already have it installed on your computer. I think Windows XP Service Pack 1 (or 2?) installs it automatically.

Regards,

Bob

[BillyX]

Don't forget! You need the .NET Framework in order to use this add-in. If you get a MSCOREE.DLL missing error message, that's why!.

I checked my system, and there is no mscoree.dll. Perhaps that is the reason why only few people (165) downlowded your add-in. Why should I install a new feature to my system without knowing what happens if I do so, just for testing your add-in where I don't know if I'm going to like it or not.

.NET Framework is needed by more and more software (e.g. ATI-Graphics-driver and Logitech Webcam Software) and I think it is getting a standard on Windows. Future Windows and Office-Versions will contain and depend on it.

You can compare .NET-Framework with the Java-runtime. The Java-runtime is especially important in Browsers, .NET in the Windows-world.

[Dieter]

I think Windows XP Service Pack 1 (or 2?) installs it automatically.

I have installed WinXP SP 2, and it has not been installed in my system!

Regards
Dieter

[Chactory]

Hi Bob Loeffler, hallo BillyX, hallo Dieter, hi Carl Mercier,

does somebody know a way to check wether the .NET framework is installed already on a computer? And what does this MSCOREE.DLL missing error message mean?

Gruß,
Chactory