Ecco Pro: Difference between revisions
1. Official distribution site is proper external link. 2. This is restoring another editor's contributions which were reverted. 3. the user group is an external link here, not a reference source. |
no evidence that either of these official - see talkpage. |
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Assignments to a date folder can include complex repeating date rules, alarms (including file/program execution), show until marked done options, advance notice options, advance warning, and follow-up rules and alarms. The items displayed in the Views can be filtered based on multiple criteria. Very basic auto-assign rules can be applied for each folder in native ECCO Pro, and more complex rules can be auto-assigned by use of a free add-on extension. |
Assignments to a date folder can include complex repeating date rules, alarms (including file/program execution), show until marked done options, advance notice options, advance warning, and follow-up rules and alarms. The items displayed in the Views can be filtered based on multiple criteria. Very basic auto-assign rules can be applied for each folder in native ECCO Pro, and more complex rules can be auto-assigned by use of a free add-on extension. |
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With a small fix, a hot link to any file can be added anywhere to the outline. When the user double clicks on the link, the item appears. Any file can be placed directly inside of the ECCO data file. OLE objects appear, can be edited, and then saved within the ECCO file. With the MagicView add-on, RTF/HTML pages can also be attached as folder values inside of the Ecco data file |
With a small fix, a hot link to any file can be added anywhere to the outline. When the user double clicks on the link, the item appears. Any file can be placed directly inside of the ECCO data file. OLE objects appear, can be edited, and then saved within the ECCO file. With the MagicView add-on, RTF/HTML pages can also be attached as folder values inside of the Ecco data file,{{fact}} or linked to external data sources.{{fact}} |
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[[Image:ecco0012.JPG|thumb|Very simple example of most basic date view]] |
[[Image:ecco0012.JPG|thumb|Very simple example of most basic date view]] |
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| publisher = PRnewswire |
| publisher = PRnewswire |
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}}</ref> |
}}</ref> |
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Development by [[NetManage]] ceased in the fall of 1997 after the July 1997 release of version 4.01, however, NetManage permitted continued distribution of the final version as a free download at several user forums. |
Development by [[NetManage]] ceased in the fall of 1997 after the July 1997 release of version 4.01, however, NetManage permitted continued distribution of the final version as a free download at several user forums.{{fact}} |
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[[PC Magazine]] selected ECCO Professional for their Best of 93 issue<ref>Seymour, Jim; PC Magazine; January 11, 1994; pp. 110-111</ref> and in their May 17, 1994, issue awarded ECCO their Editor’s Choice. PC Laptop Magazine named ECCO Professional the Top Software Application of the Year. These were but a few of the awards that the product received. |
[[PC Magazine]] selected ECCO Professional for their Best of 93 issue<ref name="Seymour1">Seymour, Jim; PC Magazine; January 11, 1994; pp. 110-111</ref> and in their May 17, 1994, issue awarded ECCO their Editor’s Choice. PC Laptop Magazine named ECCO Professional the Top Software Application of the Year. These were but a few of the awards that the product received. |
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Peter (Pete) Polash co-founded [[Arabesque Software]], Inc., with Robert (Bob) Perez in 1990. As an independent developer, Polash wrote [[Adobe Persuasion]], a business presentation software application for the [[Apple Macintosh]]. He sold its marketing rights to [[Aldus Corporation]] in 1988. Perez, a 1977 [[Harvard Law School]] graduate, joined [[Apple Computer]] in the 1980s as a software engineer and eventually managed the Macintosh Software Evangelism Group at Apple.<ref name="guardian1"/> |
Peter (Pete) Polash co-founded [[Arabesque Software]], Inc., with Robert (Bob) Perez in 1990. As an independent developer, Polash wrote [[Adobe Persuasion]], a business presentation software application for the [[Apple Macintosh]]. He sold its marketing rights to [[Aldus Corporation]] in 1988. Perez, a 1977 [[Harvard Law School]] graduate, joined [[Apple Computer]] in the 1980s as a software engineer and eventually managed the Macintosh Software Evangelism Group at Apple.<ref name="guardian1"/> |
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"So what happened to the paragon of a program? The market killed it. First it was sold to a much larger company, Netmanage; presumably doing this made the original programmers a lot of money. Then Netmanage panicked when Microsoft Outlook came along as a "free" part of the Office suite, and killed development on the program."<ref name="guardian1"/> |
"So what happened to the paragon of a program? The market killed it. First it was sold to a much larger company, Netmanage; presumably doing this made the original programmers a lot of money. Then Netmanage panicked when Microsoft Outlook came along as a "free" part of the Office suite, and killed development on the program."<ref name="guardian1"/> |
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Around 2006/2007 some free-lance programmers started updating Ecco's feature set, and technology editors declared Ecco Pro 'back from the dead'.<ref> |
Around 2006/2007 some free-lance programmers started updating Ecco's feature set, and technology editors declared Ecco Pro 'back from the dead'.<ref>[http://www.wordyard.com/2007/09/04/ecco-pro/ Wordyard, "Ecco Pro" Sept 4, 2007]</ref> Currently, Ecco Pro while far from its historical significance and #1 ranking in 1996,{{fact}} is still ranked within the two thousand best applications by technical sites such as CodeWeavers.<ref>[http://www.codeweavers.com/compatibility/browse/name/?app_id=966 Codeweavers, Ecco Pro]; Rank 480 (4 votes); Retrieved 04/05/2010</ref> |
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The current development is a combination of freeware known as the 'extension' that has official specifications as a public wiki, and commercial extensions by at least one remaining commercial developer |
The current development is a combination of freeware known as the 'extension' that has official specifications as a public wiki, and commercial extensions by at least one remaining commercial developer.{{fact}} |
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== Version History == |
== Version History == |
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ECCO Pro was marketed as the world's first SuperPIM competing with other PIM programs<ref>PC Magazine, August 1997, pp. 222-223, 237</ref>. These included Polaris Packrat, [[Symantec]] [[ACT!]] (now Sage ACT!), [[Lotus Organizer]], and Microsoft [[Schedule+]] (predecssor to [[Microsoft Outlook]]).{{Citation needed|date=March 2010}} Also in this product space at the time was [[GoldMine]], Starfish Sidekick, and Jana Contact.{{Citation needed|date=March 2010}} |
ECCO Pro was marketed as the world's first SuperPIM competing with other PIM programs<ref>PC Magazine, August 1997, pp. 222-223, 237</ref>. These included Polaris Packrat, [[Symantec]] [[ACT!]] (now Sage ACT!), [[Lotus Organizer]], and Microsoft [[Schedule+]] (predecssor to [[Microsoft Outlook]]).{{Citation needed|date=March 2010}} Also in this product space at the time was [[GoldMine]], Starfish Sidekick, and Jana Contact.{{Citation needed|date=March 2010}} |
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The marketing budget for ECCO |
The marketing budget for ECCO decreased under NetManage's tenure. NetManage closed the acquired Bellevue, Washington office and disbanded the ECCO development team in fall 1997 after the release of version 4.01<ref name="guardian1"/> |
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Although ECCO development by NetManage ceased in 1997, the program is available as a free download, and development on the object code continues |
Although ECCO development by NetManage ceased in 1997, the program is available as a free download, and development on the object code continues.{{fact}} |
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==References== |
==References== |
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==External links== |
==External links== |
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* [http://eccowiki.com Specs and Info on active development of EccoPro object code] |
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* [http://http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/ecco_pro/ Distribution site for Official Release of actively developed EccoPro Software (Freeware)] |
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Revision as of 06:59, 5 May 2010
 | A major contributor to this article appears to have a close connection with its subject. (October 2009) |
 | The article's lead section may need to be rewritten. (April 2010) |
 | This article contains weasel words: vague phrasing that often accompanies biased or unverifiable information. (April 2010) |
 View of very basic outline with graphics. Notepad view in ECCO Pro. | |
| Developer(s) | NetManage, Arabesque Software |
|---|---|
| Stable release | 4.01
|
| Operating system | Windows |
| Type | Outliner / Personal Information Management |
Ecco Pro is an outliner, calendar, database, archive, and phone book, with fields (including dates) linkable to each parent or child item. Items can be instantly filtered (in multiple simultaneous views) by field but still displayed in their outline context.
As a personal information manager the program includes a phone book, calendar and 'notepad' sections filtered by field associations. Add-on software (MagicView) extends the program to include a RTF/HTML/PDF/DJVU/graphics pane, which acts as a second outliner pane or as an optional field assignment of any item. All items or subitems can appear in any section, depending upon the item's field assignments.
The software was originally produced by Arabesque Software, Inc., then purchased by NetManage, Inc., and subsequently abandoned.[1]
Overview
The product offers three primary types of views — phone book views, calendar views, and notepad views. Central to the program's design is an outlining structure and the ability to easily manipulate information regardless of which view it was entered. Multiple notepad, calendar, and phonebook views can be opened, and each item seen in each view can be a collapsible outline, with each line assignable to folders/categories which can themselves be their own views, text field, pulldown menu, calendar date (including repeating date), or phonebook entry.
Product functionality
The active views are also the report views. Information is entered in "items," (text blocks up to 32 kilobytes, or a Windows OLE object (such as a .bmp file, Microsoft Word document, Microsoft Excel document, etc.) that can be arranged hierarchically, as an outline.
Each item can be linked to one or more "folders" (by manual assignment, basic text matching, or with a free 'addon extension' by complex regular expression, relational lookup, computational, and Lua, Perl, JavaScript, VBScript, or Python programmatic assignments) which function as a fields in a database.
Thus, a user could write a note that read "Meeting with John Smith about Generic Project" and by placing it in folders named "Calendar," (assigned to a certain date), "John Smith," and "Generic project," the user could relate nearly any item to any other. This, combined with the built-in networking ability allowing free or controlled sharing of files and parts of files (online and offline), are seen as the core of ECCO's power. Each item, and each of that item's sub-items can be assigned to thousands of different folders of various types (text, numeric, date, pull-down, or checkmark).
Assignments to a date folder can include complex repeating date rules, alarms (including file/program execution), show until marked done options, advance notice options, advance warning, and follow-up rules and alarms. The items displayed in the Views can be filtered based on multiple criteria. Very basic auto-assign rules can be applied for each folder in native ECCO Pro, and more complex rules can be auto-assigned by use of a free add-on extension.
With a small fix, a hot link to any file can be added anywhere to the outline. When the user double clicks on the link, the item appears. Any file can be placed directly inside of the ECCO data file. OLE objects appear, can be edited, and then saved within the ECCO file. With the MagicView add-on, RTF/HTML pages can also be attached as folder values inside of the Ecco data file,[citation needed] or linked to external data sources.[citation needed]
The use of outlines and columns can be used to create powerful user interfaces. Outlines are compiled by collecting the items in a folder. Users can display these outlines with columns relating to other folders, very much like a spreadsheet. The use of other features such as filtering and "views" allow it to be customized to meet a wide variety of purposes such as Getting Things Done, project management, bibliography handling, contact management, project management, and printable checklists.
ECCO provides native PDA support (for Palm and Treo devices) and sharing over a network, and 3rd party add-ons provide for pocket PC (windows) and outlook hot syncs[2].
Ecco Pro also contains a DDE API which exposes many elements of the database to external manipulation. The API can be accessed directly via DDE, and there are several bindings with functions specific for Ecco Pro.
History
The Microsoft Windows application was released in June 1993 by Arabesque Software, Inc.[3], originally based in Kirkland, Washington, and later Bellevue, Washington. In March 1997 NetManage introduced support for Microsoft Exchange 5.0 [4] Development by NetManage ceased in the fall of 1997 after the July 1997 release of version 4.01, however, NetManage permitted continued distribution of the final version as a free download at several user forums.[citation needed]
PC Magazine selected ECCO Professional for their Best of 93 issue[5] and in their May 17, 1994, issue awarded ECCO their Editor’s Choice. PC Laptop Magazine named ECCO Professional the Top Software Application of the Year. These were but a few of the awards that the product received.
Peter (Pete) Polash co-founded Arabesque Software, Inc., with Robert (Bob) Perez in 1990. As an independent developer, Polash wrote Adobe Persuasion, a business presentation software application for the Apple Macintosh. He sold its marketing rights to Aldus Corporation in 1988. Perez, a 1977 Harvard Law School graduate, joined Apple Computer in the 1980s as a software engineer and eventually managed the Macintosh Software Evangelism Group at Apple.[1]
On August 19, 1994, NetManage announced that it had agreed to acquire Arabesque Software for up to $6 million cash, with $3 million payable upon closing and the balance subject to the achievement of certain revenue levels and technical milestones. In addition to obtaining ECCO, the Arabesque acquisition provided NetManage an entry into the retail marketplace established by ECCO. NetManage's product line at the time, primarily the Chameleon suite of internetworking applications, were primarily sold by a direct sales team.
Andrew Brown, writing in The Guardian, wrote Ecco Pro's epitaph: "So what happened to the paragon of a program? The market killed it. First it was sold to a much larger company, Netmanage; presumably doing this made the original programmers a lot of money. Then Netmanage panicked when Microsoft Outlook came along as a "free" part of the Office suite, and killed development on the program."[1]
Around 2006/2007 some free-lance programmers started updating Ecco's feature set, and technology editors declared Ecco Pro 'back from the dead'.[6] Currently, Ecco Pro while far from its historical significance and #1 ranking in 1996,[citation needed] is still ranked within the two thousand best applications by technical sites such as CodeWeavers.[7]
The current development is a combination of freeware known as the 'extension' that has official specifications as a public wiki, and commercial extensions by at least one remaining commercial developer.[citation needed]
Version History
Versions of ECCO include[8]:
- ECCO Professional 1.0, June 1993
- ECCO Professional 1.1, Fall 1993
- ECCO Simplicity 1.1, Fall 1993
- ECCO Professional 2.0, April 1994
- ECCO Simplicity 2.0, April 1994
- ECCO Lite 2.0
- ECCO Pro 3.0
- ECCO Pro 4.0
- ECCO Pro 4.01, July 1997
ECCO Lite:
- For standalone users
- Calendar, PhoneBook, and Outlines
- No networking or synchronization
ECCO Internet address book
- ECCO Lite with an ECCO file of more than 2,000 Internet URLs
ECCO Simplicity
- For network or standalone
- Calendar, PhoneBook, Outlines
- Cusotmizable PhoneBook forms
- Group scheduling, synchronization
- Shared Calendars, PhoneBooks, and Outlines
- Integration with Delrina WinFax PRO
ECCO Professional
- For network or standalone
- Calendar, PhoneBook, Outlines
- Cusotmizable PhoneBook forms
- Group scheduling, synchronization
- Shared Calendars, PhoneBooks, and Outlines
- Integration with Delrina WinFax PRO
- Customizable folders, and columns for categorizing and organizing info
- Filters and sorts for selective viewing of info
ECCO Pro was marketed as the world's first SuperPIM competing with other PIM programs[9]. These included Polaris Packrat, Symantec ACT! (now Sage ACT!), Lotus Organizer, and Microsoft Schedule+ (predecssor to Microsoft Outlook).[citation needed] Also in this product space at the time was GoldMine, Starfish Sidekick, and Jana Contact.[citation needed]
The marketing budget for ECCO decreased under NetManage's tenure. NetManage closed the acquired Bellevue, Washington office and disbanded the ECCO development team in fall 1997 after the release of version 4.01[1]
Although ECCO development by NetManage ceased in 1997, the program is available as a free download, and development on the object code continues.[citation needed]
References
- ^ a b c d Brown, Andrew (26 July 2007). "Bad ideas spread like wildfire, so why didn't a good one catch on?". The Guardian.
- ^ http://www.compusol.org/ecco/hotsync.html
- ^ Keizer, Gregg, PC Magazine, September 4, 1993, p. 50
- ^ March 11, 1997 - NetManage's ECCO(R) Pro Provides Support for Microsoft Exchange 5.0, PRnewswire, retrieved 2009-10-11
- ^ Seymour, Jim; PC Magazine; January 11, 1994; pp. 110-111
- ^ Wordyard, "Ecco Pro" Sept 4, 2007
- ^ Codeweavers, Ecco Pro; Rank 480 (4 votes); Retrieved 04/05/2010
- ^ Journal of Corporate Accounting & Finance Volume 14 Issue 5, Pages 41 - 47.
- ^ PC Magazine, August 1997, pp. 222-223, 237