[ale] New website for H1B [Slightly OT]

[ChangingLINKS.com]

> A question still raises itself, how much time have you spent negotiating
> off shore contracts? 
No more time that onshore.

> How much money have you spent on calling your
> programmers and talking to them? 
Max $200 in two years. The programmers I have found work well through 
Ymessenger, and ironically seem to understand my needs quicker.

> Have you encountered any language walls?
Yes. Ironically, I have more trouble communicating with the American 
programmers. Maybe because I spend more time simplifying my words with 
offshore programmers? Not sure. But when I posted a problem to THIS list, the 
offshore guy understood the problem and had the solution while the US 
programmers asked more questions or said "I do not understand." This is a 
very general overview of what happened - but illustrates the point.

> Have the time zone differences caused issues in response time?
No. I stay up from 11am-4am. I work at night the most - so it fits for me. For 
some reason, I get little work done during mid afternoon. Also, when I do 
want to work mid afternoon, I can write a Looong email and send it.

> How is the
> customer support? 
Excellent. I have a way of using what I call a specsheet to work through 
features that are needed. It is like a 2DO list that I send to them and mark 
off completed tasks.

> You say "he would do Q&A for 3 months" but you are
> changing the program yourself? 
I think I usually change everything I get (at least a little). I am critical, 
an make minor changes to make the code more "mine."

> Why hire someone to write the programs in
> the first place if you are just going to edit the code and rewrite it
> yourself? 
For clarification, I don't have to rewrite code all of the time.  But the 
reason I WOULD do such a thing is because it gets done faster. Kind of like 
using a paralegal to pull case cites -

> How much do you bill out at? 
I am not a pro programmer. I do bill for other services and usually 
undercharge, bill for cost of some software I want, or barter. I am avoiding 
being pinned as a "worker" and work on projects if it furthers my goals on 
other projects.

> Have you considered that it is much
> harder to enforce an NDA across the Atlantic? 
Honor. Trust. The programmer I used offshore and I had a "email written" NDA. 
We even changed the names of certain nouns when discussing the project. I 
trusted him not to share. He trusted me with ALL of the source before I paid. 
We quickly built trust between each other, and now I only go to him with the 
most sensitive code.

> Have you also considered what
> is stopping that 10 dollar an hour programmer from selling that same
> program to your competitor?
Sure. But, the same problem arises with a US programmer. Moot point. (You are 
probably thinking I can just sue the US programmer; If so, you have not spent 
time in court. I pursued a federal lawsuit for 2 years. Suing ain't easy - 
and I do not see it as an option).

> I am sure you have considered some of these questions, but each single
> question in and of itself is a _valid_ reason to spend more money on an
> American coder. 
They would be valid reasons if they were not offset by other loses that come 
from using US programmers.

> Just as you can justify that it is more cost efficient to
> hire an offshore programmer I can justify that my project requires a strict
> NDA and rapid response times because we are under a tight deadline.
I have never been able to complete a project with an onshore programmer. 
Offshore programmers are always faster. The foundation of an NDA or any 
contract is "trust." If I cannot estimate that a programmer is trustworthy, I 
will not work with him. Also, I try to isolate what can be revealed. For 
example: The last project I have worked is being developed in 3 phases. Busy 
work for the Russian, Trusted work with the Romanian, Final code with all 
necessary attributes to make it work - me. Further, the software will use 
includes, so that I can have other programmers look at the front end without 
trusting them with the secret formula.

> I think the major difference between the two differing viewpoints is that
> Grant runs the entire project from coding to implementation.  
No. I have used offshore programmers to implement the code. But, I have a 
preference to tinker. If Grant implemented code for me, I would still tinker 
with it. 
The quickest illustration that comes to mind is that a maid puts the pillow on 
the bed, but I squish it and place it where I want and "tuck myself in." It 
is a feeling thing. I want to know the code I am running on custom software 
(not so far as OS stuff though).

> When you are
> doing half the work it does not make sense for you to pay the coder like he
> is implementing it as well. So what I would suggest doing is calculate what
> you bill out at and add it to what you spend on programmming then i think
> you will get a number that more closesly resembles grants rate.
I am not doing half the work, and the work I do will be applied to Grant's 
code AND offshore code. It is irrelevant - however your position may be valid 
with managers or companies that are less "hands on."
Still I contend that even if I hired a $20 programmer to do 5 hours work, and 
needed a $100 programmer to do 2 hours work, my total bill would be less than 
having the $100 programmer do all of the work. (Assuming the $100 programmer 
is 25% faster working alone, I would still save at least $100 in the example 
above.)

Drew
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