Thoughts/Observations on the Parallax Semiconductor Forum
mindrobots
Posts: 6,506
I'm strictly here as a hobbyist, I'm not a Professional Engineer and don't visit many forums populated by Professional Engineers. I have been a professional my entire career and have worked for high-profile technical companies even at times in customer facing positions.
If I were coming here as a new potential customer instead of a hobbyist sneaking under the fence from our rough andtumble forums, I would wonder what is going on with Parallax Semiconductor.
1) A number of threads go unanswered by Parallax FE's with the user community providing the answers (sometimes conflicting but mostly correct). I understand the costs of support personel but a lot is being done here out from under the official Parallax flag.
2) If I didn't know the backgrounds and personalities and saw a thread "Propeller GCC Status" I'd start wondering what was going on as I read through it...do these guys know where they are headed? Why all teh contention over Parallax's choice of development tools? Why all the back-biting? Who is this guy "jazzed" and what does Cisco Systems have to do with Parallax's tool development? Why isn't Parallax involved in their tool development?
3) To #1 above, if I were to buy into this Propeller thing as a Professional Engineer, is support going to come from the user community?
Progress and success needs to be published in ths threads and maybe on the website home page (or Software Status page) such as:
Name calling, in-fighting, implementation arguments, sarcasm and bickering belong elsewhere.
4) Common "New User" questions need to be tracked, tallied and turned into a FAQ - AN000. The good and bad of a FAQ have been a recent discussion on the Propeller forum over on the other side of the fence.
Just some thoughts from the outside. No offense to any of the people implicitly or explicitly called out in this note. The passions and efforts are to be commended, but maybe just need to be polished a bit for a "professional" website and forum.....first impressions and all being considered.
If I were coming here as a new potential customer instead of a hobbyist sneaking under the fence from our rough andtumble forums, I would wonder what is going on with Parallax Semiconductor.
1) A number of threads go unanswered by Parallax FE's with the user community providing the answers (sometimes conflicting but mostly correct). I understand the costs of support personel but a lot is being done here out from under the official Parallax flag.
2) If I didn't know the backgrounds and personalities and saw a thread "Propeller GCC Status" I'd start wondering what was going on as I read through it...do these guys know where they are headed? Why all teh contention over Parallax's choice of development tools? Why all the back-biting? Who is this guy "jazzed" and what does Cisco Systems have to do with Parallax's tool development? Why isn't Parallax involved in their tool development?
3) To #1 above, if I were to buy into this Propeller thing as a Professional Engineer, is support going to come from the user community?
Progress and success needs to be published in ths threads and maybe on the website home page (or Software Status page) such as:
This week's status installment.
- Agreements for consultants are being signed this week.
- Dave Hein's excellent spinsim simulator is being expanded for Propeller 2 use.
- Development hardware access plan is in progress.
- Requirements Document is still in process.
"This week we are seeing code generator progress.
Code is being committed into the repository.
It is encouraging that we continue to see people volunteering for Propeller GCC testing."
Name calling, in-fighting, implementation arguments, sarcasm and bickering belong elsewhere.
4) Common "New User" questions need to be tracked, tallied and turned into a FAQ - AN000. The good and bad of a FAQ have been a recent discussion on the Propeller forum over on the other side of the fence.
Just some thoughts from the outside. No offense to any of the people implicitly or explicitly called out in this note. The passions and efforts are to be commended, but maybe just need to be polished a bit for a "professional" website and forum.....first impressions and all being considered.
Comments
C.W.
I think somebody from Parallax eventually does respond though... At least, in all the threads I've read...
I need to go visit more vendor forums targetting non-hobbyists to see how it works, I guess.....I'm in new waters here at times!
But, I think now that if I were the kind of person that Parallax made this forum for, maybe I would want my question answered directly from Parallax.
So, I still think you have a good point.
I think we should keep in mind that this forum deserves a professional attitude by all involved, the "regular" forum can be more "social".
C.W.
Thanks a lot for your input and feedback. I wanted to offer a few comments in regard to the Parallax Semiconductor forums as well as our presence and support as FAE's. We (FAE's) do read every post on the Parallax Semiconductor forums and we try to respond as promptly as possible to those issues which require our professional FAE support. That said, while this forum is dedicated more toward professional and semiconductor issues, there is still a lot of discussion and social interaction between members. And I think that discussion and sharing is part of what the forums is about (in addition to getting tough questions answered).
Another major component of our professional support goals is to provide instantaneous talk-to-a-real-person-now phone and email support for product developers and engineers. We provide our direct contact info so professional customers can contact us just about any time of day to resolve issues immediately (during standard business hours, and also several of us often work late into the evening and are available then too).
So while we do read every post, if it appears to be a general discussion or social sharing of ideas, I don't always have much to comment. However when there are technical problems or direct questions posted on the forums, we try to address those promptly. And we try to address emails and phone calls immediately.
We do really appreciate your feedback as it offers insight into where we can improve.
-Cheers!
Parallax is very attentive to their customers when they are valued customers, willing to work, creative, and so on. they employ.
That way you see people passing on the forum have a role "superior".
Sometimes in this forum there are questions that require x hardware, and Parallax can not answer, but another customer who uses that hardware.
I know it's worrying expect good news on Propeller 2, I've lost count of how many years we are expecting, but it is certain that we are closer than last year. lol
As Kevin pointed out, the FAEs have several duties. Almost all of the commercial customers prefer to contact their engineer directly via e-mail and phone. The conference call/webinar system has been really useful in this way since we launched Parallax Semiconductor. We know that our FAEs are a bit slow to reply to the forum questions and we're working to improve this since it's a key responsibility. But, like in programming, priorities take precedence. I'll make a point to draw their attention to this thread; thanks for sharing the observations.
Parallax Semiconductor has assembled a team of skilled GCC developers. GCC is an open-source tool chain that we'll be developing for Propeller 1 first, then Propeller 2. We didn't have the skills inside for this project so we've turned to engineers who've targeted the tools for specific processors.
Jazzed is Steve Denson. He's our external coordinator and technical liaison, also hired by Parallax. Steve understands all of the interoperability of the GCC design with our processor, and he lives close enough to Parallax that he can attend our coordination meetings. I don't know why his avatar is a Cisco Systems logo, but this project has nothing to do with Cisco. In total the team has five people on it and all of them are external contractors. Inside, our Project Manager is Daniel Harris - you've seen him on these forums several times.
The goal of the GCC tool chain is to provide an open-source, multi-platform, C-compatible set of tools. Parallax Semiconductor will still maintain a simple IDE. There's a private forum for the development effort. If you've observed some squabbling on the forums about the effort from our team that's a problem; if we're not well-coordinated and acting professional then unfortunately I'll have to address that point. With a few minor exceptions, the GCC team has healthy technical debate and is keeping our eye on the goal.
Support can come the way you want to receive it. These are the options:
- Forum posts here in the Parallax Semiconductor or Propeller forum
- Directly from the FAE who is best suited for your project
- support.parallaxsemiconductor.com support portal
- Just call us 916 624 8333 and start with Jessica, Engineering Manager
OK. We'll make the effort to get the New User questions tracked in a better way, or at least discuss it at our next FAE meeting. Have you seen the Propeller QnA document? http://www.parallax.com/portals/0/propellerqna/ - it also runs on a mobile format. This might be what you're seeking.
Thanks mindrobots,
Ken Gracey
Thank you for your response to my observations. I appreciate the time and level of support you and the entire Parallax team provide through the forums. I've found answers to all my beginner questions through the forums and haven't had a need to ask anything directly. At this point, I'm here strictly for fun and adventure not seeking fame or treasure!
My observations were from the point of view of what I thought a new customer might think, not my observations or impressions. The GCC Status thread would probably be toned down to make a better "first impression" if I were running the railroad - that as my only real point there. I know Steve (in the forum sense) and think you made a great choice for the team leader with your goals as I understand them. I also understand the heated debates within a development team but when they come off the internal forum, as paid contractors/consultants, they do represent Parallax.
I was not aware of the 'qna' document. It's a great introduction and answers many questions for a new user. Thank you for pointing that out, it's in my Propeller bookmark file.
Keep up the great work and fighting the good fight for all of us out there using your products!
Thank you for your caring support!
It would serve as a good anchor for the rest of the application notes, and the web version can include hyperlinks to relevant application notes. The QnA is an easily accessible document for new users., having an introductory and readable paragraph on each question.
Unfortunately, like Mindrobots, new users may not know what to search for to find it. Slotting a pdf version of it in as AN000 puts it right up front to trip over.
Also there is a broken link when trying to get to the QnA on the Parallax Semi "Support" menu - it just dumps you in the Parallax home page
Edit: Sorry if this has already been discussed previously in the FAQ discussion "over the fence"
This seems kind of important. I would thing there might be a sticky that states this is available to biz clients.
Also, I would expect a list of FAE's and their specializations.
http://www.parallaxsemiconductor.com/corporate/biographies
Parallax has the right idea, so get to work Chip & Beau