no activity in 4 days....checking if site up
There is so many forum's questions and answers, and users can find there solutions for most part ofproblems
Loads of potential spammers creating accounts. I reckon 10 per day on average.
@PH: you missed one! Oh. Wait! Passed your bedtime. LOL. That's what happens when somebody's today is my tomorrow! You've done a great job vacuuming the site. 😌 😬 😂
When I check forum's statistics (http://visguy.com/vgforum/index.php?action=stats) it makes me sad
(https://i.ibb.co/dMdyNKB/stat.png)
In 2020 we get about 3.5M page views, it is about half of page views in 2017.
Trend is interest for MS Visio is lost ?
Quote from: wapperdude on December 03, 2020, 02:16:13 AM
That's what happens when somebody's today is my tomorrow! You've done a great job vacuuming the site. 😌 😬 😂
Welcome to the world of tomorrow!
My wife doesn't think I do enough housework. She may be right, but a vacuum cleaner does not count as a power tool. I'll use the angle grinder on the spammers in the future.
Interest lost? Hard to say. 2020 being such an odd year due to CV19...money is tight, businesses on hold, Visio would be low priority. M$ has tried to make it more forward-looking, aka the Ribbon and Visio360. But, it comes with hefty price tag, and very little in usable, feature upgrades. Plus, no incremental updates to resolve bug issues. Basically, riding the magic carpet until it becomes threadbare and an antiquated, wall hanging. All of these point to dismal 2020. It may take awhile before interest re-bounds... unless lower cost alternatives have finally caught on permanently.
Quote from: wapperdude on December 03, 2020, 02:53:06 PM2020 being such an odd year due to CV19...money is tight, businesses on hold, Visio would be low priority.
Trend started before 2020! Since 2018, every year we have a 15% decrease in page views...
Quote from: wapperdude on December 03, 2020, 02:53:06 PM
M$ has tried to make it more forward-looking, aka the Ribbon and Visio360. But, it comes with hefty price tag, and very little in usable, feature upgrades. Plus, no incremental updates to resolve bug issues.
Their efforts are focused on cloud versions. Desktop versions practically unchanged since 2013!!!
Quote from: wapperdude on December 03, 2020, 02:53:06 PMunless lower cost alternatives have finally caught on permanently.
For example AutoDesk have program AutoDesk Developer Network (https://www.autodesk.com/developer-network/overview), where 3rd-party developers create new solutions for CAD eco-system.
Not all users have enough standard MS Visio stencils. Some countries use specific national standards. AutoDesk, other CAD software companies (and 3rd party) make products with support national standards!
We don't even get so many members on the forum these days. Many of the old hands haven't appeared for a long time.
Microsoft did have a network of 3rd-party developers and a whole marketing plan for them, lots of work was involved with getting up to speed on the system and meeting MS's requirement. It all got dropped like a hot potato. Never trust MS marketing again.
I still love this forum!
I am also! And our Russian visio forum (https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=&sl=en&tl=en&u=https%3A%2F%2Fvisio.getbb.ru%2F) too, there is silence now.
:(
Yep. Many familiar, regular contributors seem to have vanished altogether. Others of us are no longer nearly as active. Feels like our community has diminished.
Being one of those who disappeared, I deeply apologize.
Yes Visio is still the greatest data graphics tool out there, but:
1. the questions tend to repeat themselves
2. there are so many other (software) toys out there.
I thought about starting a series of Visio Tutorials on Youtube covering the stuff I specialized in (smart shapes, whole solutions, python automation). Especially since Visio is still such a niche product, that you can barely find useful tutorials on the net.
The idea is to publish more on the howto and the workflow, rather than the finished solutions in order to empower others to accomplish the same.
I find it really difficult to make videos, espevially tutorials and alike.. writing script, filming, editing.
I can easily spend one day crafting 10 minutes long video :-\ Yacine do you have some experience to share maybe?
Quote from: Yacine on December 05, 2020, 01:22:20 PM
Being one of those who disappeared, I deeply apologize.
3 weeks! You call that being away? I'm talking about those who have been away for years!
I got a gold badge on the Super-User forum the other day, Fanatic - gold - for visiting every day for 100 days. Sad.
Quote from: Paul Herber on December 05, 2020, 04:48:32 PM
I got a gold badge on the Super-User forum the other day, Fanatic - gold - for visiting every day for 100 days. Sad.
wow!
Quote from: Nikolay on December 05, 2020, 02:56:40 PM
:-\ Yacine do you have some experience to share maybe?
Not really, but I believe that getting started in a "childish" way, experimenting and without the fear of not being perfect is fundamental. Disregarding if you get to master the thing or produce only crap, you still will have got the fun of experiencing it.
For instance, I have absolutely no artistic talent, but I paint (at least I did). I can't cook, but I do and my family eats my meals (without too much complaints). It's the fun.
From the 2-3 videos I posted on Youtube, I learned at least the following:
- a good microphone is necessary + some breathing noise reduction "solution"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EwTZ2xpQwpA (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EwTZ2xpQwpA)
https://blog.accusonus.com/fix-broken-audio/common-recording-problems/ (https://blog.accusonus.com/fix-broken-audio/common-recording-problems/)
- a script is mendatory - unless you're very experienced
- post-editing (cutting out bad sequences) enhances the tut
- filming one self speaking adds to the experience, but it is certainly much more difficult and no so mandatory
- bigger subjects can be split in smaller videos, gathered in a playlist.
... and finally Youtube has certainly tons of tutorials in how to make tutorials. I haven't checked any yet though.
I guess you can lump me in with the vanished. It's been almost half a year since I posted anything. Or visited the forum, for that matter.
Blame it on being blessed with a pandemic-sponsored vacation financed by an unreasonably hefty stipend of unemployment compensation and Trump bucks. Spent a lot of time traveling, camping on the Appalachian Trail, whitewater canoe/camping, and similar fun with the wife, kids, grandkids, and friends. As I mentioned before, I've been enjoying the pandemic, strange though it may seem.
Since my Visio projects were "paused' (in their words), I took advantage of the forced vacation to write my next novel, No Dogs on Mars – A Starship Story (http://astarshipstory.com). It's about riding the SpaceX Starships 33 years from now.
But all good things must come to an end. Last month one of my Visio projects was "unpaused", so I'm back in the thick of it. I was back here this morning for the first time since July looking for the fix for the Error 318 problem (which didn't work—more on that soon). Bottom line is that I'm back.
As for the declining interest in Visio, in my experience it's the price that puts people off. As I (think I) mentioned before, I had to get special dispensation to keep my Visio after a company-wide purge deleted most everyone's licenses. Their rationale was the poor return on investment. Now they're using freeware, like Zephyr and Gliffy. Sad.
I saw a similar trend with Lotus Notes. A great product for its time with a loyal fan base, until one day they just pulled the plug on it. Lots of wailing and gnashing of teeth over that. I can see the same thing happening to us one day, unless M$ gets their act together on it.
In the meantime, I'll continue having fun with Visio. Even when I get those unsolvable 318 errors.
- Ken
Quote from: Hey Ken on December 15, 2020, 08:52:07 PM
I guess you can lump me in with the vanished. It's been almost half a year since I posted anything. Or visited the forum, for that matter.
Blame it on being blessed with a pandemic-sponsored vacation financed by an unreasonably hefty stipend of unemployment compensation and Trump bucks. Spent a lot of time traveling, camping on the Appalachian Trail, whitewater canoe/camping, and similar fun with the wife, kids, grandkids, and friends. As I mentioned before, I've been enjoying the pandemic, strange though it may seem.
Since my Visio projects were "paused' (in their words), I took advantage of the forced vacation to write my next novel, No Dogs on Mars – A Starship Story (http://astarshipstory.com). It's about riding the SpaceX Starships 33 years from now.
But all good things must come to an end. Last month one of my Visio projects was "unpaused", so I'm back in the thick of it. I was back here this morning for the first time since July looking for the fix for the Error 318 problem (which didn't work—more on that soon). Bottom line is that I'm back.
As for the declining interest in Visio, in my experience it's the price that puts people off. As I (think I) mentioned before, I had to get special dispensation to keep my Visio after a company-wide purge deleted most everyone's licenses. Their rationale was the poor return on investment. Now they're using freeware, like Zephyr and Gliffy. Sad.
I saw a similar trend with Lotus Notes. A great product for its time with a loyal fan base, until one day they just pulled the plug on it. Lots of wailing and gnashing of teeth over that. I can see the same thing happening to us one day, unless M$ gets their act together on it.
In the meantime, I'll continue having fun with Visio. Even when I get those unsolvable 318 errors.
- Ken
Ken I think the new self-service option for buying Visio in large organisations is a big win:
https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/visio-blog/purchase-visio-cloud-subscriptions-with-your-business-domain/ba-p/1736584?ocid=usoc_TWITTER_M365_spl100001542419078
I agree Visio is expensive, but if companies choose a small set of diagram producers and a large set of consumers the cost is meaninglessly low for a large organisation. Still I agree lower prices would be better.
People being able to get it themselves, not having to wait on the IT department, is a key improvement for the desktop app. In some orgs this just takes ages, this shortcut helps people to get Visio on their corporate desktop in one hour instead of one year (or more).
I think if the guys will continue building Visio online at the same pace they do now, they are soon outta here (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DNE0sg1n8VE) ;D
I understand Visio is not a flagship product of Microsoft, but still if you have a dedicated team, wouldn't it make sense to make them do at least something?
Doing just marketing is somewhat similar to saying "honey" many times - not going to be any sweeter. Not adding a single feature in 10 years, but instead annoying users with awkward ribbon and dramatic slowdown? Hmm. Okay.
Sorting in OrgChart wizard? Not in this life probably, I guess there is no one left in Visio team who remembers what C++ looks like ;D
Now, Visio Online API is also a disaster imho. I think this is not just me (although I have personally hit at least three bugs).. You could check out GitHub's issues for office-js related to Visio. Kindergarten.
Of course this is all a bit exaggerated, but this is not to complain, but to motivate ;D
Nikolay, You mean motivation for users or developers?
Quote from: Surrogate on December 16, 2020, 08:49:09 PMNikolay, You mean motivation for users or developers?
Both ;D Just grumbling ;D
Well, maybe it's just like that: Everything is Amazing & Nobody is Happy (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8r1CZTLk-Gk) - "You are Sitting in a Chair... in the Sky!!"
Visio used to be so cool when I started using it 199x.
Now had to pick another framework for the new project (diagramming-related), Visio Online turned out to be not quite up for the task... In Visio Online:
- No custom shapes
- No custom code
- No custom constraints
- No custom actions (such as context menu items)
This situation makes me kind of sad ;D Although it may be similar to complaining about absence of WIFI in a plane, like in the video above.
So we have just a viewer that is a bit buggy (https://github.com/OfficeDev/office-js/issues/1539)... and recently caught some CORS issues (https://github.com/OfficeDev/office-js/issues/1378) in API... :-\
But anyway....
(https://i.paste.pics/012a0e03637aaeca03a8802db076fc1c.png)
;D
Dedicated team??? One person, a team does not make. Seriously doubt that a single person would be dedicated.
Good people are putting their complaints on the table, Microsoft clearly needs to get an impulse if there's any chance they'll improve this. In my opinion they are so far behind in webbased diagramming, webbased software like diagrams.net is so far ahead that Microsoft only has a shot with its still excellent desktop software. Excel desktop is getting plenty of software upgrades and Visio should get them too to justify the high asking price for a Visio Plan 2 subscription.
Well, diagrams.net is based on MxGraph (it's not that bad, that's the one I use in the current project - it's pretty solid and open source).
Still it's old and clunky and full of garbage (does anybody remember what VML was good for?)
From the other side I may be a bit biased ;D
(https://i.paste.pics/c733bbd6cd73fe8d0d999749ee385b78.png)
But yes, if you "cook it properly" MxGraph it can look similar to Visio Online (check this out, it's actually mxgraph, with UI "modernized" a bit) ;D
(https://i.paste.pics/942fc67b347a87e5db0f9f3de07ca15a.png)
MxGraph has solid UNDO/REDO support, in the browser (this point was critical for me). And you can program any shape yourself (behavior, looks, styles, constraints, actions, etc).
But yourself. In javascript. There is nothing even remotely similar to Visio formulas and shapesheets (well maybe styles, but that's not exactly it)
Still, for simple diagrams, with predefined set of shapes it's okay.
😂😂😂
Because mxgraph/drawio started 15 years ago should be full of old code/junk yes, but as an end user I do see a ton of functionality compared to Visio webbased.
Really nice UI upgrade Nikolay!
MxGraph has some real issues with tablet / phones:
- Some controls are just too small to hit. 3px x 8px arrow on a retina touch device? Seriously?
- Pinch zoom is simply broken (multi-touch)
- "mm", "cm", etc units are supported in a strange and unusual way.
- they have given up on mxGraph "standalone" version, moving all development to diagrams.net
- the UI is really dated, looks like it's something from 199x
- lots of garbage, like IE6 support that doesn't work, rendering to VML and other crazy stuff (for 2020)
Good you've checked under the hood, sounds like doing a complex project on mxgraph will bring lots of issues with it.
Our statistic in May'21 (http://visguy.com/vgforum/index.php?action=stats;expand=202105#m202105) is exciting !
We have more page views even than in March'18 (http://visguy.com/vgforum/index.php?action=stats;expand=201803#m201803) !!!
Have people become more interested in Visio ?
Most time online: Me! How sad.
Quote from: Paul Herber on May 28, 2021, 01:18:45 PM
Most time online: Me! How sad.
It's an accomplishment that will live in infamy! It's all that time you spend guarding the forum. We all benefit from your diligence and are grateful. 😌 Unless, of course, you just forget to log off! 😱😬😉
Quote from: wapperdude on May 28, 2021, 02:01:22 PM
It's an accomplishment that will live in infamy!
Infamy! Infamy! You've all got it in for me!
Log out? Wassat?