{"id":694,"date":"2010-11-24T20:35:38","date_gmt":"2010-11-24T08:35:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.deltics.co.nz\/blog\/?p=694"},"modified":"2010-11-24T20:35:38","modified_gmt":"2010-11-24T08:35:38","slug":"product-activation-how-to-lose-customers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.deltics.co.nz\/blog\/posts\/694\/","title":{"rendered":"Product Activation: How To Lose Customers"},"content":{"rendered":"[Estimated Reading Time: <\/span> 3<\/span> minutes]<\/span><\/span>

Embarcadero clearly don’t want or need new customers. Their product activation system is not only a nuisance, but an active barrier to new customers, rendered unable even to access trial versions of their products.
\n
\nI am currently investigating PHP tools for a new project. I have already looked at Eclipse and NetBeans and whilst they have things to like they also have lots of things that I dislike. I wanted to take a look at RAD-PHP XE, so I downloaded the trial. Then I installed it, and that’s when I got the message loud and clear that No, thank you very much, Embarcadero are not interested in my custom.<\/p>\n

Kindly bu**er off and use someone elses products.<\/p>\n

What gave me this impression… let me tell you.<\/p>\n

STEP 1: REGISTER<\/h2>\n

Seriously? WTF!<\/p>\n

In fact, I may even have been required to sign up for a Developer Network account before I could even get as far as being issued with a serial number (though I may be mistaken and could have been able to login if I already had one, but not required to create an account if I didn’t).<\/p>\n

But in any event, the point is – WHY?<\/p>\n

OK, let’s just say that it’s reasonable for Embarcadero to want to capture some details about me before I even start a trial of their product.<\/p>\n

I hope they don’t intend using that information to send further unsolicited communication while I am investigating their software. That sort of pushy selling really get’s my goat and is likely to cause me to reject a company that engages in that sort of thing, regardless of the merits of their product.<\/p>\n

So I have to fill in a stupid registration form before I can start the download (why the hell can’t I do it while I’m waiting?), but at least once it’s downloaded I’ll be good to go…<\/p>\n

OH NO! This is Embarcadero we’re talking about….<\/p>\n

STEP 2: ACTIVATE<\/h2>\n

Not only do I have to register for a trial copy, I also have to ACTIVATE it. They can’t just send me a serial number with a time lock.<\/p>\n

After installing the product they force me to run an Activation Wizard before I can start trialling it.<\/p>\n

And here is where the genius of the system really comes to the fore.<\/p>\n

I duly entered the Serial Number they emailed me into the registration wizard dialog.<\/p>\n

I carefully entered my DN account name (so I presume even if not required to download the trial, a DN account is presumably a pre-requisite after all).<\/p>\n

I diligently entered my DN password.<\/p>\n

I submitted my information.<\/p>\n

And hey presto my trial finally started.<\/p>\n

No.<\/p>\n

Not at all.<\/p>\n

I instead got told that activation failed with some mumbo-jumbo about corrupt license blah blah blah.<\/p>\n

No worries – there appear to be two options.<\/p>\n

1 – Try web registration. I think what I have may count as “Trouble Connecting”<\/p>\n

2 – Register Later. Ah. No. This is’t an option – it’s just a bit of useless dialog bling. A button that never enables, just sits there dangling the carrot of deferred registration, an enticement that is never actually offered it would seem.<\/p>\n

So let’s try again….<\/p>\n

STEP 2: ACTIVATE – WEB STYLEEE<\/h2>\n

I really did have high hopes.<\/p>\n

But it seems that the “trial” in Embarcadero’s “trial” software is in getting to actually use the bloody stuff in the first place.<\/p>\n

Because upon visiting the page that the Web registration option takes me to, I am told that I have exceeded the activation count for that Serial Number.<\/p>\n

WTF!?<\/p>\n

I tried it once, and it failed. And that has exceeded the activation limit?<\/p>\n

IT NEVER ACTIVATED EVEN ONCE.<\/p>\n

STEP 4: UNINSTALL<\/h2>\n

STEP 5: CURSE THE DAY EMBARCADERO BECAME GUARDIANS OF THE DELPHI HERITAGE<\/h2>\n

STEP 6: WITH GRITTED TEETH RETURN TO NETBEANS<\/h2>\n

It may have some things that I find less than perfect, but at least the damned thing works.<\/p>\n

Hell, at least it let’s me BE a user!<\/p>\n

Poor show Embarcadero.<\/p>\n

Very, VERY poor show.<\/p>\n

I had heard some grumblings about Product Activation with the latest Delphi releases. It seems that the rot runs even deeper than I had feared.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[Estimated Reading Time: <\/span> 3<\/span> minutes]<\/span><\/span>Embarcadero clearly don’t want or need new customers. Their product activation system is not only a nuisance, but an active barrier to new customers, rendered unable even to access trial versions of their products.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[4],"tags":[119,120,121],"class_list":["post-694","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-delphi","tag-embarcadero","tag-product-activation","tag-rad-php"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1TKYv-bc","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.deltics.co.nz\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/694","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.deltics.co.nz\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.deltics.co.nz\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.deltics.co.nz\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.deltics.co.nz\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=694"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.deltics.co.nz\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/694\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":696,"href":"https:\/\/www.deltics.co.nz\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/694\/revisions\/696"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.deltics.co.nz\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=694"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.deltics.co.nz\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=694"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.deltics.co.nz\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=694"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}