All database based software should come with tools to enable the owner of the data to make changes, perform updates, do housekeeping tasks, examine the database structure etc. After all, it’s your data, not ours.

The images below give you a preview of some of the Data Tools available within ContaxCRM Version 3. All these tools are available within a single window which is opened from the Utilities menu. RSS Feed: http://feeds2.feedburner.com/stevencholerton Tweet

I loved the book so much I thought I would give his Veracity product a try. I've read Eric before a few years ago as he is also the author of one of the definitive books for new the software developer / entrepreuner. The Business of Software

The title of his latest book 'Version Control by Example' hardly promises a riveting read, yet Eric's rhetoric is suitably light hearted and his comedy analogies suitably terrible that I found myself very entertained and devoured the book within a couple of days.

For anyone considering Version / Source Control or any CVS / DVCS this book is a worthwhile read. RSS Feed: http://feeds2.feedburner.com/stevencholerton Tweet

The pictures below should enable you to understand the use of Email Snippets and Variables and to appreciate just how useful they can be. ...

Of course, as with any other email sent from ContaxCRM, the full details of the email is recorded against the recipients contact record. ...Arten Science Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed Tweet

This is the advert I will be placing. The idea is to ask questions of the potential customer and answer them with ContaxCRM. It is not the obvious way to advertise a B2B solution through B2C advertising but I think of the 40000+ readers some of them are going to be in business and of those I hope a few may become customers in the future. ...Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed Tweet

We are very excited to be involved in this event :-) Steven Cholerton Arten Science Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed Tweet

I am pleased to announce that the REAL Studio UK User Group event in Leicester on 28th July is now SOLD OUT. 20 developers from the UK, Germany, Belgium and Holland will be gathering.

Presentations will be made by Christian Schmitz of Monkeybread, Steve Cholerton of Arten Science, and Eric Gibbon of MacTasks. There will also be a video chat with Geoff Perlman of REAL Software to get the latest REAL Studio news, and plenty of time for Q&A and for developers to network.

This will be the first of many events organized in the UK. To be informed of future UK events, please send an email to eric@mactasks.com and your name will be added to the email list. ...Tweet

Denby House is only a couple of miles from my home which was a factor in deciding to move there, I’d like to cycle to work in future if the weather is ok. I looked at taking offices at Denby House in 2007 when I first started Arten Science and for some reason I never went ahead with it, I guess the time wasn’t right. Alan and I kept in touch though and we are now fully moved in and loving it :-)

Our new address is: ...Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed Tweet

All Contact History Search

All Contact History Search is available as part of the Information Search Centre which at the moment only also contains Contacts and Companies.

Very simply All Contact History Search allows you to input a word or part of a word or phrase and use that to search the complete history database extremely quickly. The results can be Encrypted / Decrypted, Viewed using EZ View or even read to you by your computer :-) ...Arten Science Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed Tweet

Note: LinkedIn is like FaceBook for Business, it’s a great service that seems to be really gaining momentum. ...

Steve is always timely and professional, We found him to be very approachable and understanding of our needs. His work always achieves what we feel was the impossible at the time - Steve has the ability to interpret our business processes, simplifies them with elegance which in turn allows us to concentrate on running the core elements of our business. ...

We contacted Steve in order to solve a specific programming problem, and he did this triumphantly, on time, and without a problem. ...

Arten Science seems to be branching out with the services they offer and may soon achieve world domination - are distributing software in the US, Europe, Japan and the list keeps growing.

Good luck for the future Steve, although I don't think you'll need it as your expertise and friendly nature will get you there.” ...

Nigel Toplis, hired Steve as a IT Consultant in 2010, and hired Steve more than once ...Tweet ...trk=fc_badge">

If you have an interesting use of an Arten Science application or an interesting, amusing or educational story to tell and would like to be featured on our blog along with the chance to win a free license for any Arten Science product and a $15 (or equivalent) Amazon voucher for those we publish, please contact us: story@artenscience.com Steven Cholerton Arten Science Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed Tweet

Snippets ...Ok, ok - I never said it was going to rock the world, however it is a small and very simple but actually very useful feature that allows you to setup any number of blocks of text identified by an appropriate name. The key to making this useful is making it easy to use.

The first area of ContaxCRM that benefits from Snippets is the Compose Email facility. ...

Snippets are setup within ooSooMpro which is part of the ContaxCRM Suite. ...Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed Tweet

The History list is then filtered to display only those entries matching your search string.

For example searching for: eve

Will find: STEVE steve Eve EVE Everything Ever ... ...Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed Tweet

To be honest nobody has ever requested this feature but as I will find it very useful I’m sure the same will apply to many other customers new and old :-) Steven Cholerton Arten Science Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed Tweet

With Version 2.5.0 of ContaxCRM (if you have been given access to an interim release - 2.4.8 - you will also have this functionality) you can now choose whether you wish for the email to be created and opened in your default email client program, or whether you wish ContaxCRM to do the heavy lifting and send the email directly. ...

You can send the email in Clear Text by clicking the Send button in the Toolbar, or you can Encrypt and send it securely and privately using the Encrypt button. ...

You can attach as many CC or BCC contacts to this email as you require, again, using the appropriate Toolbar buttons.

You can attach files using the Attach button or just by dragging and dropping them into the Files area on the email window.

You can schedule a Follow Up for this email by specifying the date you wish to action the Follow Up. ...

I used Outlook 2003, 2007 and 2010 from Microsoft as well as Apple Mail as a guideline and influence on the design of this email window so that hopefully familiarity will reduce the learning curve. ...

You can setup a default signature in the Preferences and overwrite it if necessary by clicking the Option tab. ...

Using the Received Email tab you can also reply to any received email from this contact at any point in the past. ...Tweet

The Data Dictionary will be of use to advanced users of ContaxCRM who are producing sophisticated reports or queries. ...

This facility allows you to create a file that you can then use to create a Mail Merge with the Word Processor of your choice, Word, Open Office, Pages etc. ...

As previously you can drag and drop documents of any kind into ContaxCRM where they will be stored with the relevant contact. Now however you can also put these documents into user defined categories and apply a name and descriptive notes to each document.

In addition you can now choose to either MOVE or COPY *INTO* Document Management and MOVE (Delete) or COPY *OUT* of Document Management. ...

The Geographical tab has been removed and the information can now be accessed by clicking the ‘World’ icon on the Address section of the Detail tab. In addition you can now view many of your contacts on the same map giving a useful ‘geographical proximity’ view. ...Tweet ...trk=fc_badge">

Three of our products will be available on sale via Bits Du Jour for 24 hours only. ...

On the 2nd April our award winning security product R10Cipher will be available with a 59% discount making it only £3.84 per license ...

On the 12th April R10Clean - Data Cleaning and Manipulation - normally £50, will also be available with a 59% discount ...

On the 17th April R10BatchMail - Email Marketing and Bulk Email Sending - will be available with a 59% discount as well. ...

If you have any friends or family members or colleagues who might be interested in any of these superb products, please let them know about this sale. We can't afford to offer this kind of discount often, and it will only be available on Bits du Jour for a single day only. If you visit http://www.bitsdujour.com right now you can click the 'Notify Me' button and you'll be sure not to miss these great deals. ...Tweet ...trk=fc_badge">

I read in your Support forum that you intend to have an affiliate program developed in the future.  Please let us know, so we can put a link to your R10Cipher program on our website. I think it is an ideal and easy way for clients to encrypt their health and lab information when then send to me, and far safer than the password on a PDF file, which is what some do now. Steven Cholerton Arten Science Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed Tweet

Some screenshots below: Steven Cholerton Arten Science Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed Tweet

This guide to the ContaxCRM Suite is presented as a series of questions that a software reviewer, or prospective purchaser may have. These questions are answered in an appropriate amount of detail for someone new to the ContaxCRM Suite products and / or Arten Science Limited, but who does have at least some small amount of knowledge of Contact / Task and Document Management solutions.

The PDF document can be downloaded from the link below:

http://www.artenscience.com/Documents/ContaxCRM%2030%20Minute%20Overview.pdf ...Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed Tweet

If you wish to setup a ‘Shared Secret’ with someone, how do you do that without somehow communicating the Shared Secret to the other person. ... Here is one way of doing it that works just as well over a public forum like Twitter, or over email as it does over a more secure medium. ...Step 5: You do the math, First Number to the power of your Secret Number. ...Step 6: I do the math, Your Number to the power of my Secret Prime Number. ...Step 7: You do the math, My Second Number to the power of Your Secret Number. ...

Both you and I are now in possession of a Shared Secret of 4.76837158e14. ...

This works because exponential math is not affected by the order in which the multiplications are done, and it is virtually impossible for an interested third party to calculate the Shared Secret as they are not in possession of the two numbers that were kept secret. ...Tweet

We have also re-rendered all Status icons for a higher quality look and feel.

This is a recommended update for all users and is of course provided free of charge. ...Tweet ...trk=fc_badge">

What this does is allow a message to be sent using an existing public communications mechanism and yet only understood by the recipient(s) with the Shared Secret needed to decode the message.

If your message exceeds the 140 character Twitter limit then R10Cipher splits it for you automatically and sends the message as consecutive tweets.

This latest 4.5.0 release of R10Cipher is a free upgrade for existing customers, or R10Cipher can be purchased for £10. http://www.r10cipher.com Steven Cholerton Arten Science Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed Tweet

TwitQwik is the simplest, easiest and quickest way to update your Twitter status and upload photographs, from your Apple Mac computer. TwitQwik does not download your tweets, leaving you to read those at your leisure using your existing favourite Twitter client.

TwitQwik is FREE, unless you are using it within a company or enterprise in which case a Site License is available for $100 which also gives you a customised version with your own logo.

If you would like to pay something for TwitQwik then of course we would be more than pleased for you to do so, please send a small payment via Paypal to paypal@artenscience.com.

TwitQwik has no adverts, no spyware and uses minimal system resources, and the price is right :-) ...Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed Tweet

The updates were mainly about providing a better ‘first time user’ experience. For a start the data files are now created in a structure within the users Documents folder, rather than in the program folder. ...These folders are created and populated only if they do not already exist, therefore the user does not have to be concerned with overwriting their data-files, or moving them elsewhere. ...There is also now an 'Online Multi-User Demonstration Edition' which allows potential customers to test drive the software using a pre-created database hosted on the internet. ...Finally, all software windows will now fit nicely even on the MacBook Air 11'' Model :-)

This is a free of charge upgrade to our existing customers. ...Tweet

The complete set of icons used for Contact Type are shown below, from left to right: ...

History notes can now be protected from prying eyes using up to 384 bit Blowfish encryption provided by the award winning R10Cipher encryption engine. ...

When using ContaxCRM to automatically catalog and record your incoming email, and also using the manual control option which allows you to choose which email are filed and which are not (this level of control is setup within the Preferences) - you now get the option to accept an incoming email for filing, but choose to encrypt it using up to 384 bit Blowfish encryption provided by the award winning R10Cipher encryption engine. ...

You can now drag and drop documents directly into the Documents area of your selected contact.

Those are the highlights of the 2.1.6 release of ContaxCRM.

This is a free of charge upgrade to our existing customers. ...Tweet ...trk=fc_badge">

This round of updates is all about windows, not Microsoft Windows, but program windows :-) All the applications have had a new Preferences option to specify whether or not you want the application to remember the window size and position the next time the program runs. In addition each application can now fit properly on the screen of the new 11 inch Apple Macbook. Window drawing and sizing on Microsoft Windows is now much slicker than previously. ...Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed Tweet

You can see it by following this link: http://www.artenscience.com/newsletters/ASL%20Newsletter%20001.pdf

A lot has changed for us and in the newsletter we tell you about those changes.

In addition, using the Coupon Code: HAPPYNEWYEAR at the checkout for any of our products will give a 30% discount for the first 50 customers until the end of January. Steven Cholerton Arten Science Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed Tweet

Here’s the ‘Member’ Icon ...

Here’s the ‘Competitor’ Icon ...

Thanks to the awesome skills of the guys over at IDM Design. You’ll be able to see the results ‘in the flesh’ with the 2.1.6 release of ContaxCRM. ...Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed Tweet

These guys and girls gave me a lift to hospital 15 months ago when I shattered my leg in a motocross accident. Thanks and Merry Christmas. You rock ! Steven Cholerton Arten Science Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed Tweet

To celebrate this release and the festive season we are offering the coupon code XMAS25 which will give a 25% discount on any purchases made from the Arten Science store.

This latest version is a significant upgrade of the popular Cross Platform Contact Management Solution, ContaxCRM Suite. ...

ContaxCRM goes beyond Single-User desktop solutions and gives you a true shared Multi-User Contact Management solution, without becoming huge and unwieldly and without having to operate via a potentially slow and limited browser interface .

Tight Integration with Mail and iCal on Mac OSX and Outlook on Windows removes much of the administration around contact management. ...

Some of the enhancements and updates in this 2.1.5 release are: ...

A Single User Trial Version of ContaxCRM can be downloaded and used for 30 Days, it also features a nag screen which can be removed with a single keypress. ... Data entered into the Single-User version can be transferred to the Multi-User version at the click of a single button using the Utility module supplied with the Multi-User licence. ...Tweet

The new windows for Mac OSX and Windows 7 can be seen below:

Seriously Shiny ;-) ...Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed Tweet

This release gets us nearer my goal of providing software that has minimal complexity, maximum reliability and does everything it needs to do as simply as possible. ...Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed Tweet

There have been significant User Interface improvements as well as additional functionality and bug fixes: ... • Vault and Task lists - now ‘Middle Wheel’ scrollable ... • Documents can now be directly attached to Task Items ... • Vault Link text button replaced with a graphical icon button ...

The new version can be downloaded from the ooSooMpro home page: http://www.oosoom.co.uk/

Screenshots from the Mac OSX and Windows 7 editions can be viewed below: ...Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed Tweet

This Shared Secret is used along with the existing document to create an encrypted document that cannot be opened or read by anyone without access to the Shared Secret. ...The in-build R10Cipher Key Management database copes with this scenario easily, allowing you to use one Master Password in order to retrieve any of the fifty individual Shared Secrets. ...

So the next stage is this: What if you and fifty, or even five hundred of your best friends / colleagues need to communicate securely with each other as well as a client base of several thousand ? This is where you need R10Cipher 4.4.x which is a free upgrade and the Centralised Key Management Database Utility, which is an optional purchase. ...

The Centralised Key Management Database Utility (known as GOD-Mode or G-Mode during development - try saying or typing Centralised Key Management Database utility a few times ...) is launched and pointed at an R10Cipher database nominated as a Master Key Database, ie: one setup and managed by the Company / Department or Individual responsible for your secure communications. G-Mode then populates a MySQL Database with the contents of the Master Key Database, and a text file is edited and incremented, for example from 5 to 6.

The next time any of the users who have had their R10Cipher software configured for G-Mode, load R10Cipher, R10Cipher compares the local database version number with the remote database version number and if necessary syncronises it’s local database with the remote MySQL Key Management database. ...

Note: You can also setup R10Cipher with your own personal Key Management Database as well which is not designated to sync with the remote database. ...Tweet

The Launcher is available free of charge and can be downloaded from here.

You can view a movie of the Launcher in action here: http://www.artenscience.com/movies/ContaxCRMSuite/T0002/index.html Steven Cholerton Arten Science Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed Tweet

NanooSooM is free whether or not you own ooSooMpro. It can be downloaded here: www.artenscience.com/autoupdate/latestversions/nanoosoom_osx.zip Steven Cholerton Arten Science Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed Tweet

When you click it you get this:

This provides a quick and simple method for our customers or prospects to talk with us, either to ask a question, report a problem, document an idea, give us praise or give us praise. (OK, I said the last one twice - there’s some subtle subliminal mind control there ...)

So there you have it. Get talking - we really do want to hear from you :-) ...Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed Tweet

Just as important is trying to maintain a spacious, clear and uncluttered view of the contacts primary information. The image below shows you what we’ve got so far. The first two pictures are taken from the Mac OSX edition and the last picture from the Windows 7 Edition. Steven Cholerton Arten Science Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed Tweet

ContaxCRM Suite and R10Cipher will both be available to purchase via Amazon in the next few weeks, although you can purchase the download editions immediately from the product websites: ContaxCRM Suite: http://sites.fastspring.com/artenscience/product/r10office R10Cipher: http://sites.fastspring.com/artenscience/product/r10cipher3 Steven Cholerton Arten Science Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed Tweet

The biggest release was ContaxCRM 2.0 and the ContaxCRM Suite, but I’ll talk about them in a different post.

The three products listed above have all been updated to make the trial procedure better for the potential customer and more profitable for Arten Science :-)

When the 30 Day Trial period is over and the potential customer trys to run the program, two things happen. ...

The second thing that happens is that a screen similar to the one below is shown, thanking the potential customer for trying our product and allowing them to enter a serial number and user id when they have purchased one :-) ...

A major project for Arten Science going forward involves looking at every facet of our business and trying to improve the user experience. ...

Another improvement to these three products in the latest releases is to do with downloading the trial version and also upgrading an existing version of our software.

From today onwards the download from our site and those of our distributors will include the complete version of the product, needing only a user id and serial number to change the product from Trial to Full. ...Tweet

The main reason for the release is a new feature we have added which allows you to link a Task to a Vault Item and it’s associated documents. This was a feature asked for by existing customers and with a little imagination can be very useful.

To link a Vault Item to a Task, first select the Task and then select the appropriate option from the Options menu. See the image below:

Once the link has been established you can access the association easily. See the image below:

ooSooMpro 1.1.2 is a free update for existing customers. ...Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed Tweet

Some new images taken from the Mac OSX Edition of ContaxCRM Suite are shown below: ...Tweet

For more information see the Press Release here: http://prmac.com/release-id-16683.htm Steven Cholerton Arten Science Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed

Hi Steve (Cholerton). Just wanted to leave a note on this thread to say thank you. I followed your instructions above - which I have to say were as clear as a bell - & bingo! Sent a test email, received it, ping - up came the images linked to my web server! Be assured - not that you need it I'm sure - R10BatchMail is a great piece of software :-) It’s much appreciated Tim ...Arten Science Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed

In addition iCal time based events (for example meetings), can be scheduled for a particular contact directly from within ContaxCRM and this will automatically insert them into iCal, and show them against the correct contact in ContaxCRM.

Q: Does ContaxCRM Sync with the Apple Address Book

A: ContaxCRM can initially have it's contact database populated (imported) from the Apple Address Book if you desire. After that selective contacts can be inserted into the Apple Address book from within ContaxCRM at the click of a button. ...

A: The iPad / iPhone Edition of ContaxCRM will be available before Christmas 2010 ...We don't believe it is realistic to carry the whole of your CRM database around in your pocket - however our concept is to intelligently hold locally what is 'current' and 'necessary' and wherever possible if there is a connection available, we will retrieve additional information as and when you require.

You can see the live webpage here: http://www.infinisys.co.jp/product/cutecipher/ Steven Cholerton Arten Science Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed

The contact information is stored over 5 windows which can be accessed using the drop down menu in the top left of the window or using the shift key and the left and right arrow keys.

Each screen is fairly self explanatory, although the final window is unique (to my knowledge) in the type of software. The user defined ‘Ratings’ window allow you to rate your contact is any way imaginable. I suspect we will see this feature become very popular with our customers. Steven Cholerton Arten Science Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed

By default ContaxCRM uses your local timezone information when writing data to the database. If you are running the Multi-User Edition and you have users located in different timezones then using the local timezone could cause confusion. In this scenario you have the option of using UTC (Zulu) time taken directly from the server. This means that data entries that are time stamped can actually make sense from a chronological perspective.

In addition, there is an option that can be set to produce the time and date information in the format required for ISO-8601. ...

There are many, many enhancements in Version 2.0.0, I’ll find the time to tell you about some more of them soon. ...Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed

Follow this account for Arten Science product news, business news, notice of new blog posts etc, promotions etc. @artenscience Steven Cholerton Arten Science Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed

'Hi Steve. Many thanks for the help, it all works fine now.   Could I also compliment you on the swift response to my problem, a few e-mails and in less than an hour everything works perfectly. If only other Software Companies were as helpful and professional.   I will be telling all my friends and family about your excellent products. I wish you and your team every success in the future, keep up the great work.'  - Gerry   (A Very Satisfied Customer)

I love to get emails and comments like this, keep ‘em coming ;-) ...Arten Science Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed

My customers rock :-) Steven Cholerton Arten Science Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed

Anybody interested in looking further at the pre-release version can download it from the following addresses: ...http://www.artenscience.com/temp/contaxcrm_win.zip Macintosh OSX: http://www.artenscience.com/temp/contaxcrm_osx.zip Steven Cholerton ...Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed

Products that have been around longer for example, we have dropped in price to reflect the fact that they are older, and also the fact that their R&D costs have already been successfully repaid.

The pricing for our new products is as follows: eBook: Securing the Network: Corporate Security Issues for the Non Technical £3.99 ...MonitorMyMac: Webcam and Screen Capture, with Internet Upload: Mac OSX £9.99 R10Cipher: Encryption and Security Solution: Mac, Windows, Linux £9.99 cuteCipher: Encryption and Security Utility: Mac and Windows £9.99 ...The price of ContaxCRM remains unchanged at £69.99 for the Single User Edition

We also do discounts for multiple copies and Site Licenses as well as Charities, Education and other worthwhile causes.

’Perfect Colours has been using ContaxCRM to keep track of technical support contact with customers for repairs, warranties and callouts for the past six months and it has transformed our engineers’ access to information. I would recommend it to any small business wanting to share information across their company, particularly given the low entry-level cost and the cross-platform nature of the software.’ Matt Kavanagh Technical Support Manager www.perfectcolours.com Fantastic, Cheers Matt :-) ...Arten Science Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed

After downloading, Install MySQL by following the prompts and accepting the defaults. ...

Create a new Catalog called ContaxCRM. ...

Setup a ContaxCRM User Account and Password. ...

Attach the ContaxCRM Schema permissions to the ContaxCRM User Account and Save the changes. ...

Run the ContaxCRM/MySQL setup tool from Arten Science and click all four of the right hand buttons in the order top to bottom. When prompted for a SQLite database, point at your demo or tutorial database probably located in your ContaxCRM folder. ...

That took all of maybe 10 minutes, now setup the ContaxCRM clients, you’ve almost finished so put the kettle on ready :-)

R10Cipher is an Award Winning Cross Platform File and Text Encryption Solution. ...

From the README file: 4.1.0: Released 27th July 2010 A new checkbox is available when batch encrypting files: ‘Delete Original Files after Encryption’. If this box is checked then the original, unencrypted, file will be deleted following encryption. New options under the Help menu to view the Arten Science Blog and the Developers Blog. ...

4.1.0 is free to all licensed users of R10Cipher IV. ...Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed

This was a couple of days work and you can see the results in the demonstration movie below:

Remember, for custom Software Development for Mac OSX or Windows (or Both) that might be less expensive than you think: Who you gonna call ? ...Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed

If going to see a customer it’s wise to brief yourself on their details and past activities, support issues etc. If you’d rather listen to this in your car on the way than read from the computer screen, you can with ContaxCRM. ContaxCRM will use the computers speech capabilities to read the information directly to an Audio file which you can them listen to wherever you are, whenever you want. Title: Audio / Speech Capability (Mac OSX Only) View below or from HERE: Steven Cholerton Arten Science Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed

The way it works is this; If you have a Contact selected in ContaxCRM and you select the ‘Calendar Entry’ option from the Actions Menu, or use the Shortcut Key, CMD-I, then the iCal Event Entry screen is opened. Possibly you have just finished entering the details of a conversation with a prospect into the ContaxCRM History and now you need to book a call for next week to remind you to contact this prospect again.

You can now fill in the details on the ICal Event Entry Window, you can select which Calendar to use from the Dropdown Menu, you can choose to set an Alarm and you can enter a Title and Notes. The URL and the Contact Details are automatically copied into this iCal Window for you, leaving you with less input required, yet a more informative Calendar event.

You can see from the screenshots above that you are informed of the success of creating the event in iCal as well as the extremely useful bonus of having this event automatically written to the Contacts History. ...

The ooSooM tab has been replaced by separate Tasks and Documents tabs as seen in the picture below. ... On the main window you can also now see the Outstanding Tasks from ooSooM, the sister program of ContaxCRM. ...If you store addresses and other information in your Address Book then the new script that I have included in the ContaxCRM folder will help you. ...

Is is now possible to drag one or more text documents onto the ContaxCRM screen and have them automatically added to the Contact History.

Email received at the moment has to be manually dragged and dropped into ContaxCRM. In the next release however that will not be the case.

Within your email rules you need to add a rule similar to that shown in the following screenshot:

Once that rule is active it will copy all incoming mail to the ContaxCRM Mail Handling software which will match the ‘From’ address to the email addresses in the ContaxCRM system and save the email into the history of the appropriate contact. ...

Of course by doing it this way and using the mail rules as the starting point allows you, the individual user, to specify the criteria for which email gets transferred to ContaxCRM. Maybe you want to restrict it to one account, or maybe base it on keywords ? ...

What is undeniable is that this has got to be the simplest and most effective way of automatically recording your incoming email against the appropriate contact in your ContaxCRM system.

TwitQwik was written to ‘scratch an itch’. I like to send several Twitter posts every day and if I use a standard Twitter client I see lots of posts from others which tends to distract me, I can catch up on those later in the evening when I’m not so busy. So with TwitQwik you can leave it open and send your Tweets and you are not distracted by incoming Tweets from others.

If you wish to view the incoming tweets you can click the Twitter icon and you will be taken to your Twitter webpage.

Simple, Quick, Easy and Free. ...Arten Science Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed

The reason is quite simple. From a customers perspective they can choose when to update based upon the features that have been added, they are not forced to update every time I upload a new version. For those customers however who are waiting for a particular feature they can have it immediately with no waiting around for a particular ‘scheduled update’.

From my point of view it allows me to do several weeks or months on a product and see the results of my work ‘out in the wild’ where customers and prospects can give me immediate feedback.

Another reason is, because I can. I think the fast development, immediate distribution model is where we need to be nowadays to stay relevant and current and to give our customers value for money. This is where a small company like mine can add value over the larger companies, our ship can be turned on a dime, their ship has a lot more inertia and finds it difficult to turn quickly to react to changing market and customer needs. ...Arten Science Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed

See the screenshots below: ...Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed

I just thought I’d share it :-) Steven Cholerton ...Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed

These changes make it virtually instantaneous to show, for example, all Prospects with a High Potential Success rating, or all Troublecome Customers or Yyour best Suppliers etc ...

ContaxCRM runs on Windows and Mac OSX and any mixture of each. Download the Free Trial. Steven Cholerton Arten Science Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed

In addition all the images can be downloaded as a zip file to be viewed offline at your leisure. The link is here: http://artenscience.com/autoupdate/images/contaxcrm_images.zip Steven Cholerton Arten Science Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed

ContaxCRM is designed not only to run extremely well as a Single User application, but also to run as a Multi-User Networked application backed against the MySQL database system.


If MySQL is to be used as the database for ContaxCRM it has to have all the Tables and Indexes setting up prior to being used with ContaxCRM. This can be done using the Free ContaxCRM MySQL Database Utility. Two clicks and you are up and running :-)


If you are upgrading from a Single-User SQLite version of ContaxCRM to a Multi-User MySQL version of ContaxCRM then our Database Utility will copy all of the data from your Single-User database into MySQL for you - at the press of a single button. It couldn't be any easier to get started.


Lots more information coming soon :-) NOTE: Screen Design Differs From the Release Product ...Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed

You can see all the movies including the new movie here: http://www.artenscience.co.uk/contax/Pages/movies.html NOTE: Screen Design Differs From the Release Product

In addition there is a new Technical FAQ page based on questions I have recently received. You can view the Technical FAQ here: http://www.artenscience.co.uk/contax/Pages/Pages/techfaq.html Steven Cholerton Arten Science Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed

ContaxCRM runs on Windows and Mac OSX and any mixture of each. Download the Free Trial. ...Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed

The easiest way of doing this is with cuteCipher. cuteCipher is a further development of the award winning R10Cipher, shortlisted for Information Security Product of the Year 2009, Technology Excellence Award by the British Computer Society and Computing Magazine.

Arten Science will create a customised version of cuteCipher for you which you can then give out to your customers for free (or charge them as you see fit). ...

Your price will differ depending on whether you wish to offer your customers the full Encrypt and Decrypt facilities of cuteCipher or instead you wish to offer them just the Decrypt software, dCipher.

When customised for you cuteCipher and dCipher could look something like this: ...I received this from Paul in Australia today: ‘I have cuteCipher (and R10cipher) on my Mac and works well and easy to use - can’t actually get much simpler.’ Paul goes on to say ‘You certainly are streets ahead of some other developers of products I have had to deal with - no names but congrats’. ...

Contact us today to see just how inexpensive it would be to secure your clients data. Prices start from £250 ($400, €300) for a customised version of cuteCipher for in-house use and a customised version of dCipher for up to 100 clients.

R10BatchMail is a Mac OSX and Window Bulk / Batch eMail Program. Fantastic for keeping your customers up to date and for making announcements and pitches to your prospects. R10BatchMail is available to purchase for £40 for a Single User License. Steven Cholerton Arten Science Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed

Simply drag your files onto cuteCipher, enter a Shared Secret and click the Encrypt button. ...Tested on Children, Parents, Elder Relatives and Other Innocents ! cuteCipher was officially released earlier today with a Press Release and an offer to existing customers to obtain cuteCipher at a discount.   cuteCipher is based on and compatible with, the award winning Encryption and Security software R10Cipher. Never before has encryption been this simple.   ...cuteCipher starts at £14 for a single user license with bulk purchase discounts dropping the price by up to 75%. Disclaimer: No Parents, Children or OAP's were hurt during the testing of this software. ...Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed

If you are updating to version 1.7.5 from a version number lower than 1.6.1, then you need to make sure you review the README file as there are some changes to file names that you need to be aware of. ...Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed

I’ve been thinking of trying to put together a portfolio, a listing, a directory of Midlands based IT companies for a while. My company specialises in distinct areas and anything outside of those areas I want to pass along to others who I know and trust to do a good job. Other IT companies in the Midlands are undoubtedly in the same boat.

A few weeks ago I decided to do something about this. The result is here: http://www.midlandsitgroup.co.uk/ This is very much a work in progress but it’s a start. Using the power of LinkedIn I sent out invites and those that replied are included on this site. We already have a vast selection of expertise and knowledge available - I think it’s a good start. ...Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed

1.5.5 has the following small but useful update:

Attached Vault documents from ooSooM are now shown against the appropriate contact within ContaX and can be opened in their original application by double clicking them.

You can see this in the annotated screenshot below:

This is a small but useful feature that gives added value to the document management features of the ContaX CRM solution. Steven Cholerton Arten Science Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed

MonitorMyMac takes timed snapshots of the computer Screen(s) and / or takes snapshots from the connected Webcam. These images are stored locally, or remotely, and are also optionally uploaded to your FTP server or MobileMe Account meaning they can they be accessed from anywhere via Webpage Bookmarks.

You can view the Computer / Webcam from Your iPhone, Netbook, Computer or any Web Enabled Device.

The reason I have done this is simple. If just one child is saved from abuse using technology I have developed then that’s fantastic. Making it free means that any parent who’s child has an Apple Computer can obtain the software quickly, easily and without cost. Introducing this extra element of security and safety may make all the difference. ...Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed

Available for the iPhone R10 is an application which gives you the latest news from Arten Science by giving you access to the both the Arten Science Blog as well as my Personal Blog (this one) for those who are interested in the person behind the company. See the screenshots below: Steven Cholerton Arten Science Subscribe to our RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ArtenScienceRssFeed

However, the current version of ContaX works against SQLite which is a Single User database making ContaX CRM more suitable for Individuals, or the Self Employed.

A Multi-User version of ContaX CRM has always been on the cards but development has been accelerated due to the many requests from potential customers who desperately need an easy to use CRM package for their small business and they don’t want to spend the earth. ...

The licensing will be very simply a multiple of the Single User price and a one off additional fee of £100. ...

The combination of attractive pricing, simple licensing and easy to use but powerful CRM functionality means that when it comes to CRM solutions for the Small Business, there is no need to look anywhere else. ...

To upgrade from the Single User version of ContaX requires only that you purchase the Multi-User License. ...

The initial plan was to make the first supported Multi-User database REAL Server from REAL Software. ... Listening to our customers however has made us change our minds and put our development efforts towards making the first supported Multi-User database MySQL.

MySQL is incredibly popular, it has a lot of loyal supporters, a lot of expertise is available and best of all it is available free of charge.