I think a lot of people are missing this point. This will not allow someone to become their own carrier. It allows someone to install their own "cell towers" and have devices connect to them without having to use a 3rd party carrier.
Does this only work with files or can any source be used as long as it is a Stream? Basically, I'd love to have something like this for arbitrary data, not just files.
I am the Salty Dog: a sturdy, weather beaten crew member who stands at the prow of your ship, guiding you safely through the rocks.
Full Stack Mobile Development, Design, Coding, QA, Back-end. Java, C#, Objective-C, Xamarin, C/C++, Azure, AWS. 20+ years experience, 7 years mobile development.
Achieve better outcomes through communication, risk management, and experience.
I am the Salty Dog: a sturdy, weather beaten crew member who stands at the prow of your ship, guiding you safely through the rocks.
Full Stack Mobile Development, Design, Coding, QA, Back-end. Java, C#, Objective-C, Xamarin, C/C++, Azure, AWS. 20+ years experience, 7 years mobile development.
Better outcomes through communication, risk management, and experience.
I tend to agree. I only had luck when I described it as maintenance and estimated dollar or schedule costs for not addressing the issue. And then it was regarded as a one time fix as opposed to something that needed to be done on a routine basis.
In what way do you mean "freelancer". There are multiple types of freelance jobs.
"Freelance" can mean:
1) Working remotely as a contractor though a 3rd party agency.
2) Working remotely hourly or per gig for yourself.
3) Doing end-to-end project work. Start with designs, code, test, and submit as a package deal.
All have different ways of finding clients. However, they tend to follow a career progression in that same order. My career path did.
I advise you to think about freelancing, not as a developer, but a business owner. Consider the following:
* What sort of business entity are you going to have? All have trade offs, and specific obligations from a pure business perspective. One piece of advice that my accountant gave me: Just because you create an LLC with your state govt doesn't make you an LLC. From a court's perspective you have to act like it. In my state that requires Articles of Organization, an Operation Agreement and at least yearly documented meetings with the stakeholders.
* Learn how to protect yourself legally. This means find a lawyer and get a standard contract. Have an attorney review any contract before you sign it. Figure out a strategy for when someone doesn't pay, and how this strategy may change if they are local or remote. It is much harder to take someone out of state to court. I have turned down gigs because we couldn't come to agreement on contract language. One contract asked me to pay all court fees in the event the software led to any issues for their clients. (It was for a medical device.)
* Think about how you are going to charge. Hourly/by the project. Clients may ask for fixed prices and not-to-exceeds. There are a lot of opinions about this. Make an informed decision about how you are going to approach this.
* How are you going to sell yourself. Most of my work comes through word-of-mouth. Figure out your pitch, and how you differentiate yourself from competition. Reputation counts for a lot. Think about setting networking/sales goals. Expect the engagement process to take a long time, and not all of it to pan out. I've spend many hours trying to engage a new client, only to have them change their mind at the last minute. Account for this in your pricing.
* Expect feast or famine. Sometimes you may be sweating bullets because you don't have enough work and bills are coming due. Sometimes you're sweating bullets because several clients are wanting things all at once. Sometimes you may be working nights and weekends.
* As a small guy, you are the product. It pays to be a high quality product.
I am 49 and have a CS Degree, ~25 years experience. I run my own mobile/web development company out of my home, making more money than I ever have before. I've been in business for about 3 years and each year my revenue increases by 20-30% I am principle architect and coder.
In order to do this, I have had to learn new languages, frameworks and new ways of thinking about things. Some of those "new" things weren't difficult, they just required tweaking old ways of looking at things.
For example, older mobile devices are resource constrained. Having to think about conservation while coding isn't new. I started my career coding on shitty MS Dos system where if you had 640K of memory, it was a high-end machine. The tweaking comes in with the addition of other constrains such as battery life, coalescing radio usage and the fact that the OS can decide to shut down your app and restart it at any time, but the user's expectation is it should be the way the just left it.
Continually learning and reinventing myself is just the way things are now. If you haven't had to deal with that yet, just wait. It will come.
Looking for Xamarin Forms and/or PHP/Laravel developer for occasional load-leveling. We're a small dev firm and sometimes needs help when things get too crazy.
Please reply to curtis [at] saltydogtechnology [dot] com.
It's actually a larger question than you perhaps realize. There are different kinds of freelancing. The spectrum ranges from something that looks like "remote" work to something more akin to agency-like project work.
That former is much easier. The latter pays better but requires a whole bunch of other skills, and takes much more time. The two aren't mutually exclusive however, and that is what I've done as part of my strategy.
There is a monthly find a freelancer thread on here where you might be able to find a gig. Work on building your portfolio/reputation. I'd suggest small projects at reduced rates.
Next, I'd visit a lawyer and get a template contract worked out. Rather than have him write one from scratch, find one that includes a lot of the things you want and have him tweak it. It will be cheaper that way. Most important (IMO) are indemnification, terms of payment, and arbitration.
Get used to promoting yourself. Have your short and long "elevator pitch" together. Put together a landing page and get some business cards. Talk.To.Everyone! You never know where and when your next client will come from.
One of the issues you will run into is the feast or famine issue. You never know when you will get your next client, you have to always be on the lookout and courting -- overloading the queue because a percentage will drop out. If you don't find the next soon enough, then famine. If, as it happens often, several prospects say yes, then you feast. By feast I mean work a lot of hours and save up so you can weather the next famine.
What are your skills? Do you have a portfolio? How about an up-to-date linked-in profile?
After 25 years in the industry, and been in the roles of senior engineer, lead engineer, manager, business owner. Here is my advice and thoughts.
Companies, divisions and teams are inherently social and political. Communication is very important. Understanding other people's perspectives, even if you disagree. Keep your emotions in check. Take the high road. Don't assume malice when incompetence is a sufficient explanation. Go out of your way to help other people. It builds good karma that will pay you back. Get to know other people in the company. Talk to them and show interest in them.
Perception is king. The only thing that matters is other people's perception of your you and your work. That said, the best way to increase people's perception you is to be a hard worker. Manage the visibility of what you're working on and look for visible things to do. When a department is being downsized, it's the people who are perceived to be of high value that are retained. Remember that you're being watched, even when you think you aren't. Don't look at porn at work. Don't be the last to arrive at work or the first to leave.
Knowledge should be your main goal at this point. Knowledge increases your value. Learn new technologies. Absorb as much as you can. Become the expert in niche technologies used by your team/company. It is your responsibility to make sure you understand what needs to be done. Don't expect someone to explain it to you. Make an educated guess about what are the relevant for next year and learn those. Code at home. Follow your interests.
I think a lot of people are missing this point. This will not allow someone to become their own carrier. It allows someone to install their own "cell towers" and have devices connect to them without having to use a 3rd party carrier.