Does this community want a collective voice on PD enhancements?

[GeorgeMcGeachie]

In the early 1990s I ran a mainframe Data Dictionary (metadata repository) for an insurance company, and we were members of the vendor's user group. We were able to participate in suggesting and voting for enhancements to the product; the vendor made sure we were aware of the pros and cons of each, especially if they didn't really want to implement them. :smile:

In May this year I wrote in my SCN blog (Enhancement request process for SAP PowerDesigner, via ISUG (part 1)) about the PowerDesigner enhancement request process available via the Independent SAP Technical User Group (ISUG–TECH. Anyone can raise or view enhancement requests, and ISUG-TECH members can vote. Periodically I will bundle up the changes and pass them on to SAP.

The intention is to provide a collective voice for the community, and to enable SAP to have a better view of what PowerDesigner users really want. PowerDesigner uses vary in their willingness to raise enhancement requests directly – not everyone will raise cases for seemingly minor matters, and we're all guilty of muttering to ourselves when something doesn't work the way we expect or want it to, and just carrying on using the tool. We're also generally unaware of what other PowerDesigner users think, of how much of our experience is shared by everybody else.

Since I wrote that blog post, not much has happened to the list and I'm trying to understand why. The following table shows the number of requests raised and the number of votes cast for each month from February. I added my personal backlog of enhancement requests, hence the blip in March.

Month (2014)	Enhancements Created	Votes Cast
February	1	1
March	39	0
April	2	1
May	0	4
June	1	1
July	1	1
August	0	2
TOTALS	44	10

So why has so little happened? I know that PowerDesigner isn't perfect and every user I talk to has something to say about PowerDesigner, so why haven't you been flocking to the site to have your say?

• Is the process unclear?
• Is it a lack of publicity?
• Is it because you don't want to join ISUG-TECH? (if you're a member of a SAP user group, you may already be a member of ISUG-TECH)
• Perhaps you're all asking yourselves "what's the point? I can already raise cases directly"?

I'd really like to know, so please respond to this blog post and tell me why you're not submitting and you're not voting .