rhspeer

  Ai tools have flipped the build vs buy math in favor of passionate small teams making CraigsList.com style business models.

https://www.narratear.com/ is pretty far along with this, and the founders are solid.

Meh, Mockflow & Lucid Chart consistently deliver better outcomes.

Figma is optimized for invoicing & silos.

I know these are fightin words for some, but I've personally never seen Figma be a good thing for product goals or the whole team.

I recognize the good intentions of your comment.

However, I want to push back a bit. I was depressed, but not from trauma. I avoided going to the doc to avoid long term prescription drug use and therapy. I regret that decision, and it cost me career opportunities and damaged relationships.

It is a legitimate concern, but wildly overstated in my mind for 18 tough years.

Well I took a written survey about my symptoms answered some questions. Doc said my brain did not produce enough of something and wrote me a script.

She's a funny old lady and was hilarious about how she liked these pills because it did not effect my funny hand gestures here.

I was sceptical, but took half a pill as she instructed. Next thing I know I am eating a sandwich at chick-fill-a not hating Chick-fil-A people thinking normal is going to be EASY.

I kept taking half pills a week longer that instructed because the positivity was a bit much to take.

I accidentally took 2 pills a couple times and I feel so positive I annoy myself.

If I forget a pill the old familiar negativity and muscle pain in my shoulders comes back.

I do still dislike Chick-fil-A people.

Yup, this was me for 18 years. Doctor had me fixed in about 45 minutes.

Massive life improvement all around.

Feel dumb about waiting 18 years, so I talk about it to break down the stigma associated with mental health.

Correct, they are exactly random inflammatory topics.

So what examples would you suggest?

The examples from the post were: * Euthanizing disabled babies * The positive side of colonization * Choosing ones race like one chooses ones own gender identity

Those also seem to have a political bent.

Also to be clear not advocating for or against any of these ideas, some of them make me VERY uncomfortable even thinking about.

This is necessary.

Yes there will be ideas discussed at the quality of eugenics.

However, there may also be ideas like the earth orbiting the sun.

Example topics that should cause too much controversy for open discussion are: * The Palestinian apartheid

* How Carolyn Bryand Donham fits into the #metoo movement

* Supply side economics is the root cause of Facism

* How long should a peaceful protests be ignored before it can morally be violent?

* The United States was violently founded on "Taxation without representation". The same situation is happening now with gerrymandering and outdated Senate rules.

* Cloning is going to happen, and it is going to get weird

* AI is going to happen, and it may be scary

I am NOT opening these ideas up for discussion. What I am saying is that all these are worthy of open, thoughtful discussion. Sometimes to say they are not a thing, sometimes to change perceptions. Mostly they are going to make a lot of folks angry.

H.D. Smith perfect handle tools.

From my understanding they went out of business in the great depression. However their hand tools endure through quality and continued utility.

If you ever get to hold a he Smith 660 screwdriver it is a surprising joy

Skill qualification and the more formal communication requirements.

FYI: Sails plugins are called hooks, and there are about 7 community hooks at this time

https://sailsjs.com/documentation/concepts/extending-sails/h...

I did some research on how to optimize for getting a site into the answer area at the top of results using schema.org's question & answer protocol.

http://robertspeer.com/schema-org-for-busy-professionals/

Turns out it's a LOT easier than it sounds. Unfortunately I never got a client to bite on this so I don't have results to share.

that's new to me, thanks!

It would be interesting to refactor zork into HTML+CSS and set it up like cssZenGarden.com so folks could add their own designs.

Although a much smaller text adventure game would me more achievable.

This could be a nice acquisition by Jeep/Chrysler since they're lagging behind in EV development due to lack of funds.

It would also help get the taste of the compass & patriot horseshit they've been peddling lately.

That's some beautiful vaporware, I hope they make it.

Huh, down votes signal it is reasonable to want a pet human, but not an apprentice?

Contimplating fostering a computer nerd to do QA. I believe that is how the old apprenticeships worked.

Would also move out with a savings, a marketable skill, and references at 18.

Not a bad start for a Dev.

Food nutritional information and packaging photos are essential for B2B foodservice applications where purchasing decision makers are looking for quality data that's quick to find.

It's less of a need for B2C applications, but still an important factor depending on the product or brands target consumer. The "label reader" persona is an easy one to see value.

These exist commercially, the one I'm most aware of is SmartLabel: Bacon Example: http://smartlabel.labelinsight.com/product/2709932/nutrition

It costs money & time to take people to court, so jerks will under pay you like $2000 because it's not worth the time and effort to go to court over it.

Dev is not like other services in the US where we can easily put leans on property.

So yea, own the hosting, take down their site if they don't pay.

I promise you every business owner has to deal with people that don't pay their bills and will understand.

Have a low tolerance for assholes, and if you ever get a lead on a client bad mouthing their previous developers about holding their project hostage, just run.

It would be interesting to see the Omniprocessor used to treat animal waste from factory farms in the US. They are a significant source of multiple forms of pollution in the states and contribute to some nasty algae blooms.

I also wonder how the heavy metals in the solid waste can be or are mitigated.

Had to switch from BitBucket to GitHub because BitBucket has performance issues dev team in Nepal.

The 24 hour dev cycle is upon us and it's important to make sure these tools work on both sides of the planet.

For Education, I really like this approach: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/davinci-flight/davinci-...

Learn by making awesome things to solve problems, then attach rockets and see what happens. It's a good approach, that's more fun for all and more accessible to folks that don't learn from the book & lecture model well.

I really like the prototype, simulate, 3D print approach. Being able to take home a flying model at the end of a lesson is just awesome.

Full Disclosure: Chris, the lead on the project, has been one of my best friends for the last 25 years so I'm biased.

I just watched 4 guys get stuck in a dumpster and shout profanities at each other for 2 minutes. A questionable use of a billion dollars IMHO.

Maybe this means I'm old now?

Perhaps this stereotype reflects poorly on both men and women. Mothers may be more likely to get involved in a new experience and demonstrate their ignorance, but fathers may be less likely to put themselves through the feelings of vulnerability required to learn something new.

Nobody likes feeling stupid, I would assume, this is magnified by how one wants to appear to their children.

My father liked his website but I had to keep it updated for him, he would not participate in it.

in hindsight we both should have substituted would for could

Oh no, be prepared for some really harsh criticism for the "your mother could do it". I did that here: http://www.robertspeer.com/blog/apostrophenow-a-cms-so-easy-..., it's not because my mom's dumb, she's kind of a big deal in the cruise agent world (http://www.cntraveler.com/travel-tips/travel-specialists/lin...) and the kind of person I don't mind talking about on the internet, because she's also a bit of a badass. It's because she's my harshest critic, in the nicest (ish) way and will not tolerate wp & drupal's nonsense.

It's not that mother's are ignorant, it's that mother's care about your success more than your feelings and will tell you drupal & wordpress suck no matter how much work you put into it. I'm working on a new Apostrophe 2 site for her now. Mom if you read this it's coming, and it'll be good I promise :)

I feel the same way, if I had things to do over again I would have gone into a different and likely skilled labor field.

TLDR: perception, complex value proposition, dev project are not making enough money, wholesale / retail projects, & dev projects are expensive to sell.

Better hours, awesome power tools, significantly less politics & frustration. I like solving problems and I spend most of my time keeping clients from sabotaging their projects and dealing with syntax & communication.

A couple points I'd make: 1) Skilled labor have significant fixed costs with equipment and buildings, I have about 5k (maybe) total invested in my little home based web dev business (contact me for quality onshore+offshore web development ;). The fixed costs for skilled labor are easier to understand, for example the phrase "it was cheaper for me to higher it out than buy the tools and probably mess it up the first time".

2) Most software projects are losing money, get on a project where your work is within the direct profit stream and rates are higher, as are expectations.

3) One of the many difficult things about tech projects are that it's really difficult to understand what is hard and what is easy. Estimates are rough even after over 10 years of programming, non technical stakeholders have no idea, that goes double for the ones that tell you about all the cool tech stuff they did in the 90's. With plumbing, and almost any other skill, the value proposition is easier to see.

4) Dev's do not do a good job of appearing to be important. Like it or not perception is a big deal, I loath working with suits, and do what I can to avoid looking like them because looking professional has become synonymous with high quality hair product and low quality work. I realize if I look expensive, act like I know what I'm doing, people assume I know what I'm doing. I usually do, but I'm also usually working at home in a T-shirt, carhartt shorts, and flippy flops, but when clients seem me I dress like Bill Gates & Warren Buffet, not to slick but professional.

5) Many dev clients are not retail, they are wholesale. It's important to adjust rates based off volume & project risk. Joe Shmoe from craigslist is going to offer a low volume project, with the high risk that he's going to mess up his project and blame you because he has no idea what he's doing, those guys get higher rates. Agencies that have a good plan, reasonable volume, and a history of success have earned a lower rate.

6) Dev projects are expensive to sell compared to skilled labor projects, this means sales guys deserve a bigger cut, and since they are good at negotiating they leverage this to get as much as they can. This leaves a smaller piece of the pie for the rest of the team.

https://doc.ez.no/display/EZP/eZ+Publish+REST+API

While a good post, the real issue is that non technical managers of technical projects is quickly becoming more of a risk than many projects can prudently accept.

The old, and unfair, characterization of programmers as smelly trolls that can't handle client interactions is more of a crutch for fools than a reality.

The truth is my clients complain bitterly about how they'd prefer to just talk directly to the dev's and not be bothered by the various hand waivers trying to justify their line item on an invoice. Often this is a great way to annoy the dev team, but it's a good expression of the perceived value of a non technical intermediary.

In the end the old truism of "You can't manage what you don't understand" still applies to this new fangled industry of software development.

That being said, ramping dev's up on management techniques is another challenge, for another internet rant.

down for me, this is the google cached version for the lazy: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache%3Ahttp%...