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[wolffe]

Pretty much the title says all. Every time there a sanctioned feature request thread, it goes all charlie fox, and there's no real way to determine what is actually liked and how much by forum members.

[JimH]

We watch closely what people ask for.  If something is popular, we see it.

Sometimes popular requests aren't possible.

Sometimes we do things that nobody has every asked for because we believe it's a good idea.   

[Grenache]

I agree with the OP. Just have a look at the feature requests threads, the "Too Easy" I, II and III, and the discussions on better touch support, "Pretty Face" and so on. It's simply too time consuming to go through and impossible to know the popularity of each request (especially when we're not allowed to "+1"). Maybe that's one of the reasons why so few of all these requests have been met? Now, I also completely understand that it's entirely up to JRiver to decide what they "believe is a good idea", but if the requests were better organized in some way or another, it would be easier for them to actually understand the needs and wishes of their customers.

[JimH]

... Maybe that's one of the reasons why so few of all these requests have been met?

We did quite a few of those.  Maybe even most of the ones that met the original qualifications.

"Better touch support" doesn't qualify as "too easy" and it's too general to respond to.  We did an option to provide wider scroll bars.  Specific suggestions are appreciated.

[Grenache]

We did quite a few of those.  Maybe even most of the ones that met the original qualifications.

While it's not always easy to know what's meeting the original qualifications, very few of the requests in the "Too Easy III" thread (from more than six months ago) have been done. And if you go through the seven pages of the general "Feature Requests" thread (started in May) the number is close to none. But this is not my point. As already said, I completely understand that it's up to you which requests you want to meet or not. It just would be nice to have an idea wether they have a decent chance. A more organized feature requests forum or some sort of voting system where JRiver could respond with "Done", "Working on it", "We'll consider it" or "No way this is ever gonna happen" would help your customers to know where they stand.

"Better touch support" doesn't qualify as "too easy"

And I didn't say that. I just mentioned it as an example of something that has been requested time and time again, and where the suggestions and requests are scattered all over the place. This means it's hard to get an idea of the "popularity" of these requests and impossible to know if it's something you're working on or never will consider.

We did an option to provide wider scroll bars.  Specific suggestions are appreciated.

I know. And thanks, I'll give you some specific suggestions, but to stay on topic I'll open a new thread.

[JimH]

While it's not always easy to know what's meeting the original qualifications, very few of the requests in the "Too Easy III" thread (from more than six months ago) have been done.

You could read the first post in the thread:

http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php/topic,102992.msg715014.html#msg715014

I count seven marked "Done" on the first page of the thread.

[Grenache]

You could read the first post in the thread:
http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php/topic,102992.msg715014.html#msg715014

I have. I'm quite sure you know what I mean, when I say that it can be difficult for a normal user to judge if a request meets all the following points:

1.  Easy to implement (less than an hour)
2.  Generally useful to most users
3.  Something that doesn't remove existing functionality and that isn't controversial

I count seven marked "Done" on the first page of the thread.

And what about the other four pages? And the seven pages in the general "Feature Request" thread? But as already said that's not my point. Or the original posters point, so there's no need to keep discussing it. This thread is about the usefulness of an alternative feature request system.

[jgreen]

I would like to vote certain features off the program, the way certain TV programs vote people off the island.  "You're fired!" as JimH's candidate for President would say.

[stricko]

Sort of on the same subject, and in no way challenging jriver's absolute right to do what it wants with its product, does anyone really know which features (old and new) are actually used and liked/disliked by the user base? It's all well and good asking for development suggestions, and possibly even having a voting system, but i'm guessing that the regular forum users are a vociferous minority of the whole user base. it would be interesting to know what percentage of the user base ever reads or contrbutes to the forum.

[spiggytopes]

I agree totally.

I used to run a simple spreadsheet for a software  company years ago where I collected and collated feature requests and then ranked them by votes from regional user groups in the UK.

Nothing special at all (it couldn't have been if I was running it!) and users could see easily where the product was heading and whether a type of request was popular and gained traction with the developer.

It would be even easier now using one of the Google web based sheets.

Personally, I won't upgrade until a few very seemingly simple (to me) things I've requested have been done.