How It All Began – Part I

I think it’s only fair that I explain to everyone why DropBoks exists in the first place. So here goes…

Almost two years ago now I found myself (yet again) emailing files to my own email address in order to save them online. I was doing this so that I could retrieve those files on a different computer at a later time. But this time was different. The files I was trying to send were too big. Ugh.

So I did some shopping around for an online file storage service. I wanted something quick and simple. My search became quite prolonged. It seemed that every service had way too many features and was much too complicated. I didn’t want all the features they offered. I just wanted to upload some files and be done with it!

It then dawned on me that I should create my own solution to this problem. So I decided to quit grumbling and get off my butt and do something.

Now, professionally I am a user interface designer / usability engineer, so I knew I had the chops to create a decent interface. It was only a matter of getting going. So I got going. After about 4 or 5 months I had completed all the designs and workflows. Phew.

Next step was to find a developer to bring the thing to life. See, I was able to do the front end development like the html and css and some javascript, stuff like that. But I needed a real pro to work on the guts of the application. Finding this developer proved the hardest part of the whole process. I had connections with a good amount of developers but at the time pretty much every one of them was too busy with their full-time job, or swamped with their current gig and so on. See, I didn’t want to just hire some schlep. I wanted my application to be coded extremely well and be rock-solid. I’ve worked in software too many years to go down the path of short cuts and hacked up code.

As luck would have it, a friend referred me to Dan. A developer which he had worked with in the past. I gave him a call and once I spoke with him on the phone I knew he was the guy. You see, I am a huge fan of Agile development and he is an Agile zealot… we were a perfect match.

After Dan reviewed the design of the app and workflow models and such, he recommended it be built with Ruby on Rails. He convinced me that was the way to go, so I never looked back.

Part II coming soon…