Hot fixes - what the customer thinks

I was going to put all this in one post, but figured it was different to the CD issue. This may be only my experience, but then again it may be common. I think we all can agree that the best thing ever to happen to Navision was Microsoft. One of the real advantages I can see (and there are many), it the continuous supply of hot fixes. Every time I hear about a new hot fix, it says to me “hey there is some one out there looking after my investment”. Yet most of the hot fixes are of no interest to me, they are just for functions that I don’t use, but every now and then, I have a problem, and find that it was fixed in a hot fix. Well that is great, (well its great if I know about it) . It does seem to me though that NSCs are not too proactive in letting clients now about hot fixes, and I just can not understand why. I can only think of two reasons. 1/ The NSC is overloaded, and does not have the support level required to deliver Hot Fixes if their clients requests it, or 2/ That they are concerned that the continual supply of hot fixes would make the clients feel that Navision has lots of bugs that need to be fixed. Well if its 1/ then there are two very simple solutions, a/ stop being a Navision NSC, and let someone more qualified take over your clients, or b/ um no sorry, a/ is the only option. :wink: If its 2/ then I think you are wrong. And this is the point of my post here. I think that we all know that ALL software has bugs, and I personally would rather buy software from a company that says, “yes we have bugs, yes our software can be better, and Yes we are fixing the bugs, and Yes we are making it better.” rather than buying software from a company that says, “no our software is bug free, there is not need for hot fixes, so no we are not fixing it”.

Steven I will put the next half of my reply here, so we keep th threads in tack. The issue with hot fixes, is that Cleints shoul get at the lesat an email from their NSC as soon as a new hot fix comes out, informing them of what is in the hotfix, etc. I don’t understand why NSCs don’t inform their NSCs that a Hot Fix is available, OR maybe most NSCs do this, and I don’t know. Are there end users out there that get at the minimum an email fromt heir NSC for every Hot FIx release or visa versa, are there End Users out there that are not getting them.

David, I do agree more or less, but: How does a NSC get to know that there are new hotfixes ? (There is no automatic notification from Microsoft for this at all) There is no need to apply a hotfix which solves a poblem I do not have [;)]

Point taken. For smaller NSCs this can be an issue. I must admit my source to find that a new hot fix is released, is MBSOnline [:D]

I think you may find that mbsonline is many users first hotfix point of call. I have an outstanding issue at the moment that the client is manually getting around and Microsoft have very kindly forced the resolution from SP3 into SP2 (or hybrid but before SP3), BUT the incident is now closed, how do I know when the release is issued? I have to periodically ask Microsoft [:D] Surely there is a better way than this!!

Torolf I moved this reply here, sorry but someone mixed up my two threads [;)]

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And don’t even let me get in to the teasing that MS does in CustomerSource, saying that yes, we have a wonderful hotfix for this that will fix your problem, but, we will provide you no method to get it. I mean they don’t even provide any objects, we as customers kind of get nothing.
Originally posted by THaug - 2006 Feb 22 : 22:16:10

I don’t think that end users should be given direct access to HotFixes, that is too dangerous, but it shoudl be a ver simple request tot he NSC to get it. The NSC would know if its somethign you can do and send you the files, OR know that the hot fix will clash with mods in your DB, and will have to do the install them selves. But yes definitely the delivery process needs to be simpler that root canal work.

quote:

someone mixed up my two threads [;)]
Originally posted by David Singleton - 2006 Feb 22 : 18:44:14

You’re the one mixing everthing up: 1 guy, 2 threads, 3 subjects… [xx(] [:P] [:D] As Steven and Thomas put it, it also doesn’t seem easy for every NSC to get timely info on HotFixes. Some, probably the biggest and the ones on which Microsoft also depends on, will get the information. But the others (maybe most?) will have to look for it themselves. It can be argued that this is also part of being a “good” vendor: go out and find everything you can about what you’re selling. But this is definitely a case where things can be much simpler than that. I realize this is mostly an NSC-oriented topic but I’ve had some experiences trying to setup a communication channel between us and our NSC’s for things like these and the results are always different. Which leads me to believe the problem is somewhere at Microsoft’s level. It could possibly be improved. Maybe Service-Packed… or Hot-Fixed… [:D]

I can only agree that the inclusion of hotfixes should be a regular task and as Davids mentions the continuous supply of hotfixes and bugfixes in the “Hot Topics” section is really a great improvement for Navision. But you have to be somehow proactive, and keep on checking the partnersource to keep up to date with all the new stuff that’s get published - and the information is sometimes a bit confusing… improvements, hotfixed, knowledge base issues, service packs, and the documention is not always that specific on how all these relate together, e.g. does a service pack include all the issues that have been posted in the knowledge base??? Regarding the customer, there are a couple of additional issue to take into consideration - and David is right with the 2 initial points, but there can be another reasons for this hehaviour… 3) the customer argues that he purchases a working business solutions, therefore you won’t get paid for bugfixing… it’s a valid argument, and depends a lot on the initial contract and negotiation to set a clear set of rule 4) usually the customer databases are customized, and therefore it’s not just taking the fob, loading it, and that’s it… ususally it involves checking object by object, and this for each customer, and all the different versions that a a NSC has implemented… that’s can be a lot of work. Saludos Nils

Nils, thanks for the confirmation, and yes 3 and 4 are significant, and I should have addressed them into account. Actually the true objective of this post was to determine if its better to tell users that all software has bugs, but that there is a huge machine here that is working to recitify them. I think that is so much better than saying that the software is bug free. I think that most Navision clients understand that the guarantee from Microsoft applies to the base product and not to any enhancements and mods, so the client must in some way be prepared to pay for the costs to integrate hot fixes to their modifications. This is all a part of the sales process, and goes back to my old argument that most of the problems that happen in a Navision implementation happen before the contract is signed. [;)]

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This is all a part of the sales process, and goes back to my old argument that most of the problems that happen in a Navision implementation happen before the contract is signed.

I completely agree… and therefore it is very important from the start to do a very professional work! Saludos Nils

Dave, This is being to be more and more of an issue for existing Navision clients. I am personally getting contacted on a regular basis…once a month…by Navision users that are having problems with their existing NSCs. The typical complaint is “I’m on version 3.01 and Microsoft has discontinued support. My NSC never told me about this. I know I’ve been paying 16% per year for the past several years and I thought I was getting all these fixes and upgrades. What’s the deal?” Too often, NSCs are doing the initial install and then walking away and just doing basic support type activities, but never going back in and discussing with the client the future path of Navision and how they can leverage it. Maybe this is an issue of the makeup of the NSCs themselves. You’ve got a Salesman that is only looking for new sales. There’s no true Existing Account Manager out there looking at generating additional sales from the existing clients. This has been one of the main issues I’ve seen. Most often, the only time a client gets an upgrade is when the client gets proactive and starts researching Navision on his own and starts educating himself through forums like MBSOnline.