How much money you've earned till now using Lazarus

[ajosifoski]

I know this is sensitive question but let me start first.

Till now (2013-nov-22) $674 working on one project via odesk.

Also have ~dozen opensource applications on sourceforge (my signature) for which I did'nt receive any -> zero <- donations  till now.

[marcov]

I've held 3 fulltime senior programmer jobs during the last 10 years (and still), where during all job interviews, the fpc/lazarus experience was key.

In one, very funny case, they asked about experiences with Indy (it was a Delphi job), and I was able to guide them to my website where I showed the initial  Indy ports of Indy9 and 10 for fpc/lazarus :_)

As for your SF experience, you seem to create small potatoe programs for end-users, while SF is mostly visited by programmers. I really wonder how you expected anything else there. (regardless in what they were programmed).

[felipemdc]

Where do you live? I'd recommend a traditional job.

I won't be going into numbers, but I make money with fpc/lazarus so it is possible.

The problem of Pascal obviously is the low usage in comparison with the 3 kings C++/Java/C#, which translates in less job openings but at the same time in less competition too. Funny enough my main job involves programming in Pike, a even much less popular language than Pascal ... so you can make money with any language. They don't actively search for Pike developers, since .... well there are none to be found. They just sent me a C++ programming exam instead. The thing is that if you want to make money with a particular technology you might need to relocate.

Also have ~dozen opensource applications on sourceforge (my signature) for which I did'nt receive any -> zero <- donations  till now.

It's really hard to make money from free applications ... my best success so far is putting Google AdSense ads on a page which explains the program. If a lot of people (let's say 200) visit the page daily, then you can make a small amount of money with ads, like US$300 yearly.

Other approaches which I tried like donations and ads directly in the program bring almost zero income.

I see now that almost all of the most famous open source apps in sourceforge are bringing in recomendations of chrome or whatever in their installer: http://sourceforge.net/blog/today-we-offer-devshare-beta-a-sustainable-way-to-fund-open-source-software/

It think it might be worth a try ... I wonder how much money this would make. And nearly everyone is doing it nowadays, winscp, filezilla, etc, etc, so its not like the app will get rejected because of it.

[chrnobel]

I think you shall use another approach.

I do a living, where I am making programs by request, and do some IT services in conjunction, supplying my customers with a solution.

For being able to do that I have a toolbox (just like any other artisan) where the most important piece of tools is Lazarus.

But tools without skills have no value, and vice versa.

So to put it simple, it is not possible directly to tell how much money I have earned using Lazarus, but I know for sure that it would be very difficult for me to make a living without.

[ajosifoski]

Where do you live? I'd recommend a traditional job.

I see now that almost all of the most famous open source apps in sourceforge are bringing in recomendations of chrome or whatever in their installer: http://sourceforge.net/blog/today-we-offer-devshare-beta-a-sustainable-way-to-fund-open-source-software/

It think it might be worth a try ... I wonder how much money this would make. And nearly everyone is doing it nowadays, winscp, filezilla, etc, etc, so its not like the app will get rejected because of it.

New suggestion. In new forum make it Location with * must be filled.
Suggestion-2. In new forum create visible large message (large font)-> Please post your question also on stackoverflow with tag Lazarus.
(our goal is to beat there  cobol for now, than fortran then.. Let it be His (John 1,1-3) will.)
see  our delphi brothers: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/tagged/delphi
see us: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/tagged/lazarus
Best  search:  (union) http://stackoverflow.com/questions/tagged/delphi+or+lazarus+or+pascal+or+freepascal

At this moment there are 484 tags for cobol _and_ 396 for lazarus.

Want  to work as freelancer, traditional is not for me.
Tnx for sharing new ideas from sourceforge, filezilla have ~100.000 downloads per day, but I'm skeptical.

[TurboRascal]

Suggestion-2. In new forum create visible large message (large font)-> Please make a copy of your question on stackoverflow with tag Lazarus.
(our goal is to beat there  cobol for now, than fortran then.. Let it be His (John 1,1-3) will.)

I'm afraid that would be an unrealistic request, i.e. almost nobody would do that...

[Leledumbo]

I'm gonna need to convert to $ first. Assuming $ 1 = Rp 10000, then I've got $ 300 so far, from one short time (2-3 weeks part time) project around 3 years ago. Since I have fulltime job, with Lazarus made tools for internal use,  I've been paid for > $ 12000, mixed with my other (main) jobs of course.

[ajosifoski]

If I am well money situated and want to promote lazarus who knows what will do?

Just for fun
Will post every day 1 task on freelancing sites, specifically lazarus skill
some easy tasks let say $5 or $10 fixed price

Lot of people are reading posts, so, my argument that Lazarus is wanted such as cobol (which is true for now) will dissapear.

Let me back to ruby reading...

[garlar27]

I'm workin with FPC-Lazarus since 5 years and 5 days. But not as a freelancer, I'm an employee.

If you want to make money with small apps, I recomend you to focus on mobile devices and games. Sell them for $1 to $5 and put them in apple store and in any other store.

You can also produce a free version and a "Platinum" version with more functions or less limitations.

The final user will not see what you used to build your app, this is the same for all languages out there.

Change your strategy. It has to be simple to pay for your app and it shouldn't be a price too high (I mean if you build "yet another cell phone flashlight", a $10 fee would be too much).

There is a lot of things you can do to have a better chance to be chousen among a thousand applications. See what other people are doing and learn from their errors and success.

[ajosifoski]

Don't know if this will working.

Putting button somewhere in program which will redirect to some web page (even free blog  on wordpress.com) with donors list

Idea teaken from Mint http://www.linuxmint.com/donors.php

[BeniBela]

How much money you've earned till now using Lazarus

400 €

on which I had to pay 10000€ tax, because Germany has flat rate social insurance fees for freelancers, almost independent of your actual income. It's an absolutely horrible country

[aradeonas]

@BeniBela you are a greet developer and you tools help me and sure other people alot but I think they need new and shiny home to attract attentions like Xidel.
And for answer to question I earned nothing until now(about a year) from Lazarus because my main field is Delphi and I'm moving to Lazarus.

[jagnje]

Hello aradeonas.

Can you explain the rationale behind move from delphi to lazarus?

Thanks. I am new to all this, that is why I am asking.

Thanks.

[aradeonas]

Hi,
In one word because its lovely.
If I want to explain I should say:
1-Its small and fast.setup,compile or anything in Delphi is kind of slow but in Lazarus everything is fast.
2-Its free and open source,Very good reason!
3-Its cross platform.Yes Delphi works in MAC and compile for iOS and Android but not Linux and Delphi mobile apps are slow again.Also I want to write server apps and with Delphi I don't know its possible or not but Im sure its not as easy as in Lazarus.
4-Here you find really good libraries that comes form passion of their developers.Like BGRABitmap.you cant find things like this in Delphi world.
5-Its more geeky.You can do more stuff in more devices.From a server to a mini computer like raspberry pi.
6-I like the logo
7-Lazarus and FPC people are kind.Im still new to this word but until now they help me a lot and I appreciate that much.

I think if you want do company works do with Delphi but for personal,free,small,big projects choose Lazarus and FPC.
Delphi with it's very big components world is good for get jobs done but Lazarus and FPC are very good tools to make dreams real.

And don't forget these are my personal opinions

[BeniBela]

How much money you've earned till now using Lazarus

400 €

on which I had to pay 10000€ tax, because Germany has flat rate social insurance fees for freelancers, almost independent of your actual income. It's an absolutely horrible country

update: I have spent the last three years writing complains to the insurance provider, and they have actually refunded half of the "tax" this month