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Ok, kind of a long story here, but I need advice as to how much money I should request for my services.
This was my first consulting job, for my Dad's company who is implementing an Oracle warehouse management system accross all of their national warehouses. The problem they brought me in for had to do with the fact that they needed a java programmer, and they did not have anyone working for them who currently knew java.
What they needed implemented was a java class that would execute everytime someone in the warehouse scanned a barcode. Some of the warehouses had really dated barcodes that did not include delimeters. So the first part of the job was to find out what warehouse the scan came from, and then to format (add '.') to the barcode accorddingly. This is not a very complicated task, besides the SQL call to actually find the warehouse name (because I had no prior SQL knowledge, but the person I was co-working with did.) The next task was to break apart the barcodes and pass each value using SQL to get a certain piece of information about the scanned product. Finally these values had to be displayed in the appropiate areas on the screen.
I went in for a week in the beginning of January, and worked approximately 55 hours while I was there. By the time I left however, we had not gotten very far. The problem had to do with the fact that 1. there was very little documentation on how to implement a custom scanning class besides the default one, and 2. there was no documentation for the existing code besides the example code of how one could configure a custom scan for only one screen in the program.
We initiated a TAR (technical assistance request) in the middle of the week, to help determine why my program was not being executed upon a scan after following the original white paper's instructions. I went back to school, unsure if I would ever be able to resolve the problem.
With Oracle's assistance, they were finally able to resolve the execution problem, but not until February 9th, a full month since I had last been on site. Oracle also issued an updated white paper later in January with example code that would work for all screens as an appendix. Here is where my lack of experience caused me to waste sometime. I initially ignored the appendix for two reasons. 1. At the beginning they said the simplest way to solve the problem we were having at the time was by just adding return characters. 2. I was unable to compile the appendix C code because I am on a windows machine, not a Unix (didn't realize that at the time.) So I spent last week all week trying to get my code created from scratch to work, and eventually it did, except for one small problem, the cursor refused to move. However, this week I talked with the person back on site, who said that I could use the appendix C code on a Unix machine, so I took a couple of method's from my code, implemented them into Oracle's example, and bam, success.
So that's where the story is as of today. My question is how much should I ask to be paid ? Anyone out there a java consultant who could provide suggestions. Since this is somewhat private info for most people, I'm open to PMs instead of regular replies.
I really don't know how much I should ask for. My Dad told me what it might have costed them to bring in someone from Oracle for two weeks, however I'm not sure if they would have been able to do in two weeks since it took technical support nearly a month to find the answer. I know this may seem somewhat irrelative.
I want to ask for a good amount of money honestly, at least half of what they would have had to pay someone from oracle according to my dad (which is a hefty sum for a college student.) I think I have a pretty good right to at least 50% of what a professional would have cost, mainly because 1. This is the first time this has ever done been done according to Oracle, so I was pioneering, and 2. 50% off is still a damn good deal even if I did take a week longer than a professional might have. (Moreover I most of this remotely.)
So any feedback? Sorry for the wordiness, I'm a little excited about this, first consulting job a success as a freshman in college.
This was my first consulting job, for my Dad's company who is implementing an Oracle warehouse management system accross all of their national warehouses. The problem they brought me in for had to do with the fact that they needed a java programmer, and they did not have anyone working for them who currently knew java.
What they needed implemented was a java class that would execute everytime someone in the warehouse scanned a barcode. Some of the warehouses had really dated barcodes that did not include delimeters. So the first part of the job was to find out what warehouse the scan came from, and then to format (add '.') to the barcode accorddingly. This is not a very complicated task, besides the SQL call to actually find the warehouse name (because I had no prior SQL knowledge, but the person I was co-working with did.) The next task was to break apart the barcodes and pass each value using SQL to get a certain piece of information about the scanned product. Finally these values had to be displayed in the appropiate areas on the screen.
I went in for a week in the beginning of January, and worked approximately 55 hours while I was there. By the time I left however, we had not gotten very far. The problem had to do with the fact that 1. there was very little documentation on how to implement a custom scanning class besides the default one, and 2. there was no documentation for the existing code besides the example code of how one could configure a custom scan for only one screen in the program.
We initiated a TAR (technical assistance request) in the middle of the week, to help determine why my program was not being executed upon a scan after following the original white paper's instructions. I went back to school, unsure if I would ever be able to resolve the problem.
With Oracle's assistance, they were finally able to resolve the execution problem, but not until February 9th, a full month since I had last been on site. Oracle also issued an updated white paper later in January with example code that would work for all screens as an appendix. Here is where my lack of experience caused me to waste sometime. I initially ignored the appendix for two reasons. 1. At the beginning they said the simplest way to solve the problem we were having at the time was by just adding return characters. 2. I was unable to compile the appendix C code because I am on a windows machine, not a Unix (didn't realize that at the time.) So I spent last week all week trying to get my code created from scratch to work, and eventually it did, except for one small problem, the cursor refused to move. However, this week I talked with the person back on site, who said that I could use the appendix C code on a Unix machine, so I took a couple of method's from my code, implemented them into Oracle's example, and bam, success.
So that's where the story is as of today. My question is how much should I ask to be paid ? Anyone out there a java consultant who could provide suggestions. Since this is somewhat private info for most people, I'm open to PMs instead of regular replies.
I really don't know how much I should ask for. My Dad told me what it might have costed them to bring in someone from Oracle for two weeks, however I'm not sure if they would have been able to do in two weeks since it took technical support nearly a month to find the answer. I know this may seem somewhat irrelative.
I want to ask for a good amount of money honestly, at least half of what they would have had to pay someone from oracle according to my dad (which is a hefty sum for a college student.) I think I have a pretty good right to at least 50% of what a professional would have cost, mainly because 1. This is the first time this has ever done been done according to Oracle, so I was pioneering, and 2. 50% off is still a damn good deal even if I did take a week longer than a professional might have. (Moreover I most of this remotely.)
So any feedback? Sorry for the wordiness, I'm a little excited about this, first consulting job a success as a freshman in college.