Hey BuBBy!

As usual, you make some very good points. Okay, its off to the (other) forum I go - well, after I wake up and have something to eat that is. Hey, when its as hot as it is here right now, being a nocturnal creature has its up side - much cooler after sundown.

HG

I haven't had a chance to look at it yet - I'll install it and have a closer look for you.

Also I have found the advice about support from the developers (or the products user community) is a good one.

Often on the developers site - they have a support forum where you could ask your questions. The way I read the GOTD "no support" clause - is developers are not obligated to provide any support. At their discretion they may decide to provide some support so the product can be evaluated (if it doesn't install or function). Also the developer may be interested in any legitimate bugs or useful suggestions to improve the product.

A developer who outright refuses any contact or communication with a potential customer or someone interested in improving the product is probably a developer who has no interest in developing their business or increasing their customer base. I have even had dealings with some developers who I have helped fix some pesky bugs or made some brilliant suggestions displaying superhuman insight ;) - and was rewarded with a free full license (or multiple licenses).

But hmm - back on topic - some of these problems with software, like incompatibilities or crashes and lockups - some developers actually like to find out about these - so if there is a problem in their program - they can fix it, to make other future users happy that they don't have to experience them.

Thanks Face - thats good advice, and I appreciate your taking the time to post it. And you're right about contacting the developers. I want this program enough to wait and see what options are available. As for my wheel, again, good advice. There is just one problem. The other hamster is using it.....and he doesn't share - remember what I said about grafting onto body parts? Not worth it - guess I'll just keep chewing on the furniture instead.

hamstergirl

hamstergirl:

I don't have anything specific to offer at the moment, but my advice would be:

1. Do not do anything rash! - So many times people have trashed programs that they were having problems with and shortly thereafter someone has come along with a simple fix - so leave it be - do not uninstall!

2. Try contacting the developers. Even though the arrangement is - no help, several companies have been very responsive when problems have occurred. And these guys have demonstrated their support of GOTD in the past and by continuing to offer great products. E-mail them (Be sure to be polite and tell them how much you appreciate them offering such a great product and how wonderful you think it is, etc., etc.) You may be pleasantly surprised by a response.

3. Give people here time to find this thread and consider possible solutions - there are almost always suggestions when a member runs into problems and who knows - someone else may have had the same thing happen and have come up with a solution.

4. And while you wait - go run your wheel - a little exercise may clear your head and you might come up with a new approach!

Good luck and hang in there!

I know the hour is late, but I have been wrangling with today's giveaway and how time can fly even when you're NOT having fun.....anyone else have this problem?

Dl'd just fine. Activated and installed just fine. Uninstalled just fine......repeat process from "Activated" three times, just fine. The problem is when I try to save anything, it crashes. And when I restart the app and try to load the autosave of the document, it just hangs.....forever. Oh, wait...on one attempt, I tried to open the help file (you know, the one for another program....). All I got for my troubles was a handful of msgs telling me the requested plug-ins had failed and would not open, then a big msg saying the program asked MS runtime libraries to "shut the program down in an unusual way" and that I needed to contact the developer. After that - all hell breaks loose - nothing worked, including shutdown. I had to just reboot manually and fortunately, things seem to be okay - even Concept Draw, which has still retained that little saving problem.

Look, I'm not really mad at anybody in particular - I'm just mad, like generically speaking (and hamsters can be vicious little animals, like when we surgically graft ourselves to an extended body part). This is the first time I have ever had a problem with a program from here and I was really excited about this one. I know its not a program for a beginner, but I figure thats the best way to learn (hey its gotten me this far). So, before I tank this one permanently, if anyone has any ideas.......no I haven't tried the developers - didn't think it was an option.

OS is XPPro. - and thanks for letting me gnaw on a finger or two
hamstergirl

Sorry I'm so late getting back. Had shoulder surgery. I got the program going.
Thank you
Bob

Try someone else with the games, not sure about them so don't want to give bad advice.

Well browse to them and save them.

Then export them back.

I just did a soft restore, which reinstalled original MS software ... and disabled software I had purchased or downloaded.

I did try to back up my screen shots of the registration keys, but the WinRar file was corrupted in the soft-restore process. I did successfully export the registry before the crash (apparently caused by Advanced Windows Care .. which worked beautifully the first couple days) so I'm wondering if I could replace the registration keys for the past week's programs by culling them from that exported registry? The programs I really miss are Aston, Flash Spring, and ConceptDraw's Mind Map. The games would be nice, but those programs were genuine blessings.

Can anyone help?

My dad called me and he had the same problem. Although in his case, he didn't run the Activation.exe file found within the ZIP file first (open don't run the ZIP). It isn't too late. You can still run it while the application is closed for another 5 hours yet.

Mine is still asking for a serial number.
I reinstalled and restarted computer, still asks for serial number.
What should I do??
Bob

Whoo-hoo! :)

What ever I did fixed the problem. Installed and activated.

Thanks,

Rockman48

Hi rockman48... Thanks! I have no idea why it seems to fail for some people sometimes. Are you behind a proxy?

I checked IE after looking at one of the other threads, but it is set for online.

Port 80 is open on our firewall.

This is the first time I have had one of the applications fail to activate properly.

I am going to download the app again, uninstall, reinstall and activate. I will let you know...

Hi rockman48! I have heard some causes for this, like the firewall is blocking port 80, anti-virus, anti-spyware, etc. can cause these problems. But someone discovered another one. And that IE is accidentally set to offline mode (under File). And it doesn't matter if you are using IE or not. As it will still block activation even if you are using another browser. Hopefully some suggestion will work. Good luck!

No joy. The symtoms are the same.

Reboot your computer and try and activate it again if when you open the application it asks for a serial.

Hi rockman48! I don't know what you did wrong, but it sounds like you ran the Setup.exe before running Activate.exe. If true, close the program and reopen and hopefully it will be gone.

Hi,
I am also experiencing problems with activating Mindmap. I have installed the program, run ACTIVATE.EXE, received the "Successfully Activated" message. But when I run the program, it asks for a serial number.

Any suggestions?

Hi nennepus,
Thanx for helping me out...

Hi!
You have to run the activate.exe that is in the zipped file...

Hi guys,
As I am a newbie here I can't make out why the mindmapping software doesn't work when downloading it properly (I presume I did). I read the 'read-me file' but didn't find any reg key and now I can't get it to work. When I open up the software it prompts me for the licence key entry (?). I thought this was supposed to be free? Anybody out there who can sort me out?