John DeVries

Reviews by John DeVries

SO

SoftMaker Software GmbH

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Jun 7, 2023

Word for Windows good - SoftMaker TextMaker even better.

For 30 years I have been happy using Microsoft Word. I think it is a wonderful piece of software and after so many years it should be. 6 months ago I discovered a word processing programme called Textmaker, written by Softmaker Software. What a wonderful piece of software it is. Better by far than Word and the support from the company is fast and I mean fast. Hours at most. I am always cautious about recommending anything but if you are looking for a word processing programme which is easy to use and all encompassing, then Textmaker has everything you need. It has a free version which is almost as useful as the paid for version and for four months I used this before signing up to a very reasonable annual subscription of I believe around €20 or a little less. In my opinion the little extra was worth it in that it brought additional benefits which I found useful. I don't hesitate to hand out the brickbats but in this instance bouquets are more than justified.

XA

Xara

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Apr 20, 2020

Xara - and crippleware the demand to upgrade.

I have used Xara for many years and its always been a good programme. A while ago I purchased Xara photo and graphic designer. As usual it was up to its normal high standards. Some time after purchase, perhaps a year I started receiving notices asking me to upgrade. I didn't need to upgrade what I had was more than adequate so I ignored it and requested the niggles to stop. They didn't stop. Nor could they be stopped, they kept telling me I could upgrade which I did not want to do. No matter how many times the box was/is ticked the demand to upgrade is always there. In itself this niggle is tolerable but then they started to get nasty. Asking for a previous item I had used suddenly spirited me off to a page of flags where I was asked to select my country. Doing so it then asked me to upgrade once again. It does this constantly, denying access to the things I wanted when initially purchasing the programme. Items I had been using - tables, call outs and other items etc suddenly were no longer available. Frankly this is bordering on or is fraud because had I known when contemplating the purchase that it was full of crippleware if I did not upgrade and give them more money,. I very simply would not have purchased it. As I said, I had always been happy with Xara products but it strikes me that times must be getting difficult and they are going for "cake and eat it". Gimp which is a free programme is better. I would not recommend a Xara product as long as they are playing this game and if you buy it be prepared to compulsorily upgrade or lose use of it.