It’s been more than a month since the new layout for Rapid Signal was delivered to me. Still I had a lot of other things to look into and no time to upload it. Moreover I wanted to finish the new copy for the site (still only half-done).

Anyway about 10 days ago I decided to upload the new layout using the old copy and images.

It’s a clean layout using the same simple organization. It’s not overly modern but it was designed by a professional and it shows (at least in my eyes!). I found the designer through www.solucija.com.

It’s (not) funny how the simple act of getting the new site online (integrating with my custom CMS, uploading and testing) took me the better part of a full day. Plus I managed to mingle some mail settings and two mails with trial serials weren’t sent (fortunately I took notice of that quite soon).

One of the things I’m doing is rebuilding the Rapid Signal and Magna CRM site. I’ll hopefully have the new templates by mid-May, so I hope to have it online by the end of May.

This takes more time than I thought… It was the same with the screencast (on hold for now) and the press release I wrote (published in just one place for the time being). The only thing that feels easy and natural is programming ;-)

Anyway, it takes a lot of work to design the navigation, edit the texts and decide how to implement things like multi-language support (it’s strange how Magna CRM supports 2 languages but the web site only 1 language). I hope this constant feeling that something is wrong goes away after the new site goes live!

Today I released the Windows Installer for Magna CRM I talked about some time ago!

It came out pretty well and I’m quite happy about it. It installs Apache 1.3, PHP 4.4 and uses Access as a database. Everything is installed under one directory and only 3 registry keys are created. Also it comes with a utility to easily change the configuration settings.

The reasons behind this were:

1. Offer an extremely easy way to install the trial.
2. Offer this as a permanent solution for small businesses.

Indeed it is now quite painless to install Magna CRM, either to check the trial or as a permanent solution. Moreover the installer handles upgrades too. Another good thing is that the download is about 2.1 MBytes (the zip version is about 1.5 MBytes).

The installer doesn’t run on Windows 95 / 98 / ME, but I believe this won’t be a big problem. The reason for this is for Apache to be installed as a service.

I will try to write a technical article on how I did it, what problems I faced etc.

I have decided to create an installer (windows only) for Magna CRM. This will install a web server (apache or lighthttpd) and a completely pre-configured environment (prefilled Access database and configuration files).

There are 2 reasons to do this:

1. Offer an extremely easy way to install the trial. Right now you must know of things like web server, document root, Access / MySQL / SQL Server, permissions etc. in order to run the web based installer. With a Windows installer you’ll only have to press Next 4-5 times and maybe fill in 1-2 fields.
2. Offer this as a permanent solution for very small businesses. There are thousands of small businesses out there with 1-10 employees and no IT department. These could take advantage of the easy installation procedure without having to ask a 3rd party to install it.

Although this doesn’t look especially hard, there are many things to research: If the Apache / lighthttpd licenses allow redistribution, if the web server will be installed as a service (better overall but Xp/2000 only), how updates will be handled and what installer to use (I’ve used NSIS in the past but I am not sure its scripting language will be up to it - maybe I’ll have to check InnoSetup). Moreover this will create an extra step when releasing a new version but I hope to integrate this procedure in my current build process.

When the time came to setup my online shop, I looked around for available choices. It basically boils down to these two:

• Do it all yourself solution: setup a merchant account and payment gateway, accept credit card payments and maybe purchase orders, phone and fax orders.
• Go with an established e-commerce provider like share-it, 2checkout, Kagi, eSellerate etc. You can find a comparison of many such services at http://www.regshare.com/ and http://www.blackcatsystems.com/regservices/.

At the time I felt that a completely integrated system is more appropriate for business software. However I changed my mind and went with an e-commerce provider for 3 reasons:

1. Some people believe it’s more secure to give their credit card to an established company specialized in receiving payments, than to a new, small company.
2. I wasn’t sure how hard it would be to handle purchase orders, phone and fax orders. I don’t think it’s that complicated or demanding but then again I had no experience in this area.
3. At the same time I read an excellent article by Dennis Gurock, describing how they did their shop using share-it. I think their shop is very well done: clear and professional while offering multiple ways to order.

So I followed their advice while building my shop, only I took it a step further: I created a customer area, where customers can login to download the latest version of Magna CRM and find their serial numbers. Although I also went with share-it, it is because I find their rates and service good. I think the same shop could be built with any other advanced e-commerce provider.

In order for this to work I had to take advantage of the share-it serial number generator API. Share-it allows developers to generate serial numbers for their products in real time. They do this using a generator you provide them: either an EXE or a specific URL that is hosted by you. I used this second way, only I don’t just generate a serial number I also create an account for the customer area.

So, when someone buys something from my shop, share-it calls a specific PHP script hosted by me. They pass information like customer details and what he ordered (obviously they don’t give any payment details). In this script, I create a new account for the customer area and return the username / password combination to share-it. This information is then sent to the customer who can immediately login and download the product.

Advantages of this approach:

• The procedure is completely automated. The customer can pay and download his software without any human intervention.
• Exactly the same system is used for the trial version.
• The customer area can provide more benefits in the future (apart from product downloads and serial numbers)
• The generator script also works as an event for a new / returning customers. I use it to update customer details and assets in Magna CRM or insert new leads in case of trial sign-ups.

Here are some completely useless but fun stats about Magna CRM.

Code, icons, help:

• 174 PHP files
• 26.613 lines of PHP code (including comments and empty lines)
• 999.853 bytes of PHP code (including comments and white space)
• 28 icons
• 1 JavaScript file
• 2 CSS files
• 24 html help pages with 16 accompanying images

Other:

• 25 Database tables
• 539 localization strings
• 160 resolved items in bug database (FogBugz)
• 369 subversion commits (I tend to do way too many commits, e.g. a typo in a comment may get it’s own file commit)

Site:

• 66 files
• 16 images

The biggest complaint I received during beta, was about the homepage layout when you first login. It looks like this:

I have to admit it looked wrong and ugly, being so empty. So, for the final release, I created a small example image of how the homepage will look with data and added a highlighted note on creating new records. Of course after you insert some data the image goes away. I think 37 Signals were the first to do this, but I’m not sure.

Here is how the empty homepage looks now:

Moreover all new users now have a default task (to Configure their settings), so the task list is not empty.

Overall I think that’s much better!

I’m quite happy (and a bit proud) to report that Magna CRM was released a few minutes ago!

The web site has been updated with an improved product page, screenshots / tour and of course an online shop. The price list has been determined (for a couple weeks now actually) and the manual is now fully written and online (although it will always be a work in progress).

Few changes from beta 2 were introduced: some cosmetic, a few small improvements in the way things work and a couple issues with the installer. This makes me confident Magna CRM will work as expected.

I have a ton of things I want to write about, I hope I’ll get to it later!

Dennis Gurock of Gurock Software wrote a post about Magna CRM which he quite liked! Quoting him:

I tested it and it’s looking great. I tested some other CRMs in the past and most of them were just overkill for us, slow and bloated so I’m happy to see a simple web based CRM for small businesses.

Beta 2 (version 0.96) was released a few minutes ago. Normally the “Check for updates” function shows the new version, should you use it (it doesn’t check on it’s own).

Release notes:

• Many CSS fixes
• Changed default CSS file
• A task is created for new users, reminding them to configure their settings
• Help is now integrated
• When homepage is empty (e.g. after installing), an example image of how it will look with data is displayed.
• A task is created for the first administrator, reminding him to configure Magna CRM.
• Show link to Markdown syntax help under each textarea that supports it
• Various bugs

If you didn’t have the chance to try Magna CRM, download it now and give it a try. Your feedback would be very much appreciated!

The beta release is going good with about 15 downloads so far.

I had expected to more or less know people downloading the beta: from forums (e.g. JoS), from a comment here, the mailing list, fellow ISVers etc. The interesting fact is that about half the downloads were from people I have no recollection of. This has of course made me quite happy and all the more anxious about it!

Feedback has been minimal so far, which is to be expected I guess as it’s only been 12 hours since the beta started. So if you’re interested in Magna CRM do sign-up for the beta and certainly send feedback.

Magna CRM beta is finally released! I am a bit anxious right now but here is the news:

You can participate in the beta by registering here:
https://rapidsignal.com/shop/trial/

The beta will run for two weeks, Jan 09 to Jan 23.

Your feedback will most certainly be appreciated and in return we’re offering active participants a free Single User license and a one time 50% discount if you purchase more licenses at the end of the beta.

Support is provided at http://rapidsignal.com/support/ and on support@rapidsignal.com.

This is the 3rd post with screenshots. You can find the rest in part I and part II.

There won’t be a 4th part and for good reason: beta will start on Monday, run for about 2 weeks and then Magna will be released. There will be many screenshots in the product tour plus an online demo and a downloadable trial.

Click to open large images in a new window

Reporting options.

User settings.

In the previous post containing screenshots I wrote:

I hope to post more screenshots tomorrow and maybe annotate them on how things work.

That was about 15 days ago ;-) Anyway here are some more screenshots:

Click to open large images in a new window

This is the user’s homepage. Information displayed here includes: Upcoming events (today and tomorrow), latest leads and opportunities and unattended opportunities.

This is the month view of the schedule. This is a standard schedule showing timed events. The other two views are day and week.

I am going to repeat my intention to post some more screenshots soon!

Testing is going well so far. I have tested on a big variety of configurations including:

IIS / PHP4 and PHP 5 / CGI and SAPI
Apache 1.x / PHP4 and PHP5
Apache 2.x / PHP4 and PHP5

Apache was tested on multiple Windows and Linux servers and I have tried various php.ini configurations. Now, combine these with 3 databases (Access, MySQL and SQL Server) and you understand it was no easy task. Finally I feel quite confident it will work correctly on the majority of configurations but I still intend to test some more configurations (lighthttpd being one of them).

Currently I am finishing the second-to-last code-related task: the installer. Honestly I hate doing PHP installers. They usually end up being a mess, plus they are sensitive and error prone. Nevertheless it is a very important part of an application, so I’m trying to be careful.

The last code-related task will be a customer only part of the web site, where customers will be able to download the application, check for available updates, find their serial numbers etc.