Potential Partnerships?

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Amy Stephen on February 13, 2010 at 3:53pm

Hard to feel a strong calling when no one responds to you! I am glad you are going to participate in the magazine. That is a great way to start making connections and that's good for partnerships and exposure and business! I am looking forward to getting to know you better.

Permalink Reply by Adrian Rosian on January 17, 2011 at 4:10am

I am looking for the exact same things. Contact me and we can discuss

Permalink Reply by Justin Kerr on February 22, 2011 at 9:14am

We have a fantastic Joomla users group in Chicago -- see joomlachicago.com for more information.  This has proven valuable for networking with fellow like-minded professionals.  Also, I went to a great event last year called CMS Expo; see cmsexpo.net for more information.  Lots and lots of open source entrepreneurs and professionals attended (and everyone was very smart and nice, too).  Perhaps you can look for users groups and conferences in your area.

 

I personally think that the technology end of things will continue to get commoditized to the point where it's not nearly as profitable to just implement Web site technology for someone.  Most businesses in the market for a CMS (i.e. small- to medium-sized businesses) also want/need everything else that goes along with a Web site, including the soft-and-fuzzy services of marketing, graphic design, copywriting, etc.  And these businesses want one-stop shopping for it all.

 

These softer marketing services can provide a great source of revenue and profit when deployed properly.  I personally am looking at a blended solution targeted toward a specific vertical market.  That way, I hope to leverage economies of scale for both the technical and creative services I'm providing to my clients.

Permalink Reply by Justin Kerr on February 22, 2011 at 9:28am

Also, to answer your questions:

 

1. Do you make an honest living offering design or development services?

Yup!

 

2. Do you feel that itch to expand your business beyond your current capabilities?

Absolutely!

3. Do you have some great ideas, just little time to develop them?

I think a lot of people are in this boat, for example, every business school graduate who has a great idea, "but I just need a programmer."

 

Part of the coolness of new open-source CMS and other tools is that it puts developer-level power in the hands of ordinary computer folk (like graphic designer professionals, HTML/CSS jockeys, dedicated hobbyists, etc.).   I'm finding that with Joomla's extensions in particular, all of the possible Web application tools you need fall into place.  Hard-core development time and expertise becomes much less necessary.  For the Web site needs of small- to medium-sized businesses, the existing tool set gets you 95%-100% of the way there.

 

That being said, there are certainly still many holes to fill and itches to scratch.

 

As a person who comes at all of this from a communications (non-technical background), you know what I really want?  I want some advice for the best way for me to gain some foundational programming expertise that will help me better understand how all of these PHP scripts work.   Stuff like explaining an array (and how it's practically used), how "this" gets applied in programming, the mechanics of a counting loop, or whatever it's called, "for" statements, etc.

 

Can anyone offer some ideas for either books to read, a practice language to start learning, tutorials to go through, etc.?  Yes, there's tons already on the Web, but where to begin?

Permalink Reply by Adrian Rosian on February 22, 2011 at 10:48am

w3schools is a great start for every beginner. Start with html, continue with xhtml, css, php, javascript, xml. Read everything on these topics to make a general idea. Than go to the MooTools site and see what that's about. Search wikipedia about programming patterns and read about Factory, Singleton, Observer and then go and dive into Joomla. The docs for Joomla are pretty good too.

Permalink Reply by X5Creative on February 22, 2011 at 11:00am

HTML/CSS are quite easy to learn.  Once you grasp the concept on these two, you can get by with a cheat sheet. Of course you'll become more proficient as you utilize these skills, but the fundamentals of both are quite simplistic.

 

PHP/Javascript are more of a challenge. I suggest starting with PHP and then once you grasp the concepts try your hand at JS.

 

The only way to learn these are by mastering the basics. Killerphp.com has some awesome video tutorials. He does a pretty good job of explaining.

 

Finally, I found jQuery a little easier to pick up than Mootools. There seems to be more community support for jquery (eg, lots more online for jquery).

 

 

Permalink Reply by Justin Kerr on February 23, 2011 at 9:42am

Thanks for the resources, guys.  I'm already very fluent in HTML/CSS and can usually pick apart PHP to figure out roughly what's going on.  I think what I need is just some more experience: Time to get the hands dirty!