Yeah, this is another instance of the "nobody ever got fired for buying IBM" problem. There are some interesting books out there that helped this crazy market make sense. The "Crossing the Chasm" books by Geoffrey Moore explain that there really is some reason why Oracle still exists -- and it has nothing to do with technology. Even if you're an interested bystander, this might be an interesting read, but if you're involved in a technology product company, you've got to read it!
I saw a few others point this out, but I'll chime in to put my weight behind it --- make sure you understnad what you're getting yourself into!
In short, you need to understand that starting a consulting business means you're taking on WAY more than just IT work. There's a lot of really interesting growing for you to do here, but be aware that it's going to hurt!
If I were you, I'd look into whether there are any consulting companies who would work with you to handle some marketing so that you can concentrate on some of the other aspects of growing this business. You'll still have way too much work to do, such as project management, billing, bill collection, account management, and so on.
Final piece of advice: Consider doing this if you're excited about trying to build a business, but DO NOT do this if you're just excited by the idea of doing a bunch of development.
There's some truth here, but you're distorting the hell out of it. To begin, MS did break compatibility with older code *to some extent*. In the case of Visual Basic, for instance, there are some language features that are no longer supported, but many programs will work just fine with no modifications, and others will work after an upgrade script converts some of these old structures to new ones.
Next, C# *is* brand new, but C++ still exists. I can't speak to compatibility between C++ in.Net vs. the previous version, but I suspect that, like VB, C++ remains largely intact.
Microsoft *is* offering developers a brand new language in C# for many of the reasons that drive the call for a new version of Java. The upgrade path is not insignificant, however, which is part of the reason why MS introduced this brand-new language.
Java can grow, but to do so at the expense of backwards compatibility would be suicide.
Sitting on the tarmac waiting to push out from the gate. Lots of time passes. The captain comes on the horn to say that they were taking some manual fuel measurements to cross-reference with a questionable cockpit gauge. Eventually, they shut down the whole plane, one system at a time, until it was completely dark and still. Then, they started "booting" it back up, one system at a time. Eventually, the captain came back on to announce that everything's ok. There is something vaguely troubling about sitting through a Boeing reboot...
As a couple people have pointed out, just getting neighbors to talk to one another is a small feat. But, let's just say you get that far -- then what? You've got to pony up a lot of dough for equipment, then someone's got to do system administration.
You're going to have neighbors bitching at each other over who's sucking up all the bandwidth streaming videos, and so on. Now, this happens to some extent already with cable modems, but when people get bent out of shape with the cable company, they bitch at the cable company, who's better equipped to deal with the bitching than the neighborhood propeller-head.
Sounds like way more trouble than the typical neighborhood community wants to step up to.
If you're looking for failover, SMC makes a wireless router with serial interface that will automatically fail over to ISDN or dialup connection if the broadband connection goes out. The same router has a built-in print server and all the normal firewall stuff. It's a real nice all0-in-one solution, and the price is right (I paid 179, but it's available for less now).
I haven't used my wireless to play Quake, but I have no problems with speed and response time. I would expect no particular latency problems, because the total distances involved aren't exaggerated like they are with satellites.
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Yeah, this is another instance of the "nobody ever got fired for buying IBM" problem. There are some interesting books out there that helped this crazy market make sense. The "Crossing the Chasm" books by Geoffrey Moore explain that there really is some reason why Oracle still exists -- and it has nothing to do with technology. Even if you're an interested bystander, this might be an interesting read, but if you're involved in a technology product company, you've got to read it!
I saw a few others point this out, but I'll chime in to put my weight behind it --- make sure you understnad what you're getting yourself into!
In short, you need to understand that starting a consulting business means you're taking on WAY more than just IT work. There's a lot of really interesting growing for you to do here, but be aware that it's going to hurt!
If I were you, I'd look into whether there are any consulting companies who would work with you to handle some marketing so that you can concentrate on some of the other aspects of growing this business. You'll still have way too much work to do, such as project management, billing, bill collection, account management, and so on.
Final piece of advice: Consider doing this if you're excited about trying to build a business, but DO NOT do this if you're just excited by the idea of doing a bunch of development.
Oh, and good luck!
There's some truth here, but you're distorting the hell out of it. To begin, MS did break compatibility with older code *to some extent*. In the case of Visual Basic, for instance, there are some language features that are no longer supported, but many programs will work just fine with no modifications, and others will work after an upgrade script converts some of these old structures to new ones. Next, C# *is* brand new, but C++ still exists. I can't speak to compatibility between C++ in .Net vs. the previous version, but I suspect that, like VB, C++ remains largely intact.
Microsoft *is* offering developers a brand new language in C# for many of the reasons that drive the call for a new version of Java. The upgrade path is not insignificant, however, which is part of the reason why MS introduced this brand-new language.
Java can grow, but to do so at the expense of backwards compatibility would be suicide.
Sitting on the tarmac waiting to push out from the gate. Lots of time passes. The captain comes on the horn to say that they were taking some manual fuel measurements to cross-reference with a questionable cockpit gauge. Eventually, they shut down the whole plane, one system at a time, until it was completely dark and still. Then, they started "booting" it back up, one system at a time. Eventually, the captain came back on to announce that everything's ok. There is something vaguely troubling about sitting through a Boeing reboot...
As a couple people have pointed out, just getting neighbors to talk to one another is a small feat. But, let's just say you get that far -- then what? You've got to pony up a lot of dough for equipment, then someone's got to do system administration.
You're going to have neighbors bitching at each other over who's sucking up all the bandwidth streaming videos, and so on. Now, this happens to some extent already with cable modems, but when people get bent out of shape with the cable company, they bitch at the cable company, who's better equipped to deal with the bitching than the neighborhood propeller-head.
Sounds like way more trouble than the typical neighborhood community wants to step up to.
If you're looking for failover, SMC makes a wireless router with serial interface that will automatically fail over to ISDN or dialup connection if the broadband connection goes out. The same router has a built-in print server and all the normal firewall stuff. It's a real nice all0-in-one solution, and the price is right (I paid 179, but it's available for less now).
I haven't used my wireless to play Quake, but I have no problems with speed and response time. I would expect no particular latency problems, because the total distances involved aren't exaggerated like they are with satellites.