Adilas Key Contributors:

Steve Berkenkotter - Main owner and business partner - original ideas, concepts, and training - sales, relationships, dreamer, visionary, custom code, coordinator, builder of the first industry specific skin, and the list goes on. Huge player in the adilas story and timeline. One of the original owners in Moring Star Automotive - where the system came from. There are three known Steve's in the system notes. Most of them are this Steve (99 out of 100 times). He won't admit it, but adilas was his brainchild.

David Berkenkotter - Steve's brother and business partner in Morning Star Automotive. David was a system user and helped us create the adilas quick search. He liked using that feature, the quick search, but it only existed on one page originally. He wanted us to put it on every page. That ended up being in the header. He was also one of the original partners in adilas. Power user in the system. Sadly, he passed away due to cancer.

Shari Olin - Commonly known as "Shari O.". She worked in the accounting department back in the Morning Star days. She has been somewhat of a mother hen to help all of us crazy chickens keep going. She helps with customer support, training, payroll, bill collection, and tons of backend office functions. Major power user. Just being silly, but she can have the mouth of a sailor but the heart of an angel. Part of the adilas admin team and a great friend.

Craig Leitner - Also part of the original Morning Star team. Craig was the automotive floorplan and bank guy. He is a power user in the system and does a lot of bank reconciliation and other tasks. He currently works with Steve and asks as the adilas controller (money flow guy).

Cory Warden - Originally an adilas rep and consultant. Cory become part of the team after being a rep for quite some time. She helps with customer care, client support, project management, and keeping the team on track. She also does all of the news and updates and other training material. Cory does tons of oversight type services for our clients. Power user and part of the admin team.

Sean Carlton - Sean was a manager at a Cannabis dispensary in Colorado that used adilas for years and years until they sold. Steve recruited Sean to help with sales, deployment, and training. Sean brings lots of usage experience. Often, he is one of the helpers if we need to send someone onsite to help with a deployment or training session. Power user.

Brandon Moore - I'm one of the guys that writes most of the developer's notebook entries. Originally, I was hired by Morning Star, the automotive dealership, to help with data entry, accounting, and website stuff. I ended up being one of the main adilas developers and architects. I build content, write code, help other developers and team members, and help with training. Helped start the project back in 2001 under the Morning Star name.

Chris Dunsey - One of the first adilas interns (developers). Helped with a number of projects. Ended up being somewhat of a consultant later on.

Shawn Curtis - Kinda a funny story. He was taking a developer's class at Bridgerland. He knew my brother Russell. He asked to join our developer class and became one of the first interns along with Chris Dunsey. Shawn ended up helping with payroll and other projects. Some of the photo galleries in the system came from Shawn's help. He also worked on the media/content (file upload) pieces. Later on, he did more payroll work and acted as a buddy to Brandon and did some consulting work. We worked together for years and years.

Russell Moore - Russell is my younger brother. Originally, he was added to the group because of his graphic skills. He ended up being a great backend developer and project manager. He has also acted as a trainer and mentor for Brandon along the way. Much of the current system came from projects and efforts that Russell was involved with. He has also been Brandon's AI tutor in recent years. Great help to the system. Huge contribution.

Chris Johnnie - He is an entrepreneur who teamed up with Russell to help create a company called "Adilas For Business" or "AFB". Eventually, both Russell and Chris sold their pieces back to adilas. They were honestly the first ones to really try to run as a white label of adilas. This was back in 2015 and 2016. Chris really helped to push the product to the next level along with Russell's help.

Danny Shuford - Longtime friend of Steve's. Danny helped with some website design, sales, and videos for adilas. He even got into creating custom PDF labels for clients. Light development work.

Marisa Shaw - She is Danny's daughter. Danny brought her to an adilas training event in Denver, CO. Marisa was the star student. She ended up helping with some graphics, flyers, marketing material, teaching, instruction, and planning. Power user. Very helpful.

Shannon Scoffield - Shannon is Brandon and Russell's sister. Her maiden name is Shannon Moore. Huge help and virtual assistant to Brandon. She has helped with training, project management, and content creation. Most of the major content sessions were or have been with Brandon and Shannon working together. When they, Brandon and Shannon, were traveling, Shannon was one of the primary adilas instructors. If she was teaching Brandon was taking notes. If Brandon was teaching, Shannon was taking notes. Power user.

Cheryl Moore - Cheryl is my mom. What an asset. She owns a small business and has owed a few different ones. When we were doing training sessions, she came to every one of them. She asked wonderful questions and was a great supporter. Sometime, I would use her as a test subject - can my mom do this? If yes, we are good. If not, we may need to keep tweaking it. Thanks mom!

Wayne Moore - Wayne is my dad. He was my hiking buddy and more than willing to talk about ideas and concepts on our walks and hikes. He helped out with video stuff and was a great coordinator for making other connections. He worked at Bridgerland (technical college) and helped us get setup with classrooms, computer labs, and other great connections. Huge cheerleader! There is another Wayne, Wayne Andersen, he is a backend developer, systems guy, and database guy.

Wayne Andersen - This Wayne lives in Portugal and helps with all of the backend security, server, and code testing. Major skills, writes code, helps push all of us to new technologies, partially retired but loves to play with tech stuff. If you search for Wayne and it deals with concepts and coordination stuff, that's my dad, Wayne Moore. If you search for Wayne and it sounds like a master backend guy, that's Wayne Andersen.

Alan Williams - One of the lead developer's at adilas.biz. Alan joined us in 2015 and quickly came up through the ranks. Trainer, CTO, team lead, master developer, prototyper, and system architect. Alan has helped with many projects and features over the years. He also helped Brandon with some of the prep work for the adilas lite (fracture) plans and project. Sometimes called "Dr. Alan" by the other developers. Example: This might be a project for Dr. Alan.

Bryan Dayton - Bryan has been one of the most versatile guys on our team. Originally, he joined a development class out of curiosity. He and Brandon live in the same town and know each other from church. Bryan has done more custom code or small system projects than almost any other developer. He also joined the team in 2015. He helps with sales, custom projects, pushing on projects that he thinks will yield a return. Lots of work on the adilas lite and fracture project. Very hard working and versatile.

Dustin Siegel - Developer who helped with numerous cannabis and cultivation type projects. He worked directly under Steve to help with that business vertical. Many of the original pages that Steve built were taken over and remade by Dustin.

Eric Tauer - Developer and custom code guy. Originally, Eric knew Steve and lived in Salida, CO. As a note, adilas is Salida spelled backwards. Eric has a background in database work and data warehousing. Eric has done tons of custom systems for clients. Often, Eric would pioneer certain features or logic, as custom code, and then we would bring those features into the main adilas application.

Garrett Kirschbaum - Adilas intern and then full developer back in 2015. Stressful time of building and expansion. He and others helped run the adilas shop with Brandon's help. Garrett was a great developer and helped us standardize a number of tools and features. He was the first developer to work on sub inventory, back in the day. He also did other projects and helped with some developer management stuff.

Charles or "Chuck" Swann - Charles was an instructor at Bridgerland for web development. He builds custom websites, does amazing mock-ups, prototypes, and is a CSS master (styling a website using code). Chuck worked with Russell to help with redesign work, projects, and vision. Chuck worked fulltime for a number of years and now works and coordinates work done by a small hand-picked design and development team. Anything that needs some design loving gets passed over the Chuck and his small team.

Steve McNew - Friend of Steve Berkenkotter's. This Steve helped prep some whitepaper documents to help with getting adilas standardized and some internal audit type stuff. Mostly white papers and putting things down on paper. He ended up getting hired by the local school district and wasn't able to finish the process, but he got it started. He asked some great questions, and we had some good conversations.

Abby Elkins - Abby is Brandon's daughter. Her maiden name was Abby Moore. Abby, when she was little (10-12 years old) helped with some of the original concept artwork for adilas. Later on, she helped with content for the presentation gallery and then the adilas lite plans (fracture). Currently, she is working graphic artwork for different adilas pages. She's now in her mid 20's and has some awesome art and content skills.

Aspen Moore - Aspen is Abby's younger sister and Brandon's daughter. Aspen helped Brandon with some planning and counseling (mental help). Aspen also did some general business consulting with her dad Brandon.

John Maestas - Developer, backend server guys, and designer. John came to us through Dustin. John was uses as a jack of all trades on the backend and frontend. He did numerous projects, documentation, payroll, and page redesign projects. John was also very help to Brandon in working on the notes and comments on the SWOT analysis document. Many other projects as well. Good vision of the future.

Kiva Berkenkotter - Steve's wife. She helped Steve with various projects and planning sessions. At one point, she was in charge of paying commissions and collecting monthly reoccurring payments. Huge supporter to Steve!

Heather Moore - Heather is Brandon's wife. What a trooper. Cheerleader, support, ideas, and consulting. Huge asset to Brandon (me). Thanks Heather!

Jonathan Wells - Designer and mock-up guy. He helped to map out the system and created a number of deep mock-ups for adilas lite (fracture) projects. Great job catching the vision and putting those pieces into a visual representation. We still refer to his work when talking about fracture (future project for adilas).

Jonathan Johnson - Business consultant from Epic Enterprises. Met with Brandon and Steve in end of 2019 into 2020. Really helped us see some needs and opportunities. Later, helped Brandon with some other consulting when trying to define the fracture plan.

Calvin Chipman - Windows software developer. Calvin also did a bunch of web-based work, database stuff, label printing, and API socket stuff. Calvin was the first developer to use the adilas API's to create a native mobile app for a client. He also built a number of special developer tools used by some of our team to speed things up. He's the tool guy!

Cody Apedaile - Bryan Dayton's cousin, Cody helped with a bunch of JavaScript code and changes. He also spent some time working on the UML diagram for the adilas database. We didn't get things finished, but he was working on a new build your own interface (custom to you) for adilas. We ran out of funding. We want to get back to that project at some point.

Dave Forbis - Dave was the official "high tech gofer". He did a bunch of things. Graphics, project management, brainstorming, planning, sales, and helped with managing developers for the adilas shop. He was another great student. He came to a number of training courses and brought so much to the courses. He was also a big support to Brandon during some rough times.

Josh - There are three Josh's. Josh Wheeler, Brandon's friend and developer. Josh Sagert, developer and adilas user (worked tons on the discount engine), and Josh White, Steve's friend from California. Josh White has brought us a number of bigger leads and bigger players, like franchises, and other higher-end clients. Anything recent is Josh White, from California. He helps with networking, sales, and dreaming of new things.

Suzi Distelberg - Sales, training, and deployment. She also worked with some custom projects and doing step-by-step user guides. She has helped with all kinds of projects and even gone onsite for setups and training. Great asset!

Kelly Whyman - Kelly is Dustin's wife. Kelly was single handedly the best independent sales rep that adilas had. She did training, consulting, and sponsored a number of custom projects. Kelly helped Steve and Brandon with reports, functionality, and other things. She got so good at things, state contracts snagged her up to work at state and multi-state level stuff.

Molly Hennessy - Molly was another independent sales rep and consultant. She had numerous clients and got into doing SOP's (standard operating procedures) and other high-end documentation and training. Molly was an entrepreneur and even started creating some of her own product and services. If you search adilas on google, some of the other results are from Molly. Super creative and a great consultant.

Hamid Karbasi - Developer - He has worked with Brandon doing small websites, training, and small tasks. He currently is a manager at a retail store and brings some managerial type skills to the table. Willing to talk about concepts and how they apply to retail and other environments. He is also lightly helping with some planning for fracture.

Gene Spaulding - Friend, entrepreneur, and businessman. Gene is an old college friend. We had a number of friends in common. He has been a small mentor to me over the years. Way back, before adilas, he helped me get my first business loan for a project that I was working on.

Sharik Peck - Friend, entrepreneur, public speaker, physical therapist, and businessman. Good influence and mentor in ways. Sharik and I used to exercise together back in the day. Many of fun walk, run, and weightlifting session. Learning some conference and training skills from him and his wife. They have done really well pushing their product lines and doing some marketing. Trying to get some ideas.

Bridgerland Technical College - Use to be Bridgerland Applied Technology College. Not a person, but a huge help. This is a local technical college in the Logan, UT, area. Brandon's dad, Wayne, worked there. Tons of assets. They provided classrooms, training options, computers, and even an small incubation spot (starter office space) for the adilas shop during the startup phase. Huge asset!

McCorvey's Pro Shop - Also known as Bowling World. Client that had multiple locations. The started out with around 30 and grew up to the 90+ location level, all using adilas. Long time client.

Emerald Fields - They were the first client that wanted their own fully dedicated box and server. They had multiple locations and requested some custom code, reports, and features.

Beaver Mountain Ski School - Client that we helped them track their ski school (snow sport) lessons. Students, instructors, classes, and schedules. Custom interface dealing with elements of time and flex grid.

Bear 100 - This was the first event or annual event client that we did. They used the system for about a week each year. They had 350+ runners and their families that would be on the site for multiple days straight. It was a 100 mile running race with 13 aid stations and a small social portal for the family and friends to watch their runners. This one was special as it had custom input options to upload CSV files to populate the database vs normal HTML form field entries. Records were sent in batches from remote places to adilas for storage and race progress.

High Valley Bike Shuttle - Online ecommerce and scheduling client. They also have a cafe and small retail store. Fun online scheduling and bulk flex grid projects.

Herbo - Mike Roundtree, owner of Herbo, was the first company to do a small white label of adilas. Mike has been a great asset to Steve and the two of them have worked on projects, plans, and dreams. Herbo also has a custom payment solution that they are trying to market and get rolling. Mike has been a great supporter for years. He is also a certified CPA and that credential helps us and him. We would like to get other CPA's on board as well. Thanks Mike!

Nxtlinq AI - AI assistant. These guys really pushed us to get an AI agent inside of adilas. Tons of development took place and lots of prep stuff. We wanted to do a 3-part plan for integrating AI. 1. Teach it how to navigate using the AI quick search (check - done), 2. Teach it all things adilas. and 3. Teach it how to be clear up at the consultant type level. We only got the first phase done. Lots of other plans and such, but we ran out of funding.

Grok AI - Steve loves using Grok. He has built a number of image generation options inside of adilas. He is also working with Grok to feed it data to help with analytics and AI insight. This is not finished yet, but we may end up using Grok as an AI assistant inside of adilas. We have simple and emerging connections available right now but need to really polish things up before going live with the AI assistant options.

ChatGPT AI - We have started using ChatGPT to help with code, explanations, explore resources, planning, and help with training and flow for people and other AI bots. Currently, Brandon, Steve, Bryan, Alan, Josh, Russell, Chuck, and Wayne are using AI in either ChatGPT chat sessions or some other form of AI. We have some using Copilot, Gemini, Claude, etc. AI is actually helping in many ways. ChatGPT is a big one for use. Anyways, they are earning their place in the adilas key contributors list.

There are so many more that I can't list. Developers, users, power users, reps, consultants, trainers, clients, accountants, friends, family, and even critics. They have all helped out the idea farming process and progression. Good stuff! We couldn't have done this alone. It takes a community to do what we are doing.

Various emails, text messages, and phone calls. Touching base with some of the team members. Physically on the phone with Shari O, Bryan, and Alan. Texting others.

Emails and then a phone call with Shari O. going over possible options for online meetings. We have an adilas Zoom account and the adilas GoToMeeting account. We use them both. I tend to use the GoToMeeting account more often for meeting with our guys and gals. Talking about who uses what tools and how all of that plays out. Light catch-up on other subjects and topics.

Emails and follow-ups. Quick phone call with Shari O., going over some questions. Checking on some funding options. Working on some public facing pages and doing a small update on those pages. Trying to make them look better. Changed 4 files dealing with the adilas API and letting users show/interact with those pages. Pushed up new files.

Small fixes for Shari O. on some payroll forms. Looked around, sent off a text to Shari O. I might need her help. The fix deals with an alignment issue and I don't have the originals. She wants me to move some of the form fields around for perfect printing but I'm not sure how much to move them.

Started working on a small piece for Cory. She needs a special bulk deposit status clean-up tool.

Prep work for the 1096 yearend payroll form. This is the annual summary and transmittal form for what was submitted. Pushed up new forms and code pages. Called Shari O. to let her know.

On a meeting with Bryan, looking over some new rules for smart group buttons and tiered pricing, based on sizes, vs quantities. He is making good progress on that project. He has a client that wants to bulk price things based on some sizes.

After the meeting, I made a small custom email change for Shari O and Applejack RV Park. Made changes and pushed up new files. Sent Shari O. an update email letting her know that everything was good to go.

Working with Shannon on glossary terms. We were in the "A" section. Going over some the verbiage and doing some light clean-up. It may be a while, to get through all of them.

Towards the end of the meeting with Shannon, Shari O. jumped on. I was helping Shari O. out with some changes for a client (corp-wide settings and custom invoice stuff). I showed her how to do some light HTML to add some bolded items and some line breaks to a disclaimer. We chatted about other stuff that is going along as well. Good catch-up session.

Emails. Light tech support to help Shari O. out with some rules and regulations for an RV park. They wanted these rules as part of their in-line disclaimer for their invoices. Recording some expenses and uploading images. Recording some post-it note ideas from last week.

Quick phone call with Shari O. She had some questions about some sold inventory reports. Spent some time refactoring some code on the adilas third party action page. Removed tons of lines of code. Consolidated some of the sub API socket assignments into a function call.

Jumped on a meeting with Steve to go over some prep stuff for the AI agent launch. We were asking the ai agent to help show us some info. It didn't retain our last training session. It did, during the session, but then it didn't keep it long term or globally. Light AI training... see attached word doc - eventually, we want to make all of our documentation public and use it to train all of the LLM's (large language models). That would be super cool.

Working on cascading the code to get the Nxtlinq AI agent up and running for all corps. Added some code to the classic homepage to check for the AI agent. If the AI agent is not found, it auto adds it. That should help with new corps coming onto the system. Finished up the code to cascade the auto deploy of the AI agent to all servers and all corps. Pushed new code up and ran the update.

Spent some time getting back into the partial PO project. Looking into tracking PO back orders and partial payments or partial receiving PO line items. I'm glad that I wrote some notes (almost 20 pages). It's been almost four months since I was on this project. It took a few minutes to get my head back in the game.

Helping to open up the date field on vendor credits. It actually took a bit of work. I thought that it would be pretty easy, but it had some hidden catches. Anyways, we got it done. This was a request from Shari O. and Cory to finish up vendor credits and other special account transactions.

Phone call with Bryan. He is working through a merchant processing setup. He reached out to a number of people and just wanted to talk about what to do and where to go next. It seems like a small mix between a specific merchant account and specific hardware being used. We are trying to figure out the next steps.

Recording changes in the adilas ownership percentages. Sent an email to both Shari O. and Steve with documentation.

Emails, paying bills, phone call with Shari O., and sending out some gift cards to the guys and gals. Other small to do list stuff.

Working on populating new code for 2024 tax year 1099's and W-2's. Spent a bunch of time in Adobe Acrobat editing forms, creating form fields, testing tab orders, alignment, and previewing data and data overlays. Also went into some of the backend logic and did some small tweaks and updates. Pushed up new code and new forms to all servers. Let Shari O. and Cory know that new forms were up and live.

Phone call with Shari O. going over MMLLC ownership and new member options. Phone call with Cory to talk about orders and PO based back-orders (inbound order status stuff). Light research on MMLLC's (multi member LLC's) and options for gifting percent ownership.

Fun new tools and toys demo. We had Cody, Shari O., Bryan, and I on the meeting. We went through the new check write settings first. After that, we got into the other main projects that Cody is working on. We spent some good time going over the new adilas label builder (v3) and the new custom homepage layout tool (fracture/adilas lite stuff). Check out the attached video, if you want to see things. It's about 52 minutes.

After the meeting, Cody and I pushed up some new changes and did some light testing.

Up helping with the Yogen Fruz deployment with Sean up in Tronto, Canada.

Here are some notes and recap:

Sunday - 10/27/24 - Drove to Colorado. Needed to get a passport and Utah didn't have a passport agency place.

Monday - 10/28/24 - Spent the day in Denver getting my passport. Had to go back to the passport agency a couple of times. One for the initial appointment and another time to pick it up and verify information. While waiting, did some research on my cart favorite buttons, smart groups, tiered pricing and rules and assignments for the smart group buttons. Met up with my brother for dinner.

Tuesday - 10/29/24 - Went to the Denver temple in the morning. Spent some time playing around with Affinity Designer and learning how to control color and saturation levels. Graphic stuff. Drove to Salida, CO. Met up with Steve at his house. We chatted about some upcoming projects and challenges. I really liked his house. He had redone some rooms, cabinets, counters, rest rooms, and such. Super cool! Craig came over and gave me a bunch of adilas checks. We talked about goals and ideas for the Canada trip and venture. After that, I met up with Mrs. Shari O. up in Buena Vista, Colorado and we had dinner together. Great time and fun chatting. I then got to go see Shari O.'s house and dogs. Super cute. Visited my friend Andy Maupin and then drove up to Denver.

Wednesday - 10/30/24 - Slept in my car in the airport parking garage - fun! Flew up to Canada and Sean picked me up in Tronto. We went to the hotel, got settled in and got some dinner. After dinner, we went and found a store to get some snacks and other food for the week.

Thursday - 10/31/24 - Trick or treat... We got tricked... :) We went to headquarters and met with some of their team. We got there at 9:30 am in the morning. We didn't leave until after 12:30 am, that night. Super long and stressful day. Tons of hardware issues. They wanted us to fully configure the old FranPOS units (7 year old Android tables with a locked software system installed). We were attempting to run adilas (web-based system on that unit). The browser part worked great (normal adilas stuff). The ability to interface with the peripherals and hardware were crazy tough. We couldn't get anything to work. Totally beating our heads against the wall. Trying all kinds of stuff. We did have some help from one of their team members (Harsha) and that was about it. At one point, it looked like that was the end... The main boss on their team was saying, it doesn't look like we will be able to deploy this software. Sean and I asked for leave to go to the computer store and purchase some things that we knew would work (new hardware). We were also somewhat waiting on another one of their team members who hadn't come in yet. He was a tech savvy guy who had been able to hack the locked code on the FranPOS on the last visit from Suzi from the adilas team. Without going into crazy details. We got some new hardware and started setting it up. We were also blessed and the other IT guy (George) from their company came and was able to get some things going through on the older hardware. Pretty stressful day.

Friday - 11/1/24 - Went to the mall (Square One mall in Tronto) to help get the system up live for the client. We were needing some help from the IT guy. He was a little bit late, we had it mostly running before he came. He put the icing on the cake and made it work. In the meantime, I ended up recoding some of the my cart favorite buttons, making them bigger, and styling the mini invoice (customer receipt) format. Sean was doing some training and by mid way through the day, it was going super smooth. If it wasn't for the hardware issues, we could have been in and out in just a few hours. Anyways, good day and they seemed to like the system. Answering random questions here and there. By the end of the day, they had done over 150 invoices (sales tickets) through the system.

Saturday - 11/2/24 - Went back to the store (Square One) to help out and see if they had any questions. Had lunch with the owner (Eric), great guy. I spent most of the day fixing small little things to help with flow and settings. Fixed a few information messages and added a new setting to control the auto print option for the mini invoice. Good day.

Sunday - 11/3/24 - Woke up early to update all of the time zones on the servers (daylight savings stuff). Sean and I went to church and then did some site seeing (Niagra Falls and such).

Monday - 11/4/24 - Back to headquarters. Worked on uploading customers. Sean was helping and doing some training. We spent some time and put together a small email with a list of to do items. We then had a meeting with some of their team to go over the email and to do list. That was really good. I met with a couple of people and setup some new accounts for some of the accounting people. Towards the end of the day, I got a chance to chat with the main operations boss (Phillip). I enjoyed that. Trying to show him what we do and how we do things. He has a lot of things going on.

Tuesday - 11/5/24 - Sean dropped me off at headquarters and I worked there all day. He took the rental car back and flew home. I spent most of the morning working on loyalty points and getting data entered into the system. Various questions, different sessions, etc. Towards the end of the day, I did some group training for four of the main people (Phillip, Rex, George, and Harsha). I thought it went good, hopefully they enjoyed it. There is a lot to cover. At the end of the day, I found a good spot to stop and did some light planning. One of the guys gave me a ride home (Rex). He was pretty cool! Just being silly but I got back to the hotel and said, "I'm alive!". I was super happy. We still have some things flapping in the wind but nothing that we can't tie up and/or fix. All in all, I was pretty happy.

Wednesday - 11/6/24 - Took a cab to the airport and got all checked in. I spent some time going over emails and what not. I hadn't checked them too much for the past week or so. Somewhat behind. Flew home and drove from Denver to Grand Junction, Colorado.

Thursday - 11/7/24 - Drove home from Grand Junction, Colorado to Logan, Utah. Stopped along the way and had a 2 hour phone call meeting with the adilas team (Steve, Alan, Cory, Sean, and I). Had a little car trouble but got home safe. What a trip!

Meeting with Steve and Alan. Going over budgets, pay offs, timing, talking about the approach, don't talk about positions, pitch the sale ($150 internal vs $75/hour - using some of our guys directly). Steve was and has been selling pieces of custom code to our clients. He would like help there and have the guys pitch their own services.

We spent some time talking about our identity and who and what we want to be. Taht is coming along. Here are some other general notes from our conversations (multiple topics):

- Help protect our clients...

- Set some caps on how much our developers can charge

- Communication back to the clients - weekly reports and billing

- Billing - weekly

- We can't let our developers rough up our clients

- Helping our guys succeed - plans, billing, communication, oversite, etc.

- Possible kickback - commission to adilas

- It takes so much time to crunch things up - sales or custom code - the reality of what it takes

- Can't keep pushing things over to the balance sheet (code or projects for Kelly) - it costs of too much. We pay the developers and we owe money back to Kelly.

- Consultation document or a checklist type doc

- We are generic on purpose - if you want it custom... you've got to pay to optimize it

- Setting up boundaries and being firm on that

- An add-on cost for custom work - they need to pay for it - they may need to keep paying for it (reoccurring) - maintenance

- Selling what we have

- Our development and sales focus is as a general business tool

- Elevator pitch - web based, SaaS (software as a service), we focus on operations and accounting, we have a base model, and we allow custom

- We want to be generic. We want to cover a number of industries. We want to be a great companion software for any business.

- This is who we are - defining ourselves and what we do

- Plans for our upcoming meeting with the developers - take care of business and setup another meeting where we have some plans all made up.

- The developers may have some ideas on how to make things work

- How can we get some of the cool stuff exposed to the public? Selling what we have. - sales - nobody is pushing it, our tools and features, as a product.

- Alan had the idea of using an outside marketing firm - when ready

- There is a need for marketing, education, etc.

- YouTube influencers - quick, short, and powerful mini messages - short and to the point

- Podcasts - how to run your business, tips, tricks, and best practices

- Piece work - we have tons of stuff - what if someone could harvest that kind of stuff? - YouTube, Facebook blogs, podcasts, etc.

- Alan would like to talk about the future - looking short term, medium term, long term, etc. - talking to Steve, Brandon, Shari o., Wayne, Cory, etc.

Meeting with Shannon. Talking about happenings (catching up on things) and making some plans.

Got a phone call from Wayne. We were talking about what we know dealing with the hack attempts on data 0. One of our plans is going to be moving to a new version of ColdFusion (2023). Trying to close every door possible. Wayne has some outbound logs from the server that we need to review. We may need to get a lawyer involved, if needed. I told Wayne that I would give Steve a call and figure out a plan on that side. We talked about maintenance and how we have to put out fires and grease the squeaky wheels. Some of the other stuff stays undone. There is too much to keep it all up. All part of the game. We also noted that Hostek (the hosting company) is being a little slower on their responses. Looking ahead, we know that we need to fix and work on some labels stuff, need to fix older barcode and QR code libraries, Wayne has a new solution in mind, replace the older BBQ and iText (java libraries). When ready, we will be pulling reports with dates/times, corps, customers that may have been affected by the hack attempt on the data 0 server.

Phone call with Steve. Going over hack attempts and course of action. Steve was telling me about hacks on huge companies like Netflix, Target, Apple, etc - everybody is being compromised. Dealing with credit card transactions, we are heading more and more towards a tokenization approach of data transmissions vs real data being passed back and forth. Steve said that a bank person (person in charge of fraud at a bank he goes to) said that they, the bank, re-issue 90-150 new credit cards a month, due to fraud. This was a small local bank. It's happening all over the place (hack attempts). We will work with Wayne and see what the window of time is that is in question. It's only on data 0. Our plan is to only notify those people/clients that may have been compromised (data stuff). I will get with Shari O. and get her involved to help send a note out. I'm also supposed to get some info from Wayne (tech stuff) about what we know and what that window looks like.

For me - Shannon and I were talking about a book called "Rhinoceros Success" by Scott Alexander. Taking small bits of wisdom from the rhino book - keep charging - damn the torpedoes! As a side note, one of the chapters in the book is called "Damn The Torpedoes" meaning that people are going to be shooting torpedoes at you all the time. Grow some thick skin and keep charging!

Recording notes from today. Fixed a bunch of custom email addresses for Shari O. and client out of Colorado.

Bryan had some questions on the QuickBooks API connections. Just looking around a bit. Lots of OAuth stuff. Back and forth, back and forth. Small graphic fix for Shari O. and the adilas internal email stuff. Emails and follow-up. Non-compete for Cody Apedaile. Prep work on the adilas label builder app.

Phone call with Shari O. - touching base on life. Going over emails, need for logos and other graphics, and settings. Multiple topics.

Phone call with Shari O. She had some questions and spent time going over merchant processing stuff. Meeting with Cory and Bryan (over an hour) doing a mini scan cart demo and walking through the different settings. We didn't cover all of the settings, but we did walk through a bunch of them. Cory had some great questions. This was the first time she had seen some of the new pieces.

Meeting with Bryan. Going over golf club (image a country club) type business options and how to use adilas to help with certain tasks. Things like scheduling tee times, tons of restaurant type needs, etc. Bryan was asking all kinds of questions. We have all of the tools, they just need to be tweaked a bit. Eventually, our meeting got into a who knows what type conversation. For example: So and so knows about this part, and so and so knows about this other part, etc. No one knows all of it. I was telling Bryan about some custom work we did for a Mexican Burrito place and how we were using ecommerce to help them place their orders with certain choices. I know that Sean and Dustin know about tons of other stuff. Alan has helped with other setups and custom code. Steve, Shari O., and Cory all know other things.

We talked about normal cart stuff, delivery, fulfillment stuff, custom webpages, and setting up custom skins or custom flow processes. I ended up doing some consulting, talking to Bryan about custom skins, and setting up a demo site. It takes effort to configure the tools. Once set up, the flow is much easier. Ideally, we would like to gather up all of the knowledge and put it in one place for use by others who want or need it.

Started out doing some emails and recording some notes. Then meeting with Cory and Shari O. Looking at a small convert to PDF error on data 1. Other systems seemed to be doing fine. Just a problem on data 1. We also looked at a possible error out in statement land and math dealing with tips. Also in statement land, we had a request to apply a data filter to what was going to be on the statements based on amounts owed (paid or pending invoices).

We then spent some time looking at payroll settings and checking code on bit bucket (code differences between old and new code). We couldn't find anything that really stuck out. We then went and tried it on a play site, and it worked great. Cory is going to check the settings for the company in question. Also dealing with payroll, Cory and I jumped into a couple of state websites and pulled new tax and withholding tables and formulas for a couple of states. We need to update those values inside of adilas.

Lastly, we went over some priorities and talked about other projects. I've got the top 3 priorities written down in my notes on my computer. They are checking some older bad data for a report dealing with sub inventory, helping Bryan with the custom project to connect PO's to elements of time, and updating some state withholding formulas. We also know that a custom data import is coming towards the end of the week. Busy times.

Emails and internal tech support - Wayne had questions and Shari O. was reporting on yearend stuff. Checking out yearend documents and financials.

Meeting with Shari O. over the phone. We went over questions on yearend payables, math questions, and also what about different payments for different things (interest and commissions). She saves results and documents things with spreadsheets (full audit trail). After talking about work stuff, we switched gears. We had some conversations about honesty issues - what stresses us out - what is the correct way (legal way) - our levels of job satisfaction - team stuff - etc. Good conversation. Shari O. and I can talk pretty openly about all kinds of subjects. That is nice.

Going over meeting notes from this morning (# 10813). Light training on customer affiliate programs for invoices, ecommerce, and customers. After that, we chatted and talked about some other internal needs and ideas. See notes below:

- A lot of the meeting kept coming back to - what are the rules? How do we define things?

- That is something we are really missing and what is needed in defining some structure.

- Efficiency - how can we create more efficiency?

- Retention - clients, users, internal, more??? Retention may need to include all of those pieces of the puzzle. We need help internally, Brandon wants to help to keep sharing the vision and helping other people succeed as they try to define and implement more structure.

- Make a new graphic to show the structure... this could go along way...

- If working in different departments, report to the correct supervisor based on the project and/or task.

- Helping people know who they are accountable to report back to.

- Start with simple budgets - incentives, bonuses, etc.

- Flex grid to help track budgets - super simple

- Easing pain points

- Guidelines on budgets - make up some rules

- Budgets - start right off or wait? could go either way.

- Staffing - prioritize the biggest needs

- Understanding the biggest pain points

- Biggest resources - other people who are already doing those things

- Get some feedback and input from others - help them invest in the solution

- People are one of your best assets

- Customer support - Sean, Cory, and Shari O.

- Counseling with others - Getting that input from others - Perspective changes - May take a little bit longer

- Communication - Getting people on the same page, then getting it going, then helping it keep going

- Leadership and defining roles

- Processes - plans - what does that look like?

- Talk in person - setup a time to meet, call, text, etc. somehow meet

- Micro meetings

- Department text thread (quick blast) or department email - Group communication format

- Following protocols - Going up the chain - Somehow making a note or list of items to talk about

- Discussion and re-defining expectations - Softer conversation first - If it becomes reoccurring, escalate it

- If we need to, we could use the advisory board to help make hard decisions

- Finding and seeking out good talent

- Not everybody is a leader, that's ok

- Apply my areas of expertise to customers, users, and internal people - training, consulting, support, setup, planning

- Retention Department - Responsible for things such as: Training, Setup, Customer support, Consulting, Adilas University, and their own research & development

Going over new reports and who is going to work on those reports (assignments out to developers for certain projects). We talked about coming up with a solution to our bad data issue that we were going over this morning (a corp on data 10 from over 1.5 years ago). We came up with two possible solutions. We are going to be running a limited number of records through on a testing server. We will then go in and manipulate the testing data to simulate the bad data that we found. We will then figure out how to fix that data and make it correct and/or correctable.

Sharing info with Cory and Shari O. on some ideas for changing our main company structure. I referred them to some documents and brainstorming sessions from last week (1/15/24 to 1/20/24). Shari O. was really emphasizing the need for open communication between key players. We have been having some issues with communication channels.

Meeting with Kelly and Cory and Shari O. over a Zoom meeting. The main goal of the meeting was to look at some bad data for a client on data 10. We can't make it happen again, it was data from well over 1.5 years ago, and everything since then has been good. I'm just being silly, but it was a bit of a beat-up drill and a brow lashing of sorts. The good thing is we found the issue (limited number of bad records). At least we have a starting point to work from. We do not have a plan yet but that will come.

I was pitching the idea of a known issues report. Instead of just showing data (normal reports), we could actually look for bad data or errors in our code or data mismatches. That would be a small level of AI (artificial intelligence) on the reporting side. Imagine a report that said... check this and that... these things are known to be off the rails. That would be super cool. Side note, we actually started a known issues report way back (3/11/09)... at least listing out known areas that might have trouble. We just haven't been able to get around to building out that report. The actual report is in our code at this location... (top_secret/secure/known_issues.cfm). It has a huge list of possible problem areas, date mismatches, flow problems (something happened out of order or out of normal flow), and id/relationship possible problems.

As soon as we get a chance, it would be super cool to help uncover these and other possible problems and issues. Kelly had the idea of working backwards to help find the errors and exceptions.

One big take away, and something that we want to keep in mind for fracture (adilas lite) are these key pillars... We track money, inventory, finances, and full histories (Kelly was saying that those pieces are huge keys to what makes adilas awesome).

Meeting with Cory and Shari O. to go over projects and questions. Shari O. had a request for being able to sell stock/units and special fees and presets (pack or specific fees or collected values for each sale). We currently allow for 5 preset items to go along with the sale of a stock/unit. She was requesting 10 (increase it by 5). We talked about options, and I gave them a rough quote what I thought it would take. If the client was tech savvy enough, they could recipes. That is unlimited and could be easily configured to add multiple (unlimited) items to a sale (into the shopping cart) from a single button or click. Anyways, just a free option that already exists.

We spent some time talking about payroll and the need for other states, more HR (human resources) options, and deeper payroll/HR functionality. That would be awesome, and we'd love to add that in. It just depends on who is paying for it.

The other main topic was going over some new reports that have been requested. Both for sub inventory and more accounting level stuff.

Meeting with Cory and Shari O. on projects. We went over some yearend documents and forms and progress there. We spent quite a bit of time on some new quotes. One was a revamp on a prior quote. We added in some new requirements and needs for histories for flex attributes. Randomly enough, there were other requests for other hidden history records and reports. Some of our clients want us to watch almost every single place and record histories (some visual to the users and some that are hidden and only seen by administrators). I thought that was very interesting and something that we need to be on top of for fracture and adilas lite.

One of the places that they want us to watch was settings and who turns things on/off (like a gram controller for the shopping cart) and other setting changes. We also went over more requests to tie things to elements of time (like PO's and E/R's). We have some clients that are using elements of time for help with production runs and delivery options. Interesting what people need.

The last quote that we worked on was for a better or more standard report or export for the balance sheet, P&L (income statement), and general chart of accounts (deposit types and expense types and balance sheet types). The requests was for a report that showed each segment in a nice grid like fashion. On some of the existing reports, the values are all there, they are just hyphenated, the request was to break each data piece down and export it in a simplified grid, no other formatting. I think that the end goal is to pull it into Microsoft Excel and do some tweaking of the data and values there. Just guessing.

The last thing that I wanted to say was put in another plug for better aggregated data to help provide some better speed and business intelligence (BI). We have this planned as part of the fracture and adilas lite project, it just takes time and resources to get there. There is a whole project called the adilas value add-on core model where we will be working on these layers over and on top of the transactional core. Just for fun, here is a link with other references to the adilas value add-on core model.

Emails and then back on printable 1099's and red data overlay forms. Texting back and forth with Steve, Cory, and Shari O. about 1099 tax forms. Came up with a plan. Phone call with Will to help him with some questions on options for uploading images for customer websites. On the 1099's, we decided to not do the red magnetic ink forms this year. We pointed the users to file those online. We only have the printable black and white W-2's and 1099's on our site this year.

Meeting with Shari O. and Cory. Going over plans and priorities. We talked about yearend stuff for payroll and 1099's. I'll be working on that here this week. We also talked about a quote that a client would like. It's joining PO's, flex attributes, and elements of time. We watched a 15-minute video that Cory and Kelly made with the requirements and requests. We may modify it a bit, but it looks like a good project. This one has more of a manufacturing type flavor to it.

Recording notes and then jumping back on the yearend payroll updates. Met with Bryan to look at some code. Pushed up a new API socket to help with pulling customer info based on a last date modified. Then back on to the payroll updates. Pushed up the 2023 W-2's and sent a message to Shari O. and Cory.

Sent out some email updates to both Shari O. and Cory with some changes that they had requested. I then got back on the yearend payroll updates and changes. Working on some JavaScript changes to help with some settings that were added (form fields that will either be on the page or hidden - not there). Making sure that the functions work with all scenarios.

A number of different and random things. Emails, recording notes, code review for Will, providing feedback and suggestions, custom email addresses requested by both Shari O. and Cory for clients and new adilas internal users. Quick meeting with Bryan. Merged in some code and pushed things up for testing. Updating the 517 Blake Street address with the new PO Box 852. Changed out personal phone numbers for Steve and I with the main adilas tech support number 720.740.3076. Changed tons of files. Merged in new changes. They should auto rollout tomorrow morning with the other new code from today.

Jumped on a meeting with Cory and Shari O. Going over yearend payroll stuff and tax forms. We then got into a discussion on average costing and a thing called internal cost corrections (ICC). We have some of our older clients that came on (started using our systems) before we had sub inventory. Some of them are wanting us to add in either average costing options or be able to virtually update the COGS to match-up what has come in/out of the system on a per item basis. The best solution would be to get them to buy into and/or use sub inventory or parent/child inventory. Anyways, we were talking about some options.

Quick meeting with Shari O. and Cory. Going over priorities and a light overview of where we are heading in the next couple of weeks. We looked at schedules. Checking emails.

Jumped on with Cory and Shari O. to show them some progress on my bulk clear loyalty points project. Small show and tell. We merged in a small branch for Chuck and then talked about some clean-up on pagination on certain pages that is needed (go to the next page - pagination). We talked about yearend stuff and getting the known pieces done before the end of the year. That one, yearend tax stuff, comes up every year. We have to update 1099's, W-2's, and other reports. We also have to add new tax withholding tables and update values. Maintenance stuff.

Meeting with Cory and Shari O. going over projects and priorities. After that, we jumped in and went over an API socket connect for a company. Light tech support helping them get connected and going.

Meeting with Cory and Shari O. Going over projects and priorities. Small updates on where each of the current projects stand. We talked quite a bit about the need for more special line items and maybe even making them more dynamic. Special line items are things that our clients get by default (things like labor, part number other, fee, shipping, freight, discount, supplies, etc.). They also have some special functionality that nothing else has as far as how they play, how they show up for roll call, and special grouping on certain reports. The other feature that Cory has been using recently is the percentage add-on feature that takes the cart total and then figures out a percentage to make that number stick and pass through the cart as a fee or whatever. We may end up doing a project to help with these features (dynamic special line items).

Toward the end of the meeting, we were talking about yearend payroll updates and changes that are needed (taxes, rules, forms, new rates and formulas). That comes up every year. One of our constant maintenance items for the adilas application.

Meeting with Cory and Shari O. - Going over projects and priorities. I'm going to be doing more work on the discount engine this week. We spent a bunch of time on possible solutions for recouping credit card processing fees. We talked about adding in an extra hanger on the main invoice, commandeering the tips options, increasing prices, adding a separate line item, running things through hidden line items, play with it like a tax, adding a connivence or administrative fee, and using multiple invoices to do the job. We also talked about bulk tools and reverse discounts (add to an invoice vs taking away). Lots of options.

We physically went in and played with some of the options. Cory is going to take the info back to the client and see what they want to do. Some of the options are free, meaning they already exist. Other options may include some development time.

Another topic that seems to be heating up is people are wanting to use our loyalty points and they want to transfer in data and/or upload things from outside sources. We talked about bulk external upload tools and how all of that works. We just made some of that code for a client last month. We plan on reusing that and making it able to upload multiple times without doubling things up. Recording some notes.

Two different sessions with Eric, going over tips, payments, and use cases and scenarios. Our first session was in the morning from 9:30-10 am. I had to bail out to meet with Cory and Shari O. We met up again at 11 and did some more talking and discussing. The main goal was tips, flow, and keeping financials in balance and in good shape. We also talked about either creating and/or using some mappings for new expense types and/or deposit types. We talked alot about EMV/chip readers, tips, and how to handle those credit card type transactions. We also talked about cash/check scenarios and how that is sometimes treated differently for tips and repayment.

Each corporation does their own stuff and handles tips in their own way. Some treat it as cash and cash out every night. Others hold it, track it, and pay it back out with payroll, taxes, and a rolling payment method. Lots of companies in between, including some companies that don't allow or don't even deal with tips. Lots of possible scenarios.

Some of our discussions got off into the weeds a bit. Adilas is so flexible, we allow our clients to sort of make up their own rules. That is great, but we may also need a way to help steer them in a good direction and/or help them enforce their own rules. If we create something, we can't just take that away. We have to leave it alone so that it can play through any past transactions or user history actions. That complicates things a bit.

We talked about a dedicated tip screen on the checkout process. That would help us gather the correct information and even provide us with enough information to process things how we need to, to keep everything inline.

Meeting with Cory and Shari O. over a Zoom session. We were looking into an issue with one of our client's balance sheet and some gift card transactions. We had to update the created date/time on the corp special account transactions for some gift cards that were partially done in the old way and then converted to the new way. As a side note, we may need to allow that date/time field to be editable. I had to do it from the background. That might be nice to have that as a standard feature.

We talked about the discount engine project and came up with a small plan for going forward. The new plan involves a database change, retrofitting the old discount engine code to use the new database changes, then working on the new discount engine code. Ideally, we get the database piece done and then allow our users to pick if they want to use the old or the new (for a while). When ready, we fully transition to the new code base. We also covered some other questions and what not.

Meeting with Cory and Shari O. We went over projects and priorities. That went pretty quick. We then got into some code and looked at the SG&A costs (selling general and administrative costs). We looked over older code, went through things, and then brainstormed on some new ideas. We would love to start from the expense/receipts. Basically, build it, then click a button or something to create the PO (SG&A inventory) and back tie it to the expense. That would be really cool. We went over some small drawings and such.

After the meeting, I got on a phone call with Bryan. I also did some emailing back and forth with Will on some general webpage settings for ecommerce.

Meeting with Cory and Shari O. over a Zoom meeting. We started on the end of day reports. We have some clients that like the payments filtered by invoice or main salesperson and other clients that like the payments filtered by the person who did the payment or who was responsible for the invoice payment transaction. We talked about some possible options.

We went over our to do list and set some priorities. After that, Shari O. helped with some cross training to help get Cory up to speed on setting up merchant accounts and merchant processing settings. Light back and forth and some light training. We made sure that access and permissions were set on certain servers and accounts.

Diverse day. Just got back from a multi-day Adobe ColdFusion conference. Lots of catch-up, phone calls, meetings, and small code changes. Here is a rough overview.

- Spent a little over an hour with Cory, on a Zoom meeting. We were going over to do list items and prorities. We went over a number of smaller needs and upcoming/current projects. General project management type stuff.

- Phone calls with Eric, Steve, and Shari O. - These were all separate calls with differnet topics.

- Added users, permissions, and sent out emails to help get Eric setup with system admin options on the data 11 server.

- Going over emails. While doing emails, got a few small code change requests. Made the changes and pushed up the new code. Some of it was internal and some of it was a request from the Bear 100 data team. Created a public facing test CSV file uploader page, specific to the Bear 100 and their runner data files. No database activity is done from this page. It only looks at the uploaded CSV files and spits back parsed data (it runs through the backend logic but no database changes are made - inserts or updates).

- Paying bills and recording receipts from Bryan and I's trip to the ColdFusion conference.

Zoom meeting with Cory. My main two projects this week are the new shopping cart and the Bear 100. We also talked about the public API and 3rd party solutions using either the public API or a special 3rd party API socket channel. We spent some time talking about the discount engine and figuring out a plan to launch the new code while still leaving the old code somewhat in place. We may have to go backwards and retrofit the old code to handle the new custom date ranges. We'll get it all figured out.

We looked at some sub inventory reports and sub reports based off of sub id numbers and other sub reports based off of the RFID tag number. Shari O. had a few questions at the end of the meeting. She was mostly just listening in to say on top of what is going on and happening. Cory got to show her a little bit of the new shopping cart. It seems like we are mostly on top of things right now. No huge out of control fires. I left the meeting and Cory and Shari O. were still talking about emails and clients. Good stuff.

Bryan and I merged in some code last night that we were working on. It was working great on all of our tests. We weren't able to push it live for testing before it got auto deployed. When it went live, we found that if you didn't have a certain setting turned on, it was throwing an error. I was out hiking and got a call and text message from Cory. I joined the Zoom meeting once I got home.

Wayne and Bryan were on the Zoom meeting with Cory and Shari O. We got the error fixed and made some adjustments to the code. While Wayne was re-deploying code on all of the servers. I was able to get my VPN stuff setup so that I could push code directly to the servers. That ability and connection was down for a couple of days (on my side - just not being able to connect directly to the servers). Anyways, we got it all resolved.

Once things calmed down (servers were getting fixed), I was able to talk to Wayne and do some catching up. We haven't spoken for a few months due to who is on what meeting. That was good and he was explaining his wants and needs (as a system administrator). Some of what he does we don't fully understand and/or know. Our conversation ended up flowing into the start of the server meeting. I think that he needed to talk. That was good.

Emails, recording notes, paying bills, and on the phone with Shari O. Mostly random to do list stuff.

On a Zoom meeting with Steve, Cory, and Shari O. We covered a number of topics. One new one was a little mini cart overview. They want one that is super simple and just does a limited scan cart for barcodes. No major look-ups (showing search results). We went over a few project specs. We talked about a future need for multi cash drawers or multiple registers. This could include a possible way to flag and tag an invoice and an invoice payment based on who is using what.

We went over a number of other small projects. Nothing really pressing. I took a few notes. Mostly just light maintenance stuff and/or allowing payees (users or salespersons) to be flipped on invoice payments or payees (users) to be flipped on subs of time. Most of those places, we just grab the payee (user id) from who is doing the transaction or payment. We may need a way to go in after the fact and flip that, in certain scenarios. Should be pretty simple.

We had an update meeting to show progress on ship B stuff (adilas lite and fracture). We had 10 people on the meeting. We had Alan, Hamid, Steve, Sean, Danny, Cory, Shari O., Shannon, Bryan, and Brandon (myself).

We did record it. The recording is right about an hour long. The first 20-30 minutes were from Alan going over market research and tech deck decisions for fracture. After that, I introduced a new website to publish some of our work on the adilas lite or fracture project. Here are a couple of links:

Adilas Lite - Project Home - https://data0.adilas.biz/lite/

Adilas Lite - Videos & Research - https://data0.adilas.biz/lite/adilas_lite_videos.cfm

The meeting went well. As a side note, Shari O. recommended that we have a fun, non work, meeting just to catch-up and say hi and what not. She is kinda like our mother hen, for the adilas team. Fun times. See attached for some other videos and assets.

After the meeting, I spent some time uploading things and doing some light clean-up from the day. Busy day. 

Project management with Cory and Shari O. We reviewed progress from last week, talked about chip readers, and other upcoming projects. We spent some time looking at user data and how a certain company uses PO's, E/R's (expense/receipts), and PO payments. We used the system, did some look-ups, and even looked at some raw data to see if we could figure out what they were doing. It seems like they had a PO, paid for it, then added or modified it, and then repaid for it, then remodified it again and again, and repaid for it. Not your normal processes. The system got confused. We are planning to meet with the client and doing some training vs changing any code.

Mostly working on logic for the Bear 100 and the leader board. I did get interrupted a number of times this afternoon. Only recording 2 hours of this session for the Bear 100 project. All other time will go to the new email servers.

Back to the Bear 100 - Currently, all code for the leader board is on a test file (scratch) to check dumps, variables, queries, and dynamics. Almost done with the logic portion. Still need to run a few more tests and then move code over into the real page.

Other work was stuff like emailing back and forth with Wayne and Shari O. on email server questions. Tech support call to Newtek to get info to pass on to Wayne about the email servers. On hold for over half an hour. Got a request from Bryan to jump on and help him out with the API sockets and customer payment profiles project for the new Authorize.net project. Busy afternoon!

Phone call with Shari O. going over questions on merchant processing and custom email accounts. We really need a better or tighter company structure. Certain things are falling through the cracks. Sent an email out to Wayne, Cory, and Shari O. with information regarding the custom email addresses and accounts.

Phone call with Shari O. and fixing a stock/unit problem for I-35 Trailers out of Texas. ended up bouncing around and we altered some database records behind the scenes. It appears to have fixed all of the issues. Somehow, they were using a model id number that was tied to a non-trailer inventory type. Not sure how that happened.

Helping Shari O. with some email stuff. We briefly talked about the new Google Workspace stuff. I got here a small list of custom email addresses (out of a custom code page). Tried to run some other queries and was getting denied. Light investigation to look-up some database changes.

Poor Shari O. - I got so busy I totally forgot about this appointment. We will meet up later, but this didn't happen. My bad.

Got a text from Shari O. asking me to jump on the GoToMeeting session. The guys had spun up a new server and she was trying to get in. We ended up contacting Wayne and Cory and worked through a few things. Some of the settings weren't quite right. We got it all figured out. This seemed like a special case. We had copied images and a database from data 33 to data 39 and then Wayne had flipped some values and ids. Basically, a company needed a full deep copy and then wanted that new corporation to be able to be completely separate and run independently. I'm glad that we have some talented folks on our team. We did something similar years ago and it took me days and days.

Phone call with Shari O. to go over a few things. Emails and recording notes from yesterday (6/14/23). Busy day.

Quick phone call with John. We jumped on the GoToMeeting. Sean was on there and asked about the group meeting about the pivot that we had last night. We reported to him. I then helped John get passed a small payroll issue that he was having on his local box. I did some checking on an employee/co-owner draw and gathered some history info. Quick phone call with Shari O. to chat about the meeting. She will pass me over the recording when it gets uploaded. I then sent out an email to all of the guys/gals with the notes from last night's meeting.

New transition today. I popped onto the morning meeting because that is what I normally did. I let the guys know that I wasn't going to be doing that any more. Sean was on the meeting and we chatted for a bit. By way of an update, he is doing great working with the dynamic adilas label builder. He is also willing to do some checking out of what our competitors are doing and providing me some competitive research. Nothing too huge.

John joined the meeting, and we were looking at some mock-ups. We would like to allow our users to interact with options to setup their own space, look and feel, etc. We would also like to do some early prototyping. Get it out and in their hands. Even things like settings for click vs hoover and other simple choices that affect their space (what they do and use - their space, their flow). We already have a bunch that we have paid for and haven't been able to use it yet. We have a ton of R&D stuff that Jonathan Wells did in Adobe XD for fracture, adilas cafe, and a new shopping cart.

A picture is worth a thousand words. Dramatize it, push up XD docs from Chuck on the content server. We have done tons of really good R&D. Let's use that. This is how we are going to get fracture up and going and off the ground.

John and I talked about trying to centralize all of the data and assets. I have a bunch of it. We have pushed up a bunch to the adilas content server. We also still have quite a few assets and raw authoring files with the guys/gals who made them - Jonathan Wells, Chuck, Russell, Marisa, etc.

As part of our discussion, John was showing me some of the projects that he worked on for school. He's got business design docs, pitches, proposals, flow charts, etc. I'd like to tap into some of those planning and system scope documents. Not necessarily for his project, but more for what we could do for our projects. Once again, show them don't tell them. That is huge and reoccurring theme. Show them, don't tell them.

Here are some other notes from our meeting:

- We could make some awesome customizable dashboards

- Realtime data on what is going on (tables, graphs, charts, and quick aggregates), help them see everything without overwhelming them. Full visibility.

- "Show them" and then do it over and over again.

- Talking about dream salaries between John and I. Where would you like to be, salary wise?

- Keep idea farming - that's what we do

- Shari O. joined the meeting. She loves to do some gaming. I'd love for her to come up with some ideas on how to turn adilas and the daily work into a game of sorts (the game of business). Shari O. said that she could do some light research and maybe come up with some ideas. As we were talking, she said that she changes games based on moods. That's good information. We may want to come up with something similar - what mood are you in? Ok, let's play that way. This is just a dream right now. I'd like to see where it goes.

- Keep gathering things together. Eventually, we will make our own world.

- More ideas for the application and/or system - education mode, game mode, nuts and bolts mode (just get it done - speed mode).

- More talks with Shari O. about Facebook groups, other social groups, having meetings, setting up schedules, and giving people power to run what they want to do. Make the whole thing a team effort.

Meeting with John and doing some planning. We were going over themes, ins and outs of how to make a new theme in our existing code, folders, paths, settings, and page level controllers. We talked about some of the new code and R&D that Jonathan Wells did. We are looking for feedback. We may end up offering options and pushing the choices over to the users. Tons of toggle on/off switches for the different features.

People don't want to scroll and they want a minimal number of clicks to make something happen. We talked about getting the information (all kinds) into the database. Minimal on the hardcoded pieces. The whole thing becomes data driven.

I was drawing and talking about different things. We would love to create a master plan. John and I started a small google doc to gather some the of the master plan info so we both could access it.

Shari O. jumped in and had some payroll questions. We did some quick research, pulled some records, and helped her make some changes. We got it all figured out.

Sean and I talking about dreams and plans. Where do we want it to go? I love those kinds of talks and conversations.

John and I were talking about budgets and hours. He is concerned. Shari O. joined and John and Shari O. were talking about layouts and interface stuff. We have a client that is requesting some custom navigation. They want to shortcut things by one click or put buttons and/or links where they want them to show up. This is more of a "controlling space" meaning what you work with and where things are located. Custom space - think of your desk or bedroom, you put certain things in strategic places in order to be efficient or effective.

Shari O. was asking questions about some of the new payroll settings for a client. We went in and looked, and it looked like the client was in there changing things around. Some of the changes that Shari O. had made were gone. We fixed it and will get ahold of the client and do some training.

Shari O. and I were looking at the verify payment logic for expense/receipts and expense payments. We had some questions that one of our power users had brought up. We recently made some visual changes, and we think that is what caused the confusion. The new interface as a graphic or icon where some words used to be. You can get a tool tip if you mouse over the icon, but it no longer spells it out in raw text. The same link and option exists, it's just smaller and tied to an icon vs a normal spelled out text link.

We are all so much of a creature of habit, we tend to go super-fast and not slowdown unless we need to. The slightest change can throw us off if we aren't ready for it. After we got done with our research and checking things out, I spent the rest of the hour doing emails.

Long meeting today. Started out talking to Wayne and Shari O. about emails, internal emails, external emails (outbound to different clients), and possible options. Wayne repointed the IP addresses yesterday back to the original way we had the email system setup. It was kinda wacky for a couple of days. Anyways, we put it back to what it was. We still need to look deeper into this, but it should be stable for now.

Steve was asking about the bus to motorcycle project - datasource or world building project. Wayne was reporting that some of his new code is trying to deal with this issue or these issues. We talked about the current state and where things are going. Briefly touched base on combo primary keys and removing major dependencies on existing standalone primary keys (database connection and relationship stuff). Along with the datasource topic (which database to talk to as a single time) the conversation also included our ever growing need to do cross corp stuff. We didn't talk about it, but some of this is very similar to the adilas cafe talks and discussions that we have had.

If we get majorly into cross corp stuff, and each corp has its own database or sandbox, we may end up doing cross corp stuff through API socket connections. That sounded like a good idea. We'll have to look at it, as we may do unions, API sockets, or other temp database tricks to show and/or report combined data.

We flipped over to the new framework that Wayne is working on. He did a small demo for us on what he is working on. These are just a few of my notes. See attached for a 1:39 - one hour and 39 minute video of of some of meeting.

- Our switch to a new framework is not just a time saver. It goes way deeper than that.

- Lots of conversation about supporting different frameworks, themes, and versions of code.

- The whole new framework is setup as an MVC framework or MVC model - model, view, controller

- We need to keep moving forward in order to stay valid

- Layouts and views

- Everything is event driven

- We have both raw input (info and data directly from a user or customer) and we also have cleaned up and formatted data (okayed, approved, combed, retrieved, or sanitized data).

- These are just some keywords and concepts - handlers, events, models, interceptors, layouts, views, classes, methods, etc.

- One of the goals is to get rid of all of the repetitive, ticky-tacky maintenance code. This is stuff like params, validation, permission checks, making sure that certain values have been set, etc. Basically, the prep work before the real meat of the page begins. Some of our pages may be hundreds of lines of code deep before we actually get to the meat of the page. The framework would help us simplify and standardize some of the prep work stuff.

- If we build this way, it could open up options for multiple layouts and/or views (what it looks like). Keeping a separation between the business logic and the view or presentation of that data.

- Events, watchers, and triggers that help us run clean-up and other processes and routines. Key everything off of certain events.

- Getters and setters - smaller mini functions for each class, object, and property within that class. All built-in and/or available. We really wanted to do this for the fracture project (future project for adilas).

- Options for self-documentation

- Debugging, tracer options, logging, and security stuff already built-in

- Lots of talk about the benefits of using a framework.

- Mementos and smaller sub sets of data, that may be pre-formatted and/or setup how we need it - saving time in conversions and retrieving available data.

- Defining things and then using them over and over again in other pages.

- This is huge, but the framework already has a ton of built-in documentation and samples. That takes a lot of work and preparation. Also, it is able to self-generate basic documentation based on how we code it (based off of keywords, hints, notes, and rules).

- If we build off a new framework, we could use either Adobe ColdFusion (current model) or we could use Lucee - open source CFML engine. The framework can flip flop pretty easily between the different backend engines. It's basically a config option.

- We do lots of things over and over again. Make that more simple, standardized, and compartmentalized.

- They offer a standard set of options and configurations. We can use that and/or pick and choose or customize whatever we want.

- Light talks about the pros and cons of an ORM model (object-relational mapping - mixing of objects and relational databases)

- Shooting for a more modern approach - use of code, technology, and a layered approach

- Wayne really wants to come up with a process of how to convert our current pages and code into the ColdBox framework. Think of a set of instructions (virtual recipe) and then allow other developers to help convert the pages. Basically, a road map to follow.

- Our customers really need and want us to be more stable and reliable, as a company, and as a software system. This includes how we develop code, release and deploy code, and manage systems and servers. In a nutshell, they want us to grow up, as a company and have a bit more of a standard structure and presence.

- We are heading more and more towards clustering, enterprise level stuff. We need to build towards that.

- As a side note, Wayne says we have way too many includes (files that get included and/or strung together to make the whole).

- One of our major focuses on switching the backend architecture is customer reliability.

- Wayne sees a need for radical changes to simplify, stabilize, and build things out for the future. It has to be sustainable and sustainability. Light talks about evolution vs revolution or changes over time vs drastic changes all at once. Things are smoother if software can evolve vs just being harshly changed. However, sometime things need to majorly change, hopefully for the better. There are some pros and cons to both approaches.

- Building new has a motivation factor to it - true story - what keeps us going?

- This is a chance to rebuild it like we want it - build to the dream

/////////////

We switched subjects and were the guys were talking about hosting companies and how that scene is changing in the datacenters that we are using. We have seen a lack or lowing of the customer service levels. We may end up checking out some other hosting companies.

John and Cory were talking about other projects and timelines. They were also talking about uptime, downtime, and databases. We talked about coming up with new SOP (standard operating procedures) for pushing up code, code rollbacks, and deployment of new features. That got into talks about manual and automated database updates, scripts, auto processes.

That topic lead to a discussion on roles and responsibilities and who does what. There is a need to define some of the roles a little bit deeper and make it clearer who does what and in what order. More SOP stuff for the backend processes and procedures. There also needs to be good communication between the developers and the system admin persons. We have to keep up those communication channels. That is really important. Nobody can read minds.

Towards the end, John and Cory were going over projects and coordinating dates/times for testing, review, look and feel changes, and testing. Good stuff.

GoToMeeting session with Shari O. and Sean. Going over emails and client communication channels. Hoping to get with Wayne a bit. Shari O. had a quick question about merchant processing and some settings there. Light talk about some wish list stuff.

Sean and Shari O. were on the morning meeting over GoToMeeting. They were going over clients and who is doing what and what needs are being expressed and acknowledged. They are doing a great job. Shari O. is doing a bunch of client one-on-one help and training. Sean was reporting on a demo from last week. There is a difference between frontend and backend expectations, as far as requirements and system needs and wants. In this case, the frontend guys are the ones doing the daily interactions (primary users or customer facing users) and the backend folks are more managers, accounting, and owners (secondary users or more specific users for certain tasks or internal facing users).

Shari O. and Sean were talking about internal reporting and setting up flex attributes and custom data fields. Along with that, it is hard to enforce specific standards, best practices, and other ways to help normalize the data. The more I watch, from the background, I can see a need for maintenance on data, practices, and training. Maintenance is a huge deal. The end goal is to make it all uniform and be able to get it in, get it out, and make it useful. Actually doing that can be a tricky move.

I was doing emails, listening, and scribbling down some notes. I had to jump off at 9:30 am to join a different meeting. I left and both Sean and Shari O. were still on the meeting.

On the server meeting with Wayne, John, Cory, and myself. Sean and Eric popped in for a bit as well. We were talking about email servers, merging in code, and making plans for pushing up new pages. Eric joined and Wayne merged in his code for the global item catalog - enterprise stuff. Once that happened, I pulled the branch down on my local box and was clicking around to see if there were any errors. Looked good.

Small code merge for Dustin. Then working with Wayne on his ColdBox framework stuff. We talked about users, payees, vendors, multiple corps, and memory and session management stuff. Small Q&A with Wayne and John about the framework, plans, and how we will handle certain pieces of the puzzle. Light plans for the future (wish list stuff). After that, John and I spent a little bit of time talking about internal education and training for our developers.

Phone call with Shari O. touching base on budgets, tech support questions, and a new project for a client. The client has reached out to both Shari O. and Cory - trying to double dip and push their project through.

Server meeting with Wayne, John, and Cory. We started out by talking about code that just sits on the shelf. We've got to get things finished up and pushed forward. We have to make some global changes and then make sure everybody knows about it. One of our goals is standardizing things across the board. We were also planning which branches are going live and who is on call for changes that are needed.

We have a big product upgrade coming out over the next couple of days. The big push is getting the enterprise level item catalog live on all servers. Making plans and assignments.

Wayne, John, and Shari O. had a meeting with Hostek. Good progress there. They were reporting about all kinds of stuff. We talked about disaster recovery stuff, plans, schedules, and contacts. It sounds like Hostek is going to try to work directly with our server admin team.

We talked about new email servers, flip flopping branches around on the testing server, and figuring out plans for all of those pieces. We then spent some time talking about changes to the look and feel. Getting approvals and other people to test and sign-off on things. Trying to coordinate efforts.

Eric joined the meeting to help us plan some stuff. As a side note, it is really hard to plan for every possible scenario. At some point, we need to move away from the classic theme (old look and feel). It is starting to cause issues because we still support it, but no new development is being done on that code set. It is also intermixing with other pages that are just on the new more modern snow owl theme (newer look and feel). It's causing more maintenance and larger pages due to keeping up with multiple sets of code (virtual supported versions).

At some point, we would like to automate some of the database updates to get rid of any dependencies when deploying new code and new functionality. John had some questions and we chatted for a bit after the main meeting.

Meeting with Wayne, Cory, Steve, and Shari O. over a Zoom meeting. Talking about Wayne wanting to retire by the end of the year. He was reporting on his research and plans with the ColdBox framework from Ortus Solutions. I took a bunch of notes...

- Our development process – it's too difficult and hard to test

- Be able to make a plan, set some goals, requirements, and then be able to hand that off to a developer

- Unit testing

- Our product is super complicated

- Spaghetti code

- Included files – they are all over the place

- Knowing where to put things – tops, headers, body files, footers, etc.

- Spend a bunch of time developing and then spend more time trying to get the code actually launched.

- Our development process takes a long time and causes frustration to our team and our clients

- Back to included files

- Different processes – ways of using the page

- Element is undefined in xyz scope – session, variables, FORM, URL, application, arguments

- Things get lost

- Paths – all kinds - ../, ../../, other paths – that creates problems in different pages that are included in different pages

- Wayne talking about global variables and global listings

- Setting up a standard framework and setting up standard practices

- Even though our code is older, it has really gone a long way

- Because of the way that it is coded, it makes it harder for progression and ways to hand it off

- Steve wants to sell the cool-aid (our current product)

- Triage – what needs our attention first? Life threating things first.

- Steve was talking about some of the developers being lazy – kinda getting frustrated

- Wayne is trying to solve some of those problems and/or issues – he wants to show us some concrete evidence and ways to solve things.

- Some of our developers are up against the wall and doing the best that they can.

- Wayne would like to make our code as simple as possible – guide or a recipe type level

- Cory – to rewrite the entire adilas application – that would take years and years and thousands and thousands of dollars (millions – plural).

- Cory – What about clients who want changes to their current system?

- Steve – How does object-oriented programming play into this? MVC – model, view, controllers – classes, sub classes, view models, controllers

- Wayne really thinks that he could crank out some major changes in a hard month - at least a good indicator or model

- Tons of little maintenance stuff is already baked into the framework

- In our current code, we have so much validation, permissions, and sub logic work – 75% of the whole thing is error handling and validation.

- Cory – If Wayne leaves, what is the reliance on him and the framework? Wayne thinks that it will be even easier and work better – even for the long haul.

- Wayne – Open-source projects and making the framework better – he has contributed already to the main code branch and has had some of his code accepted.

- Steve – Can we do this little by little? Wayne – Sort of – It would be better to get it all done so that we are operating in a different environment.

- Steve – What about docker? Wayne – We would use docker for the main ColdFusion stuff for the servers – Not tied to the current ColdBox framework.

- Steve asking about the datasource project (bus to individual motorcycle). – Wayne was saying how we could do some work to eliminate the reliance on the primary key – Turn everything into combo keys vs the single primary key id. All of the tables could be intermixed with combo keys.

- Steve – We may need to abandon some of the old ways of doing things

- Wayne – Even our database structure needs to be updated and changed. It is built in the older style. Technology changes over time, speed, computing power, etc.

- Steve – We need to be careful where we go, because changes do happen – all the time. Skate to where the puck should be.

- More than one way to skin the cat – If it doesn't work, we could go a different direction.

- Wayne wanted to get a fully working prototype done and finished up before he showed us what was available.

- Wayne is starting on the payee level login as his first few pieces and pages. He wants to get it all ready and documented before we just jump. Wayne is still learning as well.

- Cory is glad that we are talking about this – She would love to see our developers be more efficient and get stuff done.

- Wayne – He feels this is something that has to happen. We need this as part of our solution. Looking forward, we almost don't have a choice.

- Steve – Wayne, you are part of the ownership of this company – Let's make it good for everyone. He was encouraging Wayne to keep going and even setting up the next meeting to show us more.

- Cory asked how Wayne found this framework stuff. Wayne explained how he found things.

- Wayne did a small little dog and pony show on some of his code. Showing rules, routines, variables, and lists.

- Steve and Cory – They both think that Wayne should keep going and bill as he does his work. We also want to make sure that John is up to speed.

- This is a personal investment on Wayne's part – building the future of adilas.

- Wayne has been using Toggl time tracking to keep track of his hours.

- Just for fun – Wayne wants to get it done well enough that we want to write him a check… :)

- Documentation on how you do things – Ortus books and live samples

- Hoping to save money, keep our clients happy, and have a stable product.

- Cory – you have to change to grow. Things that don't grow die.

Cory, Shari O., and I were talking about budgets, hours, and recording times, and notes. Small meeting about emails and our needs in that area. We have some email compacities but want to improve and refine those processes. We need a strong communication channel, auto emails sent out daily for collecting monies on accounts receivables, sending invoices, sending quotes, sending statements, etc. We also use emails tons out in ecommerce land to notify both customers and merchants about new sales.

Making plans and moving forward on our email services. Sadly, our current solutions have been a small thorn in our side. We need to provide an enterprise level communication channel. Some of our bigger clients keep wanting more and more high-level enterprise functions and support. Along those same lines, we talked about new development and being able to copy users and permissions between corporations. Other demands keep coming and piling up. It's hard to keep up and make sure that everything is tight and fully functional. Sometimes we feel like ants trying to serve virtual data giants.

When I joined the meeting, John and Steve were talking about hours, work, documentation, and projects. After that, Steve and I jumped in and talked about SG&A costs. I showed him some of what I launched and how it works. We recorded two different sessions. Only the first one saved correctly. See attached.

Shari O. and John were chatting about a meeting with Hostek that they had with the main admin server team. Sounded like some good stuff was discussed.

Shari O. and I talking about a bunch of different options. She was saying that she likes to give out virtual "hall passes" to our clients and our developers. They can kinda do whatever they want. However, if there becomes a problem, she can take it back and/or revote the virtual hall pass. I thought that it was kinda funny.

John jumped in and we talked about business and general DevOps (mix between software development and IT backend server stuff). We have a good team but it is a little wild and footloose. John would like to see more structure, responsibility, and defined roles. It can be very frustrating at times. I've seen this as well. Sometimes, I just don't know how to fix it or (the real question is) is that the biggest problem (getting pulled on to other fires)? We talked about competitive wages, challenges of multi-tasking, transitions between projects, wearing tons of different hats (roles), and other remote team issues.

We spent time talking about servers, challenges, and struggles of managing a remote team with a number of different skill levels. Switching to code, we were talking about the differences between building new vs converting the older into the new. We talked about scalability, clustering, and normalizing systems across teams, servers, and management styles. The conversation got into talking about knowledge and scope. Who knows just a little bit, who knows a lot, and who see and deals with the whole picture. There is a huge difference. At some point, we'd love to get rid of some of the older dependencies that have been built in. Progression of things.

There is a huge need for documentation and helping the next guy down the road. Looking out for each other. We flipped over to budgets and salary discussions at the end of the session. We talked pros and cons of hourly vs salary-based pay or systems. Anyways, just going over some goals and what not.

Cory and I going over different projects. One of the new things that needs to be done is some new code to help with emailing invoices as PDF's. Currently, we send emails with links to web based invoices out in ecommerce. We have a client that has to get their emails as a PDF invoice. Anyways, we talked about needs for that project and being able to automatically email clients who owe us money with the PDF invoice, be able to save it, attach it, and also do a clean-up routine for keeping things tight on the server. We talked about some new settings to make all of that happen.

Along with our conversation, we were talking about being able to do these things asynchronously so that the user doesn't have to wait. Also, as a side note, if we did this, our client would be happy and Shari O. would have an easier time. She does all of our billing stuff.

We flipped over to recipe/builds and a custom report that mixes elements of time, recipe/builds, flex attributes, and inventory planning. We made a small bug fix for the USAePay EMV chip transaction stuff. After that, we spent the rest of our meeting going over custom report requests. It's amazing what people want to search by, group by, and what things they want to mix and blend onto a single report.

As we were talking, Cory had the idea of building a big robust report builder that allowed for all kinds of stuff. Basically, a smorgasbord with options, filters, and such. We then put that power in the hands of our users and let them go at it. In rough terms, it will be let them pick and choose, save it, run it. That would be really cool. We also talked about linking and mapping things internally for sub inventory, kinda like family groups for sub inventory attributes. What are they paired with, how are they related, etc.?

The last subject was dealing with mapping, relationships, groupings, and aggregates. Everybody wants all of the data (details) but they don't want to have to wade through it (sums, counts, maxes, mins, averages, etc.). Those are the aggregates. Everybody wants sales data, inventory, and sub inventory data.

Meeting with Cory. She was checking on projects. We ended up looking at some corp stats for a client. We found a small discrepancy between two different reports. The numbers were the same, but one report had more information, and it would be nice if both had the same values. One is called the history homepage (more values and drill-down links) and the other is called corp stats (no drill-down links and missing things like customers, log entries, customer media/content, employee/user counts, vendor counts, bank counts, etc.). We might need to build that out a bit.

Cory invited Shari O. in and they were helping me to look the data and figure out what is wanted and needed. I did a small data fix for Cory and a client on the data 8 server. It was running kinda slow. Anyways, we got it all fixed and patched up.

John and Sean were checking in. Steve called in from his phone and had some questions about SG&A costs (sales, general and administrative costs). He is working with Mike on some cool ideas. Basically, they are trying to fold in certain expenses into the mixture. Instead of just strait expenses (say a light bill or something like that), you have to capitalize your expenses into the inventory and then show those expenses over time as things are sold and/or held in inventory. In super general terms, you can't just hang an expense on the P&L (financials) and call it cost of goods sold without doing capitalization and utilization (tie the bigger thing into small measurable pieces). This is only true on/in certain business verticals. Sometimes the other, more simple practice is allowed. If a real accountant was reading this entry, they would be rolling their eyes. I'm just talking my language.

Anyways, we were talking about some possible solutions, ideas, and ways to track those smaller aged variable costs per item or per package. Each item or portion within a package may get a different variable, aged, and cost portion/ratio assigned to it. The whole thing gets pretty deep and complicated. That's where we shine. one-to-many-to-many-to-many (or whatever) relationships. Bring it on.

Talks about capitalized inventory levels, smart reports, daily backend processes (auto and/or manual), certain date ranges, lifespans, terms, flags, tags, and automation. Details, histories, drill-downs, reporting, exports, etc. The whole nine yards. We were talking about how certain inventory (that is aging and/or being stored) may be assigned a higher SG&A cost due to how long we hold it before it gets moved and/or sold. Lots of talk about processes that would allow us to load an item with cost, sell it for that new loaded cost, then repeat. We could do this real-time, forward facing (predicting and assumptions), or running a day behind based on what really happened. Lots of possible options. Anyways, we ended up simplifying it and saying load, sell, load, sell, repeat.

This led us to conversations about having a hopper (holding container), loading the hopper, figuring out when and how each new expense should be disseminated or resolved (dates and aging and ratios per day stuff). Steve wants us to start thinking about it and running scenarios through our minds. We'll re-meet up and have a powwow. I recommended that he and Mike play with the financial flow calculator to play with some ideas. We have two different versions of that tool, one if free and public facing (a little older) and one is internal that has an updated look and feel and few other things. Anyways a great tool for teaching, learning, and running scenarios through it.

Shari O. joined the meeting. She and guys were talking about a live event and things that were needed. She had some suggestions on some pages and verbiage changes for some new pages. I'm super grateful for all of the feedback and suggestions, ideas, and requests we get. No way could we figure this whole thing out on our own. We need a village or a community.

From Shari O. - Get w/Brandon about the Insurance needed for Privacy liability, Data Breach and Electronic Data Liability - Need to get this into place by this week, so I can put this to rest, and get info to Nevada Compliancy Board; as Adilas renewal of app is pending METRC app for Nevada Compliancy Board until proof of insurance is submitted.

Recap of the meeting - Spent half an hour with Shari O. talking about insurance. We were using the analogy of a baby going naked to wearing a diaper (just being funny). We are ok taking on some more costs to a certain level. If more is needed, we'll have to pass on those costs to our clients. At least those who need the extra coverage. The main conversation was dealing with CGL (commercial general liability) insurance and going over a quote that we got from a company. We decided to go for it based on the quote.

Shari O. had a question about the adilas phones stuff. We looked at the page and there was some code that tried to show a sub or outside website that was not in a secured SSL (https) site. We made some tweaks and pushed up the code. Kind of a temporary quick fix.

Wayne, John, Cory, Shari O., and I were on the meeting. They were talking about a client and their servers needs. They (our client) may be closing some of their locations down but want to keep other ones active. Light back and forth on whether or not any server specs needed to be changed on that server. There was also a conversation about the need for more tech support. Both on our side and on the server side (the hosting company). Often we don't need help, but when we do, it is kind of painful.

Cory had a list and was checking on different projects. Good dialog and good back and forth. Wayne may be moving on and working less in the next few months. He is wanting to be more of a part time or fully retired. We need to get plans in place to figure out who is going to be taking over that role and what documentation and knowledge needs to be transferred over. We talked briefly about Dustin maybe wanting to help with servers and also looking at existing knowledge levels. Do we want to bring up one of our own guys and/or hire it out to someone else with more knowledge? Great questions.

Wayne was talking about options for virtually building a new ship. This has been a discussion and topic for years. Do we keep building and tweaking what we have or do we rewrite things and try to go all new (code, architecture, design, etc.). There are pros and cons to both approaches. Due to current budgets, we have to stay with fixing what we have vs building all new. That can be painful as well and takes a lot of time. Wayne was talking about doing a sample project and seeing what kind of time it might take to move the existing adilas structure over or under a new standard framework. There are a number of unknowns, but worth looking into.

Towards the end, John and Cory were talking about look and feel stuff. Also, Wayne and John will continue to work on some outlines and plans for the system architecture stuff. Making progress on most fonts. We'll take it!

Both Sean and Shari O. popped in on the meeting. they have a client meeting a little bit later today. I spent most of the time working on the data clean-up for a client.

Hostek went down a couple of days ago. Wayne was reporting on what was going on. We talked about communication and disaster recovery processes. Who does what and what are steps and responsibilities. We need to more tech support from our hosting companies. We have like 40 servers there at Hostek. Most times they do great. However, if things go wrong and/or bad, we don't get any preferential treatment. We kinda need that.

Anyways, Wayne was doing his own trouble shooting processes and found a few problems. We have a growing need for more documentation for our processes and procedures. We also need to keep some of them super secure. That makes for an interesting mix. There is also a ongoing need for more communications and keeping everybody in the loop that needs to be there.

At some point, we would like to reclaim some of the WordPress stuff on our main site. Sometimes WordPress is a high level target, with tons of plug-ins, themes, and required sequential updates. Once again, we need to get documentation for all of these pieces. The next subject was a statement that everybody needs to give us documentation and architecture layouts. Some people don't like that, don't think like that, and it's worse then torture for them. We have to figure things out and figure out who is going to do what. Everybody has talents, virtues, strengths, and weaknesses. It is tough to require the exact same things from everyone. It will end up being a moving balance.

As a side note, we may end up needing to help certain people do some of those things like documentation, training, and certain communication skills or tasks. There may be a need for a new role to help the devs and get the info out of their heads and into a consumable format. Eventually we have to get documentation on all internal and external dependencies. There is a big difference between knowing what to do and actually doing it. Sometimes we are pushing so hard, it's hard to slow down and virtually clean-up or sweep the floor.

We talked about having a checklist for our developers. We have an old one that Alan and I worked on years ago, but that's all that we have at this point. Some of the developers just can't do the documentation (and sadly, some of them we don't want them to do it). It seems like the next steps are helping to collect and organize the information and documentation. We have some holes that need to be filled. John was commenting that we need to add this into the budgets and project costs. We need to charge more than just the developer's time. Once again, we may be going too fast or running too hard. We are missing a part of the puzzle.

Next, we went into talking about Adobe ColdFusion uptime on hosted platforms. Wayne was reporting to Cory about a survey that he was reading and what it was saying. Cory wanted the guys (Wayne and John) to call and talk with Hostek to see if we could some things changes (service levels and response times). We need to make sure that we have the access and tools that we need. Some of our clients are 24/7 everyday, even holidays.

The new dedicated testing server was the next major topic. We switched over to talking about the data 5 server, capturing documentation, and walking through the project with both Wayne and John. They are working on both training and documentation and so it is taking a bit longer. Making good progress. John has a project that is done that needs to be tested by some outside parties. He and Wayne are setting up and managing the project queue. Cory is helping to coordinate the actual projects and the testing.

Spent some time talking about look and feel and talking about a new version of the internal shopping cart. We know that there is a need there, we are just not sure how deep to jump. We may end up doing things in a couple of rounds. Round one, just look and feel. Round two new settings to toggle on/off certain fields, sections, columns, and features. There may be another round that gets into a smart cart level (deep cart engine logic). In a nutshell, we want to remove things and make it smarter and easier.

We are looking for feedback. Talking about timing on projects, testing, and pushing things all the way until they are live and in production (and fully documented). Shari O. popped in and was asking about insurance and levels of support from Hostek. Sometimes, the lack of support can be a deal breaker. We've seen this even in sales of our system. It's a part of the puzzle that gets overlooked sometimes.

Sean and Cory joined the morning meeting. Sean was asking about parent attributes and how to use them out in ecommerce. After that, Cory needed a bulk update for units of measure (converting each to grams on a bulk scale). Alan joined the meeting and Cory was going to have him help with some of the backend data updates and data clean-up.

Cory and I were looking into some errors and needs on the merchant processing side of things. Shari O. jumped in and we talked more about standardizing our merchant processing efforts. See elements of time # 9934 for ideas on standardizing merchant processing by using Datacap as a 3rd party solution. We need a more trusted solution and we are not very good at hardware integration stuff. An outside party to handle that would be awesome!

Phone call with Shari O. going over special inventory clean-up processes and requests. We have a client that wants to totally remove all activity of a certain vendor. We will do it but will also document it via log notes, emails, and sign-off's.

We started out the server meeting and Cory wanted to check on the data 34 server. It was reported that it was running slow. Wayne logged in and looked around. They ordered some more RAM for the database server. Pretty cool to see how quickly they can jump on things.

Next, we started talking about a client and their balance sheet. I mentioned to Cory that we have on our wish list a report that would show known issues (bad dates, things done out of order, or other possible problems that we could detect and/or figure out). That would be so cool. As a side note, the page already exists, it just hasn't been built out yet. Definitely on our wish list for fracture. This could help all of us out and make things more transparent and visible.

Both Wayne and John are working on documenting things on the server level. It's far from done, but they showed up a 3 page document (just the start) of the outline or outline of the server layered architecture design document. Pretty cool. Starting to see that being worked on. I'm excited to see what they come up with.

The next major conversation was dealing with adilas phones, phone trees, and other forms of digital communication. We had some open discussion about do we want to keep it, who is going to support it, who is going to maintain it, and so forth. This piece is kinda flapping in the wind. We also talked about, if we want to, allocating both time and money and getting that code and/or process fully inhouse. Right now, it is a virtual 3rd party entity, even though we technically own it. The prior owner/developer is the only one who really knows what is going on inside there. We talked about different technologies that we could and would use if we brought it fully under our control or under our roof.

The reason that the adilas phones stuff got brought up was because of this document that they are building out for the system architecture and layered plans. Hopefully, we'll uncover other issues and/or dependencies that we need to look at and evaluate (spend/don't spend, maintain/don't maintain, market, pitch, let it die, etc.). We kept getting off on tangents. Cory did a great job keeping the discussion going in a good direction. Once setup, we will provide an open VPN (virtual private network) for our developers to be able to remote into the testing box to push code and make changes.

After that, we got into talking about the testing server and what our plans are for that. We have a client's data that we want to move off of a production server and put in the Amazon cold storage or Amazon Glacier. As we were talking about the testing server, Shari O. was sending questions and comments through the chat feature on the GoToMeeting account. We are making progress there and making headway.

We got into talking about insurance, coverage, errors and omissions, and general cyber security, and data breaches. We have a 3rd party integration that is pushing on us and wanting all kinds of certifications and proof of insurance coverage. Everybody but John and I had to leave to jump on other meetings or calls.

After that, John and I spent some time doing a code review on his recipe/build rework stuff. We talked about a new possible user-level setting for using the time-pickers vs an open entry time field. John likes the time-pickers. I had to take them out the other day due to a few clients complaining. That sounds like a perfect option for a user-level setting. We also went over new options for showing progress bars and helping the users know which step they are on and what is still needed to complete a certain task and/or process.

As a final comment for the meeting, John said - "The ROI (return on investment) for the testing server will be internal peace of mind." I liked that.

Not just our clients, but many clients have huge inventory problems. We are trying to help them out. Shari O. had me work on a new clean-up script to clean up unused items per vendor. Yesterday, we did a clean-up script per setup or inbound PO. Today, we are getting tighter and doing things by vendor, as a whole. I had to make a few changes for the new process. This is not a standard tool that we want to release (special or custom bulk clean-up tool). After that, I touched base with John, Sean, and Michael.

Reviewing a project for Shari O. dealing with an inventory update for a client. On a phone call with Bryan going over projects. Bryan and I spent some time talking about merchant processing and where we are heading with that.

Cory and Steve were going over labels and sub inventory stuff. Mike Roundtree joined in and was asking about Herbo payment solutions and options for demos. I mentioned to him, if needed, we could help him out by using special accounts, inside of adilas. We will check to see what is already built out and then go from there. Anyways, he has some needs and ideas. We'll see where it goes.

Next, Mike was talking with Sean and Steve about ecommerce, multiple locations, using a single system for multiple different tasks, and making plans for a new demo site for somebody in Hawaii. Shari O. will spin up the new site, Sean will help fill things in, Cory will help Sean where needed. Fun to see them all making plans and coordinating. We also pulled in Bryan briefly to talk about the Herbo (eXPO) payment solutions and what has been automated and integrated. The demo is out a few weeks.

Shari O. had some questions on a bulk inventory update that needed to be done for a client. She and I made a plan and she will be kicking me over an email to get it in writing.

Emails and a phone call with Shari O. about corp specific tables and Metrc compliance settings. Light tech support and looking things up with Shari O., while on the phone. Sent out an email to Alan about filters, settings, and corp specific tables.

Various different things. Small data fix for a client and their costs of goods sold. Flipped a bunch of costs to $0.00 for unlimited items. They had a cost associated with those items and it was throwing off the balance sheet. Part way through, I noticed that some of the items on my list were actually real inventory items tied to sub inventory. I stopped and made some notes. I called and left a message for Cory.

Did some emails, light tech support, text messages, and finally heard back from Cory. I jumped back on the data clean-up project and only modified the unlimited items. Light backend database updates and changes for a client. Little clean-up project. Sent an email out to Cory and Shari O. with notes on what I ended up doing.

Sean, Shari O., Michael, John, and I were on the morning meeting. We all checked in and said what we were working on. After that, we all either left or went on mute and worked in the background. Shari O. had to take a tech support call and Sean was waiting to chat with her once she was finished. John had some flex grid tie-in questions. I was doing some research on MVP's and past data that we had recorded for what we wanted in some of our MVP (minimal viable product) stuff.

Here is a short MVP list that I'm thinking about - for the record, we already have some of this, we just need to refine it and make it watertight:

- Special accounts and in-store credit - We already have loyalty points, and round 1 for gift cards. Eventually, we would like to do in-store credit, vendor credits, punch cards, and other ones. The next biggest need is for the in-store credit stuff (in my opinion).

- Round 2 on gift cards - We've been gathering ideas and wants and needs

- Coupons and promotion codes - clear out and through ecommerce and internal shopping carts

- Take Calvin's adilas label builder to the next level - we've already done some planning and prep work there

- Standardize the merchant processing options - We have like 9 different integrations. Here's my next goal, pick one, make sure it flows from start to finish and is super simple. I want to do normal sales, pre-auths, captures, tips, refunds, voids, and reoccurring payments, etc. We have to be able to do manual key (like ecommerce mode), swipe, chip/EMV, and tap to pay hardware integrations. I want to do and offer all of the merchant processing functions. I was thinking that we could do a big push and try to get all hooked up with Datacap and then let them handle all of the different hardware pieces and different merchant gateways. That's my thoughts right now.

- Revamp the internal shopping cart, my cart favorite buttons, and general look and feel. I would love to head towards the fracture project - we have a bunch of R&D on where we want to go with that.

There are tons of other things on my list, but that is my quick MVP list for right now.

Prep work and checking out a reported bug/issue on the time-picker. It actually wasn't a bug, it was just forcing the users to play clear out to the minutes and seconds, based on some settings.

Cory joined and we spent some time catching up and talking about projects and issues. We talked about it and we will take off the time-picker for most of the pages that allow for user time inputs (files like add new timecard, clock in/out for users, edit timecards, customer logs, follow-ups, and both main and sub entries for elements of time). We did a search and it only looked like a few (20+) pages that need to be edited.

As we were talking, Cory gave me a few other small projects that need to be done and finished. She will send me some emails with more details, but it sounds like a data clean-up for a client that had the wrong cost of goods based on manual changes. There is also a request to add a few new search filters to a sub inventory PO based advanced search. We went over a few other projects and requests as well. Cory and I finished up around 11:30 am.

I then started working on the project to remove the time-picker from certain files. I uploaded new code to all servers and let Cory and Shari O. know about the update. Small work session.

Sean and I started out the morning talking about deployment and how we need to keep offering that as a service. Certain clients are so busy, they really don't have time to deploy or devote time to training and setup. It's not that they don't need or want it, they are just spread too thin. Sean was talking about a current deployment that he is working on and I told him a story of us going into a kitchen ware store and helping to set them up. It took a couple of weeks with a few of us onsite to make it happen. At one point, the lady in charge of the kitchen store said, "If it wasn't for you guys helping us out, we never would have been able to make this transition." That is totally true.

Anyways, I wrote down in my notes that part of the fracture project that we are planning has to take into consideration training, deployment, setup, and other marketable services. We need the support staff to help support what we are trying to do, build, and accomplish. Taking the time to get it done and make sure that the parties that be are in the know and can function on their own. They need to know how to get help, but ideally, they have been trained sufficiently for the task(s) at hand. Another plug for the concept of "education mode" as a setting for helping people to get started.

Steve was on some phone calls and somewhat listening in the background. Sean and Shari O. were talking about merchant processing and where we want to go with that. I mentioned the company Datacap and let them know that we may want to look into doing a 3r party integration and solution with them, as it would open up a number possible merchant processing options. We can do merchant processing right now, but we have to spend time and resources integrating with each gateway, merchant, and/or device. We could really use something to help speed up that process.

As the meeting ended, I was doing emails and other small to do list tasks. I was thinking about small nursery rhymes and how we have used some of those same analogies and stories in our own story. Things like stone soup, the little ren hen, and many others. Kinda fun. We are daily building and hoping that someone will catch the vision and help us along the journey. Like the tortoise and the hair, slow and steady wins the race.

Sean was reporting to Steve about a client meeting and how they (the clients) weren't wanting to do things (prep work or setup). They just wanted it to read their minds and just do it (whatever the task was). Silly, silly. Along those lines, you can see how AI (artificial intelligence) and easy presets would really help things out. You still have to play the game, but maybe helping to make it easier.

Going along with the topic above, they were hoping that it would do multiple tasks at once. For example, bring in inventory, price it, track it, and sell it back out to a single client in one quick process vs the normal processes or tasks. We can do some of that, we just need to know that that is the goal.

Steve and Sean were talking about trailer rentals and tracking those through the system. They are going to get with Shari O. and go over things. While they were talking, I was reading emails and trying to fix a small bug on some formatted dates and times for a custom report.

Shari O. joined the meeting and her and I and Sean did a small training session on using a built-in percentage mark-up tool. We did mark-ups, saleprices, and percentage fees in the cart. We did some light training on existing tools and features. We have a client that needs to charge a credit card processing fee (be able to pass it on to the customer). I showed them the percentage calculators and tools on the add item to cart button. It totally calculates a percentage based on the cart or other given amount. We went through a few examples.

Some of our customers really fight against doing the work that is required to really make things great and really make things work. The tools are there, but the chainsaw doesn't cut the wood by itself.

We started out by John and Cory going over pages, options, and new look and feel changes. Talking about show/hide search criteria, scrolling, or creating new flow and/or better layouts. Making some good progress and John is making a number of updates.

KPI - key performance indicators - We have a client that is wanting us to build a custom dashboard page that KPI pieces as part of the dashboard. We may end up going in on the development costs with the client to help them get what we/they want.

Wayne joined the meeting and we were going over a number of lists and different projects. Wayne, John, and I met a few times while Cory was gone, so this was the first time that all of us were back together in a couple of weeks. Touching base on various projects. Looking over a few issues and small bugs. Shari O., Cory, Wayne, John, and I were on the meeting for a while. Things seem to be going well, in general. We are making progress in a number of areas.

Light talks between Cory and John on the discount engine and planning to roll things out. We are getting better and better at planning things and hopefully doing them (acting on the plans).

Meeting with Cory. Small bugs and small fixes. Working on quotes, projects, and general project management stuff. Cory had a list of things to go over. She has been out of pocket for a few weeks (vacation). Shari O. joined and we had a quick chat about numbers, budgets, and personnel.

Research on investing and a company that invests in SaaS type models (software as a service). Pushed up some code for Dustin. Recording notes. Phone call with Shari O. and doing email stuff. General to do list stuff. Looking up adilas videos on YouTube and adilas university.

Shari O. and Sean were on the meeting. Looking at email options. We checked out both some shared server and VPS (virtual private server) options. The more we talked about it, the more we really need to get this going and help it to be as solid as possible. Our current solution works great, as long as the shared server is up and running. Because we have that part of the puzzle on a shared server vs a dedicated server, we can't control all of the pieces. That makes it tough. Looking at options. I pitched a few ideas to both Shari O. and Sean.

Next, we went over some expense types and yearend totals. Shari O. is getting ready to submit everything for taxes. She is really doing great and giving it the extra look over. We also went over some comparisions between our merchant processing companies. We now have everything switched over to the new merchant and it seems to be going good with similar costs. All is well there.

Shari O. jumped on and showed me an error that was happening with a client and their PDF invoices. The error was dealing with the new bigger or alternate logo that we allow them to upload and use for different printable invoices. The settings were not being pulled per corporation and it was defaulting to the testing corporation and thus showing the wrong image.

We texted Bryan and he joined us on the GoToMeeting session. We were looking over things and eventually found a session value that was being used outside in the PDF realm. Session stuff doesn't work out there. We fixed it and tied the corporation look-up to the corp id that was passed in via the URL (web path) and that seemed to fix the problem. Crazy!

Small work session with Shari O., Bryan, and I. I'm glad that we got it figured out.

Shari O. and I looking at payroll and time clocks. We disabled double clicking on the submit button and extended the auto redirect from 3 seconds to 5 seconds. We logged into a client's site and looked up some historical pieces to help cross reference the data. Shari O. got ahold of the client, and they joined up on the GoToMeeting session. It appears that the main problem only happens once in a while and only on the clock out.

Sean checked in. I was doing emails. Shari O. checked in and had a few questions. We talked about projects and new settings for ecommerce. Shari O. has a client that wants to be able to turn active ecommerce (able to place orders and invoices) between certain time slots. Say 7 am to 10 pm. Anything outside of that range, the ecommerce pages wouldn't allow it to be placed.

We are getting closer on submitting taxes for 2022. Shari O. is getting ready to send things off to the CPA. I was having some internet issues and it kept dropping me out of the GoToMeeting session.

Pretty quiet meeting this morning. I heard over the grapevine that the sales meeting was going to be pushed back to just Fridays. Anyways, both Sean and Shari O. checked in. Light questions. Cory is out on vacation so they had some questions about data migration for clients and how to do some of those tasks. Cory normally does that. I showed them around and gave them some links and instructions on how to use the corp-to-corp migration and special copy tools.

Part of the session, I spent it taking a file that we had found and making it into a more robust so that we could use it as a new migration tool. It was hardcoded, but we turned it into a more dynamic or generic tool. The new tool deals with being able to copy part categories between corporations.

Bryan jumped on and we pushed up some new files for date-picker stuff. We then did some planning on the new employer withholdings settings that he is working on for payroll settings. We went over some logic, choices, and data flow. He was taking notes to get to the next step. I also gave Shari O. a call and we chatted about numbers, plans, yearend filing stuff, and what not. We spoke for a little over half an hour. We are on the same page.

Chat and work session with Shari O. We were talking about 1099's, both federal and state liability, ethics, values, and right (subjective) vs correct decisions. Good session.

John, Shari O., Cory and I were on the meeting, at least at first. The three of them were chatting about mobile responsive webpages and options and costs. We know what we want, and our clients know what they want, but there is a huge cost barrier to really do it correctly. We have an internal website/system with thousands of pages, and each one is different. That's a challenge and would cost multiple hundreds of thousands of dollars. Even if you had the best team in the world, it would still cost up in that neighborhood. Big project.

Cory and I jumped in and did a small quote session and were going over requests and new projects. One of the new projects really wants to have us speed up access and reporting for sub inventory stuff. We would love to do that and are willing to share a cost with the client. Cory and I chatted about options and things that would help us get the data quicker and more standardly for certain reports. We also went over a number of other projects and upcoming feature enhancements.

I was late to the morning meeting. When I hopped on, Steve, Sean, and Michael were talking about clients and helping them with ecommerce and system setup stuff. Steve was saying, we are almost offering (right now) a 30-day free trial and we'll help you set everything up. That's pretty awesome.

The topic switched over and they were talking about keeping up with modern trends, technology, and look and feel type stuff. Steve and Michael were chatting, and Steve was giving some great ideas and direction. Kinda a peptalk for Michael. All of the rest of us were just listening in on the conversation. After that, Steve and Shari O. were talking about ecommerce and a new client that they are setting things up for. They are making great progress and the client seems to be pretty happy.

Morning sales meeting. The guys were going over the new business cards and asking for feedback. We got into a discussion about the user interface and how intuitive or non-intuitive it is. Danny was talking about possible small videos and things to help people get started. We also talked about doing some client feature stories and showcasing real clients and how they use the system. Danny had some fun ideas with small videos and what not.

Michael piped up and said that he has some film and video editing skills. We didn't know that. that is awesome and he and Danny may be working together to get more adilas content up on YouTube and other social media platforms. That's exciting!

All of the guys were giving their updates and what not. Shari O. and Sean were going over buttons and client settings for a small mexican restaurant. They are working on some menu items and how best to display and show things. We talked about a number of ideas and options. Towards the end of the meeting, John and I were looking at some look and feel things. Talking about page layouts and site-wide decisions for style guides.

Morning standup meeting. Guys and gals reporting in. Sean had a request to get sandbox merchant accounts setup for our demo sites. I told him that would not be a problem. Shari O. has been helping with onsite setup and training. As part of that, she had a few questions for the group. Shari O. asked about buttons and how to display things out in ecommerce. We talked about the need for stacking of buttons or stacking categories. We can do that internally through a tool and feature called my cart favorite buttons, but we don't have the same things exposed to the general public through ecommerce yet.

As we were talking about things, Steve was pitching us ideas about using parent attributes and being able to do some sub selections and choices out in ecommerce. We also talked about flipping the descriptions and adding small choices just to the descriptions. As a side note, if you have a checkbox (normal form control) and it is named the same as the other checkboxes, it can build a list for you without any special code. The key there is the value is different, but the actual form control is named the same. Small techy side note.

Switched over to working with John. He had some questions on how to do photos and media/content on his local machine. We talked about some other look and feel stuff as well. The discussion got into data tables and mobile responsive tables. What we want to do for our graphical homepages. This may be a topic for another time, but circling back around to talking about graphical homepages with charts, aggregates, sums, counts, graphs, and other dashboard type widgets and features. We really want to see what we could do there to help out. It all comes down to time and resources.

Once we started talking about layouts and custom CSS, that lead to a discussion about printable items, reports, and pages. We will need more time and more help to get all of that done in a consistent manner. We want it all to work and look nice. After that, we went over some other pages, branches, and code changes that John is working on. Making plans.

Eric jumped into and was checking on credit card payments and a possible bug that got reported. Steve and Sean were talking about sales, leads, and follow-ups. Shari O. and Steve have been working on some local businesses and getting things setup for them. I spent some time while they were talking finishing up some of my notes from yesterday.

Shari O. and I doing some scheduling. We recorded it and will give it to a client for review. Most of the time was spent going over new setup of reoccurring online booking and scheduling. Small code changes. Testing and then we switched over to talking about yearend reports and 1099's. Small work session.

Cory and Shari O. jumped on and we went over some payroll questions and strategy. Touching base on where we are heading. Certain clients require a lot of our time and absorb whatever we will give them. We have a client that has latched onto Cory and Shari O. and literally contacts them almost daily. It's way beyond tech support. It's full-on training. The two ladies were talking about plans and how to break that cycle and/or have them pay for training.

Cory and I were working on projects and project management stuff. Shari O. was reporting on the new payroll rules for the state of Colorado. We spent some time talking about the new payroll settings and how to help them handle things. We talked about both fixed values and dynamic values. These new payroll settings will end up being a new project for Bryan and John.

Next, we checked on some custom data for a client. We figured out a few things and sent them an email asking which way that wanted us to fix the data. After that, Shari O. and I got on and did a small session on graphics and editing PDF's. She may need some Adobe Creative Cloud tools to help her out. She it trying to modify existing welcome packets and what not.

Meeting with Shari O. and John. Going over payroll and new requirements. Whether or not we like it, on payroll and other things in the system, we have to virtually keep up with the Jones (stay up to date). We talked about some new settings for other withholdings 1-5 and helping to standardize those names and values. They are very flexible, but maybe too flexible.

If the company isn't careful, they could mix numbers for different things. These custom withholdings fields are for things like 401K, insurance, dental plans, meal plans, child support, Aflac, IRA's, etc. The problem is, if one person has child support and they put that value in flex withholding field 1, then they have to do child support always in field one, for other people in the same company. If not, image how crazy it would get if Betty (fake person) has field 1 for her 401K and the Tom (other fake person) has field 1 for child support. Individually, they would be totally fine, but any combined numbers get muddy and mixed.

We talked about the need for some other payroll settings (show/hide, aliases, global naming, etc.). We will create these new settings and then help our clients configure things so that they run how they want them to run. Basically, we'll help hold their hands through the setup process.

Fun show and tell with the guys and gals. I showed off the Beaver Mountain special events, how we are building in paperwork and release forms, subs of time, history and usage, and customer logs. Danny, Sean, Michael, Shari O., John, etc. were on the meeting and I was just explaining things and showing the guys where we are headed, drawing, asking questions, good back and forth, and just having fun. I'm not sure if they knew it or not, but they were my audience today.

Shari O. joined the meeting and let us know about a new state withholding tax called "FAMLI" - pronounced family. Each of us on the meeting was giving an update on what we are doing. More need for mobile and doing ecommerce type transactions. We are also seeing more of need and want for online ecommerce appointments, scheduling, and online signup for special events. We spent some time talking about our current sales staff.

Some of the guys were talking about going to other peoples sites and checking out what they have for ecommerce and how their checkout and transactions take place. Kind of some research, in a way.

John was reporting on some new CSS and layout changes that he is working on. We are making progress there. Things are heading more and more towards mobile ready and mobile responsive development.

Small sales meeting and morning meeting. Some of the guys were talking about linking things together and how that takes time but really helps with the flow of both data and logic. The ability to link things together is huge and rests on the web technology called hyperlinks. It's been around for some time, but the power of what it can do is not fully realized. That's pretty cool!

We got into talking about how we have tons of features but some of them are hidden, or no one knows how to use them. It's our job to keep pulling thing together like a zipper be zipped up. Organization, links, navigation, settings, and permissions will be needed to continue to keep pulling things together. Those are huge parts of the system.

Shari O. was talking about some new hardware that we are going to be buying. The sales guys are going to be able to give some of the hardware away to help with the setup process and to sweeten the deal for our clients and customers. That's pretty cool. We have never really done that before. Basically, taking away the barriers to entry. For example, including a free credit card mag stripe reader or whatever.

After that, the guys were talking about 3rd party integrations and the problems and disconnects that we run into with those solutions. They are both good and bad. Sometimes, they put up good money and help push the ball along. Other times, something goes wrong with either us or them (usually them) and it gives us a black eye. Meaning to our clients, they have gotten a bad taste in their mouth due to problems or promises being made (either side of the fence). We've talked about it before, but if we put as much effort and energy into our own product as we have given to outside 3rd parties, we would have a ton of stuff. Like I said, it's a bittersweet subject. It has helped by filling a role but has come at a higher cost.

Steve was talking about going back to finding and setting up smaller companies. It's so much easier to set them up and get them going (how much red tape). We then switched over and were talking about some of the sales staff and what they are doing and/or trying to do. Currently, our goal is to just get them going and help them learn step by step. It's a process.

While they were talking about stuff, I was pushing up code for Trailer Solutions for their custom data export tool.

Bunch of random stuff. Emails, phone call with Shari O., new systems and setup options, more emails, and trying to setup and work on my local system. 

Eric joined the meeting and was touching base on a number of projects. We chatted about gift cards, enterprise catalog or item catalog, and the inventory snapshot project. Small sales meeting. The guys were reporting on efforts and what not. Lots of follow-ups and different communications. We have the best price for the value. Talking about bigger demos and updates. There are lots of little shops out there that need our help.

Shari O. asking questions about a client setup. Steve was showing some stuff from the Herbo proposals. Light research on using Google Meet (online meetings). We currently use GoToMeeting, just looking around.

Working with Danny, Sean, and Shari O. on the rafting site (demo site). They, especially Danny, were requesting and wanting some kind of SOP's (standard operating procedures) or some kind of a quick start guide. See attached for our notes. New notes are at the bottom. Mostly the session was just checking in and some light communications for today.

One of my observations is we have things all over the place. We have things inside elements of time, in physical notebooks, in emails, on adilas university, on YouTube, in help files, on different google drives, and the list goes on. We have a ton of resources, but they are not yet linked, cataloged, and organized for use. It's too spread out. That would be an awesome project to get all of that together and available to the public. That could be a future fracture type project. Training and education are huge spokes that we need in our wheel. There is a whole other side to this thing and it's on the education and training level.

Totally random, but a fun side note or thought - Think how cool it would be to go through the different system players (all 12), all of the different system business functions (12 of those as well), and the underlying core concepts. That would be awesome. Beginner, intermediate, advanced, and deep dive or backend levels. Show how things act, cause and effect relationships, where they show up for roll call, how things happened historically, how they effectually show up for roll call, and even how they financially affect inventories, banks, P&L's, balance sheets, and other financial relationships. That would be sooooo cool! I would love to work on that project.

I would love to get into the how, why, and what we are doing. The how and why really seem like fun topics. The "what" is pretty normal but allow us to do the other parts of the puzzle or passing the data along the virtual data assembly line. Getting into 3D world building and all kinds of cool stuff. So many things that we want to do and build. We just need help getting to that next level.

Steve and Sean were on going over new custom label settings that Steve was working on. He is doing tons on the labels and tying in everything to dynamic page settings. He had a few questions about version control (Git stuff). We got him all squared away and headed in a good direction. Next, we chatted about upcoming online scheduling settings and where to go next with those pieces. Bryan and I are making some good progress. I was doing some drawings and showing the guys where we are headed and what some of Bryan's new setting will do for unique calendar events and being able to book those from online or ecommerce.

Steve was talking with a lady and virtually gave her a small demo just by talking to her over the dinner table (concepts and principles). The lady loved the concepts of what we are trying to do and how it could help make things better and smoother. Basically, I think that people do like what we are doing, they just expect it to be done and ready to pull off the shelf (walmart style) where it looks nice, has a set price, and you can just pick it up. We will keep heading in that direction, but the reality is, it takes time and money, tons of settings, permissions, and even custom pieces. We are really going in a great direction. Keep going!

Shari O. and Danny joined the meeting. We did some light sub inventory training with them. Sean was chiming in as well. We've got some great team members. That is awesome. Hopefully we can all keep learning together along the way.

Working with Danny and Shari O. over a Zoom session. We were looking into more new settings and getting the rafting company demo site up and going. We made some plans, showed a few updates, and even had some fun marketing and sales type ideas. See attached for an updated MS Word document. Shari O. recorded the meeting. Once again, mostly a work session, but she recorded it anyways.

After the meeting was over, Shari O. and I stayed on and chatted about business ownership, percentages, goals, and feelings about how things are playing out (pros and cons). It was good for both of us, and we both needed a listening ear. Bouncing some thoughts and ideas off of each other. Good stuff. Crazy how busy life is and gets sometimes.

Work session between Brandon, Shari O., and Bryan. The goal was to do some training on the settings for online client facing scheduling and the new ecommerce settings that Bryan has been working on. We recorded a good part of the meeting. Shari O. has the video recording. If I were sum it up, I would say, it all comes down to the setup (planning and then executing that plan). See attached for a small Word document that we were working on to help us with reminders. If I can get the video from Shari O., I'll add it here.

Recording notes, checking on data stats for a client, and talking with Shari O. about USAePay account transitions and asking her questions about certain data for a client. Fairly quiet meeting.

I was late joining the meeting (dentist appointment). Sean and Shari O. were on the GoToMeeting talking about demos and client needs. After they left, I just did some clean-up, recording notes, and looking over emails. Entered some reimbursements from the Adobe ColdFusion conference earlier this month.

Emails, recording notes, and a phone call with Shari O. going over emails, servers, and USAePay accounts.

Steve and Sean were talking about merchant processing and where we are headed. Good ideas and plans. Shari O. popped in and we ended up on a 2 hour call with Newtek and USAePay. We were debugging our integration with the USAePay virtual terminal - merchant processing stuff. We originally did that integration back in 2009.

It got a little bit frustrating because it would work if we only had a single account with the correct API keys. Once we got into two different accounts, then it fail depending on which account was first (alpha sort order based on the account name). We ended up finding a small bug dealing with how the system choose which account to use, in the multiple account environment. An account id was being passed on to the correct pages but it wasn't sticking. At one point, we had Shari O., a guy from Newtek, a lady from USAePay, Eric (one of our developers), and myself on the meeting. We just couldn't figure it out. We were doing traces, testing, creating new accounts, trying it from different servers, you name it. I'm so glad that we ended up finding it.

Working with Shari O. on the USAePay accounts and settings for a client. She has been working really hard to get things going and fully set and done for the client. Trying to get some of their API socket keys to work and play through for their virtual terminal payments. On and off mute, conference calls, tech support, and GoToMeeting screensharing. Kinda all over the place. We had two different sessions totaling about 45 minutes in total.

Steve and Cory were talking about looking up projects in bit bucket (code repository stuff). Being able to check on commits and branches. They were then talking about different industries and how they are financing some of their developments. Lots of games that people play and how do we fit into that mix. While Steve was still on with us, Cory was reporting in on some meetings that she had had with Kelly dealing with the adilas label builder and sub inventory attributes. Both of those subjects seem to be heating up a bit.

Our current goal is to focus and try to get some small victories (projects being done and across the finish line). Cory and I spent some time going over projects. We talked about the need to test everything. Even small stuff. We have had it bite us before. Next, Cory and I looked into a possible bug in some settings. We looked and looked and couldn't see anything quickly. We may have to jump in deeper, when we get a chance.

Shari O. popped in and had some questions about getting a new internal email server. Our current solution has been giving us some problems lately. We don't change any code on our side and it works great, all of the sudden it will be down, and without any changes on our side, it all of the sudden starts working again. Kinda crazy. Shari O. calls it the gremlins or email gremlins. As a side note, later in the meeting she popped back in to let us know that it was working again. Random.

Wayne joined the meeting and got Cory and I up to speed on a few things that he is trying to work on. Performance tweaks.

Cory and I then started going over her list of possible projects, quotes, and estimates.

- Need quotes for inputting sub attribute data all at one time upon PO creation (start with build page)
- Bulk update sub attributes interface
- Mapping of EOT (elements of time) data to sub attributes (settings for cultivation and manufacturing)

Along the way, we were talking about options and settings that relate to the concepts of the data assembly line, recipe/builds, showing subs in the packaging and production pages, and managing recipe/build output better. Lot of talk about bulk edit tools for sub inventory attributes, batches, phasing, sub locations, and moving subs along a known path or virtual assembly line.

Dealing with the data assembly line concepts, I was telling Cory how we setup both rules and assignments for smart group buttons (tiered pricing buttons). I was mentioning that we could use something similar to help setup and do the mapping between elements of time, sub phases, sub locations, sub groups, and monitoring the progress of certain things. We need the rules (what or how to do things) and the assignments (who or what to connect or monitor). Using the two pieces in combo (rules and assignments) we could then have the computer and/or system help us monitor progression and progress. They are good at that, they just need instructions and the who, what, when, how, and why and they can do those jobs over and over again.

As we keep rolling more and more towards the concept of fracture (future adilas project) I would really like to keep working on the data assembly line concepts and using rules and assignments to get the correct flow and mapping in place. I see that as important as we keep going forward.

On a conference call with Shari O. and a rep from Newtek. We were going over specifics for two different clients and their merchant processing needs. Both sides were educating the other side as to flow, processes, and needs. I had to bail out at 1 pm to get on a new meeting but Shari O. was trying to help negotiate rates for a client where they, Newtek, couldn't provide the correct hardware device.

Steve, Sean, and Cory were on the morning meeting when I joined. Cory was only there for a little bit but after she left, Steve and Sean were talking about setting up a rough schedule for some of their sales guys and gals. Our model has been very open - you have work to do, do it when you can, record your hours. What we are finding is some people need more structure and our super open model is causing people to fail due to the lack of structure. For example: I know that I can dictate my own hours but I know that I work from 9 to 5 on certain days. I plan accordingly and thus have a base structure of what I'm shooting for. I can change it at any time, but base structure gives me a starting place. Some of the new folks coming into our model are used to having a set schedule and then having to abide accordingly. With it being so open, they kinda get lost, don't have a plan, a goal, or anything set. As such, they tend to let whatever the day brings dictate their output and schedule. That is great, but sometimes there needs to be a bit more structure.

So, Steve and Sean were talking about helping their guys and gals setup a base schedule and then if they need to modify that, they can, but at least they have a set schedule. Interesting. I love freedom but it can be bad if not structured properly (and to what level - it may vary).

Phone call with Shari O. and a merchant processor company. We were going over accounts and needed options. After that I sent Cory a text message about some client training that needed to be done for one of our clients. Other emails and follow-ups.

Online with Shari O. going over settings on merchant processing. We ended up looping in a tech from Newtek to help us look at the settings. He decided that he would need to make some changes on his side of the fence. We'll go from there once we hear back from them.

Steve and Cory were talking about pages, packages, and sub inventory. Shari O. popped in and we ended up having some light budget talks. The four of us talked briefly about the state of adilas and where we are going. Lots of good things going but we do need to be careful. On a different note, many things are changing all around us - including code changes, settings, clients, needs, expectations, etc. It's a moving target.

Light talk about what is an MVP (minimal viable product) for what we are doing? Even though we have so much functionality, do we have all of the required pieces? There are still some things that we need, even for an MVP - although it be a large MVP.

Cory was asking questions about projects and what not.

I joined later on. Helping my wife Heather after ankle surgery. When I joined, Cory, Shari O., and Steve were on the meeting. I was pretty quiet for the first part. Mostly just listening. We went over numbers and budgeting stuff. As we were going over some of our projects, Steve was recommending that we include Mike on some of the upcoming features and marketing efforts. There was also some talk about real time sales tax redemption and money transfers. They are (Stev and Mike) are trying to figure out some angles on state compliance systems and using sales tax redemption and tracking as a possible angle. Good ideas.

Cory was recording the budget numbers. We also talked about other projects and bids. Lots of verbal reports. At the end, Cory sent around the budget spreadsheet numbers.

Talking with Wayne on the server meeting about master branches vs other deployed code branches (on other or certain servers). The more servers that we have with specific testing or production branches, the harder it is to manage all of that. We have some code that needs to be live but still may be in the testing phases. That can screw up all of the other live production servers. It can get interesting.

We spent quite a bit of time going over the add/edit new corporations code, issues, and errors. Shari O. has been sending a series of emails out to us to let us know about certain problems, once again, we have some servers on one branch and others on another branch. It can get a little bit interesting. There is basically one branch of code that is hanging up the others, we'll get it all smoothed out and going.

Cory and Wayne were going through a number of small issues and small bugs. They were also coordinating and planning some future testing dates and times. One of the things that is coming up is a data capacity and memory issues. We have some of our clients that are getting so much data, it is getting hard to deal with all of it.

John and Wayne were talking about long variables vs normal capacity variables. We may need to expand some of our JavaScript variables into longer length capacity variables. It got pretty techy talking about memory, caching, garbage collection, and efficiency stuff.

Shari O. and I met on the GoToMeeting session and went over new USAePay accounts, settings, and logins. Part way through I got a call from Calvin and we chatted for a bit. Shari O. and I jumped back in and were looking at more settings and playing around. As part of the meeting, she was showing me what she does to track and correctly process the reoccurring invoices that done inside of adilas. There are a lot of places that we could help her out (automation). We may have to circle back to that.

As part of our meeting, we also went in and looked around on some of the new Trinity Payment stuff as well. Basically, a small look-y-peek into their backend card processing interface. It looks good.

Admin meeting. We were going to do some budgeting but ended up getting pulled into other topics of discussion. Lots of talk about 3rd party solutions and our love/hate type relationships. Sometimes, those relationships can be challenging. We also talked about some possible rules for bigger clients and helping them get transferred over to semi-dedicated or full dedicated serves vs staying on the shared environment.

We chatted about a number of up-and-coming projects and ran through some pros and cons with each of them. A number of them are dealing with outside 3rd parties and have some good things but also have some teeth (virtually).

For outside custom work, we are heading towards full pre-payment or getting something upfront and then billing along the way. We have been skunked a few times and had to run things out to bad debt (uncollectable invoices). along those lines, permission was given to Cory to help wheel and deal as needed for certain projects.

At the end of the meeting, Steve was doing some training for Shari O. and myself on his new timeclock and timecards for our internal co-owners and what they are working on. Good meeting. I sent around notes to all of the key admin team members.

Phone calls with Eric about the USAePay and EMV/chip readers. He is going to check in with the bike shuttle guys to make sure all is well. On the phone with Shari O. going over a plan. We talked about the new USAePay account, EMV/chip reader stuff, and options for handling tips on invoices. After that, I spent the rest of the time working on the Trinity Payment stuff and getting setup on the new USAePay account. I ended up doing a lot of emails back and forth and on a tech support call to try to get things ironed out.

Phone call with Drew and the bike shuttle/coffee shop stuff. He was asking some questions and we went over a bunch of different items and topics. Here are some of my notes:

- eCommerce and client facing scheduling. He is really wanting to know a timeline on when that is going to be done and finished. He is spending tons of time right now on the phone and doing everything manually.

- Tips - He wanted to know how to do tips. We talked about techy talk and credit card stuff (normal sales vs pre-auths). We talked about unlimited line items, over payments, after the fact values or relationships, etc. Lots of ideas. Not sure where to go with it. I'll check with Steve and Shari O.

- EMV/Chip reader - they have some hardware and want to get someone over there to help them out.

- They would really like some sort of mobile checkout and mobile payment option. They are out of the shop and people just want to pay them right there vs going back inside and what not. Sort of a quick sales (all mobile).

- They would really like the bulk edit on flex grid tie-ins. The page is prepped but not fully online yet. Currently, they have to edit individual lines at a time.

- They also want to get some custom stuff done with monitoring availability on shuttle rides (virtual seats that are available - we are using budget settings inside of elements of time - expected and actuals).

Sean and Shari O. were coordinating on some client training that they both are doing. Basically, an I'll do this and you do that, type of coordination. They both bailed out and I was just doing emails, recording notes, and jumping back into my bulk edit flex grid tools project.

Bryan and I were looking into his new changes for the automated emails and corp email settings. he is making progress on that section. He will do some clean-up and then circle back around for a final code sign-off. We are getting closer. He has been working with Shari O. on this project. That is awesome. I also asked Bryan to start helping me with client side or client facing scheduling. That is one of the next big things on my tick list.

Quite a few folks checking in from over the weekend. There were six of us on the morning meeting, to start out. After they checked in, they would bail out and do their own work in the background. Cory had a few questions for the group. She and Shari O. bailed out to chat about other things. John had a few questions about some older code that Steve had written. They touched base and exchanged some emails back and forth. Steve and Sean were touching base and setting up individual sales meeting calls. I was chiming in here and there and doing emails and recording notes.

Budget meeting with the admin team. We have Steve, Cory, Shari O., and myself. We went over numbers, spreadsheets, revenue, expenses, forecasting, and other budget stuff. I took a bunch of notes and sent them out after the meeting. Hopefully we are getting into a performing groove and making progress. Sometimes it is hard to tell, but we are making progress and things seem to be smoothing out.

On sales, they (the sales team) are switching from group meetings to individual meetings to help the guys and gals focus directly on what they are doing and are good at. That is a change. There was also quite a bit of talk about future development and direction that we are wanting to go. We will continue to keep seeking outside funding on much of that enterprise and higher-level stuff. There seems to be a number of folks and companies that are looking for those bigger bulk or enterprise level tools.

Steve, Sean, Shari O., John, and I were all on the meeting. We were touching base on a number of different subjects. Towards the end, I had some Internet issues and got kicked off.

Working with Shari O. on some custom email stuff. We found a small typo and got it fixed for a client. After that we spent some time talking and listening to each other. Sometimes you need a shoulder to cry on and/or an ear to bend (light venting and verbalizing frustrations). Good stuff. As a side note, Mrs. Shari O. helped save me, numerous times, when I was so overwhelmed that I didn't know what to do and where to turn. She was able to see my pleas and virtually read through the lines. That is a great skill to have. Shari O. is feeling some weight right now with the state of Colorado and unemployment type stuff. Some of this comes back to how adilas is organized and how we are claiming certain relationships with our guys/gals (co-owners, 1099ers, or employees). There is some debate on the subject and it is affecting Mrs. Shari O. I'm really glad that she cares and wants to do the right things. I'm a big fan of Shari O. and what she does, for everyone on the team. She's a huge asset and it hurts to see her under a big stress load.

Sean, Chuck, Cory, Shari O., and I were on a meeting. Shari O. came in a little bit later after the rest of us had started. The goal was to talk about and look at options for creating some industry specific tables and logic to hold bowling ball drilling specs (important pieces for the bowling industry). I was taking notes and the others were chiming in with questions, feedback, and ideas. Good little brainstorming meeting.

Here are a couple of topics of discussion:

- We have some really old screenshots of some bowling specific software that looks like it was developed in the 1980's or 1990's - looks like old windows stuff.

- Talking about options by using flex attributes - (real in-line database extensions). Those are fairly new and are unlimited, but they are only currently developed as a one-to-one relationship (you only get one set of unlimited data points) vs a one-to-many relationship where you could have one customer and they could have many balls or different drill patterns. We would also have to go in and setup these flex attributes per corporation. We went over some other pros and cons there.

- We could use flex grid tie-ins or even limited flex grid tie-ins, but we cap out at 30 custom fields. They can be used as one-to-many relationships and already have a ton of flexibility and features built in. Possible option.

- Currently, one of our bowling customers is using an old school paper type model. They print out a form, fill it in, and then scan and upload and attach it to a specific customer. They can upload as many new images as needed. They could also use PDF, Word docs, Excel files, etc. - using media/content vs photo uploads. These options exist right now at no additional cost, just some training. The downside here is that each photo or scan is not searchable. It exists but you can't search for patterns or combine things.

- We talked about a budget of between $2,000 and $4,000 ish to get a custom project up and running. This would include onsite research, planning, designing, development, and even some reporting. Just guessing without more info at this point.

- We have a number of resources (people in the bowling industry) that could help and guide us. That is huge. We just haven't really tapped into it yet.

- Chuck had some great questions about other service type industries and how they track their repairs and custom jobs - ski shops, bike shops, etc. Maybe look at what it would take to do and/or extend things out to other industries. Good insight.

We closed the meeting and both Cory and Sean are going to poke around with some of our contacts and see what we come up with. As it develops, we may setup other meetings to keep pushing the project forward.

Paying bills and going through tons of emails, after being out of the office for a week. Got a request from Shari O. to add in a custom email address for the High Valley Bike Shuttle. Went in and added that email address and hardcoded it as an option in the backend code. Pushed up new files.

Planning with Bryan. Working on the process of helping to automate the emails for invoices, quotes, statements, and customer emails. Earlier today, Bryan was working with Shari O. and watching her work on emails and taking notes on her current processes. Trying to help where we can. We can gain a lot of information (gleaning) by watching others do their work.

Small little impromptu sales meeting with the guys who were on the morning meeting. Sean, Michael, and Steve talking about gun dealers and firearm sales (current and future clients). Tons of fun discussion and them making some plans to get with our existing clients to see if we could help speed things up, make things better, or add in needed connections and functionality. They are excited to stir the pot and see what they can make of it. Michael has some prior firearm sales experience and he's an experienced adilas user and manager.

The topic switched over and Sean and Marisa were talking with Shari O. and I about the bike shuttle company. They did some training with them yesterday and just doing some follow-up. They will be doing some more training next week.

Wayne reported on some server issues and other projects that he and others are working on. Towards the end, we also got a report from John. After that, Shari O. and I spent some time chatting about different things. Not all of it was server related, but just taking care of business.

All kinds of random stuff. Emails, phone calls, fixing voided invoices with credit card payments, updating our credit card info with vendors that have our credit card on file for different services (we got a new debit card with new expiration date). Talking with Shari O. Talking with Eric about the inventory snapshot project. Reading and research on merchant processing and costs and pricing (wholesaling processing). Going through a PDF presentation from Trinity Payment Solutions. Small bug fix on the add/edit flex grid page. Pushed up new files. Recording notes. All kinds of little to do list items.