E-Commerce Adventure

I've wanted to create an e-commerce site for awhile, but when I first started out, I couldn't fathom the difficulty of programming a website (even if made from a template). Thus, here is a running journal of my progress. Ahem...the journey of a programmer who doesn't really program:

December 2011: 
Began working on osCommerce (newest build), but it was so buggy that I couldn't even get into the installation portion. I downloaded an older version and figured out how to fix the installation part, but there were admin panel errors that wouldn't go away. Frustrated, I trashed the entire project and vowed to begin anew in 2012.

January 2012:
Started to research other open source e-commerce sites in mid-January. I was mostly impressed with the amount of features within Prestashop, so I tried to download that. The program had over 5,000 files and took forever to unzip! Also, the store did not install properly. I tried an autoinstaller on my web server, but there were errors - also ended up trashing Prestashop. I tried Magento (super clean design, as I saw on their website) and it was the first program that worked. Funnily enough, I found out later that where I installed the site and where I thought I installed the site...did not coincide - which was probably one reason Prestashop did not work properly. Here are some updates:

• 1/24: Got familiar with the site and tested out the product page. Began refining the "Contact Us" link.
• 1/25: Completed the "Contact Us" form (for the time being)...and it works =D...but it took 1-2 hours to figure out. Designed a simple logo and favicon (HAAAA, awesome). Revised the header and footer.
• 1/29: I did a full restore of the site (started from scratch). It was strange because my address had a subdomain that I had not set...and it was superannoying. Example: mysite.com/default.
• 1/31: Good progress made today (2 hours of work)! Loaded products into my catalog with descriptions (to be revised later). Navigation (top navigation bar and site map) was automatically created when stock inventory was set to 1.

February 2012: 
I finished the frontend design for the website!!! It's super simple, but clean - pretty good for not knowing PHP (and most programming languages). I spent 1/3 of the month tweaking the look and feel of the website (adding content for most of the pages), 1/3 of the month updating the product catalog, and 1/3 of the month scouring forums for hints on managing the ordering system. At first, I tested the ordering system using Paypal Sandbox, but I wasn't able to log in from the site, so I used a real-time solution instead. I created a test product worth $0.01 and bought the item so that I could go through the entire process from the customer's perspective. After figuring out where to find email templates, I edited them and re-tested the email functions. Though the customer sales emails didn't work at first, another few days of scavenging led me to the solution (hint: use customer service emails hosted by one's own domain). March will be a month of SEO implementation and Internet marketing madness. I'm also looking forward to populating my product inventory with more goodies =D...and documenting the entire process of growth.

Looking back, Magento is not the most intuitive e-commerce solution out there, but it surely has the cleanest interface that I've seen thus far. While setting up my page, I had problems with email messaging and finding out where each of the files were located, among other basic necessities.

2011-2012: Busy, Busy!

I haven't updated lately because I've been so busy living life! Here's what I've been up to for the past 10 months:

• Worked at three jobs in different fields. For the majority of 2011, I planned programs for Chinese business people, but I also took on positions that reflected my passions - graphic design/media and marketing. I am currently working at an online start-up and I've learned a lot about blogging, link-building, and SEO!
• My friend and I started up a YouTube channel in March 2011. Our angle? Offering our unique viewpoints and commentary whilst vlogging at events and retail locations. We actually made several genres of video - stop animation, parodies, and...others that are more difficult to categorize. Well, what a ride it's been! I've gotten to know some awesome YouTubers/filmmakers/artists, as this is a tight-knit community. It's such an inspiration to be surrounded by so many talented individuals.
• Some traveling was had, as I journeyed to the East Coast (a pimpin' business trip), Alaska, New Mexico, and Las Vegas. I'm looking forward to more adventures in the near future.
• I began working with a talented group of Asian American filmmakers on a groundbreaking documentary - you'll hear about it very soon! I am on both the marketing and sponsorship teams - challenging, but extremely rewarding work! The project will be released in summer of 2012 - only a few months away...
• I attended CES and met tons of wonderful, ambitious, passionate people! My favorite moments were: 1) joining a fun company's booth at a party when my group ran late and 2) finding out that I was invited to a party because of a silly YouTube video I made (said the CEO).
• Recently, I gave a VP Public Relations training presentation to 83 club officers. Although I only slept four hours, I think the presentation went well!
• It seems like I'm always busying myself with tasks, but they are all a means to an end (financial freedom). On my to-do list for this year:
• Further enhancing my Internet marketing skills with quality job experience.
• Business development for companies of friends and family.
• Helping the Asian American documentary succeed.
• Reaching the next level in Toastmasters and helping local clubs develop their public relations campaigns.
• Starting a blog or two (!!) and making use of my Internet marketing knowledge.
• Taking Tech Entrepreneurship classes through Stanford's free online courses.
• Training my voice for...Carnegie Hall!!
• Creating more videos. I have a couple that are in progress, but it's hard to allocate time to them when I have so much going on!

I'm currently working on an e-commerce website for a business and I'll keep all my updates within one post, so that I (and others) can understand how I've progressed in developing the site.

Dreams #0005 - Disaster, Violin, Gift

1) I began this dream in an urban neighborhood. I walked between two buildings with a roof connecting them. There were random box-shaped steps at the end of one hallway. When I attempted to climb up the steps, I would turn around and there would be even more steps to climb. There was a break in the dream, but I finally walked out of the hallway onto a green patch of grass. I saw a tall building or steel tower (also boxy in shape). I looked up, and four men in orange hats attempted to coordinate some last-minute building infrastructure processes. However, at an inopportune moment, I looked up and saw a slab of concrete fall down. Luckily, it did not hit any of the construction workers. I was standing about a quarter mile away from the building, but in an instant, I saw a whole floor topple off of the building and yelled to the workers. Somehow, the entire building fell apart, but the workers neither reacted normally nor ran away. I turned away before I saw any more building pieces hitting the ground.

I guess this is a subconscious reaction to reading news about natural disasters before going to bed...

2) In my second dream, I was standing in a crowd in an artsy area, waiting for a concert. I stood for awhile, when a youngish Hispanic lady approached me and Bro. I spoke to her about music, but I spoke to her as if we were strangers. A bit later, she talked to me and revealed that we had actually met a year ago (dream-me had a lapse in memory, I suppose). I continued to talk to her and she invited us to another event for the next day.

The next time we met her, we went to a nice garden outside of a place with an archaic air (may have been her house or a music conservatory). We spoke more about our love of music, when I asked her about buying violins. She replied, "Why do you have to buy one? I'll give you mine..." I was surprised and replied, "...But don't you need it?" Her answer was ambiguous, but I felt that she was giving up on music - she enjoyed playing violin and has done it for a long time, but she is going to pursue her other passions. She meant it to be a gift so that I could fulfill my/Bro's wish to hone our skills in violin. I was so touched by this gift, but I woke up with no violin, yet felt inspired by an example of human kindness created in my head.

Scary Health Ordeal

At the risk of disseminating too much information...I had the worst monthly pain in my history. Let's skip over the womanly details and go straight to the strange, hurty stuff:

• I had the the worst headache last week. It was the weirdest sensation I have ever experienced, outside of almost-fainting. I had been working, mostly walking around and looking at a piece of white paper with writing. After a bit of walking, I saw some squiggly wavy lines at the corner of my right eye. These wavy lines resembled the heat mirages that you might see when driving down a road in sunny California. I was a bit confused about why I was seeing things, when I started to notice that I couldn't read my paper. The numbers and letters were whited-out by some neurological light. It was most curious.
• Ten minutes later, I was begging to lay down. I had a migraine with sharp, indescribable pain that prevented me from doing further work. I began to feel nauseous, a harbinger of wahness. About twenty minutes later, I felt a strong sensation of nausea overcome me and I hovered over the toilet four times. It was not good. My stomach was emptied.
• After I laid down to rest, I researched my strange symptoms and found that I had experienced "migraine with auras," which is experienced by approximately 20% of the population. I was fine that night, except for the fact that I had slept too much...
• However, the day after, I experienced overwhelming confusion. I was writing something and I became so confused about whether it made sense or not. I rarely get confused - I usually question how I can improve my writing.
• I also had these strange tempers - I would feel empowered by something, but all of a sudden, I became the exact opposite - a crying mess.

I suppose this is an example of the ways that unaddressed stress may affect a person. It's important to take care of oneself and heed such symptoms. Have I done anything to address these symptoms or my invisible stress? Not really, but I'm going to start working out and doing things to lower my stress level.

MIA Here => Here I AM

The last time I blogged on this account was about a month before I left for China. In the months between March and December, I have:

• Completed 10 Toastmasters speeches and achieved the Competent Communicator Award,
• Worked at Expo 2010 Shanghai as Student Ambassador; three months afterward, I was promoted to Finance Associate,
• Traveled throughout China, visiting cities new to me - Xiamen, Qingdao, Tibet, and Tianjin - as well as some old favorites,
• Arrived home to experience the monotony of funemployment and some side adventures,
• And spent more money this holiday than during any other. I'm such a consumer @_@.

In blog posts thereafter, I hope to detail some of my adventures in Shanghai/at the Expo/after the Expo. Even if I can't verbally express the fun I had, I will no doubt be able to spam my blog with 80+ gb worth of photos. >:D

Turning - into +

The months from autumn 2009 to winter 2010 were filled with catastrophe. Though I am still too scarred to openly share such experiences, I recognize some lessons learned from each event.

November 2009:
Life is the most significant entity to cherish.

December 2009:
Purging extraneous things and implementing minimalism facilitates simplicity in life.

January 2009:
Before taking any risky transactions, research, plan, and admonish (if you are not the direct party considering the transactions) for more favorable outcomes.


Additionally, I realized throughout these months that:
1) When one makes impulsive, last-minute decisions, he or she is more prone to making mistakes. Slowing down to properly understand the matter and to remember the importance of safety is conducive to good results.
2) We, as individuals, must place more trust in ourselves. Sometimes, other parties that are "sent" to help us will not do their best. We have the power to question their decisions and push them to continue their tasks, but in the end, if they cannot help us, we should not regret that we did all we could for the result we received.


Though I did not include anecdotes with these lessons, I hope everyone heeds such words and uses care in all endeavors.

Reunion with a Childhood Friend

As many know, I moved from the midwest to the west coast during my teen years. It was a difficult time for me - I left my childhood friends and school to start anew. Even then, I never really forgot my old friends...

My oldest childhood friend (probably the first friend I made in America) and I shared many fun times growing up, from going over his place to hog his Nintendo, to collectively tolerating the Saturdays spent in Chinese school. Sometimes, his parents and my parents would visit each other; while the parents spoke of parently things, we children played.

Then, I moved away, just when communication technology started to develop. At this time, AOL was popular, CDs were expensive, Yahoo was the main search engine, and the internet had begun its proliferation. After I moved west, I used email (at the not-so-popular usa.net domain) to try to stay in touch with friends. However, because we were young, none of us really utilized email. From when I was a child to now, I always imagined the day I would have the opportunity to re-connect with old friends. Sadly, because of the absence of communication tools (and the lack of using the ones that existed), I lost touch with much of my previous childhood network...

...Until one day. In high school, I began to use AOL Instant Messenger (AIM) to chat with friends. Around this time, Google began to infiltrate the online realm, and, in a moment of curiosity, I typed in my childhood friend's name and was surprised to find a few results. It was from this method that I found my friend's screen name. Not too long after, I IMed him and we began to re-establish contact. It was a shocking moment for me, as well as one of the first times I harnessed the power of the internet to find someone with whom I lost contact. From then on, my friend and I spoke sporadically on AIM, until Facebook emerged. I added him on Facebook and we've been in contact ever since.

However, I suppose good ol' telephone also helps friends to stay connected. Not-so-beknownst to me, my parents have been in contact, here and there, with my childhood friend's parents. On December 22, 2009, after hosting a visit from relatives, Mom received a call from my childhood friend's parents. Surprisingly, my childhood friend's entire family was in SoCal for a few days. I was so excited for the opportunity to see them and to catch up. My heart raced and my fleeting attention span made me unproductive for the night.

The parents called each other to arrange a visit for the next day. December 23 came. Mom told us the childhood friend and his family were in town and would stop by our house. I was so happy. Words could not express the richness of such emotions. The last few holiday months have been difficult, so having this sliver of happiness (and a childhood dream realized) was a welcome retreat from the real world.

As the hour between the confirmation call and the arrival elapsed, emotions abounded, some of trepidation, others of unspeakable excitement. I wish I could somehow bottle such a flurry of emotions and let a little out each time I need some inspiration. I was quite nervous; of course he and his family remember us, but what would I say to them? Pure befuddlement.

At last, the doorbell rang. We invited our guests in and conversed about our present life. I also shared my photo albums with them. There were a few awkward silences and some nervous laughter from me, but after the initial speechlessness, I felt our group warming up a bit. In the office, I sat next to my friend with a sense of wonder. Could it be - we childhood friends - are finally reunited after one so many years? I couldn't believe it; I suppose I was in a state of shock and I couldn't break away from it. I didn't know that our meeting would come so soon. With my emotions peaking to the point of total awe at the way life works, after 2.5+ hours of catching up, we bid my childhood friend and his family farewell.

Even though the meeting was short and is a commonality in any other person's life, I felt as though a huge revelation met me face-to-face. It wasn't as though I found the meaning of my life or had a life-changing epiphany. Rather, I discovered a complex emotion - one that could not be priced, though it was highly valued; one that lives in the moment and cannot be captured. I recognized it as a once-in-a-lifetime feeling (though I can have it more than once if I somehow get the chance to visit other old friends). I felt this the final time I performed in my percussion ensemble and each unique time I danced on stage. This emotion was deceptively simple, yet extraordinarily delicious, only described as an amalgam of gratitude, wonder, intrigue, surprise, apprehensiveness, and finality. I recognized the meeting as the first time I met my friend and his family in a decade, but one of the few times I would experience such an uplifting sense of amazement in human interaction.

This post redolent of sentimentality only expresses a fraction of emotions I felt at the time. I tried to relay my experience to a friend, but was unable to speak about it in the fullest extent. For lack of words...I had a "moment." I was extremely grateful for such an encounter - I hope that the longer I live, the more of these I will experience.