Chris Meller

I need some help, oh loyal readers. I know someone out there has to have experience with CRM solutions, and I need advice.

Here at work we’ve been using ACT! since the 2.0 days (and possibly before, but that’s where I started working here). Unfortunately, now that they’ve been bought out by at least 4 and possibly as high as 6 companies (including Symantec, Best Software and now Sage Software), the product has gone so sharply downhill that it makes it impossible for me to tollerate letting it be installed on our network. We’re also looking to expand our user base here, so we clearly can’t purchase additional licenses for our copy of ACT! 2000, which works like a charm.

Being a Microsoft SysAdmin who loves unity and centralization, I’ve tried previously on several ocassions to push the “Why don’t we just use our lovely Exchange server and its Public Folders feature for exactly what it’s intended - Contact storage?”. Did I mention I was totally and utterly unsuccessful?

So I ask you, my readers, what CRM solutions would you recommend? We’re only looking at about a dozen users right now, and probably won’t be expanding that in the near future. A web-based solution would be spiffy, simply because I wouldn’t have to manage any additional software packages on local machines (which would invariably be forgotten, should someone recieve a new PC). Any web-based solution would also have to be non-Microsoft based (no one wants to run a Microsoft web server anyway), since our intranet server is a Fedora Core 4 box with Apache and PHP.

Any suggestions, oh devoted followers of Meller?

I forget how I stumbled upon the first article (I was searching for something), but as with most of these articles, I checked out the author’s other entries and found a stream of other things of note and interest.

So, for all you [Windows] SysAdmins out there, these may come in handy at some point, if you haven’t already mastered them:

Using Remote Storage To Extend Available Storage Space
Working with the Windows Server 2003 Volume Shadow Copy Service
Profile and Folder Redirection in Windows Server 2003

These are all, obviously, from the same website: Windows Networking. I highly recommend them and the rest of their network (featuring a very helpful Exchange-centered site in particular).

I was searching for some help installing Windows Vista in a Virtual PC environment and Wink came to my rescue with this helpful blog entry from a Microsoft Virtual PC worker: Running Windows Vista Beta 1 under Virtual PC / Virtual Server.

Helped me out, hope someone else can find it helpful as well. More on Vista to come…

Yikes, I hate it when I get sick. Usually I’m a really healthy guy, but when I get sick (once every year or 2 years), it totally knocks me out for quite a while. Fortunately, thanks to some very powerful prescription antibiotics, I appear to be back up and running.

Hope to get back to the grind next week. I’ve got some code to write and some blog entries to write, so it should be fun to get back in the flow of things again.

Today Alex and Scott announced their Pricing for FeedLounge, since their public beta will launch January 16th.

For those of you (like me) who have been curious, it’ll be $5 a month or $49.95 a year.

For those of you (like me) who suck at math like rocks sink, that yearly plan comes out to $4.16 a month, which is really a pretty fair deal, considering you’d pay $24.95 for NetNewsWire or $29.95 for FeedDemon. It’s a particularly good deal when you consider that you’ve got two developers working on their own to develop this product from the ground up. It’s an even better deal when those developers are actively answering questions and tracking down bugs before your eyes in the forums.

I, for one, can’t wait for the launch. Even though I’ll be given a free 2 month credit for being an alpha tester (really, shouldn’t I be paying them for the priviledge?), I plan on putting my money where my mouth is as soon as I can tap out that credit card number.

I urge everyone to give up their cheesburger every month and check out FeedLounge. It’s a kick ass product now, and I can’t wait to see what these guys have coming next!