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VonHagNDaz wrote: This is a small company, and their first attempt at software development, I don't want them to have to buy unnecessary tools, and I don't want to be halfway through a project before I realize I've missed a huge component.
Microsoft has something called as BizSpark[^] to help startup businesses flourish. They offer Visual Studio Ultimate with MSDN subscription under this plan at a MUCH subsidised rate. VS Ultimate with an MSDN subscription will give you nearly everything that you may need.
Of course there are terms and conditions, fees, etc., but you could apply for one of these subscriptions through the link I provided, and they'll help you out with the rest.
"Real men drive manual transmission" - Rajesh.
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Again, thank you.
[Insert Witty Sig Here]
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Rajesh, you submitted the same thing before I could. I guess I have to give you a 5. 
Steve Maier
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If they are possibly looking to make some software to sell, then I would say to try to get into the BizSpark program, which is free and that gives full MSDN licenses. But the company must be making less than 1 million a year. Unfortunately Microsoft closed their Empower Program that allowed you to get 5 MSDN subscriptions for $400. It seems that the BizSpark or just purchasing a subscription might be the best thing.
The nice thing about the subscription now is that you will also get a license for TFS and TFS2010 is alot easier to setup. This means that a bug tracking and version control system could be setup easily for them as well by you making you look even more like a hero.
Steve Maier
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Its a good information.. 
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Since the software is to be used "in house", you have to make sure that it can run on their computers/network. First, find out the operating systems (no .NET 4 on Windows 2000) and hardware used, the limitations of the network etc. Find out how the systems your software has to exchange data with work (lots of COM, PInvoke, C++ header files, simple file exchanges,...?). Then you will see which technologies should be used, whether to use .NET with or without COM interfaces, or rather prefer archaic C++, etc. And then you can decide which development environment to use. By the way, there are also the "Express" versions of Visual Studio.
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Hi,
nice question, choosing right technology is all depend on your project and requirements. sometimes client prefer the language. if your project will be deployed on multiple platform then choosing dotnet is not good option. there are monoproject which is totally free and opensource. you can go for that , all the dot net features are available with it and its also growing well.
hope this information will help you,
thanks
-amit.
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Hi
I've had over three years of experience working as DotNet programmer. Someday I will like to run my own bussiness my question is:
Since I dont have any mentoring or couching in my actual job, How can I get that experience? I read and code a lot in my free time but I will like to know how to get more experience by myself.
Regards
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Running your own business is alot more than just coding. And I would have to say that coding is the easiest part of the business. You have websites, SEO, marketing, payments, possibly employees, etc that all have nothing or little to do with your core business.
I suggest that you find a small thing that you are passionate about or something that you have a need for a solution. You can then write the solution and then try to market it. It might work, and it might not. But this way you can give it a try even with the experience that you have now. My biggest selling iPhone app took me 3 hours to write and submit to the app store. This shows that the coding is not the main thing. A friend of mine actually contracted people to do the coding for him and then he sold the apps and started making enough to quit his manager job.
Give it a shot and start looking at what you are interested in. there is also a website for the business of running a software business here. Business of Software[^]
Steve Maier
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Thanks Steve, I think that you are right about coding to be the easiest part of the business. The Website is very interesting Ive been reading the information.
Im going to give it a shot and start looking, thanks
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Good luck. I am working on my business and it does take up alot of time.
Steve Maier
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The thing to avoid is to blaze ahead with a great product, since
as a technical type youll likely make something that you
wish you had, rather than something that the average Joe wishes they
had, and you will go out of business with lack of sales since the
number of people who want the neat thing you wish you had (and
are willing to pay for it since they need it and cant make it
themselves) is actually very low.
Step 0:
Figure out who you want your customer to be
Step 1:
Ask yourself to list what pains the customer is in without your product.
Make sure you are answering a "top 3 pains of the customer" issue
if your product does not answer a top three pains issue
for the prospective customer your product is likely not
worth developing.
Step 2:
Figure out bottoms up how you will get it to market, NOT top down like
"the market is X big and I can capture Y percent of X",
Top down never works. If you have a bottoms up plan of
"tuesday I will give a copy to X, and upload it to Y, then etc etc"
then you have a chance.
Step 3:
make a working prototype
Step 4:
start a C corp, make sure it owns the program, copyrights, patents, etc
Step 5:
show your prototype to a VC if you need lots of money - they will take 20% of your shares
no matter how little or much money they give you so try to get as far ahead as possible on your own
Step 6:
hire a bunch of outsourced programmers to do the grunt work, you manage them and write only key code yourself, unless your project is very small
Step 7:
sell your corporate shares and retire young.
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Since you don't have a mentor coach, but feel you need one, have you tried bringing this up your manager? Are you trying to gain experience and mentor-ship coding or running a business? If it is just coding, you can try joining some open source projects.
"Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming "Wow! What a Ride!"
— Hunter S. Thompson
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Hey Guys,
I've just landed my first contracting role (in the UK)!!! Wooo!
For various reasons I'm opting to use an umbrella company for now as I'm just setting out down this path and was hoping for a little advice on good ones to consider before signing up to one.
Any info or links would be really appreciated.
Best,
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Just curious, why are you opting for an umbrella company?
"Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming "Wow! What a Ride!"
— Hunter S. Thompson
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I've found Giant to be good, but a lot of agents have a list of 'preferred' umbrellas they like you to go with (often, they have systems in place that simplify the whole timesheet/invoicing process)
I would seriously advise looking into setting up your own limited company though,
Doing so will allow you to pay yourself through share dividends rather than a salary (apart from a small salary, within the tax allowance, that most people prefer to pay themselves) which saves a noticeable amount in tax/NI (assuming your contract doesn't fall within IR35)
Its fairly simple to set a company up and even more so if you go through an accountant (mine costs £125 per month but looks to be able to save me approx £12,000 per year)
Pedis ex oris
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Hi i want to buy Reseller Hosting .. What r things i need to take care before buying and My requirements are that i want to run ASP.net + PHP + Java Web applications on that hosting ... Is dis Possible to do and any other point i need to consider please let me know .....like about server space ,, speed etc please guide me ... 
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It depends on how much load you are going to have...And consider windows hosting if you go for both php and asp.net..
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You might want to think about what some places are now calling "private clouds." They primarily seem to be managed Virtual Server boxes (VMWare/Hyper-V) in which then you manage the individual hosts. This way you could structure your environment to be however you wanted. The only downside of this is that you will have to spend more time in the sys-admin role getting everything set up.
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This section of the forum seems a little dead, but I'll give it a shot anyways.
Ok, so maybe the title's a bit of an exaggeration. But I am beginning to feel this way about salaried employment. I've only worked in two jobs but have talked to many others who describe a similar situation. Things are tedious in the corporate world, projects get stalled, code gets "maintained" (aka hundreds of format changes) and there's the inevitable waiting for approval and doing things to your bosses' "standards".
After reading a couple books on getting into consulting it seems like it might be the thing for me. What I'm hoping to find here is some advice or even better wisdom from others who have gone down this road.
I have 3 years experience and already feel like I am more productive and adept than my co-workers. I am by no means an expert but I also don't see my current line of work as a way to get to that level.
What are some of your regrets or decisions that you are grateful for having made? Is 3 years experience too early to start on my own? What can I do to better prepare myself for the business aspect of consulting?
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May I suggest reading this[^] set of articles?
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Thanks very much, exactly what i was looking for.
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What exactly do you mean by consulting? Do you simply mean doing contract work or do you mean real consulting? Are you talking about just simply telling recruiters to find you 3 or 6 month projects or are you talking about building a company where you sell your services?
Real consulting is probably 20% coding tops. The rest is sales and business analysis.
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I would like majority of my time to be coding. I realize to start this way I would need to work entirely with recruiters at first. My hope is that through networking and ambitious marketing I could gradually reduce the amount of leads found through recruiters.
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