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There is a lot of worry in the developer community about losing work to India and other areas with cheap foreign labor. As the owner of a development firm we have outsourced work to Asia and other places across the globe. We don’t just do it because of price. There are some very smart people globally and we don’t like limiting ourselves by the borders. In fact we are considering building several Asian teams. But at CogWise Software we don’t just hire foreign developers. We have developers all over the world and have a tendency to mix our teams. Our teams end up being very multi-cultural. Part of the reason is we get a more competitive price across to our clients by developing with teams in Asia and South/Central America. But by mixing cultures in our teams we get a varied perspective on the work we do.

As a side note, we have lost projects to foreign firms a few times because of cheaper rates. We generally check in on those projects we lose because they are not satisfied with what they get about 70% of the time. Just because someone is cheaper doesn’t mean they do the same quality of work we do. There is a lot of work that goes in to a software development project that usually isn’t known at the onset. A firm like CogWise (my firm) will fill in the blanks and help build a product that is magnitudes better than it’s original concept. I’m not saying that foreign firms don’t do this but there are far few I have ran across that offer that type of service.

There is a clear edge that Westernized developers have over their non-western counterparts but that edge is eroding slowly. The edge is cultural. Most of the demand is still from Western businesses which is very different from the Eastern cultures. A good book to understand the Indian cultural differences is "Speaking of India" by Craig Storti.

There is a rugged individualism and self-reliance that is very much a core part of Western culture (some countries more than others). Secondly, American culture and many other Western cultures are more forthright and direct in communication. Communication is more subtle in Indian culture and other Asian cultures. Lastly, some non-western cultures see it as offensive to do more than what is specified. In other words if you didn’t ask for it then it’s not assumed. There are many other differences but these are the core ones that cause problems.

I have a strong belief that the more the cultures mix in business and personal dealings the more you can expect these differences to go away. Global capitalism will always look for the cheapest labor and when the cost of living and quality of life rise in countries like India and China there will be other countries to continue the drive for cheap labor. The drive for cheaper labor, the highly educated technical labor pool outside of the United States and the cultural problems which are resolving over time will conclude in a lot of technical labor moving to cheaper markets over the next few years at a much higher pace each year. Further there are companies like my own that help bridge the gap between the cultures.

As I see it anyone who wants to continue a long career in a technical capacity cannot stay stagnant in the development of their skills. You must continue your dedication to learning. Any good programmer knows that you must continue to learn throughout your career to keep your abilities up and your options for employment current. The programmers who do not do this end up not staying programmers for very long ie… a CS Degree is not enough. Be globally competitive and stay on the cutting edge of technology.

The first thought for most people and the easy way out is to insist the government push companies to use native labor and not use foreign workers. The result is we get complacent developers who can’t compete in a world market which is not good for us. You can only keep your job as long as your company is competitive and makes a profit.

A lot of my personal and business decisions are based on a gut feeling and a watchful eye. A great programmer continues to build great things both for themselves and for whoever they work for. A great programmer also loves what he/she does. A great programmer will not be affected by the global dispersion of the profession. A lot of people don’t understand that programming is a creative profession. It’s not really like the exodus of industrial jobs. An afraid complacent programmer who does it for the cash will not survive very long in this market and should choose a different path. I made a personal decision to move toward the business side of things because I love the programming market but don’t always enjoy writing code any more. I guess I’m just bored with writing code. I also made a decision to work with foreigners in order to be able to have a diverse talent pool, become talented in bridging the cultural divide and offer my clients a more competitive price. There’s money in bridging the cultural divide right now and if you enjoy it then I would suggest you learn it.

As some of you know or some of you may not know I just moved to Hendersonville (across Old Hickory lake). If there were a bridge I could get to my old house in about 5-10 minutes. So far I’m pretty impressed. I ended up using Chris & Katie Bradds as Realtors/Property managers. We found the most beautiful ranch style home and immediately fell in love with it. However, I was concerned that with my poor credit and my girlfriend’s nonexistent credit we wouldn’t be able to get the place. Chris & Katie worked with us and we made our case about the situation we were in with our prior landlord. Eventually we got approved and moved over here. The house has an attached apartment that has its own entrance, bathroom and kitchen. My mom was able to move in there and share rent with us bringing my bills much further down and giving us a babysitter right next door. Further my mom works for the cable company so we were able to get free cable, internet and much cheaper phone service. Overall my bills are now lower than they were at the other place and I have 3 times the space here. Though I make decent money I’m a sucker for a good deal and always trying to lower my living expenses.

I have to say that Chris & Katie at Bradds Realtors & Property Management made the experience very pleasant and they have a number of homes that are beautiful on their website.

I’ve had to modify the below statement/paragraph because Rick McClintock of Old Hickory Property Management threatened to sue me for libel. Classy of them. Let’s just say if you want to know more about my experiences ask me personally.

Secondly I have to negatively point to my old landlord. My experiences with  Old Hickory Property Management were absolutely terrible. I rented with them for over three years and would absolutely never do it again. If you do get involved with this company read the fine print very well. The contract is very verbose and has a lot of loopholes in it that could get you in troube if you are not aware of them. As a review of my dealings with this business I’d have to say on a scale of 1-10 with 10 being the best experience… I’d give this business a 2. I have talked with other tennants of this company and they have had very similar statements. Also, I only tolerated renting from this company for so long because it was difficult and time consuming to move and when I first moved to Nashville I had a bad credit history. That is a factual statement about my experience with them and what I am allowed to say according to the law

I will miss my old neighborhood. Old Hickory Village had a certain charm to it which I loved. I felt close with most of my neighbors and enjoyed the area very much. I will always remember my time in the Village and how I raised my first son there and enjoyed the first three years of my time in Nashville there. I would recomend it to anyone looking for a close knit, peaceful neighborhood that isn’t a bad transit to downtown Nashville. The negatives about Old Hickory is the bedrooms and bathrooms in many of the older houses are small. So, looking around for the right house is a must if you move there.

Looking forward, I’m really excited about Hendersonville. There are a lot of interesting restaurants over here to try and the neighborhood I’m in seems really laid back. The transit to downtown Nashville isn’t much worse than Old Hickory. We went exploring the other day and there are a ton of beautiful homes in this area. Within a year I aim to own a boat that I can dock here at the Marina. Also, there is a Geek Breakfast in Hendersonville now! Geek Breakfast Listings . There is a lot of charm in our new house and I’m looking forward to throwing our house warming party over here in May. This time I’m going to invite a lot more people as there will be much more space to party and I’m much more proud of our setup over here.

UPDATE: This recent release (beta 2 of iPhone 3.0) is much more buggy than I would like. Though I get a lot of cool features it’s almost too buggy to be worth it now that I’ve spent some time with it. It’s a beta release for sure… be warned. I can’t get it to work with my usb hookup to my car stereo any more…. have to use aux hookup )-: and further it crashes ever so often. A few apps don’t work very well or at all. Use extreme caution because you cannot downgrade once you have upgraded to 3.0.

If you have an iPhone developer license this is easy because you can just add your phone to the dev phone list in your account and download the beta version of iPhone 3.0. Then you apply a simple carrier update and you’re good to go. Sure, you have a 5gb cap that you should keep a close eye on but you can have internet everywhere with nothing but your iphone and laptop. Here’s a good tutorial for mac users:

http://www.myappleguide.com/blogs/iphone-world/2280/how-tether-iphone-3g-over-att

I’m currently using bluetooth on my phone to tether with my macbook pro. If you are using windows you are on your own. If you are not an iPhone developer there are ways to get the 3.0 OS and hack your iphone to get it on there. You might have to jailbreak. I heard that 3.0 has been jailbroken already. Use google and you can find it.

Be very careful of your cap on data transfer as AT&T will charge you for overage (for real). Go to Settings -> General -> Usage on the iPhone to see what your current data usage is. Second, tethering swallows your battery whole! I suggest pluggin the phone in to your computer even if you are using bluetooth. The connection seems reliable… every once and a while I have to reconnect to the network.

Lastly, the iPhone OS 3.0 is a bit buggy at this point. I’ve had to restart my phone now and then and their are quirks in some apps. It does have copy & paste and I love that because now it feels like a real tiny computer. It has a universal search, a search for contacts and a search for email… love that too. Now it has landscape mode for sms and for email. I’m sure there are some other features but those were the most noticable. For an early beta it’s not too bad. I have the second release of the beta. Overall, I think 3.0 will put the final death blow on it’s competitors. Apple, I’m waiting on a 32gb version and some updated hardware this summer!