Startup Ireland

If you are an Irish startup you should definitely register for the Microsoft BizSpark program.  This is a program specially designed for Startups world wide, you get software, support and services all free from Micrsoft.

To enroll find a BizSpark Network Partner (there are many!) who can endorse your application and away you go.

There are some minor constraints on who can apply,  specifically your startup,

• Is in the business of software development,
• Is privately held,
• Has been in business for less than 3 years, and
• Has less than US $1 million in annual revenue

So what are you waiting for?

MaryRose gives the lowdown on early stage funding in Ireland.

Dear Amazon EC2 Customer,

We are excited today to introduce the AWS Toolkit for Eclipse, a plug-in for the Eclipse Java IDE that makes it easier to develop, deploy, and debug Java applications on Amazon Web Services. With the AWS Toolkit for Eclipse, you’ll be able to get started faster and be more productive when building AWS applications.

The initial launch of the AWS Toolkit for Eclipse is targeted at Amazon EC2 developers and provides basic management features along with tools for deploying and debugging Java web applications.

The AWS Toolkit for Eclipse, based on the Eclipse Web Tools Platform, guides Java developers through common workflows and automates tool configuration, such as setting up remote debugger connections and managing Tomcat containers. The steps to configure Tomcat servers, run applications on Amazon EC2, and debug the software remotely are now done seamlessly through the Eclipse IDE.

The AWS Toolkit for Eclipse is available at no additional cost for Amazon EC2 developers. We encourage you to check it out and contribute code to the project.

To learn more about and download the AWS Toolkit for Eclipse, go to http://aws.amazon.com/eclipse.

Sincerely,

The Amazon Web Services Team

Here is a list of all the Enterprise Ireland HPSU’s for the last few years.

Via The Northern Ireland Business and Innovation Centre (NORIBIC),

AWAKENING CREATIVE ENTREPRENEURSHIP

An un-conference about all things creativity

Ace – a.k.a “The Unconference for Creative Entrepreneurship” is an unconference-style iconic event that’s dedicated to bringing together the creative community for a face-to-face collaborative meet-up where new relationships are formed, old relationships are nurtured, ideas are shared, skills are developed, creative entrepreneurs are promoted, and innovation happens in real-time.

The technology world will converge in the North West from 25 to 27 March when Silicon Valley comes to Derry/Londonderry for the ACE UnConference, which has been funded through the Arts Council’s Innovation Fund and is managed by NORIBIC – The Northern Ireland Business & Innovation Centre.

The not to be missed three day UnConference for Creative Entrepreneurship will see senior figures from the world’s leading creative technology and communications companies visit the region including Palm, Adobe, Powerscourt, Deutsche Bank, Nokia, Microsoft and DemonWare among others. The delegate driven industry event provides an opportunity to showcase the talent of local creative industries and will act as a platform for local entrepreneurs to access global expertise within an open innovation environment. Tickets for ACE are free, and with demand expected to be high, it is essential you register your interest to avoid disappointment.

Via Web 2.0 ireland comes news of this session in Letterkenny on the 25th March.

Enterprise Ireland is doing an information evening on starting a tech business in Letterkenny on 25th March.

It looks like a very useful session with speakers on:

• Business Planning Process
• EI supports to High Potential Start ups
• Paul McNulty on starting his own Technology Business

If you wish to attend, please contact marian.roberts@enterprise-ireland.com

• Google Apps For Domains : Hosted email, calendar, chat, documents, wiki
• Bizspark: Free development and hosting services from Microsoft
• Incubators: Free office space and training
• Wordpress: Free blog hosting
• Open Office: Free Microsoft Office compliant documents with built in PDF generation
• PDFCreator: Make a PDF out of any document you can print
• UBuntu: Free Linux operating system designed for mortals
• Microsoft Live: Free Document Sharing
• Drupal and Joomla:  Two top notch web based content management systems

I have justed added the complete list of Enterprise Ireland HPSUs to the Irish Startups Search Engine. Nip on over there and see if you can find yourself.

I thought it would be useful to document how I configure the http://Startup-Ireland.org blog as a useful guide to other businesses who are setting up a web presence.

1. Register your domain name. I use GoDaddy because its cheap, but its not everyones favourite registrar.
2. Find a hosting company, this blog is hosted on webfaction.com (I need some stuff that only webfaction supply) but normally I would recommend blacknight.com.
3. Point your DNS name at the host you have purchased, you will need access to advanced DNS functionality for this. Get a geek to help you if you get stuck here.
4. Install some blogging software. I’m a dyed in the wool wordpress guy. Both Blacknight and Webfaction have auto installers for wordpress which makes configuration very straightforward. The rest of this guide is specific to wordpress.
5. Setup yourself as a user on the blogging software so your posts don’t appear under the user “admin”, this is a classic rookie mistake.
6. Change the title and other settings to customise your blog to yourself .
7. Pick a nice theme. Thre are plenty to choose from.
8. Enable akismet the wordpress spam protector. For this you will need to register at wordpress.com and get a key.
9. Burn your feed. This meana delivering your RSS feed through the feedburner interface. This will allow you to track your readers anc collect lots of other useful information about your blog. This requires two steps. First you should install the Wordpress Feedburner plugin. Then burn your feed and use the output to configure the plugin.
10. Add the subscribe to comments plugin. This makes commenting more interactive and promotes better discussion on posts by sending all comments to all commenting participants.
11. Configure Google Analytics. Setup an analytics account and then use the Ultimate Google Analytics package to configure it in Wordpress.
12. Install the  WP-Super-Cache plugin for when you get your techcrunch.com writeup.

Now go write some posts.