What shall i take?

[Libero]

I have developed an app for the company i work for. And have spent about 200 hours on my freetime for that. Im working in a carcompany at the development department. Im measuring headlights. When im measure new objects i got to have a unique filedescription for it. My software comes with suggestions on that and store it in specifics documents. What would u people suggest me to take for it?
Sorry for my bad English.

[HDR]

I'm sorry, but I can't understand your question.

[Libero]

Sorry! I mean how much money do you think its possible to get for the developing of the software. How much would you people suggest?

I don't understand either.

[CtrlAltDel]

$5

[JayWms]

A million billion dollars... It depends on if they really need the software and your ability to support it...

Libero, I think it would be best to get people to test it out for you and to give you their opinions. if you are worried about them stealing your software, then only give them limited functionality versions for them to test.

I'll have a look if you like.

[Libero]

The funny thing is that i am the only one who use the software :-) And it is the company who wants to know how much the software is worth so they can pay me for it. Its not that important to me because i programming for fun. But Wossman, you have right, i think its best to put in some limit, because they can hmmm... missuse it. But still! The company wants to know how much its worth. I have no idea.

Wossman> I gladelly let you have a look but the program contents some confidential stuff. Sorry :-(

[kokopeli]

Tell them what you have told us. You have put in 200 hours in developing it, and I assume it will help you to perform your job duties quicker. Tell them to pay you what they think it is worth. Chances are you can modify things so you can sell it to others too. It doesnt sound like you are too concerned about how much they pay you since you are programming for fun. I bet you learned quite a bit while building it, and that is worth something.

[Paul282]

Just write a project plan in retrospect, write the different stages of design and dev, testing and bug fixing and give each part a total of hourse taken (just make it up so that it sounds reasonable, forget the real time taken because the project is finshed.

Then get you're overtime/holiday work rate and multiply it by the total, as if you were contracted. if they don't like that then calculate your normal wage as an hourly rate and multiply through.

If they don't like that then no figure based on time will satisfy them so just ask them how much their prepared to pay and either take it or quit!

not a big deal

NEXT time, get the price/rate in writing before you embark on a 200 hr project. You've got no bargaining power now because it's done and there is no contract.

If you get nothing for it then it will have taught you a good lesson.

[Richyrich]

Are you Italian??

I'd think the best solution is to test a couple of people with the software and ask them how much they think it's worth.

If you do not want to do that, as someone esle said on here, multiply your 200h by your wage. Say for example, $20/h, then you should get paid $4000.

Ok software sells not for what hours you put into development, but for the percieved value it brings to the company. Also you make your money on multiple sales of the same software.

Example....If you had to pay Microsoft for the total man hours invested in producing Excel you would be talking in the millions. However you pay for a license to use the software, as does the the rest of the world.

Which brings me to another point. When you sell the software to your company, you are selling them the right to use your software, and not the actually software itself. You retain ownership of your source code.

I developed a Database app to keep track of hardware and software by user and got $3000 for it. Took a weekend, however l developed a Sales Solution for the Tile Industry and got a first Sales of $1500, it took about six months. Have on sold it 18 times since. Got to love people you will pay for upgrades as well.

The company l currently work for have a full business package which sells for about $250,000.

Defiantly get some cash for your work.

[JasonGS]

I would say like $7.00 or $8.00, charge sales tax too!

[Libero]

No i`m not an Italian, i am from Sweden. I`m glad to see that so many people comes with suggestions. Thank u all.

Have you decided on how much you want to sell it for?

[Libero]

No i havent. I thinking of the hours i have spent multiplied with the money i got/hours in my regular work. And a little more. Something that Paul282 says.

[Paul282]

Nice to be appreciated!

[Eiredrake]

If you're looking to get paid for it I'd say that your hourly rate for normal pay multiplied by 200 hours is reasonable, depending on your future plans.

I know I designed an app for the publishing company I worked for I did it for free, annotated the source code and gave them that too so that if it ever broke down for whatever reason they could find someone (other than me) to fix it.

The only stipulation was that I'd be able to use it as a demo project for job hunting in the future. Since I want to be a programmer, and the company I work for now is pretty high prestige I thought that'd be worth more than the couple of hundred I would have charged them for it. It took me about two weeks to put together and I pretty well 'demanded' (i didnt really demand I just told them they couldn't use it unless they tested it) that they test it for a period of two weeks. It's worked perfectly other than that Damned I-Love-You bug that went around screwed over it's parent app.

So basically all I got out of it was three letters of recomendation from my direct supervisor, his superior and her superior for later use. And as said in other threads here, experience is worth more than a degree.

So if it's more important to do for fun then just give them a figure. If you're looking for a reference, then don't worry about it. But don't let them dick you over.


Eiredrake

[Libero]

Thanx alot Eiredrake. That was some wise words. Like you say, it is more important to be known as a good programmer than to get alot of money.