Comment by sarosh | Hacker News Reader

Comment by sarosh | Hacker News Reader

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I respectfully disagree with edw519. While your assessment that you are indeed not a "programmer" may be technically accurate, but, if this is you:

http://www.linkedin.com/pub/2/B06/B99

then I think you sufficiently qualify under a very broad definition of a hacker, or, alternatively, you are quite technical yourself. While you may currently feel you need a co-founder for your project who is a "programmer", you should not sell yourself short.

One thing you should strongly consider is just plunging in and trying to code for yourself. Take a look at this article regarding the founder of Plentyoffish.com. Mssr. Frind built the site while learning to program. See, http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/13/business/13digi.html?_r=2&...

So one approach would be to learn to program while you put the site together. While this may be rough in the beginning and ultimately result in total failure, you will at least (a) know more about what goes into making a web app (generally) and (b) when you seek a technical co-founder you can be much more precise and clear about what you need.

As for languages, Ruby on Rails or Python would both be great. But, just for fun, take a look at Arc http://arclanguage.org/

Hope that helps.

Thanks for the advice. Right now, I would like to continue in my hunt for a co-founder but do plan on trying to pick up some knowledge of programming even if I do find someone to work with.

regardless of whether you have previous knowledge or not, if you're willing to program (whether it's front end or back) and you do learn, even if it is on the fly, for this project... then maybe a 50 50 split does make sense...

Any suggestions on things to read so I can start to learn. I am going to buy a book on rails (agile web development). Know of joel on software. Programming.reddit.com. Anything else?

Find something that has you start AND finish something, anything. Almost any O'Reilly book. Read the reviews on Amazon to see if it's the right thing. Webmonkey also has lots of beginner tutorials. The technology doesn't matter. The important thing is to try to BUILD something, fail (or not), and finally get it working. The first time you see something YOU wrote actually work, it's orgasmic.

An oldie but goodie:

http://webmonkey.com/webmonkey/programming/php/tutorials/tut...

You can't get wet from the word "water".

I've been working on a big project involving Adobe Flex for the past year. Before we started the project, they brought in Adobe trainers for 5-days of on-site, slightly-better-than-powerpoint Flex training. Too much information - from one topic to the next. We all knew no Flex. Theoretically, we could have learned Flex from the online tutorials but after the recovering from the deluge of 5-days of Flex we could claim plausible knowledge. Then, we sat on it for 4 months - no flex. Of course, not until we started trying to develop UIs using Adobe Flex 4 months later did we start to learn (painfully). But the training got us started.

The point of this little story - get help, ask questions (hacker personalities are problem solvers and love to solve problems), but get started. Training and mentoring can help bootstrap it. Ask a friend who is a programmer to help get you started.

You seem like a good writer - why not write a blog about learning enough about programming to build your own web application?

I prefer Python to Ruby, but language choice is another topic entirely. There are a number of web frameworks for Python that are AT LEAST as useful as Rails, including Django and Pylons. In some ways, I think Django might be better for the type of site you seem to be interested in. Of course, I'm going mostly on assumptions...

I know there are a number of Python tutorials that were written specifically for scientists that are new to programming. I would think that a few tutorials that use practical examples from your own field would make the wall a bit easier to scale than a tutorial that just addresses complete noobs? I don't know of any similar "Programming for Scientists"-type tutorials for Ruby... (?)

There is also a good intro to programming book that uses Python (Zelle is the author) that was recently adopted by MIT. If you want a stronger foundation - but with a potentially slower payoff - you should look at htdp.org and SICP, both of which use Scheme.

I do agree with shooter that python is good technologically... but the problem with Python web frameworks is that there's no one official framework yet for python that's overwhelmingly popular in the python world (though someone can prove me wrong). The end result is that there aren't that many books on stuff like Django (compared to other technologies), which really sucks when you're just starting out.

Rails on the other hand has tons and tons of books. I just started a little less than a year ago and I've caught up fast because of the plethora of books and communities for Rails.

in the end, if you happen to find your partner quick - they may help you choose (that's probably the best route)

Forgot to mention - check out some video tutorials of Rails programming:

http://rubyonrails.com/screencasts

http://railscasts.com

http://peepcode.com (not free but really really good - they actually have 2 vids that covers all of the basics of Rails - in I think about 3-5 hours; you're not goign to remember all of it in the 1st run but it gets u comfy)

a decent list of resources

http://railshandbook.com/

http://rubyinside.com

http://dzone.com

http://poignantguide.net/ruby/ -funny and useful intro into ruby itself

How many books do you need for a web framework?

Django is pretty simple. There's already the official book in print. Not to mention one of the reasons Rails has so many books to begin with was due to really poor online documentation. Django doesn't have that problem.

Usually I think havings lots of printed documentation is very important, but in Django's case, due to its simplicity and quality of existing docs, I don't think it is an issue.

different people learn in different ways just like different people teach the same subject in different ways. To me having more variety helps out a lot.

Techwise - Rails and Django are more or less the same (compared to the other stuff out there). Rails just has a bigger community than Django. I think that really helps for someone just starting out (with a deadline to boot)

There's even more books on Java. Maybe you should pick that up :) take a look at some tutorials if you want to learn python web programming. It doesn't take a book to START making useful sites with something like Pylons.

Maybe I should start offering some Pylons lessons online (for free, just to spread the love).

well Ruby and Python are near equivalent - so it's unfair to bring up the java point...

Great sites are nice but you shouldn't discount the power of books in the very very beginning of learning when you're not on your Nth programming language. I think u and I are so far off now that we forgot what it was like starting out...

I'd rather have a few good books and "tons and tons" of quality libraries.

I also think that having a choice among frameworks is a good thing.

imho Rails has that too

besides the Python community is in the midst of consolidating web frameworks... there's a reason for that

I could be wrong but doesn't Django only have one book? Do the other Python frameworks even have a book for them (as opposed to chapter or two in a general programming book)?

To get started with Rails, learn at least minimal Ruby first:

http://tryruby.hobix.com/ Read "Programming Ruby" part I

Yeh, that's an awesome idea - let's get rid of the insights Ford gained from the assembly line and toss out about a century's worth of industrial progress and all drop what we're doing and waste time re-inventing each other's wheels. That will really help bring thing about much more efficiently. Tell me, once you're done with your product, do you see yourself going to a VC for funding only to have the VC tell you in return, "You want money from me? Well, I don't know - if you're willing to spend years learning how to raise money from institutional investors all over the world, I might be willing to look at your proposal, otherwise, well, it's not worth it for me."

Maybe you need a CEO with relevant experience. I hope the people who you approach turn around and tell you, "Gee, you're a noob when it comes to building/growing/managing a business - tell you what, why don't you first invest some time and become an executive at a Fortune 500 company like me, then I'll consider helping you out by adding my credibility to your "startup" which is basically just a bunch of code. Call me in 10 years when you're the EVP of a company whose products I use."

This is why we need "big idea business people." Leave it up to you guys and your "prove your worthiness to me first" approach to life and the world would fall apart.

Geesh - imagine going to a doctor or surgeon only to have them tell you, "Well, tell you what - if you're willing to go to med school, I might operate on you. Otherwise, you're not worthy of my effort."

I'm not saying that engineers don't need business people at all, but they do need competent business people. Either the business person in question is charismatic enough to convince or he has a proven track record or he already has money (from convincing investors). from your perspective would you partner/hire an engineer who can't build something. you can guage who's a solid engineer by what they've built, as oppose to just what they claim...

on another point, when u don't have a product yet does it always make sense to get someone to start selling it before it's there in every situation (as opposed to getting someone to help you build it)?

"imagine going to a doctor or surgeon only to have them tell you, "Well, tell you what - if you're willing to go to med school, I might operate on you. Otherwise, you're not worthy of my effort.""

that's a bad analogy, considering patients are doctors' customers

> but they do need competent business people

But most business competence is recognized in retrospect. How many Harvard MBAs with awesome corporate track records do you see starting awesome companys which make products you love? Like, almost none?

> to convince or he has a proven track record or he already has money

"proven track records" are what jealous people who inherit money to start investment funds look for to make business starters feel small. Tell me, based on the "track record" of Steve Jobs/Woz, Howard Shultz (door-to-door expresso machine salesperson), Richard Branson, and God knows who else, would you invest a penny in their "I dropped out of college/never went to chase my dream of beating huge, well-financed, well established companies on their own turf by doing something unproven" ideas? I bet not. But you'd be very rich if you did.

> from your perspective would you partner/hire an engineer who can't build something. you can guage who's a solid engineer by what they've built, as oppose to just what they claim...

But most people just showcase what they CAN build, which, in my experience, rarely translates into the ability to build what they've never built before.

>on another point, when u don't have a product yet does it always make sense to get someone to start selling it before it's there in every situation (as opposed to getting someone to help you build it)?

Sure. I'd gladly pick an awesome salesperson who can pre-sell it to 100,000 paying customers over 10 of the best programmers working away day and night all the time. That salesperson's ability will get me the money to tell VCs to go to hell and then have plenty left to hire the best programmers I can find. The programmers, meanwhile, don't guarantee anybody will buy it once its done.

>that's a bad analogy, considering patients are doctors' customers

Not really. Most surgeons make enough money to not have to work for the money and do it for the challenge/love. Imagine they got offended at everyone's lack of medical knowledge.

"How many Harvard MBAs with awesome corporate track records do you see starting awesome companys which make products you love?"

well a lot of them tend to join big established corporations... not to mention many successful entreprenuers don't have MBAs let alone degrees

"tell me, based on the "track record" of Steve Jobs/Woz, Howard Shultz (door-to-door expresso machine salesperson), Richard Branson,"

well I mentioned charisma right? Jobs and Branson are bad examples for your argument, since they are extremely charismatic - hell they're legendary for it

" most people just showcase what they CAN build"

better than empty words...

"Sure. I'd gladly pick an awesome salesperson who can pre-sell it to 100,000 paying customers "

what if it doesn't get built after you presold?

"Most surgeons make enough money to not have to work for the money and do it for the challenge/love"

well all the doctors I know from college have a lot of bills to pay, which don't include the extremely high cost of malpractice insurance.... =)

> well a lot of them tend to join big established corporations... not to mention many successful entreprenuers don't have MBAs let alone degrees

Exactly. Hence, track records are useless. Unless you have a track record of starting big successful companies. Nobody who has that would bother talking to programmers. They'd hire them to wash their ferraris for the entertainment value.

>well I mentioned charisma right? Jobs and Branson are bad examples for your argument, since they are extremely charismatic - hell they're legendary for it

Psst! AFTER they get rich it's called "charisma" .. until then, it's called being a loon. Take away fame and money and "charisma" suddenly = annoying personality.

> better than empty words...

Not really. I can build the biggest house of cards you ever saw. Not sure how that makes me money. Same thing with most applications I've seen programmers show me when they told me they're too busy to build my thing. Awesome. Profound. They even convinced me their solutions were technically superior to everyting. I can't figure out who'd give them any money for it, so in the end they amount to the same thing as my house of cards or "empty words" , ie, nothing anybody would actually buy.

> what if it doesn't get built after you presold?

Um, well, if programmers are still too snobby here after I got 100,000 people to pay me for it up front, (a) they're too stupid to hire because they don't realize the value of 100,000 people willing to pay you before it's even built and (b) I'd use the money to fly to Russia and spend 3 months finding programmers there.

> well all the doctors I know from college have a lot of bills to pay, which don't include the extremely high cost of malpractice insurance.... =)

Doctors, maybe. Surgeons, I doubt. Most surgeons can pay off med school with 1-few proceedures, depending on the nature.

> extremely high cost of malpractice insurance.... =)

I don't think the doctors themselves pay that - the hospitals / private companies which own/manage them these days do that.

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