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How Do I Get Open Source Programs Written For Me?
An anonymous reader writes "I am a biomedical researcher interested in having general-purpose, scientific programs developed and released as open source. Interface design and reusability of the code are of primary importance to me. For my purpose, Cocoa applications relying on Core Data seem to be the best way to get the job done quickly. While I have some programming experience, I have few connections to the industrial world. So my question to Slashdot readers is: how do I find someone (individual or business) to write high-quality programs? Are there reputable contractors experienced in Cocoa? What sort of rates should I expect, to use as a starting point in negotiations? Would a requirement that programs are released as open source make it more or less difficult to find someone to do the job?"
Simple as that.
Perhaps you could contact a University with a good CS program, or something of the like. You could fund a few grad students to develop your program for beans, with the stipulation that the source code be GPL'd. Grad students can be cheap, believe me - I am one, and I make a whole lot less than minimum wage.
Quiz: True or False -- On a scale of 1 to 10, what is your middle name?
There are a few things about this blocking your path to open source success ... and even then, it's not guaranteed. So right off the bat, if you're depending on this to get a job or research done, you might want to exhaust all other options (footing the bill yourself/coding it yourself/seek help in your department).
... and I'm not a fan of the cost associated with OSX. But if this is a hard set requirement, you're winnowing down your possibilities. Just get them out there, put them on Sourceforge, post them here, get eyes looking at them.
... is this what you are interested in? I recommend your first step being to approach a friend who is a system engineer (again, seek help) and drafting requirements for your initial program. Once you have that, it will both make development very easy to do via open source and help you concrete your end vision.
First off, the Cocoa requirement reduces your target development community substantially. Is this necessary? Are you opposed to Linux based development and execution? Personally, I haven't done a darn thing with Cocoa nor do I own a single Apple
Second, where is the list of requirements? I know you're not a Systems Engineer but if you're not worried about this stuff getting out there, why not link us to a list of requirements. I know very little about what you need and therefore would have a hard time advising you on who to approach and how to do the job. I know a little bioinformatics (FASTA)
If you do end up approaching a business to help you, research them. Do they have competitors? Is this their bread and butter or a side project? Have they historically contributed to open source? Figure out these answers so you don't have a pitch meeting that they take as an insult.
My work here is dung.
Perhaps so, but if the programmer is aware that his code will be available for future customers to see, that provides a pretty strong incentive not to churn out crapware. This works in most of the rest of the economy, and it's hard to believe on faith, as so many seem to, that it can't work for software. I doubt that all of the programmers hired to work on Apache or MySQL always feel pumped about writing whatever regression test needs doing, but even if they had no personal pride in their work, there would be the external incentive.