JGari.com

Nov 11 2009

Things to consider when starting an e-Commerce business

Starting an eCommerce business on the internet could be very demanding. With the many steps involved in the process, it is very hard to figure out where to start. Below you will find some of the major items that should be considered when starting an eCommerce business on the Internet.

When I meet with clients that are starting out in the E-Commerce arena, I spend a great deal of time giving them the overview of how an online transaction is handled. Of course, at the end, I tell them not to worry about all the complexities, since my eCommerce Webstore System automates a lot of it.

In short, here is what’s needed to be considered to sell products online:

1. A “Domain” name (paid yearly)
- This is the online equivalent of your offline business name

2. A Hosting service (paid monthly, but I generally advice to prepay it yearly)
- This is the online equivalent of your offline physical location of your store

3. An attractive professional web design, that balances out visual appeal with functionality.
- This is equivalent to the way you would decorate your offline physical store, so that customers can select their products easily, while enjoying the experience of a nice place.
- Traditionally people have liked attractive things and that seems to have translated to the web. Recent studies show that people will judge your website with a blink of an eye. Once you lose them, you may never get them back (http://www.websiteoptimization.com/speed/tweak/blink/).

4. Products/Services:
- Either stocked by you or stocked by another company that can ship them for you (drop shipper).

5. A product/order management system to:
- Reside on your hosting service account
- Add as many products as you want to your site and update their pricing(and other fields) for promotions, without requiring technical knowledge of HTML nor any programming language.
- Notify you (and possibly your suppliers, if you choose to) of every new order
- Automatically create accounts for customers to logon to check their order status online, unless you can handle thousands of phone calls of customers who want to know about their order status.
- Automatically notifies the customer once the order has been shipped out
- print packing slips (if you are shipping the products yourself)
- tracks all search queries and visually alert you of those products your visitors are looking for.
- provides you detail report of the products that visitors are looking for and where in your website, they are clicking from.
- provides tracking links to shipping companies, so that customers can track the movement of their products after shipping.
- allows customers to review products for other customers to read

6. A Merchant Account:
- To make it easy for customers to pay for your products online
- Generally associated with monthly fees and per transaction fees.
- For examples of some merchant providers, read my mini-review at: http://www.jgari.com/?q=node/25

7. A Bank Account:
- Where your money will be deposited by the merchant provider for your orders

8. An account with a Shipping Company:
- If you ship your products you may need to get an account from a shipping company, such as USPS, UPS or FedEx.
- Ideally, you would want your product/order management system to somehow connect to your shipping companies so that when customers check if their orders have been shipped from your website, the system can automatically take them directly to their tracking status on the shipping company’s website.

9. Marketing strategies:
- Anyone can build a website, but not every website designer understands business concepts to drive sales to your website.
- The right marketing strategy and an effective web solution partner should be able to assist you in driving traffic to your website to start generating sales. In our case (GariDigital.com), since we have several community sister websites, we generally announce our new projects during initiation and at completion, if our client approves of it. We find that this creates expectations and drives that initial traffic to website right at launch.
- Although the above items can be time-consuming, it is marketing that will ultimately make or break your online business.

10. A unified seamless approach:
- Although you, as the business owner, have to deal with all these complexities, your customers need not be expose to them. You would want an unified approach so that as far as your customers are concerned, they are only dealing with you for their online transactions.
- Most customers would be happy to browse your product selections, read their information and reviews and place orders. A great majority will not want to learn how you fulfill your orders, which is the reason I believe that it is important to have a system that integrate and automate as many of the operations as possible.

Although this seems like a world of complications, Your Web Solution Partner, should be able to get you going in less than a week, so you can start raking in sales. On the other hand learning the entire process is also fun, especially if you want to become a web developer.

If you take a few minutes to view the diagram located on my documentation, it should give you a visual of the entities involved in an online transaction:

http://www.garidigital.com/docs/webstore/

__________________
Jorge Garifuna
Professional Web Developer
“Your Web Solution Partner”
http://www.GariDigital.com

About the author:

Jorge Garifuna is a Computer Scientist and Real Estate professional, who loves to serve his Garifuna community. Jorge has served as vice-president of former New York-based, Garifuna youth organization, Lileiti Dufigati, has been the president to Los Angeles-based, Garifuna organization, SONHOCA, and holds membership with various Garifuna organizations, such as Wafadaha Uwara, and national technology organizations, such as ACM and IEEE. Jorge has donated his time to lecture classes about Computer & Internet usage for Garifuna organizations like, MUGAMA. Additionally, Jorge has trained high school students in programming, for national competition, under the BDPA-LA organization.

Jorge is also the CEO of Garinet Global Inc. Garinet has established itself as the major Garifuna Network since it launched in 1999. It currently averages over one million hits per month from over one hundred different countries around the world.

Garinet has consistently created services to enhance the future of the Garifuna community. Through its GariDigital.com website, Garinet offers the general public, a multitude of Website services for organizations, businesses, entertainers and family members.

To stay updated with Jorge’s latest development, you may visit his official website, Jgari.com:
http://www.Jgari.com

Jorge may be contacted by email at jg@garinet.com

92 responses so far

Oct 26 2009

Business PHP framework ATK 6.4 released

Published by admin under Uncategorized

ATK is a special purpose PHP framework, targeted at business applications. It allows you to build an application with very small amounts of code. This release contains bug fixes and several enhancements.

Read more about this release by clicking here.

106 responses so far

Oct 02 2009

Jorge Garifuna’s Top 3 Picks Credit Card Payment Processors for eCommerce

Published by admin under eCommerce

If you are planning on selling products online or are already in the process, you may find beneficial the following reviews of credit card payment processors. I have experienced with several credit card payment processors and below you will find the advantages and disadvantages that I’ve been able to experience with PayPal, 2Checkout and PayJunction.

Disclaimer: These reviews are based on the experience of the author as a user of these services and are to be used for educational purposes only. The author is not to be responsible for any incidents arising from the reader as a result of these reviews.

With that out of the way, here are the facts that I faced about each of the three credit card payment processors:

1) 2Checkout (2C):
My Overall Rating: 3/10
- advantages:

———- no monthly gateway or statement fee
———- deposits money automatically into bank account
———- customer does not need to create account with 2C to pay for products

- dissadvantages:

———- hard to get someone on the phone for emergency tech support
———- setup fee of $49 (this may be different now, please check latest)
———- high per transaction fees of $0.45 + 5.5% (at least it was, check for latest figures)
———- deposits are made biweekly to your bank account (at least it used to be, check for this)
———- (this is why I said enough with 2Checkout)do not allow you to charge your customers cards, so if your customers call to place orders and provide you with their credit card number over the phone, I think that it is a violation of 2C’s policy for you to charge your customers card yourself. Your customers have to be the ones inputting their card numbers.

2) PayPal:
My Overall Rating: 7/10
- advantages:

———- FREE and easy to setup
———- no monthly gateway or statement fee
———- considerable low per transaction fees ($0.30 + 2.9%, again be sure to check latest) compared to 2C
———- provides an ATM card

- disadvantages:

———- hard to get someone on the phone for emergency tech support
———- you have to manually instruct it to deposit money into your bank account (I’m not aware of an auto deposit, but you can check)
———- money takes about 3 days to appear in your bank account, after you manually request the transfer
———- (this is why I said enough with PayPal)I was experiencing their system being down for maintenance around mid night very frequently, so I felt that my visitors were being denied from paying for their orders on something I had no control over.
———- Buyers were required to create accounts with PayPal. Some of my clients would report to me that some of them would not buy because of this, while others reported they would not buy because they could not remember their PayPal account information for subsequent purchases (we can tell the clients to click on the “forgot password” link, but is still an additional unnecessary step from the store owner’s behalf)

I still use PayPal to pay for certain things, but not as my main merchant provider for my e-Commerce sites.

I finally had enough with PayPal and decided to try a real merchant provider and my sales went up almost instantly, inspire of the monthly gateway + statement fees. Most people get attracted to 2Checkout and PayPal because there is no monthly service fee. For starters this could be very convenient.

My current merchant account provider is Card Payment Solutions (http://www.csiprocessing.com) and the credit card payment provider they assigned me to is:

3) Pay Junction (payJunction.com)
My Overall Rating: 10/10
- advantages:

———- a real person picks up the phone for tech supports
———- are willing to accommodate for custom e-commerce programming needs. I developed my own e-commerce system and they worked with me till the end to get it working properly with their system. (I was very pleased about this)
———- you can charge your customers credit cards directly on their secure web-system. This is beneficial for those businesses that get orders by phone. This is also very convenient for customers who call your business from a print ad, such as brochure or product catalog.
———- low per transaction fees. It could go below 2% and around $0.10 - $0.20 per transaction if I recall correctly.
———- customer does not need to create account with PayJunction to pay for products
———- oh, before I forget, they batch the transactions daily so the money is in your bank account usually within 2 days.

- disadvantages:

———- the nightmare of every starter, monthly gateway + statement fees, which I don’t mind, considering that I’m selling more than I was with PayPal and 2C

The verdict:

Of course I also played around with other credit card payment processors such as iBill, but these are my top 3. Currently here is how I use each one of these providers:

- PayJunction: for serious e-commerce business
- PayPal: for occasional payments to certain people and for those clients that would rather use the monthly fees of a real merchant account for other business expenses or have low sales volume.
- 2Checkout: a thing of the passed for me. I’ll probably consider it, as a substitute for my PayPal activities, if PayPal goes out of business, which is very unlikely.

__________________
Jorge Garifuna
Professional Web Developer
“Your Web Solution Partner”
http://www.GariDigital.com

About the author:

Jorge Garifuna is a Computer Scientist and Real Estate professional, who loves to serve his Garifuna community. Jorge has served as vice-president of former New York-based, Garifuna youth organization, Lileiti Dufigati, has been the president to Los Angeles-based, Garifuna organization, SONHOCA, and holds membership with various Garifuna organizations, such as Wafadaha Uwara, and national technology organizations, such as ACM and IEEE. Jorge has donated his time to lecture classes about Computer & Internet usage for Garifuna organizations like, MUGAMA. Additionally, Jorge has trained high school students in programming, for national competition, under the BDPA-LA organization.

Jorge is also the CEO of Garinet Global Inc. Garinet has established itself as the major Garifuna Network since it launched in 1999. It currently averages over one million hits per month from over one hundred different countries around the world.

Garinet has consistently created services to enhance the future of the Garifuna community. Through its GariDigital.com website, Garinet offers the general public, a multitude of Website services for organizations, businesses, entertainers and family members.

To stay updated with Jorge’s latest development, you may visit his official website, Jgari.com:
http://www.Jgari.com

Jorge may be contacted by email at jg@garinet.com

57 responses so far

Aug 07 2008

A magical AJAX-enabled JQuery grid worth looking into

Published by admin under Software Development

In streamlining the user experience of my ATK modules, I have been considering the integration of external sources. Two of these external sources have been the JQuery plugins: Flexigrid and jqGrid.

Both plugins are great. They both provide AJAX paging and record searching among other things. I went to the extent of integrating Flexigrid into the dashboard of my ATK ERP/CRM module and it brought a completely new experience to the mix.

Recently I have come to find another JQuery grid plugin, which probably offers more than Flexigrid. Its name is jqGrid.

In my view, these are the items that sets jqGrid apart:

- Great documentation

- Over 45 practical demos with source code

- Well rounded feature-set and active development

The following are 3 features that jqGrid offers out of the box, which I would love to see in the ATK grid:

Inline editing:

Inline editing may be be triggered in different ways. In the screenshot below, inline editing is triggered by clicking on the “E” button located on the left Actions column.

See it in action:

To see inline editing in action follow these steps:

1. Visit: http://trirand.com/jqgrid/jqgrid.html

2. Click on “Row Editing” from the left menu

3. Click on “Custom Edit” and then on the “E” button of any row

AJAX-driven Master-Detail directly in list mode:

Clicking on one of the records in the master grid, automatically makes an AJAX call to acquire data for the detail, which gets displayed on the detail grid, within the same page.

See it in action:

To see the master-detail in action follow these steps:

1. Visit: http://trirand.com/jqgrid/jqgrid.html

2. Click on “Advanced” from the left menu

3. Click on “Master Detail” and then on any row from the “Invoice Header” grid

Subgrids or grouping:

Grouping data on the main grid comes in two flavors: Subgrid and Grid as Subgrid. Both of these are triggered in the same way. Mainly be clicking on the plus(+) sign that is located on the left column of the main row. The difference between the two is that Grid as Subgrid is a Grid with complete features including searhing and paging.

See it in action:

To see the Subgrids in action follow these steps:

1. Visit: http://trirand.com/jqgrid/jqgrid.html

2. Click on “Advanced” from the left menu

3. Click on “Subgrid” or “Grid as Subgrid” and then on the plus(+) sign of the left column on the grid to view the subgrid of any row

Screenshot of Subgrid:

Screenshot of Grid as Subgrid:

Other nice feature - Toolbars and search:

Toolbars:

Toolbars are already part of ATK, and is also great that jqGrid supports it.

See it in action:

To see the Toolbar in action follow these steps:

1. Visit: http://trirand.com/jqgrid/jqgrid.html

2. Click on “New in version 3.1″ from the left menu

3. Click on “Toolbars and userdata” and then notice the “Click Me” button on the top grid and the “Total Amount” label at the bottom of the lower grid.

Search:

Search is triggered by clicking on the icon located on the lower left corner of the grid. Although jqGrid allows the user to search several fields, only one field can be searched at the time. I prefer ATK’s search feature, which allows the user to filter multiple fields at the time.

See it in action:

To see the Toolbar in action follow these steps:

1. Visit: http://trirand.com/jqgrid/jqgrid.html

2. Click on “Manipulation” from the left menu

3. Click on “Grid Data” and then on the icon located on the lower left section of the grid.

References:

- jqGrid Download page

- jqGrid Demos page

- jqGrid Documentation page

- ATK is a special purpose PHP framework, targeted at business applications. It allows you to build an application with very small amounts of code.

Hopefully we’ll get to see some of these features make it to ATK in the near future.
_________________
Jorge Garifuna
Professional Web Developer
Garinet Global Inc.
http://www.GariDigital.com

132 responses so far

Jul 17 2008

Amazing Google Visualization API implementation in PHP

Published by admin under Software Development

The QGoogleVisualizationAPI package is the PHP implementation of Google Visualization API. Although I had heard of Google visualization API before, I had never considered it, until I came across QGoogleVisualizationAPI PHP edition by Tom.

The first release was missing the org chart. I kindly submitted my sincere feedback to Tom and what amazed me the most, was his prompt response in adding the org chart to the package.

I tested the org chart on my local system and it worked like magic.

If you are developing in PHP and want to easily integrate charts into your project check out QGoogleVisualizationAPI at:

http://www.phpclasses.org/browse/package/4665.html

Until next time,

Jorge Garifuna
Professional Web Developer
“Your Web Solution Partner”
Garinet Media Network, LLC.
http://www.GariDigital.com

133 responses so far

Jun 18 2008

PHP ATK Framework gets a brand new website

Published by admin under Software Development

After using the PHP ATK Framework for a few years, I am extremely happy to see a brand new website that showcases the magical framework. ATK is one of the few respectable PHP frameworks that allows developers to write a PHP application in 10 lines of code.

Although the framework offers nearly complete solutions for Web Applications, some developers have been put off by the existing ATK license.

The license issue will soon become a thing of the passed. According to their new website, “As of version 6.2, the license of ATK is the LGPL license. This means you can use it at will in open source or closed source products.”

I’ve put ATK to the test in the following projects and it has delivered every time:

Cross-functional Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system

Automated Bilingual eCommerce Webstore System

Content Management System

Multilingual Project Management System

Document Management System

Complete Personal Finance System with national data expense comparison

Financial Tools, including product profitability analysis and amortized loan payments
Credit Report Management System
Personal List Shopping Tracking System

Salary Hourly, Weekly, Bi-Weekly, Semi-Monthly, Monthly and Yearly Breakdown System

Business Card Management System

Websites Management System

Activity Management System with Calendars and Email notifications

Automobile Management System with depreciation, equity and annual gas expense

Marketing Management System

College Savings Plan Application accounting for inflation

Valuables Equity Sheet Application

Book Collection System

DVD Collection System

Bookmark Management

Events module

Photo gallery module

Testimonials module

Sound bytes module

Video management module

Feedback form module

Banner Management module

Search module

Front image/ads rotator module

Tell a friend module

Random product display module

Sponsors Module

Links module

Some of these modules are implemented on the following sites, which are powered by ATK:

http://www.garitv.com/

http://www.garinet.com/

http://www.garinetmedianetwork.com

Visit ATK’s brand new website at:

http://www.atk-framework.com

If you are new to ATK, feel free to read about my experience on how I learned ATK.

345 responses so far

May 13 2006

Google projected King of the Web by August 2007

Published by admin under Tech Talk

According to WashigntonPost.com, Google had 92,147 (thousands) unique visitors in February 2006, a 21% increase over the

same period last year, while Yahoo had 115,401 (thousands), or 5% increase over the same period last year.

IF the growth rate remains the same, Google is expected to
be crowned the “King of the Web” by August 2007, which is about 18 months after the
data was measured. MYSPACE.COM and BLOGGER.COM had an astronomical growth of
318% and 528% respectively. If these two players continue to perform at that
rate, it would only take them 5 and 6 months to reach the top and Google would
have to fight harder for the throne.

To keep things simple, let’s just assume the war is between
Yahoo and Google for the top position. Under this assumption, below you will
find the numbers I was able to calculate, based on a small PHP program that I
wrote, using the Future Value formula to arrive at my results. You will also
find the PHP program below, just in case you would like to run your own
numbers.

Projection Date	Yahoo Unique Visitors (thousands)	Google Unique Visitors (thousands)	Difference in Visitors (thousands)	Difference in Percentage
Mar-06	115,882	93,760	22,122	23.59%
Apr-06	116,365	95,400	20,965	21.98%
May-06	116,850	97,070	19,780	20.38%
Jun-06	117,336	98,769	18,567	18.80%
Jul-06	117,825	100,497	17,328	17.24%
Aug-06	118,316	102,256	16,060	15.71%
Sep-06	118,809	104,045	14,764	14.19%
Oct-06	119,304	105,866	13,438	12.69%
Nov-06	119,801	107,719	12,082	11.22%
Dec-06	120,301	109,604	10,697	9.76%
Jan-07	120,802	111,522	9,280	8.32%
Feb-07	121,305	113,473	7,832	6.90%
Mar-07	121,811	115,459	6,352	5.50%
Apr-07	122,318	117,480	4,838	4.12%
May-07	122,828	119,536	3,292	2.75%
Jun-07	123,340	121,628	1,712	1.41%
Jul-07	123,853	123,756	97	0.08%
Aug-07	124,370	125,922	-1,552	-1.23%

Below is the PHP code that I wrote to compute these values:

PHP Code to calculate when Google will become King ofthe Web



/*

Author: Jorge Garifuna

Email: info@GariDigital.com

Website: http://www.GariDigital.com

The following code calculates when Google will overthrow Yahoo to become the king of the web The measurements are done based on data released about the unique visitors of each site as reported by: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/custom/2006/03/31/CU2006033101136.html */

$report_date = "2/1/2006"; // the date the report measured

/* start google settings */ $ginterest=21; // google growth rate $gpv = 92147; // google unique visitors in February 2006 (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/custom/2006/03/31/CU2006033101136.html) /* end google settings */


/* start yahoo settings */

$yinterest=5; // yahoo growth rate

$ypv = 115401;  // yahoo unique visitors in February 2006 (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/custom/2006/03/31/CU2006033101136.html)

/* end yahoo settings */
$match_in_months = -1;

$months = 1;

$match = false;
$start_date=strtotime($report_date,time());

print_value("Stat Date","Yahoo","Google","Difference","Margin");

print_value("---------","-----","------","----------","------");
while(!$match){

$google_fv = fv($ginterest, $months, $gpv);

$yahoo_fv = fv($yinterest, $months, $ypv);

$yahoo_fv = number_format($yahoo_fv,0,"","");     // remove decimals

$google_fv = number_format($google_fv,0,"","");   // remove decimals
if(($google_fv >= $yahoo_fv)){

$match_in_months = $months;

$match = true;

}

$difference = ($yahoo_fv - $google_fv);

$margin = ((($yahoo_fv - $google_fv)/$google_fv)*100);

$margin = number_format($margin,2)."%";

$stat_date =strtotime("+$months months",$start_date);

$stat_date = date("M Y",$stat_date);

print_value($stat_date, number_format($yahoo_fv,0), number_format($google_fv,0),number_format($difference,0),$margin);

//print "$stat_date\t\t$yahoo_fv\t\t$google_fv\n";

$months++;

}
$yahoo_fv = number_format($yahoo_fv,0); // format value

$google_fv = number_format($google_fv,0); // format value
print "\nMatch in $match_in_months months\nWith Google $google_fv and Yahoo $yahoo_fv unique visitors\n\n";
/*

Author: Jorge Garifuna

Email: info@GariDigital.com

Website: http://www.GariDigital.com

Created: May 13, 2006

This function calculates the Future Value
@params

- $pv : accumulated quantity (eg: 9000 for 9,000)

- $period  : number of months (eg: 120)

- $interest : interest or growth rate (eg: 5 for 5%)
returns

- the future value

*/

function fv($interest, $period, $pv){

$interest /= 100;

$interest /= 12;

$fv = ($pv * pow(1+$interest, $period)); // compute future value

return $fv;

}
/*

Author: Jorge Garifuna

Email: info@GariDigital.com

Website: http://www.GariDigital.com

Created: May 13, 2006

This function prints a formated version of the the output
@params

- $date_info : either the stat date header label or the actual date value

- $yahoo_info  : either the yahoo header label or the actual unique visitors value

- $google_info : either the google header label or the actual unique visitors value

- $difference : the difference in quantity of unique visitors between Google and Yahoo

- $margin : the difference in percentage of unique visitors  between Google and Yahoo

*/

function print_value($date_info, $yahoo_info, $google_info,$difference,$margin){

print "$date_info\t$yahoo_info\t\t$google_info\t\t$difference\t\t$margin\n";

}

?>

Update 1 Sept, 2, 2008: It took Google one year longer to become king of the web

About the author:

Jorge Garifuna is a Computer Scientist and Real Estate professional, who loves to serve his Garifunacommunity. Jorge has served as vice-president of former New York-based, Garifuna youth organization, Lileiti Dufigati, has been the president to Los Angeles-based, Garifuna organization, SONHOCA, and holds membership with various Garifuna organizations, such as Wafadaha Uwara, and national technology organizations, such as ACM and IEEE. Jorge has donated his time to lecture classes about Computer & Internet usage for Garifuna organizations like, MUGAMA. Additionally, Jorge has trained high school students in programming, for national competition, under the BDPA-LA organization.

Jorge is also the CEO of Garinet Global Inc. Garinet has established itself as the major Garifuna Network since it launched in 1999. It currently averages over one million hits per month from over one hundred different countries around the world.

Garinet has consistently created services to enhance the future of the Garifuna community. Through its GariDigital.com website, Garinet offers the general public, a multitude of Website services for organizations, businesses, entertainers and family members.

To stay updated with Jorge’s latest development, you may visit his official website, Jgari.com :
http://www.Jgari.com

Jorge may be contacted by email at jg at garinet.com

217 responses so far

Jan 19 2006

Summary of my technology meeting at LAMPsig, 1/18/06

Published by admin under Uncategorized

Last night I attended a meeting by LAMPsig in Los Angeles, California. LAMPsig is one of the open source technology groups that I’ve joined since this passed December. The meeting was filled with great energy. All of us, attendees, were exposed to a presentation by a new and upcoming web technology, called, SVG.

Prior to heading to the meeting, I called home to see how things were going and check if my 10-year old son, Jimmy, was done with his homework. To my surprise he was done with his school work, but he still had some extra reading and reporting to do for his lovely parents. When I invited him to the meeting, he was so happy, probably thinking that dad would forget about his reading and report writing assignment.

Usually when we attend technology meetings of this kind, we bring our laptops to connect to the internet wirelessly to share projects. I had Jimmy pack his laptop and as soon as we got on the road, I asked him to pull his reading material to complete his work, to which he gave me that nice look, somewhat signifying “I would prefer to enjoy the ride by just looking around and doing nothing more”

When we arrived the meeting, we came across many new faces, most excited about the great new features that SVG has to offer. The whole setting reminded me when I attended a PHP meeting at the University of San Diego, when I had recently relocated to California in 2001. Back then, PHP was in its infancies and now it has grown to be one of the major development languages on the web.

If you are new to all these technology buzz, SVG, stands for Scalable Vector Graphics. The gentleman presenting at the meeting last night was from an organization, called Ink Scape.

I just recently visited the Ink Scape’s website and this is what they are all about “Inkscape is an Open Source vector graphics editor, with capabilities similar to Illustrator, Freehand, CorelDraw, or Xara X using the W3C standard Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) file format.”

You can learn more about Ink Scape from:

http://www.inkscape.org

Just like PHP, I have no doubt in my mind that SVG will be one of the next biggest things on the web. The popular browser, Firefox version 1.5, already has built-in support for it.

Who will benefit from SVG? Well ultimately the end-users will enjoy all the benefits of a rich-client web experience. At the heart of all, Graphic Designers and Web Developers will find SVG to be a great addition their tool box.

As a Web Developer, one of the problems that I always found with flash, was the inability to add dynamic content to the beautiful interfaces. Of course this has changed over the years, but I love the fact that SVG allows for dynamic content from the ground up. What this mean is that Graphic Designers can add their artistic touches to their work, while the Web Developer may alter the content of the graphic, programmatically on the fly. All of this is brought to you, thanks to the XML structure that SVG is composed of.

If you are a cutting edge Graphic Designer or a Web Developer, you may consider the following sources to further your education about SVG:

SVG Tutorial
http://www.w3schools.com/svg/default.asp

SVG Examples
http://www.w3schools.com/svg/svg_examples.asp

Open Source Scalable Vector Graphics Editor
http://www.inkscape.org

To be part of the growing members of LAMPsig, please visit the following site and sign up to the mailing list:

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About the author:

Jorge Garifuna is a Computer Scientist and Real Estate professional, who loves to serve his Garifuna community. Jorge has served as vice-president of former New York-based, Garifuna youth organization, Lileiti Dufigati, has been the president to Los Angeles-based, Garifuna organization, SONHOCA, and holds membership with various Garifuna organizations, such as Wafadaha Uwara, and national technology organizations, such as ACM and IEEE. Jorge has donated his time to lecture classes about Computer & Internet usage for Garifuna organizations like, MUGAMA. Additionally, Jorge has trained high school students in programming, for national competition, under the BDPA-LA organization.

Jorge is also the CEO of Garinet Global Inc. Garinet has established itself as the major Garifuna Network since it launched in 1999. It currently averages over one million hits per month from over one hundred different countries around the world.

Garinet has consistently created services to enhance the future of the Garifuna community. Through its GariDigital.com website, Garinet offers the general public, a multitude of Website services for organizations, businesses, entertainers and family members.

Jorge may be contacted by email at jg@garinet.com

71 responses so far

Jan 19 2006

How to eliminate your debt faster - Part 1

Published by admin under Personal Finance

In this series, I discuss two methods of eliminating debt. One of these methods is a well known method, which suggests that you pay your debt with the highest interest first. I introduce a new method that I’ve tried, have recommended it to friends and families and many have found it useful. This method of eliminating debt is closer to the realistic life of most people, which suggests to pay the debt of the lowest amount first.

Disclaimer: While the author may have learned and used some of the methods mentioned in this article, he is not claiming to be a financial advisor. The opinions are merely for educational purposes and if used, you are using them at your own risk, releasing the author from any financial responsibility as the result of your actions. It is always advisable that you consult with your financial advisor, prior to making any financial decision.

I would like to thank the user, numada, for inspiring me to write this article. Numada, replied to one of my recent articles titled, “How much money should you save to live comfortably?” posted on the Garifuna Community forum:

http://www.GarifunaCommunity.com

When it comes to dept elimination, one of the common theories that I’ve heard repeatedly, is to pay the one with the highest interest first, by making additional payments, while making the minimum payment on the other ones. After you’ve paid up your target debt, then take the money you were paying on it and roll it up to your next target debt, so the process would be something like this:

Say you have 3 credit cards with a total debt of $4,000:
You owe:

$1,100 on Credit Card 1 at an interest rate of 10%

$2,000 on Credit Card 2 at an interest rate of 20%

$900 on Credit Card 3 at an interest rate of 15%Then under the “pay the highest interest rate first” theory, the payments would go in this order:

Concentrate on making additional payments on Credit Card 2, which has an interest rate of 20%, while making the minimum payments on Credit Card 1 and 3
Once Credit Card 2 is paid up, take the additional payments you were making on it and apply it to Credit Card 3, which has the next highest interest rate of 15%, while making the minimum payment on Credit Card 1.
Now that Credit Card 3 is paid up, apply the additional payments you were making to pay up your last and only, Credit Card 1.

This is the conventional theory out there and it may make a great deal of sense, once you run the numbers. What I’ve done in the passed that has worked very well for me and the friends that I’ve recommended to, is a method that is more realistic to most of us, where you really feel like you are progressing in eliminating your debt. I call this method, the “pay the card with the lowest amount first”, and then concentrate on the next one with the lowest amount.

For the example above, in most case, it would be easier and faster to target and completely pay, Credit Card 3 for $900 than to pay Credit Card 2 for $2,000. I would find some satisfaction in paying off Credit Card 3 and then concentrating my energy on the next Card that I would eliminate faster, which would be, Credit Card 1.

When you run the numbers, my method may not be the most efficient way and you may end up saving more on interest with the first method. Reality is, we live in a world of instant gratification, which is the reason most people get into credit card debt in the first place. This is one of those cases where the old saying, “if you can’t beat them, join them”, comes in very handy. Some habits are just so hard to break, and while most of us think about fighting those habits, in many occasions, we end up doing nothing. You may have tried the conventional way of eliminating debt, only to find yourself not seen any significant progress. I say, don’t fight it and simply adjust your method to the reality of your life. This is one of the reasons I believe my method may bring gratification to many, especially when they see their cards being paid off faster than expected.

With my method, I still use the concept of making additional payments and rolling it to the next card after my target card has been paid up. The only thing that changes from the conventional theory is the order in which I would eliminate the debt.

The process for my method of paying the card/debt with the lowest amount first, would go as follows:

Concentrate on making additional payments on Credit Card 3, which has a debt amount of $900, while making the minimum payments on Credit Card 1 and 2
Once Credit Card 3 is paid up, take the additional payments you were making on it and apply it to Credit Card 1, which has the next lowest debt amount of $1,100, while making the minimum payment on Credit Card 2.
Now that Credit Card 1 is paid up, apply the additional payments you were making to pay up your last and only, Credit Card 2, which has a debt amount of $2,000. At this point you are not concern about other contenders and you should have enough energy to bring the big one tumbling down very faster than if you were worried about other debt at the same time.

As usual, if you have a financial advisor, please follows his/her advise since he/she knows all the details of your specific situation. On the other hand, if you are doing all the crunching yourself, I would advice to consider some financial tools.

For keeping track of expenses, I found that Microsoft Excel does a great job, but when it comes to debt elimination, you would probably need a computer program that assists you in the process with expert recommendations.

I’m not affiliated with any of the following, so please use at your own risk. Having said that, I looked at the following Excel spreadsheet that allows you to record your debt:

Consumer debt manager

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/templates/TC010744651033.aspx

I also ran a search for “debt analyzer” at tucows.com and the following program showed up, which makes expert recommendations to eliminate your debt in the fastest way possible. The program is a FREE 30-day trial, which I think is more than enough to get you going:

Debt Analyzer version 3.5

http://www.tucows.com/preview/393045

Good luck in your debt free life and let me know if you found any of these methods helpful!

About the author:

Jorge Garifuna is a Computer Scientist and Real Estate professional, who loves to serve his Garifuna community. Jorge has served as vice-president of former New York-based, Garifuna youth organization, Lileiti Dufigati, has been the president to Los Angeles-based, Garifuna organization, SONHOCA, and holds membership with various Garifuna organizations, such as Wafadaha Uwara, and national technology organizations, such as ACM and IEEE. Jorge has donated his time to lecture classes about Computer & Internet usage for Garifuna organizations like, MUGAMA. Additionally, Jorge has trained high school students in programming, for national competition, under the BDPA-LA organization.

Jorge is also the CEO of Garinet Global Inc. Garinet has established itself as the major Garifuna Network since it launched in 1999. It currently averages over one million hits per month from over one hundred different countries around the world.

Garinet has consistently created services to enhance the future of the Garifuna community. Through its GariDigital.com website, Garinet offers the general public, a multitude of Website services for organizations, businesses, entertainers and family members.

Jorge may be contacted by email at jg@garinet.com

95 responses so far

Jan 18 2006

My recent meeting at the Pan African Film Festival, 1/17/06

Published by admin under Uncategorized

On Tuesday, January 17, I attended the meeting of the Pan African Film Festival (PAFF) in Los Angeles, California. I was invited to the meeting by Kenneth and Candy, the great folks that I met late last year at a technology meeting.

The meeting room was filled with about fifteen to twenty bright individuals that I had never met. One topic of discussion was the schedule of the Film Festival that PAFF organizes every year for the month of February in Los Angeles, California.

I had the opportunity to meet several members of PAFF, including, the Executive Director, Ayuko Babu, the Celebrity Liaison, Chris Sibley and the Special Assistant, Gail Jenning, among many.

During my brief conversation with Gail, she was kind enough to share with me some of the business ventures that she was involved in. In one of those ventures she imports great seasoning products directly from West Africa to have them distributed in the United States. You can get a better appreciation of her great seasoning products at:

http://www.kingspepper.com

As I mentioned on some of my previous articles, I’m currently collaborating on the paff.org website, assisting Kenneth and Candy with some technical programming and concepts.

If you live in the California area, be sure to checkout the Pan African Film Festival that takes place every February. You will be glad to be one of the first ones to have watched a unique film before it makes it to the big screen. You may also have the opportunity to come across some upcoming actors and actresses that may become big Hollywood stars in the years to come.

To learn more about PAFF, please visit the following website:

http://www.paff.org

About the author:

Jorge Garifuna is a Computer Scientist and Real Estate professional, who loves to serve his Garifuna community. Jorge has served as vice-president of former New York-based, Garifuna youth organization, Lileiti Dufigati, has been the president to Los Angeles-based, Garifuna organization, SONHOCA, and holds membership with various Garifuna organizations, such as Wafadaha Uwara, and national technology organizations, such as ACM and IEEE. Jorge has donated his time to lecture classes about Computer & Internet usage for Garifuna organizations like, MUGAMA. Additionally, Jorge has trained high school students in programming, for national competition, under the BDPA-LA organization.

Jorge is also the CEO of Garinet Global Inc. Garinet has established itself as the major Garifuna Network since it launched in 1999. It currently averages over one million hits per month from over one hundred different countries around the world.

Garinet has consistently created services to enhance the future of the Garifuna community. Through its GariDigital.com website, Garinet offers the general public, a multitude of Website services for organizations, businesses, entertainers and family members.

Jorge may be contacted by email at jg@garinet.com

3 responses so far

JGari.com

Official Site of Jorge Garifuna

Things to consider when starting an e-Commerce business

Business PHP framework ATK 6.4 released

Jorge Garifuna’s Top 3 Picks Credit Card Payment Processors for eCommerce

A magical AJAX-enabled JQuery grid worth looking into

Amazing Google Visualization API implementation in PHP

PHP ATK Framework gets a brand new website

Google projected King of the Web by August 2007

Summary of my technology meeting at LAMPsig, 1/18/06

How to eliminate your debt faster - Part 1

My recent meeting at the Pan African Film Festival, 1/17/06

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