I have a little story to tell that I hope will inspire someone to pursue an entrepreneurial goal. I came across a notebook recently. I don’t remember exactly when I used this one, but it was somewhere around ’97 or ’98. Back then, I was playing chess on a web site called ItsYourTurn.com. I loved […]
Early in my career, I decided I was going to build a web site to compete with one that I used, but had some problems with. It seemed like something I could pull off part time, while continuing with my full-time job. At the time, I had little idea of how much work it would […]
When you start a project, one of the early choices you need to make is what technologies to use. You use tools that will support your efforts, not get in your way. For Trovz.com, I went with PHP on the server side. Over time, I added CakePHP, and I adopted jQuery for client-side work. I […]
Trovz.com taught me that it’s important to get some core users early. But how do you get them, and how do you make use of them? First things first: what does a core group of early users do for you? First, users will tell you what’s wrong with your site. (Or if they don’t, they’ll […]
I’ve always known that the visual aspect of software is important, but most of my software development career has been building behind-the-scenes components that no user ever saw. I knew good user interface design was important, I just didn’t know how to design one. Not knowing anything about web development when I started, I began […]
It’s very difficult to start up a company part time. I’m not saying it can’t be done, but it’s tough. This simple equation popped into my head earlier: Productivity = Skill * Commitment * Tools Early in our effort, we actually did pretty well on the Commitment part of the equation. Four of us developers […]
In April 2007, I started work on what became Trovz.com, a site to help people lend, rent, and buy stuff. On August 19th, 2009, I threw in the towel. I think my first lesson came even before I got started on this idea: the value of an honest friend. I’d previously worked with a guy, […]