Your Idea Isn't Good Enough

I've been hesitant to write this post for a while. I'm a true idealist, and I know that the littlest bit of discouragement can hurt a dream. However, this has been a long time coming, I'm going to try and do it with kid gloves. 

A good idea is not enough. I know no one has thought of a way to network single nurses to doctors who want to have affairs and large payrolls (if you know what I mean). Yes, you are the first one who came up with the concept of sharing only children's birthday parties on a network of school aged children that enjoy horseback riding. While all your friends wouldn't shut up about the new twitter API changes, you were home working on your business plan for the SMS driven app that links construction workers standing on corners with guys in pickup trucks and questionable ethics. None of these things have been done, you are a genius, bravo. 

I can't tell you the horrors I've seen of people getting ripped off playing the start up game. I am not going to bore you with stories about developers who were in the midst of deploying apps they worked months on only to go unpaid and never rewarded. I don't know if it is the Facebook movie, or the amount of capital getting thrown around the market, but every developer I know is getting bombarded with opportunity. I can't tell you the golden ratio of making a Gmail Killer. I can tell you what I've seen, and how best to avoid becoming a roadkill on the superhighway. Buckle up.

The person that will be your CTO for mostly sweat equity is not someone you want building your application. I now live in a world where "CTO" or "Technical Cofounder" is a fancy way of saying "someone in this relationship is being had." On one end you have a person that is investing all the money that they got from selling their grandmother's minivan in a single person that is telling them they are a developing machine that is going to bring them from zero to Mashable with $10,000. On the other hand you have a founder who has happened upon a recent grad who wants to prove themselves, and will work 90 hour weeks until it's obvious to everyone involved that they are in over their heads. 

Founders, the odds are against you that you've found the perfect person to create your app. The developer that is qualified to build an app from the ground up is not running around tech events handing out business cards. They are working for funded companies that respect their knowledge and education enough to give them a full team of people support them.

Developers, someone with a marketing and PR background doesn't know anything about managing a software project. They have no concept of what goes into it, and what is neccessary to make it successful. They don't care that you're architecting, or iterating, or writing unit tests. They want to click the button and see the magic, anything else is overhead and costly. 

 

The developer that tells you "no" is the one you should believe. There is no incentive for us to say "no" or "not possible" or "this will take a very long time" besides saving both of us a lot of headache. The easiest way for me to get you to part with your hard earned cash is to say "This is a fabulous idea! It should take me 6-8 weeks. I will need half up front." If a developer telling you it's a bad idea, or it will take longer than you think,  it's because they are being honest. In all likelyhood they've done this a few times, and they don't want you to get burned. If you are hearing this, instead of moving on to the next developer ask for some feedback on how to make it more feasible. We'd love to tell you. 

No individual is going to have your best interest in mind. Except your mom, and I don't think that's who we're talking about here. The odds of you finding the perfect person to build your empire in this market are akin to your odds of being hit by lighting, at a Tumblr party, while checking into Foursquare. Sometimes there is magic, sometimes there are sparks, but remember what you are asking this person to do. We don't come to your job and say things like "I think it would be great if you could create this ad campaign for 10% of your usual price. If it makes me money I will share it with you! If not, eeeh, at least we tried." or "Can you give me these implants for free? If I make it as a huge Hollywood celebrity I will give you 40% of my royalties and 9% of my groupies." No, we respect what you do and ask you to do the same. 

 

There are teams of people that build applications from the ground up and that's all they do. You need to find them, vet them, talk to the people they've made happy, and pay them to do what they have done many times. Maybe you will hire a firm, maybe you will find a proven, experienced developer and give them the resources to do so. They are used to talking to people with no tech background, holding their hands through the process, and giving them quality products. Check their previous projects, talk to former clients. If you don't have the money to pay a team to build your application, you don't have an application. Maybe you need to cut some features and be realistic about your budget. Maybe you need to start hitting the streets and talking to VCs. Maybe the nest egg you have would be better invested elsewhere. 

 I hope I haven't burst any bubbles, I am not here to tell you not to follow your dreams (both founder and developer). I just think there is a real void in communication here, and a lot of people getting burned. If you want to make your vision a reality don't let anything stop you, just educate yourself on what is out there, and make sure your feet are firmly planted in soil. 

 

Oh yeah, and try to get one of those domains that are a real word but have the dot in a funny place. Like port.ly or stalk.me. I hear those are cool now. 

About Sara

Sara is a developer living in NYC specializing in web applications with a focus on JavaScript and Startups. In her spare time she Wrangles Nerds. 

She likes speaking to and meeting with diverse groups from the Girl Scouts to straight up code junkies. Her goal is to inspire more females to see that being a developer is fun and glamorous.

She is best reached via email, twitter, or on her cell at (862) 201-3065. 

Current Projects:

Girl Develop It

Add Blocker

Elizabeth & Clarke

New Work City

This Developers Life

The Girls are Back In Town

There is something I’ve gotten really excited about lately and it is only just beginning. I’m talking about the new wave of awesome girl tools to hit the web. I’m in the middle of the the biggest petrie dish for startups in the world, New York City (oh yeah, I moved, I love it!). I’ve been watching new ones pop up monthly, companies like Fashism,  Birchbox  and ToVieFor. Conceived by girls, run by girls, built for a mostly female demographic .

My life's dream knocked me full in the face when I saw this (omg, that google search made me find this  I <3  you, Microsoft). I was 17 years old and I knew exactly what I wanted to do with the rest of my life: be a part of the community that creates applications like that. However, I learned quickly that apps like that didn’t actually exist. I dreamed of the days when women figured out how to leverage software for their needs and wants. For a long time we’ve had fantasy football apps, miniature train forums, and ways to randomly put your friends into intermural sports teams online. Guys have been doing this for a decade, but now FINALLY, we are tinkering too!

Proud of you, ladies, can’t wait to see what else is in store.    

 

Making the Internet a Better Place

"What's your business model?" The words sprung from my mouth like rhetoric. Like "How are you?" and "Are you ok?" the phrase is a staple I use when discussing some startup or another, which is a semi-recent hobby of mine. While I was getting the elevator pitch during a meeting last week I asked this question, immediately noticing the douchiness behind it when the developer replied, "We don't have one." He went on to explain that they were very proud of their product and wanted to expand their user base before figuring out how to make money off of them. It's funny because I was often hit with the same question when working on Bundl.it, and I would answer "I don't have one, I'm just building a tool to make the internet a better place."

Like it or not we are the curators of the largest compilation of stories, ideas, pictures, and video that has ever existed (I like it a lot, and I bet if you're reading this you do too). Sometimes it's not about squeezing every last cent out of people that enjoy your work. Sometimes it's making life easier for users, or even developers, and not being concerned about what's in it for you until it becomes necessary.

I don't have ads on this blog. I've been approached by maybe a half a dozen companies in the past few months, and my answer has always been the same. I wont put advertisements on my site that are pictures, or images, I will only have ads when this blog gets big enough to attract the advertisers with the least offensive ads, the ones that are small lines of text that don't interrupt your reading experience and are an after thought. Why? I like you guys, and I don't want to pimp you for a penny. I feel like you are a guest here, and I don't want to make a quick buck by making your stay here less pleasing.  I'm trying to add to the value of the web by adding my opinion and thoughts, I hope it helps.

I love money just as much as the next girl (you should see my shoe tower). However, the place in my heart that the interwebs holds compares to no other. I consider it a career goal to make my footprint beneficial.

Join me? This is our internet, let's help each other enjoy it.

et tu, Iron Ruby?

The news of Iron Ruby possibly being euthanaized by Microsoft sincerely surprised me. I have long felt that the Iron projects are a nod to the real developer from a corporation that often panders to the drag and drop community. Pointing resources at an initiative that will never make them money (in a measurable way) caused many of us to believe that there was a part of MS that was inspired to give back to the people that have been building applications and bringing them Windows and SQL Server hosting fees for years. 

This comes on the heels of Microsoft.Data.dll and Visual Studio Light Switch being announced. It's very difficult to get a reputation in the development world as a skilled and knowledgeable contributer when your primary focus is .NET. Many look at us like bubblegum coders, not really able to tread water without our WYSIWYG IDE This type of progression does not help. 

I really hope it is not the intention of MS to phase out Iron Ruby and it is all just rumor and happenstance. I know that either way I will be continuing my pursuit to learn Ruby better and keep filling up my toolbox. I will be keeping a close watch as the rest of this story unfolds. 

In other news Rob Conery is working to rally the troops for a triage mission. If it comes down to it, it will be hard for me to say "If MS doesn't care about keeping this project alive why should I?" However, I do see IR as a valuable resource for diversifying the .NET community. I would love to be a part of this should the gauntlet be thrown.

Concept Camp 2010

    I have been waiting for this one event all year. Of all the conferences I have been to, this one last year was hands down my favorite. It was a weekend of software and s'mores, what more could a girl ask for? We hosted some amazing talks, we ate some great food, and we talked about the stuff we love. It rained all weekend, but that only made it more fun (you'll just have to take my word for it).

   I'm not going to sell it to you, there are 30 tickets being released, buy them while you can. 

   Without further ado, Concept Camp 2010. Pics from last year below:

  


  

Alright, Internet, give me your best

When I first started out as a freelancer it was very lonely. Steven and I spent many an hour staring at each other, and he never contributed anything of worth to our morning standups. Enter: New Work City, I had heard about coworking through some chatter on Twitter, I googled to find a space in the NYC area and found NWC.

I've been working out of NWC for a little more than a year an a half now. I have never fallen in love with a community like I have the one that works here. There are all types of people in different professions. We have developers (of course), but we also have startup crews, project managers, CEOs, and even a fitness DJ. One thing all these thing have in common is they are all extraordinary. Just walking in the room at NWC fills me with warmth and inspiration. It's such a privilege to be surrounded by people that want to do nothing less than make the world a better place.  

I've been actively involved in NWC's growth for the past year when I became a member of their board. We have been steadily expanding since I started. It became necessary for us to find a new location three months ago. As with everything else we do we turned it into something fun and exciting. We had a member scavenger hunt to find a new location. 

We found 412 Broadway, and we have some seriously ambitious plans for it. We are going to have classrooms (which we have already reserved for Girl Develop IT), we will have an event space for things like launch parties and different types of meetups, and we will have plenty of room for the spillover we are now getting from our packed house down the road. 

So, it's all hands on deck as our Mayor Tony Bacigalupo leads the charge to raise money. I want to do what I can, in getting us this amazing space, so I am laying my dignity on the line and giving it to you: Internet. A guy named Blake has made a web app called My Dunk Tank.  The idea is to allow folks to dare you to do things by donating money. The winning dare has to be done or the money is refunded.

I know you folks like me as much as I like you, so I'm not concerned that I will have to do anything embarrassing. I mean, you wouldn't do that to your favorite Girl Developer, would you? We go back so far!

Check out My Dunk Tank here, and remember, I'm a nice girl!

Your Code Sucks

       A very good friend of mine is in the midst of an avalanche of work. He has a lot of open contracts, and has been abandoned by a fellow developer that was helping him with his workload. So, with three huge clients breathing down his neck he has been working non stop for weeks now. 

       One client contacted him about the iPad application he is building for them, he let him know "I paid another developer to look at your code, he says it really sucks." 

   When he told me this story, I had to chuckle a bit, and think of all the times I had decided that other people's code sucked. When I first started out, and I looked at code that definitely sucked hard, I scrapped it, and started from scratch in a way I knew was way better. As I matured I looked back and realized that what I had destroyed was a well accepted design pattern, and what I created was a mess of a mess pattern.

Lesson learned. 

      After some growth I encountered code that I thought sucked ever so often. At this point I wasn't decimating things all together, I would find specific parts of code that I found intolorable and rewrite it. About 9 times out of 10, when I got more than halfway there I'd run into an issue that made me say "Ooooh, that's why they did it that way" and revert it or use the same "sucky" logic with my syntax. 

     Now that I am a little more seasoned, I can tell you with all confidence that I never look at a solution that someone else created and say "Oh, this code sucks." I know that there really is no quick way to tell if code is good or bad without understanding the entire solution. Sure, sometimes things can look sloppy, or poorly done, or undocumented (in my case, not self documenting), however, you never know what was going through the head of the developer that wrote it. More often than not there is a reason why they have done things this way, and there is no hard and fast way to tell what the context is without being elbow deep in it. 

    So, when I hear that someone has looked at someone else's code base and determined that it sucked I smile and remember what it was like to be so new and sure of myself. So sure that I was an amazing developer, and that I knew what was best in every problematic situation. I miss that swagger, but I appreciate what I have learned, and that is the only person's code that sucks is my own, and the reason why it sucks is I just haven't learned how to make it better yet.

Throw 'Em Up For HTML 5

If you've talked to me about web development for more than 5 minutes you've heard my rant about how "JavaScript is the future." I have an ongoing love affair with JS, it's been around since nearly the beginning of the web, it died a little when we came to know abstractions like Flash and, more recently, Silverlight. However, one thing we've all come to realize is that the cost of those platforms. There is overhead, the need for browser add-ons, the difficulty it gives search engines with indexing content. As a developer, a purely web developer, I can't reconcile asking my users to deal with this flaws. 

Enter: Javascript. When it comes to floating elements, and snazzy page manipulation JS is the answer. Our savior from the downloads, our bail-out from intros and restaurant music (sorry, but there is something to be said about Flash being nearly synonymous with the classical music playing and browser hogging restaurant websites that we've all seen too much of). I, personally, spend a large portion of my time elbow deep in JS and JQuery. That being said, JS can't produce the embedded video issues that....

...HTML 5 CAN! Check it. Not only can you implement the video that flash can, you can much better integrate it into your markup. If you have the passion that I do for the DOM, you can really appreciate the purity that HTML 5 offers you.  

  Why bring this up now? This is semi-old hat for all of us, and a battle we've been fighting for a while. I bring it up for a few reasons, I intend to invest some time in learning some HTML 5 myself (I did it with Flash, and I can't preach the 5 without being able to do some of it myself.) Also, I came in contact with this awesome site tonight. So, I had to contribute, and give my respects to the future of web development. Throw 'em up:

 

Girl Develop IT!

In the past few months I've been working with some amazing people about something I'm very passionate about.

Over the past few months I have been working with a rock star team: myself, Tony Bacigalupo and Ana Hevesi of New Work City, and Vanessa Hurst of Developers for Good. We all feel that there is a big need for low cost programming costs for women. We think it is important to create a place where ladies would be comfortable learning concepts, and tools, and mainly "how to code." As I have said before, I think the first step in closing this gender gap is to get women shipping software. So leaving them with something tangible was a priority as well. 

We are all proud to announce, along with our sponsor Girls in Tech: Girl, Develop IT!

Party with a Purpose - MongoDB WAN Party

 Tonight we had a very different WAN Party. I have been wanting to learn about document databases for a long time. I tweeted about it the other day and someone mentioned that we should do it together on the WAN party. I thought that was a great idea, so tonight we went about implementing it. I used some screensharing software to show everyone my desktop, then all together we went about removing Linq-to-SQL and adding MongoDB to http://bundl.it. It didn’t take us too long, and we all got to learn together. It was really great, and I hope we can do this more often.

 

Anyway, I thought it would be a good idea to share what we learned here. MongoDB seems pretty awesome from the little I’ve used it (basically just tonight). You are able to map your objects and store them in really simple ways.  

We used these blog posts as references for our education session: Jason Alexander's, Fredrik Kalseth's

So, the first thing you do is download the executable for Mongo here.

I then opened Mongod.exe to get the server running on my machine, and then mongo.exe to look at and play with our data. What I did next was find a driver so I could access my data from my application (http://bundl.it is written in ASP.NET and C# MVC 3.5 Framework). Someone suggested Norm, it’s a project by Rob Conery and it seemed like it would be up for the task. We downloaded the repo, opened the project, and built it in Release mode. We then went over to the bundl.it solution and included the Norm.dll.

Ok, so, next step was replacing Linq-to-SQL in the bundl.it solution. I gutted all my data access methods, the idea was to get the application back up and working again using MongoDB. The next step was mapping out some classes. There was much dismay at my “BundleManager” class, also my throwing two objects in one class file, however this was for the sake of time and will be fixed before I deploy.

The ease of setting up my objects to Save and Request from MongoDB was suprising. Norm provides a connector class “MongoQueryProvider” within which you pass the name of your datastore as a string. The cool thing is if you haven’t created that particular store yet it will create it for you.

Step next was making sure my objects saved. The syntax on that was “mongoQueryProvider.DB.GetCollection<T>().Insert(object)” or “mongoQueryProvider.DB.GetCollection<T>().Save(object)” (this also does an Update).  Retrieving them was just as easy: “mongoQueryProvider.DB.GetCollection<T>().FindOne(new Object {Property = property})”

 

One thing I loved was the ability to find a list of child objects by passing in the parent using “mongoQueryProvider.DB.GetCollection<Child>().Find(new Child() {Parent = new Parent() {ParentProperty = parentProperty}})” I didn’t have to map out these relationships in a painful ORM manner.

 

I don’t have enough experience with MongoDB to accurately cover the bonuses and pitfalls. However, the little I have worked with so far I really have enjoyed.

 

I’m going to make a “tldr;” how-to below to make life easy:

 

Step 1: Download the mongo executables and unzip.

 

Step 2: Run the mongod.exe from your command line

 

Step 3: Run the mongo.exe from your command line

 

Step 4: Download NoRm 

 

Step 5: Build the NoRm project and Release

 

Step 6: Include the NoRm dll in your project

 

Step 7: Create a MongoQueryProvider

 

Step 8: Add new object

 

Step 9: Update existing object

 

Step 10: Retrieve object

 

Bonus step: Retrieve children via parent.

 

 

I plan to do the same “learn together” format for the next WAN. I have an idea of what we will learn, but if you have any desire one way or another let me know.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

What the Frig is up with the WAN party?

So, lately the WAN parties have been few and far between. Originally we were going every Wednesday and then we were at once a week, but random days, however the past two months have been spotty and non-existent. Frankly, I've been pretty busy, and I've found it hard to dedicate one night every week for the WAN Parties. I've been looking for someone who could host them when I'm not around (I still am if your interested), however, none have come forward. 

I'm a little torn, because I enjoy them so much, however my responsibilities are many. I'm involved in some pretty cool stuff right now that I will be sharing soon (Some folks already know about, such as theMVC Melee). I'm going to try to have them as often as possible, and you can find out when via twitter. If you do not follow me, shoot me a line and I will make sure to let you know when one is scheduled. 

Thanks to everyone who has been frequenting them. I really enjoy the opinions I hear and the things I have been learning from the group. I look forward to many WAN parties to come.  

Mix 2010

So, I was lucky enough to go to Mix this week and it was awesome. Vegas was beautiful, the casinos were great, and I got to hear some really cool talks. I was surprised, I expected things to be very designer focused but it wasn't. You have to think, though, how many Windows designers do you know? I don't know any. I think design degrees come with a Mac Book and some granola.  

Douglas Crawford of JSON fame made a special appearance. It was cool to see him speak and even cooler to be sitting in on the same sessions as he was. He had some interesting stuff to say about aging out browsers and Java Script the good/bad. 

There were some cool dynamic language talks, a great "ask the experts" dinner, and many other Java Script sessions I really enjoyed. They have all the videos online and I recommend the following:

Six Things Every JQuery Developer Should Know - Elijah Manor\

How JQuery Makes Hard Things Simple - John Resig



The Tale of Java Script, I mean ECMAScript - Douglas Crawford

The Mono Project - Miguel DeIcaza

Reactive Extentions for Java Script - Eric Meijer

ASP.NET Security - Hanselman and Haack

Check those out and there are dozens more I didn't see that I hope to check out. I leave you with this picture of me and some Microsoft/Mono folk at the awesome attendee party at LAX in the Luxor. 

Happy Developing!

Introducing the MVC Melee!!!

Hi, how are you? Been well? Awesome. I wanted to tell you about something I think is pretty cool, and that's the MVC Melee. The ever so clever/kick ass JP Toto and I thought it would be cool to put together a competition for y'all to do neat stuff with ASP.NET MVC. 

The basics are that contestants get together in teams of 1-4 folk (I suppose one person isn't really a team, is it?) and get 48 hours to build the coolest web app they can think of in ASP.NET MVC. The applications submitted are then voted on by the community and then winners are crowned in a few different categories. 

I'm hella excited about this and a bit jealous I can't participate. JP and I will be starting soon with building the supporting framework that will make the contest possible. 

Check out the site, tell your friends, and be excited. We will be hosting teams at New Work City and other co-working spaces around the country are welcome to join in. We plan on plowing through the weekend, so bring a sleeping back (if you plan on sleeping). 

Review of my MVP trip coming soon. See you at Mix! 

BLOGGING LIVE

That sounds so cool, doesn't it? This week I will be blogging daily from the MVP Summit in Redmond starting tomorrow. Hear it here first as I DONT tell you what I learn (as per NDA) but I DO tell you who I meet. 

I will also be taking lots of pictures, and trying not to feel like a weirdo about it. 

Stay tuned!!

Blogging is hard, let's go shopping!

I have been extremely negligent with blogging lately. Partially because I am learning to manage a very full plate, and also because  I haven't really been inspired by anything. I'm working on a technical post, but until then I figured I'd throw a quick "What UP?" out here. 

So, come things. Well, NY Code Camp call for speakers is out,  you can send in your abstract here. This is something I'm looking forward to. One addition it appears we are making is hands on Labs for sessions. 

Vote for Barbie to be a Computer Engineer!

I am working with the Girl in Tech NY on some development classes geared towards women. I will put more information here when I have it. 

So, the WAN Party, instead of being every Weds at 7:30 has been taking place usually either Wednesdays or Thursdays, I always announce it on Twitter so tune in to get the scheduled or just email me and I will let you know. 

Cheers! 

Thank You, Yahoo

 In October of this year Yahoo host Open Hack Day in NYC. It was a cool event, they had great speakers (including a keynote from Clay Shirky); they also provided space, resources, and food to those who wanted to compete in an overnight coding competition. They had workshops, and cool exhibits (like the Makerbot 3d printer using icing). They had amazing food that included a  hot dog stand and Stella (my favorite beer). It was a great experience, I didn't get to catch many of the talks, but I did get to speak to other developers, meet some fine folks, and learn much about Yahoo's dev tools. 

In our welcome pack we got a bag, which included our schedule, a toolkit for "hacking," and a bag of toiletries for those of us that decided to stay the night.  The bag included things like soap, toothbrush, toothpaste, deodorant...etc. It was a great idea, and nice of Yahoo to consider the developer's personal hygiene. 

Thinking I could use the soap or the lotion included I threw my kit in my gym bag. I've taken to working out before heading into the coworking space I work out of some days recently. The week before last I was at my gym, freshly showered and about to put work clothes on when I realized I had forgotten to grab deodorant. I remembered I had that little Hack Day toiletry kit and I remembered the deodorant inside. I have used men's deodorant in a tight spot before, I figured I would just make due. I automatically assumed it would be men's deodorant, I mean, this was a coding competition? 

It wasn't! It was scentless gender neutral deodorant. I know it's dumb, but this surprised me greatly and made me feel included. I know there was some scandal involving the Hack Day in Taiwan and female dancers, however, the Hack Day in New York was a smashing success and whomever planned the goodie bag is awesome. 

So, thanks, Yahoo, for thinking of the ladies as few as we may be.