A curse of engineering mind
There’s a lot of useful, nicely designed, user proven, tested, stable, time saving, free or cheap services, programs, scripts, webapps and things alike in this world. And I could be using any one of them to get the job done well, effortlessly and on time.
And yet, for every useful, nicely designed, stable, free or cheap service, webapp and thing alike, I switch to “analyst/designer/programmer/engineer“-mode. All I can think about is how could I create an application with the same functionality and run it myself. I get so into it that I can see a solution for any specific sub-problem, feature and caveat.
I have a problem with not having total control over things I use and know I could create myself. On the other hand, I break that “personal rule” on daily basis - I have no problem using GMail for my main e-mail, no problem with using Google Calendar for time management, no problem with using Dreamhost for my domain and Django apps hosting, and last but not least using WordPress for this blog. And I use these tools on daily basis, some of them for 5th year and running.
But since I’ve started actively developing different web applications I find myself rejecting to use perfectly good, usable, tested, stable, time saving and free existing services. If I would have to pay for the service, then the whole “master plan” for building the service myself just jumps in front of me, leaving me troubled, knowing that I do not have the time and energy to create it properly, but still refusing to use the existing service.
For example: I’ve recently came to realize that I need a way to make my whole photo library available online with photos in full resolution, EXIF information, tagging, sub-galleries, custom access restriction with guest users & uploaders, with unlimited space and bandwidth restriction.
Great, I thought, I’m sure there’s something out there I could use. Well, finding something I could “agree with” is something totally different. Services like Flickr and Marela have bandwidth restrictions and do not offer “private-only” albums and advanced usage; open-source scripts like Gallery2 and others are something I despise for their extremely bad user experience; html-generating desktop applications are fine when you want a single gallery with 20 photos, but when you have gigabytes of pictures like I do, those end up useless too.
Then one day, Fry, a colleague from Kiberpipa, pointed out a professional-oriented photo hosting service called SmugMug. I’ve checked it and it was all my dreams come true! Unlimited storage, unlimited bandwidth, access restriction, style skins, no ads, everything! Sure, you have to pay a subscription fee of $40 USD/year for Basic, $60 USD/year for PowerUser or $150 USD/year for Professional account, but there it is - hassle free, worry free, free backups, everything now and ready to use. But…
There it comes, the engineering part of my brain, telling me “why should you pay for something you know how to create and maybe do a better job in making it the way you like it?”.
And the whole process of figuring out all the details and stuff is started and cannot be stopped. Sure, I would have to have a hosting for 50GB now and 150GB in a year, but that’s doable. Sure, I would have to keep extra backup of it somewhere if something goes wrong, but I can do that. Sure, it will take me 2 months to build the basic functionality and design the way I want it, but other projects can wait.
That’s all fine and groovy, but I still have 50GB of photos I need online access to, a way to restrict access to, a way to have someone pay for the download or just give someone a glimpse of what I can do. And I need it now! But my cursed engineering mind wouldn’t let me! :(
But then again, I’ve been a programmer for far less time than I’ve been a looser dreamer. That might just be a reason I’m good at being a looser dreamer and can actually do it on time (for a change).
June 27th, 2007 at 09:29
Because even most expensive account is cheaper than spending a week developing the application? And that’s not counting price of storage and bandwidth.
By the way Marela only restricts how much you can upload per month. If this is too limiting, then please drop me a line. As features go, well, we’ll see what future brings :)