shorbaji

Easier? Well, just do it and get over the first few rejections. Things I kept in mind to make me feel better when I started in sales engineering are:- a) every "no" gets you closer to your next "yes" b) some customers are out there waiting for someone to come along and solve the problem you application solves c) Expect low conversion rates, e.g. of 100 calls you make less than 10 may accept a short meeting.

To make it better, a) prepare an elevator pitch to get you started b) make sure you have quality leads - e.g. if your customer is the marketing manager, don't pitch to HR or the secretary - make sure you have the right telephone numbers c) be relevant. d) You are less likely to get an audience when you get introduced through a "friend" so use social networking sites. LinkedIn was particularly useful

Good luck

nontrepeneurs?

Government programs have funded the majority of these. Haven't they?

Yes, the centralized research centers of the past are dwindling - giving way to a new "open innovation" model. However, the article attributes too much to these silos the successful spawning of industries in the U.S.

I would argue that it was the open ecosystems around these research labs (e.g. silicon valley, cambridge area, etc) that are the true catalyst. These clusters continue to these day and the spirit continues. The reach is now more global.

You're right. Fixed.

I would be happy to chat about this. Please drop me a note. My email is in my profile.

First reason is to minimize error rather compound it. Second reason is to avoid overloading the user with information. I do expect that the set of queries prepared for a user will be large and possibly imperfectly ranked, at least initially. To use this set in its raw form to pre-fetch answers will dilute accuracy and be a large amount of information.

Rather, I take the approach that search is a commodity that is already fast enough and good enough. I let the user choose (and thereby rate/vote up) a query and then fetch only relevant results.

I would focus on anticipating the user's search needs even before he/she formulates them and types out a search query.

I would use as much context that a user is willing to provide me - location, recent email messages, voice call transcripts, unread messages, web browsing history, etc - to try to anticipate what the user is likely to query for.

For example, a sales engineer who receives a technical query in his email inbox is likely to be searching for product information once behind his/her laptop. Also, a student that lands in NY JFK airport one a morning, will likely be searching for restaurants in the vicinity by evening.

I would focus on anticipating such queries (among a range of others) in advance. And would let the user choose which ones he/she wants answers for.

I'm sure this is easier said than done, but is a direction I think is worth exploring.

I have been thru the same a few months ago. Let me tell you what worked for me.

Start by picking a language. Which one you choose will depend on why you want to be a programmer. My goal is to develop a web app for a startup so I looked at popular languages with popular frameworks. I chose Django/Python over Ruby on Rails.

Playing with a framework gave me some quick returns for minimal effort. So the rewards kept me going.

Quickly though you realize that you need language expertise. That's when I hit the books, sought assignments and problems (e.g. Project Euler).

One last tip, set some mini-projects with limited scope as goals - one after the other. Make sure their complexity increases. This will serve as a ramp up, but also the sense of completing a project becomes a sort of self-reward. The projects may also server as a portfolio.

Use this as a negotiation exercise.

If you do, first things first. Know your best alternative to a negotiated agreement (BATNA). Try to factor in the opportunity cost, i.e. what else you can be doing with your time if you do not take the job.

With that in hand, accept any offer higher than the BATNA. Reject any offers below the BATNA. Either way you are best off.

Of course it is easier said than done ...

(see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Best_alternative_to_a_negotiate...)

I would say do not use flags unless you don't mind being dragged into world politics :-)

I can give you the example of Arabic that is the national language across 22 countries. Which flag would you choose there?

The thing is flags come loaded with nationalistic sentiment. You will be dragging yourself into the middle of many political conflicts worldwide. Taiwan/China is one but you will also have Israel/Palestine, Kosovo/Albania and likely others. Users from one national tendency will quickly point out how their flag should be there.

Of course if you are only supporting a few languages this may not be a big issue.

Well said.

Microsoft dethroned IBM with "if we did PCs, [most] people wouldn't need to do mainframes".

Ditto Google to Microsoft with "if we did search & cloud, [most] people wouldn't need to do OS".

For someone to "beat" Google the the search bar needs to become irrelevant.

nytimes.com/technology roughtype.com gigaom.com

Thanks. The plug-in description (which includes RBAC) looks like it might be useful.

I did toy with rails while trying to choosing a framework over the past two months - but chose to develop using Django. Is there an equivalent based on Django/Python?

Thanks for the tip. The question is broad because I am looking for guidance how to even get started tackling the problem.

The application will allow buyers to complex RFPs online & sellers to respond to them - a collaboration. I will need access control to allow users within and across companies to collaborate with appropriate restrictions.

ditto

Well, this would rule out anonymous contribution to "community-related activities". Not sure how, but this may be an issue.

Good point. I guess when one looks backwards - different years may seem to have passed quicker or slower than others.

And, by the way, for me senior year high school seems the longer.

I agree. To elaborate:-

A given duration of time pales away in comparison to one’s age as he/she grows older.

For example, a 20-year-old sees a decade as half a lifetime. For the 100 year-old it counts as just 10%.