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About

Company Overview

Poplar ProductivityWare is your Seattle-area source for Drupal and WordPress web sites, modules, and plugins, as well as other custom web programming and web databases. We are expert software developers, experienced in working with both highly-technical and highly-non-technical clients. We create custom software and installations of open-source software for the following purposes:

  • Content Management for web sites
  • Web-based distributed Data Management
  • Database-based Catalogs on web sites
  • Mouse Effects for web sites
  • Custom Modules for WordPress, Drupal, and Facebook
  • Other Web Scripts and Web Programming

Our approach is flexible, practical, and straightforward.

  • We use open-source software, where appropriate, as a starting point for software development and web sites (see below to find out why).
  • We design software, web sites, and databases that are easy to use, quickly updatable, and have features customized to your needs.
  • We are small enough that every client is important to us, so we will take the time to ask questions and listen to your answers, to find out what those needs are, before starting on any software development or database programming.
  • We are experts in a range of software and database development tools, so we can help you find the right solution for your business, rather than promoting our personal favorites.
  • You can be confident that going forward, we will be able to adapt the software to your future needs as your business evolves.

Poplar ProductivityWare was formed as an LLC in 2003 by Jennifer Hodgdon (its lead consultant), as a reformulation of the consulting practice she began in 2001.

Why Poplar ProductivityWare?

  • Make use of our broad knowledge: our head consultant Jennifer Hodgdon has more than fifteen years of experience as professional software developer, using a variety of languages and operating systems, for many different applications and in various industries. If it turns out that we haven't worked with your exact software or problem before, chances are we've done something similar.
  • Benefit from our expertise: studies show that expert software developers are ten to one hundred times more productive than novice developers, yet cost only about fifty percent more per hour, so it will save you both time and money to hire an expert.
  • Gain flexibility from our use of open-source software, which is well-tested, standardized, and cost-effective (see below for more information)
  • Draw upon our analytical capability: Jennifer has a PhD in Physics, combined with extensive real-world business problem-solving.
  • Complete your project quickly, from definition to delivery.
  • Take advantage of our small size: we can afford to bid on small jobs, and our overhead is low.
  • Trust us -- learn more about the values that govern our business, or see what others have said about our services.

Why Open-Source?

If possible, Poplar ProductivityWare uses open-source software (Drupal and WordPress, for instance) to achieve the goals of clients. Here are some of the reasons:

  • The open-source software we recommend has many thousands of hours of development behind it. A purely custom-built solution will likely only have tens of hours of development, which means fewer features.
  • The open-source software we recommend is developed by a large community, so it reflects accepted software standards rather than one person's opinion. Also, people and organizations like Poplar ProductivityWare continue to contribute updates to improve it.
  • As compared to commercial software, open-source software is lower-cost and more flexible (you can modify it if you don't like how it works).
  • The open-source software we recommend is used by many thousands of users, so security issues and bugs tend to get found and fixed.
  • There are many other developers using this software, so if for some reason Poplar ProductivityWare becomes unable to help you with maintenance or updates, you will be able to easily find another developer to help you.