One night while half asleep, I had a dream and in my dreams I saw a website. WoW!! People have such cool dreams and I just saw a website. But in my dream, the website was not just a website, it was a cool thing, a platform for students to get together and help each other, a helpline for students. It was something that I had to act upon.
Having been an International student myself, I understood the problems that some students faced and this was the main motivation behind www.studenthelpline.org. I got up from my sleep and shot of an email to a few friends who I hoped would share my enthusiasm of giving up their free time and instead spend time building a web-site. Well, my faith wasn't misplaced. My pals responded and we slogged through the weeks and months. Yes, there were periods of inactivity and procrastination but finally on the 13th of October, 2008 we made a BETA version of our website LIVE and available to the general public. Since we have no sponsors to speak off, we are cutting costs and running the application from a server that sits next to my bed. Guess, thats what you call giving 24 hours support. :-)
The current version is BETA and I expect several refinements and fixes over the coming months but overall, it was a fine effort and when I look back at the year that is gone, I am happy that we acted on our impulse. Even though at times it appeared as if we were hardly moving, we persisted and today that dream is a reality. The web-app has been built in what I know best - Java. Stay tuned for a series of 'Lessons learnt while building our web-app' posts.
Finally, I can go back to bed and dream again...
Having been an International student myself, I understood the problems that some students faced and this was the main motivation behind www.studenthelpline.org. I got up from my sleep and shot of an email to a few friends who I hoped would share my enthusiasm of giving up their free time and instead spend time building a web-site. Well, my faith wasn't misplaced. My pals responded and we slogged through the weeks and months. Yes, there were periods of inactivity and procrastination but finally on the 13th of October, 2008 we made a BETA version of our website LIVE and available to the general public. Since we have no sponsors to speak off, we are cutting costs and running the application from a server that sits next to my bed. Guess, thats what you call giving 24 hours support. :-)
The current version is BETA and I expect several refinements and fixes over the coming months but overall, it was a fine effort and when I look back at the year that is gone, I am happy that we acted on our impulse. Even though at times it appeared as if we were hardly moving, we persisted and today that dream is a reality. The web-app has been built in what I know best - Java. Stay tuned for a series of 'Lessons learnt while building our web-app' posts.
Finally, I can go back to bed and dream again...
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