[TYPO3-english] Customers and Extensions

[Mark Kuiphuis]

Hi all,

I believe a lot of us are developing websites for customers. Customers 
always want to have some features which normally can be solved by using 
extensions (whether to create one yourself or use an existing one).

During my work with Typo3 I've seen some magnificent extensions. 
Extensions that offer a lot of features for their specific target. Other 
extensions don't offer a lot of features since they don't have to offer 
a lot of features.

However: it could be me, but I have the general feeling that a customer 
wants to have some specific functionality in his/her site, but doesn't 
have the detailed picture in his mind yet.

They initially provide us with a "sort of" description how it should be.

First of all, we are going to look if there are any extensions which 
might do the job (why invent the wheel twice) and install, configure the 
extension.

But then, when they have seen something visually, they want to have this 
feature added, that feature deleted, since they are not going to use it 
anyway, etc. etc. How do you normally handle these requests.

Since I am fairly new (brand new to be honest) in regards to extension 
development (still eagerly waiting for Dmitry's book to arrive, ordered 
the book over 2 weeks ago :-( ) I don't feel comfortable modifying 
someone else's extension. First reason is the current "lack of technical 
insight in an extension" and second: I don't want to break the added 
functionality when the extension has an update in the TER. (A security 
update is always a good reason to upgrade imho).

We cannot expect of an extension developer to add functionality 
immediately (even if we are willing to pay for), so how do you keep the 
customer satisfied when you use an extension, but this extension doesn't 
  fully satisfy the customers needs?

I'm very curious how the Typo3 world is handling these things?

Kind regards,

Mark