Alpha and Beta Testing How you can be involved!

CUSTOMER INVOLVEMENT - OUR GOAL

We want you to be involved!  Customer Involvement is one of our core goals - read About Us and Our Philosophy for a summary of our goals.  By being involved in the testing and development of our products, you will ultimately benefit from a product that more closely matches your needs, and you will receive a product that is of higher quality.


WHAT IS AN ALPHA PRODUCT?

An Alpha product is very new!  It is so new, that it has not yet reached the stage where it can be sold.  It is still being developed.  However, it HAS reached the stage where those who enjoy cutting-edge technology can download the product as-is, and try it out for themselves!


WHAT IS A BETA PRODUCT?

A Beta product is one where new feature development has stopped, and the focus is on polishing the product and ironing out any kinks, ready for sale.  We still encourage you to suggest ideas for improvement during this stage, but they will most likely be logged for development in a future version.  Of course, if you find any bugs, please tell us!


HOW DO I PARTICIPATE IN THE ALPHA OR BETA TESTING PHASE?

During the "Alpha" or "Beta" phase of a product:

• DOWNLOAD - You can download and install the product to see whether it suits your needs.  You automatically get a 7-day evaluation license at installation time, during which period the product is fully functional. 
  
  
• SIGN-UP - If you wish to continue using the product after the 7-day evaluation period has expired, you must sign-up to become an "Alpha Tester" or "Beta Tester", depending on which phase the product is currently in.  Signing up is free.  You will be prompted to sign up when you launch the product.  All you need to provide is your name and email address.  In addition, as a reward for participating in the Alpha Testing phase, you will be entitled to a discount on the retail price of the product when it goes on sale.  (See Note 1 below for further information)
  
  
• DISCUSSION FORUMS - You can suggest ways to improve the product!  You should do this by participating in our Discussion Forums.  During the Alpha phase, suggestions for improvement will be actively taken on board.  When a product moves to the Beta phase, then new feature development stops.  However, suggestions for improvement are still considered and discussed, and may be logged for development in a future version.  We welcome any ideas for improving our products.
     
  
• REPORT BUGS - If you find any bugs with the software, please report them!  There is sophisticated bug-reporting capability built-in to the software, in the event that application errors should occur.  For other issues that you consider to be bugs or problems with the software you should submit a bug report via email.
   
• PRODUCT TRACKING - Keep up to date with each product via the Product Tracking page.  From this page you can get a list of all issues logged, and find out whether that bug for which you logged a bug report has been fixed yet.
  

 
 

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Note 1: Alpha and Beta versions of a product are activated on a time-limited basis.  Once the retail version of the product goes on sale, the license for the Alpha and Beta versions will not be renewed.  At this time, you will need to buy the retail version to continue using the product.  A discount will be available for those who participated in Alpha and Beta Testing.  There will be a limit of one license available at the discounted price per registered email address.