Russell and I got on a Zoom meeting to work on some CSS and JavaScript issues with the snow owl theme. Both he and I were trading back and forth. Most times, I had my screen showing and both of use were drawing, talking, and filling things in. We used some remote control options to allow Russell to do things on my screen. Lots of debugging and searching around. We ended up making a new little branch and taking some other notes on the technical side of things.

These are a few of my other notes from our conversation. The concept of maintenance may be restated as... "prioritizing what we want to let fail or let go". Sometimes there is just too much to do. Often, we talk about maintenance as keeping up with stuff or even being ahead of the curve. Well, what happens if you can't keep up? It turns into a decision of what do we want to let go or what can we let go of? No fun, but sometimes very needed as well.

If you get bigger, as a company, you also have to become bigger in practice as well. There are so many cause and effect decisions with trying to be bigger or trying to stay or be smaller. Often, you get either small and flexible or bigger and rigid. It's really hard to be big and flexible. We were using the analogy of a bike and train. If you want to go almost anywhere, you need a bike. However, if you want to be efficient and carry a ton, you need the train.

Anyways, we had some good conversations as we worked on code and CSS changes. Good meeting.

Steve and Sean going over a new gram controller and all kinds of new rules that are being forced upon us through outside state mandates. I was going through emails while they were talking about new changes and even showing some of the things in action.

Wayne and I were going to meet with Alan to go over the new Application.cfc pages and process. However, before we got going on that. We spent some time talking about coding practices and how that relates to decisions and projects. I was drawing and trying to show some cause and effects from some recent changes. Going over what Russell and I were looking into on Saturday. Wayne was trying to help us get pointed in a good direction as far as action paths and how we should attack those issues. I put some branch stuff and notes through chat and Wayne will check things out to see if he can fix the CSS and JavaScript things.

Wayne had both Alan and I on the meeting. John, Steve, and Cory were also there but mostly on mute in the background. Wayne was doing an explanation and virtual show and tell on what was going on with some of the Application.cfc changes. We talked about all kinds of subjects and topics. Here are some of my notes:

- Our current settings need to keep moving more into models, services, and objects.

- Cfc's, in ColdFusion, are like classes in other languages.

- Lots of time going over onRequest actions and setting global variables. Lots of root path stuff to help with navigation from any folder, any server, and any sub directory (tons of path stuff).

- Talking about includes and possible copy and paste errors.

- We worked on a small bug fix together. Cory brought it up, Wayne coded it, and Alan help do some research and offered guidance.

- We went over a bunch of functions, private, global, and even page level functions. We started out wide on the global defaults and then went deeper into the page level values and defaults.

- Towards the end, Wayne and John were pushing up some of their new changes. I was watching them log into the other servers and do a git deploy and some of the other scripts behind the scenes that I do get to see very often.

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The meeting switched and Eric joined us. We were watching Wayne and Eric talk about some super deep admin SQL (database code) and some custom scripts that they were working on. We got pretty deep into grants, permissions, special functions, triggers, and stored procedures. Alan joined in and all three of the guys were talking about some deep meta data level stuff and options for their functions, tables, and backend routines. Definitely an database admin level discussion. Steve and others were still listening in, but they were mostly lost.

We got into some discussions on checking dependencies and what relies on what (levels and structure). The guys were talking about stored procedures and even comparing code between different branches to make sure that they had the latest and greatest code. Eventually the discussion got into other value-added services and how to monetize some of the tweaks and changes that we are making. Often the developers or server admin guys just try to make things work. We were talking about different ways of structuring stuff so that it could pay for itself by passing on the costs to our customers, for those who want specific features and functions.

The next subject was dealing with corp objects and how does this play into cross corp and cross server updates and changes. They were even talking about options and how to store data, store session values, and application scope values to be able to mix and match users to servers and users to corps. Lots of stuff already exists and we can already do a bunch of this, but it is only getting deeper and deeper. Stuff like sharing session scopes, custom database storage, accessing stored objects, being able do single login and then flipping between corps, servers, domains, and applications. Deeper, almost universe level stuff.

Alan and Wayne were talking about new properties and being able to modify some of the models, services, and objects. They were making some plans and talking through some options. I know a bit of code, but getting Wayne, Alan, and Eric talking about things got pretty deep. My job was pitching the vison and hoping to keep them going on those pieces. They honestly were over my head a bit today.

Towards the end of this meeting, the guys were going over some other Docker and Percona MySQL database issues that they had talked about before. Giving each other some updates and setting up some new tasks and to do lists. I'm really glad that we have a team that can figure some of this stuff out. I know that I couldn't do it alone. I'm super grateful for the other team members and what they bring to the table. One of the end goals is having and using better and better coding practices. We are all trying for that.

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All of the other guys left, and Steve and I stayed on for a few minutes talking about scalability and direction. We have a lot of other things cooking and going on. We also spent some time talking about marketing, sales, and even creating some pricing flyers dealing with the core level to enterprise levels of what we have and what we are building. We will try to get Sean, Marisa, Chuck, and Danny in on putting those pieces together. Here is a quick overview of the different levels.

1. Standard Adilas Core
2. Industry Specific Skins and Features
3. Custom Code, Flow, Data, and Interfaces
4. BI - Business Intelligence Dashboards - Aggregates
5. Enterprise level(s) - Multi Corp or Multi World

Emails and tech support stuff.

Cory and Eric were going over the progress and needs for the sales tax aggregate project. We spent a good 20 minutes or more talking about security and automation options for this project. Eric will work with Wayne on some options.

Next we spent the rest of the meeting going over a special API socket wire-up for two banking entities and getting loan documents in place. One of them is an adilas client and has requested some special or custom wiring. I was drawing and Eric was asking questions. Cory was making connections and helping to figure out the next steps. Eric will end up connecting with the client, getting some more information and then reporting back to Cory. The goal of this meeting was to kick off this project and get the ball rolling.

John joined and has some AFB (adilas for business) questions and we chatted about some variables, layout stuff, and bootstrap best practices. This is dealing with the snow owl theme, based on some bootstrap templates and themes.

Bryan and I then went in and looked at some code that he was working on for a session based payment solution and storing special session values for the flow to work correctly. We were going to merge some stuff but decided to hold off until Bryan could get with their developers to run a few things by them (the payment processing company).

I spent the rest of the time recording notes from today and doing emails.

Going through emails and such. Checking in with Danny on the structure for promissory notes and small business loans and investments. Small stand-up with Alan, Cory, and I on a side project. I got pulled into looking into a possible sub inventory export error dealing with multiple decimals. From everything that I was able to find, our code looked to be doing the correct thing. However, Microsoft Excel was reformatting some of the data and only showing 2 decimals by default. We had to do some manual formatting in Excel to get it right and show all five decimals. All of the data was there (our part of the export), it was just formatted incorrectly on the Excel side. Reported back to Cory about what I had found out.

Server meeting with Cory, Wayne, John, and I. We were talking about 4 main topics. They were: Getting the sales tax aggregate code tested and merged into master, alternate domain names, SQL back-up of all adilas corps for 2021, and progress on the big settings tables and using special models and session values to help out with options. All in all, making good progress. None of these are burning, on fire, topics. That is awesome! Anyways, we'll keep going and chipping away at things.

Touching base and catching up after the Christmas holiday break. Shannon and I did a work session on the verbage and copy for the adilas core concepts origins document. We are right in the middle of an explanation of the concepts of world building and how that concept has influenced us, as a company. Fun stuff. It's good to be back working on this content. See attached for where we are at in the process.

Touching base with John about the payroll projects. He just got some new info from the IRS and so he will work on some of those pieces and we'll touch base again tomorrow. We also went over some hours, invoices, and billing process stuff.

Back on the reoccurring expense/receipts and schedule tasks rewrite. Got in to it and then got pulled out again, due to other requests and tasks. Merged in some code for Dustin. Phone call update with Steve. We were talking about new changes, updates, and upcoming projects. We also talked about getting Chuck going on the internal shopping cart as his next project. After I hung up with Steve, I was trying to get things prepped and ready to get Chuck going on that new cart project. Lots of bouncing here and there and trying to pull together some of the pieces. We've been wanting to do this for years and years. We are going to start tracking progress on that project using time id # 1561 inside of adilas.

Small bug fix fest this morning. Wayne, John, and I were talking about bugs, custom validation, special routines, and includes, code aborts, and custom tags. We worked together to fix a small validation bug. Pushed up files and cascaded pieces to all servers. Shari O. joined the meeting and had a small question about some merchant processing and EMV/Chip reader stuff. Looking into some code for her. She will meet with Eric to get some deeper tests, as Eric build the function in question.

Before the meeting started, some of the guys were talking about a game that they play and how they, the gaming company, is using the player base to fill out the local info for the game. I wanted to record that, as I think that we could use the same thing. Just another idea for the adilas cafe and community project.

Working with Chuck on his to do list on the view parts pages. Small little work session. Good back and forth on what he is trying to do and how to do it. His project is looking good. I think that this project is working as a good wire-up project for Chuck. That is awesome.

Towards the end, we switched over to talking about the shopping cart project. He, Chuck, is already reaching out to some of the power users to get some input. We will be having a meeting next Tuesday to talk about options.

The last topic for the meeting was Chuck and John going over some of the adilas docs and new changes and updates. Both of those guys have been great ambassadors for the adilas docs project (all of the adilas standards, code snippets, naming conventions, templates, style guide, etc.).

Reporting on progress, both John and Cory were touching base about projects, hang-ups, and break throughs. Talking about bugs and getting fixes put in place. A lot of John's time has been spent working on bugs, fires, and server issues. He and Wayne have done a great job!

We got into a discussion and were talking about other services that we offer and want to offer. We need to put together a fun price list type flyer of what we offer. This could be core adilas, consulting, design, project managements, custom code, dedicated servers, and other client care services. We also briefly talked about how that pricing structure would look. We will get the sales and marketing folks involved as well, just kicking around ideas.

Finished up the timeslot by doing a small merge and push of some new code for a project that Dustin had finished.

John and I working on year end payroll forms for tax year 2021. He was working on 1099 Misc and I was working on 1099 Nec forms. We were both pulling files off of the IRS website, saving the raw files, flattening them (getting rid of the IRS custom code), and then in Adobe Acrobat moving things around and adding our own form fields. Lots of work but making progress. Good little work session.

Merging some code and files for Chuck. He is working on a rewrite of the parts homepage, view parts page, parts usage, and add/edit parts pages. He had two different branches that he was working on, I just merged the two together.  This will help him test things and do the final prep before it goes into the master branch and goes live. Emails and recording notes from earlier today and yesterday.

Steve was on the morning meeting showing Cory and Sean some of the new gram controllers and their functionality. They were also talking about some changes to Metrc and where they are in that process. After that, Steve and Sean were chatting about some things. John and I were using the GoToMeeting chat to touch base on the year end tax forms for 1099-Misc, 1099-Nec, and W-2's.

Light research on Zoom vs GoToMeeting for online meetings. We could possibly use some breakout rooms and alternate channels. Sometimes, our current morning meeting can get taken over and then nobody else can break in very easily. It gets dominated by a single conversation. Just looking into possible solutions.

Cory and I met over a Zoom meeting to work on a new non-compete and non-disclosure document for the adilas developers, designers, reps, consultants, and dependables. We were using some new info that Chuck sent us to help with some of the new verbage. Our plan is to use the old one and just tweak it a bit for where we are headed. Nice little work session. Just for fun, Cory and I were going over some numbers and what it costs to run our teams that we have. We setup another meeting for next week to finish up. Making progress.

Re-reading the adilas core concepts origins document with Shannon. We were working on the section that talks about why and how we have used world building (concepts and theories) to help us build up what we are doing. We also were moving some teaser type content from one document to another. Basically, some good stuff, but it just didn't fit in the current document, but we didn't want to lose it. Lots of reviewing pass entries, lists, notes, scans, and pulling out small gems. See attached for our progress.

John and I had a small work session going over PDF forms for year end tax and payroll stuff. We reviewed the 1099's and W-2's that John has been working on. Looking good, just a few small tweaks and they will be ready to push up and go live.

Emails, schedules, and a couple different check-ins with Bryan. We did the first one and then rescheduled. Once we got together, we looked over some code that he is working on for an outside merchant processing connection. It looks like he will have to get with the other development team, from the other company, and work through some of the responses that he is getting. He may need to get with Alan as well, as Alan built the original code to connect to the merchant processing gateway.

Phone call with Eric going over vendors, users, payees, and how they interrelate. Small intro into that section of the application. Recording notes and transferring messages from paper scribbles to digital entries.

Major changes to the way that we do custom validation on inbound URL and FORM scope parameters. Both Wayne and John were showing me some major changes that they are working on. We used to have a thing called a custom tag. This was a crossover between a special page include and a custom function. It had one basic routine to help with all kinds of error handling and user input validation routines. We use basic error handling and validation on almost all numbers, dates, and strings.

Wayne was showing me that he was able to change literally thousands of pages by running special scripts and super deep find and replace scripts. It would have taken me weeks and weeks to do what he can do in a matter of minutes. He can bulk change things, check it, run tests, roll it back if needed, and then do it again. He can keep doing it until he gets it right. Major change in the number of pages that are affected at once. Our old custom tag validation is done (used inside of adilas code) in over eleven thousand places. Wayne can alter all eleven thousand pieces in about a minute. Crazy. I was pretty impressed.

They would like to do the same thing for other sections of code where we show error and success messages. Basically, a global change from somewhat old school if statements, include files, and abort commands into an error handling service that is more global. Some cool stuff is coming.

The two of them were showing me some advanced tools and how to use Linux shells and other advanced tools and commands. We talked about some cool things that we can do with Git (code repository and version control software). We went over some advanced Git commands. Wayne and John were talking about putting in some code snippets and handy scripts into the adilas docs and adilas server docs. These are backend style guides and notes on servers, code, layout, logic, requirements, and best practices. They are really wanting to push those pieces forward.

We got into a show and tell session dealing with slow pages and slow queries. They are monitoring those things and wanting to get in there to fix those slower pieces. We are gaining lots of good tracking and optimization tools, report, and new techniques for finding slower pieces and sections of code. That is really exciting as well, which means once we have a target (slow page or slow query), we can then try to go in and fix things, specifically. That will be awesome.

As part of their show and tell session, we got into optimizing database queries and doing custom indexing, based on needs and usage of the database tables. Light training on combined or combo level indexes, inside of the database engines. We talked about performance concepts and possible tweaks that we could make. As we keep learning these things, we are also wanting to get some internal training going on for our guys. We are hoping that some of the new and upcoming training will happen sooner than later.

Just for fun, Brandon and I were talking about when we bid on the state of Colorado Medical Cannabis program. See attached for the introduction document that was included in our bid. 

John was talking with Steve about business needs, perks, and having Adilas back our developers and network guys with supplies, computers, and person hardware. Eventually, that's the goal. After that, I was working with Cory on some stuff and answering some basic questions. Once Cory and I were done, John and were talking about funding, financials, budgets, and plans. We were inside of adilas, running reports, numbers, and doing some comparisons. We setup some time for tomorrow, to dig in deeper and see if we could do more budgeting dealing with adilas income/revenue and expenses.

The value of time and how much time it takes to get things done. There is a value there.

Working with Bryan on some merchant processing and decisions on cart checkout logic. We were looking into the cart checkout and payment processes. We did not launch his code at this time. He was going to go back and work on part of it a bit more.

Meeting over a Zoom session with Cory to work on internal document and standards. We spent some time talking about budgets, costs, and rules of engagement. Cory has been trying to help shield some of the developers, so that they can focus and get certain tasks done and completed. We talked about funding, invoice payments, and general turnaround times for getting invoices paid out.

We also talked about outside jobs, work, budgets, and cash flow. We had a small work session rewriting the Adilas non-compete and non-discloser documents for our guys and gals. See attached for our progress. Still being worked on, but coming along.

Looking over and merging in some code for Bryan, dealing with merchant processing stuff. Pushed things up to data 0 for him to test a little bit more. After that, I went into adilas and was pulling some numbers from 2018-2021, P&L (profit and loss statement or income statement), general numbers and financials. Looking for trends.

Small email change to add Marisa to the list of custom email persons for the internal emails that we send out of adilas. Pushed up the new changes. Working on catching up on notes and recording things from earlier meetings today.

Meeting with Steve over GoToMeeting. We were going over general updates and new happenings. Things change quickly around here. Talking about funding, plans, and strategies. I showed Steve some quick numbers that I put into a spreadsheet. After that, we looked at his code and made a small tweak to help him get past a small error. He was super close, just needed another pair of eyes on it. We chatted about some other stuff, and we'll hit it again tomorrow. Good stuff.

Recording notes and looking into numbers for wages for the different people from 2018 to 2021 (people costs).

Small mid-week sales meeting was going on when I joined up this morning. I think that the sales team was going to start a small Tuesday meeting and then still do their normal Friday meeting as well. Just touching base quickly and getting more communication going on. While the meeting was going on, I was mostly in the background watching and listening. Danny was running the meeting, Marisa was taking notes and going through the agenda, and others were chiming in. Steve was giving a lot of input with ideas and challenges.

They also talked about some targeted marketing in Colorado. Reaching out to trailer dealers and also possible leads in the campground and reservation industry. Basically, networking, finding people who need our software and tools. Lots of tossing ideas around. Towards the end, it was just Steve, Marisa, John, and I. Marisa sure has been a huge asset on the sales and marketing side of things. We have a really good team.

Covered some of the following topics in our server meeting today. Cory, Wayne, John, and I were on the meeting.

- Advanced Git commands (code repository stuff)

- We still have some extra domain names that are not being fully used. We need to go in and change the pointers, so that they reflect back to adilas. We used to have them all pointed correctly, but we changed some web hosts, domain names, and put a number of things behind Cloud Flare.

- Custom validation routines on the developer's testing server. Going over progress and wish list stuff. It's getting better every day.

- Checking on a back-up SQL (database dump) for all of the adilas corporations. Trying to get a valid back-up saved for our records.

- We also spent some time talking about the sales tax aggregate project and how to help push it from testing to live. That seems to be the next step. Light talk about other options and other possible tools that may need to be built out.

- Wayne and John were going over processes to help with some backend custom scripts to help run massive updates per server.

- We really want to get some of our current projects out of the testing area and into live production environments. Sometimes things get stalled out. Either, the developers lose interest, something goes wrong and no body fixes it, or it's not clear who takes it to the next level.

Hour long work session with Shannon on the adilas core concepts origins document. We had a bunch of extra ideas and text, but we pulled it out and moved it over to another document. We are trying to wrap up this document and create a good lead in towards the other documents that will be needed. This is not done yet, but we are creating some new content. See attached for our progress.

Great little meeting. The main topic was the adilas shopping carts, both internal and outside eCommerce shopping carts. I took five pages of notes and we got some great ideas and discussion topics written down. We had Cory, Kelly, Marisa, Sean, Chuck, John, and I on the meeting. See attached for meeting notes on the smart cart.

- Lots of talk about modes - eCommerce, internal, user based, customer based, management based, quick and dirty, and more detailed modes.

- Speed is key

- Wants, wishes, and hopes - see attached

- Smart cart logic dealing with discounts and the discount engine - cart as a whole, beyond just the normal add process

- Research and plans

This meeting didn't happen. John and I ended up participating in the smart cart meeting instead.

Recording notes from earlier today. Making a list of shopping cart features and needs. Ended up with pages and pages of notes on what the cart does. It's not finished yet, but see attached for the progress.

Emails and reviewing a slide presentation that was sent over by the Herbo guys.

Making tons of cart notes, help file links, and testing the developer testing server on some new validation routines that Wayne was adding to the application.

Talking about the internal shopping carts. We went over some of the pros and cons of the short and sweet cart (still in beta mode). We then switched gears and looked at the progress on the parts section (current facelift project). Light code review with Chuck. We also talked about the lead magnet that he and Marisa are working on. Chuck reported on his training hours and where he is spending his time. I made sure that he had access to the Adobe XD shopping cart stuff that I had from Jonathan Wells. He is working on research and gathering up information about the carts (internal secure and external ecommerce carts). He is also doing some research on some of the competition that is out there.

Light clean-up with Wayne on some extra hardcoded parts and special line items for the testing corporation. Talking about custom projects with Wayne.

John reported in on his year end forms and payroll updates. Cory joined us for John's report and Wayne's questions about projects. Eventually we ended up on the discount engine and where that project is at. We are trying to do some prep work for the cart and the smart cart functionality (cart with a brain and ability to roll forward or backwards based on stored settings and discount logic). John really likes things detailed out. We were encouraging him to keep documenting the user stories and sharing the info where needed.

The last little bit of the meeting was spent on ROI (return on investment) discussions. We were talking about planning in the ROI on projects and trying to stay focused. We get pulled in so many different directions. The goal is to get things done, without getting burned out and overloaded.

Work session with John on W2's and 1099 Misc forms. Merged and pushed up some new code for the year end documents.

Bryan and I working together. Light review on some finances and where things are at, inside of adilas, payables, receivables, banks, etc. Switched over to his multiple credit card readers and devices project. Good back and forth on what we have and what is still needed.

After Bryan and I's meeting, I went in and did some checking on some questions that Dustin had sent over dealing with JavaScript files, CSS stuff, and general questions.

Paying bills and finishing up some changes on the reoccurring expenses. This is part of a project that I've been on to help rewrite some of the scheduled tasks. Pushed up files and then reading through tons of email.

Bryan was checking in on a couple of questions. Steve and Cory were checking on some tech support needs. We then got into a discussion talking about settings and the progression of settings. Often, there are challenges with having so many settings and trying to keep up with changes. Steve and John were doing some emergency Metrc fixes. They, Metrc, had a bunch of new requirements but it was failing and having problems. We had to backout some of our new code. Steve's plan is to use the new code, if their servers are up, and have a rollover or failsafe mode if needed (old way vs new way).

Eric, Wayne, Cory, and I were on a meeting going over sales tax aggregates and rollups. Talking about the next steps. Light talk about managing system maintained balance sheet items. We spent some time in bit bucket (code repository) and going back in time to look at earlier code. We may need to rebuild or rehash one of the update scripts and processes. Looking at flow, needs, and making a plan.

After everybody else left, Cory and I were talking about projects and different needs. Going through some questions that she had on her list.

Work session to work on the conclusion or wrap-up for the adilas core concepts origins document. We've been working on this one for a while now. It is getting really close, we just need to refine a few things and button it up. See attached for our progress on the document.

Small bug fixes with Cory. Looking into some validation and visual display issues. Steve joined us and we went over some stuff. We reread the new non-compete and non-discloser document with Steve. He had a few suggestions. After Steve left, Cory and I were working more on an ROI (return on investment) document. I was taking notes as we were working. The file in on my computer.

Merging in code, fixing merge conflicts, and pushing up some new code for Bryan. This was dealing with multiple credit card processing terminals for merchant processing using multiple devices per location. We pushed up files and did some debugging and testing.

Emails, paying bills and uploading scans, and then recording notes for the past couple of days. Amazing how quick you can get behind. Thank goodness for scribbles with pen and paper. It is so much faster than typing things out, especially when you are required to be on or in a meeting and presenting. It would be too distracting to be typing all of the time. A quick pen and paper note about a topic or ideas is super-fast. You can then expand on it later on, when you are not under the gun. If you don't make the little notes, you honestly can't remember what happened in an hour-long meeting. Notes are great for the brain to review and remember what was going on. I highly suggest note taking. It helps you remember, and it engages you in the meeting instead of having your mind be elsewhere or floating. You need a tether or an anchor.

There were a bunch of folks on the morning meeting when I joined. I believe that John had invited Cory, Chuck, Eric, and Steve to talk about the discount engine and new shopping cart functionality. As the meeting progressed, they were talking about servers, tech support, maintenance, new sales tax aggregates code, database update scripts, doing some data clean-up, and the new changes to the cart. We were all over the place.

The more we can make things data driven, the better. Currently, if we have some switches, they are in code and some in the data. If we can make it all data driven, then it works great based on the data or switches that are thrown or used.

We got into some big discussions on maintenance and who is going to maintain what pieces. Nobody wants to be that guy who has to fix everybody else's issues or problems. There are definitely some reoccurring or ongoing maintenance pieces that we need to look at. Also, as maintenance gets done, it also helps us see where to build and creates a focus or focal point.

There was some talk about taking the existing shopping cart and changing it over to a more object-oriented model. Once the cart object existed, we could have some simple switches that told the model which version of the cart it was dealing with. It could then have methods or functions based on the cart mode built into the model.

We flipped over to the short and sweet cart and talked about pros and cons. We also went over some client expectations and how to help manage those expectations. Some of that gets tricky and tough. Cory was giving Chuck and John a small demo on the short and sweet cart stuff. It still needs some loving, but it works (ish). Our current goal is to get the other carts functioning faster and faster and then go through the short and sweet cart. It is only being used by a few people right now. Our priority is the existing classic cart and the kush cart. We run thousands and thousands of carts or shopping carts a day, per server. We want to make sure that those pieces stay intact and running smoothly.

The final subject for the meeting was Cory and the guys chatting about plans, goals, and resources. We have some bigger cart planning meetings planned for later this week, but we are going to either cancel them or slim them way down. We need to look at what the costs are and where we are headed. We love ideas and dreams, but someone has to pay for all of that as well. We just need to mix and blend the different pieces to see where we are headed.

More talk about plans and where we are heading. At some point, it would be nice if we could remove or get rid of some of the other pieces, functions, sections, or pages. Often, we keep adding and adding and don't do much to manage the removal or clean-up of older pieces. We had some good chats and talks about the older classic theme pages vs the newer snow owl theme pages and what that costs as far as maintenance and upkeep. At some point, we may to depreciate some of the older code, features, functions, pages, and parts of the application.

Cory was helping Chuck and John with some overviews and insturction. After that, Bryan joined us and he and Cory were going over a project for a 3rd party solution called "EyeRate", which deals with customer surveys, customer satisfaction, and analytics. We talked about some questions and places that we need clarification to work on the security, privacy, and options for opting in and out of the additional service. We have a bunch of things already, we just need to know what the mix will be for this client or 3rd party integration.

Here are 3 things that Cory mentioned that are good indicators on project, whether or not we should invest in them as well...

1. We have customer or client contributions (funding and backing) - they want it and are willing to help fund it
2. Good ROI - We could use it over and over again and sell it to our other clients - upgrade or upsell
3. Able to spread out the work load and able to do sprints or scrum projects on the bigger pieces

Going over different questions and projects with Bryan. He had a small list of things that he wanted to touch base on and/or work on. We got his local environment fixed up and good to go. Small reset to his local server or developer box. We also looked into a possible error with credit cards and running pre-auth's (pre authorizations - hold but don't fully commit to the amount yet).

Bryan sent a meeting invite out to one of his contacts at digitech payments. The guy was able to join us and run a small test for Bryan using live code and a live test. They communicated back and forth and he sent Bryan a dump of the information and variables.

Quick meeting with Dustin and Cory to go over progress. Dustin was reporting in on his sample package stuff for production and cultivation companies. After that, Cory and I switched gears and talked about projects and other developers and their projects. I also spent some time recording notes from earlier today.

Merging in some code for Bryan. We met up two different times. We did the first merge and push and then he needed another quick change. Back on recording notes and catching up with my to do list.

Emails and tech support. Shari O. sent me an email about the forgot password section. I spent some time looking into that and pushed up a small change. I also got an email from Cory about a possible error with a PDF version of the income statement (P&L). Four of us jumped on the GoToMeeting session to see if we could fix it. We had Eric, Cory, John, and I working on things. We tried a number of things, but we decided that we would unroll some of the changes and get with Wayne tomorrow morning on what was merged in a couple of days ago. Lots of the new changes across the board. We were dealing with changes from both Wayne and Eric. Wayne's changes were on the application level and Eric's changes were on the sales tax aggregate level. Anyways, we made a number of changes and fixed a few things but decided to unroll the new changes.

Midweek sales meeting going on this morning. There were 10 people on the meeting. Marisa, Steve, Alicia, Audrey, Chuck, Danny, John, Sean, Shari O., and I were attending. Marisa was taking notes and she and Danny were swapping out and running the meeting. They launched a newsletter signup that is tied to news and updates. They were talking about leads and demos that they either have, have had, or are scheduled.

Sean and Marisa are doing great and handling all of the demos. Shari O. chimed in a few times. They are tracking the deployment and training on the new accounts and new corporations. That is awesome.

Once the sales folks left, Steve had some questions for Chuck and John dealing with CSS and page layout. Funny thing, they were trying to fix it and then Chuck went to the adilas docs and pulled some sample code out for Steve to use. What do you know, it fixed the issue. The cool thing was that the answer came straight from the adilas docs. Good job Chuck and John!

Towards the end, Chuck and John were talking about options for imbedding custom videos per page. Good little discussion.

More talk on uploading and configuring a custom video player. Chuck is willing to help build it out. He just wanted some input and direction. The conversation was between Chuck, John, and Wayne. Making some small plans. Cory and Steve were on the meeting and chimed in with a few comments and questions.

Wayne did some teaching on how to back out a commit and revert back to other handy Git commands. See attached for a small recording. We also went over other topics like: the database back-up file from Wayne for all adilas corps, cleaning up old data on servers, small bugs and fixes, corp-wide settings and consolidating those settings, light talks on plans for the view cart page. Good little meeting.

Overarching concept of world building and finishing up the adilas core concepts - origins document. Shannon and I worked on the conclusion and the first couple of paragraphs to help tie the whole document together. See attached for our finished first draff copy of the document. We may end up adding pictures and such to the document later on. The main goal right now is dealing with the story, the history, the verbage, and the copy.

General to do list stuff. Checked on a bug, pushed up a new video recording, reread a page that Shannon and I were working on - dealing with the origins of adilas core concepts and how that ties into world building concepts. See attached for a copy of the document.

Paying bills, filing documents, making back-up copies of all adilas corps, downloading media/content files and images, emails, and recording notes. Also worked some more on the existing cart functions document. See attached for current progress.

Working on budgets and plans. See attached for a scan of my notes from a 3x5 card that I made on Sunday as I was thinking about what to do.

Here is a type written list:

- A budget - maybe even separate budgets, budget by person, budget by area

- Build in savings

- Build in repayment

- Steve and I need to communicate

- Shut people off - no pay, no service

- What kind of business are we?

- Make up some rules

- Balance

- Protect each other

- Delegate - where possible

- Work together as a team - what does that look like? A team and Z team

- Make a community - effort - stone soup

- Allow for agency - you can't force it - multiple lessons on Sunday about this

- Small and simple things - progress by degrees

- adilas trust

- possible board or management agency - some kind of a council

- Pitch a timeframe like 3 months, 6 months, 1 year, etc.

- Pitch the pitch

- Co-founders and dependables

- Open & honest discussions

- Lean on the Lord

- Trystorming

- Allow for investments for labor, time, or money

- What about prospecting?

- Start, stop, continue

I also spent quite a bit of time tonight looking over numbers and coming up with budgets and options. Lots of good stuff going on.

Both Sean and Danny joined in on the meeting and were checking in this morning. We spent a little bit of time and went over some of the intro to world building stuff that I sent around yesterday evening. This is the small five-page doc that Shannon and I have been working on for the adilas core concepts - origins doc. Anyways, we had some fun discussions about some of the concepts. My goal is to keep introducing some of these pieces, one piece or step at a time. I think that the full-blown concept of world buiding or business world building is too deep for people to get right off the bat. However, as they learn about it, I really think it helps them envision possibilities and creates the "why" for what we are doing.

Eric joined and we went over some progress on the sales tax aggregate project. We have learned some big lessons on this one. Anyways, I think that he and Wayne have had some great meetings and have a good plan in place. One of the things that was happening was cross merging. We had some hidden first round pages and prototypes in place on the master branch. Then as new development would happen, even on a different branch, we would merge in the master code branch to keep it up to date. The problem was, the true older code was on the master branch and so it kept overwriting the new development. Anyways, I think we got it figured out. Lots of cause and effect things. It also brings into light the need for a manual touch vs just letting the code or applications do everything automatically. All part of the learning curve and what it takes to have a master code branch, a dev testing branch, and keeping everything straight and still up to date. Lots of challenges.

One other topic that Eric wanted to bring up was a communication platform called "Discord" and how it may help us connect and interact better. We currently use GoToMeeting for online meetings. We also have a number of folks who will pop out to Zoom sessions or whatever. Eric is going to look deeper into Discord and then give me a small walk-through to see if we want to switch and check things out there for some of our meetings and communication needs.

After everybody left, John and I were talking and going over some of his skills and how diverse they are (backend, servers, IT, graphics, frontend UI stuff, and modern trends and strategies). He also has done some managing and admin level stuff in the past. A good mix.

Chuck and I met up for a follow-up meeting. John was in the background and chimed in through chat and even through audio at times. We started out and I passed the existing cart details and functions document over to Chuck. I would still like to get to more of it, but it already has pages of good data and information about the current shopping cart, ecommerce, flow, settings, functions, usage, and requirements.

We switched over and Chuck was showing me some of his research. We talked about promo videos, went over screenshots from our competition, and talked about pros and cons. Great little discussion. We also talked about options for mixing CRM and POS stuff together (customer relationship management and point of sale systems - CRM and POS).

How much info do you show, what is needed, where do you put the stuff you don't need, what about real estate and mobile friendly or responsive options, etc.? Lots of options and choices. We also talked about ecommerce, cart abandonment, possible usage of global CRM (our whole network), and possible payment options. Really good topics and discussions. With the payment options, we even talked about - what if we did our own payment solution. That could be really cool, and it could be a money maker as well, say a small percentage of each transaction.

The meeting was going over all kinds of neat ideas, slick features, speed, and optimization enhancements. We also briefly talked about the need for more bulk ecommerce tools, need for different themes, layouts, etc. You can see that it was heading towards more data driven settings and then making the new carts respond and run based off of the data input instead of hard coding things. We spent quite a bit of time talking about themes, colors, custom styles (fun, clean, classy, business, punk/trashy, etc.), and putting those options in our client's hands.

As part of our discussion, we talked a lot about the my cart favorite buttons and being able to use super slick and clean buttons to help navigate the system. Basically, take the existing functionality of our buttons and give them a face lift to help them look better and be a little bit smoother. There is already a ton of power built into the buttons, they just need a little face lift and some loving.

Along with the simple buttons, Chuck really wants to make different modes for the cart. It could be so simple (button mode) that a person lives and dies on just a couple of small pages. Then, somebody else, who needs a more robust invoicing system could have all of the tools that they need at their disposal. Make things as fast as possible, as small as possible, but also have the depth and functions available if needed. That's the challenge.

We switched gears and started talking about video players, CDN's (content delivery networks) and linking to outside plugins and libraries. We got into a great discussion about upgrades, costs of maintaining older code, and keeping our clients moving along with us as we progress. It got into a great discussion about goals, short term, long term, and where we are wanting to go. This topic and conversation blead over into the next meeting as well.

John, Cory, Chuck, and I were in a good discussion on versions, code dependencies, frameworks, and what the future may hold. This was a carryover conversation from an earlier meeting, but we ended up spending a bunch more time on it. I thought that it was interesting the mix that we had on the meeting. Both Chuck and John have been our biggest proponents (supporters) for a centralized style guide and the adilas docs project. They were both huge assets in this discussion on direction and upcoming future decisions.

I'm not sure I can put all of the topics that we discussed into nice sentence formats. I will just list them and make some bullet points. It will help me switch gears and subjects quicker.

- BATC or B-Tech (local technical college) and working with them in networking and possible intern training options.

- What technologies are needed and being called for - in the general marketplace?

- Focusing on UI and UX first. UI (user interface) and UX (user experience). It used to be called GUI (graphical user interface) but they have added in the user component and what the experience is like. That is great and really makes a difference.

- Once the UI and UX is nailed down, go back in and recode the backend based on the UI and UX decisions. We also want to use standards and frameworks.

- We talked a lot about critical components (things that we use or lean on). We talked about how we had to alter a number of things when Adobe Flash went through its end-of-life stages and what impact that had on our application and company. We talked about other things that are being deprecated or are entering an end-of-life range. Things like bootstrap 3, jQuery, and other code technologies that we use.

- Cost analysis - what do we gain and what do we lose if we change?

- Some of our customers don't care about mobile and the latest trends and fashions. Some of them really care about mobile and responsive interfaces.

- How can we show and expose the features, advantages, and benefits of what we are doing? If we get buy in, that helps us push things out to our clients vs trying to convince them that they want and need what we are doing. Pitching the pretty and sparkling things. Steve always says - sell the sizzle, not the steak.

- Changes in code and technology. Like using CSS variables vs a custom mix of server-side code and pages that we build on the fly, every time. Speed, consistency, and efficiencies by using newer tech.

- Lots of time talking about helping and optimizing things by making some of these changes and enhancements. Including validation plugins, JavaScript, and moving things to the client side of the application. Less touches on the servers. Let some of the things happen on the client side of the application.

- If we make a bunch of changes, we will have to do some training for our developers on the new techniques.

- Cory was asking, how do we protect ourselves from a crisis mode? Dealing with end-of-life and depreciated or deprecated code sets and libraries.

- Setting priorities and focus areas

- The whole discussion switched as we talked about moving to new technologies and when we should do this. We were talking about adilas as a ship (small analogy). We talked about options of having ship A (current adilas platform and application) and building ship B (new or fracture adilas platform). We talked about what that would look like, how we could do that, and what changes would be needed. We also talked about options for transforming or morphing between ship A and ship B (what we have now and where we are going). Pros and cons to both approaches.

- I did some drawing and showed the guys some ideas and options on how we could set things up and structure things. Tons of potential. As a note, if we did start building a ship B (new or fracture model), we would want to put it in a totally different folder/directory and start from the login process going forward. We have lots of brainstorming already done on what we have learned and what we could build if we went to the fracture model.

- We got into a discussion on prices, up sales, and pitching the dream. Talks about pricing lists for products and services that we offer and what our clients gain if we go in that direction.

- Along with prices, we also talked about really charging for data usage and storage. Right now, that is not really a part of our pricing model, but it can be a huge load to carry, depending on the client. Some price changes and price increases are very needed and are completely warranted. As a side note, we (adilas as a company) may need to listen to our guys and gals who are working with us. They are pitching higher prices. It is totally warranted and needed. We are really close to tipping over the point of not making it (costs are higher than revenue coming in) to being on the positive side of that line. Price increases could really help us do that without trying to wrangle in tons of new sales and other efforts.

- Keep making small changes - progress by degrees

- John is going to start creating a document with some prices for dedicated servers, semi-dedicated servers, shared environment, and other products. We already have some of this, but it is not in a central location. The end goal is not to have it on a separate document, but have a centralized spot, location, and even get it all into our POS system. Lots of possible variables. As another side note, we (Steve and I) have produced quite a few different pricing spreadsheets over the years. It gets tricky based on number of employees, number of invoices, number of customers, number of locations, amount of traffic and usage, data storage, media/content and image storage, and other features that our clients either use and/or don't use. That's where it gets tricky.

- Both Chuck and John expressed that they are grateful that we (as a company) listen to them and take the time to try to implement their thoughts and ideas. That makes a big difference, if you feel like you are being heard.

- I'm wondering if Steve and I should step back and let some of our guys and gals make some of the changes that they are pitching and proposing. We have to get to a good balance point of normal supply and demand economics and business logic. I would be interested to see what would happen. We could monitor it and help guide it, but I would be super curious to see where things ended up going (fresh outlook and fresh set of eyes on older or existing problems or issues).

At the end the meeting, Chuck had to bail out, but Cory and I kept going with John. He was reporting to Cory on his payroll updates, plans, and other projects. He is almost done with the year end tax and payroll form printing stuff. We keep getting better and better at the communication thing. It's tough to nail that down. Making progress.

Recording notes from earlier today. Tons and tons of great ideas from the guys in the different meetings. They truly are some of our greatest resources and assets that we have. They like what we are doing and want it to succeed.

Back working on budgets and numbers over time.

John and Steve working on some styling. Steve asking questions about old tech vs new tech. We really need to restyle everything. Steve was making an analogy of a pay phone and pager vs a modern cell phone or mobile device. Things change. We talked a little bit about fracture and the evolution of code and design. John really wants to start moving things to the next level. If we do that, there will need to be some internal training and making sure that all of our guys know where we are going and what we are shooting for.

Everything has a lifespan and a maintenance schedule. We have so much functionality, but it's kinda ugly. We need to work on that. Along with that, someone needs to keep up with the changes. We talked about a need for a deeper look into coding versions, functionality, custom exports, special print stuff, and more. This topic returned us to talking more about efficiency stuff and back talking about newer versions of some of the underlying code, libraries, plugins, and library dependencies.

It got into price increases based on our costs and reflecting that back out to our clients. Thing, costs, really have gone up and we haven't done anything about that. There is a disconnect there. Our current look and feel is virtually killing us. People dismiss us a viable option, because we look a little bit older. This seems to be the biggest factor where people judge our software. The value of having a good style guide and then sticking to it. We really need this in our site and app.

Meeting to talk about ROI (return on investment) with Kelly. We had Kelly, Cory, Steve, John, and I on the meeting. Lots of talk about the progression of the logic and the style. Kelly was talking about FinTech (financial technology) and how that plays in. We are considered FinTech in many ways. Lots of talk about carts (internal and external - eCommerce) and how to tap into that market. Lots of talk about style guides and costs for obtaining new clients. See attached for tons of other notes.

Going over some of the origins doc that we just finished. Talking about adilas core concepts, plans, business plan, heading toward fracture, budgets, and small teams. We also talked about optimizing vs maximizing and pros and cons there. How do you implement change? What is the cost of transitions and switching gears?

Here are our current priorities (just for Shannon and I - where we are heading):
1. Budgets and getting cash flow under control
2. Plans - business plans, investment pitch stacks, and planning out fracture.
3. Back to the adilas core concepts and new content for articles, user guides, or other docs.

Chuck and I - Talking about a custom video recorder. Cart talk and where to focus. We will focus on scanning vs quick buttons - meaning how people interact with the cart. Buttons are super quick, but scanning allows you to be much more specific, if you need that level of accuracy.

On the phone with Eric going over code and changes that he is making. Quick update and touching base.

Budgets and building things out to see the budgets better. Work in Excel and research using adilas reports and numbers.

Meeting with Steve, Cory, and I going over budgets, plans, and even reviewing notes from previous meetings today. Lots of similar topics. We did some playing with projections, budgets, cuts, costing, and other ideas. We also put a number of ideas into a note document as we were talking. We were flipping from Excel, to adilas, to the notes. Good brainstorming session. We didn't get everything decided, but making good progress. See attached for some other notes.

Emails. Meeting up with the guys on the morning meeting. Steve was touching base with the guys when I joined. Eric popped in and asked a few questions. We also had Sean, Danny, and John join and ask a few questions.

We were chasing a bug on reoccurring expenses and dealing with random days of the month (some with 31, 30, or 29 days). Added in a small fix and pushed up the new files. Talking with John how state tax and withholding calculations are being handled and done in the payroll portion of the site. He is looking to help me out with the payroll stuff. Big learning curve to get into that section of the application, thousands and thousands of lines of code and lots of branching logic.

Shari O. and Cory joined and were talking to John and I about server costs. I was impressed, they had a multiple page spreadsheet and were trying to really dial in exact costs and even semi associated costs. In the past, we primarily just looked at raw costs, and didn't take into consideration maintenance, monitoring, upgrades, and primum server support for our servers and boxes. Lots of back and forth. I'm excited to see us looking at real costs. We have flown by the seat of our pants for way too many years.

We got pretty deep in to costs and what we gain from having Fusion Reactor and server monitors in place. We are being charged by the minute that those servers are being monitored. The costs stack up really quickly. We've quadrupled our costs in the last couple of months. We looked at ways to possibly bring that down or manage it better.

John keeps bring up this concept of providing a white-glove type service for our big clients (tons of server monitoring, optimization, and access to reports and even system admin personnel). Anyways, just throwing things around. We were also getting into deep level configuration scripts and how to manage some of our existing servers and assets. One of things that we were talking about was dealing with old corps and inactive accounts (old or dead data) and how to clean some of that stuff up and make it faster and smoother.

We talked about monitoring our clients and their storage levels, media/content files, number accounts, amount of data, traffic, and overall usage. We have some that we know that are big and there are others that slide under the radar because they don't call us or complain. We need to help those who want to play and charge accordingly. Some of our clients are so different, based on their habits, usage, and system needs.

There was some talk about wiping data and starting fresh for certain sandbox and smaller accounts. We need to load up certain servers with more clients to make it economically feasible to keep certain servers up and running. Basically, manual load balancing and monitoring what clients are on what boxes and how those boxes (servers) are doing (sever health). We have some of the servers that we probably need to kill and get rid of them. The other option is loading them up with more clients and then really using them.

We have a project out there that has and keeps circling around. It is called the datasource or world building project. Currently, we have a perfect one-to-one relationship between a data server and a supporting database server. We would like to allow for a single data server (code box) to interact with multiple databases, as needed. Make it more configurable. This datasource project would allow us to do those types of things. This has been referred to as getting our clients off the bus and getting them setup with their own virtual motorcycles (quick and speedy smaller databases). We would love to split some of these things up and make everything faster.

Another big project is paring down some of the big corp-wide settings tables. We have two huge ones right now that are over 400+ columns (going across or horizontal). We would like to rebuild this system and stack things vertically (data records per setting - going down vs a single column going across or a unique field per setting). Anyways, this project keeps rearing its ugly head as well. We are starting to work on it (Wayne and John).

The last section of the meeting got back to budgets, checking and monitoring usage and traffic, checking CPU's and RAM allocations per server, and adjusting as needed. Along with these budget type questions and topics, we would also like to look at possible up sales and offering other services to our clients. Including targeted or specific offerings to certain clients. Trying to harness more out of our existing clients.

John and I skipped this meeting today from 11 am to 12 pm, because we were on other meetings.

Dustin joined us and gave Cory and a I an update on his project for production samples. It is getting closer but still not finished yet. We ended up talking and doing some training on dynamic variables and looping over structures or objects. Trying to help him get the skills that he needs without recoding the whole thing.

Chuck and I were talking about finances and payments. Looking at different options. We then got into the video and CSS player code and mini app for our site. We are going from static, what he built, into a dynamic, on the fly player. See attached for a small document that we were using to do some planning.

Chuck, John, and I were talking about moving from Bootstrap 3 to Bootstrap 5. We ended up getting into a multiple-hour discussion on versions, planning, maintenance, code sign-off and other topics. At some point, we need to keep moving the ball forward (tech and code) vs always patching the older stuff up. See attached for a bunch of other notes.

Working with Bryan to get his local environment going and setup correctly. He was having problems switching branches and the backend server (on his local box) flip flopping some of the new application-level changes. We also went over some scenarios for e-Checks and how to record the associated fees. We had three different scenarios and talked about pros and cons for each scenario.

Jumped on and the mid-week sales meeting was going on. There were 10 people on the meeting. They were talking about email campaigns, domain names, and where to focus efforts. At the end of the meeting, John and I went over some new changes to the database updates pages that John was working on. He is getting more and more into payroll and helping with that ongoing project. That is much appreciated.

Server meeting with Wayne, John, Cory, Steve, and I. There were a couple of others hanging out, on the meeting as well, but didn't participate. Sometimes they like to hear what is going on. Basically, doing work in the background but just keeping their ear to the ground.

Wayne was reporting on some new application changes that he made in the shop folder this morning. He made sure that certain variables were switched to application-level variables, vs being held in session scope. Small discussion on that process and suggestions going forward. They talked about costs on Fusion Reactor and plans for watching and monitoring but not running up the charges too high.

Marisa had some domain and DNS record questions for Wayne. This is dealing with web addresses and marketing materials. We went over the sales tax aggregate project and the state and status of that project. Eric and Wayne are going back and forth making small changes. It is currently only deployed on the dev testing branch, but we are looking to merge it into master here soon. They, the guys, also talked about optimizing shopping cart functionality and making a skin-deep cart facelift.

Lots of talk about planning out the future and how we are going to deal with end-of-life, plugins, updates, and themes. Before we get too crazy there, we have to help the current system be able to sale more systems. We need to increase the revenue portion of the puzzle. Along with this topic and conversation, we got into talking about triage and what do we need right now and then changing the focus to more proactive or forward-looking plans and strategies. We also need to keep planning and doing reoccurring maintenance and other non-planned system upgrades.

Towards the end, Wayne was showing me the progress that he is making on breaking up the two big tables and how the new system is handling all of the corp-wide settings and defaults. That is and has been a pretty big project. He is making progress and it is looking good. Along with that, we also talked about using the black box services that he has setup to help us maintain and handle custom code and custom pages. We really want to keep the business logic, the database stuff, and the visual elements in different areas and sections. For readability, consistency, and future maintenance.

Shannon and I met up and started to get back into some user guide files that we were working on in mid 2019. We were going over some financial theory, what makes us different, and why do we do what we do. We'll circle back in and keep working on that section. The underlying tone of the documents was dealing with the concepts of the data assembly line and how to track objects and data through their lifecycles, states, status, and checkpoints. Good stuff.

Touching base with Bryan on the eXPO e-check fees and saving a setting to make it easier and smoother for the users. Briefly looking over his progress on that project.

Transferring notes from pen and paper into the developer's notebook. I've got a couple of days' worth of entries to catch-up on. Uploaded lots of smaller supporting Word documents for the different meetings that we have been attending. Quite a few good budget and strategy meetings in the last few days and the last part of last week.

Feedback on shopping cart mock-ups from Chuck. Emails and other to do list items.

Helping John with some questions on state tax withholdings. He is going through each state and updating things as needed. Lots of emails and reading through things. Steve and Sean were going over a new gram controller that Steve has been working on. Metrc keeps changing things and adding new requirements. Pretty quiet morning.

Trying to fix a local error on Chuck's local development environment. We ended up reaching out to both Wayne and Alan to see if we could get help. We also tried playing with it a little bit and doing some testing. It was over our heads.

Chuck and I were talking about some of the hard questions and hard decisions that we need to make as a company. We were talking about creating a nice letter that we could send out to our clients and let them know that we have to raise the prices. Maybe use Marisa or someone who could turn it into a small marketing ploy or add some flower or fluff to it. We also talked about how we need to let the people know that we are still a lower cost solution than the competition. We talked about setup fees, what it really costs, and how long it takes us to recoup that or those costs. There is a client acquisition cost and we need to cover and recoup that cost. Chuck and I were estimating that it costs around $2,000 per client (at a minimum) to get a new client on to the system.

He and I were going over some rough calculations and projections. Basically, Chuck was kinda coaching me and giving me some good ideas that I could take back to management meetings. Along with those same comments and options about raising our prices, we talked about how quick we could turn things around, including paying our own bills and our own payables. We have a problem there. We end up paying for everything, but if there is a cash crunch, we are slow paying our guys and gals. That is a problem and causes strife and issues as it keeps going.

Going back to the price increases for our clients, we have been eating the extra costs for years. We just can't keep doing that. It is hurting us. We had some really good discussions, good talk, and good advice.

Towards the end of the meeting, Wayne joined us and we tried looking into the local development error that Chuck was getting. Other email stuff as well.

Brainstorming on ideas to help with adilas, our teams, our servers, our costs, our plans, and our strategies.

I read an article on how open-source projects make money. I also looked up how free apps make money. Most of it was from providing hosted solutions, paid support, licensing, training courses, or selling other paid products that support the open-source portion or application. They could also offer advertising, do donations or allow contributions, or some other kind of offering. The other option, that I thought was interesting was a free core and then add-on's on top of the free core. I thought that was kinda interesting. Just for fun, I wanted to see how much would it cost a single client if they wanted to run their own version of adilas. Say it cost them nothing... What would it really cost to get it up and running on a monthly or yearly basis? You would have to get the code, buy a domain name, setup the server with the correct specs, sign a hosting contract of some sort, condition the server settings (super backend level), add the database, populate the database, make sure that they connected (code server and backend database), setup a new account, do initial settings, configure logos, look and feel, and then get a user in and trained on the system. That is for one single person, not even a full team or set of people. You would then need someone to setup other people, train them, and start using the system. I don't know an exact cost, but I would say thousands (plural).

These are just some other things that I was thinking about... No specific order. Some are questions, some are ideas, some are reminders:

- Seek first to understand, then to be understood

- Apply It! We keep learning things... it really takes affect when we start applying what we are learning and have learned.

- What if we created a fundraising pitch deck for investors? On our own? What would that take or cost?

- Playing with the small phrase "start, stop, continue". I heard this statement in a training course one time. It is a way of looking at things and seeing how they or things are going or doing. Imagine something like this: What do we want to start doing (adding something new), what do we want to stop doing (subtracting or taking some things away), and what is working well (continue or keep refining)? Just for fun, you could also say that saying like this: "add, subtract, refine".

- How firm is the foundation? Everything gets built off of that. That is a great question: Do we have a firm foundation? Let's make it super solid, we have a lot riding on it.

- Core and then the add-on's on top of the core... This goes along with our concept that everyone is going to need an adilas core as the base level. This came from an entry back over a year ago. See element of time #6629 for more details. The concept of the value add-on core model - with different rings to denote the other levels of add-on value pieces. We have determined at least 5 levels as of right now. 1. Core, 2. Business vertical or industry specific, 3. Custom level, 4. BI or Business Intelligence level, and 5. Enterprise or multiple corp(s) level. Each of those value rings has to be purchased and serviced. You have to have the transactional data core to get it started, but anything beyond that, is extra or a value add-on piece. Very configurable.

- Dealing with the core add-on or add-on core - I would really like to make some graphics of what that would look like and even put some prices to that model. That would be fun!

- Random side note - I've got so many things started or half baked... it sure would be nice to finish up some of those things. So many things, I get pulled in multiple directions and even lose momentum or focus. Part of the territory of what we are doing. Lots of moving pieces.

- Do a quick napkin style fix job - quick and dirty. Pretend that you are solving the problem on a single napkin, after you ate lunch. What is a quick fix? Get that going and then dive in deeper as needed.

- How desperate for help are we? How desperate am I? Is Steve? Are others? - I'm not saying that I'm there right now, but I've been there. Literally clawing for any traction or firm ground. It's a scary place and you feel totally vulnerable and fragile. You feel like things are out of control and you'll do anything, pay anything, give anything, to get back in control or onto stable ground. Searching frantically for any shred of hope or positive traction. It really feels like that sometimes. Just being honest.

- I think it would be good if we could define our roles, responsibilities, and expectations - within our own small teams. Put real numbers, attach values, priorities, and get rid of any assumptions. This may help with our expectations of who is doing what and even what our jobs (perceived or actual) really are. A little bit more structure there.

- Build on what we have

- Reaching for firm ground and what does that fear drive us to do? I could say lots here. I've been there. I'll most likely be back there again. Who knows, I may even be there now (again). It won't be the last time. It has happened over and over again. It seems to be a pattern of sorts.

- Along with that feeling of desperation, are we desperate enough that any help or progress is allowed, tolerated, and even welcomed? Be honest!

- Are we making decisions off of logic or emotions?

- It may be good to review some of the business consulting that we started doing back in late 2019 and into the first part of 2020. Here are some link: EoT # 5295 (1st meeting), EoT # 5296 (2nd meeting), #5354 (3rd meeting), there are also some uploads in the media/content section (in the shop) called meeting_with_epic_enterprises.docx with tons of other notes.

- From Kelly - We need to spend time managing our own company. Who is helping to manage adilas.biz?

- Focus on one thing at a time

- Saying "no" 101 - a no sandwich - Yes, I'd like to do such and such. No, I can't. Yes, I'd like to do this and that. Basically, yes, no, yes.

- By not talking about certain things - what are we avoiding and/or denying?

- Fall down 7 times, get up 8 times!

- How firm a foundation - We get lost out on the limbs and branches. Maybe bring the focus back in a bit.

- Getting rid of assumptions - who is going to do what? List it out and define it.

- Setup a time or a person to help manage adilas

- The costs of transitioning (switching between things, projects, tasks, focuses, etc.) - it is a real cost that is hard to nail down. There is also a mental side to transitioning without finishing things. That wears on a person's confidence and psyche.

- Maybe cut down on dedicated hours

- Dealing with funding options, we could divide some of my percentages (ownership) - just an option.

- Who is going to manage things - single person, small team, some kind of board or council, nobody, or hire it out?

- What about the adilas Jellyfish model - good, bad, change, tweak, refine, kill it, what?

- Who are we and what size are we comfortable with? Small, medium, large, extra-large, massive? Just being silly. I really like the small to medium sizes personally.

- Reread the internal adilas questionnaire summary that Shannon and I put together from the different key players and adilas dependables.

- Timeline to make and implement these decisions - how are we doing?

- So much - We get pulled on every day - how do we get away from all of the distractions? Focus!

- Just for fun, what does it take to go public? Meaning publicly traded or a way to raise capital and investments.

- Could we sell some of our shares? What would that look like?

- What about freeware, shareware, or full open-source options? Do we even want to go there, or do we stay with our current model and just keep tweaking it? Just ideas.

- Our internal rates - What we charge for what we do - We are held captive due to available monies and funding. As an independent developer, I was charging $50/hour back in early 2000's. Where are we at now and is there any room for progression? There is a disconnect to what we are making vs what we have to deal with and try to coordinate. The stress alone is way bigger.

- What if we created our own investment pitch deck? We could do all kinds of levels - loans, investments, equity, shares, other supporting companies, etc. Might be interesting.

Working with John on some state taxes and withholdings, payroll stuff.

We had a guy by the name of Michael from the Panther Capital Advisory Group meet with us for a little bit over an hour. He was representing a group of venture capitalists and some of their options. We went over a multi-page document (their pitch) to us on the meeting. They were saying that they could help us make and/or create a deck or pitch deck for investors (small 2-pager). They could also help us put together other assets and resources. As a side note, they said that it is normal for it to take about 90 days or so before you would ever see any funds or fruits from your preparations. Interesting number.

We talked about debt equity and investment equity and some of the pros and cons of each type of equity. Spent more time going through their presentation and slides. They, the Panther Group, will help close the deals for us. They circulate the pitch deck through their network. We got into warrants and fees for what options they provide. A warrant is kinda like a sweat equity percentage that they could redeem for ownership or payout if things are successful. Another way to think of a warrant is like a lien on your business.

We went over how many deals they are doing and how they interact with their investors. They talked about possible marketplace options and what not. All money comes with a pro and a con or multiple pros and cons. The importance of finding the right partner or investors.

Steve was asking a bunch of questions. Michael was very helpful. One of the major takeaways was dealing with the chemistry of your team. Be really careful on who you want to bring into your team. After Michael left, Cory, Steve, and I talked about our chemistry and how our team has grown organically over time. Our organization, Adilas, LLC., has its own flavor. We get to help that along and make it into what we want it to be. We also talked about costs of money, opportunity cots (unseen costs for doing certain actions, including costs of what else you could be doing), and talking about our clients and our goals.

Rereading notes from yesterday on some brainstorming and ideas. Shannon and I were going over things and talking about options. We were talking about some of the unseen pressures. Building in a little bit more structure and what that would look like. We were talking about different tasks and who does what (more brainstorming). When we finished, I sent out some emails to both Steve and Cory with links to the brainstorming notes.

Working on some budgets and prep work for an upcoming meeting with Steve, Cory, Shari O., and I later today. Working spreadsheets on costs and trends.

Steve, Cory, Steve, and I on a meeting. Going over budgets, plans, and options. We came up with a triple play (plan) that we want to do to help out with cash flow. See attached for more information. Part of the triple play includes a current price increase, new and future sales (small changes), and slimming down or trimming where we can. Lots of work on spreadsheets and taking notes in a Word doc. Good discussions.

Eric and Steve talking about merging in a big project. There is a need for good data and up to date data for the projects that we are working on. Some of our projects are general (for everybody) and certain ones are specific and deal just with a single client and needs to match their data style, values, and quantity. That makes a big difference.

We had a discussion about moving away from barcodes and more into QR codes. Barcodes work great un until a certain size, then they just get too long to be efficient anymore. QR codes can contain so much more data and say within a smaller or limited space. Lots of talks about what needs to stay and what needs to go - general progression of tech and supporting different and changing technologies.

Sean and Steve were touching base on some projects and clients. John had some questions about state tax calculations and just needed some direction.

Cory and I going over projects. We looked into a request for duplicating and scheduling expense/receipts. The request for duplicating expenses was to expand one of the fields to show more data. The request for the schedule or reoccurring expense/receipts was dealing with auto adding in a balance sheet entry if applicable. After looking into those two things, Cory was going through a list of projects and questions and running things past me.

After that, Cory and Steve were going over PO's, payments on PO's, and balance sheet stuff for pre-paid invoices and pre-paid inventory. This is futurist, but it would be really cool to have the system be able to track vendor credits (through special accounts) and pre-paid inventory stuff more automatically. You can do it, it just requires some manual attention right now.

Cory and I looked into a custom report for the state of Oklahoma, but we couldn't find it. It was originally created by another developer. We found some small relics, but nothing worth spending our time on. If we want it, we will have to recreate it.

At the end of the meeting, we had some time, so I started to fix some of the expense/receipt requests that were made earlier this morning on the duplicate and reoccurring expense/receipts. Small work session.

Helping John with his state payroll stuff. It sure would be nice if we used the master corp list to keep track of who is using what key or primary features within the system. Currently, we have to go to each server and run a serries of checks to see who is using what and what configuration each corp is using. It sure would be nice if we had all of that information on one server, in a nice and tight list.

John and I worked on building out a small query to see who is using payroll and what states they are using in their calculations. Once we had the query built, John took it and ran it on each of the servers to get a list of who was running what states for payroll and withholdings.

Meeting with Dustin and Cory. Dustin was reporting in on his samples and production samples project. He wanted to know what was next, as well. We spent some time and talked about options. After that, Cory and I spent some time looking into expense/receipts and monies being paid out.

Chuck and I working on the cart payment page. We were going through his to do list and making small changes and making decisions. Light testing and small work session.

Steve, Cory, Shari O., and I on an admin and budget meeting. We were going over roles and who is going to do what. Our current admin team is going to be the four of us. Steve has the final say, but the rest of us have power and authority to help in the roles that we are playing in. See attached for some of our notes.