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Show HN: I built a self-hosted Basecamp alternative. Try the demo

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Re: Show HN: I built a self-hosted Basecamp alternative. Try the demo

#71

Post by mbreese »

todd3834 wrote: post #47
rsobers wrote: post #40

Beautiful product! Just be aware of the support nightmare that comes along with people trying to install your software in many different environments. I will never, ever create installable software ever again.

I've been thinking about this and I like the idea of building the software to run on Heroku (or similar). For those that want a self hosted plan you just tell them where to host it and if they want installation outside of that you charge them a decent hourly rate to make it worth it.

I've always liked the option of providing a virtual machine image. Then you get a predictable deployment environment, and the client can run it where they like.

Re: Show HN: I built a self-hosted Basecamp alternative. Try the demo

#72

Post by mbreese »

cmalpeli wrote: post #68

Nice work! At $49 you are seriously undervaluing this product. I'd think you could easily charge $395 or more. If I'm looking for a self hosted option for project management, I'm likely in an org w/ some security restrictions, etc - AKA the Enterprise. $49 may even lead me even think it's "too small" to buy if i'm the Enterprise purchaser...

And you probably want to make sure it has enterprise features, like LDAP/AD integration, etc. (didn't check the features to see if this is there already).

Re: Show HN: I built a self-hosted Basecamp alternative. Try the demo

#73

Post by 23andwalnut »

cmalpeli wrote: post #68

Nice work! At $49 you are seriously undervaluing this product. I'd think you could easily charge $395 or more. If I'm looking for a self hosted option for project management, I'm likely in an org w/ some security restrictions, etc - AKA the Enterprise. $49 may even lead me even think it's "too small" to buy if i'm the Enterprise purchaser...

When I first decided to start building this product, I had just started my freelance career. I seriously considered ActiveCollab which is in the price range you're talking about, but I just didn't have the resources to buy it. I want this to be accessible to as many people as possible, even those people just staring their business. But I agree, I will definitely lose out on some customers because they think it's too small. Perhaps as the product evolves and includes more features, I will consider raising the price.

Re: Show HN: I built a self-hosted Basecamp alternative. Try the demo

#74

Post by ikhare »

rsobers wrote: post #40

Beautiful product! Just be aware of the support nightmare that comes along with people trying to install your software in many different environments. I will never, ever create installable software ever again.

I can easily imagine what some of the dependency management issues could be, but I'd love to hear your thoughts on the following two options:

In the Java world there is a concept of a .war file which packages everything up so it's easy to deploy on app servers that handle it like: Tomcat or Jetty.

Also what's wrong with giving out a prebuilt virtual image for a single server install? Github enterprise does this.

Re: Show HN: I built a self-hosted Basecamp alternative. Try the demo

#75

Post by jamroom »

cmalpeli wrote: post #68

Nice work! At $49 you are seriously undervaluing this product. I'd think you could easily charge $395 or more. If I'm looking for a self hosted option for project management, I'm likely in an org w/ some security restrictions, etc - AKA the Enterprise. $49 may even lead me even think it's "too small" to buy if i'm the Enterprise purchaser...

As someone who has sold self hosted software for almost 10 years, there is a whole different level of "hand holding" expected when a customer spends $395 versus $49. We are in the process of re-doing all our pricing with our new release specifically to make the price lower.

Re: Show HN: I built a self-hosted Basecamp alternative. Try the demo

#76

Post by 23andwalnut »

tonyoconnell wrote: post #62

Great work. It's very elegant and delightful to use. Is there any way to duplicate/clone a project?

Not yet. It's a highly requested feature though, so it will probably be among the first that I add. Along with the ability to download pdf invoices.

Re: Show HN: I built a self-hosted Basecamp alternative. Try the demo

#77

Post by jmathai »

rsobers wrote: post #40

Beautiful product! Just be aware of the support nightmare that comes along with people trying to install your software in many different environments. I will never, ever create installable software ever again.

As someone who's built software that others can install I can confirm that it's a lot of work. It doesn't mean you shouldn't do it though.

The most important thing is to separate the "self installed" users from the ones using the hosted version (which you might try to monetize at some point).

Point self hosted users to a "community" that can help them while users on your system can email you directly.

It's worked out pretty good for us. We have a much shorter response time for hosted users than self installed. We typically answer most questions on both but it helps separate what's most important (hosted users).

Re: Show HN: I built a self-hosted Basecamp alternative. Try the demo

#78

Post by thoughtcriminal »

I'm wondering if there are easy to follow, step-by-step instructions on setting it up on my own PC. Can Joe Sixpack set this up without too much grief?

I'd like to use this for my own projects, but I'm way out of practice doing this stuff.

Re: Show HN: I built a self-hosted Basecamp alternative. Try the demo

#79

Post by danenania »

I can understand the appeal of selling on codecanyon for the existing marketplace you get access to there, but I would consider an independent checkout for the website. Your design and branding are well done and signal high quality, while codecanyon has more of a script/component flea market feel. I think taking someone out of the flow of your site to buy there is a bit jarring and might cause people to reconsider, especially enterprise-y customers.

I also have the sense that you could probably raise your price significantly. Considering what businesses pay for a service like basecamp, they aren't going to blink if you charge them, say, $250 instead of $45 if the software is good. For a business of any size, $250 and $45 are essentially the same as a one-time cost--negligible.

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