I am one of the Freelance members that does Alpha Software on the Desktop.

Most of my business is for small businesses wishing to keep their data off the web and out of the cloud.  They wish an application that runs reliably and quickly with from one and up users without a hitch.  I have the latest A5 V12 developer and Runtime as well as a few older versions to be able to bring applicarions from A3, A4 and early A5 versions to where my client needs them.  I have a trove of already written functions to utilize as needed to cut time in development and lots of applications to go back to as needed. 

I also  create applications that I sell on the web as downloads where you buy, download and install. 

I offer a 90 day bug removal for all work and "optionally" a yearly maintenance program.  

Work is figured by the hour, but you get a real close estimate of final hours and cost up front.  All estimates for any work from anybody starts with a hourly rate.  After computing estimated cost, billing is done by an application built with Alpha.   An invoice is sent each Friday or as agreed.  Easy payment plans to get you as far as you want to go or to completion. 

Let me put my cards on the table - I am a long term Alpha Software user and have fully paid up versions from the old DOS days to version 11 - all Desk Top (DT) development. More recently I needed an RAD Webapp construction tool with the speed and flexibility of the Alpha DT environment, so Alpha Anywhere (AA) was my first port of call. As Alpha users will know, from V9 it was shipped with a local Web Application Server (WAS) to enable users to practise using Alpha as a Webapp development tool. It was OK and worked up to the point that you needed to do something which was not included in the box you kept your DT ideas in, and that meant learning a whole new way of using Alpha. Simple stuff is easy using the DBF file structure so for trial purposes it works and is pretty slick on your personal PC.

I would have stuck with Alpha for Webapps but for four things;

How Freelancer Sites Work
For the Freelancer, sites work in a lot of ways

1. Most will require a membership where they verify the email or more.
2. Most do not require a fee up front for work.
3. Most will Take from 5% to 15% of the price charged to the client
4. Most will offer top billing on the bidding process for a fee.
5. Most offer the freelancer premium status for a fee per month. 

I Created a new website and had over 1000 visitors everyday as soon as it went up.  Searching the new domain name showed it to be a 10 year old site and was considered a real good one.  Searching a bit more showed it had pretty good traffic built, so no problem, right?

Wrong.  As a standard, I keep a visitor counter on most websites to be sure of traffic.  I just don't trust of site counters because they have been proven innacurate. 

Now the reality.  I added Akeeba Admin to the website and spent the time to configure it.  Added The honeypot to catch and stop all the spammers and scammers.  Added a bit of code as instructed to stop php injection.  Ran a number of tests to be sure of no injections and no virus lurking in nooks and crannies in the back end. 

Funny thing.  The traffic dropped by about 75% where people were coming and going and trying to find ways into the back of the website. 

My take on this is, one must have great security or risk eventual compromises.

Websites and Databases Let's Take a php application on the web as an example.  It could be Java, PHP, c#, c++ and some other ones.  PHP is a backend for mostly data control.  Backend generally means it is not the part you see a lot of on your browser.

Database is usually a sql of one or the other, but can be many other types and the php code is in files mostly called by javascript or html code.  First thing is to design the database and tables as always.  Of course, this is almost an art in itself anymore because a small part of the program is imbedded in the databases. We utilize forms, panels, ux, grids and a few other things that form the basis for the application.  They are used for input and showing data.  Then we build the reports.  Usually pdf format, but can be any form necessary.   We make sure there is ajax involved to help with speed.

SEO-Search Engine Optimization

When asked about SEO, I have many questions of my own, so I am going to number what I can do and why.  I will also give the reasons for doing what I do and why I do it.  First of all, one of my sites ranks as being 88 out of a possible 100 on seo and page ranking varies from page 1 to page 300 depending on which search words one uses.

Why do you want SEO?  The best reason is to gain people coming to the site to purchase, read or other.  If you have nothing to sell and nothing to read, they will not be there long.  People making a website for family and friends to see what they are doing really don't need to worry about SEO at all.

Desktop Database Application Suffice it to say, a database is defined as anthing that holds data.  A pad and pencil can get that done.   Most people associate a database as one to any number of tables on a computer that holds the necessary data for them or their business.  They are here and have been for many years.  Even the lowly spreadsheet is really a database.

Monetizing a website can take on many flavors.

The first question is whether to monetize or not.   If you have a website for family and friends or for a closed entity of some type, monetizing may not be desirable.  If you have a website where a lot of people visit every day because you sell something, have great information or have free stuff for the to download, then monetizing may be a real good thing.  This site is actually getting over 200 hits per day and monetizing makes sense.  It is not large enough for google adsense as yet, but there are other ways. 

Doing it the right way! 

The domain name should always be first! 
The right way is to purchase your own domain name first.  Be careful and do several name searches.

A domain name that is short and simple is easier for you and any visitors to remember.  Most hosting sites have very good searches for the name(s) you might desire.  The domain name does not have to be on the same hosted site as the domain name is purchased.  Important:  when you own your domain name your site will be known as myname.com or whatever you chose from available names.  You may not want myname.atmyhostname.com.  The latter is a subdomain at some other hosted site.  Like this blog is blog.applicationallstars.com meaning it is on the same hosted account with our site.