Software in a bottle Get in touch

Software help for small companies

Software help, scoped before it starts.

A feature that needs making, a system that's grown hard to change, or a product that needs someone to own the technical side. You get a written scope and a fixed price before any work starts, then the work in small pieces you can try.

Start a conversation How it runs

Taking on a small amount of work

An example scope: what you'd get before any work starts

i.

Three kinds of job.

All of them for a small company with software that matters and no one who owns it.

  1. A feature that needs making

    Something the product should do and doesn't: sign-in, a report, an integration. Built, tested, shipped and written down.

  2. A system that's grown hard to change

    It works, but only one person understands the deploy, and that person left. Made boring again: rebuilt where it has to be, documented where it doesn't.

  3. A technical partner

    A product with a founder and no one who owns the technical side. Architecture, application, data and the servers under it, from one person.

ii.

How it runs, every time.

The same four steps whatever the job. The scope is the part that keeps the price fixed.

  1. A conversation

    What the software is for and what's in the way. If it isn't a fit, you hear that plainly, and where I can, who is.

  2. A written scope and a fixed price

    What will be done, what won't, and what it costs, on one page.

  3. Small pieces you can try

    Each week something lands where you can use it, not one big reveal at the end.

  4. A handover

    The running of it is written down, so nobody is the only one who understands it.

The example scope, week by week
Week 1 Sign-in, live on staging you try it
Week 2 Your own results page you try it
Week 3 The season table one question for you
Week 4 Deploy, backups, monitoring live, and written down

iii.

Is it a fit?

One person, deliberately. That's a strength for some jobs and wrong for others.

A good fit

  • A feature, a fix, or a rebuild of how it runs
  • A product that needs a technical partner
  • A decision worth checking before it gets expensive

Probably not

  • A team of ten, all at once
  • Work with no scope and no end
  • Just a website: that's Site in a bottle

iv.

Who you'd be working with.

Jakob Rytter: a developer who builds software and runs it, from the application down to the servers.

Where is your software stuck?

Write with what it's for and what's in the way. You'll get a straight answer, including when the answer is "not me".

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