Meeting with Hamid. He was showing me the progress on the business zipper website that he is building (small side project). I gave him the URL for our old site and told him to read the bottom portion that talked about the concepts of the business zipper. Here is the link and some of the text (you have to scroll down to the bottom portion of the page to get to this info).

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Older website text

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Many people over the years have asked us, what do you guys do? Why do you do that? Where are you trying to go? How long does that take? How can you do such and such and others can't? And what makes you so different? Those are some great questions. The answers vary depending on the time someone is willing to listen. :) This is somewhat of an inside joke, but sometimes we feel like saying "Did you pack a lunch?", meaning it can get pretty deep pretty quick.

To answer plain and simply, we are in the business of tracking people's data. We are a virtual data portal. The word "data" means different things to different people. The word "adilas" also means different things to different people. To some it may be CRM functionality (Customer Relationship Management). To others it might be inventory, sales and POS information (Point Of Sale). To others it might be ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) or backend office functions. To others; general operations tracking, JIT inventory tracking (Just In Time), manufacturing, online expense tracking, business intelligence (BI), paperless office, document management, a CMS (Content Management System), financial data and reports, paperwork, payroll, timecards, scheduling, etc. Because we say we track "data", we need to be as deep and diverse as the term itself.

Our goal is to help you, as a user or a company, get in, get out, and be happy. Along the way, and depending on what you consider to be data, we try to help show you the whole picture of what is going on. If what we have helps you out, great! If not, that's ok. We enjoy sharing what we have learned. The adilas.biz business platform is a huge integrated tool set that allows you to play in multiple different areas. It is very scaleable and caters to custom settings and different permission levels. Your use of the system, depends on you and your needs.

The words "system" or "platform" denote more than one piece working together in harmony. A full system allows you to do things that others can't do, simply because everything may not be there.

One of our biggest strengths is helping you get your data into the system. Once in, it becomes part of the big picture. Data coming in usually means some form of "operations" or the day-to-day business that happens. We love this and have a strong focus on helping on the operation side of the equation. We try very hard to follow a logical or linear model in helping you to get your data in and out of the system as quickly and easily as possible.

We also offer some great backend office tools and accounting features. If truth be known, the reason we are able to offer you accounting-type features is directly related to how we track your data and help you do your operations. We, at adilas.biz, are actively working on a new and more modern model for accounting as compared to the current, somewhat antiquated, double entry accounting system embraced by most companies. We can run your operations regardless if you use adilas for your accounting needs or not. If you are looking for a traditional credits and debits accounting system, we may not be your product other than for your operational needs. However, if you are willing to try a more modern and nontraditional approach to accounting, you will love what we do and where we are headed. Straight up, it is new and different and we are still pioneering on a daily basis.

Here is a little background on the traditional double entry accounting model that dates back to the fifteenth century (500+ years old). Luca Pacioli, an Italian monk (friar) wrote one of the first math text books called "Summa de Arithmetica". In that book he explained about how the Italian merchants kept track of their sales which we now call "double entry accounting". This guy was a genius and a math wizard for his time. Here is the kicker, this text book came out in 1494. Two years prior to that, Christopher Columbus, in 1492 sailed the ocean blue to show people that the world was round. People were just coming out of the dark ages and entering into the age of the Renaissance. The only way that businesses could track their "data" was in giant notebooks called journals and ledgers. They had large rooms with tons of paper copies and went through different processes of recording, adjusting, and posting their data between the different journals and ledgers. Sound familiar?

Basically, they were trying to track different states and statuses of the data. Some of the processes that they used to track these changes and states of the data were called "debits" (negatives) and "credits" (positives). These debits and credits were added to things called "T Accounts". The different T Accounts made up a bigger thing called the "Chart of Accounts". The Chart of Accounts usually had a numeric value and a name associated with it. This is how they tracked things, on paper and in different notebooks. These Chart of Accounts were then added up and used in financial documents called the "Income Statement" (profit and loss statement or P&L) and the "Balance Sheet". The goal was to make sure that everything got recorded and accounted for. In order to make things balance, they had to do one entry on one side and then a matching entry on the other side of the T Accounts. Thus the term "double entry accounting". This standard has been followed for years and is currently the accepted way to do accounting. As a mater of fact, most computer systems that do some form of accounting, have basically computerized the 500 year old model and added their own little tweaks to the process.

So what makes us so different? Well, we spent the first five years working on operations. The original goal had nothing to do with accounting. The goal was to start tracking inventory and other data. We wanted to be able to quickly view things, pull reports, and even be able to show where that data was or what had happened to it over time. Through a step-by-step approach to solving our own business problems, we stumbled upon a new way of doing accounting. Basically, once we had the operations in place (this is a big key), we just kept asking the question, what happens next? We would then build the system out to that level. As we kept going, the path began to be rolled out and we just kept taking the next logical steps. This process took years and years and was only possible because we kept working at it. Concepts that were only a dream or a wish started to be right in front of us and we simply reached out and grabbed them.

Adilas can virtually track objects and data over time without using the old double entry accounting model. We still simulate some of the pieces of that model, but we do not have any journals, legers, T Accounts, Chart of Accounts, and other standard accounting features that are considered traditional requirements. We don't use the words debit or credit and we try to use as few adjustments as possible. We use technology, good data, flags, dates, checkpoints, approvals, permissions, and business mapping to run things in a linear fashion. Every entry or data object has a life-cycle and we simply track it. We are then able to go back in time and virtually ask the objects or items questions. What's your story? Who created you? Where have you been? Where are you headed? Who are your buddies? Where do you belong? When did you finish? What is your value? And the list goes on. We call it "roll call accounting". At the end of the day, we still produce an Income Statement (profit and loss or P&L) and Balance Sheet. We just arrived there through mapping data and running objects over time.

We are still pioneering and developing steps to the roll call accounting process. We've had a blast creating it and we can't wait to share it with you! Although our accounting system is not completely finished (fully automated to the highest level), we have had many companies happily use it for years. We just keep adding new pieces that make it better and better. Remember, our main goal in providing the adilas.biz system or platform is to help you track your data. Adilas can help you with your operations, accounting, or both. The model is open and flexible.

We invite you to check it out. We would be happy to meet with you in person or give you a live online demo. Give us a call TODAY! Call 719.439.1761 and ask for Steve or email us at sales@adilas.biz.

If you want more information, there is a brief history document of the making of adilas at the bottom of the page. It is a short 6 page read that tells the story of what happened when and who was involved. It has been a wonderful journey thus far and we're still going!

Just for fun, we wanted to list a few of the core concepts if you don't want to read the history document. This is just for fun... :)

When we first started, back in 2001, our original goal was inventory tracking. As things progressed, one of our main goals was to figure out a way to help fill the gap or create a "bridge" between operations and accounting. There seemed to be a very large and visible disconnect between what was happening in the field (operations) and what the final output was (accounting and final numbers). In one of our brainstorming meetings, we came up with the analogy of a "zipper". One side of the zipper was operations and the other side was accounting. Our goal was to start bringing them together one cog at a time, like a zipper being pulled upwards until it came together.

We came up with the theory "track every penny in and track every penny out". With this thought in mind, we started to track each penny from start to finish. What we found was that every transaction had a life-cycle that it went through. We decided to enter the items and data as easily as possible on the operations side and then track it through a number of steps until it found itself finished or completed. Along the way, we started time-stamping each step with a flag and a date. Each flag and date combo became what we called a "checkpoint". As each new flag was added, we would lock the prior steps below that based on permissions.

This process of passing data from checkpoint to checkpoint, based on permissions, is how we track your data. A great analogy of this process is if you imagine what it takes for water to turn into ice. This process doesn't happen all at once, it needs to go through different phases, states, or status levels. As your data passes through these different phases, called checkpoints, we simply help you flag and date the data as it runs over time. Just like the ice analogy, the water droplets are very loose at first "operations" and slowly become crystals, then slush, and finally become completely frozen or ice "final numbers and accounting".

We then use a process called "roll call accounting" to virtually map backwards in time to where the data was at a given date or time. Another synonymous term for roll call accounting is data mapping. The reason we use the term roll call accounting is because that is what we ask the computer to do. Imagine data that is flagged and dated as it goes through certain checkpoints. Pretend that the computer is an army General giving out a roll call or a flag/status report. The computer says, "I need all of the invoices that were not fully paid at such and such a date to step forward". Only these invoices would then be counted - based on flags and dates. You could then use the computer to do the math and give you the totals you need. Each time you want more information, you simply tell the computer what criteria to use for the roll call and eventually it will tell you the story of what is going on.

To sum things up "literally", by keeping track of your normal day-to-day operations, we can get very complex results like aging, histories, usage, reports, final numbers, and accounting. Thus the accounting becomes the date sensitive sum of the details. These values are what make up your "Business Intelligence (BI)" or "Big Data" concepts. It all comes back to managing and tracking your data. Because every piece of the puzzle still exists in the database, you are able to virtually go back in time and see what was where and when it moved out of each checkpoint. If the data is correct, let it flow. If a modification is needed, make the correction, lock it down, and let it keep flowing. The accounting becomes more of a check and stamp of approval rather than entering numbers from different journals or locations. When you put it all together, what do you know... All Data Is Live And Searchable.

11.7 - Old School Accounting vs. New School Accounting

-Similar to a movie that says the views and opinions expressed here are those of the authors and creators and do not necessarily reflect traditional views on accounting. We acknowledge that this could be a very controversial topic and do not mean to make any sort of inference or offense. Having said that we are trying to stir the pot a little and challenge tradition.

OLD SCHOOL ACCOUNTING

-Old school accounting, or traditional accounting, or double entry accounting, are some terms that are used to talk about classic ways of keeping books. Books meaning a company’s financials. Interestingly enough, originally things really were kept in books or notebooks. These are often referred to as journals and ledgers.  

-By way of a little history a couple of very important events happened. The father of accounting is a guy by the name of Luca Pacioli. He was an Italian monk that lived at the same period of time as Leonardo DaVinci. He is credited as the father of accounting due to a textbook he published called, "Summa de Arithmetica" (the summation of arithmetic). Here is the kicker, this book was published in 1494. To put this date in perspective, Columbus sailed the ocean blue in 1492. Many of the modern day accounting systems have just digitized and sped up these 500+ year old concepts. This is potentially why we would call it old school accounting. 

-Going way back, before computers, company’s would keep track of their records on paper. The word “paper trail” goes back to this method of accounting. In order to keep things separated and organized they put things into accounts or T-accounts. A T-account was almost like a miniature bank balance which you could add to it or take away from it so that you could know the balance in that account. These pluses and minuses are called credits and debits. Normally a credit is a plus and a debit is a minus, there are some exceptions.  

-These processes may be different per company but this is a general overview. A company would have something that they wanted to track. Often this was something that was either important to the company or something the government said they had to track due to taxes. Where they would start is to create a list of categories that they called a chart of accounts. Each category or piece that they were going to track got a number. These numbers have all sorts of levels and specific categories that have been defined over time. There are certain numbers for cash, accounts receivable, accounts payable, long-term loans, etc.

-A journal entry was a debit or credit to one of these chart of accounts. This is where your T-account comes in, meaning credits on one side of the T and debits on the other. These journal entries are the small transactions or day by day activity. The sum of these journal entries would then be passed on to a more stable spot called a ledger. Back in the day, depending on the time period between things, the journal entries would be kept daily or as often as they could. When the time period came that they wanted to get the totals, they then summed up those totals and put them into the ledgers. This helped them save space and kept the ledgers clean so that they weren’t showing all the daily ups and downs and fluidity of business. Often these final posts to the ledger were done weekly, monthly , quarterly, annually, or some other period of time. This is where the word post comes into accounting - moving from a general journal to a ledger - aka summing things up and stamping it into the more final record.

-As part of the journal entry system businesses would do what is called double entry, meaning if something happened it may have effected more than one account. Technically this is how they were tracking cause and effects. For example if I got some new monies from a sale I would have to record those monies coming in and the other side of that would be that I got to deposit that money and my bank account increased. Some of these double entries can get very deep.

-To help businesses keep track of their financials there have been some helpful documents or reports created that we still use today. These reports helped them to know the vitality of the business. These are things like cash flow statement, income statement (P&L or Profit & Loss), balance sheet, etc. These documents are wonderful tools that were created. Most business owners will recognize these names as standard financial documents. Business owners use these documents to get business loans, submit taxes, track business operations, buy and sell businesses, make business decisions, receive other financial reports/requests, etc.   

-There are a number of other things that are associated with old school accounting or traditional double entry accounting. There are chapters upon chapters and textbooks upon textbooks that go over all of the ins and outs of double entry accounting. In general, most of the existing accounting software packages literally emulate the same 500+ year old accounting concepts and flow. They use the same names, the same flow, same mentality, it is just digitized and has some technology enhancements that help it to go faster but it is based on the traditional accounting practices. We may address some of these traditional accounting aspects further as we discuss new school accounting.

NEW SCHOOL ACCOUTING

-New school accounting, roll call accounting, time stamp accounting, tracking objects and data over time, data assembly line, world building, these are all some terms that could be used for modern and/or progressive ways of tracking your data and doing your books. As a note, some of the terms and concepts that exist in old school accounting will be mimicked or copied in new school accounting but some of the names have been changed. This is really important because if you keep some of the traditional names, people expect it to follow the same process as the traditional method does.  

-In old school accounting we added a history section that showed sort of where things came from. Before we jump into new school accounting we feel like it is important that you have an idea where some of these things came from before we start right into ideas and concepts. Right up front we didn’t set out to make a new accounting system. Our business problems were all on the operations, day to day tracking, side of the equation. If you would like a story type format here is a great document below that tells the unfolding of what happened with Adilas.

Web link - adilas_history_bio.pdf - (Tons of fun concepts as they developed. This document shows lots of the problems we encountered as a business and how our solutions evolved into the Adilas system.)

-As humans we love to use tools because they help us accomplish our tasks more efficiently. In old school accounting some of the tools used at its roots go clear back to paper and pencil, which are some great tools. Each tool has pros and cons and at some point, if the task keeps evolving it can break the efficiency of the tool being used. (If you are interested in seeing a fun document exploring tools and where they excel and break click here - time id # 4029 in adilas university.) 

-All data actually has a life cycle, meaning it gets started or created and ends and/or finishes. Usually that means that there is some sort of time frame between these different phases or stages in how data fulfills it’s life-cycle. In our quest for tracking things we started on the operations side. We really wanted to see where every penny went from beginning to end. The missing pieces for our business were on the operations side of tracking inventories, selling inventories, counting inventories, building new things, etc., etc. Basically we needed to get more details on what was happening in the day to day transactions and activities. Step 1 is catch the data at the source.

-As you try to catch data at, or from, the source you have to have tools in the hands of those who are doing it to allow them to capture the data. This can be a problem due to technologies, permissions, or trust issues between departments and employees. As part of this discussion we need to acknowledge that there is a known gap between operations and accounting. Operations, or sometimes the sales department, tries to make things happen to make the deals go. Sometimes accounting doesn’t like all of the decisions made by the operations department and/or doesn’t want to give all of the control for decisions to the operations department. This is where permissions come in. A permission is basically a thumbs up or a thumbs down on being able to add, edit, delete, modify, and so on to all kinds of elements. 

-At this point we want to introduce a few analogies. One of them deals with this life cycle of data. What we want to introduce is the idea of water becoming more solid or the process of water freezing into ice. At first when the water is very flexible this is like the sales - things are still happening and moving, deals might still be in process and negotiation, promises may be being made potentially on both sides of the equation. As the deals solidifies it is almost like that liquid water starts becoming snow or slush. At this point we now have fixed numbers, maybe we have monies, a transaction could have been completed, or we need to further build or fulfill something.  As the time goes on those values, numbers, monies, product transactions, and data become more firm and stable like ice. They become fixed and a piece of the history. We call this analogy the water, snow, to ice analogy. 

-The next analogy we want to introduce is a cart and a horse analogy. We propose that the horse is the thing that is moving things along, which is your operation or sales side of the equation. If you don't sell anything, you don't have anything to account for anything. If you separate the horse and the cart, the horse can stop, eat, or run wild. If the horse is not attached to the cart (your accounting), your accounting just sits there. There is no knowledge that gets passed from the actions of the horse to the cart. It literally just sits there and/or rolls down the hill (just being silly). This is the gap between operations and accounting. Long story made short, you have to connect them, let the horse lead (operations and sales), and then account for and/or tell the story of where you went and what was done. That's the accounting side of the puzzle. Up higher, in another section, we mentioned that accounting can still control the horse using reigns, bits, halters, bridles, yokes, etc. Sales doesn't run totally wild, but you do have to follow them, and/or account for what they are doing. Once again, just being silly, but if you put the horse behind the cart or make the horse push the cart, good luck. We haven't found that to be very successful.

WORKING BELOW HERE....

-how to wrap this up... world building and the assembly line for data (keep passing the good data on and sum of the details). use technology... small little analogy of the shoebox... if that works, then what we are building can totally work even better.

-Comparison between operations and accounting with static, parallel, perfect lines - everything is perfectly static.

-How we actually need flex bubbles and periods of time/waiting, etc.

-Difference between operations and accounting and the gap between those. Batches, things get batched, missing time, lack of communication, non-centralized data,

-3D data assembly line and 3D world building models

4:17 PM

Brandon Moore

/// notes from the adilas history bio

- corps, locations, users, permissions

- web-based

- tools >> head, paper/pencil, computer tools, software, database, web solutions

- Internet came into play mid 90's

- gathering information into a central location

- limiting duplicate work - collecting data and allowing it to flow (start a process)

- start with your pain points

- enter once, use many, and empower the users at the point of action

- letting operations lead

- with the right tools, productivity increased and sales increased, and that drove the need for better accounting

- pain - load and stress

- zipper analogy and using the system as the common element (even the bad guy - saying no)

- permissions and opening and closing virtual windows

- solving problems and then going to the next logical step - keep solving bigger and bigger problems (cogs of the zipper)

- one-to-many relationship model

- dreaming up a super system (what if we could do this... or that... or maybe both...)

4:17 PM

Brandon Moore

- maybe grab the paragraph about no road maps and we were just going off of ideas, concepts, and needs... shannon liked that section.

- we are still doing the same things today as we were back then. where is the pain and how can we possibly fix that (more zipper cogs coming together).

-From here maybe start looking at the post-it note list and see if we can transition into some of those other pieces. We’d like to describe that there is gap, horse/cart, time, batching - and just how this gap keeps getting wider and wider with the real time effects of these things, using computers and technology to create logic that can perform these accounting operations (conversation with Brandon & Steve --- WORKING….  

-IDEAS: We are going to start defining terms, concepts, start typing up pieces and ideas and we will probably need to come back and sew it all together, smooth things out, and make transitions.

-Another Note: On 6/25/19 as Brandon and Steve were talking Steve was saying how old school accounting used to have post after post and entries and different journal entries - lots of time and inputs, whereas roll call accounting can use technology to create logic and teach the computer to look for certain patterns and use logic to map to what is actually happening. Because it uses the logic and mapping, it can do that process over and over again and allows the data to flow more on its own, it just tracks where everything is at and puts numbers where they need to go. Computers are really good at doing repetitive tasks.

-Ideas/Concepts from History Bio Article:

These concepts are enter once, use many, and empower the users at the point of action.

The entire development process was as follows: 1. Find a specific need 2. Figure out what pieces came from where 3. Take a step in that direction by releasing a new tool, feature, or report. The natural consequence of the user actions would then present the next logical step and management would be able to see where they wanted to go. In a way, the horse began leading the cart instead of the other way around.

-If you would like some additional research from the developer’s notebook on new school accounting look here.

Web link - developers notebook - q=new%20school

-Some entries from the developer’s notebook on Christopher Columbus and Lucas Pacioli. Christopher Columbus - 1492 sailed the ocean blue. Luca Pacioli - the father of accounting - in 1494 published a work on the double-entry system of book-keeping and accounting called "Summa de Arithmetica".

Web link - developers notebook - q=columbus%2Bpacioli

-This is a 6 page document that has a publish date of 2011 and deals with the start of the Adilas system. It discusses where Adilas came from and how we even started on this journey. Lots of fun concepts of roll call accounting and tracking objects and data over time.

Web link - adilas_history_bio.pdf

-The link below is a photo gallery but has some interesting accounting concepts to check out especially in the second picture.

Web link - photo_gallery_full.cfm

Working with Shannon on adilas user guide content. The subject for the day was old school accounting vs new school accounting. We only got some content written on the old school side (classic double-entry accounting). We went over journals, journal entries, ledgers, t-accounts, chart of accounts, batching, posting, and reports such as income statement (P&L - profit and loss), and the balance sheet. Shannon has all of the content. As soon as it is ready, we will post it in an element of time.

I had Wikipedia open and was doing a number of different searches:

Christopher Columbus - sailed the ocean blue in 1492 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Columbus

Luca Pacioli - father of accounting - published a math text book with rules for double-entry accounting called "Summa de Arithmetica" in 1494 (2 years after Columbus). - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luca_Pacioli

double-entry accounting - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double-entry_bookkeeping_system

We didn't get to it... but this was an article that we (adilas) wrote back in 2011, it has a number of different key features and shows some of the changes in newer or more modern day accounting (new school accounting). This is a 6-page document that is more in historical story type format, but a fun read. - https://data0.adilas.biz/adilas_history_bio.pdf