
Desktop First - bretthellman
http://blog.hall.com/post/21024674004/desktop-first
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Androsynth
OT: I hate company blogs that don't have links in the top left corner back to
the company's actual site.

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bretthellman
Good call - we'll work on that today

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Lockyy
I was also a bit confused as to why the "The Hall.com Blog" and "Home" both
took you to blog.hall.com.

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bretthellman
Know of any quality tumblr themes that handle the startup blog experience
better? Or a tumblr alternative?

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ckluis
Wordpress. Any theme. Couple Plugins. 10x better blog.

Great Theme - <http://www.studiopress.com/themes/streamline>

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rglover
This is one of those things I don't understand.

It seems as though a lot of companies look to the "mobile first" argument
without first considering the context of their application.

In this instance, why wouldn't I work on a desktop app first? _That's where my
users will most likely be using the app_ : on a desktop. Sure, there will
certainly be times when they're mobile, but what about the majority of the
time? It seems especially odd when users are requesting it ad nauseam _and_
it's a logical next step.

On a different note, I signed up for the app and it looks awesome. Can't wait
to get some friends together to try it out.

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gunz_rozez
@rglover, You'd think it'd be a no brainer right? Even though it may be
logical and your user's have been asking for it, it is more I think cognitive
dissonance, cuz you see "mobile/social apps" winning and everyone around you
is doing cool consumer stuff and you get sucked into that vortex even though
you know fully well you are an "enterprise app" but again there is that whole
idea of making enterprise sexy and what else is more sexy right now than
mobile/social....again cognitive dissonance. As Entrepreneurs it is ok to make
decisions based on what your surroundings are telling you as long as you are
fast enough to realize what aspects of your product work and which ones to
cull and iterate onward.

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rglover
What's the ROI of "sexy?" I'd ask myself that before I made any decision,
especially those motivated by those around me and not my customers/users or
team. You're right in that there's nothing wrong with making a decision based
on your surroundings. Though, unless those surroundings are in tune with your
product (i.e. other teams/companies working on enterprise products), they
might as well be ambient noise. The only opinions/qualifiers that matter are
those coming from your user base.

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ralphsaunders
I've spent 5 minutes looking around trying to work out what your app does and
I still don't really know.

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bretthellman
@ralphsaunders we really appreciate the honest feedback. Hall is collaboration
for your company and team. Our current product is the War Room which enables
team collaboration (chat, video, file sharing, rt notes) all in one place.

We hope you'll give us another chance by creating a war room for your team and
letting us know what you think. Thanks! brett @ hall-inc.com

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smacktoward
I'd recommend changing the hero text on your main site's home page to
something like "Hall is collaboration for your company and team, all in one
place" from the current "Working Together in War Rooms Doubles Teams'
Productivity", then.

"War rooms" as a concept already exist outside the context of your app; when I
first saw the site, I didn't understand how the statement connected to your
app. I thought it was just a generic statement about war rooms, which was
confusing.

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bretthellman
Really appreciate the feedback. We'll be iterating on the landing page soon to
keep up with the actual product inside.

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lancefisher
This seems like it could be cool, but for it to replace Skype for me it needs
to have screen sharing.

Also, I don't really like being pestered to connect Facebook and LinkedIn at
every turn. I'm wary of annoying my friends, and I especially don't want to
send invites to everyone on Facebook and LinkedIn without trying out the app
first. When I do send invites, it will only be to a few co-workers not all my
contacts so uncheck everyone by default please.

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cantastoria
Does anyone know what they used for the GUI? Is it QT?

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ronadams
We're using Adobe Air/HTML5/Jquery/Backbone.js/CSS.

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sohn
You're doomed

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subpixel
Politely: I won't install an Adobe Air app unless forced to by me employer.
Maybe that's how this will work, but Air is always a drag in my personal
experience.

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ronadams
Again, it would be great to get feedback on exactly why it's a drag.

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halostatue
Because it's Yet Another Runtime that I Don't Want to Have to Install and
Maintain.

I have yet to see an AIR application that is truly cross-platform functional.
They _run_ , but that doesn't mean that I want to spend time in them.

I hadn't heard of hall.com before this post, but while I appreciate that (a)
you've done this out of response to your users (good) and (b) you've done this
because it's faster than doing something else, (c) I don't install AIR.

These days, I only want .apps that include everything I need inside of the app
bundle and don't require external installations. (I say this as someone
shipping a USB stick with an app that, to apply an update of the app on the
stick from the Mac, you have to have a driver installed. I don't want that
driver, but I have to. Can't stand it.)

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ronadams
Excellent! Thanks for the feedback. That's the type of useful information we
need.

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robkwok
Congrats! It's very sleek and awesome just like the the hall website.

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bretthellman
Thanks Rob - please let us know if you have any product feedback/requests!
hello @ hall-inc.com

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lbotos
Honest question from an aspiring entrepreneur: How do you plan to stay
afloat/relevant when Apple has made it clear they are targeting platform
integrated notifications in Mountain Lion?

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gunz_rozez
@lbotos if your talking about Apple's Messages (I guess you could call it a
platform), it would actually make applications like Hall.com even more
powerful. Now if you are talking about Hall.com competing with iChat(or
Messages or whatever apple chooses to call it), then I believe instant
messaging is only one part of Hall.com's abilities. I believe platforms like
Hall.com and its ilk will drive the next generation of collab tools taking
what IM's, IRC's, Email clients etc has done very well and either complement
them or disrupt them.

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lbotos
Honest Feedback:

I missed the majority of what Hall does. This blogpost was really tailored to
people who wanted that feature implemented. I thought you only were a
notifications app, not a full collaborative platform. Sorry for any confusion
caused by my oversight!

