John is pointing out one of the reasons Guide may not be for everybody
(in the sense of being a massive sell), and that is its somewhat dated
appearance. Unfortunately I suppose that may put some people off, and
besides that, Guide does have a learning curve.

I suppose most of the die hard Guide fans use it because it is fairly
easy for the end user to make Guide display whatever data one wishes
to see. I say "fairly easy", as making a user dataset can be a bit
fiddly for most people. But the simple fact that it is possible to do
so without a degree in computer science, is just fenomenal. The fact
that Guide is self-contained, ie not depending on the registry or some
such, is a major pro. It may be detrimental to piracy protection, but
it is very user friendly, making it extremely easy to move a custom
setup from one computer to another.

I think that adding ASCOM support was a life-safer for Guide, at least
in the mid-long term.

Others have pointed out the great assets of Guide in the database, its
extensibility, the support offered. Being able to literally talk to
the developer and get your ideas implemented must be unique in the
industry. As a software developer I'm not sure of what impresses me
more, however; Bill's willingness to implement these features, or his
ability to maintain the codebase through all these changes.

Arild :)