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Adilas.biz Developer's Notebook Report - 4/1/2017 to 4/30/2017 - (82)
Photos	Time Id	Color	Title/Caption	Start Date	Notes
	Shop 2353		Brandon out of the office - spring break with family	4/1/2017	Out of the office all week for spring break with my kids and family.

	Shop 4597		Virtual Post-It Note	4/8/2017	-On emailing invoices, quotes, and statements. Allow another link that is a normal web version v.s. the convert to PDF version. Just an idea, we've had people who couldn't open the PDF's

	Shop 2537		Clean-up	4/8/2017	Emails, follow-ups, and paying bills. Ran into an error on the snow owl theme that dealt with a variable (query) that was getting overwritten. Called Russell to let him know and made the changes. Other odds and ends. Doing some light clean-up from being gone for a week.

	Shop 2478		Adilas Time	4/10/2017	On the daily developer session with Steve and Alan. We started out the meeting catching up from being gone for a week. We then rolled into a session on goals and projects that need some help and lovin'. Here are some of the notes from the session: - Sales and who to call? We need to figure out some phone numbers and make changes within the site. - Who is dealing with custom projects? We spent tons of time on this subject. Alan and I will be making more concrete decisions in a later meeting today. - What is the process? Lots of talk on processes. Assigning projects, getting projects, working on projects, sign-off, etc. - We have a breakdown in communication. We know we are dropping some balls. - Internal projects... >> mini conversions >> sub part categories >> sub queues >> special accounts and loyalty points >> world building and database stuff >> rework sub inventory >> dollar off discount stuff >> other discount settings >> icon menus >> sales and promotion >> pricing tiers >> custom labels >> smart cart stuff >> post-it notes - little to do list stuff >> flex grid stuff - additional settings >> rentals and reservations >> internal repairs - such as duplicate expense/receipts, reoccurring expenses >> adilas API section - documentation and ease of access >> help files and user manuals >> forgot password or password reset >> emailing invoices, quotes, and statements. We need to provide custom email addresses and maybe web versions of the pages (links to a .cfm page vs the PDF versions). >> bitbucket - branches and issues and pull requests >> Code sign-off and general communications. >> training and education >> server management and optimization - We need to focus on the features and benefits that we do have to offer! The list is huge and most of those pieces are fairly stable. They may need some light tweaking but are fairly stable. -------------------------------------------------- Brandon's typical day. On a trail by 6:30 - 8:30 Breakfast/Shower Meetings from 9-5 7-9 am sometimes early morning meetings 9-12 pm adilas meeting -- brainstorming, work session, or putting out small fires -- this session seems to be pretty productive 12-12:30 pm lunch 12:30 - 1 pm call with Calvin - 50% affective 1 - 5 pm with other developers on their projects -- meetings with Russell, code sign-off, planning, reviewing progress, brainstorming, doing actual code, debugging. -- meetings with Bryan, code sign-off, questions, training, helping with projects, guiding him on what is needed. -- meeting with Alan, planning, counsulting, dreaming, code work, documentation stuff. -- meeting with Nick. Planning, education, code sign-off, and working his projects. -- meeting with Shawn. Code sign-off, planning, and finishing projects and fine turning stuff. -- meeting with Dave Forbis and Shannon. Consulting, custom code, quotes, tech support, etc. - If I check email, text, or voicemail... I usually take down the info and make a post-it note... That just gets added to the pile. I've got these things to do on normal basis... - emails - text messages - voice mail - bug fixes - custom projects that are assigned to me - tech support - get calls from Steve, Shari O., Shannon, Developers, and other clients - Pay bills & write checks - Prep for upcoming meetings - server stuff - notes, documentation, and recording stuff - graphics - We tend to loose a lot of time in the transition between projects. - We are going to have Alan help with some scheduled times for code sign-off. During those times, I will be working on my own projects. - Use Craig as the "bucket" guy. Have him fill in where needed. Some backend business management stuff.

	Shop 2493		Lunch	4/10/2017

	Shop 2542		Virtual Post-It Note	4/10/2017	We had a request from a client to be able to alter the default verbage on the emails that were sent through the system. That would be a good setting and might help a number of other clients.

	Shop 2543		Virtual Post-It Note	4/10/2017	We are getting more and more requests to have view only permission. Just today we had a request for a view only customer permission. We have had other similar requests for all kinds of features within the system. It might be worth our time to relook at all permissions and see what ones need to be broken down into smaller pieces.

	Shop 2551		Virtual Post-It Note	4/10/2017	We need to setup a testing environment for all the developers to use. This could be on the content server and/or on one of the other data servers. Currently as of 4/10/17, this does not exits. We just test on local boxes and then push code. This may become part of the code sign-off procedure.

	Shop 2552		Virtual Post-It Note	4/10/2017	We really need reoccurring elements of time. That would really help and save us some time and steps. There are some other ideas recorded earlier. As a quick note, what about 3 months at a time and creating the main element and then being able to use a calendar to select what other dates that should show up on. Think of check boxes per day. It would grab the main pieces (title, start and end times, color, assignments, and notes) and then cascade it for as many checkboxes as it found. When Alan and I were talking about checkboxes... we would like one for all, per day, and per week. This would allow us to use JavaScript to fill out the 3 month calendar very fast without having to click tons of times. See attached for a small screen shot of the idea.

	Shop 2505		Calvin Time	4/10/2017	On a phone call with Calvin talking about needs and ups and downs of doing software as a service (SaaS) type models. We briefly talked about email and text message tools and other communication stuff.

	Shop 2538		SHAWN TIME	4/10/2017	On a GoToMeeting session with Shawn. We chatted and mostly did some small work sessions, working on our own projects. Shawn has 4 new states and their withholdings ready. Also, he wants to get into the code a little bit deeper with the code repository (git and bit bucket) and such. We will be meeting tomorrow to push up some new code.

	Shop 2517		Alan Time	4/10/2017	On a GoToMeeting session with Alan. We looked up an older document on code sign-off processes and spent the whole time working on that document. We didn't quite finish, but I have uploaded what we were working on. This document has a number of questions that developers should ask themselves before they release a project and try to get it signed off on. See attached for ideas on testing, debugging, CFC's, black boxes, naming conventions, query stuff, and more.

	Shop 2479		Adilas Time	4/11/2017	GoToMeeting session with Steve and Eric. First hour was just Steve and I. We talked about some of the developers and current projects. We also updated some new credit card info for Adobe Creative Cloud and Newtek for server payments. Eric came on at 10 am and we spent the rest of the session working on the sub queues for the main customer queue. We checked out the database update and then started with the login process. We pushed a couple of files to get some new session values in play. We then worked on personal settings and how to flip things as needed. We ended the session by working on the new add/edit page for sub queues.

	Shop 2494		Lunch	4/11/2017

	Shop 2506		Calvin Time	4/11/2017	Quick phone call with Calvin to touch base on some payment stuff.

	Shop 2539		Menu Board	4/11/2017	On a GoToMeeting session with Bryan. We went over a custom job and custom report for a client. I was driving and drawing and helping to map things out. The custom report was dealing with black boxes and flex grid tie-in results being exported out to MS Excel. After that, we went over some other questions that he had.

	Shop 2550		SHAWN TIME	4/11/2017	On a GoToMeeting session with Shawn. He had some new code for 4 new states. They were Maine, Michigan, Rhode Island, and Deleware. We merged in some files and ran some database updates. We didn't quite get finished, but really close.

	Shop 2544		Brandon's Custom Projects	4/11/2017	Paying bills, recording notes, and doing emails. Part way through, Bryan and I jumped on a GoToMeeting session to talk about his menu board project. We talked about ways of short cutting the media/content pieces and how to help walk the users through the virtual setup process. After that, I went back to paying bills, phone calls, and tech support stuff.

	Shop 2480		Adilas Time	4/12/2017	Steve and I were talking about people management and human resources. We know that there are people who want us to be very structured and very organized. Steve and I really don't want to go super deep into that model. Maybe we let them try to run with it. Go back to the railroad model. We own the tracks and the land and we allow others to build all around us and maybe ride along with us. We need to sell what we have. We may also need to help train them on what they have. We are seeing our clients as targets from other companies. They have a relationship with us and a level of trust, but these other companies want to jump on and sell to them as well. This is somewhat of a problem. We have somewhat given up two major pieces... They are the adilas market (adilas world) and the adilas university. Currently, we have allowed Adilas For Business to start running with these pieces. On pricing for a system, we need to have a standard structure. It is pretty loose right now. Also, we are seeing that companies that don't get trained, tend to fall off the system. We may need to go more towards a small package type scenario where we have setup, monthly, some consulting, and some training built in. We have tons of people who want to play but some of them don't really want to do the work. Kinda like the little red hen and making bread, planting, harvesting, grinding the wheat, and cooking the bread. Once it came out, everybody wanted to play but by then it was too late. We are seeing tons of outside parties that want to create their own little products. What people really want is an integrated product that does it all. They want a platform and/or a system. What if we don't try to grow and grow with more clients... What if we focused on the clients that we have. We have enough. We just need to take care of them. We just let things keep growing as we can (organic growth). We may end up pulling back a bit and stabilizing things vs. pushing forward with a wreckless vengeance. Adilas training centers. We've got some great ideas out there. That would be really cool. We are seeing more and more of a need to get our people trained. That helps make our clients happier and more loyal to what we are doing and where we are going. We keep getting ideas and suggestions (virtual idea farm) from our clients. We need to keep harvesting those ideas and such. From Steve - "It's not how fast you go, it is how well you go fast." - Good stuff.

	Shop 2495		Lunch	4/12/2017

	Shop 2568		Virtual Post-It Note	4/12/2017	We had a request from a client to have the multi-upload option for media/content and files work directly from emails. Basically, instead of saving locally and then uploading, being able to drag and drop directly from an email and have it work. I think that is too many steps to cut and may not even be possible due to limitations of the web and interacting with other software systems. Just a thought. Anyways, wanted to record the request.

	Shop 2507		Calvin Time	4/12/2017

	Shop 2554		Russell Moore	4/12/2017

	Shop 2553		Travel into Logan for a meeting	4/12/2017

	Shop 2518		Alan Time	4/12/2017	Went into town to meet with Alan. We met at Bridgerland and used their cafeteria area for a quick meeting. We were going to be working on the database project but got somewhat sidetracked onto the vision of adilas and where we are trying to go. I had a lot of fun and I hope that Alan had fun as well. I was bouncing through different projects that we are doing to somewhat prep the waters. I was trying to show Alan that, not only do we dream things up, we really try to play with the ideas and actually create mini projects that use the concepts. I showed Alan a bunch of the photos, scans, and images that Russell helped me put together. Click here to see the online concept photo gallery. Lots of our conversation dealt with database changes, new settings, new permissions, and new ways of modularly controlling the application. We talked about toggle on/off interface options, real in-line database extensions, custom flex grid options, corp to corp mappings, API sockets, smoke and mirrors, and education stuff. Really fun. After that, I asked Alan a few questions and we scribbled down some answers. See attached for some of his answers and what not. Once we were done with our meeting. Alan and I drove up to USU to meet with Joe Tripp, a new want to be adilas developer. I introduced Alan and we chatted with Joe. He showed us some of the stuff he has done and we setup a plan to have him do a small mini project of sorts to see how his skills are coming along. Good meeting and I was super happy that Alan was willing to be somewhat of the go to guy to help with new developer training. Alan would make a great team member and internal adilas family member. We'll keep working towards that. Yee Haw!

	Shop 2481		Adilas Time	4/13/2017	On the morning GoToMeeting session. Meeting with Russell, Steve, and Chris Johnnie. We started out going over some new progress and some new drag and drop look and feel stuff. Both Steve and Russell are working on some of the new look and feel pieces. We then jumped into a conversation about the state of affairs within the adilas world and environment. There are a couple of different resource piles (monies, people, and features). We are all double dipping and no one controls the inflow and outflow of the different resource piles. We need to work on an incoming project process. Basically, we are lightly talking about job costing and managing those assets. We need a funnel and/or process to help manage this stuff. We are seeing a big need for some internal communication tools to help things be more effective. We then talked about the size of the adilas family. Russell was saying, If we have enough for 6 members but have 10 members that we want, it becomes painful for all. We may need to cut back. S.M.A.R.T. goals - Specific, Measureable, Attainable, Realistic, and Time bound. Russell also likes to add some flexibility and dynamic aspects to the smart goals. Just like a strict budget, you have to allow some flex, otherwise you won't ever hit the goal. As a company and a team, we may need to focus on one industry at a time. We may have to cut things back. Sometimes, that is really tough and plays on the emotions. On a different note, us having communications (talking about some of these things) is already helping all of us. We need to keep doing this. Maybe roll back to the old list of projects and go through it and prioritize things. We could then work on one or two projects at a time vs. 10 to 20 projects all at the same time. That would be a lot easier to manage vs. what we are doing right now. We aren't worrying about tons of money and funding. We would rather be working with people we want to be working with and building out our internal family. We may need to allow our clients and customers to choose if they want to be part of our client base. There will be many who don't like what we do and/or how we do things. That is ok. This is an abundant model. We don't like to owe monies to other people. We may need to turtle up and wait things out a bit. After the meeting with Steve, Chris, and Russell, I spent the rest of time working with Eric on the sub queues and sub customer queue options. We spent the entire time working through the logic and actions to help with the actual add/edit sub queue page. We finished up everything except for the deeper testing on that page.

	Shop 2496		Lunch	4/13/2017

	Shop 4598		Virtual Post-It Note	4/13/2017	-We need to fix up the old MSRTI web site. It currently is still somewhat of an API demo site of such. It could use a little bit of loving to make it less work

	Shop 2508		Calvin Time	4/13/2017

	Shop 2545		Brandon's Custom Projects	4/13/2017	Emails and then on a phone call with Steve going over finances and plans. Good call and we may be pulling back a bit and taking on some of the internal projects and keeping things in house vs. having our outside developers working on things. Steve and I were going over multiple scenarios.

	Shop 2536		Black Box Project	4/13/2017	On a GoToMeeting session with Nick. He showed me some of the school work and projects that he is doing and working on. After that, we jumped in and I updated him on some of the new changes within the adilas family and how things are going to work. We talked about his likes, dislikes, and potential projects. We are going to have him continue doing black box stuff and then helping Russell and the AFB guys out with some of their projects. Nick will also be interfacing more with Alan for code sign-off and what not. Good changes are going on and I'm happy with what is happening.

	Shop 2569		General	4/13/2017	Emails and doing some catch-up. I also got on a GoToMeeting session with Bryan and we did a small session on a custom flex grid report. Bryan is doing great and taking on tons of custom projects. After that, I recorded some notes and did some other non computer stuff that was on the to do list. Good day with lots of things happening and changing. Good stuff.

	Shop 2490		Brandon out of the office all day	4/14/2017

	Shop 2482		Adilas Time	4/17/2017	On the morning GoToMeeting session with Steve. We went over some updates from the weekend and then started working. We had both Alan and Eric pop in at different times. Most of the session was spent doing our own projects. I was working on a new feature for reoccurring elements of time. Basically, it was a mini calendar type interface that will allow a user to check a number of boxes that are wanted as reoccurring events and/or duplicate dates. The system would then submit and add new elements of time for all of those options. This page isn't done yet, but that is what I was working on. The other main thing we did for the day was added a new QR code search option for the main adilas quick search. Basically, we were looking for the first four characters being "http", the search having at least one dot (.), and being a certain length. If yes, we are allowing the system to reroute it self to that location. We are basically using the normal adilas quick search and pretending that it is the top web address bar on the browser. Kind of a quick work around. All new pages were pushed up and online.

	Shop 2497		Lunch	4/17/2017

	Shop 2509		Calvin Time	4/17/2017

	Shop 2555		Russell Moore	4/17/2017	On a Zoom session with Russell. We went over some budget stuff and how we want things to roll out, as far as upcoming projects. We talked about some of the new direction into JQuery and Ajax type calls and methodology. I pointed Russell over towards custom code jobs and explained where we are at and what is going on. Ideally, we'll have him do a couple months in the custom land and then reevaluate where we want to go. The goal is to use other people's money to help train our guys and grow our business. We spent some time looking over some code and I gave Russell a couple of pages that have some Ajax stuff on them that was built by Chris Dunsey (one of the original adilas interns). We talked about using JSON for custom data storage and how to get things in and out of that type of storage container. Mostly just pointing Russell in a good direction. After our session, I had about half an hour that I worked more on the reoccurring elements of time and how to setup that page to gather the reoccurring info and such. Making progress.

	Shop 2519		Alan Time	4/17/2017	On a GoToMeeting session with Alan. We spent the first hour working on and going over the adilas developer's guide and self examination and prep for code sign-off. See attached for a copy of the document. We then started getting into a discussion about our processes and project management. We decided to start reading together from the document called "Get Control! An Introduction to Process and Documentation" by Dave Hecker – April 12, 2004. See the attached link to the document from sitepoint. While we were reading together, we talked about all kinds of project development. Waterfall (set setps and set releases), Russian (small concepts and then go for the bigger picture), iterations (build things over and over with improvements), and cowboy style (fake it the whole way - yee haw). We then talked about how a small version of "Scrum" might work best for us. It is somewhat of a combo of all of the other pieces put into a flexible process that involves some planning, concepting, and iterations. Eventually, we want to use elements of time to help us record and do our project management. We are thinking that doing some early concepts and then keep refining things is how we want to run - where possible. This would allow for short turn around times and quick feedback and client buy-in. Most likely, we will have to mix and blend to get a good approach. The good thing is, we are starting to talk about it and hopefully apply it as soon as possible. Spent some time at the end of the day recording notes and pushing up new files and such. Good day today.

	Shop 2592		Working on the reoccurring time functionality	4/17/2017	Working on the reoccurring elements of time page. Started into the form fields and checkboxes per day stuff. Working through the logic.

	Shop 2483		Adilas Time	4/18/2017	Steve and I were on the morning GoToMeeting session. We chatted and talked a bit about some of the projects and light direction on where we are going. We then split up and worked on our own projects. I was paying bills, writing checks for developers, and working on the reoccurring elements of time. Lots of work on the JavaScript stuff to help with some special checkboxes and auto filling days of the week (columns going down the calendar) or weeks (rows going across the calendar). Fairly dynamic scripting was required.

	Shop 2498		Lunch	4/18/2017

	Shop 2510		Calvin Time	4/18/2017	Quick phone call with Calvin to touch base. He is going to be busy the reset of the week. We will get back on the conversion project this next after he is done with his other commitments.

	Shop 2546		Brandon's Custom Projects	4/18/2017	On the phone with Alan helping him with some merchant account stuff. We lightly talked about other things that are coming down the road.

	Shop 2591		PO Labels- Anna	4/18/2017

	Shop 2540		Black Box Project/ AFB Branding	4/18/2017

	Shop 2484		Adilas Time	4/19/2017	- On the adilas 3rd party solutions page, we (Steve and I) want to know about it and give an approval. Maybe add something to the new developer's guide book for code sign-off. - We eventually want the 3rd party solutions page and the adilas market to join up and work together. Steve would like to set a minimum of $2,000 to $3,500 to be on the 3rd party page. - If a developer gets a big chunk of money, we would love them to somehow credit us some hours to keep building the process. Basically, we don't want the money, but we need the developer's help on the backend. We need help on the adilas API, the adilas market, and the general backend for adilas. We also need help with testing and defining end points. - On FTPing and uploading processes, we need to define some rules of the road. Currently things are pretty loose and we have 10 or so developers who have access to everything. - We are starting to establish a number of game plans. We are trying to move away from the wild west and getting some rules and sheriffs in place and on duty. - As part of the meeting, I sent a copy of the Adilas Developer's Guide to all of our developers. We are expecting them to comply with the new rules and guidelines. Alan and I will try to help enforce some level of compliance. This is a start. Towards the end of the session, Eric came in and we worked on the sub queue stuff. We tested some methods and functions and started into the normal or main add/edit customer queue stuff. We stopped as we were just starting the bigger prompt for selecting the sub queue on the add mode. Towards the very end of the session, I helped Bryan with a couple of questions regarding permissions and access to certain sections within the system.

	Shop 2499		Lunch	4/19/2017

	Shop 2511		Calvin Time	4/19/2017

	Shop 2556		Russell Moore	4/19/2017	On a Zoom session with Russell. We spent the first hour or so going over what happens on the adilas 3rd party solutions page and how things work. Russell is going to be doing a custom job on those pages and we worked together to get a high level tour. We talked about some tricks and even some short comings of the existing code structures. After that, we talked about a magic number that it would take to have Russell fully join the team. Along with that, we talked quite a bit about AFB and what products they have and how we could work out some kind of deal and/or trade. Good stuff. Russell is making a mark and we are liking what we are seeing. Our current plan is to just keep going and see what we can do and offer and gain as we go along. Basically, we are going to let he and Chris (AFB guys) keep going, building skills, building products and features, and see what we can do to include them into the main adilas family.

	Shop 2520		Alan Time	4/19/2017	On a GoToMeeting session with Alan. We were working on processes and documentation specs. Most of these ideas come from the sitepoint article we are reading. See element of time # 1226 for more details about the article. - Choose a flexibility level based on the client. Basically, we can go loose or very tight based on the client and the trust levels with the client. - Educate the clients in the process. Accommodate them without compromising the project's success. - As the project progresses, try to read what and how the client is feeling. Are they digging it, hating it, sick of it, frustrated with it? Adjust as needed. - Release multiple iterations of your project. Let people start using it and collect feedback from the usage of the products and features. It is ok if the project is not complete, showing a half done project can really help. Let people see where the project is at. - What if we get the UI (user interface) out there... basically mock-up the data (dummy data). Then get a sign-off from the client on what they are seeing and the overall visual concept. This could be proofs, graphics, plain HTML pages, and other mock-ups. No real code at this stage. Sometimes what is said on paper may not be what is really wanted and/or needed. - Keep and save your emails. This is already a kind of documentation. Here are some suggestions: 1. Write every email as if it might, one day, be read by a judge in a court case. Be careful not to be too informal. 2. Don't keep a super long chain. Think about one topic and/or related topics per email. It is ok to split them up. 3. Use the subject line well. Help you and the client know what is going on based off of the subject line. This helps you find things if you need it. - Sign-offs and versioning - Think about critical milestones along the way. Maybe think about: the original quote, project specs, schedule and work flow, and final acceptance (completion). There may be others. Get sign-offs along the way. This helps you be more confident and the client more happy. - Use sign-offs as somewhat official decisions vs. just talking and making suggestions and/or giving ideas. - Put just one person in change. Groups and committees can be a major pain. Pick someone and give them ownership. Things tend gravitate to the person who shows to be the most promising leader. - Use an agenda and then return and report on meetings and decisions. - Different document types (keep things specific and direct for a purpose): Functional Requirements, Technical Specifications. Allow your clients and other developers to read over these docs and make changes and suggestions. This is still early in the planning phase and will help capture ideas and suggestions before any coding takes place. This process will also help limit the amount of scope creep and on the fly changes that may occur. - Plan things out on paper before ever going to code. Make a plan and think through things... - Think flow, layout, navigation, use cases, scenarios, if/then's, content, and functionality. What about validation, pagination, field length, and other details? What are the cause and effects? Think of the bell curve type model - try to tackle the biggest part as a basic flow and then deal with the other exceptions. At some point, there will be a point of diminishing returns - going beyond this will ware everybody out. - Wireframes, sitemaps, flow charts, etc. We many not want to draw static lines between all pages. Make a wireframe and then setup the relationships on the fly. Use callouts to clarify and define functionality. Wireframes include blocks, specific functionality, lines, placeholders, explanations, instructions, and general flow. Don't worry about the graphics. Keep it simple and unpolished. It is ok to keep it slightly rough. Allow for changes as needed. - Early planning will help with custom verbage and names for pages, permissions, and functionality. - Functional vs. Technical Specifications - Functional = how does it work? Think a general audience. Technical = IT level stuff - how, why, what, when, etc. Think about speeds, sizes, technology, languages, code, databases, protocols, and other techy stuff. This is meant for the IT and programmers as the audience. - Other possible documents (just ideas): contracts, project scope & overview document, project schedule, workflow, roles & responsibilities, phases & milestones, creative & technical briefs. Focus on the major points and get a sign-off on those. Think of hitting a target. These documents won't be needed for smaller projects. Once again, size-up the client and what is needed to protect all parties. Share these documents with the clients. This helps to get good buy-in. - Early naming convention and being consistent will really help. Try to get everyone on the same page with names, pages, features, and flow. - Using Microsoft Word is awesome for building outlines with bullets and numbering. Numbering and bullets can really help with organization and grouping of like topics. Using numbers and sections can also help later on when referring someone else to the documentation. - Word docs can help with table of contents and other formatting options. Once completed, make sure and attach those outside docs to the actual project (in adilas, that is media/content stuff). One downfall is that the Word docs are not searchable from the Adilas quick search. They are a separate doc. - To see more notes, see elements of time # 2521 for the next section on use/test cases, changes orders, etc.

	Shop 2594		Working on the customer sub queues	4/19/2017	Working on the customer sub queues. Got the main customer queue working with the new sub queue features. Added some new filters and new display options to show both colors and sub queue names and initials. Lots of work with the session values to make sure that the system could follow along.

	Shop 2485		Adilas Time	4/20/2017	On a GoToMeeting session with Steve and Eric. Steve and I talked and worked together for the first hour and then Eric came in to work with me on the sub queue stuff for the customer/client queues. Steve and I were talking about some of the current projects as well as some ideas on how to get and keep good talent like we currently have. I showed him a demo on the sub queue stuff and then we went online and looked at the Beaver Mountain stuff. Steve has a campground and cabin rental place that is looking for something similar but based off of a location-type model. Imagine all of the locations being listed down the left side and the date range being listed along the top. Then you could see what is rented, reserved, and what is available at a glance. Great idea. That might be fun to build just as a tool or other view of the time homepage or optional custom report view. Once Eric and I got working, we kept pushing on the sub queue stuff. We added visual options to the advanced queue search and then started working on corp-wide settings for showing and using the queue outside in ecommerce land. Good session and making some good progress.

	Shop 2500		Lunch	4/20/2017

	Shop 4599		Virtual Post-It Note	4/20/2017	-As a practice...Let other people speak and explain things -Check for understanding and then build from there -Tend to talk to much

	Shop 2512		Helping Bryan with an update query	4/20/2017	On a GoToMeeting session with Bryan. We worked on some customer update queries that he is writing. Bryan is doing more and more projects with the adilas 3rd party solutions page. Lots of it deals with one click from a user and then do multiple different things in the system like setting up defaults and making sure the path way is clear so that the outside vendors and internal customers get everything that they need. Interesting.

	Shop 2547		Brandon's Custom Projects	4/20/2017	Recording notes, emails, and clearing off my desk (random little things). Spent most of the afternoon just cycling through things. Emails, scans, text messages, etc.

	Shop 2491		Brandon out of the office all day	4/21/2017

	Shop 2486		Adilas Time	4/24/2017	Getting caught up on emails and such. On a GoToMeeting session with Steve to go over some possible pricing models. We are really starting to look more into data driven pricing and monitoring vs. a fixed standalone price for our services. We spent quite a bit of time looking at total record counts, media/content, outside data storage (files and media/content stuff), and how to mix and blend things together. We don't have a definite plan yet, but we are starting to go over things and talk about options.

	Shop 2501		Lunch	4/24/2017

	Shop 4600		Virtual Post-It Note	4/24/2017	-building the product and feature may only be half way...similar to the top is only half way on a big hike

	Shop 2513		Calvin Time	4/24/2017

	Shop 2557		Russell Moore	4/24/2017	On a Zoom meeting with Russell. We started off the meeting with Russell doing a demo on putting the adilas university on a program called thinkific.com. It looked pretty cool and it was just what we are wanting to do on training and lesson stuff. Super cool. As we were talking, I was somewhat torn on using an existing product and/or building our own product. The problem is time and money. Currently we don't have the time to do and finish out our dreams. That hurts a little. We then talked about goals and direction and where we want to go. Russell is really trying to push us towards being bigger and bigger. That is both good and bad. I have some mixed feelings about getting too big too quickly. Interesting. After that, we switched gears and worked on a custom project that Russell is doing on the adilas 3rd party solutions page. It is dealing with a custom wire job and turning on multiple windows with just one click.

	Shop 2521		Alan Time	4/24/2017	Working with Alan on more processes and documentation stuff. We reviewed the notes from last Wednesday and then moved on to new stuff. See element of time # 2520 for an earlier session. - Useful use cases - These are ways to describe what the application does from the user's point of view. These use cases are great for complicated processes and/or possible different choices and channels. It puts the specifications into somewhat of a story based format vs. just plain requirements. Depending on the scenario, you should choose between plain specs or use cases - usually not both unless they are needed. - Test Cases - How can I prove that this works? Do this, then this, then this, you should get... These are virtual step-by-step instructions that could be used for testing. Test cases show that we have met the requirements. Test cases are easy if you have a good set of requirements. - Use cases are stories on how to use the application based off of the requirements. This often involves different choices and/or flow processes. Test cases show that the application works and/or the requirements are being met while using the application. - The secret is to consider the project, the client, and then make a plan that fits. There is no special secret that has to be done every time. Make a specific plan for each project based on size, dollar value, the client, and other available assets. Don't be afraid to make a new plan if needed. If it is different, treat it differently. That is ok. It is also ok to reuse and/or modify something that already exists. - Use the sign-off as more than just being legally covered. It is more of defining the project scope and defining key points and features as well as getting client buy-in on the process. That helps to manage the expectations for the project. Based on the project size, there may be one or more sign-off's periods or sections required. Mix and blend as needed. Once again, think about the project, the client, and other variables. - Sometimes use cases and test cases can be one in the same. Repurpose and keep things simple. Sometimes it is hard for developers to test their own code... they already know exactly what to do to make it work. We need to test and use things from a fresh pair of eyes that may not know all of the tricks and/or sequences that are needed. Think about user errors and/or the full user experience. Use/Test Cases allow someone who is not familiar with the code to walk through a process with an expected outcome. That could really be a great benefit for the application and/or project. - Help the requirements set bounds - both - it will do this and this and it won't do this and this. Cover both sides. Set a clear ending and/or strategy for deploying and sustaining the usage of the project. Nobody wants a never ending project... - As a side note, "the top is only half way" - Remember the 90/10 rule. What about testing, sign-off, merging, documentation, education, maintenance, etc. Building the project is only half way there. Think of the full trip and/or full project from start, clear to sustaining the project through other phases. If we build a new feature and nobody knows how to use it or even knows that it exists, it is almost like not even having it. Two of the biggest components are: education and maintenance. - Change orders - We have lost our shorts on change orders and project scope creep. Literally, thousands and thousands of dollars and even months and months of time. All of this was basically pushed off onto our shoulders and the clients have either been unsatisfied and/or frustrated due to set backs and changes in time lines and project scope. This is something that we really want to change and get more control over. If control is the wrong word, maybe think more of managing these issues. We need to mange the change orders better. Sometimes we get addicted to progress and progression. That has cost us dearly over the years. - Change orders could be alterations, expansions, simplifications, or enhancements to a project that happen mid-stream. That is totally ok, but we just need to make a conscious effort to get them covered and/or paid for. A change order could alter the cost, the timing, and even the functionality of a project. They can be small, big, numerous, and/or even a virtual game changing piece. If you have good documentation and good processes, that is half of the battle. If they, the clients, have read and signed off on other documents, they will be more willing to admit that the new requests were not part of the original scope that was previously signed off. We need to adjust requirement, costs, time lines, and get a new sign-off before proceeding. - A change is just progression. We love that. We just need to make sure that we get covered and are able to adjust the price, cost, time lines, and specs as needed. We love doing custom, but that comes with a price tag. That is ok and we just need to communicate that. Part of our reason for looking more into processes and documentation is due to the pain we have encountered from un-managed change orders and change requests. This has been our Achilles heel in many ways. - We have been trying to implement tons of these processes over the years. We have made some great progress and learned tons of lessons as we have made this journey. Keep applying what we are learning. - We may need to slow down a bit. We keep going so fast that we are skipping steps and virtually shooting ourselves in the foot. Starting up a process will take more time at the beginning but will pay off huge dividends as we go forward. It is time to focus more on project management in order to help us keep up team morale, provide awesome products and features, keep our clients happy, and help our bottom line so we can keep building and maintaining what we like to do. We have really enjoyed building adilas. What a journey.

	Shop 2487		Adilas Time	4/25/2017	On the daily GoToMeeting session with Steve. We started out the conversation and talked about the impact that Russell is making on what we have going on. Tons of new visual stuff and even some new vision. He is really brining a lot to the table and we love it. We talked about possibly barrowing and/or subbing out some of the code and pieces until we have time to get it all under one roof. We talked about a new adilas.biz website that Russell wants to build and also a training option that could help us doing some training right now vs. waiting for us to build out all of the new tools. As Steve and I were talking, Steve mentioned that even within adilas, we may to flex and come back together and then flex again and then come back together. Very similar to our checkpoint and pod-type model. Lots of new changes coming and we may have to allow things to flex and then come back together at a future point. Interesting how we almost have to use our own analogies. After that, I started paying some bills and then Eric came on. We looked into the sub queue stuff and started to add code to Steve's custom homepages as well as out in ecommerce land. Did some prep work and then got things going again. At the end of the session, I finished up paying some bills and recording things on that side of the fence.

	Shop 2502		Lunch	4/25/2017

	Shop 2514		Calvin Time	4/25/2017

	Shop 2548		Brandon's Custom Projects	4/25/2017	On a GoToMeeting session with Eric. We were cascading some customer queue and sub queue stuff out in ecommerce land. Coding and testing and trying to get things working.

	Shop 2596		filtered report	4/25/2017	On a GoToMeeting session with Bryan. We went over a number of questions and worked on tons of different projects. Lots of little tweaks and going over things.

	Shop 2488		Adilas Time	4/26/2017	On the morning GoToMeeting session with Steve. We went over some funding pieces and talked about where we want Russell to play into the mix. I helped Steve with a page he is working on and we talked about opening up some doors and somewhat coming out from behind some of the hiding places we have been using. Some of this will be done with a new look and feel, a new customer facing website, and changing some of the marketing approaches and such. That will be good and should be fun. We also talked about education and training and getting things going on that level as well. Around 10 am (ish), Eric popped in and the two of us finished up the sub queue stuff. We did a lot of work out in the ecommerce level and pushing the customer queue with sub queue stuff all the way through the quote, order, and full invoice checkout process. Lots of testing and tweaking. This new piece is ready to go other than deploying, help files, and live testing. It has been a good little project. See attached for the final tick list and to do list for the sub queue project.

	Shop 2503		Lunch	4/26/2017

	Shop 4601		Virtual Post-It Note	4/26/2017	-On sub inventory packages - we need settings on only show parents, show/hide children, only show active packages, show both active and disabled -Rules for children -What about auto closing and auto opening the next passage -Special bar codes for subs -On subs...what if we changed the view into a mixed horizontal and vertical view

	Shop 2515		Calvin Time	4/26/2017

	Shop 2558		Russell Moore	4/26/2017	On a Zoom session with Russell. We started out and went over a custom project that Russell was working on for the adilas 3rd party solutions and a custom API piece. We did some code sign-off and merged in the branch. We then pushed the new code up and did some testing. After that, we started talking about the new adilas.biz website. We made a small wish list of ideas and features and made a list of some to list items. We even talked about getting PHP installed on the server to handle a Word Press type site if needed. We want to mix and blend the old adilas.biz site with the current AFB site, and then take it to a new level. Good start to that project.

	Shop 2522		Alan Time	4/26/2017	On a GoToMeeting session with Alan. Our original plan for the day was - Review and then focus on internal processes and how to apply it as we move forward. We have tons of future internal projects. Let's practice there because we can manage and control some of the aspects of those projects. ---------------------------------------------------- New brainstorming dealing with internal projects: Q-1. What do we want to be done when working on internal projects? A-1. Water, slush, to ice analogy. Start with a dream or a concept, talk about it, record some notes about it, let it sit and simmer. As it sits, keep adding new aspects, expansions, ideas, cautions, etc. We've gained tons by letting things sit for a bit and get some feedback from others and see how they inter-relate to other projects and/or needs. Record the notes and ideas as you go. We are pretty good up to this point (currently with our normal flow). Form here, we start getting into a lack of a real process. We have tons of ideas, post-it notes, and other brainstorming notes and documents but we can't really hand it off to another developer to run with it. It then falls on me, to point people to where to get the project info. Lots of time in training, showing the vision, and orienting people as to what is needed. The next step would be to start standardizing things and bring it all together. It might be nice to then start putting them (the notes and such) together in a common place where everybody could get at them. That is what we developed elements of time for, and it is only partially being used. Tons of potential, but no real set flow. Then once we decide to roll with it, we would come up with naming conventions, and start putting the project together and implementing it. This would be specs, functionality, requirements, and even wish list items. We could then beat that up a bit and refine it. This works best if we do the beat-up drill with the person who is going to be doing the work on the project. This helps educate them and gets their input. Can we break it? What about this and that? Do you understand this or that? What about the UI (user interface or user experience)? Is it easy to use? Does it do what we want and need it to do? What other places does it touch? etc. It would be nice to have a starting place or template that we ran every bigger project through. This could have a bunch of questions that we could answer so that we at least think about and/or consider. Things such as: general usage, common holes, pit falls, we've been burned here before (warnings), trickle-down effect (cause and effect relationships), one-to-many, one-to-one, corp-specific, automated, short cuts, custom (naming, sorting, placement, aliases, rules, settings), permissions, special settings (corp, location, user), and the list goes on. This template document could be in our style vs. a hard fast technical doc. Keep it somewhat loose but still get the major points across. Then make sure that the document is tied to the project. Update it as needed. This could be full replacements (overwrite the older doc with the new ones) and/or incremental pushes (new doc with new changes - leave the old ones in place). Once we feel we have most of the things listed out and we have an actual plan, we would start working on the project using the project specs and virtual to do list as the guide. We would then keep coming back to the project specs doc and even adding to it as we go (this is kinda like internal change orders). Keep documenting the new ideas and possible enhancements. Internally, we may allow more freedom with internal change orders. Treat it like an idea farm and be willing to do some harvesting. If the project is more of an external project, we really need to deal with the change orders on a more rigid level. We may also want to do different rounds on projects. If a huge round is still needed. Start a new future project where we can start dumping ideas and start the process over again. Iterations and multiple rounds are great. Maybe start using a key word like "round 2 of elements of time" in your notes so that we could find things again. Just an idea. Pretend that the project is built and/or ready to be released (even in phases is ok). When ready, we do code sign-off, we merge, and we push the project live. We then finish up the documentation, help files, and let others know about it (think education and maintenance). We may need to do new videos, updates, and let any marketing avenues know about the new updates, tools, and features. This last part has been lacking due to crazy pressure to keep running as fast as possible. As an idea, in order to get the developers (including ourselves) to finish the project, what if we scheduled the full and up and down trip (pretend it is a hike to a mountain peak - plan for both up and down the hike). This means planning, research, concepting, coding, sign-off, merging, deploying, documentation, training, and even maintenance stuff. That would be really cool. Especially if we had funds allocated for all of the pieces and the developers only got paid based off of what they have finished and/or completed. Treat it kinda like how Morning Star used to use the system as the bad guy in order to get title work, paper work, payments, etc. If we tie it back to pay, we may have more success with it. We may even want to put things on both the developers and the leads (some one in admin) so that we get everything done. We could even use some bonuses in order to help keep things going. Make a plan and/or a budget to get the whole project done - both the up and the down part of the trip. Other things we would like to take into consideration are: Timelines, wages, budgets, bonuses, reviews, communications. Do we care about speed, durability, a combo of both, or what else are we looking for? How do we manage this? We do want speed but we also want stable and well fitting pieces. More focus on well fitting pieces and planning for years vs. quick and unstable code. We can do combos of sprints, marathons, or just steady walks. We may need to mix and blend based on the project and the pressure we are getting. Ideally we would consider the impact of the project, the stability, what else it touches, expectations, budgets, available persons and talents (assets), etc. Other random questions: What about risk management? Are there certain things that need to be done in sequence? How much freedom do we give the developers in the process? Is this a copy and paste job? If yes, from where? Was it cleaned up? Did the developer and lead go through the standard adilas developer's guide (general process for all developers)? Who is being assigned to what? Are there back-up persons for the different pieces? Who is in charge of what? What happens if other projects come up or someone has to leave to do something else (sick, leave, quit, health issues, school, etc.)? How is it funded? Is the project fully funded (start to end) or will it be on the fly or hourly funding? How do we manage the balance between payment and deliverables including final stage stuff like education and maintenance stuff? Alan is going to do some reading on project management stuff and what other pieces and processes we may want to look into. Alan was talking about a thing called "the spiral method" where you have small goals and build things out to that point. You then circle back around and advance to the next goal, whatever that is. It could be as simple as let's do some research on such and such and that is the project. Or it could be let's plan out project x or y or it could be something like let's actually do project xyz. Basically, tons of mini goals and then work towards a bigger end goal. Instead of trying to tackle the whole mother load, you tackle some little pieces and keep chipping away at the whole. Bite size pieces.

	Shop 2608		General	4/26/2017	Recording notes, email, phone calls, and paying bills.

	Shop 2609		Merging code for the sub queues	4/26/2017	Working through the code to get all of the new files merged, pushed, and uploaded to all servers. There were about 60 files that had been changed over about 2 weeks. I had to push files in three main sets so as to make sure that we didn't cause the system to fail due to new dependencies on new code stuff. Long night.

	Shop 2489		Adilas Time	4/27/2017	GoToMeeting with Steve. Work session, help files, and talking with Shannon.

	Shop 2504		Lunch	4/27/2017

	Shop 2516		Calvin Time	4/27/2017

	Shop 2549		Brandon's Custom Projects	4/27/2017

	Shop 2598		Denver Packaging SQL	4/27/2017

	Shop 2492		Brandon out of the office all day	4/28/2017

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