Finances and Time Tracking
Currently all projects are worked on as “time and materials” costing. This means I charge a hourly rate and pass along any costs of materials that I must purchase to complete the project. Any purchases will be authorized by the customer before purchasing.
I use Freshbooks for time tracking, sending invoices, and keeping tack of finances. All invoices are sent out on a monthly basis. At the start of the project I will give a best estimate of the time the project will take but I will try to complete the project as fast as possible.
Project Planning and Documentation
I use Jira and Teamgantt for project management. Project documentation is done in Confluence and customers will be given a single user account for the duration of the project. The customer is allowed to export all the documentation during and at the end of the project. At the end of the project the user account will be disabled. Any Gantt charts generated in Teamgantt will be placed into the Confluence project page.
Design Files
All design files, spec sheets, spreadsheets, schematics, layouts, and firmware are revision controlled using Github. The customer will be give temporary access to the repository for the duration of the project. The Github repository is private and only the customer and Asgaridan have access.
Design Library
I currently have a large Altium schematic and footprint library that I use on all designs. The customer gains access to this library for their project. Any new parts created for the project will be included in my library unless they are covered by a manufacture’s NDA or by customer request. At the end of the project I will create a project specific Altium library in the Github repository that the customer owns.
Altium Designer has a very advanced 3d modeling system and my designs fully utilize this. I will generate 3d pdf files and 3d step files that can be used for mechanical placement and enclosure fit checking.