It’s a crazy and blessed year for me. Some highlights of my year so far:
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My Year 2012
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Women in Tech – What’s up with that?
I want to work in an industry where we are not divided by gender or age, where women does NOT have to be more comfortable with women, likewise men to men and kids to kids.
Have you heard of Men group in technology? Why are there special mentions in women or girl groups in technology? Are we really that scarce here in Philippines?
The internet is full of “women are scarce in technology”, “women are being bullied by men in technology” articles and blog posts and that “we need to encourage more participation from this minority”. Back when I started in this industry (2005), I was one of those people who joined women tech group because I felt I would feel more comfortable.
Then, one time I was talking to my senior and brought up this topic and the idea of creating women group in Philippines too. He was just clueless and ask why. That hit me, is it really an issue for me and the others? Have I felt being treated differently? Did it occur to someone I know? Was it more comfortable working with women than men? Do I have the numbers to prove we need help? The answers were all no. What I have learned though, there are too few men and women who were into technology and internet in general.
Continue reading
Mobilizing Tripsiders.com Tour Marketplace
I haven’t announced it yet here, in the last week of May I launched the Tour Marketplace in Tripsiders.com. It is made from Drupal. The site was only designed so far for the desktop users so one of the thing that was on my todo list was to make it mobile friendly. Over the weekend, I finally had time to create the mobile theme. The experience was great and I want to share the thought process behind it.
Just like any project, I defined my requirements first. One important thing that I had to consider was to choose between using a different subdomain or use Media Queries instead. Media Queries has been the easiest option. I used Media Queries for tablets like iPad since I did not have to tweak it that much. The design is still the same, it just needed adjustment of the width and some padding.
As for the small mobile device, I was inspired by the simplicity of Sephora‘s mobile design. I cannot do it using media queries so I chose to use subdomain (m.tripsiders.com) for the mobile devices and use a different theme.
I checked for possible modules to use and below were on my list: Continue reading
Pre-opening an Online Business is like Pre-opening a Hotel
I’m an avid reader of tnooz.com since I became involved in the tourism industry. There is a topic called “How to pre-open a hotel” and I found it amusing because the tactics could also apply to any online business. Some snippets:
- Actually the promotion should start the day the first construction is initiated. Put up a big sign “Coming Soon” with some breathtaking images of what you are building to attract the attention of people walking and driving by.
- FaceBook, Twitter, Pinterest, YouTube, blogs, etc, are ideal places to get the word out there, even before the opening. Communicate the story of the hotel online and share the progress of the construction with potential future guests.
If you read the post more, the tactics apply in any kind of business. Promoting it early on even before it even starts accepting clients. Making your customers excite. This is also the concept when I joined the workshop of Lean Startup Machine in Chicago last January.
I think the bottom line is, start get it out there so when it really arrives, you don’t need to wait for nothing.
I should have done this when I was still working on the Tour Marketplace. I’m a loser when promoting my own project because of some fears. Discussing fears is a topic of its own.
So what do you think about engaging users about your project without the actual product yet. How do you do it? Tell me in the comments.
Drupal Camp Manila 2011
Here’s a short clip of the Drupal Camp Manila 2011 event held last February. Stay tuned for another Drupal camp 2012 of February.
Thanks to all speakers and sponsors for making this happen.
Croogo as your building block for Cakephp App
Croogo, a simple CMS built on top of Cakephp. But for me, it has become my first building block for most cakephp application that I create. Why?
- It has the most common features setup already
- Less features, less complication
- It can be extended without touching the core CMS
Less features to reinvent
I hate reinventing the wheel over and over again. Those includes installing ACL (pain) and recreating commong login functionality such as login, create account, forgot password, reset password and account administration. Comments and captcha are also setup. Most of my apps almost always have these so croogo makes it really easy for me to not to worry about them.
Few features
Common features may be setup but it’s not too complicated nor too difficult to use it for your other goals. It is still cakephp and it follows the convention. Unlike other CMS made from cakephp, there aren’t a lot of features. I don’t use them all but I find less time coding by utilizing the features that is already setup in the CMS.
Extendable
Another factor that makes croogo good as a building block is its plugin and hook system. I rebuilt the app that I created for a couple of months to croogo style in just a week. See their wiki to get a glimpse of what I’m talking about. Using the hooks, you can alter the behavior of the existing pages or features of the app. Using the plugins, you can enable or disable features. Think of wordpress and its plugin, it was built that way.
How to start?
In the next couple of articles, I’ll show you how to utilize the CMS to make you focus on your development to the real core. In the meantime, play around with it, read the wiki and join the google groups.
How to introduce someone in an email
I had been doing introduction lately via email only and it was a bit awkward because I did not know how to do it. Should I use the formal “please meet name” type introduction or something else? Googling about it did not help. Today, I found this article on how others do it so I just want to share.
Here is an example from the post:
Hi Sally,
Hope all is well with you! I really enjoyed your last blog post “insert topic here.”
I wanted to introduce you to Bob. Bob is doing “insert startup idea here” and is looking to meet people with expertise in the industry. Naturally, I thought of you since you “insert flattering remark here.”
Bob- I’ll let you take it from here.
Thanks,
Stella
Taxicab Confession – Featured in AcquiaTV
The webinar about Promet’s implementation of the taxi dispatcher system using Drupal and Phonegap by Andy Kucharski is out.
I’m excited to share that I am one of the panelists! On the webinar is also another Solutions Architect of Promet, Chris Bartlett, who now I call the map master or the Cartographer (which we both agreed sounds better than Solutions Architect). Being part of the acquia webinar was pretty exciting. But aside from me being excited to be part of it, Andy Kucharski gave everything away the in and out of how we developed the software. Hope you’ll find it useful!
See the original post here.
Drupal as Mobile Framework Talk
Yay! I presented the second time around at CDMUG (Chicago Drupal Meetup Group). The first one was last year at the Drupal Camp about drupal migration event. This year, I presented Drupal As A Framework For iOS Mobile Development
I talked about how drupal can be used for iOS mobile development. Here is a short presentation
Drupal as a Framework for Mobile Development
View more presentations from Rachel Jaro
I’m in Chicago! Woohoo!
For people who haven’t read my facebook updates, I’m currently in Chicago, Illinois. Thank God I’m living my dream! I’m staying here for quite a while but I’ll be back for sure. I kinda already miss the people back at home but I’ll make sure I’ll experience full Chicagoan life before going home!
My Chicago Life
So far so good but here are some snippets of the unforgettable moments
- I lived for a week just right the corner of the Magnificent Mile.
- First time I saw a lake that’s also called a beach.
- If you haven’t checked out Subway, you haven’t experienced Chicago yet. haha. John said that. (Parang jollibee?)
- I was lost on my 1st day in office. I had to be picked up by a co-employee (geesh)
- I was lost on my way of looking for my apartment. I looked for it from 7pm to 10pm in a very cold night.
- I’ve been lost many times but I was able to get back to our office or to my apartment. I’m the lost girl in Chicago!
