Hiring freelance software developers

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Hiring freelance software developers

A guide to find developers and work with them to get your project done

About the Book

There is typical one thing staying between you and getting your project done: finding a software developer that can understand what you want and build it for you. 

Where you find software developers? How much should you pay? How do you communicate with them?

This book try to get to the point and provide concise, actionable answers.

About the Author

Federico Tomassetti
Federico Tomassetti

I am a Consultant Software Architect specialized in Language Engineering: I build languages, editors, parsers, compilers, interpreters and simulators. You can read regular posts on my blog on language engineering.

I have an insane passion about Software Development: I love it since I was 8 years old and I keep thinking about it all the time. I have done several things: got my PhD in Software Engineering, done research and worked in Italy, Germany, Ireland and France. I spoke at meetups and scientific conferences, wrote papers and article, worked for TripAdvisor and Groupon.

I contribute heavily to open-source and spend my time thinking about software development and looking for the next challenge. So far I had an incredible amount of fun and I have no intention to stop any time soon.

Table of Contents

  • Introduction
    • The plan
  • 1. Why to hire a freelance software developer
  • 2. Understand the context: what is the market for developers?
    • References
  • 3. Understand what problem you want to solve
  • 4. Understand the value of your project
  • 5. Where to look for developers
    • Why you should avoid freelancer, Upwork and those large freelancer markets
    • Selected freelancer markets
    • Using your network… with some help
    • Where passionate developers meet
    • When to use an agency instead of a freelancer
    • Look for Open-source contributors.
  • 6. Should I pay a daily rate or a fixed fee?
    • The difficulty of predicting development time
    • Requirements change
    • Are you willing to pay for a proposal?
    • When to work with fixed fees?
  • 7. How much should I expect to pay?
    • The perils of calculating yourself the fair price
    • Why it does not matter
    • Compare several estimates
    • Let’s look at some numbers
  • 8. How can you understand if a developer is good?
    • Evaluate domain competence
    • Evaluate professionalism
    • Evaluate enthusiasm
    • On technical competence
    • Evaluate technical competence through proxies
    • Evaluate technical competence through a consultant
  • 9. Contracts and NDAs
    • Contracts: a few things to look into
    • NDAs
  • 10. Build trust
  • 11. Communication
    • Set expectations
    • Demand regular updates
    • The advantages of writing
    • Describe what you want
    • Do your part
  • The author
  • Credits

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