Quickies: Pocket Quicken, Kyocera, Springboards, Fictionwise, L.A.

LandWare has released Pocket Quicken 2.01, which adds a number of new features and maintenance fixes. -David Porfido

Kyocera Wireless has announced that the Kyocera QCP 6035 smartphone will be on sale in Canada this month. Bell Mobility will be the first mobile service provider. -PR

PMN is presenting the Springboard Review Series, with in-depth reviews of every Springboard module available for the Handspring Visor. The first six reviews are now available. -PMN

Fictionwise.com has announced the eBook release of Double Star, Robert A. Heinlein’s classic science fiction novel. The work won a Hugo Award for best novel in 1956. It costs $5. -Scott Pendergrast

The next meeting of the Los Angeles Palm User Group (LAPUG) will be on Saturday, July 14 The meeting will feature Ray Corteen from Verizon Wireless who will show off and discuss the Kyocera QCP 6035 Palm-based cellphone. -Russell Howell

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PQ 2.1 - What's New?

I.M. Anonymous @ 7/12/2001 9:56:36 AM #
I have searched and can't find what the fixes or added features are. Does anyone out there know?

RE: PQ 2.1 - What's New?
I.M. Anonymous @ 7/12/2001 11:06:06 AM #
I search all over the internet as well...this upsets me to NO END.

I hope the "people" at LandWare read this board.

RE: PQ 2.1 - What's New?
Logan @ 7/12/2001 12:05:31 PM #
RE: PQ 2.1 - What's New?
I.M. Anonymous @ 7/12/2001 1:21:26 PM #
Macs please! I hate my PC's. Please let me use my Mac! I know OS 9 is a dog, but at least it's mostly smoother. $.02...

Thanks

Dissapearing Entrys in Pocket Quicken

I.M. Anonymous @ 7/12/2001 10:30:02 AM #
I purchased Pocket Quicken before I really put it through the full 14 day demo period. What a mistake!

The program is great except for one very very big flaw.
YOUR TRANSACTIONS/ENTRYS DISSAPEAR FROM THE HANDHELD!!

You have to open up the desktop quicken program after every hotsync, drill down a page or two into the program and hit 'accept data' button then close the program. If you don't do this after every hotsync your transactions will dissapear from the handheld untill you do so.

So, continualy at the store I would be thinking, "So how much money do I really have? Did I do the desktop Quicken thing after my last hotsync or did I forget again?"

In my opinion, they should be liable for every bounced check this flaw causes, and all the great reviews on the website I think were written before anyone had a chance to discover this flaw. (I would have written a glowing review after the first day or two, but not after the third day.)

I have written and faxed landware about the problem and they seem unwilling to address it as a problem and just said that 'yes, you have to open up desktop quicken every time.'

So much for the quick and easy hotsync idea.

RE: Dissapearing Entrys in Pocket Quicken
I.M. Anonymous @ 7/12/2001 11:04:18 AM #
I have never experienced your problems and I have used PQ since it was introduced. I download from my desktop the last three months of transactions. They all show up on my handheld. Have you talked to customer service at all before blasting thier product? I have had a few small probs and thier customer service is top notch! I give Pocket Quicken 11/10 stars.

RE: Dissapearing Entrys in Pocket Quicken
I.M. Anonymous @ 7/12/2001 11:06:17 AM #
Try changing your settings in Quicken to retain more transactions and transfer balances back. I don't think I have this problem, but I'll double check now.


RE: Dissapearing Entrys in Pocket Quicken
I.M. Anonymous @ 7/12/2001 1:52:42 PM #
Yes of course I talked to Landware first, and yes I have all the settings just like they told me to set them.

I really thought they would resolve it but instead they confirmed this issue. If you hotsync twice without opening up the desktop quicken program to accept transactions in between, your transactions will temporarily dissapear untill you open the desktop quicken and accept transactions. They told me it was no biggie, that to avoid having them dissapear, I had to open it every time...which is exactly the problem!

It took me a couple of weeks to notice so maybe some of you have not noticed it yet. Give it a try, put a test entry into your register, (subtract a penny or something) then hotsync, open up the program on your palm but not on the desktop, see that your entry is there. Now hotsync again, open the pocket quicken on your handheld and scroll around, see if you can find it, I bet you won't be able to find it.

I am running this on a m505, I have windows ME on my 800mhz vaio laptop.

RE: Dissapearing Entrys in Pocket Quicken
Logan @ 7/12/2001 2:01:08 PM #
>The program is great except for one very very big flaw.
>YOUR TRANSACTIONS/ENTRYS DISSAPEAR FROM THE HANDHELD!!

I'm sorry that PQ has caused you frustration however I do feel your post is a distorted simplification that implies that Pocket Quicken is destructive to data. Its not. We have worked hard to ensure the product is solid and reliable.

What you are seeing here is the Pocket Quicken register mirroring the state of the desktop register after MULTIPLE SUCCESSIVE HOTSYNCS without you having accepted transactions into quicken. Its not a bug.

>You have to open up the desktop quicken program after every hotsync,
>drill down a page or two into the program and hit 'accept data' button
>then close the program. If you don't do this after every hotsync
>your transactions will dissapear from the handheld untill you do so.

This is not quite correct. Your balances and transaction history will be correct after the first hotsync. If you do not have any transactions sitting in Quicken's holding area you can hotsync as many times as you like and balances, new desktop transactions etc will be updated correctly.

It is only if you perform more then one *successive* hotsync with transactions still in the Quicken 'pending area' will the new transactions be *temporarily* hidden in the PQ history.

For what its worth Quicken's balances don't reflect these new transactions either until you accept them.

Once accepted they will show up again in the PQ register. I admit this behaviour could be improved upon but at this stage its the best we can do given the current desktop architecture.

>In my opinion, they should be liable for every bounced check this flaw causes,

If you are truly uncomfortable with the way PQ works then you are welcome to return the product to us for a refund.

This situation is not improved upon by any of the competing products. They make you manually maintain the balances and you certainly won't see your transaction register automatically updating (Ultrasoft money excluded)

>I have written and faxed landware about the problem and they seem unwilling
>to address it as a problem

I'm sorry if we gave that impression. We acknowledge this limitation and are working with Intuit to see how we can improve on it. When we do however you will no longer have backward compatibility to Q99. PQ will require you upgrade to the latest version of Quicken that implements those design alterations.

One of the conscious design decisions we made with PQ2.0 was to remain compatible with Q99 and above so people weren't forced to update to the latest version. However this also meant that there were some small architectural limitations we had to live with.

RE: Dissapearing Entrys in Pocket Quicken
I.M. Anonymous @ 7/12/2001 2:03:53 PM #
Also, I installed the 2.01 version to see if that would fix it. NOPE!

And I am not bashing this product. I really want them to fix this product so I can trust it enough to use.

Mitch Richardson
mobilemitch@yahoo.com

(I exchanged a plethora of e-mail with the support staff and even faxed a letter to thier office on this issue. Logan, who replied to a question above is (I think) someone big in Landware, maybe he will adress this?)

RE: Dissapearing Entrys in Pocket Quicken
I.M. Anonymous @ 7/12/2001 2:10:06 PM #
Logan, looks like we posted at the same time. Thank you for responding!

So what I am saying is true. You must open up the desktop quicken between EVERY

RE: Dissapearing Entrys in Pocket Quicken
I.M. Anonymous @ 7/12/2001 2:11:50 PM #
Woops, sorry, I didn't mean to post that, Damn that touchpad thing and Damn my big thumbs.

Anyway, I think that having to open up quicken between every hotsync is dangerous, I need to hotsync a lot more often than I need to look at my financial data in quicken. What happens when you forget to do it (as I have a few times) and you overdraw on your account because the balance is inaccuriate due to a temporarily dissapeared transaction? I realize you do not call this a bug, fine, then it is a design flaw or limitation that is unacceptable IMHO.

Also, looking at the posts from the other users it looks like they don't know it is happening to them. I sure hope they don't find out the hard way.

One question, just for clarifications sake. Are you saying that if I used Quicken 99 I would not have this problem and that the syncronization problem only happens with Quicken 2000?

And, how do I go about getting a refund? (I might not want one if it works ok with quicken 99)

To sum up, one of the core reasons why I like my palm pilot is because I don't have to babysit it during hotsync... but your program destroys this!

RE: Dissapearing Entrys in Pocket Quicken
Logan @ 7/12/2001 3:57:30 PM #
> Anyway, I think that having to open up quicken between every hotsync is
> dangerous,

Not as dangerous as a software vendor hanging out at a PalmInfocenter discussion forum ;-)

>I need to hotsync a lot more often than I need to look at my financial data
>in quicken. What happens when you forget to do it (as I have a few times)
>and you overdraw on your account because the balance is inaccuriate due
> to a temporarily dissapeared transaction?

If you where concerned about accidentally bouncing a cheque you could set the PQ minimum balance level to a figure that would give you enough prior warning.

I accept it's a limitation given that one particular scenario and we are looking into ways of improving it. It's not as trivial as you might think.
Fortunately for 99% of PQ owners it doesn't present a problem.

You also mentioned in your letter to us that you will switch to Splash Money if we do not fix this.

I'm not meaning to knock their product however you should be aware that the QIF import approach adopted by other apps also has significant limitations in this area.

To quote from their manual: "After transferring transactions from SplashMoney to Quicken you may wish to update the ending balance so it matches Quicken ... if you record transactions in both Quicken and SplashMoney the balances will not match"

Certainly if SM is more compatible with your work patterns then go for it. The great thing about the palm platform is you have wide choice of alternatives.

>Also, looking at the posts from the other users it looks like they don't
>know it is happening to them. I sure hope they don't find out the hard way.

For the vast majority of PQ owners it doesn't present a problem.

>One question, just for clarifications sake. Are you saying that if I used
> Quicken 99 I would not have this problem and that the syncronization
>problem only happens with Quicken 2000?

No this limitation exists with Quicken 99, 2000, 2001 and 2002.

>And, how do I go about getting a refund?

call 201 261 7944. After you fill in a software destruction certificate they will refund your money. I'm sorry this proved to be an insurmountable problem for you.

RE: Dissapearing Entrys in Pocket Quicken
I.M. Anonymous @ 7/12/2001 4:17:11 PM #
Wow, thanks for all the great replys Logan.

I think I will get the refund, but I just might come back when you get this issue resolved because otherwise it is a great program.

I am not sure what other program I will use, probably go back to Accouns and Loans with QuickBudget... I need a good count of my money more than I need all the extra stuff you get with quicken...

Its amazing to me that your other users don't find this to be an issue. They must sync much more infrequently -or- they just haven't noticed the disapearing transactions. (I think the latter based on what I saw from posts above, plus it took me a while to notice.)

Anyway, thanks!

RE: Dissapearing Entrys in Pocket Quicken
I.M. Anonymous @ 7/12/2001 4:36:10 PM #
After seeing this great custumer service, I rate Pocket Quicken a 20 out of a possible 10! : ) Thanks Logan for all of your valuable info.

RE: Dissapearing Entrys in Pocket Quicken
Logan @ 7/12/2001 4:38:47 PM #
>I am not sure what other program I will use, probably go back to Accouns
>and Loans with QuickBudget... I need a good count of my money more than
>I need all the extra stuff you get with quicken...

Well if you don't need to update quicken on a regular basis then simply disable the "Send new Transactions" prefence in Pocket Quicken.

Then say on a weekly basis recheck the pref, hotsync, accept into quicken and you are done.

This would be a solution to your problems

RE: Dissapearing Entrys in Pocket Quicken
I.M. Anonymous @ 7/12/2001 11:10:48 PM #
I can't see how this is a problem. The entries from PocketQuicken show up in desktop Quicken to
be accepted in exactly the same way as transactions that come directly from a financial institution.
I cannot imagine a different way of doing it; in fact, I was really pleased to discover that it worked
exactly the same way as bank transactions.

PocketQuicken is the best thing that has happened to me in a long time. I am saving HUGE amounts
of time by doing all of my financial data entry at the point of occurence rather than late at night.
For $39, this is an incredible deal.

If the original poster is having trouble bouncing checks because he can't remember whether he has
accepted his entries, perhaps he should hock his PDA.

RE: Dissapearing Entrys in Pocket Quicken
I.M. Anonymous @ 7/13/2001 10:39:01 AM #
Logan,

I might just try that 'send new entrys' thing, I have backup buddy and have my data backed up to the SD card as well so that actualy is not a bad idea.

Thanks!

Springboard Reviews

I.M. Anonymous @ 7/12/2001 3:19:40 PM #
It's great to see these reviews, but who came up with that tiny format? Come on folks, I'm not reading these reviews on my Pilot! :)

How do you get this upgrade?

I.M. Anonymous @ 7/12/2001 2:44:39 PM #
I have gotten no notification from Landware about a new version. When I go to their upgrade page it has the same instructions for upgrading from 1.0 to 2.0. I don't know if I have to uninstall or what....btw I paid twice for Pocket Quicken since I had owned Pocket Quicken for years before they upgraded to 2.0. But Landware claimed not to be able find any record of me even though they could when I asked for tech support. After one e-mail they stopped answering any questions about this upgrade. So I ended up buying another copy at list price to be able to get 2.0 The only reason I did this is because only Pocket Quicken has a conduit that syncs automatically with Quicken on the desktop otherwise I would dump the product for their poor customer support.

RE: How do you get this upgrade?
Logan @ 7/12/2001 4:17:42 PM #
>I have gotten no notification from Landware about a new version. When I go to
> their upgrade page it has the same instructions for upgrading from 1.0 to 2.0.
> I don't know if I have to uninstall or what....

Sorry we only released it last night so we haven't had a chance to notify everyone yet.

Also a slight technical hitch prevented us from getting the 2.0->2.01 upgrade wizard online yesterday.

In a nutshell:

1. Ensure you have transferred any newly entered transactions to the desktop
2. Delete 2.0 from the handheld
3. Run the windows add/remove application to remove the PQ 2.0 conduit
4. Run the 2.01 installer
5. Hotsync.

If you have any trouble our tech support team are there to help at 201 261 7944

>btw I paid twice for Pocket Quicken since I had owned Pocket Quicken for
>years before they upgraded to 2.0. But Landware claimed not to be able
>find any record of me even though they could when I asked for tech support.

Not sure what the background here was but we do provide free support to all users registered or not.

>I would dump the product for their poor customer support.

Again I'm sorry to hear your particular experience was less than ideal.
We try hard to provide quality assistance and i would like to think this partially illustrated by the extensive content at www.landware.com/help and the massive and detailed Pocket Quicken FAQ

In any case my advice to anyone that is not getting the results they want via email is to pick up the phone and call us. You will get a human pretty quickly.

RE: How do you get this upgrade?
I.M. Anonymous @ 7/12/2001 10:23:12 PM #
>btw I paid twice for Pocket Quicken since I had owned Pocket Quicken for
>years before they upgraded to 2.0. But Landware claimed not to be able
>find any record of me even though they could when I asked for tech support.

>>Not sure what the background here was but we do >>provide free support to all users registered or not.

I think its pretty clear. I bought Pocket Quicken 1.0 some time ago. I know Landware knew of me because over the years it took for you to upgrade this software several times they were able to find me in their database. When it came time to upgrade to 2.0 Landware claims they have no knowledge of me. Landware "support" stopped answering my e-mails after one e-mail. So I was obviously blown off and had to pay full price for Pocket Quicken 2.0 rather than the upgrade price I should have paid because Landware "support" could not be bothered to do a little research. Thats why I won't buy any other Landware products. I was ripped off.



Pocket Quicken

$ragon @ 7/13/2001 2:09:01 PM #
switched to Allmoney
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