Spicer Matthews » Web Programing

The New Age Business Man / Woman

Spicer — Wed, 09 Jun 2010 19:56:33 +0000

Something that has been on my mind for a while now is; What does the new age business person looks like? As more and more consumer dollars are being spend online and less and less spent in person on the streets, how does this affect the first time entrepreneur? Really great companies have been built by people with simple resumes. I see in many ways it is becoming harder and harder for a first time entrepreneur to break ground on their dream because they have to do business on the web.

It use to just take someone that was willing to work long hard hours and maybe some start up capital to build a truly profitable business. Whatever business the entrepreneur was going to go into they did not have to have 20 years of experience working in the industry, however in many cases that helped. I have a close friend who went to college and graduated with a business degree. Other than odd college jobs this friend did not have much of a resume. He knew one thing; he did not want to work for “the man”, and he was willing to work his butt of to make it happen. After much research he raised a small amount of capital and went into the fast food business. Today he has grown the business rather successfully. All this friend had was a passion and a good head on his shoulders.

The New Skill Set Needed

The above example is getting harder and harder with the move to the web. To launch even a basic business you often have to surround yourself with domain experts in all sorts of different niches. If you want to compete on the web. You need to hire a designer, web programmer, mobile programmer, sysadmin, web marketer, experts on understanding your market, and more. You can not just sit on a busy street count the people going by to understand your market. You can not just lease a space and open your doors. You have to surround yourself with domain experts that often are not cheap. So a good head on your shoulders and some start up capital turns into a bunch of people with good heads on their shoulders and tons of capital.

How Do We Solve The Problem?

The problem I want to solve; Is how do we move the world to the web but keep the “all you need is a dollar and a dream” way of business alive? I know there is not a simple answer and as the Facebook generation morphs into business people they will already be hitting the streets with a leg up on my generation and older generations, but I would like to find better ways to bridge the gap.

As a side note, I realize this is a very general topic. I realize there are many case studies of the web making live easy for first time entrepreneurs. However, looking around most of the successful web companies are started by people with tech backgrounds. I want to find better ways for non-tech people to start great businesses without tons of money.

Elevation Fitness In Private Beta

Spicer — Sat, 06 Mar 2010 18:07:33 +0000

I can not express how excited I am about Elevation Fitness. A product designed for personal trainers to keep track of their clients. I have been working on this project with an amazing team of people for over 2 years, and I am happy to say we went into private beta this week.

Elevation attempts to do away with paper and pencil for personal trainers and move their client management to the Cloud, where all software should be. If you are interested please signup for the private beta and let me know what you think.

For those friends that have asked me over the last few years what I have been working on, this is it. Now that we are in private beta I am looking forward to engaging our users and learning more about how I/We can make this an even better product.

Also, a special thanks to everyone that has supported me/us along the way on this project.

My Top Technology List Of 2009

Spicer — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 17:13:12 +0000

Every geek blog I actively read posted a list of top technologies for 2009, so I thought I would be remissed if I did not do the same. These are technologies that really stepped it up or came to my attention in 2009 and became part of my everyday life both for work and personal used.

2009 was all about moving my life to the cloud. I determined early in 2009 it was stupid to ever store a file on my computer ever again. All my data should live in the cloud so I can have access to it everywhere I go, I can have access on any platform (think cell phone), I can easily share my data with people I want to share it with, and lastly I do not have to worry about backups (for the most part), and that is just what I have done.

Below is a list of my top 10 products that have changed my life in 2009. The first 6 are sort of consumer related and the last 4 are software developer related. So if you are not a software developer I am thinking you might only find the first 6 interesting.

Consumer Technology

Google Docs / Gmail (www.gmail.com)- Hands down the best thing that ever happen to me in 2009. Yes, these products have been around for a while but google finally got to the point where I could use them full time and be happy. I no longer use a native mail client or calendar on my computer, and I no longer install MS Office or iWorks. Google has done an amazing job of taking the most used aspects of a computer and putting them in the cloud. These products still have a ways to go but I am confident Google will continue to push new features everyday.

Android (www.android.com)- Good bye iPhone!!! I have switched to the Droid for good. My geek religion got the best of me. The iPhone is an amazing phone but the openness of the android, the forward looking of the android, and the seamless integration with google products is priceless. This phone/operating system is everything the iPhone is plus more. Being opens source and controlled by a company that is more community driven tends to bring new features and technologies at a faster rate. I am sick of waiting for Steve Jobs to tell me when I can have the next latest and greatest thing. It is my phone I want to control it.

Google Voice (www.google.com/voice) - While Google Voice has a long ways to go it is pretty killer. So killer I have changed my phone number to use Google Voice, a number I have had for over 10 years. When you can port your number to Google Voice it will take off! It is so nice to be able to control where and when I receive calls. The voice mail to text email is amazing. Also, the ability to text message people as if it is an instant message client while I am at my computer is a time safer for me. Google voice is going to be a great product for the everyday consumer and an even better product for business customers.

Dropbox (www.dropbox.com) - Dropbox is a service that allows me to sync my files with the cloud. So I can keep all my files in Dropbox and revisions of my files will be stored on their servers. I can connect to my Dropbox account from any computer and have all my files with me. I can even access my files from their website or iPhone app (if I still used an iPhone). There are a lot of services out there that do this same thing but Dropbox is the first company to truly get it right, and that is why I am a customer of theirs. The ability to know my files are with me anywhere I go and that they are backed up is priceless.

Shoeboxed (www.shoeboxed.com) - This is hands down the service I am most excited about. It has really blown my mind that someone has not offered this service years ago. I have thought many times about trying to start a service such as this. What Shoeboxed does is they let you send them (via snail mail) all your receipts and they scan them and then extract the info and add it to a ledger for you. You can even send them business cards and they will scan them for you as well. They are also starting to scan documents. They categories documents, receipts, and business cards by tags which makes it really nice to find particular transactions. Shoeboxed has done a nice job of integrating with other 3rd party products as well. I hope this product continues to grow. They have helped me a great deal in my organization.

Google Chrome (www.google.com/chrome)- Seems like 2009 was a google year for me. Google really made some nice improvements in their web browser Chrome. When they released the Mac Beta version I started to use Chrome full time. It is super stable, super fast, and it was clearly built fixing all the mistakes of past browsers. I love the integration with google services as well. I think everyone should use this browser because it was the first browser built that really seems to have a successful mission of helping in the transition from native software to the cloud. I really look forward to building Chrome browser plug-ins for my different web projects. Another hat tip to the gang at google and of course the community around chrome.

Software Development Technology

Codeigniter (www.codeigniter.com)- This PHP framework has changed my life. I have been programing php for over 10 years now. I have played around with many frameworks and have even written my own. Codeigniter has done such a good job of making PHP development fast, simple, secure, lightweight, and more. At the start of 2009 I was spending a great deal of time with Ruby On Rails I was trying to figure out if I should move to RoR or continue building on my own framework. I called it SpicePhp . After spending a long weekend polishing up my framework and not getting as far as I had hoped I came across Codeigniter in a random google search. I never touched my framework again. Beyond being the coolest of the frameworks I really like Codeigniter because they are based in the north west (whatever that means for an Internet company/project). I am from Portland and I spend as much time in Bend (where their office is) as I can. I keep thinking I need to stop by and buy the Codeigniter people pizza. The problem is many of their developers are not in Bend. Regardless, it is a well thought-out framework that I know will continue to grow in popularity in 2010.

Appcelerator’s Titanium (www.appcelerator.com)- I have been watching this product all year long and have been playing with it along the way. It took a year to become what I would call “production ready” but with the release of version 0.8 they nailed it!!! Titanium is a technology that allows you to write native desktop, iPhone, and Android applications uses web technology such as javascript. I really think this framework is great for people who write web applications and need product add-ons for different platforms. Instead of having to learn 3 different programing languages you get to write really robust applications using the same language you wrote your web application in. It speeds up development time. I am currently working on some applications using this framework. I really wish appcelerator a very happy 2010 and really look forward to their inovation this coming year.

GitHub (www.github.com)- This company has changed my life. GitHub gives me a place to store all my source code for projects I am working on. They keep it secure and backed up. I no longer have to maintain some sort of backup system on some server I run. I no longer have to maintain permissions for the different users I am collaborating with. GitHub has done a killer job of taking one less system administration task out of my hands. It also has a sexy interface to review the progress of my software project. All stuff I can get from the commend line if I remember the commands. Saving me time because I can just browse and click.

iPlotz (www.iplotz.com)- This is a web based tool for building website wire-frames. This has been a great tool for me to layout and design websites. I love the tool because it is web based, putting more of my life in the cloud. I also love the tool because they give you all sorts of cool features to allow you to click through the site as if you just built it in HTML. It allows me to wire-frame out the site just as I want it so my designers can nail the design on their first design round. It really helps in speeding up the development process.

And The Winner Is…..

Clearly, Google is the over all winner for 2009 in my tech list. I have a feeling they might be a multi year winner in 2010. The company is on fire when it comes to moving the web world in the correct direction. I look forward to the grow of all the products I mentioned here. I know I will be using each one of these products everyday.

No More Compiled Software For Me

Spicer — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 18:18:51 +0000

Spicer Is Moving To The Cloud

As many of you know I am the founder and president of Cloudmanic Labs, LLC. At Cloudmanic Labs it is our goal to build web applications that traditionally were handled via compiled native software and stuff them in the Cloud. For a while now I have been not eating my own dog food (for a lack of a better term). I stilled was using a native mail client, still listening to my stored mp3s in iTunes, using word to type documents, still using some sort of compiled solution for a twitter client and so on. Then the recent preview release of Google’s Chrome OS came out and it gave me a wake up call.

A New Man, Thanks To Google

So I watch the presentation that Google put on last week highlighting how the future of computing is just a web browser. Our documents, music, videos and more will live in the cloud through cloud services. For the record I am so excited to see Chrome OS mature. This type of overhaul of operating systems was a long time coming. So I spent a better part of this past weekend truly moving to the cloud. I officially use only a web browser for my everyday computing. There are a few things, which I will get to in a bit that still lack. I read and write all my email in gmail, I type of my documents in google docs, I tweet and listen to music all from my web browser. I even went as far as storing my files in the cloud. I am only storing files with Dropbox from now on. It is so nice to be able to pick up any computer and pick up where I left off. In fact I booted my Mac Book to Windows Xp a few days ago to test out a website and I have not found a need to boot back, a browser is a browser after all. I have even linked up as many services as possible to sync with my iPhone. My iPhone is in the cloud with me!

A Few Things Holding Me Back From Being A Real Man

Music and Video. Where are we on this front? There are tons of services out there that have content I can stream or buy to enjoy on the Internet but I want a place that I can upload movies and music I already own and play it on the go on any computer. I know Google is heading in that direction but I want it now! I sure hope Apple is working their tails off to make a web based version of iTunes. I want a private web based version of iTunes that I can upload all my music and video to and Apple will “sync” it to my Apple Tv, iPhone, and more. This is something we need now not later. If Apple is not already far down this path they will lose to Google. We need to bridge the gap between already owned content and external media devices and we will have an Internet 100% ready to support cloud computing.

Spicer Is Moving To The Cloud

A New Man, Thanks To Google

A Few Things Holding Me Back From Being A Real Man

I Am Totally Jazzed On Appcelerator

Spicer — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 22:07:39 +0000

Take a look at my post over at Cloudmanic Labs.

http://www.cloudmanic.com/2009/11/cloudmanic-uses-appcelerators-titanium-mobile/

Also take a look at the new stuff they are doing in Version 0.8

Titanium 0.8 Preview – Facebook Enhancements from Appcelerator Video Channel on Vimeo.

My Love Of Jquery’s Form Plugin

Spicer — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 22:11:10 +0000

The type of web programing I do often has a large database back-end with which requires user input and data return. In the olden days you just created an html form and then posted some input data to some cgi (say PHP script) and the script would speak with the database and return some html causing the browser to reload on post. Now, that we are a super cool web 2.0 world we do things differently. We make our friend javascript use Ajax to do the post for us. If you are anything like me you take one look at javascript and say “no thank you”. Most people hate the syntax of javascript, the confusion of the language, or the browser compatibility issues; when I say most people I am including me. This is where our friends at Jquery come to the rescue http://jquery.com (more on them in another post).

For now I want to highlight a jquery plugin, an additional library that grows the functionality of jquery. The Form Plugin (Hosted Here) allows jquery to submit form data via Ajax either when the user hits submit using the ajaxForm() or on demand using ajaxSubmit(). Here is an example of how I used it in a recent project.

index.php -

So from the above html code you can see there is no submit button. Our goal here is to make it so when you change anyone of the input form items it will collect the value of each field and post the data to returnGraph.php. The data will be posted via Ajax so there is no page refresh. We want Ajax to change the graph and put the graph in the div with id “graph-return”. We also want some sort of spinner to spin to show the user the browser is thinking and waiting for a graph to appear. We are going to put an animated gif in the graph div that will be replaced with the graph when it is returned from returnGraph.php.

The next step is the write some javascript. You need to make sure you have the jquery and form plug in included in your code.

Here is the Javascript I use to bind to the form to make the Ajax call and to also bind to the input items to make a post on change.

// This function will deal with Chart controls.

function setupControls()

{

// Setup Date Picker

$(“#date”).datepicker({

mandatory: true,

dateFormat: “M d, yy”,

showOn: “both”,

maxDate: “1″,

buttonImage: “../images/calendar.gif”,

buttonImageOnly: true,

onSelect: function (date) {

resubmitGraph();

}

});

// Setup a generic bind to bind all input fields to get a new graph

$(“#control-form :input”).change(resubmitGraph);

}

// This function will get the value of each control and submit an ajax form request to reder new

// graph.

function resubmitGraph()

{

$(“#control-form”).ajaxSubmit({

beforeSubmit: function () {

$(“#graph-return”).html(‘

’);

success: function (response) {

$(“#graph-return”).html(response);

}

});

}

I will not cover what datepicker is but it is part of the jquery ui plugin. I will cover this in a later post. Jquery UI

The function resubmitGraph() is where all the magic happens. It does something call seralize the form data. It goes through each input form field creates a php post string. Here is an example unrelated to my example. I got it from here Here

Now in the background the ajaxSubmit() function sends the serialized form Post to returnGraph.php. Also, just before posting we clear the “graph-return” div and put an automated gif in place to let the user know something is happening. Once the script is done processing the data it will call the “success” part ajaxSubmit() and pass in the response from the post. In our case it is a graph. The animated gif is replaced with the graph. Ajax Submit complete.

From the code below you can see we bind a change action to each input item in the form. So anytime anything changes in the fields we redraw the graph.
$(”#control-form :input”).change(resubmitGraph);