legacy PIM Ecco Pro now freeware

[Jeff Needle]

The German ZDNet today about a legacy PIM, Ecco Pro, which has become
freeware. ZDNet writes that Ecco was one of the most promising PIM when
Outlook took the market over. Now it's free.

this is the article
http://www.zdnet.de/enterprise/sw/0,39023278,20000474-3,00.htm

and here are the links.

ftp://ftp.netmanage.com/support/pub/utilities/EC401/Ecco32/
http://supportweb.netmanage.com/ts_viewnow/downloads/patchesUnsupported/ecco.asp
http://supportweb.netmanage.com/ecco/
http://www.eccorocks.com/

Does anyone know this program ?

Frank

I used ECCO for a little while, testing out its strengths. First, it is
an immensely unattractive piece of software. It uses a metaphor that was
a little difficult for me to figure out, although I'm no genius. Its main
strength is the ability to create outlines within every part of the
program. For example, if I'm writing a note, I can create an outline
within the note. There are also some pretty good capabilities to link
pieces together, if I remember correctly -- address book to calendar, etc.

It looks old and tired. There's a pretty active ECCO discussion group on
Yahoo, with all kinds of talk of someone getting the source code and
developing it further.

 

[FTR]

The German ZDNet today about a legacy PIM, Ecco Pro, which has become
freeware. ZDNet writes that Ecco was one of the most promising PIM when
Outlook took the market over. Now it's free.

this is the article
http://www.zdnet.de/enterprise/sw/0,39023278,20000474-3,00.htm

and here are the links.

ftp://ftp.netmanage.com/support/pub/utilities/EC401/Ecco32/
http://supportweb.netmanage.com/ts_viewnow/downloads/patchesUnsupported/ecco.asp
http://supportweb.netmanage.com/ecco/
http://www.eccorocks.com/

Does anyone know this program ?

Frank

 

[The Six Million Dollar Man]

The German ZDNet today about a legacy PIM, Ecco Pro, which has become
freeware. ZDNet writes that Ecco was one of the most promising PIM when
Outlook took the market over. Now it's free.

ftp://ftp.netmanage.com/support/pub/utilities/EC401/Ecco32/

Wow this is a very old program. According to the readme.wri file located
at the above address, this PIM was made for Windows 95 and NT. Even if
you could get it to run on a more modern OS, why would you want it?
There are plenty of freeware PIMs out there in active development that
are both excellent and supported by their author.

 

[Mike Bourke]

Wow this is a very old program. According to the readme.wri file located
at the above address, this PIM was made for Windows 95 and NT. Even if
you could get it to run on a more modern OS, why would you want it?
There are plenty of freeware PIMs out there in active development that
are both excellent and supported by their author.

Which is probably why it was made freeware. As more and more software is
restricted to XP and later, I would expect an increasing number of old
programs that are better suited to the now out-of-date OSs (Win 95, Win 98,
Win NT) to be released as freeware. The hope would be (in most cases) that
when people finally update their computers, they will be sufficiently in
love with the old version of the software that they will pay for the latest
version. Or am I being too cynical?

Mike

 

[Querulantus]

The German ZDNet today about a legacy PIM, Ecco Pro, which has become
freeware. ZDNet writes that Ecco was one of the most promising PIM when
Outlook took the market over. Now it's free.

this is the article

Today? Did u get stuck in some sort of time warp, or what? The article
is dated 12th September 2003! It's software for W'95 and NT. I
suggest Essential Pim (Free, USB version) or Chaos Manager.
http://www.essentialpim.com/
http://www.chaosmanager.net/

Querulantus

 

[Goober Hodecker]

Yes there are better PIMS out there but ECCO will replace the palm
desktop and sync with my palm handheld. I have found no other PIM
which will sync with my handheld. ECCO is just a better program than
Palm Desktop. Just my 2 cents.

 

[Keith Gardner]

Wow this is a very old program. According to the readme.wri file located
at the above address, this PIM was made for Windows 95 and NT. Even if
you could get it to run on a more modern OS, why would you want it?
There are plenty of freeware PIMs out there in active development that
are both excellent and supported by their author.

I've have Ecco installed and running fine for a couple of years on my XP
notebook. Don't let the interface fool you, this program is a monster. I
teach (and use because I teach ) Outlook 2003, but I like ecco better. The
ability to outline in any part of the program - calendar, contacts, todo,
notepads, etc. - is extremely powerful. How about AutoAssign rules that
let you capture references to topics of interest, any where you mention
them in your PIM, effortlessly? You can customize the toolbar with a
single drag and drop. You can quickly create custom columns and add them
to your outlines...

Like I said, this is an oldie, but a goodie.

Keith

 

[seneca_kw]

I'd be interested in hearing about the better PIMs. I'm admitedly
biased as I've used Ecco for 8 years and like it very much. But I'm
always looking for something better. I've tried dozens and dozens of
supposedly better PIMs and so far have found them severely lacking
compared to Ecco.

And for people who read a previous poster's remarks about Ecco being
old, tired, and unattractive...don't believe it.

Wayne