Fault Code Guide

Hi Guys,

I’ve been tussling with this one for a while now and what to do with the FCG. I know that for some people it’s an invaluable tool and I know that a lot of people want it updated ASAP.

I also see the alerts seeing people trying to get it for free on a number of file sharing sites across multiple platforms and protocols.

There’s obviously a demand for it.

So, here’s my problems with it just for the WTA members..

It costs a fortune to produce in a printed format. It took almost a year to break even and, we (UKW the company) really didn’t make anything from it bar a few hundred quid at best.

But, the outlay is in the thousands. From memory it was £3.5-4K to get it printed up and I suspect it’d cost a bit more now.

That doesn’t include the time writing it and, trust me, it’s a ball breaking task that numbs your mind for ages. It took me three months to write the first one and I can’t say that I particularly relish the thought of doing it again but, to get it into a sensible format, I’d have to put in that sort of effort near enough. As I’m sure you can tell, I’m not falling over myself to get cracked on with it.

The time is fine, I don’t really mind giving up a bit of time to help everyone out so I’m not really all that bothered about the cost of that. Some people in the company do get a bit shirty about it but I generally just tell them to wind their necks in and shut the **** up, I could live without the grief though.

So I looked at doing it as an app for iOS and Android and that’s gonna cost even more!!!

£7K basically to get it done.

I can get other “stuff” (;)) tagged onto that as well for the money but it’s a hell of a risk with probably no chance of ever getting paid back on the cost let alone the effort. It’s therefore hard to justify the outlay.

I also have reservations about it from the point of view of, I think there’s more important things to be tackling in the short term.

From a WTA point of view, the CCAS is way, way more important (ADE!!!). The opportunity to comment on the DEGs review was way, way in front of this as well and both came up at the same time. The FCG therefore went onto the back burner until the other stuff I had to do was done.

And, in the midst of all of this, I still have to juggle the balls with ISE, UKW and of course NWAR as well.

The short of it is this, unless someone pony’s up a lump of cash and frees me up to be able to do it, for the short term, the FCG is not getting looked at as I don’t have either the time or the budget to do it.

It’s not dead. Just on hold.

Which leads me onto the small dilemma I have with it.

If I make it available to the WTA members as a PDF that you can mess with as much as you like how do I know it’s not going to end up on one of those file sharing sites?

I don’t much care in many ways TBH but I don’t really want to see you guys undermined by whatever other company that hasn’t paid for it and, really don’t have the rights to it using it. Or, punters getting it as, if it goes that open, they will.

On the other hand, I preach about open systems all the time and there’s some merit in just saying “stuff it” and releasing it publicly in a “good way” that tries to get us as much publicity and links back as possible from it.

So, there you go. There’s the dilemma to think about and, depending the opinion on this tread will determine what I’ll do with it. No opinion, I’ll call it as best I see for the indies as usual.

K.