MartB
Lifetime Supporting Member
A couple of recent posts have made me wonder how many people have a tech connect contract and use the Rockwell Knowledgebase at all.
Jiri Toman said:I think that your poll should include a radio button for having free access to the knowledge base! Most of my use of knowledge base results from lack of basic AB documentation, bugs, patches etc. and that is what majority of articles deal with, this information should be free, unrestricted!
If in fact there was a true app. note where someone had to build a mock up with various devices, code had to be written etc. and real intelectual property above and over the basic required info was provided I would have no problem with having such app. note as part of tech connect, but that is not the case, is it?
I hope that others on this forum feel the same way.
faehigkeit1 said:I used AB tech support to get help installing a PCMK card. The person that was helping me got very inpatient with me while guiding me through their web site. After doing what she instructed me to do I ended up with the "blue screen of death" on my laptop. The PCMK card is still in the original box it came in. I don't want to go through that again!
There are always gray areas between the two and documents are sometimes shuffled between the two as one or another argument gets made one way or the other.
JHutch2000 said:I can speak, a little, to the Rockwell Automation policy on contract vs free content.
For many products, it's basically all free (ie, Activations. Various Industrial Control products, such as buttons and relays. etc.). For others, we follow this breakdown:
Free = Break-fix/patches/firmware/error codes and explanations.
Contract = Applications and training information.
There are always gray areas between the two and documents are sometimes shuffled between the two as one or another argument gets made one way or the other.
We really do believe that the contract level answers in our knowledge base provide a value-add for the customers that use it. Even if you don't personally use it, our usage statistics show that a large number do every day. And the satisfaction surveys we employ show a favorable reaction to it on the whole.
Now, that is not to say that things cannot be improved. In fact, one of my personal duties is to try to improve both the content and the experience folks have with the KB, Forums, online question submission (Ask a Question) and online Chat (a feature that is in a Pilot phase for a few products). If you have trouble finding particular information, let me know. I don't have time to keep up with threads here, unfortunately, so I can't say that I'll see it if you post it publically here, but I do keep on top of messages and I read every post in the Forums at our website (http://forums.rockwellautomation.com).
With almost 60k answers in the current Knowledge Base, there are constantly things that can be improved, from the content of individual answers to the search results for particular keywords. There are things I can do to address both (and other) issues once they are brought to my attention.
We do want to make the electronic support a viable and important part of the support we offer our customers. I think, to a large extent, we do. I also want to get better. So, let me know what can be improved. I'll do whatever I can to make it so.
Thanks for your time,
Joshua Hutchinson
Rockwell Automation Knowledge Base Support