The Discontinuation Of TMG

[John Cardinal 0]

In your post directed at me, you snidely said: "Please describe any free software you supplied that helps TMG users."

[sNIP]

 

I was snide because you used a disagreement about whether users should upgrade to support the business or not to state that (a) I had not contributed financially to WG and ( that I should donate income I received as a result of Second Site sales to WG. You were wrong about both: I have contributed to WG and there is no good reason for me to donate income from SS to WG.

 

Regarding my activities at conferences, you assume I have ulterior motives and miss (or ignore) the important facts. WG requested my presence. Whether it was good advertising for SS is completely irrelevant. WG needed help, asked me for it, and got it. When discussing how I have supported WG, it's hard to believe you cast that as a selfish act. You were not there, but you assume I was hawking my products. Perhaps that is what you would do, but it is not what I did. I focused on what visitors requested, and that was usually information about TMG (from non-users), or advice about particular issues/challenges with TMG (from users). SS came up rarely except when existing SS customers asked me questions.

 

Regarding TMG Utility, again you assume a less-than-honorable motivation, and again, you lack the facts. The first version of TMG Utility was released three years before Second Site and was already viewed as a valuable tool for TMG users. My other free program for TMG users is On This Day, and it was also released long before Second Site.

 

With regards to Second Site income, you can ask all you want, and you can make estimates all you want, but I am not going to give you the sales info. It's none of your business. I notice that you focus on the income from SS but did not ask how many man-years of effort went into design, development, documentation, testing, beta tester recruiting/communication, sales support, and technical support. Nor did you ask about the other costs of doing business such as accounting, banking, credit card fees, etc. If you think I am getting rich off SS, I welcome you to create a competitive product and make a grab for the money.

 

Lastly, you wrote that my actions were not sufficient to save WG. That is not my responsibility. It's an indicator of your flawed thought process that you would suggest that it is.

[LeMans844 0]

Totally agree with Wal.

Is there any movement in this direction?

 

Dave

[mikey159 0]

 

I am in the same boat, shouldn't the upgrade prices be reduced since there is only six months of support left on a discontinued product ?

Ken,

 

I hope that there is no discount offered. TMG users who didn't upgrade are a leading cause of the demise of TMG, and it seems plain wrong to reward that behavior now that WG has decided to discontinue it.

 

 

The only thing I would say is I agree IF I can use it on multiple pc's after it officially ends. Otherwise buying a dead product isn't the best idea, especially at full price. I have upgraded on one pc, but have had NO LUCK WHATSOEVER upgrading to the latest version on any other pc. I have one pc that just WILL NOT upgrade to version 8, and version 9 won't even run past the initital few screens. I am using it on my 3rd pc because the first wouldn't work. This made it VERY difficult for me to decide to even try version 9. I would LOVE to be able to use it on all of my pc's, I have 3 I use on a daily basis and do genealogy on each of them. I have done the email support thing but never get to the point where they can provide any assistance, ie the program coming up and actually running.

[BruceB 0]

Hi All:

I along with I think most of the users of TMG was shocked when I received Bob's anouncement.

I do wish Bob a very happy retirement and good health to be able to enjoy his well deserved rest after 25 years of working on TMG.

 

It is my hope that someone with Bob's drive and experience with programming will make him an offer to purchase and continue this leader in genealogy software.

 

I have looked around many times at other software - but IMO there is nothing out there that actually competes with the power and flexability of TMG.

 

I have never had an issue with the cost of this quality product and have been using since version 4. Back then you had to purchase and wait until the box with CD and manual arrived in the mail.

(I still have my original version 4 with CD's and manual - using version 9 now!!)

 

Good luck to you Bob and thank you.

 

I intend to continue to use TMG for a long time yet.

[John Cardinal 0]

Mikey159, your TMG license includes permission to run TMG on multiple computers. I forget the details. The technical problems are solvable. Some users have reported problems using the upgrade process starting within TMG, and the solution is to start over and install using the full installer that one can download from the TMG site. If you have not done so already, start a separate thread that describes the issues on one PC. (It's best to focus on one PC at a time to reduce the chances of miscommunication.)

[Virginia Blakelock 0]

Mikey159

 

If as John suggests, you post your problems in a new topic in the v9 forum, I am optimistic a resolution can be found. Include the operating system of each computer and which TMG version you are installing on it.

 

We are seeing an increasing number of problems with TMG that are related to other programs running at the same time. I recommend installing in the TMG default locations, while you are off line, with no other programs running, most particularly Dropbox and similar cloud services as well as anti-virus software. Note also that TMG project files should never be synced with a cloud service or backup program; serious damage to the project could result.

 

I also suggest that instead of using the Update option for v9.03, you uninstall the present version from the Control Panel and download and install the full trial version (v9.03). With the trial version, rightclick on the download file and run as Administrator. You do not need to run as Admin after that.

 

Virginia

[nbradley 0]

I'm saddened that John Cardinal had to go to the lengths that he did to respond to some very uncalled for comments on this forum.

 

In my view the TMG community has benefited greatly from John's help.

 

As a long term Second Site user and a beneficiary of John's help I would like to comment :-

 

- it is an amazing product

- the small amount that John charges for it is fantastic value for money.

- given the amount of support that John gives to his user community, I suspect that his income per hour would be very small

- I would be happy to pay quite a bit more

[SusanT 0]

Like Sandy, I have been a longtime user of TMG dating back to the DOS days and the CompuServe days. I haven't done much research genealogy-wise for over a year now. and I haven't been on this site for sometime. I sure hated reading this forum topic today that TMG will come to an end. It will be sorely missed. In the past have tried other genealogy db, but none matched the capabilities of this program. I will certainly use Version 9 until the bitter end and then no doubt years after that.

 

I did buy TMG version 8 back in January of this year. About a month or so later got an e-mail saying I was entitled to a free upgrade to version 9. I didn't download V9 until a couple of days ago. I unlocked it with the supplied code and all went well on importing the Version 8 backup, etc.... Now have found everyday since, been 2 days, I have to unlock it the first time it is accessed that day. If I don't unlock it, it says it is a trial version and after unlocking up comes a successfully unlocked notice. I'll need to send in a trouble message to support unless someone here has a quick answer.

 

--- Susan

[Jim Byram 0]

If you are running Windows 8 or later, the operating system is removing the registration information.

 

You need to run TMG once as administrator (see below) and enter the registration information, then exit. Now you can run TMG normally without needing to unlock.

 

Select the TMG shortcut, right-click, and select 'Run as administrator'.

[mikey159 0]

I have been running TMG on my main pc ever since at least 1997. I have upgraded pc's and operating systems and even hardware over the years and am now running Win7 64bit Ultimate on every pc. I have tried working thru email but the problem is mine NEVER loads, so getting tech support from Dorothy that says 'turn off the messages' is NOT helpful!! I already did the delete, download the trial version, check the registry, start the install process and it starts but then get to some point and never does another thing for over 10 hours before I said to heck with it and shut the pc down and walked away! This was on BOTH versions 8 and 9, THAT is why I was VERY hestitant about paying to upgrade, if it doesn't work for me WHY do it?!! I finally DID pay because I got version 8 to work on a laptop..WOOHOO!! I then saw version 9 and went thru the SAME process on my main desktop as before and..pflat...NOTHING!! Exact same thing, starts loading, NOTHING else is runing on my pc and it just stops mid stream and does NOTHING else! I then took it to my laptop and it worked, so after almsot 30 days I paid to upgrade. I took the file to my 3rd pc and NOTHING! I took the info to my dads house, he also runs Win7 64 bit ultimate and downloaded Version 8 from the website, NOTHING GOING the EXACT same problem!! He wants a copy of my work but I can't share it with him anymore!! Version 7 worked on BOTH of our pc with no problem. He has purchased FTM and has asked me to bring my data to his house in a format he can use. What do I tell him? It will work but.....?!! I believe THAT is why people aren't buying the software...sometimes it doesn't even load!! Don't get me wrong I LOVE TMG, as long as it works I WILL continue to buy it, but if it doesn't work on EVERY pc I need it to that is NOT working. Asking for Tech Support to LOAD a program on a pc that is fully capable, a quad core with 16gb of ram and a high end video card, should NOT be required!! Not being able to load it on this dekstop has itself put one heck of a crimp on my research, if I can't use the pc in the room where all my data and books are it is NOT helpful!!

 

And there is no point in starting a new thread, as of December all you guys will be gone and any future assistance will be non existant, so loading it on my next pc will either work or not, if not I am done, if it does I will continue using TMG until I can find a replacement that works for me. My databse is over 15k people, small compared to alot of you, but to me it is ALOT of work and I do NOT want to have to reenter it all AGAIN!! I did that when my last program went out of business and started using TMG, The Family Edge was great, but when it quit TMG was there for me, now it too is going away. I guess we are ALL headed to the generic big company supported software or else go thru this again and again!

[SusanT 0]

If you are running Windows 8 or later, the operating system is removing the registration information.

 

You need to run TMG once as administrator (see below) and enter the registration information, then exit. Now you can run TMG normally without needing to unlock.

 

Select the TMG shortcut, right-click, and select 'Run as administrator'.

 

Thank you, thank you, Jim! It worked like a charm. No trial version to unlock windows popped up this morning. I am running Windows 8.1. I had been using a much earlier version of TMG on an older computer that was running XP. After getting a new CPU early last year, found the older version wouldn't work. I didn't get around to upgrading TMG until this year and now up to v9.

 

Thanx again! ----- Susan

[John Cardinal 0]

Mikey,

 

You are obviously very frustrated and I can understand why. Unfortunately, you did not provide any details in the message that would help solve the problem. I assume you have shared details with WG support, but that doesn't help us.

 

Meanwhile, you think there is no possibility of help from forum members. I don't agree. You should start another thread. Pick one PC where you can't get TMG to work, and in that thread, describe what is happening. Members here will ask some questions and provide some advice. It's best to work with a single person rather than a group because the process has to be organized. Based on the evidence--the information you supply--the helper has to narrow down the possibilities until the solution is found.

 

I was helping a person install one of my programs last week. She said that when she started the install program, nothing happened and the install program icon disappeared from her desktop. After determining that she had a valid copy of the installer, we discovered that her anti-virus program was the culprit: it was preventing the install from running and removing the install program. Evidently, it thought the installer had a virus--it doesn't--but worse than that, it did not communicate what it was doing. When the anti-virus program was turned off temporarily to run the install, everything went smoothly. I am not suggesting that the same solution will work for you, just giving an example of one of the many things that can interfere with installing and/or using a program.

 

Given that thousands of people are using TMG v9 on a wide variety of PCs and operating systems, it's very likely that it will work for you. To achieve that, you need the help of someone who understands how to diagnose and solve the problem. There are a few people on the forum with those attributes.

 

And, by the way, we won't be gone in December. WG Support will not continue, but user-to-user support will continue.

[fiddler 0]

I'm concerned about how to archive a copy of the TMG software to guard against a computer crash or other drastic event that may occur in the future beyond the existence of the TMG website.

 

With version 9, the enhancements (.01, .02, .03) have only been available as downloads from within TMG's help menu, with the program installing the upgrade automatically, rather than as a manually installable file that can be archived.

 

This is important because losing a hard drive with 9.03 leaves me with a 9.03 data set, and the only installable software I have is the original (downloaded) purchase of version 9.00. Version 9.00 cannot read my 9.03 data set, and there will be no TMG site to provide the needed update. Will it work to download the trial version as each enhancement is released, in order to get an installable version?

 

Thanks. Art Brown

[Jim Byram 0]

Will it work to download the trial version as each enhancement is released, in order to get an installable version?

Yes. The 'trial' version is the full installer for the current version of TMG.

[fiddler 0]

Thanks, Jim. Wish I had done that for the first two enhancements.

 

Hate to see TMG go.........I've used it since v2, I think.

 

Art

[Terry Reigel 0]

Art,

 

Remember to also keep a copy your serial number and the email address you used when you purchased v9 in a safe place too. One good solution is to keep a copy of both in a text files stored the same place as the installer.

[Michael Hannah 0]

Art said: "Hate to see TMG go".

 

But Art, TMG is not "going" anywhere, it is simply that development has ceased. Many of us intend to continue to use it for the foreseeable future. Some may even argue that there is no more "serious" development needed.

[tmilligan 0]

my suggestion for the following complaints:

 

• I should have been offered a discount (after EOS announcement) on TMG 9, and especially after using TMGx for x number of years.
• TMG was outdated
• TMG was not competitive
• Updates were too expensive (really?)

switch to another genealogy program that is in release - and get engaged in their forum.

You did not care then, you should not care now, and you should stop complaining.

 

 

I, with my TMG, am not going anywhere.