Running Your Company on Java

Okay, I've seen Evan Williams post on "Running your company on web apps" and Nick Denton's "Startup Kit". Unfortunately, that doesn't cut it for this blog, afterall this blog is infamous for its Java zealotry. I therefore have come up with my own list of apps all written in Java that I demand you use to run your startup.

• JIRA - Yes, it's an issue tracker, but its pretty effective when you have it customer facing. In addition its excellent how it can slice and dice your issues allowing you to give important perspectives like a product roadmap. Should blow Fogbugz out of the water in functionality.
• Confluence - Now this is indeed a kick ass Wiki, I seriously doubt you can find a free version that is at par with this. Excellent tool for creating documentation in a collaborative way. Surely beats using Microsoft Word!
• Zimbra - GMail like AJAX capabilities in the client all secured behind your firewall.
• SalesForce - Top notch tool to make sure that the people at sales aren't slacking off. An emerging market for extensions too. (disclaimer: I am long CRM )
• QNext - Extensible IM client. If you want to go beyond the capabilities of the run of the mill IM then you've got to use this.
• Blojsom - Extensible blogging software, extremely lightweight and pre-installed in the latest Macs.

Of course, I've left out all the excellent Eclipse plug-ins for your daily software development tasks. But this of course is just a general list of apps to run your company and not all companies are software companies! I'm sure there are many more excellent apps, so please, let me know if you know of what worth quoting here.

Finally, if you feel a tinge of hypocrisy in the blog entry. Well then , that should be a lesson to you. Don't let someone else's zealotry affect how you run your business.