It's different here

Aside from all the obvious things and the blinding sunshine, I've noticed a difference in perception of distance and time here. It probably doesn't apply to everyone, but it conveniently links into my account of how my sister-in-law shook up our Sunday afternoon by offering to drive us to Las Vegas.

For me, and I'm sure many in the UK, a spontaneous trip could be to the supermarket or maybe to visit a local beauty spot, friend or shopping center- where local is usually taken to mean less than an hours drive. A spontaneous trip for me definately wouldn't be a 4+ hour trek across glorious, iconic, barren desert under blinding sunshine and in heat which I've really only heard other people talk about. In the UK it takes me about 4 hours to get to London, but unless it's a business trip it's the kind of journey I start thinking about taking weeks in advance.

So it's safe to say I was surprised, not to mention a little aprehensive- sitting in the back of a car for 4 hours may be better than driving for 4 hours, but it's still not something I'd usually do on a whim. As usual, once my initial reaction died down it and my wife's enthusiasm had registered, I was all for it.

First things first, I loved the drive- I'd never seen real life tumbleweeds or dust devils before. The harsh desert landscape and the endlessly straight road hazily stretching off to the horizon couldn't be more different than the cuddly green mountains and winding country roads that surrounded me in England. Home is home, but the scenery here is different and totally awe inspiring.

As for Vegas, well, while I'm a little too old and a lot too geeky for the rock-n-roll, lost weekend Las Vegas experience, in the short time we spent with him, the ups and downs of my sister-in-law's over (or under?) medicated travelling companion added more Fear and Loathing flavour than I would ever need. Essentially, the trip was just a great opportunity to spend some quality time with Bea, just walking around, shopping, playing, eating, replacing some souvenirs we had lost in the flood. We flew there for a few days when we were here a couple of years ago and had a great time, so this was just a very brief refresher. It was nice to just be there without feeling like we had to see anything or make good use of all the time.

Now, anyone who's still with me might remember that this blog is supposed to be about my software company, and that might lead them to wonder if I had a point for this post. I did, but only that thinking about Las Vegas reminded me of an article (almost a manifesto!) by Eric Sink, Tenets of Transparency. It might seem like an obscure connection, but one of the major points I took from that and Eric's earlier article on Micro-ISVs, was removing obstacles. Trying to make it as easy as possible for anyone who might want to be a customer to become a customer, removing things like unnecessary registration or crippled features for trials and complicated, error prone activation methods to control licensing. All of our trial software is and always has been 100% fully functional, but we did used to ask for an email address on our download page- not anymore.

The reason Las Vegas reminded me of all this is because from the moment you arrive to the moment you leave, there are no obstacles to whatever it is you're there to do. It's like the whole town gets together to make sure every visitor is treated like a customer wherever they go.

Back in the game

I made it, normal service is resumed... So far I'm enjoying being here, and aside from the 20ish hours travelling I don't feel like it's been too disruptive.

Update: I'm starting to feel settled here in California. I'm managing to work around the timezone difference when dealing with UK customers by getting up a little earlier than normal, and I'm in a more suitable timezone for dealing with most of our non-UK customers. I'm able to work here quite comfortably, and I'm getting the hang of writing software on my laptop. Also, the internet connection here is three times faster and almost half the price of my service in the UK.

On our merry way

We've had our last meal here, mostly packed, and now this is my last post from the UK for 3 months. We're off to the US early tomorrow morning, to spend some time with the other set of in-laws.

Since our house flooded we've been staying with my parent's, and now Bea's parent's have kindly offered us a bed for a while. I'm hoping that we can make some progress with our house renovations while we're away... the house seems to be dry, so it shouldn't be too long before we can agree a builder and get some work going.

I think I'm all prepared for the transition. I've been getting used to my laptop, and we have a broadband connection waiting for us. I used Web Helper Browser to save plenty of reading material for the flight/airport, mostly long web articles or blogs I've been trying to get around to reading for ages. Also, I read a recommendation on a blog a couple of months ago for Man's search for meaning by Victor Frankel, and I'm hoping to read it on the plane. The recommendation was overwhelming, I think I ordered the book the same day, but I've completely forgotten who's site or blog I found it on. Very sorry to whoever it was.

So that's it for me for now, the next time I write I'll have crossed the pond. Anyone trying to email me in the next 24-48 hours will probably notice a delay, but I'll get back to you as soon as I can.

A good read

Today, I've added a couple of new blogs to my list. I just picked them up over the last week, but sometimes you can tell right away that you're going to be a regular visitor:-

BigPictureSmallOffice & Revenue Roundtable

I found the first thanks to a post on the Joel on Software Business of Software forums. Checking back to the same thread also lead me to David St Lawrence's blog, which also looks worth reading.

The second is a new venture involving Jim Logan, who's marketing themed blog I've been following and enjoying for a while now.

People are great

I love seeing people using our software, talking to people about our software and seeing new people's initial reaction to our software. Every single user we make contact with can teach us so much about what we do.

Last week we gave a presentation of Oriador Rota to a potential health-care customer. It seems to have gone well, but most importantly we got so much useful feedback to push back into the product development.

Software Updates

We've had a big month of updates to our software.

Our staff rota/rostering software, Oriador Rota, is available from our website in two flavours. The standard download that everyone gets directed to and that is available from Download.com is our stable product. We tend not to add new features to this unless we're really sure about them, development tends to be focussed on trying to make the software easier to use. This month we released a new version which had a few minor tweaks only, and which changed a few of the default settings.

The other flavour is our Preview version, it's available on our site for all to see, but if someone isn't looking for it they won't find it. This is deliberate, we don't want new customers who just want to try our software to end up with a work in progress by accident. It is fully functional, but some of the details of the implementation and the interface are still being finalised. Here we give people a chance to see what we're working on for the future versions of the product.

The key feature that differentiates the two versions is the rule based scheduling in the preview. Most of the core of this is finished, it keeps evolving when more feedback comes in, but the basic implementation hasn't changed much in the last couple of months. What we desperately need to work on here is the rules user interface, it's functional but clunky- we can do a lot better. This month we added a lot of new rules and fixed a lot of little issues.

Finally, Web Helper Browser got some minor fixes, a new feature or two, and Spanish & Italian interface language options.

Too American?

Another personal distraction from the previous weeks has been my wife's Employment Tribunal. The appeal deadline was approaching so she needed to talk to solicitors, and I tried to be around as much as I could for emotional support. I touched on this in an earlier post, but not in any depth, even now I'm not sure what I should or shouldn't say so I'll keep it brief.

My wife is an American, and has been living in the UK with me for most of the last 3 years. Because of Visa restrictions she wasn't able to work at first, but once she had all the appropriate papers she started looking for a job. Ideally she would have been able to stay in education, but you have to be resident in the UK officially for at least 3 years to avoid paying international tuition fees.

Eventually she found a job as a Trainee Legal Secretary, and she seemed very happy with it. Unfortunately they fired her after two weeks, and the employment tribunal centered around her claim that her nationality, background and language differences were given as reasons for dismissal in the exit interview. They confirmed that she was told "she didn't fit in", but denied that it was meant in a discriminatory way.

We couldn't afford to hire a lawyer, but with advice from the Commission for Racial Equality we were still able to take it forward. It was a very stressful process, but Bea was very hurt by the whole situation, and needed to see it through.

The local newspaper covered the rest of the process as well as I could, so here are the best links:-

Scanned Too American? Front page
First Follow Up Article
Another follow up Article

The Tribunal hearing could have gone better, Bea had to represent herself, and although she tried her best she was no match for the opposing lawyer. I was very proud of her, she really stood up for herself and the court agreed that she had been unreasonably treated, even though the case ultimately failed. I was allowed to sit with Bea throughout the hearing for moral support, but wasn't allowed to help. As an observer, it felt quintessentially English to be in a court where office "cup of tea" etiquette could be discussed at length as part of the case.

Update, finally

Wow, it's been over 3 weeks since I wrote anything here. It's amazing, I really wouldn't have believed it.

I set myself a target of writing at least a couple of times a week, so I could be pretty hard on myself today, but there's been so much happening I'm going to give myself a break. I'll be trying to make up for it by posting one or two more updates this weekend to explain what we've been doing with our software and beyond.

This is the first post I'm writing from my new laptop (thanks to all the guys at the Joel on Software forums who helped me decide what to buy), I'm going to be spending some time in the US, so I need to be portable. Now I need to set up my development environment again and replicate all my settings. This is the second time in 4 months I've had to completely switch PC after my trusted 3 year old development PC drowned- I'm used to more stability.

We're also desperately trying to get some momentum going with our home repairs, and to get as many things as possible settled with the insurance company before we go. It's unbelievably difficult to do, getting in touch with people is practically impossible, and four months on from the flood I've yet to wrestle a single penny from them. The first cheque is in the post, or on it's way to the post... I haven't been holding my breath.

I wasn't in too much of a hurry at first, I assumed that the process would just work and everyone would take care of everything they're supposed to take care of. Seems even dumber when I see it written in black and white! If you ever need to deal with something like this, call and hassle anyone who is supposed to be helping you every day until you get the service you need. That approach seems to have worked for everyone I know who's used it. Our nice casual approach didn't get us anywhere, we're at least six weeks behind everyone else I know.

The most frustrating thing for me about the payment is that we have contractors who have done what they were asked to do, and who are still waiting to be paid. As I run a small business myself, I know how important cash flow and working capital can be, and the fact that it has taken so long to get the money out to these guys really bothers me.

I've really ranted more than I planned, and the responsible editor in me has been hovering over the Delete key, but I think there's an unfortunate but important lesson in there.