What makes you think people ask a lot of questions about Fusion Logic?
This is our web page – we can believe whatever we like.

I need a custom version of one of your applications, or a custom written program. Can you do this for me?
Yes, but you might not want us to. People say a lot of really wonderful things about us from time to time – thanks, you know who you are – but no one has ever called our custom software development "inexpensive." We're not really set up to handle this sort of work. In most cases we'll be happy to quote you on custom programming – we recommend that you be sitting down when you read the quote.

Fusion Logic used to post answers to questions in various Usenet newsgroups, but this seems to have ceased. Am I reading the wrong newsgroups?
While it's an unofficial policy, we've largely given up providing suggestions and technical support through Usenet. Most of the newsgroups that deal with CAD and or CAM have turned into food fights of late – it's hard to find the postings with intelligent questions amidst the "make money fast" scams, the requests for nude photographs of Cindy Crawford and the users trying to figure out how many furlongs are in an angstrom.

A secondary consideration in this decision was the sudden appearance of dozens of new spam e-mail messages every time we posted something to a newsgroup – resolving the question, at least in part, of where spam generators collect address from.
While Usenet has its uses, it has arguably evolved – or perhaps devolved – into a medium less than ideally suited for user support and product information.
It seems better disposed to casual recreational discussion – a noble undertaking, to be sure, but not one that usually fits into our relatively full days. We'll be happy to answer questions sent to us by e-mail or better yet, try using the Fusion Logic Forum.

I sent impolite e-mail to Fusion Logic and I got back a really rude reply.
Just about everyone who sends us e-mail is polite and articulate – it's almost enough to make you wonder if all the violence on television news is for real. However, with all this good will and mutual back-slapping going on, when the occasional message from someone having a bad hair day does show up, it's a serious shock. We feel that no one – least of all our staff – should be required to smile and tug at their virtual forelocks in these situations. It gets the people involved stressed out, spoils their days and contributes to ulcers. Stressed-out people don't do their best work. We believe that our other customers should not have to deal with our staff when they're not at their best. If you contact us in a manner which we feel is impolite, rude, abusive, pig-headed or excessively liberal, we will do one of the following.

• Tell you that you're being rude and abusive and ask you to get in touch with us when your bad hair day is behind you.
  
• Accidentally delete your e-mail without replying to it.
  
• Add your name to the list of our CancelBot, which will automatically suppress all further messages from your e-mail address until January 1, 2010. This is something we usually reserve for extreme cases.
  
• Reply to you in less than polite terms. This isn't at all zen-like, but sometimes it feels good and allows us to be less stressed and better disposed to assist more worthy souls.
  

If you need help or wish to have a problem resolved, please contact us in a civil and professional manner.
If you just want to rant, contact our Complaints Department directly – they'd love to hear from you.

When I try to download a file from the Fusion Logic web page, I'm told that there has been an FTP error, and that the maximum number of users has been reached. What does this mean?
The computer that manages downloads, the server, can handle a maximum number of simultaneous users at a time. When this number of users is reached, the server refuses to accept any more new users until someone currently using it logs out. If you see this message, you can either wait a few minutes and try again.

Microsoft's Internet Explorer tells me that "extended information has been returned" when I try to download a file. What does this mean?
This appears to be a bug in Explorer. It's trying to tell you that the server is at capacity. Please try again later.

I am unable to download a file from the Fusion Logic web page. Can you e-mail it to me as an attachment?
'fraid not – we're unable to e-mail large binary files.

I have tried to download a file from your server, and it doesnt work. I get a partial file each time. What's wrong?
Have a word with your system administrator or internet service provider. This is either a local network problem at your end or a really devious conspiracy by the New World Order. Most often, it's the former.

I'm trying to download a file and it's taking forever. I've tried it at different times and the speed is still glacial.
When the server you access the net through connects to another server – such as the one which supports our FTP site – the connection is actually passed through many servers across the Internet. A connection between two servers may involve upward of a dozen of these intermediate servers that you never hear about. Each of the intermediate servers receives the "packets" of information that form your download and sends them along to the next intermediate server in the connection. If one of the intermediate servers slows down, your download will slow down. This can happen if a server is overloaded, or if part of it goes off line for maintenance. It's unlikely that all the servers will get bogged down at once. It's much more likely that an intermediate server on the Internet that your packets always get routed through is having temporary problems. To verify that this problem exists, ask your ISP or system administrator to run "traceroute" between your server and the server you're trying to download from. This is a program which gauges the response time of all the intermediate servers and spots the unusually slow ones. Slowdowns on the net are not uncommon – in most cases, you just have to try again later.

I downloaded a file and when I went to install it, Windows told me it had to be run under Windows, even though it was being run under Windows. What's wrong?
Your file was damaged during download. Try it again. Always check your downloaded file size in bytes against the file size stated at our web page or at the FTP site you downloaded the file from. If they don't match, you have a damaged file.

When I download a file through Microsoft's Internet Explorer, I'm told that it might contain viruses. What should I do?
Nothing. This is a rather ill-chosen feature of Explorer. It's warning you that any executable file could contain viruses in theory, rather than actually performing a virus check on your downloaded software.

Norton Antivirus told me that one of my downloaded files contains a virus. What can I do?
Norton Antivirus reports "false positives" on occasion, that is, it warns its users about viruses where none exist. It's by no means always wrong, but it is arguably a bit untrustworthy.

I began downloading a file and the download stopped part way through. What happened?
Something really bad... but no one knows exactly what. Sometimes the Internet just does this, for no obvious reason. You must download the file again.

I went to download a file from your web page and it just seemed to take forever. Is this normal?
This depends on what you define as "normal." As a rough guideline, on an average day on the 'net with a ADSL modem connection, you'll see a transfer rate of about 25 to 45 kilobytes per second. If the 'net's really busy, or if our server is nearing its capacity, this can drop considerably. This is just part of life on the Internet.

If I don't want to bother downloading files, can you send me a disk with the files I need by post?
Sure – we offer a CD-ROM of all our applications for $50.00 (AU).

Is there anything special I need to do when asking for technical support by e-mail.
Just one – quote all your previous messages in your dialog with our support staff. We answer hundreds of e-mail messages per day, and we delete the messages we answer as soon as they're done. We have no way of referencing earlier messages in a conversation. If you reply to a question without quoting all the messages that went before it, we will most likely have no idea what you're on about.

I have a version of Fusion Logic which was released during the late middle ages. Can I get technical support for it?
Probably not. While we will attempt to assist users of older copies of our software, our revision lists and other documentation are typically only maintained for a year or two. If you have an old copy of our software, please download the current version from our web page and see if you still need technical support.

Every time I send an e-mail message asking for technical support, I get told that my message has been deleted by the mail server and I'm asked not to send any more messages until January 1, 2010. Why is this happening?
Welcome to the mail server kill list. The kill list only gets to delete your mail if you were a really impolite bastard in an earlier message. Merely french-kissing your poodle during a funeral will not suffice to get you added to the list. Your earlier messages must have included speculation about the parentage of Fusion Logic' staff or close personal friends, a lot of expletives and typing in capital letters, vulgar deprecations of our software or other products or the expression of a profound admiration for our political process. The kill list is the list of last resort – talk to you again in the third millennium.

I e-mailed for technical support, and I've been asked a lot of questions. Is this really necessary?
Unless you're being asked very peculiar questions – this is the usual process for working through technical support issues. In a few rare and fortunate cases, we receive technical support questions dealing with problems we've encountered before. These issues can be resolved quickly. For the rest of the time, it will be necessary to find out what's happening on your system. Since we can't sit down in front of your computer, we'll have to ask you what it's up to. Some really intractable problems can require a fair bit of dialog.

What information must I provide when I ask for technical support.
This will be determined to some extent by the nature of your question. Common sense prevails. To begin with, no thought of requesting technical support should be permitted to dimly form in whatever part of your brain you typically reserve for dimly formed thoughts unless it's accompanied by a statement of:

The application you're using.
The version number of the application you are using.
The version of Windows you're using.
The amount of memory and other hardware features in the computer you are using.

If you are reporting a suspected bug in an Fusion Logic application, please be sure to state:
Precisely what you did prior to the appearance of the bug.
The precise error message that appeared, if this is applicable.
What other software was running on your system when the bug appeared.

Be sure to attempt to repeat the problem several times, preferably immediately after rebooting your computer. Windows is a somewhat unstable operating system, and is itself responsible for the occasional software crash. If you can't make a bug happen repeatably, the odds against us being able to do so such that we can fix it aren't very good.

I'm having difficulties with a job file. Can I e-mail it to you so you can see what's happening?
Please query first – your problem may be something we've heard of, and we'll be able to recommend a solution for it immediately. Under no circumstances should you e-mail us a file which is over 500K in length. Our mail server automatically deletes files bigger than this, as well as the messages they're attached to. If you do e-mail us a file, please send it as a MIME-encoded attachment. Do not uuencode it, or try sending the binary file as a text message.