No love for Softimage - autodesk feedback site

[bottleofram]

Some of you may have noticed maya got an official feedback channel not dissimilar to the one max had since last year.

It can be found at this URL:
http://mayafeedback.autodesk.com

Unsurprisingly, no such site has been setup for softimage users. I would also like to add that you can report problems and suggest features for many autodesk products - sometimes even by simply pressing a button in your application - yet, softimage gets omitted from those services as well.

There are ways, of course, and we can even log in to xsibase and quickly describe a bug on one of the Chris' threads, but thats his good will/unpaid work you rely on by doing so.

This is disrespectful from AD. They charge the same for 3D packages, but offer different value in return.

[Hirazi Blue]

I really don't think we need a Softimage uservoice site. "Ideas" and even "Small Annoying Things" can easily be picked up from the different forums. Chris Chia's Bug Thread over at the xsibase is an attempt at giving the users a direct voice where bugs are concerned. And "true" bug reporting is obviously way more important than "Small Annoying Things" fixing (IMHO).

When talking about the different Autodesk sites, there is one thing I really don't understand: why doesn't Autodesk "hook up" this page to the "Singapore Team". For a "Report a Bug" page there really isn't any good reason, why "Softimage" isn't one of the options to report bugs for.
But: "it's Autodesk..."

[Kerro Perro]

Ok well this'll be another of "those" threads

I just quickly want to say in defense of the Singapore team that a few weeks ago i got an e-mail from them following up on a crash report. That never happenend before.

Granted the crash happenend months earlier and on a previous version of SI (2012) but hey it's a start no?

[rray]

Not as a reaction to this but I just set up something similar on reddit for bug reporting/feedback.

I doubt it'll work but in case it does, the up/downvote system should be quite useful for something like this.

Reddit's commenting system should also keep things from cluttering up like it happens a bit in the xsibase thread. Wasn't much effort so I won't mind if there's noone posing there. Let's see...

http://reddit.com/r/softimagebugs

[Bellsey]

My understanding was that the Max feedback site one was the first 'toe in the water' and was the test of the process in general. Once refined the plan was to have other products also use it.

Personally I'm glad to finally see it implemented for Maya (Soft would be good too), as not only is it one way for people to feedback to Autodesk, but it also makes people think and perhaps prioritise what they might want fixed as you only have a set number of votes.

I agree the link provided to submitting a bug isn't great, but I am not sure why. The drop down list of software does look limited, not even AutoCad is listed.
As for reporting bugs, the best way is (providing you are on Subscription) is to go through the Subs Center with your loginID and log the issue there. Also other things to look at, that are often overlooked, are the CER's - Customer Error Reports and the CIPs - Customer Involvement Programs.
You might noticed the CIP window appear if you boot up Soft, there's an option to be involved or not. You can turn it on/off via the Help menu in Soft. I would recommend you participate as it helps gather system information and usage data for us.

The CERs are even better. If you're on Windows and Soft crashes, you might get a pop up box appear asking to submit the crash report to us. I bet most people just ignore it, . Basically - Don't. Fill in as much info as you can and send the report in, they do go actually somewhere and get logged. Also make sure you put in valid and useful contact details, getting reports from bugsbunny@hotmail.com aren't much good to us, lol.

[Hirazi Blue]

Ok well this'll be another of "those" threads

It doesn't have to be. One could argue about the wording, but the issues raised seem to be valid. Ultimately you might be right, but for now it seems like an early act of "crying wolf".

Not as a reaction to this but I just set up something similar on reddit for bug reporting/feedback.

That looks like a decent effort, although I somehow doubt it will take off. Does this run "in parallel" to the existing xsibase thread? If so, I foresee problems there... And Chris Chia (who hasn't even registered here BTW) and some of the other folks at Autodesk Softimage should participate too for it to have the desired effect.

Funny thing about Chris Chia's bug thread seems to be that he really should have started his thread on the dreaded Area. The Area - unlike the xsibase & the si-community - has a different approach to thread building, in which someone could report a bug as a full post (a "reply") and all the follow-up remarks to one specific bug could be added/interjected as a "comment". This is a forum philosophy I personally dislike very much, but especially for a thread like Chris Chia is trying to run, this might have helped a lot for the readability of the thread...
It also would have helped, if Chris Chia's enthusiasm in starting the thread had been done with a little more planning as to how to set this up. There is difference to a thread usable to him/Softimage and a thread ultimately usable to the community. But that's my moderator point of view (not even worth 2 cents I'm afraid).
;)

For now I stick to the print view of Chris Chia's bug thread as it offers you the whole thread and as such is "easier" to search

[bottleofram]

Ok well this'll be another of "those" threads

The place just wouldn't feel the same. ;) Although... no "that thread" is complete without a car analogy, so here we go:

If AD was a car manufacturing company, customer would be a crash test dummy. You would be expected to drive a malfunctioning vehicle for a year and by the end of it, you might just get a proper one. "Might", i say, but its highly unlikely. If you die in a process - which happens, such is life - you would not file a lawsuit. No, no! You would, in fact, write a detailed death report stating clearly how and why did you die. So that... you know... other dummies could die some other way next year. For the fun of it. Obviously.



In all seriousness though, im not making this some kind of a big issue. Its not. I said there are ways and Bellsey followed up with details which are all fine. I have to say though, CERs are ignored for a reason. We have a job to do - boss doesn't care if i had to inform AD about their screwup, he wants his shot done.

I'm wondering why wouldn't they try to make it easier. The system is in place (for all of the mentioned services) so the only possible issue i can think of is they don't have enough people to overlook for SI. Or they think it wouldn't be worth it.

But, again, it doesn't matter. I'm more irritated by the fact that the uservoice has not been setup for SI. (which i do not expect to change in the next couple of years even)

Not as a reaction to this but I just set up something similar on reddit for bug reporting/feedback.

Nice effort, but i feel like this cant be user-driven. It needs to be official or it wont work.

[Bellsey]

I have to say though, CERs are ignored for a reason. We have a job to do - boss doesn't care if i had to inform AD about their screwup, he wants his shot done.

We realise that people have their jobs to do, but seriously it shouldn't take 2mins to just send us the crash report. More detail is always good, but we're not expecting 'war and peace' style repro steps. Any information is better than nothing and even if the report is sent in, as is, that's still better than nothing.

[luceric]

the CER system analyses the crash call stacks automatically and group them by similitude so we can look at what are them as a group. There wouldn't be any point to the system if we had to contact each users individually for each crash and ask them for more info. it's only when there is something weird we can't figure out with the data captured automatically that we need to contact a user. if that happens, it may be another user with the same crash that we contact.

[luceric]

There are ways, of course, and we can even log in to xsibase and quickly describe a bug on one of the Chris' threads, but thats his good will/unpaid work you rely on by doing so.

This is disrespectful from AD. They charge the same for 3D packages, but offer different value in return.

Nobody internally thinks the Softimage users are getting short changed in term of customer interaction, in fact quite the opposite. autodesk hosts a mailing list for softimage, which it doesnt do for any product, and the dev team is directly on it. there are other channels as well. then there is stephen. btw Chris may have decided on his own to do this, but it's definitely become part of the work day.

[bottleofram]

@ luceric: You have a point there. Indeed, customer interaction, particularly from the people you mention, has been admirable. If you allow me though, i will add another thing to the "list of the things AD does for DCC apps that are not Softimage":

Annual API wishlist surveys
Autodesk® 3ds Studio Max® - http://www.zoomerang.com/Survey/WEB22FY5KP4ZPD
Autodesk® Maya® - http://www.zoomerang.com/Survey/WEB22FY5JJ4YYS


The simple fact is, these are all nice efforts to try and better tailor maya for maya users and max for max users. Such commitment has yet to be seen on this end of the product line, imho.


Cheers

[luceric]

another thing to the "list of the things AD does for DCC apps that are not Softimage"

you mean for only two of their DCCs, because Autodesk has dozens of them.

Point well taken, but I think you need more insight about how stuff happens. It's about what individuals decide to do, not the corporation.

There are dozens of technical product managers, product designers (+reps of all kinds) for Max/Maya. A manager for Max or Maya will go ahead with something like this, and then his Maya or Max equivalent may sometime say, hey, let's do that too. Softimage only had one person filling both roles, and I already wrote elsewhere that he wasn't interested in UserVoice at Avid. We did one Linux survey once I think. I also asked around why Softimage wasn't an option on the public form to submit a bug, and I was told by the Softimage person who could have added it... that he chose not to, because he thought the feedback would be of low quality compared to what comes through beta, support and the public list. It's a entire new team now, I don't know what they have planned.

[luceric]

Unsurprisingly, no such site has been setup for softimage users. I would also like to add that you can report problems and suggest features for many autodesk products - yet, softimage gets omitted from those services as well.

well you can stop complaining about that one now..

[Hirazi Blue]

"Given enough thrust, even pigs will fly!"
Great news, indeed...

[ace63]

Oh my god!

http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/it ... =Softimage

[Bellsey]

you see, you should be careful what you wish for... lol