ObjectDock 2 BETA Scheduling!
Saturday, February 27, 2010 by Frogboy | Discussion: ObjectDock
Greetings!
February is nearly over and so we are getting ready to release the ObjectDock 2 BETA.
Here's a quick status report on where things stand:
General Objectives of the ObjectDock 2 BETA
A lot of our development effort for ObjectDock 2 has gone into revamping the plumbing of ObjectDock to support 64-bit and Windows 7/Vista more natively.
The current ObjectDock works on Windows 7 and Windows Vista but some of the functionality either gets disabled or is flaky (the system tray and start menu features for example). Needless to say, the updated more secure architecture of Windows 7 and Vista made some of these features more difficult.
So one of the first things we're going to be looking for is how well this works.
Secondly, there are a "ton" of new features rolling into ObjectDock 2. Some of these features will be available in 2.0 and others will roll out over subsequent months as we nail down getting said features to function identically on Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7 and then 64-bit versions of the latter two.
This next week I plan to put up a guided tour of the ObjectDock 2 beta and outline what is expected to be in by v2.0 and what we plan to put in in subsequent updates.
User Feedback Effects
The feature set of ObjectDock 2.0 is already set. In addition, the feature set of v2.1 and v2.2 has already been outlined internally. What we will be looking for from beta testers are what kinds of things they would like to see added during the v2.x generation of ObjectDock.
Scheduling
Originally our plan was to release the first beta of ObjectDock 2 this past Thursday. Unfortunately, a number of elements have not come together yet that we need to release the beta.
These elements are:
1. Assets. We are replacing the backgrounds, icons and other visuals for the v2.0 launch. I've made it clear to Stardock Design that I expect these assets soon but their schedule has been very tight with new projects from HP and Dell. That said, at some point in the next couple weeks if we don't have them, we'll put out the beta with the art assets we already have.
2. The new configuration. The lead developer of ObjectDock (and the same person for the past several years, Jeff Bargmann) has developed a pretty amazing configuration system for ObjectDock 2. This new system was necessary in order for us to realistically continue to add features withou the UI looking like a complete hack (i.e. like ObjectDock 1).
The delay in finishing the configuration has been due to me asking for Jeff's help on updating the architecture for ImpulseReactor that we are debuting at GDC in the first week of March. Once he's finished that, he'll be able to return fully to ObjectDock 2 to finish this part.
Once item #2 is complete, we will put out the beta regardless of whether item 1 is complete or not. However, we won't release the final v2 without the assets because frankly, the icons and dock backgrounds need to be updated imo.
So that's where things stand. Thank you for your patience and we look forward to hearing your feedback and ideas!
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Reply #62 Saturday, March 6, 2010 11:16 PM
I have 85.
35 are games.
All but 26 can be hidden with a double-click of my Fences.
I run 12 gig of DDR3 on a Win 7 64bit i7/920.
The number of icons is immaterial....
Reply #63 Sunday, March 7, 2010 11:34 AM
I have 7 tabs on a dock and in just one of them I have about 70 icons! 
Reply #64 Sunday, March 7, 2010 9:07 PM
Reply #66 Sunday, March 7, 2010 10:41 PM
And we have finally learned the reason why WG doesn't upgrade his OS! 
Reply #67 Sunday, March 7, 2010 11:29 PM
Brian....WG loves XP. It never malfunctions on him and has no UAC. Hey...if it ain't busted, why "upgrade"? He's way into his comfort zone...and hey, that's cool too.
Reply #68 Wednesday, March 10, 2010 9:15 AM
Any update on when the beta will be available? Will it be a public beta?
Reply #69 Wednesday, March 10, 2010 1:30 PM
We're trying to ship the beta this month, but that's just an estimate. The beta will be made available to those who preorder ObjectDock v2.0. You can find more information here:
Reply #71 Friday, March 12, 2010 3:45 AM
We're trying to ship the beta this month, but that's just an estimate.
It's quotes like those that are frustrating people. The email pushing the pre-order clearly said that the beta would begin by the end of Feb, now we're being told sometime this month... maybe. It was because of that email that I made certain my pre-order was placed ASAP.
And of course, the "Coming Soon" page for OD2.0 is practically a masterpiece of avoiding puting anything in writing, simply stating that the beta will begin in a couple weeks with no date attached for the beta or even for when the "Coming Soon" notice was posted.
While they don't need to be douchebags about it the way some have, it's more than understandable that people would be upset, seeing as how this has been the story with OD in general (updates and the release of 2.0).
No one can deny that you guys turn out great products, it's nice to see software that isn't bounced from developer to developer to get it done, and we get that the whole "imminent release" vibe is good for marketing. However, when a company shuffles its developers around causing otherwise avoidable delays and says something will be ready by "x" only to have "x" roll around and telling us that it will be ready by "y" instead (slide "y" back over to "x" as many times as needed), some people are bound to get pissed off.
Reply #72 Friday, March 12, 2010 1:01 PM
I juist want to say sorry If OD 2 doesn't come by end of the year I will be looking at winstep because so many features are broken in vista and win 7 that the tab dock is the only thing that still works.
Reply #73 Friday, March 12, 2010 2:46 PM
Randall,
I don't think anyone here is going to discourage you from using WinStep apps. The creator of WinStep is a friend of the site and many of the users use his stuff in conjunction with Stardock apps. Depending on how urgent your needs are, though, you may want to wait for a sale--Jorge usually has a 50% sale a couple of times a year.
Reply #74 Friday, March 12, 2010 5:32 PM
I tried Winstep and forgot how busy it looked. I will wait Objectdock does what I really want.
Reply #75 Saturday, March 13, 2010 8:14 PM
We're trying to ship the beta this month, but that's just an estimate. The beta will be made available to those who preorder ObjectDock v2.0. You can find more information here:
https://www.stardock.com/coming_soon/?product=ObjectDock
I would LOVE to pre-order but some jackass decided that you can`t use Paypal to pay for
the pre-order.
Reply #76 Saturday, March 13, 2010 10:48 PM
the pre-order.
Boy, that attitude will really take you places! 
Reply #77 Saturday, March 13, 2010 11:23 PM
the pre-order.
I saw it explained somewhere in one of these threads - Paypal wouldn't let them set up the deferred charge or something like that.
Reply #78 Sunday, March 14, 2010 12:47 AM
Boy, that attitude will really take you places!
I didn't say WHO the jackass was, just that somebody was one. DaveRI says it might
be Paypal themselves and it could very well be *shrug*. Fortunately while Paypal is
my first choice everytime when making online payments it is not my only choice 
I
just had to wait till the wife got home so I could use the Visa
Reply #79 Sunday, March 14, 2010 5:33 AM
It's paypal. Paypal does not allow preorders in excess of certain number of days. So unless they were willing to guarantee that they were going to release the product in say 15 days time they would be denied the ability to use paypal to pay for preorders.
Reply #80 Sunday, March 14, 2010 11:47 AM
I've pre-ordered the update for ObjectDock 2.0.
On the https://store.stardock.com/ there is the information "Your preorder will be saved in our system, and when the product becomes available, you will be charged and notified.". But the money for my pre-order was charged from my Visa. Why?
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Reply #61 Saturday, March 6, 2010 11:09 PM
I am not one for eye candy any way just a nice looking background is all I need so no need for windowsblinds. I hate icons on the desktop so Fences is of no use.
You can hide all your icons that are inside a "fence" by double-clicking on an empty part of your desktop, and make them reappear the same way.