Software Engineering Stack Exchange
Software Engineering Stack Exchange

Questions tagged [business]

Questions about running a software development business.

126 questions
324
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52 answers

Why do business analysts and project managers get higher salaries than programmers?

We have to admit that programming is much more difficult than creating documentation or even creating Gantt chart and asking progress to programmers. So for us that are naives, knowing that programming is generally more difficult, why do business…
Joshua Partogi
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109
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20 answers

Making money with Open Source as a developer?

I'm currently a student (Applied Information Technology) and we do most of our programming in C# and Java. I was wondering how can I as a developer, make money with open source. I know there is the story of give support, or provide services, but I'm…
Haproli
66
votes
12 answers

Getting non-programmers to understand the development process

When starting a project for a company that's not primarily a programming company, one of the expectations is that there's a finished product at the end free of all bugs and does everything needed right away. However, that's rarely the case. What…
user8
60
votes
16 answers

How to stop the development spec from changing in mid development?

Problem: It seems with almost every development effort I'm involved in, no matter how much time is spent planning prior to starting development, there is always a large amount of changes required either midway or towards the end of the project.…
David
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52
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9 answers

When and how a programmer should start own business?

The title says it all but here's some explanation of what I want to know: Let's suppose a programmer has around 5 years of experience in multiple, mainstream languages. Also suppose that the programmer has worked in different positions from junior…
Yasir
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45
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12 answers

Dealing with bad/incomplete/unclear specifications?

I'm working on a project where our dev team gets the specifications from the business part of the company. Both the business management and the IT management require estimates and deadline projections, as they should. The good thing is that…
eagerMoose
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42
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19 answers

Hiring programmers for small companies?

I've been running a company for nearly 10 years, and all this time it's been just myself, another programmer (who's a great friend and cofounder), and a salesman (who's also a friend). Together, we've managed to do decent business and we've all…
Bob
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38
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14 answers

What to do if you find a vulnerability in a competitor's site?

While working on a project for my company, I needed to build functionality that allows users to import/export data to/from our competitor's site. While doing this, I discovered a very serious security exploit that could, in short, perform any script…
user17610
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35
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9 answers

How important is Domain knowledge vs. Technical knowledge?

I am working on a Trading and Risk Management application and although from a C# background, I have been asked to work on SSIS packages. Now I can live with that. The pain point is that there is too much emphasis on business understanding. Trading…
Mayank
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29
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8 answers

How to justify rewriting/revamping legacy software in a business case?

I work for a great little software company which makes good revenue from our main software package. The problem for me is that it's almost unmaintainable. It's written in Delphi 7 (has upgraded versions over time) and has been worked on by a lot…
sxthomson
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28
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11 answers

Coaxing requirements out of business people?

What methods seem to work best to coax requirements out of non-tech business people? I am working with a team that’s trying to get a spec together for a project. Every time we have met and it comes down to expectations for the next meeting, we ask…
Morgan Herlocker
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28
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18 answers

How come there is still so much programming work?

I wonder why programming jobs haven't yet "dried up" because of the software evolution. For example, I am a developer myself, which means that I do care about software (I mean I am not of the type of guys that needs a computer mainly to just browse…
jd_505
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23
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8 answers

Are IT and software industry getting more and more litigious?

The last couple of years I've been observing an exponential growth in the news related IT companies and individuals taking their cases to court, on one side, and the questions concerning legal matters everywhere on the web, on the other side. I very…
user8685
22
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5 answers

Are there any notable examples of business disasters directly attrutible to open-source software?

In "enterprise" environments, I've observed a strong prejudice towards proprietary software. Even in large business that use Java, it is unusual to find MySQL or PostgreSQL, and WebSphere and WebLogic are strongly preferred over JBoss or…
Eric Wilson
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20
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11 answers

Software Development - Project, 1 Programmer - What if hit by bus?

The company I am currently working for has me developing a bunch of internal mission critical software. I have one other person that works for me but he's more of a testing guy and not really a developer. The company is concerned about some of these…
Ominus
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