# Resource Constraints & Strategic Boundaries

## Time Constraints

### Available Time
- Development time: ~30 hours/week
- Business hours: Monday-Friday, 9am-6pm
- Deep focus time: Mornings (9am-12pm)

### Time Boundaries
- No weekend coding (except emergencies)
- Maximum 2 context switches per day
- Planning time: Monday mornings

## Resource Constraints

### Budget
- Infrastructure costs: $100/month max
- Tool subscriptions: $50/month max
- API costs: Monitor closely, cap at $50/month

### Technical Resources
- Team size: 1 developer (solo operator)
- Preferred stack: Python, TypeScript, Go
- Avoid: Java, .NET, PHP
- Self-hosted preferred over cloud

## Strategic Boundaries

### What NOT to Do
- Don't build what can be bought/used for free
- Don't optimize before validation
- Don't pursue ideas without revenue potential

### Focus Areas
- Revenue-generating products first
- Tools that enable multiple projects
- Open source for authority building

### Risk Tolerance
- Acceptable: Technical experimentation within project scope
- Acceptable: Small infrastructure costs for learning
- Not acceptable: Months of work without market validation

## Conflict Resolution Guidelines

When priorities conflict:
1. Revenue-generating work trumps experimental projects
2. Unblocking other projects takes priority
3. Quick wins (< 2 hours) can interrupt planned work
4. Context switches require deliberate decision

## Success Metrics

### Project Success Criteria
- Has clear revenue model or strategic value
- Can reach MVP in < 4 weeks
- Solves problem you personally experience
- Market exists (validation required)

### When to Pause/Kill Projects
- No progress in 2 weeks despite effort
- Market validation fails
- Technical complexity exceeds value
- Better alternative discovered
