… and 4 years later, we are still using Manager and never happier than now… Super easy and reliable software which gets updated towards the user’s needs… 
I love Manager but, basing my business on it, I always fear the fact that, as far as I know, it is a one man show. What if @lubos decides to retire on a desert island?
… then we can always continue using the software but updates would stop appearing…
That’s very scarring. What if we have a bug or everyone moves from Windows 10 to the next one and Manager stops working?
Whatever about a bug, moving to the next version of Windows would be most unlikely to break Manager.
Windows 7 still works although it was replaced years ago by Windows 8 and then Windows 10 years, so any replacement of Windows 10 will still allow Manager to function for years to come imho
But no software lasts forever - so it is inevitable that you will have to move on some day.
We can all agree that nothing lasts forever… But, if we want to be safe then we can go back to pen and paper… Assuming they will not discontinue the pen productions and that we will be allowed to make paper from trees…
I think we need to be sure that Lubos will continue the good work and to make sure he does, we all should use the paid version of the software which I am sure most of us are doing anyways.
If he has 1000 clients that pay 500 USD per year, then why would he stop producing the software? Shall we calculate if the clients are 10,000 or 100,000… I guess not… At the moment he is a one-man-show but I am sure the larger user-pool the Manager has the better for everyone…
If Lubos would discontinue the software then we can always find alternatives and continue our businesses, right?
Stay mentally positive, make backups and file the transactions on PDF format to your local file systems… That way you are pretty safe… not to mention if you keep everything on paper as well…
Why would the guy retire while he has all this potential? The worst case is that he sells it to some buyers and leaves (hopefully not leave, but definitely get some payback), but it’s not the end of manager.io. But he sure deserves some time off on a pacific island.
I keep hearing it’s a one man show but really I am starting to think Lubos is laughing at us behind his screen right now for believing this.
Dear @lubos, we demand that you reveal the size of manager.io team 
Profitable business persist after owners & specific employees move on. Unprofitable businesses close.
Hard to judge the viability of NGSoftware Pty Ltd. from here but I suspect it does OK.
Anyhow what is the worst case. You continue using your old data on the free single user version for ever and have to enter new data in a new software package. Old data is also not locked so you may even be able to export it then import it into the new package. Overall sad because Manger is so good but apart from that what have you really lost.
Guys, a 4yo post that’s being taken down a path we’ve discussed many times in more recent threads?
I don’t think that’s a concern, I’d be more concerned if he gets hit by a bus, because if he is a one-man team, we would certainly have a problem then!
You might be surprised, and you’re assuming he has a sense of humour! Well, maybe he does. 
We can only hope he has offspring who want to follow in the old man’s footsteps.
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More programs supports data import with administrative right
@zuhairsaleem, I have no idea what you are referring to. I last participated in this thread more than 4 years ago, and my comments then were about continuity plans of the developer.
I’m not sure what people are talking about when they think this software is free.
Manager isn’t free. The desktop version is free. The self hosted server and cloud are not free at all. They cost money.
If Manager desktop wasn’t free, Lubos would have a hard time selling me on the server version or his cloud version.
He can definitely add more revenue streams:
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Per feature special funding drives
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Custom dev options.
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Offer support contract for desktop version for those that want it (while still leaving it free to download and use)
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Offer training and customization.
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He even offers a white label version of his cloud, if I read that right?
Sure, there is always room for improvement and the list of requests sounds reasonable and maybe putting the source code in escrow for business continuity purpose would help.
When I found this project the other week, my concerns were along similar lines:
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Even if the software is a good fit for us, is the business viable / will they be around?
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Is the documentation good enough?
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Is the community active and vibrant?
From what I can tell, the business model seems to be pretty solid, the documentation seems to be good enough to answer my basic questions right now and the COMMUNITY IS AMAZING AND ACTIVE. I contacted a couple of users that posted 5 years ago and they are all still using Manager 5 years later.
I am sure I will find something that I cannot do but it’s not like Quickbooks doesn’t have drawbacks. Quickbooks makes butt ugly invoices even after paying all of that money and being forced to consume their advertising in their applicaiton, you cannot run it everywhere, there are all sorts of bizarre technical requirements for the software and so on.
I think it would be fruitful to have a conversation with Lubos to see what we can do to finance some of the added features, documentation upgrade, stablize REST api, and so on. The user base seems to be large enough and enthusiastic enough maybe we can make it worth for Lubos?
I think the biggest risk with Manager is that it has shown that Sage and Quickbooks have left so much money on the table that someone with real money will buy Manager and ruin the business model for everyone.
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I agree with your analysis here. Yes, definitely Manager could use a bit more funding to speed up its improvement.
Personally I believe the problem is that desktop users have no incentive to switch to a paid version. They get all the paid features and they can workaround the single user limit (the major “downside” of using the desktop version). I wouldn’t be surprised if many of them are not so keen on buying anything.
If it was up to me, I would first disable users from ever being able to override the single user limit on the desktop edition.
Also I think to that inventory, payslips, manufacturing are not something that should be given for free in the sense that if you really need a system in order to take control of your products, hr or plant operations then a fee of $39 a month shouldn’t be a problem. On the other hand if these users have that much business and are still not willing to chip in, then I don’t think serving those is a good business.
Finally I believe that history, custom themes, custom fields, custom reports and report transformations are all premium features that should be treated as such.
Another thing that maybe keeping people from using it is the huge price gap between the Desktop version and the cloud version. Many other software offer as low as $5 for two users. So maybe if manager gets a couple price points between “Free” and “Paid”, that should help users make the switch.
I really don’t want to reign on Desktop users’ parade here, but the truth to be said that if you really value the product then buying it is the best token of appreciation.
But that’s just what I would do and I think @lubos is way more generous than I am.
I am closing this topic. It has strayed a long way from the original subject of importing data from another program. And the purpose of the forum (maintained at NGSoftware’s expense) is not to criticize NGSoftware’s business plan.
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