159 karma · joined December 7, 2011
Music will only help you concentrate if the music is about the very thing you want to be concentrating on.
Perhaps they are listening to some variation of "SWIM SWIM SWIM".
It is also your responsibility to comply with local/country and international laws.
I reckon the only time it might be allowed to allow certain exploits/unwanted behavior is in a restricted controlled environment.
Recently gotten one from a friend who I consulted a couple of months ago and told them (he's a part owner of the company) that they don't need a website (yet - unless they never plan to make money off it). Now they're back with a budget and a plan ready to get things rolling - and I've managed to get 10% share in profits generated by the website.
I'd suggest you approach it differently - consider your freelance team a business. One of the reasons I dislike Freelancer/ODesk is because they tend to treat website/software developers as commodities.
That generally works out bad for everyone. Build me a facebook for 50 dollars? Heck no.
Convert an entire website to Joomla and replace "Live Chat" functionality for a fixed price of 5 dollars? Haha.
As a business doing 'freelance' work you shouln't opt to work for less than 40-50 dollars an HOUR. Looking over those requests you can easily judge ones that are worth it.
Avoid the el cheapos - it's usually the people that can't make up their minds, always extends deadlines to 'add in last minute features' or refuse to pay you (only offering 10% payment for work done).
Find out their budgets beforehand and guestimate them if their specs are within their budget. Don't work for charity, unless it's for your mother or for charity - which then you should be looking at http://www.hackersforcharity.org/ not on ODesk or Freelancer.
Also, aim for local freelance projects. Your clients will be much quicker to react if you can make time to sit with them to discuss their strategy and goal. (Agile over e-mail doesn't work)
Be sensible and be honest with your prospective clients. They just might be sending more work your way (that's how freelancers get 'set' with a steady flow of work).
It is my honest belief that unless a business requires a website - they don't need one.
There are some exceptions but in general they can more easily use existing services that has existing users. (Ex. a directory listing or some type of SaaS platform)
There's a few things as dissappointing as spending thousands of rand/euros/dollars on a website and it ends up being an expense with no tangible benefits.
I'd tell a business, lets get real. A real website requires maintenance and regular updates which means time and money. Can a small business really afford to waste money AND time on something that doesn't increase your profits?
If a website doesn't fit into your core business domain, then you probably don't need one.
Here are a couple of questions that need to be asked:
Will clients leave you if you don't have a website?
Are there any dependencies that require you to have a website?
Who will be responsible for maintenance and updating of a website?
Are the 'experts' available to help create a website? (Ex. they want to be able to do stock control but have no idea how to do it - they expect the software to make up for their lack of skill/laziness. This is a major cause of failures in software development.)
Are they willing to pay upfront what it costs to create what they want? (I call this the free ride principle)
I'd say, consider the above questions. It might be better for such a small service to not to have a website and rather spend that money on physical advertising campaigns instead.
If you can take away anything from what I said, take this: Bad news is always free. Good news has to be searched for or created - in other words you should bring them good news and they will listen to you. Ask them those questions as a consultant, if they need a website - propose to them what you would do to improve their existing website in regards to their core business domain. If they don't need a website - tell them.
It's possible to model inheritance/abstraction within database design but it's not always optimal. You can 'extend' an existing table by specifying the child identifier as a primary and foreign key referencing the parent table (this is called 1 to 1 mapping).
Most of the time when you see 1 to 1 mapping you won't see it, because in relational databases you add those columns to the same table. There are some scenarios where it makes sense to split the table into two tables, such as a User and an Account table (AccountId = UserId), so you can better model the relationships.
Most people would advise against it and tell you to denormalize those tables (put everything on the user table), but if you use an orm that does class-per-table mapping it really reduces friction (ex. anything referencing an Account is accessable from an account, everything referencing a User specifically won't be directly accessable via the Account).
There's also a difference between key-value stores and object-oriented-databases (both being NOSQL). The reason why using NOSQL is 'closer' to your actual objects is because you would be storing actual objects (they get serialized into a graphs and stored).
I'd also suggest you check out Brewer's CAP Theorem: http://www.julianbrowne.com/article/viewer/brewers-cap-theor...
I don't quite understand what makes simple form different than a html form that posts to your website where you can access the posted data by api?
Eager to get your package into the standard library?
That one is open for interpretation.
Very interesting concept.
Product companies generally tightly associate the brand of their product with themselves in the beginning.
Service oriented companies generally focus more on their mission first.
The mission: What your business objectives are within a reasonable time period usually with an associated timeline.
The vision: Sometimes lists unattainable goals but generally focuses more on goals for the future.
In the end, you have to know what the business is about and where they are heading to 'brand' them.
Technology handled irresponsibly corrupts. Remember EFNETeers flooding IRC? Or the AOLers chatting?
Proof: http://bash.org/?21154
<NickBlasta> asl?
<Cryph> unf?
<NickBlasta> no
<NickBlasta> asl
<Cryph> unf?
<NickBlasta> u want the cyber
<NickBlasta> ?
<Cryph> unf!
<NickBlasta> fap fap
<[H]Klypr8> parlor.asf
<[H]Tongboy> lol, I come back for a minute on accident, and I see what looks like 2 aolers trying to mate
Remember when 133t speak was cool, then became uncool and then proper spelling and grammer became the norm again? SMS has stupified a lot of people - lk u cnt u rd ths. One problem was solved (short messaging) and a bigger problem was created (adults who don't know the proper use of grammar or how to spell).
The same thing is happening in the business sphere - people want software that should know how to do their job. Inventory management? Writing out invoices? Calculating tax? Selling your product?
I believe that dependence on technology to that degree indicates the persons involved aren't capable of running their own business. If you can make a business idea work 'offline' then you have a chance 'online' - otherwise you are just betting the bank.
Good software can't make up for unskilled people. Don't blame the tools, blame the users! (HAR HAR). After all, software is much easier to fix compared to people.
HN uses an image in javascript to simulate a HTTP GET request to signal that you have voted.
ex. var img = new Image(); img.src = 'http://ycombinator.com/signal-voted?id=12345;
Makes sense because HN is not using jQuery or similar and it would be a lot more javascript to do it in a cross browser way (just source view hacker news - it's almost as small as it gets)
I'd almost not go for an adjective. Think about names of popular companies such as 'Blizzard', 'Electronic Arts', 'Zenga' etc. You could call it 'Storm' or 'Zero' - the real trick is just to get a name that hasn't been taken yet.
Good luck.
In my opinion you need to specialize in either java or .net to make a career of it.
On the topic of programming languages, general knowledge asserts that a programmer should at least be able to program in each of the following 'types' of programming languages:
Procedural - C/Go etc.
Object-oriented - C#/Java etc.
Dynamic - Python/Ruby/Groovy etc.
Functional - F#/R/Haskell etc.
A lot of languages cross boundaries (ex. php is procedural and object-oriented) - some programming languages can be all of the above-mentioned tyes.
The real 'trick' to get started is to specialise in development frameworks. It's all about rapid application development nowadays.
There are a ton of frameworks available for traditional desktop and web development, including: WinForms, WCF, WPF, ASP.NET, ASP.NET MVC, Django, Rails, Grails and a ton more of opensource frameworks.
Ideas come from brainstorming - sit somewhere with a notepad and a pen and start writing out ideas - something the average person will be interested in, existing ideas than can be improved, something businesses find useful (like consumer feedback) yet have become accustomed to living without.
Creating something entirely new for a need that does not exist is unheard of. Need drives innovation. A niche I would say is something people have been accustomed to not having. Programming like business is either focused on increasing profits(products or features which are money makers) or reducing cost (saving time, money, effort etc.)
If I could, I'd focus primarily on writing something useful that saves time. Trying to build something that's 'too useful' sometimes makes the process slower than it needs to be.
A simple example of the above-mentioned is inventory management systems (compare selling non-perishables vs selling perishables). An electronics store would use a first-in-first-out approach due to tax benefits. A 'food' store would use a first-expire-first-out approach. The latter approach is quite visible when standing in-front of rows of milk with the first to expire at the front and the latest to expire at the back.
An electronic store could identify electronics by type/brand, while foodstuffs requires another level of precision (a batch - all same ingredients used, same expiration date).
Selecting via type is much easier than selecting via type and batch. 'Foodstuffs' that are used as ingredients generally require some level of trace-ability - which adds another step into the process.
This is where pragmatism (business focused) outshines perfectionism (feature focused).
It also goes much easier once you realize it's about participation (making decisions) than it is about productivity.
Unless of course your participation isn't required, then you can spend your time better at another store checking out the latest games or books.
What you really will be learning is the domain and the different problems people in those industries face and the solutions that are acceptable to them. We as developers/architects should and do become domain experts in solving certain types of problems.
Say, by chance you learn how marketing affects business decisions - you'll gain a better understanding and foresight into what is expected of you (always to drive up profits!). If you do decide to leave for another industry - marketing is still applicable there. Perhaps then you will be on another boat - building the things marketing promised - or where you will be tasked to build a home page where knowledge regarding conversion, marketing copies, pricing structure and analysis (ex. A/B testing) will make you an asset to the business.
I'd say give it a try. I am interested in working for Microsoft at some stage (I focus primarily on .NET) - but after reading that they consider someone with 7 years working experience in development a 'beginner' i.t.o full-time employment - I reckon there's still a lot I need to learn till then.
I'd say if you're still interested in Silicon Valley by then, keep an eye out for job listings :).
Sin is destructive behavior that brings intentional harm to yourself, others, society and those representing others or God.
1 John 3 4 Everyone who sins breaks the law; in fact, sin is lawlessness. 5 But you know that he appeared so that he might take away our sins. And in him is no sin. 6 No one who lives in him keeps on sinning. No one who continues to sin has either seen him or known him.
Mark 12 28 One of the teachers of the law came and heard them debating. Noticing that Jesus had given them a good answer, he asked him, “Of all the commandments, which is the most important?”
29 “The most important one,” answered Jesus, “is this: ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one.[e] 30 Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’[f] 31 The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’[g] There is no commandment greater than these.”
The sum of the law is love - of God, yourself and your neighbours.
If sin is lawlessness, then sin is the opposite of that - hate towards God, yourself and others.
I wouldn't judge how lucrative or feasible and idea is without examining the domain and talking to domain experts.
A simple example would be the taxonomy of a product. In terms of commerce, the adequate description for a product would be the minimal required to identify its price and perhaps track its quantity (for FMCG). Ex. Clover 2 litre low fat milk.
On the other hand, some mass retailer clothing stores might settle for categorising products into pricing ranges. Ex. Shirt 20$ and therefore you wouldn't be able to uniquely identify the stock.
Feasibility wise - creating software that's 'free' to lure the market will bring in a lot of headaches. If your idea of accountability is 'It's free, so it's your problem if you lost all your data' - it probably won't work.
Honestly, the idea behind creating an all-in-one solution sounds much more feasible. Mini ERP software is becoming the norm nowadays.
Even then it's not as simple as that, because you would need to have knowledge about the interals to tweak for optimal performance.
I'd say unless you are building something rather silly or are able to use multiple open source project from codeplex, github, sourceforge etc. that's still a long shot.
You will probably be better off modifying an existing CMS or similar system you are interested in to suit your needs. Even that will take you a while to go through the documentation to figure out what to do.
So I'd say, starting from scratch with a new language and a framework, what you are suggesting would be impossible. Even with experience and knowledge, 1 week is still a long shot (40 hours?).
What you need to remember is that you should only 'load' what you need. Don't load a 1920x1200 size image if you're only displaying it as 240x150. Combine your stylesheets, create sprite images, load only javascript you need - try to stay away from flash and similar embedded objects. Make sure your files are served compressed (except images) and that proper caching is in place.
You can't always blame the technology.
From what I've seen, most start out with a RDBMS and switch to hybrid RDBMS/OODB later on. I've also seen some switch entirely to OODB from RDBMS and back into a hybrid.
There's also a case for schemaless document oriented databases like MongoDB. Honestly, I haven't seen 'serious' uses of document oriented databases other than for distributed caching.
In general, 'big' data needs structure.
One of days it might even become common to see most browsers support indexeddb (sql like) and local storage (kvp like).
So back to my point; efficiency, compatibility and familiarity is key for rapid application development, which is a must have for start-ups.
I'd say it's very important to focus on usability (navigation, layout, flow) - without proper implementation people will sometime just quickly scan and close the website almost immediately.
Depending on the website I'm working on, navigation usually includes a 'public' menu (main tabs), 'personal menu' (profile/log out), 'reverse navigation' (breadcrumb), 'section' menu (back-end tabs) and occasionally a 'contextual' menu (in content).
If you think along the lines of domain driven design, it is easy to spot different contexts at work.
A very important aspect of any website (and design) is consistency.
Pages would generally consist of at least a Home (sometimes used as a lead page), Lead page/s (where visitors land when clicking ads - sometimes the home page is used instead), Product pages (depending on the company, products or services can be listed here) and a Contact us tab.
The 'about us' should be evident throughout the entire design. Quite a few times I've seen the 'about us' page act almost entirely as a page where potential clients can find the physical address of a shop or service (sometimes include contact information).
Hope this short list helps you out, but that should at least get you started.
There are multiple ways of managing stress: Healthy diet (4+ servings of fruit/veg a day) Supplements (Vitamin B2 works well) Exercise (1-3 times a week works) Mind-numbing hobbies (sometimes games can be stressful too) Do something you are passionate about Take a vacation (preferably a week or longer) Mindful meditation
In the long run, the most effective way of beating stress is to lead a balanced life. Sometimes it's neccessary to say 'no' to maintain this balance.
Best of luck!