Spire version 3.6 appeared last week. It is a big update and takes Spire out of the Windows-only world and into your web browser and onto a remote server. And now you can pay for your Spire on a monthly subscription on a monthly, “cloud” license. These are two, new, big reasons to move to Spire.
Spire modules running in a web browser.
Spire 3.6 introduces a web browser interface for the Spire Customer, Vendor, Sales Order, Sales History and Purchase Order modules. Microsoft Windows interface no longer required. Here, side by side, we see the same Sales module rendered in my Chrome web browser…
… and in familiar Microsoft Windows interface:
Same program, same data, different platform (web browser vs. Windows).
Here is a Spire sales order in my web browser…
… and the same order (#0000800071) in Windows:
Version 3.6 takes Spire out of the Windows gated community (which, I must say, is a lovely place) and into the larger, HTML, web world. Run Spire anywhere you can get an internet connection on any web-enabled device. I have not run Spire on my smart phone yet. The phone’s screen is probably too small for that to be practical. But for those of you working from home or on the road on a tablet, Mac or Windows computer, this is good thing.
Spire in the cloud.
Spire Systems now offers a “cloud” option where your Spire license is a subscription and your Spire runs on a remote, hosted server rather than a server sitting in your office.
Close readers of my earlier news items know I dislike the hosted, rented, “cloud” software model. I wrote an essay against “cloud” software as a service (SaaS). You can read it here. But Spire Systems is not Lefkowitz Systems and Spire Systems listens to the market. There is a market for companies who want a subscription license and do not want to own and operate a server. For them, Spire now has a solution.
Are Spire’s web browser interface and hosted, subscription license sufficient reasons to retire your SBT VisionPoint, SBT Pro Series, ACCPAC Pro or Sage Pro ERP systems? My view is that, for most of you, Spire’s value proposition before version 3.6 was compelling. Now, with a partial web interface and subscription license option, it is even more attractive.
-Matthew Lefkowitz, President
Lefkowitz Systems, Inc.
