New approach for wish lists

[Petar_MK]

Instead of "fulfilling" our wishes for the every next version, Xara's staff should invite the best experienced Xara's users found on Talk Graphic forum and organize a meeting with them where they can freely and directly expose their wishes.
Xara's staff can also exploit their presence and watch them how they use Xara in practice. This way, they can find the weak points of Xara software and make it even better and faster.
It can be mutual satisfaction because the Xara's staff can see what bothers the users while using the software, and the users will be satisfied because they are finally heard by the real people.

[gwpriester]

Back in the 90s when I was active with CorelDRAW and writing for COREL Magazine, Corel had a bunch of us up to Ottawa for just that reason. Good idea. (Are you listening Xara? )

[Petar_MK]

Back in the 90s when I was active with CorelDRAW and writing for COREL Magazine, Corel had a bunch of us up to Ottawa for just that reason. Good idea. (Are you listening Xara? )

Nice to hear that. I've never heard about that Corel's activity, I also hope that Xara will do the same for its own good.

[Acorn]

Beta testing anyone?

Acorn

[Big Frank]

i am extremely cynical about the prospect of something like that happening

[Petar_MK]

If there is no positive reaction from Xara, you should learn an invaluable lesson -- don't waste your time sending wish lists anymore. They simply don't listen to you.

[steve.ledger]

I think it's been mentioned a number of times, even by Charles Moir that they certainly do take note of customer suggestions from all sectors, not just forums (which represent only a small percentage of the overall user base).
Xara would have a very long list of prioritised requests but it's fairly logical to accept that while it may seem 'easy' to add something based on the apparent simplicity of the feature being asked for the reality is that some things simply can't be shoe-horned into the core application quite so easily, certainly not always without it upsetting what's already there. The knock-on effect can take more development hours to debug than to add in the first place, which accounts for big bucks, money that is allocated to sure things I suspect.
I wouldn't be so dismissive of the worth that Xara and Co place on user feedback, they are business professionals and do listen.

[Big Frank]

if you look at the wish list for designer 9 and then look at what, if anything, was included
then you will share my cynicism
but i honestly dont know any more who are xara's target market
they seem to be "scattergunning" (firing in all directions with no perceptible target)
its a term i learnt at a marketing seminar many years ago

[degree451]

As far as I can tell there is zero attempt by the parent company to acknowledge its user base in any way whatsoever. They don't have an official forum, an email address, or a voting system that paid users can use to make feedback or suggestions to which makes it more than clear that they either don't care or just plain suck at common business practices in the 21st century. They've lost their core product focus: Vector graphics.. and my money for X9.

[steve.ledger]

Rant rant rant...
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