Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!husc6!mit-eddie!killer!elg From: elg@killer.DALLAS.TX.US (Eric Green) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga Subject: Re: Autocad (was OS/2 vs AmigaDOS) Message-ID: <8221@killer.DALLAS.TX.US> Date: 29 May 89 03:54:40 GMT References: <5160038@hplsla.HP.COM> Organization: The Unix(R) Connection, Dallas, Texas Lines: 83 in article <5160038@hplsla.HP.COM>, tomb@hplsla.HP.COM (Tom Bruhns) says: > dave@dms3b1.UUCP (Dave Hanna) writes: >>In article <5160034@hplsla.HP.COM> tomb@hplsla.HP.COM (Tom Bruhns) writes: >>> Amigas have not found their place in business >>>applications. What is the incentive for AutoCad to be ported to >>>Amy? How many people would buy it, even at 1/2 the PC-edition >>>price? I'd guess maybe a few dozen. >> Okay, possibly dumb idea here, but what if some of us whiz-bang program- ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ >>ming types ^^^^^^^^^^^ Whiz-bang programming types generally are pretty crappy as far as running a business goes. At least, I am. Yes, I tried it. Yes, I discovered that it's harder than it looks. Manufacturing and shipping on decent schedules was a constant battle. Inventory management and, for that matter, decent accounting (needed to satisfy everybody from the local schoolboard to the IRS), were a problem for folks with no management background. Then there was selling... you open AmigaVoid and look at the glossy ads, but have you ever wondered how they get there? Who drew those garish pictures? Who laid out the text in pleasing fonts in readable sizes, in a manner that looked professional instead of as if it were done by a bunch of amateur back room hackers? How did all this mess get to the magazine? (answer: commercial artists are best bet for professional looking results). Then there's the phone calls from the customers. Usually, their questions are easily answered, e.g., "Step 9 of the configuration processon page 34 says you need to do this and this. Did you?" (usual answer: "No."). Staying cordial becomes a necessary chore. Don't count on doing any programming, in other words, if you're going to run a business. It's an 80 hour per week job. No thank you, I'll stick to programming. It don't pay as well, but it's a steady job, and I enjoy it more. You don't need to have a degree in management to run a business. In fact, a normal BS degree in management is likely to be a hinderance ;-) (most programs I've seen have Accounting in them, which is useful to know, but DON'T have production management or marketing in them, which are much more useful). But you do have to enjoy that kind of work, and have some prerequisite skills, if you wish to make your product a success. Most programmers I've seen would rather be sitting at their computer keyboard. >>were to approach the product managers at some of these companies, >>(and I'm not just talking AutoCAD, but all the business areas that we don't >>have adequate representation.) with a proposal that they license their >>source code to us, we port to the Amiga, Porting is easy, and fairly cheap. Selling it can get expensive cheap. Then there's support... I haven't priced ads in Amiga magazines. I recall, though, that a quarter-page ad in RUN Magazine costed a couple of thousand dollars (this was back in the hayday of the C-64)/. >>Any guesses as to what kind of a reaction we might get with such an approach? > I really think it's a nice idea, but I do think you will have lots of > work ahead of you to pull it off smoothly. And if I owned the rights > to the base program, I would want some assurances you had both the > plan and ability to do it, because I wouldn't want my product screwed > up by someone I had little control over... > I guess the bottom line is, why don't you pick a product to try this > with and put together a proposal to actually do it? Make sure the > proposal is a good one, because if the parent organization thinks it > has little enough merit, you will probably be invited to not come back. Point a) Get a management/marketing type to draw up explicit plans for business organization, marketing and support. There are books in bookstores to help you do it yourself. But if you do, check with a professional to make sure that you haven't committed some horribly amateurish gaffe. Point b) Find a source of financing to assure the success of those plans. This is likely to be not insignificant, probably six figures. If the company you approach is convinced that your group has both the technical and management expertise to effectively sell and support the program, and access to the funds to back up the brave words, I can see no reason they wouldn't be receptive. Except, possibly, qualms about their source code making it into a competitor's clutches... -- Eric Lee Green P.O. Box 92191, Lafayette, LA 70509 ..!{ames,decwrl,mit-eddie,osu-cis}!killer!elg (318)989-9849 "I have seen or heard "designer of the 68000" attached to so many names that I can only guess that the 68000 was produced by Cecil B. DeMile."