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Site / Forum Search Items of Interest 10 Full Story 11 Wordfiles 12 Screen Shots 13 Awards 14 Features 15 Where is UltraEdit? This is our testimony of God's direction, guidance and provision for us over the last year. The writing of this was inspired by a good Pastor friend who had heard of a little of the story. It seems like no coincidence that this inspiration came just one week before the 1st anniversary of one of the main events. I was an engineering manager in a well paying job and quite successful in the corporate world. At that time, I was wanting to better my programming skills, to better advise others that worked for me, and to maintain my knowledge. Of course, one tends to live according to one's means and so money had to be watched. I realize this is almost too detailed or technical, but it's surprising how the smallest of details can be a part of God's much bigger plan . After buying the development software (a tool used to develop software programs), I decided to write a small program that would be useful to me as a learning exercise. This was a simple editor to replace what is known as "NOTEPAD" in the Windows world. I spent the next three to four months developing this, and found that it was quite useful. I showed it to friends and colleagues where I worked and they also thought it was useful. After some time, it occurred to me that if others liked it they may be willing to pay a small price for it. There is a concept for software distribution called Shareware - Basically you try the software for a limited time for free and if you like it you send a "registration" fee to the author. So, I decided to consult a friend and colleague about this idea - he was a lot more knowledgeable about this at the time, and more aware of the electronic distribution channels. I would get a lot of people wanting changes and sending messages, and only a few people would register is what he advised - I did as I often do in a case like this, I thanked him for his advice and decided I was going to continue and pursue it as planned. I won't bore you here with all the details, but I uploaded the software to CompuServe (this was around April 15th 1994), a very large online computer network and started to receive interest almost immediately. I was stunned when after just one month a large company was interested in 60 copies, and after some changes did purchase the 60 copies. It seemed amazing in such a short time that this editor was progressing quite well. I just thanked God, not at this point for the monetary gain, but the satisfaction and encouragement it gave me. As time went on I continued to develop this editor based on user requests, putting literally thousands of hours of work into it - God has truly blessed us, but it is not just handed to us on a plate: we should be good stewards of our time and work hard. As I developed this, I received more and more interest and recognition as an editor of choice over the next year or so, and it became clear that something had to change. I was working two full time jobs, one of them being the work with the editor. In early 1996 we were convinced that a change was necessary, but what? I had a good job, good salary, good benefits and generally I was happy with my job - but I had always wanted to go into business on my own. We prayed about this, and we felt more and more as time progressed that we should make a change - surely God had not blessed our efforts with the editor for us just to say it's too much, but dare we take the step and make it our full time occupation? It's helpful to understand a little of the Shareware concept here - Basically people would call us, fax us, send mail etc. This was a good day, and of course was an encouragement to us - But will it stop - is one product enough? This was tough, I didn't have time to generate more products. As I went to bed that night, I was praying about the situation, and I just felt like saying to God "If you give me 20 registrations tomorrow I will KNOW that I should quit my full time job, that it is your will". As soon as I said this, I was excited, I felt sure it was going to happen. I also prayed for forgiveness if I was wrong to ask - I don't like to try and make deals with God but really wanted his confirmation. This was between God and I, I would share it with my wife at the end of the day. Needless to say, I checked my e-mail looking for registrations, and I believe I had three in the morning - a good start. I was really excited that day, I called home a couple of times to see how the registrations were going - it was quiet! I got home later that day and checked the mail - No registrations! I am embarrassed to admit, at this point, being a technical person, I mentally noted that 21 was not 20 - I had asked for 20. I shared this with my wife, and we just prayed and gave thanks to God, who really had answered our prayers - we knew now that this was the thing to do. Later that evening, an additional registration came in - that made 22. As soon as I realized this, I remembered the night before - after asking God for 20 registrations, I had said to myself (I dare not say this to God - but He knows our every thought), I should have asked for 22 as it would be twice the number of the day before. From this point we knew that I was going to quit my job. I expected non-Christians to think I was crazy, but it's surprising how negative Christians can be also. We started to make the plans, sort out medical and make sure we had everything in place. It took a while to do this, and I actually stayed longer than I probably should. Many people asked what I was going to do, had comments and opinions. With only the one product several offered a lot of doubt, but we knew the Lord's direction. There were times when I would ask myself, or my wife if this was right - but nothing could then, or today take away that true knowledge of direction we had received. We knew this was God's will, He had given us such a peace and joy about it. I left the company on May 31st 1996 and since then have been fully self employed still working on the editor, improving it and enhancing it. God has opened up so many opportunities with this business, with special versions of the editor for some large companies. His provision has been so much more than we would have dreamed. Today (March 11th 1997) we are swamped with work and orders for the editor. We pray for God's direction for the future, we don't know exactly what it holds. We know that if we trust God, He is faithful to us and will show us his will and direction. I don't deserve God's blessing as He has provided for us. I don't ask God why in case He decides to take it away, but I know that I owe it all to Him. We don't give our tithes (a percentage of weekly income given back to God - biblically 10%) to get more from God, we owe them and more to Him, but as we increase our giving, it seems as we are blessed more and more. I could have written a lot more here, but I believe this tells the story of God's direction in our lives, and his provision for us. I truly pray, that if this is read, it gives encouragement and hope to the reader, and most importantly Glory to God. Update Well, it's now November 7th 2002 - 5 1/2 years later and many are asking what's going on - what's happened in the last 5 years or more years? He has worked hard and well and is still working for me now. A little later I employed another full time individual who has recently left as she and her husband moved away to work full time in Christian ministry. I now have another full time employee, Stephen, who has been with us for a short while and is going well. UltraEdit has continued to grow and we now have sales in over 120 different countries and territories with sales to individuals, corporations of all sizes, governments and other institutions. We get a lot of email and it's difficult to keep up at times but we do. We always try to respond quickly with accurate information and a friendly manner. My biggest surprise in the last five years is the number of responses we have had to posting this story. I expected some responses, and to be honest I expected mostly neg...
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