Flexcabs Update - Patrick Toomey

[bill_lumley]

Well I guess it is time for this project to come out of the closet as I have seen a few folks here asking about it . As of yesterday there is NO working program a short few months after the original commitment . Patrick has since disconnected his forum so even his current 'beta' users can not communicate with each other or him . He has also disconnected the answering machine on the phone number given on his web site .

It would appear the shopbot crowd is ripe for this kind of fraud as it is by nature a very trusting and helpful bunch of folks . I have been pleased with every bit of support I have gotten from Shopbot and this community . It is just a real shame when someone drops in and feels they can prey on us for financial gain as was also demonstrated earlier with the guy selling hardware platform upgrades that never delivered .

It makes me sad to report this news here but I thought any prospective clients should be warned that this appears to be another fraud on this community .

The search continues for a reasonably priced cabinet parts program . It would appear Shopbot wants to enter this space with it's recent hiring of a cabinet maker who wrote such a program but there has been no news there either about upgrading that program to meet user requirements .

Bill

[richards]

That's too bad. We could use several variations of cabinet type software. Few people who have not actually written large programs have any idea how hard it is to write a market-ready program. I've started writing some cabinet software several times, but the permutations seem to be almost endless. Writing a simple program that forces everyone to do things 'my way' is difficult enough, but allowing everyone to do things 'your way' would take a lot more skill than I have.

There is a very good reason why the only 'big' software packages for cabinet design and tool pathing cost as much - or more - than the Shopbot itself. It takes a long time to write the code and a long time to test things out. Anyone with even a little business sense knows that costs have to be passed along to the customer. Even though the Shopbot customer base is fairly large, it seems that very few have either the inclination or the resources to buy a license to a top notch cabinet program.

Ryan's Cabinet Parts Pro does a very good job for what it was designed to do, but it doesn't follow the European model that I use. That seems to be the 'problem' with all of the 'affordable' programs. They work very well as long as your idea of how a cabinet should be built and the programmer's idea of how a cabinet should be built are the same.

I would imagine that Patrick is still working full time on the program. He doesn't seem to be the kind of guy that would purposely cheat anyone. However, those of us who have spent years as programmers know all too well that the last 10% of the code takes 90% of the project's time.

[bill_lumley]

Mike , many of his beta testers are software skilled people including myself . I spent my career managing very large software projects that would make Flexcabs look like a walk in the park. On many occations we gave him the benefit of the doubt and told him how hard we thought it was . Nobody ever slammed him for being late . But we did ask him to communicate with us and his pattern was to only communicate when bothered by someone . His last comminication was 2 weeks ago and was done when a beta tester would not hang up the phone with him until he posted to the group .

He may not have intended to cheat us but that has is how it has turned out . The facts bear that out . One fellow asked for a refund and Patrick said he would look into it and he never heard back from him .....

Bill

[dray]

I think he may have just bitten off more than he could chew.

How many shopbotters actually bought the Flexicabs?

I have gotten used to cabinet parts pro. It only does the basic boxes then I have a folder of "canned parts" that I import as dxf's to add into any cabinet or cabinet part as needed.

[richards]

Bill,
Your expertise with software is needed. Go for it! If you can write the code then you'll have dozens, if not hundreds, of Shopbotters knocking at your door. The trick, of course, is to make a sub-$1000 package that actually works. Honestly, I can't do it and I don't know anyone who can - given the fact that the market might be 100 licenses. To a competent software programmer, the fees collected would amount to just a few days work AND, I would imagine that this type of project is a lot more than just a few days work.

[dray]

I would pay up to around $2500 or so.

I just cant see paying $15k for a software package. Im not cheap, Im just "thrifty" lol

If someone was to do actual market research I'll bet that there is much larger market than sme might think.

[bill_lumley]

Danny , I figure there at least 20 people that contributed to this science project of Patricks .
Hey I think maybe with that cash he could have just gone out and bought the KCDW CNC software and be done with it .

I may end up with Cabinet parts pro but I want to think this through before blowing some more cash on this ... Cutlist Plus is also an option with DXF support now .

Mike , if I could do it I would but I have other things on my plate at the moment that generate a more reliable source of cash . I have had enough of software in my day and wanted to do other more tangible things so I started a small cabinet making venture . There are too many challenges for an individual to release a complex software program . Everyone sympathizes with Patrick on this front BUT we wish Patrick would show some sympathy to us and give us back our money as he has apparently hit a brick wall and CAN NOT deliver . This is the decent thing to do ....

$300 is a bit steep for a program that does not work and the proprietor has gone AWOL . This is called fraud where I come from .

[richards]

Danny,
Maybe I'm just getting old and crotchity, but I believe that a 'shoestring' budget to develop a workable cabinet program that is really parametric would start at around $250,000. Without any 'handholding', that would require a guaranteed minimum user base of 1,000 Shopbotters to just cover the development costs. When you add in 'training/handholding/telephone' time of 10 hours per licence and a realistic cost per hour of at least $100 for a competent programmer who could actually answer 'newby' questions, you reduce the dollars allocated to the developer to $1,500 per license - which would require 166 licenses to be sold. Then, when you add in the cost of marketing/commissions to actually sell the product at $1,000 per license, the developer would end up with about $500 per license. That means that 500 licenses - minimum - would have be to sold just to recover costs. There may well be 500 Shopbotters out there who would pay $2,500 for a license, but I don't know who they are. When I offered a belt-drive transmission kit to Alpha users to elimitate 'chatter' for $750 I didn't get one single sale. There were dozens of Shopbotters that asked if I would be willing to 'give' them the plans or to 'give' them hints on what to do, but not one Shopbotter thought that eliminating 'chatter' was worth $750. Well, long story short, I 'gave' away many sets of drawings and swallowed the $10,000 in actual costs that I paid out to find a workable solution. My take on the Shopbotter community is that, when it comes time to lay down the money, that we're a very thrifty lot.

Edited:
Bill, you posted while I was composing. I totally agree with you that Patrick should either refund the money or produce the promised product. That is the honest and ethical thing to do. On the other hand, would anyone with real programming experience expect to be able to buy a full featured program for $300 or $3,000 or even $30,000? The dearth of software on the market makes me think that only a few brave souls have been willing to offer 'any' kind of cabinet software.

[bakerkr]

Hi all -

I think I'm the guy Bill is talking about. I called Patrick a few weeks ago to find out why we haven't heard anything from him, he seemed "surprised". I told him he had just about everyone screaming for an update and that he needed to look at the forum immedately. While I had him on the phone, I expressed my desire for a refund, as his project had gone way over the original delivery date and what he had given us wasn't anything other than a stupid database. He said he would look into it and like before I heard nothing. I contacted PalPay and hope they can offer some help or at least cut his account off.

Bottom line - This guy has stolen our money and I doubt he will be "man" or american enough to do the right thing here. My lesson from this - ask for a working demo and/or documentation (and pray my wife never asks about that software I "just had to purchase").

Patrick - enjoy the Margarita.

Kevin

[edp]

Well, add me to the group of trusting people who plunked down the $300 for the program - There is probably more than one person out there who will be annoyed enough with Mr. Toomey take a little vacation to Florida and put things right. This is a possibility that most con artists don't consider, but Toomey should start refunding the money. The foul karma he has generated will roast him when he least expects it.