Experiences 'outsourcing' app development?

shakenbake

I have a few ideas that I'd like to turn into web apps. I'm at the final stages of a DFD and a 'functional' look that I've strung together in excel for the first one in particular. I come from an IT background but amn't savy enough in SQL and PHP to put it together in a reasonable time frame. So, I've decided to get it development for me.

I'm reluctant to get a local quote because I believe it could be done at a fraction of the cost somewhere in asia. I've sourced a few companies that I'm going to approach for quotes but does anyone have experience/advice of doing this as a 'sole trader' ?

The site will effectively have the same engine, frills, functionality as a dating site ... but for an entirely different purpose. I'm not even sure how to predict how much time is a reasonable amount of development time to be quoted for, considering much of the code to achieve it is freely available?

aidan_walsh

Right, here and now if this turns into the usual ****storm all involved will be banned. This is the only warning.

AARRRGH

I have a lot of experience outsourcing bits and pieces. This is my advice for you:

Register an account at www.scriptlance.com
Post your project giving a summary of what you need, and attach a full spec explaining the project in greater detail. The reason I suggest you post a summary rather than the full spec is I've noticed bids tend to be higher based on your word count.
Let programmers bid and ask questions. Check their feedback.
If you find a programmer who sounds reasonable and is affordable, ask him a few questions to make sure there is no confusion.
Select that programmer. Put the payment in escrow, and define what the project's exit criteria is, e.g. you will release payment when everything in the spec is complete and the code is bug free.

I've done the above about 100 times and rarely have a problem. The key items are clear specifications, only pick a programmer with a good bit of 100% positive feedback, and don't make payment until your clearly defined exit criteria are met. Obviously during the project you will get updates from him and make sure there is no confusion. This will probably mean communicating a few times per day.

PM me if you want me to go through the above in more detail.

randombar

Hi Lads,

I'm thinking of outsourcing converting my site www.ratemypub.ie to MVC, I have had a quick read up on the concepts, created the blog etc. I reckon if I saw one of my own sites transferred I might get a much better understanding.

What do ye reckon? Would it cost much? would it be worth while?

Thanks for any advice lads

Gary

AARRRGH

Your site is fairly simple so should already be easy enough to maintain. Why do you want to move to MVC? Seems like a lot of work for something which probably won't improve the site.

Just my opinion of course.

John_Mc

GaryCocs wrote: »

Hi Lads,

I'm thinking of outsourcing converting my site www.ratemypub.ie to MVC, I have had a quick read up on the concepts, created the blog etc. I reckon if I saw one of my own sites transferred I might get a much better understanding.

What do ye reckon? Would it cost much? would it be worth while?

Thanks for any advice lads

Gary

In my experience, I've found that doing something myself has always been the best form of understanding how something works.

It's very easy to read code and think to oneself "Yeah that's easy" but it's another thing to actually write the code yourself. The internet is great for finding samples to work from, I'd suggest finding an example piece of code using the MVC and try to create your own based on that.

A negative of getting someone else to code your website for you is that there may be no comments, or it could be done completely wrong!

fintan

AARRRGH wrote: »

I have a lot of experience outsourcing bits and pieces. This is my advice for you:

Register an account at www.scriptlance.com
Post your project giving a summary of what you need, and attach a full spec explaining the project in greater detail. The reason I suggest you post a summary rather than the full spec is I've noticed bids tend to be higher based on your word count.
Let programmers bid and ask questions. Check their feedback.
If you find a programmer who sounds reasonable and is affordable, ask him a few questions to make sure there is no confusion.
Select that programmer. Put the payment in escrow, and define what the project's exit criteria is, e.g. you will release payment when everything in the spec is complete and the code is bug free.

I've done the above about 100 times and rarely have a problem. The key items are clear specifications, only pick a programmer with a good bit of 100% positive feedback, and don't make payment until your clearly defined exit criteria are met. Obviously during the project you will get updates from him and make sure there is no confusion. This will probably mean communicating a few times per day.

PM me if you want me to go through the above in more detail.

This is exactly how you do it, dont forget the people doing the work are only as good as the sepcification you have supplied them. So make sure your full detailed specification is perfect and you detail exactly how the site should work.