I have a combined VersionTracker and MacFixit Pro subscription that is just coming up for renewal.

I had been a MacFixit Pro subscriber for a while and thought VT pro made no sense since the desktop software was silly and buggy. I've been delighted with VTPro this past year, however.

At the same time, I have had poor responses to postings on MacFixit and have just now tried to use the Archives. The search engine seems incredibly stupid.

Is MF Pro really worth the money??


Best,


- Bill

I suspect only you can decide that for yourself.

With answers like that, you're absolutely right!

I think it’s a fair post, but I’ll be happy to clarify.

Since posting, I want to add, I’ve realized that the incremental charge for the MacFixit Pro is only about $10. I didn’t know that or I wouldn’t have bothered. I thought it was about $25.

Problem is with the archive search engine not with the forums. I didn’t make that crystal clear since the forum search engine is available without MacFixit Pro. I would be paying for access to archives, which do not seem to respond to queries very helpfully.

The search engine in the forums is pretty great. It takes a while, but I can usually find what I’m looking for.

Searching the archive for error excel autoexec gave me something like 900 hits, beginning with slews of hits matching nothing but error.

Not so good.

It also erroneously told me it was searching for the “phrase” made up of the text string. Obviously it was searching for OR matches for any of the words.

Didn’t take long to find a thread in the forums on the subject, by the way. And I already knew the answer. I had found it on the MS user groups.

For years, versiontracker flogged the software when everyone knew it was just awful. I subscribed to VT Pro once without even bothering to use the desktop stuff.

Suddenly they upgraded it, and it works. Not only does it work, it’s terrific. I depend on it a lot and would not think of letting it go. I would love to pay less, but it’s obviously something that depends on an income stream to be maintained properly. I’m totally cool with it.

The point? Although the management has done a great job and has been important to me and the community, they are not completely incapable of offering sub-wonderful product. I was wanting to know if this is a general perception or if maybe I am missing something. I do have complete confidence that they will make it work if it's not working. Just not sure I want to buy in before that time (if I'm right, which is never a sure thing).

Can I live without MacFixit? Probably so, although I don’t particularly want to have to.

The remark about poor responses was not really fair, just as you say. It varies.

I do have the vague feeling that the forum used to be a bit more responsive, but I think that probably also varies. New product introductions usually bring me back here, and I’m a lot more interested just after I’ve bought a hot new Mac. I’m sure others are similar.

So there!


Happy Holidays, Yourself!


- Bill

P.S. At that price, I'll probably go ahead and upgrade the whole package anyway. Just too stubborn not to defend my post.

Bill, I tried to reproduce your "error excel autoexec" search, and I got very different results than you did. What, exactly, are the parameters you used?

Starman, with a couple of exceptions, the people you're referring to spent far more time posting in the Lounge than responding to or even reading questions in the troubleshooting forums.

Here is the whole result. I used no parameters other than the three words. Is this not what you got?


Searched for the phrase 'error excel autoexec'. Results 1 - 10 of 743. (0.4576 seconds)

Mac OS X 10.3.7 (#7): CDs and DVDs not recognized, solutions; Software Update not working, solutions; more
… e been doing things from within terminal, and the error returned when I run softwareupdate is 'Couldn't register server on this host.' Running ktrace then kdumping the output shows an incomplete trace, Which stops half way through the xml returned by …
Date: 12/23/04 Hits: 718

Odds and Ends: Adobe Reader 7.0 enhancements; Safari table copying limitations
… footer information (date, page number, URL), this error makes Safari unsuitable as a total replacement for the now-abandoned Internet Explorer."
Date: 12/22/04 Hits: 1,111

Odds and Ends: Quicken 2005 R2 "Import Web Connect"; Knowledge Base Updates
… ils under Quicken 2005 R2 and yields an "Internal Error 761" dialog box at which Quicken becomes non responsive and a force quit is required. This has been tested on both a G2 dual processor and a G4 17" laptop with the same results. After an hour on …
Date: 12/20/04 Hits: 544

iCal 1.5.5: Problems with installation
… d but then hang when it tried to expand with this error message (The update "iCal" could not be verified and expanded correctly. Make sure you have permission to write to /Library/Packages, then try again.) The settings for this folder were correct. …
Date: 12/15/04 Hits: 1,242

PowerBook/iBook stays unresponsive after attempted wake-from-sleep (#2): Potential causes; Workarounds
… to be an Apple Engineer, so I'm doubting operator error here." Matthew Lee corroborates: "I also have a 17" 1.3 Powerbook that does the same thing. You put the unit into deep sleep and will not come back. I have formatted the drive, tried diffe …
Date: 12/09/04 Hits: 2,030

Odds and Ends: Virtual PC 7 upgrade now shipping; PowerLogix MIA?; More Virex complaints; more
… d I get a 'The Application Has Unexpectedly Quit' error. So in that sense (as in never) it takes a very long time to scan a disk!" New/updated Knowledge Base articles

* #164353 AirPort 4.1 for Windows
* #300427 …

Date: 12/09/04 Hits: 692

Odds and Ends: Plugging iPod into a different FireWire port can resolve mounting issues
# … ony CD-RW/DVD CRX830E model drive fails with 4280 error #300390 Final Cut Pro HD: CinéWave drops frames when capturing SD clips
Date: 12/02/04 Hits: 356

Special Report: Troubleshooting Mac OS X 10.3.6
… for when the bug occurs. Some users receive an error message stating that the file name already exists when attempting to re-apply the original, extended name to a truncated file. Patrick Horn writes "I also got the truncated folder names (with …
Date: 12/01/04 Hits: 11,549

Mac OS X 10.3.6 Special Report: File name truncation: When saving to servers, other locations; solutions
… for when the bug occurs. Some users receive an error message stating that the file name already exists when attempting to re-apply the original, extended name to a truncated file. Patrick Horn writes "I also got the truncated folder names (with …
Date: 12/01/04 Hits: 990

Mac OS X 10.3.6 Special Report: Modem connectivity issues
… nnecting then disconnecting really quickly and an error message saying to check my modem settings. Only reinstalling Panther up to 10.3,4 got all back to normal. Have a second hard drive that I can test stuff out on so all works fine upgrade to 10.3. …
Date: 12/01/04 Hits: 181

No, it's not. When I go to MacFixIt and paste error excel autoexec into the search field in the upper right corner of the page and click the Search button, I get a page with 2 results:

Searched for 'error' AND 'excel' AND 'autoexec'. Results 1 - 2 of 2. (0.1245 seconds)

Office 2004: More Service Pack 1 problems, fixes (#3); More on font issues, precautions (#3)
… k 1, an alert box containing the message "Compile Error in Hidden Module: AutoExec" appears every time some users attempted to quit Excel 2004. Our previously reported workaround was a re-install of Office 2004 from the original installation CD, foll …
Date: 10/14/04 Hits: 3,535

Office 2004: Service Pack 1 problems, fixes; Font issues
Service Pack 1 problems, fixes "Compile Errors"; solution MacFixIt reader Tim Wilson reported a problem where after applying the Service Pack 1, an alert box containing the message "Compile Error in Hidden Module: AutoExec" appeared every tim …
Date: 10/13/04 Hits: 3,382

If at MacFixIt I instead click on the Advanced Search link, paste error excel autoexec into the Key Words field, and make no changes to the default parameters (so the search is "for all of these words"), I get the same results. (Makes sense, since it's the same search.)

If I use the Advanced Search, paste in error excel autoexec, and change the pop-up menu from "for all of these words" to "exact phrase," I get no matches (which isn't surprising, given the phrase). If I select "any of these words" in the pop-up menu (an OR search), I get 5505 matches.

I tried adding quotation marks around the 3 words, in both the basic and advanced search, and still don't get the results you do. We must be doing something differently, but I can't figure out what it is. Been a long day, so I'm probably missing something obvious...


Duh! I decided to reread the thread one more time before posting, and the difference finally dawned on me...when you say the Archives, you don't mean old posts in general. You're searching via the Pro Archives link in the User Options column. And when I do THAT, I do get the same results you do. One mystery solved!

FWIW, I now understand why you said the "search engine seems incredibly stupid." I don't know why the Pro search returns all those matches, or what would be involved in changing it (assuming it's possible), but I'll try to find out next week.

For now, at least, you might want to use the Pro Archives link if you want to browse the archives, and try the steps I described above for searches. They work better, yes?

Wish you had put the last three paragraphs first after you realized your mistake, so I wouldn't have fumed through the first ones.

It's good to know the database is at least searchable, but as you learned, I was testing value rather than really looking for the answer. What you got is perfect, and what I got through going into the privileged section is just not remotely on - as you saw.

Glad you are going to mention it to people who should care and possibly can fix it. I'm guessing something basic has come unglued. Until they announce a fix, though, the Archive is worthless.

So we now know that the database works from somewhere. What we don't know is why I should pay more money to be able to use the Archive. That's the only feature of Pro I can see that makes a difference.

Also, FWIW, the answer you and I found going from the home page is not a true fix for the problem. That does exist in the forum, but not in the Archives apparently.

Given what we just discovered, and given that I got the good results after logging out of Pro and the bad results after logging in ....

How come I should pay $10 more for it?

That's sort of argumentative I know, but it's also a flat earnest question. I don't get it.

Maybe I need to read something more carefully? What?

Thanks.


Best,


- Bill

Sorry my fumbling was fume inducing, Bill.

It seems to me you're misunderstanding what an MFI Pro subscription gains you. Focusing just on the archives, it's not the ability to do searches, but to read the articles found. Anyone can search the MFI archives and get a list of matches, but regardless of the search method used only Pro subscribers can access the full articles. A non-Pro user clicking on a link to an archived article gets a page saying "This Content or feature is for MacFixIt Pro subscribers."

At this point I don't know why the keyword options aren't available via the Pro Archives link, but the fact that searching via that link produces less useful results than the basic or advanced search methods doesn't negate the benefits of your Pro subscription.

"Also, FWIW, the answer you and I found going from the home page is not a true fix for the problem. That does exist in the forum, but not in the Archives apparently."

Have you by any chance written to the MacFixIt editors to inform them of the true fix?

Oh.

I guess I've had the subscription so long I forgot that reading archives was a benefit.

Didn't think to post the solution to the editors and can't take the time now. I'll try to remember to do that in the next few days.

Thanks.

You figure other people who've tried to use that search form just gave up? Wonder if the fact no one has complained means no one uses it. I know I never will again.

You're welcome. Glad we got the archives-related benefit sorted out.

Could be that at least some people don't have a problem using the Pro Archives search form. Depends what one is searching on, I would think. For instance, with something like a search for a single key word the results would be as expected AFAICT. Trying to do an "exact phrase" or "and" search (especially when the key words include something common like "error") obviously doesn't work well though, and I'm glad you pointed that out. It's now on the list of improvements for MFI searches.

On the general topic of MFI Pro benefits, from what you've said I gather the option to turn off ads on the home page isn't of much importance to you. Is that correct?

BTW, this thread really belongs in MacFixIt HomePage Feedback instead of MacFixIt Forums Help, so I'll be moving it soon.

Thanks.

I do understand better why the MF Pro subscription is valuable. I would not, however, like to see the faults of that search engine minimized. The inability to search for documents containing more than one keyword is not a glitch, but a fatality. I do not think it should be on any but the shortest list. At a bare minimum, someone should disable the link to that page or put a notice on it telling the hapless user what not to expect. I'm sure that, like me, most people would assume they are doing something wrong and will waste time in repeated attempts to get the search to work right.

As for the section, move away!

Thanks again for the attention.

Sorry about the confusion; the engine does indeed behave differently depending upon which page it is accessed from. We're in the process of resolving this, and should have a fix in the next few days.

Ben Wilson,
Senior Editor, MacFixIt (http://www.macfixit.com)

Great, and thanks for the note.

So my pain was not in vain?