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Hello!

I’ve been working a freelancer web Designer & Developer for about 5 years, Now I want to start my own software company & I don’t know how to start !!
I’m not talking about legalities, but I mean how to manage stuff, how to prevent code from being stolen, how to organize tasks and be sure that they’re not wasting there times on Facebook 😊 !

Please Advice !

Thanks for your time 😉

Hi
I’ve not started a startup, so can’t really give too much advice (although I want to after Uni)
You might find this article by Paul Graham in interesting read, How to start a startup (btw, its a looong article)

As for the not wasting time on facebook, you just need to learn some self control, and if that fails, but some time based blocks on it, or just delete your account

Hi,

For the facebook part, everything you do has to be treated as a project. That way you can set deadlines, task, time-units etc. Staff can be held to deadlines, especially with a bonus system attached to it
As for code, use a decent repository like subversion and encrypt php if you den’t like others to see it.

And get a GOOD accountant, that is the most important thing. If you don’t you wont survive the second year.

This simple setup has kept me going for nearly a decade now.

Good suggestions from rogierb, but by wasting their time on Facebook, are you meaning you just dont want your employees screwin around and not working all day? Set up a proxy or some sort of web filter. They will hate you for it though 😊 Same as I hate the place I work for blocking half the damn internet. Something like Websense (what we have here) will allow you to set up quota time for things. for instance, you can set that they have 2 hours per day of time to visit sites like Facebook or something like that. Once that time is up, its blocked until the next day.

Adding to rogierb.. keep up with a good schedule. Use, god I hate to say these words, Microsoft Project, or something similar to break every piece of the project into tasks. Assigns roles/tasks/responsibilities to resources (employees). Set everything to a timeline and make sure they are staying on track. As mentioned, provide incentives for getting stuff done ahead of schedule.

I use 37 signals bascamp product to manage all my projects and tasks. It is a really incredible and effective way to delagate tasks and track time, files, messages,etc….  You can also create users for your clients that allow them to log in and communicate to you about their project.

how to prevent code from being stolen

This is a battle that probably all software vendors face. We currently use Ioncube and then a custom license key check to be sure it is running where it is supposed to. We are also going to be releasing the system as a stand alone product in the future. Still under development but you can see a little here: http://68licensing.com/

Now I want to start my own software company & I don’t know how to start !!
I’m not talking about legalities, but I mean how to manage stuff, how to prevent code from being stolen

License it as Open Source software. Eventually your application will be cracked anyway. In simple words, paid (online) software is dead.

License it as Open Source software. Eventually your application will be cracked anyway. In simple words, paid (online) software is dead.

Totally disagree with that. Paid online software is far from dead and if that was true millions of developers would be jobless.

I do agree that anything can be cracked with enough will power and knowledge. However that isn’t the case most of the time.

License it as Open Source software. Eventually your application will be cracked anyway. In simple words, paid (online) software is dead.

Totally disagree with that. Paid online software is far from dead and if that was true millions of developers would be jobless.

I do agree that anything can be cracked with enough will power and knowledge. However that isn’t the case most of the time.

You don’t need to make money on the application itself, you could charge people for support for example (as that’s something that can’t be hacked).

I do agree that anything can be cracked with enough will power and knowledge. However that isn’t the case most of the time.

Be careful with saying that, there are enough cracking teams out there that are capable of cracking anything you send them.

You don’t need to make money on the application itself, you could charge people for support for example (as that’s something that can’t be hacked).

Well yes there are lots of way to make money from a product. I don’t disagree with that. Charge for support, charge for modules, upfront charge, etc.. Each has its own pros and cons.

Be careful with saying that, there are enough cracking teams out there that are capable of cracking anything you send them.

That is exactly what I am saying.

I loved your talk about securing software 😊 !
but I was talkin about how to protect it from being stolen by staff members :D !

now, I’m working on Web app. and will work on it for long while, now if any one of stuff members took the code and went away !!

he can sell it or start his own website based on this software !!

well thats why you have your employees sign an NDA and contracts saying that anything developed for your product cannot be taken elsewhere and used.

on another not im going to be starting my own company hopefully in the next couple of years where we will provide a complete cms system to a certain market in need. the only thing is they will never see the code. it will be hosted on our servers for a number of reasons, 1 for security, 2 for reliablility, and a lot of other factors.