DataWebTect

This time around Love has won against the Money.

Geeks can be unpredictable and no wonder we had the y2k issue. Recently I came across a similar if not minor situation with the dates in Oracle database. Here is the scenario, you need to compare transaction date with the system date of birth but the catch is that you need to make sure that they are 12 years or older. Remember there is no date of birth passed on from the front end. So the easiest way they figured was to get the date extract only the year for e.g 29-Feb-2008 you extract the year 2008 and subtract the 18 years and you end up with 1990 and then add the date which in this case would be 29-Feb-1990 and convert it to a date and compare it against the date of Birth and off you go. Well it was fine until today when Oracle tried to convert the date it failed and you have errors all over the place. But this was the easiest thing to do and they did it. Now they can have another four years to fix it.

Seth has a detailed discussion on what he calls as “placebo effect” in marketing. Detailed discussion of “Placebo surgery”. He compares the marketing to that of the medical placeboand says that the importance of telling stories. I agree that the way you tell the story is more important than your product itself. Therefore, if you are marketing a product you need to make up a good story to make it successful. A very good example I can think of is the partnership between Nike and Michael Jordan to create Air Jordans.  The jordans are no doubt good shoes but what made them extrodinary was the fact that Jordan told a story for them.

Nothing happened until accidentally I met a score counselor. If you are not familiar Score is an organization with volunteers who help the small business entrepreneurs to get help and mentor them to achieve success. I was able to meet one counselor who had many years of experience in filing patents. I told him that I do not have $10,000 to file the patent and he suggested that we will be able to get a provisinal patent with less than $500. Then he asked if I had any experience writing patent lingo and suggested that I meet with somebody who can write up the patent specifications. I spent around $200 for writing the specifications. Then I filled out the provisional patent application with the help of the counselor and the fee is just $125. Within few weeks I had the provisional patent acceptance. I am really thankful for the help provided by the counselor. There is more and will continue in the next part.

Since my childhood, I wanted to be an inventor. But I always thought that to be an inventor you need your own laboratory and stuff that goes with it. Then about a year ago, I was reading a book and it stuck me that it was easier than I thought. Then I started writing my ideas in a notebook. Couple of ideas were stricking. Then I was not sure what to do next. The obvious choice was to get it patented. I reviewed the Patent office whis has more details than I really wanted to know. Then I got information about a patent lawyer and used the county law referral service to get the initial consultation with a patent lawyer for $35. But the lawyer was not there and an assistant walked me through the process and told that the costs could be between $2500 to $10,000. But I was not sure if I spent that much whether I would be able to get it back. Then I got another idea, may be, just may be if I made a prototype and sell it without patenting. I met couple of CAD tool companies to design and develop a prototype of the product. The thinking here was to make a prototype and then take it to the  companies and see if they will be interested. Turns out it would cost me around $1000 for the drawings and the prototype. Well that was cheaper but not what I wanted. Then I got in touch with a long time friend in India to see if he can help me with the CAD drawings and then create a prototype. My friend kept his word and I am really thankful to have received the drawings. I just left it like that.

 David St. Lawrence always has a wonderful post that I can relate to very well. Being a project manager the only thing that matters to you is the end goal. We are not worried about the few issues that come along the way as long as we can complete it on time. Along the way our team memers always said what we want to hear for the fear of getting in trouble. The suppressed issues will manifest itself at some point in the future when we step away from the project.  Therefore he suggests

“Achieving a target in a way that you can be proud of lets you end cycle and move on to other targets. Cheating your way to achieving a target leaves open issues that will always come back to haunt you, even if you go on to achieve nobler things.”

Truly amazing and if only we can stop to think about it!!

Currently reading the above book. Excellent book with guidelines for utilizing the flat world. Hiring virtual assistants to writing blog entriesl, taking care of your day to day needs. He has given a deep insight of how to operate online businesses using remote controls and spending few minutes every week or month. A must read to understand the new rich!!

I found this interesting piece by Christine Kane and it kind of provoked my thoughts as I had a similar experience. Last year around August, I was so frustrated about the job and the promotional aspects that I started to think where I wanted to be in another year. The only option for me was to become a Manager as I got tired of coding and supporting applications. Then I thought I could take the PMI Certification and complete the same. Well I took classes and got certification. Meanwhile, I was fortunate to have the opportunity to lead some projects which were successful and kind of projected my exposure. From that point on the opportunity came up and I became a Manager. Once you determine what you want to be and work towards the same it will come. As somebody said when one is determined all the universe’s resources come forward to guide them towards the final goal. I am grateful to everybody who helped me achieve this.

Yes, finally my dream project is up. Gift A Lunch developed in Drupal is up and running. It is an e-commerce store with a unique offering. You can purchase the gift cards and Gift A Lunch would deliver it to your favorite friend, relative or colleague. As a project manager, I always had a challenge when we had remote workers. Typically, I take the team for a lunch after every successful project. The ones who are working remote in a different location had to either fly for the lunch or miss the lunch altogether. It always bothered me as we have some great individuals who work remotely and do excellent work do not get recognized/rewarded for their work. Gift A Lunch would make it easy, all you need to do is login and pay for the gift card of their favorite restaurant and it will be delivered to them. The site is not restricted to such a situation only there are many other situations like Thanksgiving lunches for people who could not make it.

Now the technical part of it. I used Drupal and it took approximately a month to get it up and running. I used simple e-commerce module with cck and jquery for the simple forms. Midstream I had to switch domains and it took almost two days to resolve but the good folks at goDaddy cut my wait time. I was always amazed at the customer service by Go Daddy.

That reminds me on another good customer service experience from Costco. I purchased this 42 inch Samsung Plasma on 2005 but recently it started malfunctioning with a two inch thick line in the middle of the screen since April. I called the technical support who took due diligence and tried to repair but could not do it. Now they are telling me to take it to the store and exchange for a new one. Since it was purchased before the 90 day policy they covered it. These are the folks that really care about their customers and I love them.