InBizness Quiz (filemaker edition) 1.2 Release

Last month (September 2009) we released our InBizness Quiz product with an edition focused upon the popular database product FileMaker Pro. During the last month we have been working on capturing feedback from users for features to include in future versions of the product. We also added almost 200 new questions to the quiz library and now is the largest repository of FileMaker quiz questions on the planet.

Almost all the revisions were made for the $7.50 a month paid subscribers. The only exception is a tweak to the process of selecting random quizzes to increase performance. This really wasn’t an issue when the quiz only had 200 questions but became more noticeable as the quiz content library grew and grew.

We decided that the main screen of the paid subscribers needed an update. We wanted to make it easier to take targeted quizzes and we wanted to make the interface more web friendly. We added a top bar of buttons to view your quiz history, view high scores or to make changes to your user profile.

Quiz history got a minor updates as well and I’m looking to add new features here in forthcoming updates. This can include filters by topic or perhaps a tab panel that breaks down results by difficulty level. I’m also considering adding an interface that shows how many questions you have viewed from the overall number of questions in a particular topic.

High scores got a small tweak as well. You can now see high score quiz results for various topics.

Finally, we added FileMaker Instant Web Publishing support for paid subscribers. All you need to do is click the following link (click here), type in your account name / password, choose the database and you are off to the races!

New InBizness Demo Launcher

Since January of 2008, we stopped sending out demo files of our FileMaker framework products. What we do is host them on a shared FileMaker Server and send prospects a launcher file to open the networked demos. This is really helpful because we don’t want older demo versions of our software out there. Up to this point, I would send out a different launcher file for each product.

CLICK IMAGE PICTURE ABOVE TO ENLARGE

So now that we have four different applications in the InBizness family, I decided to build a unified demo experience for those interested in our products. I ended up adding more features to this launcher than I planned to do. This is the first version of the file and I’m sure that I’ll be tweaking it over time.

I recorded a very quick tutorial movie for the launcher file if you want to check it out. Here is the link,
http://www.dwaynewright.com/videos09/InBizLauncher.mov . If you are interested in a demo trial period for an InBizness product, please send us an email at info@dwaynewright.com.

Many thanks,
Dwayne Wright

InBizness Classic Coming Soon

I received an email recently about InBizness 2.0. Evidently, I had the link for the product still LIVE and they were not interested in the complexity or additional expense of InBizness 2.8. I decided to take this older FileMaker 8 version as a shell for a new low end product InBizness Classic. I’ll have a link with more information soon, look for InBizness Classic to be available by September 1st, 2009.



Here is another small banner ad we are looking at using. At the very least, this is how it will probably look at the solutions link on www.dwaynewright.com.

InBizness Real Estate 2.0 Goes Live!

July 6, 2009; Seattle Washington - dwaynewright.com is excited to announce the immediate availability of InBizness Real Estate 2.0! This latest release of an open FileMaker framework solution has two new modules and a number of enhancements to the existing contact, property listing and activity modules.


ACTIVITY GROUP MODULE (NEW)
Added a new module called activity groups, this allows the user to create groups of activities and quickly add these activities to a property record. Navigation to this module can be accessed from under the navigation menu.

DRAG AND DROP CREATOR (NEW)
Currently compatible with Macintosh computers only and uses the Troi File plug-in, allows you to leverage drag and drop desktop features for adding files and photos to property files. Optionally, you can also store these files / photos on the remote hosting service JungleDisk.

OVERALL MODULE CHANGES
Added a pop down field to give quick navigation from one module to the next

ACTIVITY MODULE CHANGES
Added “Cancel” as a value list choice option for Activity status.

CONTACT MODULE CHANGES
Added logic and custom function to create batch correspondence from a found set of records using a template.
Added the ability to link files to contact records for the contact form screen.
Added the ability to print an envelope from the contacts module from under the contact menu.
Added the ability to print a set of Avery 5160 labels from the contacts module from under the contact menu.
Added the ability to export found set of records as an Excel file from the contacts module from under the contact menu.

CORRESPONDENCE MODULE CHANGES
Added logic to create a related activity (tied to the contact) when a correspondence record is printed.
Added the ability to print an envelope from the correspondence module from under the correspond menu.
Added the ability to print a set of Avery 5160 labels from the correspondence module from under the correspond menu.
Removed the “print found set button” users found them confusing. This option is still available under the Correspondence custom menu.
Added a delete button in the correspond template dialog box for deleting template letters

PROPERTY MODULE CHANGES
Combined the File and Photo tabs together to save space and to better unify their common purposes.
Added a tab to show only the activities in open status and another tab to show all the activities related to a property.
Added validation to the SIR# and MLS # to insure they can only contain unique values.
Added a custom menu option under property listings to cancel any open activities for a viewed property.
Added contract date to the listing info section
Moved the agent info data fields to under the Other Info tab, made room for contract date field in its place.
Added the subdivision field to the main listing info area

More information is available by visiting http://www.dwaynewright.com/inbiz/realestate/index.html

InBizness Real Estate Coming Soon

Occasionally, I get a client that is interested in my InBizness product but they don’t need an office database that is so large in scope. Just over a month ago, I had a real estate professional contact me about a FileMaker CRM need focused to his business needs. He liked the setup of InBizness but had no need for 60 % of the modules. Right out of the gate, he only needed the contacts, staff, events and correspondence modules. He also needed a new module to track property listings and have it linked operationally to the other modules.

Now it is possible to invest in a copy of InBizness and the remove the navigation to modules that you do not need. The code for those modules is still there, ready to be used if necessary but users are not distracted with buttons that take them to modules unneeded to accomplish defined company objectives.


Instead of selling this customer a copy InBizness 2.8, I offered them a quote of a new database designed from scratch but using selected parts of the latest unreleased version of InBizness. Yes, there is always an unreleased copy of InBizness and I have no idea when this latest version will come to market. Instead, you will probably see mini modules of the overall product released this year. InBizness Money was the first mini module that was pulled from the code of its larger InBizness brother and now InBizness Real Estate is the second smaller scope release.

ABOUT FILEMAKER 10
InBizness Real Estate will require each FileMaker user to use FileMaker 10, the latest release of the product by FileMaker Inc. At this time, we have not built in a web or mobile feature set for InBizness Real Estate but will embrace the opportunity to do so (if or when a client requests these features). For more information about FileMaker 10 and upgrade options to this cutting edge product release, please visit http://www.filemaker.com/ or contact us at info@dwaynewright.com.

Simply put, the recent addition of script triggers within FileMaker 10 has the potential to propel our products to heights that cannot be gained otherwise. Although there are other great features in FileMaker 10 as well, script triggers are too important of a feature to invest time and effort in designing backwards compatibility. For this reason, InBizness 2.8 and InBizness Money 1.2 will stay on the market for quite some time for FileMaker 9 users. All new product releases will require an investment in FileMaker 10.

MOVIE TIME
I’m a big fan of creating computer tutorial movies for presentation and for illumination. Here is a collection of the movies I produced to cover the initial release of this product.

The Main Menu
The New User Interface
The Contacts Module Explored
The Property Listing Module Explored
The Staff Module Explored
The Activities Module Explored
The Correspondence Module Explored

Adding A Deposit To A Finance Account

I just uploaded a new movie about adding a deposit to one of the finance accounts within InBizness. I also take a small detour in explaining what the Bank Deposit module does. This module is used to make creating bank deposit statements a little easier to handle but doesn’t link directly to the Finance module itself.

Here is the link ...
http://www.dwaynewright.com/inbiz/movies/04172009/CheckDeposit.mov

Two New How To Movies Uploaded

I just produced a couple new tutorial movies for the different ways to create new purchase order and vendor bill records. Here are the links ...

Create New Purchase Order
http://www.dwaynewright.com/inbiz/movies/04162009/NewPO.mov

Create New Vendor Bill
http://www.dwaynewright.com/inbiz/movies/04162009/NewVB.mov