A Diary of Vantage Conversion from 3.0 to 5.1

system · January 10, 2002, 2:47pm

This to the Epicor consultant who gave me a cold call a few days ago... Do
you want to ask me again why I'm still sitting at V4.0?

Gary Polvinale
Denton ATD

-----Original Message-----
From: Joslin, Rick [mailto:rick.joslin@...]
Sent: Thursday, January 10, 2002 10:58 AM
To: vantage@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [Vantage] A Diary of Vantage Conversion from 3.0 to 5.1

Over the Christmas holiday we converted from Vantage 3.0 to 5.1. I
thought I would share our experiences in doing the Vantage conversion from 3
to 5.10. I will present the events in three parts;

1. Attack of the epicor Lawyer (John D. Ireland, VP, General Counsel)
2. Bugs / Failures / Uncertainties
3. Enhancement which miss the mark

Let me state "officially" for the record that my notes are for
clarification and aiding the other Vantage Users. My comments are NOT
intended soil the reputation of epicor; however, I will add that the DCD
folks are the heart of the organization the rest are well they're there.

Attack of the epicor Lawyer (John D. Ireland, VP, General Counsel)

In preparing for the 5.1 conversion we installed & re-installed the
upgrade process a number of times on our test box in preparation for doing
the LIVE data over the holidays. In doing the pre-install tests we (Mike
Podlin our Network Administrator) had the entire process mapped out in
minutes, knowing how long each phase takes.

On or before December 5th when Mike was processing the upgrade again
because of the release of two new patches 107 for Vantage and 10 for
Progress we wanted to test them for the conversion of the live data over
Christmas. As we found out as well did at least six other companies who
were also planning the Christmas change over that the new patches causes the
install to hang.

A dialog thread was started "My own 5.1 frustrations" discussing the
failure of the upgrade process. When questioned Vantage support by users,
per the dialog thread, Support did not acknowledge any problems. V-S
as-well-as others were starting to panic because our time window was quickly
approaching and the upgrade was not working ! Well after many, many
attempts Mike & decided to go back to the configuration of patch levels
which we last used successfully, 106 Vantage and the 9c Progress patch.
Fortunately it worked!!!

Now it is Dec 19th and we figure it out, the new 107 patch from
epicor was defective and needed a patch. We shared the information with
the one list. Which I might add NO EPICOR POSTINGs TO THE ONE LIST WERE
MADE regard this issue. Since V-S had figured out the situation we
posted our solution; but on epicor's web site in their infinite wisdom,
they do not make old patches available, only the defective 107 patch was
available.

**THIS IS IMPORTANT HERE EPICOR ** At the Progress website as with
most software developers the entire history of patches is available for
downloading but not at epicor. Thus we still had the workable patches
and tried to e-mail them to companies who responded with the same need as we
had. The files were to large to be e-mailed, we tried one at a time, we
tried zipping, we tried everything, they would not go via e-mail.

So Mike in his generosity and desire to help fellow Vantage users
posted the patches on his personal website on Dec 20th, so that other
Vantage LICENSED users could utilize their service agreement rights and
upgrade their Vantage to the current and hopefully improved 5.1 version.
He left the patches available until Dec 27th after which he removed them
from his website.

Here is the part the makes me mad and wishing Vantage was
supported by DCD and not epicor. On or around January 3 the president
of my company receives a Fed Ex letter from the aforementioned epicor lawyer
as a copy of a letter which was addressed to Mike Podlin which he NEVER got
a copy of. Our company president saw the letter was addressed to Mike,
and gave it to me without even reading it (ha).

In the letter he sites threatening legal action and revoking
our Vantage license for providing patches (fyi, patches are only good to
users who are licensed Vantage users of 5.1). All WE did in our opinion
was to ASSIST Vantage support so that THEIR CUSTOMERS could fulfill their
plans and do the upgrade over the holiday shut down. This lawyer has really
and seriously damaged my opinion of epicor as a company. Under the
Borg's management, Vantage users were treated like family not as a cash crop
to be harvested and tilled into the dirt for replanting.

I have to cut this part short so I can address this legal crap. I
will provide the other two chapters soon. Pardon my overall tone right
now, I AM NOT A HAPPY EPICOR CUSTOMER, it is stuff like this that makes me
wish I would have selected Job Boss.

Rick Joslin
V-S Industries
rick.joslin@...
847-520-1800
847-520-0269 fax

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Useful links for the Yahoo!Groups Vantage Board are: ( Note: You must have
already linked your email address to a yahoo id to enable access. )
(1) To access the Files Section of our Yahoo!Group for Report Builder and
Crystal Reports and other 'goodies', please goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/.
(2) To search through old msg's goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/messages
(3) To view links to Vendors that provide Vantage services goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/links

Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/

system · January 10, 2002, 10:58am

Over the Christmas holiday we converted from Vantage 3.0 to 5.1. I
thought I would share our experiences in doing the Vantage conversion from 3
to 5.10. I will present the events in three parts;

1. Attack of the epicor Lawyer (John D. Ireland, VP, General Counsel)
2. Bugs / Failures / Uncertainties
3. Enhancement which miss the mark

Let me state "officially" for the record that my notes are for
clarification and aiding the other Vantage Users. My comments are NOT
intended soil the reputation of epicor; however, I will add that the DCD
folks are the heart of the organization the rest are well they're there.

Attack of the epicor Lawyer (John D. Ireland, VP, General Counsel)

In preparing for the 5.1 conversion we installed & re-installed the
upgrade process a number of times on our test box in preparation for doing
the LIVE data over the holidays. In doing the pre-install tests we (Mike
Podlin our Network Administrator) had the entire process mapped out in
minutes, knowing how long each phase takes.

On or before December 5th when Mike was processing the upgrade again
because of the release of two new patches 107 for Vantage and 10 for
Progress we wanted to test them for the conversion of the live data over
Christmas. As we found out as well did at least six other companies who
were also planning the Christmas change over that the new patches causes the
install to hang.

A dialog thread was started "My own 5.1 frustrations" discussing the
failure of the upgrade process. When questioned Vantage support by users,
per the dialog thread, Support did not acknowledge any problems. V-S
as-well-as others were starting to panic because our time window was quickly
approaching and the upgrade was not working ! Well after many, many
attempts Mike & decided to go back to the configuration of patch levels
which we last used successfully, 106 Vantage and the 9c Progress patch.
Fortunately it worked!!!

Now it is Dec 19th and we figure it out, the new 107 patch from
epicor was defective and needed a patch. We shared the information with
the one list. Which I might add NO EPICOR POSTINGs TO THE ONE LIST WERE
MADE regard this issue. Since V-S had figured out the situation we
posted our solution; but on epicor's web site in their infinite wisdom,
they do not make old patches available, only the defective 107 patch was
available.

**THIS IS IMPORTANT HERE EPICOR ** At the Progress website as with
most software developers the entire history of patches is available for
downloading but not at epicor. Thus we still had the workable patches
and tried to e-mail them to companies who responded with the same need as we
had. The files were to large to be e-mailed, we tried one at a time, we
tried zipping, we tried everything, they would not go via e-mail.

So Mike in his generosity and desire to help fellow Vantage users
posted the patches on his personal website on Dec 20th, so that other
Vantage LICENSED users could utilize their service agreement rights and
upgrade their Vantage to the current and hopefully improved 5.1 version.
He left the patches available until Dec 27th after which he removed them
from his website.

Here is the part the makes me mad and wishing Vantage was
supported by DCD and not epicor. On or around January 3 the president
of my company receives a Fed Ex letter from the aforementioned epicor lawyer
as a copy of a letter which was addressed to Mike Podlin which he NEVER got
a copy of. Our company president saw the letter was addressed to Mike,
and gave it to me without even reading it (ha).

In the letter he sites threatening legal action and revoking
our Vantage license for providing patches (fyi, patches are only good to
users who are licensed Vantage users of 5.1). All WE did in our opinion
was to ASSIST Vantage support so that THEIR CUSTOMERS could fulfill their
plans and do the upgrade over the holiday shut down. This lawyer has really
and seriously damaged my opinion of epicor as a company. Under the
Borg's management, Vantage users were treated like family not as a cash crop
to be harvested and tilled into the dirt for replanting.

I have to cut this part short so I can address this legal crap. I
will provide the other two chapters soon. Pardon my overall tone right
now, I AM NOT A HAPPY EPICOR CUSTOMER, it is stuff like this that makes me
wish I would have selected Job Boss.

Rick Joslin
V-S Industries
rick.joslin@...
847-520-1800
847-520-0269 fax

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

system · January 10, 2002, 11:37am

Thanks Troy, and answer to your question, we were not contacted by
epicor, only a letter to our company president. Troy, it was your comments
from 12/27 e-mail that prompted Mike to remove the patches / links. I
also agree with you, that if this was such a big deal with epicor, they
should have called or respond to the onelist thread and advise us not to
post them, and yet we received nothing from epicor, only the lawyer's
letter.

Rick Joslin
V-S Industries
rick.joslin@...
847-520-1800
847-520-0269 fax

-----Original Message-----
From: Troy Funte [mailto:tfunte@...]
Sent: Thursday, January 10, 2002 10:23 AM
To: rick.joslin@...
Cc: Michael Podlin
Subject: Re: [Vantage] A Diary of Vantage Conversion from 3.0 to 5.1

Rick,

I actually had an email typed out to Mike to give him a heads up on
posting the patches, but I was on vacation and didn't have my outgoing email
configured properly and it didn't go out. I was going to mention to Mike
that he may want to be cautious about posting the patches. I was wondering
if Epicor would contact Mike about that since I knew they are having issues
with users not renewing their maintenance but still managing to get their
patches from others. I had offered to post a file that was missing from a
recent 5.1 patch, and was told NO WAY (because of the users with no
maintenance getting a hold of it). Anyway, I mainly feel remiss because of
the headaches you are now facing. I have to admit, I never dreamed that
Epicor would actually contact a lawyer and do the letter thing. A friendly
phone call would have probably done the trick in my estimation.

You have my empathy.

Troy Funte
Liberty Electronics

----- Original Message -----
From: Joslin, <mailto:rick.joslin@...> Rick
To: vantage@yahoogroups.com <mailto:vantage@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Thursday, January 10, 2002 10:57 AM
Subject: [Vantage] A Diary of Vantage Conversion from 3.0 to 5.1

Over the Christmas holiday we converted from Vantage 3.0 to 5.1. I
thought I would share our experiences in doing the Vantage conversion from 3
to 5.10. I will present the events in three parts;

1. Attack of the epicor Lawyer (John D. Ireland, VP, General Counsel)
2. Bugs / Failures / Uncertainties
3. Enhancement which miss the mark

Let me state "officially" for the record that my notes are for
clarification and aiding the other Vantage Users. My comments are NOT
intended soil the reputation of epicor; however, I will add that the DCD
folks are the heart of the organization the rest are well they're there.

Attack of the epicor Lawyer (John D. Ireland, VP, General Counsel)

In preparing for the 5.1 conversion we installed & re-installed the
upgrade process a number of times on our test box in preparation for doing
the LIVE data over the holidays. In doing the pre-install tests we (Mike
Podlin our Network Administrator) had the entire process mapped out in
minutes, knowing how long each phase takes.

On or before December 5th when Mike was processing the upgrade again
because of the release of two new patches 107 for Vantage and 10 for
Progress we wanted to test them for the conversion of the live data over
Christmas. As we found out as well did at least six other companies who
were also planning the Christmas change over that the new patches causes the
install to hang.

A dialog thread was started "My own 5.1 frustrations" discussing the
failure of the upgrade process. When questioned Vantage support by users,
per the dialog thread, Support did not acknowledge any problems. V-S
as-well-as others were starting to panic because our time window was quickly
approaching and the upgrade was not working ! Well after many, many
attempts Mike & decided to go back to the configuration of patch levels
which we last used successfully, 106 Vantage and the 9c Progress patch.
Fortunately it worked!!!

Now it is Dec 19th and we figure it out, the new 107 patch from
epicor was defective and needed a patch. We shared the information with
the one list. Which I might add NO EPICOR POSTINGs TO THE ONE LIST WERE
MADE regard this issue. Since V-S had figured out the situation we
posted our solution; but on epicor's web site in their infinite wisdom,
they do not make old patches available, only the defective 107 patch was
available.

**THIS IS IMPORTANT HERE EPICOR ** At the Progress website as with
most software developers the entire history of patches is available for
downloading but not at epicor. Thus we still had the workable patches
and tried to e-mail them to companies who responded with the same need as we
had. The files were to large to be e-mailed, we tried one at a time, we
tried zipping, we tried everything, they would not go via e-mail.

So Mike in his generosity and desire to help fellow Vantage users
posted the patches on his personal website on Dec 20th, so that other
Vantage LICENSED users could utilize their service agreement rights and
upgrade their Vantage to the current and hopefully improved 5.1 version.
He left the patches available until Dec 27th after which he removed them
from his website.

Here is the part the makes me mad and wishing Vantage was
supported by DCD and not epicor. On or around January 3 the president
of my company receives a Fed Ex letter from the aforementioned epicor lawyer
as a copy of a letter which was addressed to Mike Podlin which he NEVER got
a copy of. Our company president saw the letter was addressed to Mike,
and gave it to me without even reading it (ha).

In the letter he sites threatening legal action and revoking
our Vantage license for providing patches (fyi, patches are only good to
users who are licensed Vantage users of 5.1). All WE did in our opinion
was to ASSIST Vantage support so that THEIR CUSTOMERS could fulfill their
plans and do the upgrade over the holiday shut down. This lawyer has really
and seriously damaged my opinion of epicor as a company. Under the
Borg's management, Vantage users were treated like family not as a cash crop
to be harvested and tilled into the dirt for replanting.

I have to cut this part short so I can address this legal crap. I
will provide the other two chapters soon. Pardon my overall tone right
now, I AM NOT A HAPPY EPICOR CUSTOMER, it is stuff like this that makes me
wish I would have selected Job Boss.

Rick Joslin
V-S Industries
rick.joslin@...
847-520-1800
847-520-0269 fax

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

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Useful links for the Yahoo!Groups Vantage Board are: ( Note: You must have
already linked your email address to a yahoo id to enable access. )
(1) To access the Files Section of our Yahoo!Group for Report Builder and
Crystal Reports and other 'goodies', please goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/.
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/files/.>
(2) To search through old msg's goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/messages
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/messages>
(3) To view links to Vendors that provide Vantage services goto:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/links
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vantage/links>

Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the Yahoo! Terms of Service
<http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/> .

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]