<story><title>Developer tools can be magic but instead collect dust</title><url>http://www.pathsensitive.com/2021/03/developer-tools-can-be-magic-instead.html</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>bcrosby95</author><text>Some companies will care.  Some won&amp;#x27;t.  I mentioned something like this to mine and they upgraded the build server in response.&lt;p&gt;For Jetbrains products, if you enjoy them you can use your personal license commercially.  Your company just can&amp;#x27;t pay for it or reimburse you for it.  This is the route I go because I use their products for personal projects too.  For me it&amp;#x27;s a no brainer at $150&amp;#x2F;year for their all-products option (...for the 3rd year, 1st is $250, 2nd is $200).</text></item><item><author>MattGaiser</author><text>&amp;gt; Programmers do not like to pay for their tooling.&lt;p&gt;Because it is too much work to convince the company that spending $500 on JRebel to have me not go on Hacker News for 5 (and it turns into 15) minutes while the thing compiles (my last company).  I also have no real stake in whether the product ships in one month or two so I am not paying for it myself.&lt;p&gt;To pay for tooling, productivity needs to be a priority. I have never worked anywhere where productivity was discussed.</text></item><item><author>hypermachine</author><text>Because in 2021 developer tools are fundamentally not profitable. Jetbrains is the exception, not the norm. Developer tools are loss leaders for large corporation to acquire developer goodwill and mindshare. Previously we sold developer tools&amp;#x2F;PaaS. Programmers do not like to pay for their tooling. You have to sell to management, and when your target is management, then the metrics are completely different from what developers want.&lt;p&gt;This is why no-code and low code are so much more successful than developers tooling startups in terms of revenue and profitability. The people using are the same people who are running the business. The value proposition is clear. &amp;quot;Better developer experience&amp;quot; alone is not sufficient for selling to enterprise. And programmer productivity cannot be quantified in lines of code written. This is hard point to explain and get across on HN because this forum is inherently dismissive of the value of RPA and RAD software.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>hyperpallium2</author><text>I&amp;#x27;m toying with the idea of selling developer tools &lt;i&gt;only&lt;/i&gt; as personal licenses that can be used commercially. Like a driver&amp;#x27;s &amp;quot;license&amp;quot;, companies must hire &amp;quot;licensed&amp;quot; developers to drive the software. (also licensed plumbers, electricians, accountants, surgeons etc -  though true all are skill&amp;#x2F;knowledge credentials, not simply purchasable; so include an exam).&lt;p&gt;Companies need to hire and pay more for &amp;quot;licensed&amp;quot; developers.&lt;p&gt;It gives power to developers - and then I don&amp;#x27;t have to sell to managers or deal with uninterested clerks.</text></comment>
<story><title>Developer tools can be magic but instead collect dust</title><url>http://www.pathsensitive.com/2021/03/developer-tools-can-be-magic-instead.html</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>bcrosby95</author><text>Some companies will care.  Some won&amp;#x27;t.  I mentioned something like this to mine and they upgraded the build server in response.&lt;p&gt;For Jetbrains products, if you enjoy them you can use your personal license commercially.  Your company just can&amp;#x27;t pay for it or reimburse you for it.  This is the route I go because I use their products for personal projects too.  For me it&amp;#x27;s a no brainer at $150&amp;#x2F;year for their all-products option (...for the 3rd year, 1st is $250, 2nd is $200).</text></item><item><author>MattGaiser</author><text>&amp;gt; Programmers do not like to pay for their tooling.&lt;p&gt;Because it is too much work to convince the company that spending $500 on JRebel to have me not go on Hacker News for 5 (and it turns into 15) minutes while the thing compiles (my last company).  I also have no real stake in whether the product ships in one month or two so I am not paying for it myself.&lt;p&gt;To pay for tooling, productivity needs to be a priority. I have never worked anywhere where productivity was discussed.</text></item><item><author>hypermachine</author><text>Because in 2021 developer tools are fundamentally not profitable. Jetbrains is the exception, not the norm. Developer tools are loss leaders for large corporation to acquire developer goodwill and mindshare. Previously we sold developer tools&amp;#x2F;PaaS. Programmers do not like to pay for their tooling. You have to sell to management, and when your target is management, then the metrics are completely different from what developers want.&lt;p&gt;This is why no-code and low code are so much more successful than developers tooling startups in terms of revenue and profitability. The people using are the same people who are running the business. The value proposition is clear. &amp;quot;Better developer experience&amp;quot; alone is not sufficient for selling to enterprise. And programmer productivity cannot be quantified in lines of code written. This is hard point to explain and get across on HN because this forum is inherently dismissive of the value of RPA and RAD software.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>Stratoscope</author><text>Same here. It costs me less than fifty cents a day to be able to use all the JetBrains IDEs and developer tools and get all their updates, both for my personal projects and for work.&lt;p&gt;I can only speak for myself, but to me, &amp;quot;no brainer&amp;quot; is an understatement.</text></comment>