Organic Programming

Today I got an email from somebody that found our site selling obfusc (a tool, php obfuscator) and it is interested in using it. The mail:

Dear abss ,

hope my words reach your heart.

<name>

I like his message (how you could not:D) it tells us that we have a good product and some people are loving it.  As we prepare to release a new product, SensErp I would like to see your impression about this email (comments or by email)!

“Elegance is not a dispensable luxury but a factor that decides between success and failure.” Edsger Dijkstra

We had a discussion today in a meeting and we had an strong insight: we don’t try to create/sell just another RAD framework but we are trying to sell: an environment that will enforce code discipline,an architecture that respects the experience of the industry (like MDA), best practices.

Really! We even decided to sacrifice from the programmer’s immediate convenience in order to deliver what we promise: reduced  maintenance costs for the final applications. That could annoy some users if we fail to communicate what we are really selling: DISCIPLINE in PROGRAMMING with  MVC,  good practices and environment that will inhibit programmers  to do clever tricks. Only at the end we should say that we sell  a simpler programming framework! Sure, we are also targeting Excel users (at least the most sophisticated ones and only for simple things like CRUDs,simple forms) but it just happens that doing a “visual editor for MVC” led us near possible alternatives to spreadsheets space of tools. It is risky,very risky for a business to educate his customers but we are trying our best to do it in a easy and rewarding way.

Yes, a good education is required to appreciate elegance but usually the most elegant solution is the one that is more simple and efficient (almost by definition of the elegance) and we are thriving to achieve just that!

By best practices we mean things like:

• loose object coupling [1]
• real MVC architecture (and as simple as possible)
• MDA
• don’t mix many technologies and APIs in the same place (or like mixing view with controller as in many pseudo MVC frameworks)
• Don’t re-invent the wheel [2] (we have reinvented it for you )
• Keep things as simple as possible but not simpler. [2]
• Learn from others mistakes, not your own. [2]
• Begin with an end in mind [2]
• If it’s not broken, don’t fix it. [2]
• others…[]

References:

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loose_coupling
[2] http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en/Vsexpressvb/thread/78f6a9ba-05eb-45b7-88d5-8bcfcf0643cc

Reading this post: http://ravimohan.blogspot.com/2006/07/but-martin-enterprise-software-is.html I’ve remembered that basically  I have the same beliefs. Doing a framework for enterprise software is not boring at all. Of course we all know that. Doing one to be successful is hard. I’m trying for the 3th time to create a real maintenance cost killer framework for Enterprise software and finally I’m happy with the results (Quark 2.0 is just awesome!!!)

It is almost common sense that a business idea should be a little boring in order to be a good businesses idea (and i’m a little afraid that the work for the framework was  not boring enough ).

Our business strategy:

• create a technology to reduce creation/maintenance costs for enterprise software (with real programmers in mind,even if we are oriented even towards beginners or more business oriented people). Yes, you have Spring,Rails that are OK for programmers with medium experience but we can do much more for “Excel programmers”  but also for programmers with various skills and interests!
• looking for a way to replace Excel :we are not creating a spreadsheet clone but we want a tool with a similar learning curve as Excel for nontechnical users
• flood the market with good quality software for SMBs (open source and commercial)

Given that, I don’t think Enterprise Software is boring for everybody (is boring only for some hackers) . There are enough people (actually many many people) that have business orientation and skills to use modern programming tools for the creation of new, beautiful and useful software for companies without even asking themselves if it is boring or not.

We are preparing a presentation for how-to-web startup contest  http://www.how-to-web.net/startup-challenge/

Wish us good luck!