Home Filing the easy way with file@home and myHomeFiling.com

Home Filing - Why?

2010-02-22T17:53:00.002Z

With our newly launched facebook page and v2.1 attracting much attention, we make a lot of assumptions that people understand why they would use electronic filing in the home. But we've quickly realised that this isn't necessarily true. So without further ado, here are what we feel to be the three key reasons why:

1. Space Saving
With post (general correspondence, bills, statements etc) still arriving daily to almost every household there will come a point when a decision needs to be made on what to keep and what not to keep because space in the home filing system is at a premium. Naturally, we make the assumption that the newest documents will have the most relevant information on so a cull will begin on older documents, but at what point should the cull begin? By scanning and keeping an electronic copy of each document on your computer would it matter where in your filing system the cull occurred, as long as you had the information you needed and saved space?

2. Easy Access
A common response to the idea of space saving is "I have a loft/garage/shed/some space in a mates flat..." which is a perfectly fair response that can certainly overcome any immediate storage issues . But what happens if you need information from one of the documents that you've put out of the way? Is it readily accessible when you need it? You could be on the phone arranging car insurance in need of accident history to complete the process - you'll have to go in search of the information and call back later - time consuming and cumbersome; You could be talking to your utilities provider - now what was your account number from the previous supplier? Is that really better than having the information you need only a keypress or three away?

3. Peace of Mind
As compelling as the first two points are, for some people, the idea of recording ever bit of paper, every document, receipt etc provides a peace of mind that can't be ignored. We can pretend that bad things don't happen (such as floods, fire etc) or we can do our very best to ensure that any disruption caused by such events is as minimal as it can be. Now no one is saying that file@home can prevent your house from flooding - but, it could prevent you losing valuable information should your original documents be totally destroyed. Thankfully, many of us won't experience such disasters - but the duplication of documents and the information which they contain does afford some comfort in that the information will not be lost forever. It could be considered a modern day equivalent of photocopying documents and placing the original in the firesafe "just in case".

So that's what we believe to be the three key reasons why you would adopt a system such as file@home for home filing; (we'd have to point out here that these aren't mutually exclusive either, our experience shows that people will generally cite two or even all three reasons for their personal decision to use file@home)

Do you have different reasons though? We'd love to hear from you if you do, so please email us or leave a message in the comments.

Now for something slightly different than before

2010-02-11T01:54:00.000Z

And so, it's with great pleasure that we'd like to announce that file@home 2.1 r3 is now available from this very web site!

Erm, yep, excuse the overly formal introduction; we're never too sure how to *announce* a new product release - especially when it's the biggest update to file@home since the initial 2.0 software arrived on the scene 10 months ago.

Yes, it's later than planned, but you can't go rushing these things otherwise you have unhappy customers - and nobody really wants that, do they?

So now you're over your shock, what's changed we hear you cry? Well, deep breath, hold it, ok, here we go.....

Rename Cabinets and Folders

Well, after collating feedback since v2 launched and planning how to implement more controls for 'powerusers', we've finally implemented this change. So now, just like you can with documents, you can edit the description of a Cabinet or Folder. As the pre-defined list was completely UK centric, it will now allow our overseas users to create filing structures more appropriate for their needs.

Drag and Drop documents to move them

The old way of moving a document was a little bit on the clunky side, so we've replaced the old menu option completely - as in you won't find the option in the menu - what you can do instead is drag the document you wish to move straight to the folder that you wish to move it to

Upgraded Backup Engine

To ensure that file@home can continue to write backups to newer recordable (optical) media, the backup engine has been upgraded. Backups created with earlier versions of file@home cannot be opened with the new backup engine, so you will need to run a backup from the new version as soon as you can.

IMPORTANT: If you are using file@home on Windows XP, then you need to install this Microsoft update and this Microsoft update to use the new backup engine. If you don't install the updates you will get an error message when the application starts.

file@home Monitor Startup Routines

The monitor has been completely re-written to utilise all of the nice functionality that we introduced into its big brother e-VU Professional. This makes the monitor behave better, but more importantly, it gets rid of that annoying entry in the Alt+TAB list that was displayed but couldn't be selected

The Vault

The vault has had a bit of a make over. Initially this started out as just an icon refresh, but after putting in the changes to allow the cabinets and folders to be renamed, we found that the vault was beginning to look quite untidy when lots of folders were highlighted in bold. When we started to file in earnest, we were utterly horrified; so a makeover it was - we think you'll agree that the makeover gives the vault a nice fresh appearance.

Under the hood

Lots of updates have been going on in places only our code monkeys are allowed. They've been tinkering and tweeking to make sure that file@home will perform to the best of its abilities, all of the time.

So what are you waiting for? Download the latest version today to see first hand what the changes mean for file@home. Oh, and we'd love to get your feedback on the new version (good or bad) so why don't you drop us an email with your thoughts?

Firewall Message

2009-11-14T13:07:00.002Z

Forgot to say in the last post, with the latest release (and in subsequent releases) when you start the software it will now go and check online to see if you're running the latest version. The first time this happens, you may see a message from your firewall software saying something along the lines of "file@home has requested access to www.myhomefiling.com, do you want to allow this program access".

What's happening here is the same as if you click Help > Check for Updates from within the program.

Hurray

2009-11-14T12:21:00.004Z

Wow, it's been a long time coming this update. It's been ready for a while, but a network upgrade and switch to Windows 7/Server 2008 infrastructure delayed the release further.

But, finally, here we are, with release 21 available to download. It's not a major update on the surface, the work is going on behind the scenes. Why? Well we're looking to have file@home available in stores sooner rather than later, the stumbling block for this is how we license the software - or in this case, activate the license. Release 21 is our answer.

Obviously that's not all the changes and updates but again everything else is "under the hood". We've been receiving a lot of feedback about the software, and to incorporate the feedback into actual product changes can take some time; there is a common theme running through the feedback and that is more flexibility with the cabinets/folders. To cater for this and still retain the existing functionality for those users who are completely happy with the product as it stands isn't a trial job. So the incremental updates are allowing us to introduce underlying technology changes gradually, before unleashing new features and capabilities onto everyone.

One subject we've avoided tackling head on for a while, is that of security; the reason why we haven't provided some lock and key system for file@home has been preference. Some people want a multi-level approach for different users on one computer, others prefer a complete segregated approach where one user cannot see documents added by another user and some people are quite happy with what they have (or they prefer not to worry too much - the jury is still undecided).

Well, to us, it's obvious that we need to do something sooner rather than later - mainly because the risk of something going wrong on an upgrade will increase as more documents are added (trust us, we know).

So consider this post your heads up. A poll will be going online in the next couple of weeks to gather feedback (on your security preferences), you can leave your opinions here as a comment, or heaven forbid, you could start a discussion on the forums.

Until the next time...

Summer Holidays

2009-08-19T19:16:00.002+01:00

We've been a little quiet on the blog and twitter over the last few weeks and this has mainly boiled down to one thing; summer holidays. Ok, so if you're in the UK like us, then summer has meant quite a bit of rain intermingled with slightly less rain and - shock - sunshine! (weather summary over - normal service will now resume)

Our usual script for this time of year is that as the % of staff taking annual leave increases, the % of our available time to spend on cool things like marketing and new product releases decreases.

I'm sure we're not alone, and to be honest, it's much better to be busy than twiddling your thumbs hoping the phone will ring.

This year though, we've had a new script. We've started to get quite a few requests for file@home (the work for them is in the pipeline) - but we've noticed that quite a few have been from small businesses who're liking the simplicity (and the cost), but they need more flexibility within the product. Not a difficult question for us to answer - e-VU Professional fits the bill, well, it did. We've taken a long hard look at the direction the current version of the software has headed, and to be blunt, it's on a one way trip to nowhere. The reasons are many and varied and mostly our (Intelligent Filing hat on here, not myHomeFiling.com hat) fault. A product with no clear vision is no product at all. But change is on the way, not the slow burning sort of change either; we've created our new vision for e-VU Professional and set this in stone, no more "feature creep", no more excuses - and we have a shining beacon of an example in doing it this way in file@home. So if you're a small business in need of some document management stay tuned.

But wait, that's not all, we've had a document archiving solution available for quite some time in the form of e-VU Express. It's designed for one job (creating electronic archives of your paper documents) and it does that very well but it hasn't really had the TLC it deserves from us. So we've given it a home of its own at EasyScanningSoftware.com. This is just the start of things to come with this, so stay tuned.

Now, if we could only find the time to get the damn tutorial videos done, we'd be laughing.

To post or not to post? That is the question.

2009-07-24T11:29:00.006+01:00

Since myHomeFiling.com went live, we've seen a steady increase in the number of downloads and people purchasing the software (thank you), but any problems that have arisen have all been handled through email and telephone conversations.

We've used the blog quite regularly to provide updates regarding the software and any important announcements, but one area which seems to get no love is the support forum hosted with Google Groups. We've used it to make announcements - but to be fair, the blog and twitter are much better formats for this.

So we've reached a bit of a dilemma; leave the forum as it is or ditch it until it's a "requested feature"? Well, it takes time and effort to maintain all aspects of myHomeFiling.com (product, marketing, blog etc) so if we can reduce some of the burden by not having to maintain the forum (yes it might look simple, but vetting spam messages takes time - and there are quite a few let me tell you) then that must surely be a benefit? But in the same instance, the product links back to the forum via the help menu and taking this out requires a new release - not a big release, but more work regardless.

These pros and cons could go on for a while with no clear winning argument; so we've decided that we'll let you decide. Not in a direct yes/no vote way, more of a "don't use it - lose it way". So the forum will stay until the end of the year, but should there be no increase in its use, then we'll build into our development plan to remove the links and take it down.

Now that might seem a bit harsh, and we're hoping that it doesn't come to that, but we have to draw the line somewhere. What we're hoping for is that come the end of the year our user base will reach its critical mass and this will naturally spill over into the need for an organic, user created knowledge portal for all things file@home.

I know some people are wary about over zealous admin's purging posts when they're on their god complex trip, but we don't work like that. If it's on topic (and that's a broad topic including the software or any aspect of home filing) then it stays (and that stands even if it's good or bad!). So if something's been bugging you, or you just have a general question, feature request or tips - post away - chances are there are other people who've been thinking the same things, but didn't want to post because the forum looks a little empty. If no one makes the first move, others can't follow. So post - we'll be here to reply - and chances are so will a few more of the file@home community.

See you in the forums.

A Handy New Name

2009-07-12T07:48:00.003+01:00

As they say, no rest for the wicked, and operating a Micro ISV is a full time occupation. Sunday mornings are great to catch up on all the ideas you've had bouncing around all week, but haven't really had the time to give much though to. Marketing is one such idea. There are so many aspects to it, that quite often there isn't enough time in the day to pursue all of the options thoroughly. Not giving marketing the respect and attention it deserves is probably worse than not doing it at all.

The great guys at NeverOverwrite noted on twitter that they couldn't remember our website address, but they could remember the name of the product. Their natural instinct was to put this into the address bar. Such an obvious thing to do and something most of us learn quite quickly when we join the internet, but in our bid to get our web presence up and running, we'd overlooked this obvious domain name.

So, as of this morning we have a new way to find us; fileathome.com. After breakfast, tutorial videos. See, I told you no rest for the wicked...!

Windows x64 Support

2009-07-01T14:13:00.003+01:00

Sometimes, assumption is the mother of all problems. Just because you assume something is correct, doesn't make it so. Take our software for instance, just because it's compiled for any cpu doesn't mean that it will actually work on on any cpu!

What am I rambling on about? 64bit (x64) versions of the windows operating system. During our testing we'd made assumptions that the process we were following was correct; but a recent installation has highlighted that we were not even close to the mark. Some hurried reading later, we pinpointed the differences and rebuilt the software and the installer.

Release 19 is now fully supported on 32bit (x86) and 64bit (x64) windows Vista and Windows 7 platforms. This support has not been extended to the 64bit version of Windows XP at the current time as we do not have a test platform to work with (although there is every chance that it will work).

Release 19 is now available to download directly from our website.

Install Error - Update

2009-06-27T23:33:00.002+01:00

A quick update, the latest build of the installer (same version of file@home) dated 27th June 2009 fixes the registration problem with the components.

If you've having problems, just download the latest version by clicking this link and normal service will be resumed.

Sorry for any inconvenience.

myHomeFiling.com

Install Error

2009-06-27T17:14:00.002+01:00

We've had two reports come in that an error occurs after installing the file@home software and in both instances the software fails to start.

We're not quite sure what's going on with the installer as this hasn't really changed from v1. Anyway, we've pinpointed the problem, a file isn't being registered properly.

If you're experiencing this problem, then the simple fix is to download and run this hotfix. Save it to your desktop then run it (on Vista and Windows 7 you may receive a UAC warning - allow the file to run). When you run it, you should see an old style MS-DOS box then a message box. Click OK on the message box and file@home will be working properly again.

We'll post updates as soon as we know why this is happening.

Sorry for any inconvenience.

Supporting Community Projects

2009-06-17T13:33:00.005+01:00

Being a born and bred potter, pushing our business to support The Donna Louise Trust was an easy decision to make. But we've wanted to support other local (Swindon) projects for a while, and by chance (good luck?) one presented itself to us a few weeks back.

We received an email from Marcus, the website admin, from Ferndale Rodbourne Y.C. F.C. asking if we would like to sponsor the new kit for one of their teams.

We went through a shall we/shan't we phase bouncing emails around (as you do), but we met Marcus a few weeks back and at that point we knew immediately that this was a worthy cause. Marcus is giving up a lot of his own time to help the club, during the meeting, it was his determination that shone through.

So keep an eye on the Swindon Advertiser, you may just see the ugly mug of yours truly, standing proudly by the Under 7's B team; we'll be cheering them on from the sidelines at as many games as possible this coming season too. We'll be tweeting about the exploits too.

Gooooooooooooo team!!

Resellers

2009-06-17T13:03:00.004+01:00

Marketing has to be the single most time consuming task I have ever involved myself in. Bloggs for this, social networks for that, business lunches (they're cool), working breakfasts (not so cool when they start at 7am). But there's only so much one person can achieve in a single day (admittedly, this is actually quite a lot when you put your mind to it and stop distracting yourself..mmmm soooo shiny... I mean, erm, sorry, I digress..again).

But a thought struck me this morning, we actually operate a reseller program for our business software, so why don't we extend this to our consumer product i.e. file@home? It is actually perfect timing, because we want to start offering file@home with localised filing terminology instead of just the UK, English filing metaphors. So having a local reseller on board will help us achieve this - in exchange for favourable terms in the reseller agreement of course. At the minute, this will be english language only, but if there's enough interest, we will look to translate - but we can't make promises as this point.

The reseller program is available to businesses/people in the UK as well, just so no one feels left out, but this will be limited to 2 and will be on a first come first served basis.

So, if you're interested in finding out more fire an email over to the Webmaster to find out more.

For now, happy filing.

Dave
myHomeFiling.com

Donna Louise Trust

2009-06-03T16:14:00.005+01:00

As we sit here trundling through another year at remarkable speed (if I hear someone mention Christmas again I'll cry) I've been pondering on a thought I had a few weeks ago. Namely, how can our business can raise money for The Donna Louise Trust. The work undertaken by the trust is nothing short of phenomenal, but they need vast sums of money every year just to keep the lights on.

This is their 10th year but without continued support, they may not make another 10.

So here's my plan, for the rest of the year (that's right from the moment this blog post goes live, until Big Ben chimes on new years eve) for every sale of file@home we will donate a minimum of £1 to the Donna Louise Trust.

I know that doesn't sound a lot, but every penny counts and I use the word minimum because if we find that there is more available to donate, we will (we have to take care of server costs, the tax man and paypal fees out of the money people pay as well).

I'll build something for the homepage later this week so that you can see how the pot is building. I'd hope that by the end of the year it will be a sizeable sum, I'm keeping my fingers crossed anyway.

Dave
myHomeFiling.com

Minor Updates

2009-05-27T16:08:00.003+01:00

There's something quite unsurprising, yet thoroughly annoying about discovering an issue with your product that only exists on the MD's laptop!!

Our MD has clocked up more usage on file@home than anyone we know; he's been using it since it was FileIT 0.1 (our alpha code), so it's not actually that surprising that his historical database had a few "issues", and ones we would not have been able to replicate in testing, because we didn't know that it could happen in the first place!

After a multitude of "debug" builds, we've pinned down the offending section of code, given it a sound thrashing and told it that if it should ever fail to report errors correctly again it'll be decompiled and deleted for ever; that'll learn it ;o)

The latest update is available now on the web site, and from the update feature within the program itself - chances are you'll have never noticed that the problem was there - now we've made certain.

On a different note, if you haven't noticed, you can follow us on twitter these days too. We're using this more frequently than any other platform at the minute so why not follow us (we do tend to wander off topic a little, but it's all good fun)

Until our next exciting installment.

Program Changes

2009-05-20T22:44:00.004+01:00

Thank you to all who have downloaded (and purchased) file@home since the launch of version 2, we're extremely proud that it's been received so well.

There have been a couple of minor updates since it was launched, but the update that has just been added is our boldest moved yet. Inspired by our good friends over at NeverOverwrite.com we've made a change to our licensing.

Before this change, when the evaluation period expired, you wouldn't be able to get back into the application to retrieve the documents you'd added - talking this through, it's akin to holding your documents to ransom - pay us or you can't get them back (which is not what we were trying to do at all - it's just how the majority of the license models are and like sheep we followed).

So, what have we done? well come the end of the evaluation, you'll now be able to retrieve your documents, what you won't be able to do is add new ones. Every other feature of the program will remain intact.

Now if you've come to the end of your evaluation already and you're locked out of the software - never fear, just download the latest version from our web site and install it over the top of the current installation and all will be good. for those of you still within your evaluation period, you can run "Check for Updates" from the Help menu.

Happy Filing

Installation Document

2009-05-15T18:18:00.003+01:00

Just a quick update, in our excitement to get the software available online, we forgot to upload the installation instructions. d'oh!, sorry!

You can download the installation instructions directly from our website

Don't forget, our forums are up and running, so if you have any comments, feedback, problems etc, please let us know. We rely on your feedback to continually improve the software and deliver features you need.

It's Here at Last!! file@home v2 is available.

2009-05-13T17:30:00.005+01:00

After what seems like an age, we're finally ready to roll with file@home v2 and to say we're chuffed about this release would be an understatement!!

The bulk of the code has been ready for some time, but we've been putting it through some serious testing to make sure there are no surprises for our customers when they start to download/install/upgrade etc.

So, what's changed. Well, in a word everything. Long time users will notice that the program is functionally very much the same as the first releases - which from a usability point of view is great, if you've used the previous version, then you can use this version straight away! Obviously there's the mandatory 'coat of paint' that all new releases get, but underneath the code is more compact, neater and all round faster than before so you can get things done much quicker.

The biggest new features are the Reminders and the Monitor. When you add documents now you can choose to set a reminder so that when a certain date arrives, guess what? yep, you'll get a reminder. There's a handy pre-defined list and the option to set your own details too. The reminders go hand in hand with the Monitor as this lets you access all the details without having to open them main file@home program! It'll also show popup's when you start your computer and when you click the icon in the task bar.

The help file is vastly improved too (for those that need a little helping hand) and it's been re-written as a PDF which makes finding content much easier.

So, what are you waiting for? It's ready for download on our site now on the downloads page. Post in the forum if you have any issues, queries or comments.

Enjoy!

Version 1.5.1.8 Available - WIA Scanning Fixed

2009-04-28T17:44:00.004+01:00

This is just a quick update to let you know that a bug that stops you scanning with WIA drivers (They are prefixed with 'WIA' in the drop down list on the first page of the Add Document Wizard) has been fixed in version 1.5.1.8.

You can download the latest version of the software via the client (Go to the help menu and click Check for Updates) or here on the web site (http://www.myhomefiling.com/download/)

myHomeFiling.com

Damn Goals

2009-03-20T00:17:00.003Z

Dear Reader, please accept my apologies for the lack of update. A few weeks back, I pretty much promised the holy grail of a new software project - the screen shots, what I didn't count on was the fact that a) holidays arranged by the wife come before work b) I need to sleep - and finally c) when things aren't ready, they're not ready.

Why aren't they ready? Because it's only when you take a step back and survey the picture from afar can you see, with total confidence the checkpoints that have to be reached in order to get to the finish.

Anyways, after a change of scenery, the project itself is now firmly back on track and realistic goals have been set on the completion of the code. Intelligent Filing are ploughing a lot of resource into getting the v2 code done and dusted.

So, with the final 20% of the project to complete (5% code, 10% final testing and 5% documentation if you're interested) - may I thank you again for your patience and keep an eye out for the hot off the press news items!