Jaret Manuel» Startups

Code Academy Notes: Day 2 & 3 Web Development & Design

Jaret — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 15:18:16 +0000

These are my notes from Code Academy class. Keep in mind they are notes and I care little if there are errors (better yet you get to correct me). I am taking the Web Development & the Design class so there will be a mix and mash of both.

Jeff worked for Crate & Barrel for a few years. Didn’t get .net framework, and didn’t think he was smart enough for web apps. Found out about Ruby and then rails in 2005. Left a 20 year career and jumped into open sourced.

~/dev/mwf: ls

hello.html

open hello.html

Instructions

Puts

def

return

end

each

Data

Strings

numbers variables

arrays

hashes

puts “Chicago Landmarks”

puts “—”

puts

def print_landmark(name, fee)

puts name + “: $” + fee

end

landmarks = ["Wrigley Field", "Millennium Park", "John Hancock Center"]

landmarks.each do |name| # the . (dot) is calling a method and do is a block |name|. The first will be Wrigley Field and then it will ask for “each” of the list and DO that one. Quite fun.

puts name

end

Hash is a list but a list of pairs of things and sometimes called Keys & values {}

Think of “=>” as goes to or points to

to access a hash {} that you set you would use the [] (array brackets). As in h["item"]

Nil means nothing but nothing is something. Nil is nil.

puts “Chicago Landmarks”
puts “—”
puts
puts

def print_landmark(name, fee)
puts name + “: $” + fee
end

# landmarks = ["Wrigley Field", "Millennium Park", "John Hancock Center"]

landmarks = { “Wrigley Field” => “40″, “Hancock Center” => “15″}

landmarks.each do |x, f|
print_landmark x, f
end

The very 1st Code Academy Design class….

MMM

Make it real, Make it right, Make it matter

Make something people can use, but “want” to use, and Make it Matter.

Carolyn Chandler

12 Years as user experience architect

Co-author of A Project Guide to UX Design.

Design Instructor (Depaul Masters, Human Computer Interaction)

Curriculum Developer, WaSP Interact

All around superstar!

Books:

Topics:

Business model basics
User research
User Modeling
Visual design basics
Information Architecture
Interaction Design
Design testing
Front End development with Html5 & css3
Back end basics

Design does not equal graphics

General Business Model Ideas

Immersive Research

Ideation/Concepts

Product Design

Design Testing

Front End Development

Failing shouldn’t be a mark against you (reference to Startups).

I got sick as a dog from starting hot yoga so I was like a space cadet for the class and felt like I was getting kicked in the head. Shame on you Core Power (actually, they are great..)

The first HTML/CSS optional class:

Shay Howe is a User Interface Engineer and he is teaching an optional HTML/CSS. This is a no brainer for those who can attend. How could you turn down that collate smile? Shay travels and attends groups like a rock star so we are especially appreciative of his time.

I could go deeper into this as I know a bit about the basics but…

HTML = Content . Meaning the words, the links, the images, tables… ie. Your content.

CSS = Presentation. How you style your content (html). Half the battle is getting this separation right (my words not Shay’s)

Elements are what makes the content do things like which is an anchor tags.

Place Text here (For example:”Shay Howe”)”

DOCTYPE html>

Control + Shift + < gives you opening and closing tags in Textmate. (Shay doesn’t disagree to this but doesn’t do it himself. Personal preference.)

Now to CSS… p (is the selector) or as Shay says “Now we are going to get in the Paint! (Basketball if you didn’t know!)

p { … } this is CSS. P in this case is the selector and in between the squiggly’s is the value or values (I think.. ).

External CSS is the best way to go, meaning you have HTML files for your content and separate CSS file(s) to style your HTML (content). You do this by adding the following link tag in your html file(s) in the tag. Why the head tag? One of the reasons it is at the top of the page so the CSS (and Javascript (Shay doesn’t touch on JS) files etc if you ever get into that) page(s) can load faster. Shay and others can probably give deeper answers but to me it just makes sense.

This is what you see at the top of your browser for the title

We also got into Div classes and ID’s. You use classes to specify blocks of html that you want to style and it allows you to style many areas (classes) with one css style sheet and often simply changing a couple areas. ID’s are pretty much the same except they can only be used once per html page.

Html content such as paragraphs or Ordered, Unordered or defined lists

, etc

Then in the css file you would write:

.color {

color: blue;

font-weight: bold;

etc

}

Html content such as paragraphs or Ordered, Unordered or defined lists

, etc

#id {

color: red;

line-height: 1.5em;

}

So Class is . and ID is # in CSS.

The entrepreneurship optional Wednesday class is being led by aspiring entrepreneurs JinHwang & JeanBahnik and a big thanks goes out to them. I will cut it short this time around but a big thank you goes out all the support & help from the inaugural Code Academy class alumni. You know who you are and thank you. The support is quite impressive to say the least.

Idea: NealSales & Code Academy should get involved in Sprouter

Jaret Manuel | About.me

Code Academy Notes: Day 1

Jaret — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 05:22:59 +0000

These are my notes from Code Academy class. Keep in mind they are notes and I care little if there are errors.

SMSassist sponsored the space in the JHC (show pic you took on iPhone).

Bought Jeff Cohen’s rails for .net devs book for a friend at my last job and now he is teaching me. Crazy. I didn’t know who Jeff was when I bought the book. Small world!

Learn as if you own the code
Blog lots about what you are doing at CA
Trust instincts and what you discover
What you go back & read will have a significant impact.

Vince Cabansag:
First thing he built was a blog. Blog is a great first app project. Student in inaugural class.

* I may miss a couple here as I didn’t know the logo’s.
Pathfinder
SPARK
Code Mountain
OCA ventures
Hydepark angels
accelerate labs
sand box industries
startup weekend (SUW is amazing. I worked on a SUW project called Stokfridge in Toronto).
new world ventures

chicago land
built in chicago
illinois tech association
techweek
tech.li
technori

devmynd
gtrot by Code Academy Alumni Br_ttany
enovafinancial
doejo
tribeca
8th ligth
lightbank
obtiva a Groupon Company

geekfest (tuesday at noon’s at Groupon). Free food. Can’t attend because I am in design class
refresh chicago
chicago ruby
chicago heroku user group
code and coffee (Franklin & Chicago Starbucks).
code retreat
gathersus
chicago js
windycityrails

Dave Hoover‘s Apprenticeship Patterns book : Emptying your cup (Dump your learning now. Programming wise. Don’t be afraid to ask questions).
Mentors are excited.

It is on you to contact you your mentor.. Find them and get them, reach, schedule. It is as important as the class.

37 Signals suite.
Backpack (organize & collect) & campfire (chat). Use Use & Use.

Idea: Everybody blogging should put the others students on their “Blog rolls” or blog a list of other blogs. It will help drive traffic.

Mondays: 6-8pm html5&css (this week Wednesday by Shay Howe). Wednesday: 1pm Entrepreneur session.

Learn to Program (awesome book) & Ruby on Rails 3 Tutorial. Jeff Cohen says it is awesome.

It’s ok to be out of your comfort zone. Jeff makes reference to the moon landing and what they went through. The Run way pic.May feel like a slow start but soon there will be takeoff.

Web Development:
-Computer Science (a little bit)
-Software eng
-Agile Methods

Computer Programming:
Input (instructions + data) > Processor > Output

Hard to explain how we are going to program, we are just going to dive in (~Jeff).

Tom Cullen> Used to be HF trader. Knew nothing. Built out a lot of website he developed. Redo exactly what we did in class but add it to your app/idea/project.
Advice: no substitution for hard work (Thomas Alva Edison Quote). Nobody has passion about your idea. Don’t worry about the NDA (I find this funny. NDA? Seriously?). Fight to pair with Ragu. Cut your illusions of getting a job right away (if that is your goal).

Mike Ebert: Zero programming. Little Html. Race Bikes in Europe. Looking at apprenticeships. Looking to be full time dev. Read 1st 2 chapters of Apprenticeship patterns immediately (free online). Get with people who are better then you (Shouldn’t be tough :) . The 4 hours with Jeff in class will be your best. He is the best at breaking things down in plain english. Throw away your code. Be goal oriented. Have your runway after Code Academy, map & search for your low to no pay job for a bit. Get together on the weekends.

Luis Vega: From Philippines. Knew about it 1 month prior and came. Was supposed to go home and looking for opportunities. He met everybody and anybody in the tech scene. He would go to Hash Rocket. Blog & share that you are constantly learning, and why it is totally worth it. Github is great but they won’t see your thought process so blog about it. Bug Neal and Mike to do a startup weekend (I did one in Toronto & it was an amazing learning experience).

Kevin (RudyonRails) I don’t know how to spell his last name. Programming bat boy. Audited classes he could get into. Worked in IT support, networks but got tired of it.
Try to tee up your mentors ASAP. Don’t put too much pressure to put on yourself. Exercise. @DHH said that when he came in and said don’t work over 40 hours & exercise.

Vince: Bit of C#, CSS, HTML. Real estate broker for 6.5 years. Left job to do Code Academy. Advice: Use your mentors.
In Class: Pair with different person everyday. Don’t let people do things for you. Learn how to build things. Share your ideas. Code into a program into a breakable toy (something that doesn’t matter).

Michael Verdi: Didn’t know what the terminal was. Completely foreign. Looking to continue practising and building. The Pair Programming King (Voted the person who was best to code with. His response: Non-threatening. The fact he is Vegan it makes sense (Non meat eaters are less aggressive supposedly according to a former teacher. Come up with an idea. Redo your daily classes from scratch and apply it into your practise app and your bigger app. John McCaffrey is the man. Funny dude.

Arvin (Pronounced Ervin or Irvin not Arvin): Partnered with someone in the Tues/Thurs class. Ditched ideas half way through and started something else. Him & Josh, paired and he learned a lot through him. Have confidence in yourself & don’t be afraid to stop your partner. There is no bad situation in pairing. Usually the person with less experience will be driving (typing).

Tom Brown (Not here): Had a vision of an app & he built it, and saw it through.

Jean (French) Not sure last name. Funny guy who will be doing the entrepreneurial seminars. 12 years of online marketing. Small Running app from Startup Weekend (You tell me when) Running registration app.

My thoughts: Damn am I ever glad to be living next door to the John Hancock Center for this class.
Some students are being paid by their employers. That would be cool!

Bernhard Kappe CEO of Pathfinder Software (Lean Startup MVP) will be speaking tomorrow at noon.

HTML Programming is a language despite what you may hear.

cd dev (This is just me copying Jeff’s terminal typing. To the geeks out that ready to ransack me saying this is not HTML, I suggest Chilling out).
cd mwf
~/dev/mwf

If you feel lost:
Open (command) so open . (it essentially brings up the Finder in Mac).

Neal recommends Unix for the beginning mage (freely available but this guy deserves beers!!!)

mate (means open textmate if you use it).
mate hello.html (that will open text mate and create the hello.html file so you can start marking it up with html).

Classroom étiquette: Respect the instructor.

Ragu:
Was sitting where we were 12 weeks ago. He didn’t know spotlight (didn’t know spotlight). No such thing as a dumb question. He knows where the class is coming from. Really bad with names but wants to improve.

Evening:
Have my meeting (Friday) booked with my mentor at Eight Simple Bits. Emailed my design mentor Jake Downs Started yoga at Core Power and hit the gym in the morning. Need to be fresh to handle both these courses and the various events. Pumped. Hitting the wrapper (Bed)!

@JaretManuel

Resume’s do not stand out | Creativity does

Jaret — Wed, 21 Jul 2010 15:24:06 +0000

The following may not be an appropriate way to apply for your next mega corporate gig but being creative, different and fun should garner you way more attention then a plain “Jane” resume the employer has seen a million times before. This off the wall style should help your pursuit of standing out, getting an interview, and ultimately – landing a job with a cool creative shop or a sweet gig in the startup scene. This is a recent application I sent over to Espresso – an amazing growing boutique creative agency here in Toronto (with an office in Boston). They pretty much state resumes alone are a waste of time, and they beg for someone who is interesting and funny in order to fit into their culture. So here goes…. The result? Time will tell but it was the most fun I had applying for a job by far.

Dharmesh Shah is a liar (just kidding)!

Jaret — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 11:23:35 +0000

So first and foremost, I was just kidding and Dharmesh is certainly not a liar. Far from it. I have a great admiration for his success, love reading his onstartups.com blog (it is in my blogroll), and I tell everyone I can about Dharmesh, his multiple success, and Hubspot.com (the king of getting your company tons of the right traffic to your doorstep!). I had an opportunity to do business with Hubspot and these guys are awesome. Dharmesh, I hope you find humour (Canadian spelling for my friends down in the Bars and Stars) in this post, and if not, my apology in advance. So why did I jokingly call him a liar?

Well, it relates to his recent post Building Startup Sales Teams: Tips For Founders and he says he is not in or never was in Sales. In his view and most others he is absolutely correct, but in my view everyone is in sales and I kind of find it funny the stigma that has been bestowed upon sales as a whole (unfortunately there are idiots out there causing a few bad apples to make a nice tree look bad). Think about it, do you have kids? They are the best and most relentless salespeople in the world constantly asking parents and others for things. Can I have this? Can I have that? Please Mommy, please Daddy… The hall pass you are looking for from your husband or wife (hopefully a hall pass is not required) to have a night on the town with some friends, etc. That job you are looking for, that favour you are seeking from a friend, and the list goes on. My point is that we are constantly trying to sell ourselves onto people in personal life and in business, and Dharmesh is no different.

I actually think Dharmesh is a huge salesperson and a damm good one. He is silently selling and promoting, and more importantly he is giving back to the community of would be entrepreneurs and marketers. His modest personality and approach is effortlessly brilliant (at least he makes it seem that way). He writes one of the most practical, no non-sense, get it done and basic blogs out there for start-ups. I love it and many others do as well. He is constantly putting in subtle plugs to his business but in a very lite manner, not pushy, and helping the community at the same time. Brilliant. He has sold me and many others on his blog. He also is selling by his frequent travels and speaking engagements at various marketing events and he is an awesome presenter despite what he says. I can’t wait to hear him speak live!

I really enjoyed this post and love how he points out to stay lean, stay agile, and to focus on efficiency while protecting what little cash you have because cash is king to survival. In point 8 he mentions about not focusing too much on rewarding the Salesperson for just the sale. Salespeople should really be focusing on relationships not sales, the long term, not short, making friends not customers. This may take longer but in this increasingly connected world it will reward you handsomely in many many ways. There are previous customers of mine who will continue to get a card from me during the holidays, etc. Why? Because I care, I believe in karma, and what if I need help down the road. Those people will jump off a cliff to help you when you ask because they will want to help you. Salespeople all too often focus on themselves and their greed glands when they should always be thinking of the customer. An employer allows a salesperson a chance to earn an income but it is the customer who allows them to pay the bills, earn a great living, and put food on the table, and ultimately keep their job. When I was a kid I helped my family business pretty much every Christmas take a wrapped box of chocolates and a calendar to the senior citizens home in my small town. You should have seen those people in delight and every year they came to expect it and it was the talk of the senior citizens home. My family didn’t have to do that but they appreciated their business and they wanted to show them gratitude. For some that was the only gift they received. So where do you think they came to shop? Not only that, I don’t know how many days I spent with my father as he went around plowing out peoples driveways that were filled in from snow blizzards. He would plow for hours on end and what did he charge them? Zero. He wouldn’t take money from them. The competitor didn’t hold a candle when it came to competing. Be skimpy, be cheap, and you’ll pay dearly. Give and you’ll get. It is a pretty simple concept, however common sense is not all that common!

Point 11. Yes track data like a maniac from the get go, however do not, I repeat, do not use a spreadsheet. I posted a previous article on Salesforce and at some point using them is a very wise move but if you need to go free (to save cash) Zoho offers up to 3 users for free. Use them until Salesforce is feasible. It is easy to migrate and import the data over and it will spare you spending too much time in spreadsheets. By the way, Hubspot has an amazing integration with Salesforce.com once you reach the professional edition.

So Dharmesh, this was a fantastic article, and I always look forward to your articles on the feed. They are inspiring, fun, and will help me and many others avoid many costly mistakes as we try and emulate your success as an entrepreneur. Keep up the great selling!

Jaret

Leaving the Stable…

Jaret — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 11:32:43 +0000

It has been a while since I wrote a post so I guess there is no time like the present. I recently made the decision to leave a stable job and join what I think is a very exciting and cool start-up. I was working for a solid technology reseller called SHI (formerly Software House International) in their new Canadian office for the corporate division. The company is as good as it gets for their industry and they take great pride in taking care of their customers and getting them the proper hardware or software they require (often on short notice). Not to mention they have one of the most humble founder I have ever met, and my brief chat with her had a lasting effect on me.

If you are looking for good deals and great service on various hardware or software then look no further then SHI in the US or SHI Canada. Most people have not heard of them, however they are doing well over $3B US in annual revenue and growing. Some of the nicest people I have met. So, it was a good company, however the start-up strings were pulling at me and I had the opportunity to join Besocial.com. Very excited about Besocial and feel free to check out the site as I am quiet on the topic for right now. The fun of launching a start-up!

Have a great week and thanks for tuning in.

Jaret