Land of Zoho Creator

This is a re-print of a post entitled “Making a Turd Salad,” that I published last week on my blog for Arizona State University. Raffic Aslam from Zoho gave it some press on the Zoho Blogs as well. Pete and I thought it would be appropriate to publish here as well. Enjoy:

Last Wednesday, my wife was hit by a drunk driver as she was coming home from the gym. I was at home studying for an exam when I got her frantic phone call. Luckily it was right down the street from our house, so I was there within a few minutes. I won’t go into details about the accident, but the following tidbits should give you an idea of what we’ve been dealing with for the past week:

1. The jerk that hit her had an open 18-pack of Tecate Cerveza with several empty cans on the floor of his van.
2. He tried to leave the scene of the crime. Twice.
3. My wife ran after his (flaming, sparking, smoking) minivan, into the intersection, ripped his door open and yelled at him to get out of his car.
4. My wife has red hair. She just came from the gym. She had just been hit at around 35 mph from behind, slammed into the car in front of her, and her airbag deployed. She was not a happy camper. I would not have liked to be on the receiving end of item #3 above.
5. There is almost $13,000 dollars in damage to our car. My wife is doing well. The jerk that hit her is 100% at fault.

Here is some choppy video I took with my cell phone at the accident:

Many thanks to the witnesses that stopped, to the police officers that were on the scene, and to the many friends and family that have asked how we are doing. I’m glad she’s alive.So…you might be wondering how I will tie this event into a post on a technology-themed blog. Sit tight - here it comes.

This isn’t the first time one of us has been in a car accident. My wife was hit a couple months before we got married, and I was rear-ended about a year ago. I guess you could say we’re pretty good at it. With this experience, I know that there are a ton of phone calls to make, receipts to save, people to contact. It can be a nightmare just keeping everything straight. That’s probably why most people call a lawyer.

Since there were no broken bones, and everybody (surprisingly) had insurance, we decided to try to get through this on our own. While I was on hold with the insurance company the next morning, I logged into my Zoho Creator account and built an application for us to manage all the details related to the accident. It took me about an hour to build it. You can demo and download my Accident Tracker application in the Creator Marketplace.

Below are a few screenshots of what it includes:

Collapsible sidebar with links to main functions:

Tabbed menus along top to easily switch between views:

Record notes from a conversation:

(This screen pulls data from the contacts you have added so you can tie a conversation back to a person.)

View Past Conversations:

(With Creator’s built-in features, it’s easy to filter this list however you want. This makes it easy to reference an old conversation.)

Behind the scenes:

(Creator makes it easy to notify me of any additions. I have it set up to send an email to my account and my wife’s account anytime a new conversation is logged. This way we can both keep each other updated if we happen to talk to someone.)

I’ve also set this up so I can upload scanned documents. This came in handy when I was trying to pick up our rental car on Saturday. I needed to give my insurance company some information from the accident report. My father-in-law had his laptop with him, so I pulled up the app and opened the document I had previously uploaded. Wam, bam, thank-you m’am. I would not have been able to get my rental car without it.

A friend of my wife was pondering the validity of a time-honored cliche several years ago. I’ll paraphrase what he said. “I know that when life gives you lemons, you’re supposed to make lemonade. So what am I supposed to do when life gives me turds? Am I supposed to make a turd salad?”

While I’m not happy that life has handed us a pile of turds lately, it gave me the opportunity to brush up on my computer-hacking skills. So if anyone’s hungry for some salad, let me know.

And for crying out loud - DON’T DRINK AND DRIVE.

I am very glad to report that Pascal Veilleux has accepted my invitation to join our blog and will use this space to share with you his Zoho Creator projects, ideas and best practices. Pascal has embraced web 2.0 technologies that help businesses  and has a proven track record of bringing about considerable improvements to his clients. He has also contributed his knowledge and experience in quality methodologies such as Six Sigma and ISO 9000 to the Zoho Creator community with applications such as the Six Sigma Project Charter, which you can download for free from the Marketplace.

I’m looking forward to reading Pascal’s postings and learning from him.

Bienvenue Pascal!

A while back, I wrote about the applications that help me go about my business. Since then, I’ve been testing the different apps in the Zoho stack and have slowly (but surely)  started canceling many of the products and services in favor of Zoho, not only because they are less expensive, but also because they’re better. Granted, in these times of uncertainty any savings are most welcome.

Here’s the list:

1. Virtual Presentations. I stopped using Gotomeeting and started using Zoho Meeting. There is nothing wrong with Gotomeeting, however I found myself giving virtual presentations to just one person at a time, which can be done for free and just as easily with Zoho Meeting.  Benefit: Savings of $50/month.
2. Mail. Outlook is now (as of this week) legacy software for me. I’m done waiting for Outlook to fix a data file that wasn’t closed properly (according to Outlook) and taking 45 seconds to open (on a Laptop with 2gb or Ram, but also with Vista). Zoho Mail is better than Outlook (and Gmail too). Plenty of cool features including the Quick Reply, Offline work, view emails as conversations or in sequential order and many others.  I’m actually enjoying using Email again. Benefit: No more headaches!
3. Team Collaboration.  I was a Groove (unpaid) evangelist and partner from 2003 until now and it was really fun to work with Ray Ozzie’s team while Groove was an independent company. However, since MS acquired Groove Networks, things have changed radically (for one, our mapping product was rendered obsolete when they shut down their APIs for in-process tools). I now use Huddle which takes advantage of the Zoho Remote API when I need to share information (Discussions, Files, Whiteboards) in workspaces. Otherwise, I use the sharing features available in Writer, Sheet and Show to collaborate with my virtual team. Benefits: Easier to use, no need to have Groove installed on every machine, cross-platform and browser-based, and better synchronous collaboration (e.g. documenting editing).
4. CRM. I found the Zoho CRM a bit overkill for what I do, but not so the Zoho Creator CRM app showcased in the Marketplace, which I can modify further to fit my specific needs. Benefits: Customizable and smaller.
5. Dashboard. Zoho Business helps me keep track tasks, calendar entries, links and notes. Benefits: Easy access to everything I need.

And here’s what I’d need to research further for:

1.  Invoicing. Change from Quickbooks Online to Zoho Invoice. I don’t have an issue with Quickbooks, but if I can save $25/month I currently pay, then I’ll move to Zoho Invoice.
2. CMS for my website. I would like to investigate Zoho Wiki as an option, but feel that there isn’t enough information about doing this. The examples provided look good and serve my purposes (web site, application documentation) - I just need to explore this further.

I have managed to change my software to Zoho (services), without having to give my credit card once and  now have a more productive environment than I did before; all while saving money and lots of headaches (priceless). I hope Zoho continues to provide these services for free for small businesses but I wouldn’t have any trouble paying a monthly fee for their stack, if this weren’t the case.

Of course, there is still a wish list; in effect, the availability of deluge scripting and/or Zoho Creator features in other apps would be quite handy.

I have resurrected my first Zoho Creator prototype (Fast Food Tracker) in order to begin reviewing the new features available in ZC 3.0 and test the integration with Zoho DB and Reports, as described on the Zoho Blog. When I first looked at ZC a while ago, all I wanted to know was how long it would take me to build a few forms, import a file of sufficient size to test performance and determine if it made any sense to spend more  time with it. I’ve since realized how powerful and viable it is as a platform for small businesses (even though there’s still plenty of room for improvement).

Here’s what I’ve found in five minutes of tweaking the app:

• Many application layout options improve usability. The ability to select themes, distribution of panes and menus goes a long way toward making applications easier to use and end users benefit from this. I used the Menu layout and was happy with the results (i.e. how easy it is to change from the Entry form to the different views).
• HTML View will be pivotal in expanding Zoho Creator. I spent two minutes creating the graph view by following the steps in the Zoho Blog. This was enough to envision that it will be my preferred way to expand Zoho Creator to include other functionality I’m interested in, such as maps and graphs. I’ve created a long list of things to review further all related to this new view type.

All this is good, however (imo) the folks at Zoho should’ve spent the time and effort required to integrate their lastest graph and reporting engine with this version, because ZC’s current graph view leaves much to be desired and the integration with DB and Reports isn’t really a good workaround.

Here’s what I found from following the steps to integrate Creator with DB and Reports:

• I had to create a smaller view in order to make it work, hence the view on the Southeastern US. The main view has 20,000+ records (within the limits of what is feasible) but the file from which I imported the data is greater than 3 mb (the upper limit), so I couldn’t come up with a graph of the entire US.
• I was unable to change the colors of the bars in DB and Reports, even though there is an option to do so. The result is  a graph with the default colors instead of the ones I wanted.
• The integration between Creator and DB and Reports is painless, but the fact that I can integrate a graph into my app that shows different data (due to the refresh frequency) than what is recorded in the spreadsheet view of the same app is disturbing and surely wouldn’t pass the test of a good manager.

It does seem that they’re keen on addressing this issue as the quote suggests,

A much closer GUI level integration of making report creation features of Zoho DB & Reports available within Zoho Creator is in development.

We’ll keep looking into 3.0 and let you know what we find.

This is just a quick note to let our readers know that Zoho Creator 3.0 is now available. We had the opportunity to see a demo of it some time ago, but we’re just starting to test it within the context of the applications we’ve developed here with the previous version and have already noticed that they’re behaving differently. We’ll try our best to document what has changed and how to go about modifying your existing apps so that they work correctly with 3.0. Stay tuned.

This past week I had the opportunity to chat with Andy McLoughlin, co-founder and product director of Huddle, a very useful and well-designed web-based collaboration application that uses Zoho’s remote API. Huddle intrigued me initially  because of its similarities (from a user’s perspective) to MS Office Groove, a product I know too well (before and after the Microsoft acquisition). I am now using Huddle daily. Here is my list of features that make Huddle worthwhile as a collaboration tool for small teams:

1. Workspaces keep your information in context. Workspaces are invitation-only containers of data and tools where participants collaborate. They work best for small teams (15 people or less) where every person contributes.  Workspaces  compartmentalize your projects, which is particularly handy when dealing with multiple entities or being involved in different projects.
2. File Sharing works better than email attachments. Workspaces include a Files tool for uploading or creating Office documents online that are shared among the participants, thus avoiding the potential conflicts that arise when circulating documents as email attachments. If you are a developer, this functionality is also a good example of how Zoho’s Remote API can be used by an external application to view and/or edit the documents online.
3. Discussion threads are easier to follow than email. The forum-style Discussion tool available with Huddle workspaces makes it easy to follow issues when there is a succession of questions and answers around a specific subject.
4. Tasks viewed by all team members help keep the project on track. This tool with the Ical feed option is a project manager’s best friend.
5. The Whiteboard is a good place to develop an idea. The Whiteboard is a wiki-style tool for when you want to develop and idea and keep everything in one place. It’s also the right tool if you want to keep a journal or log your daily or weekly activities and notes and share them with your team.
6. Alerts via RSS feeds are convenient and non-intrusive.While Huddle provides a mechanism to notify people via email when something has been added to a workspace, it is the RSS subscription that makes most sense, as a  non-obtrusive way of receiving and reviewing information.
7. The Rest. There is also audit trail and version control, selective access to files and Search, which I mention mainly because none of these ever made it into Groove and they would’ve made most Groove users very happy.

In summary, the real benefit of using Huddle (imo) is being able to bring teams together quickly under the same roof (i.e. the workspace) and provide them with a set of complementary tools (i.e. Files, Discussions, Whiteboard, Tasks) to move their agenda forward, starting from a clean slate (and all from a browser).

And now the one wish for the Huddle team - the ability to embed Zoho Creator Forms into Huddle workspaces. Or for the Zoho team - a remote API for Zoho Creator.

Many of you have probably read the post about Zoho reaching 1 million users, which is a testament to the good work from the folks at Aventnet. In addition to this, the soon-to-be released Zoho Creator 3.0, is another good reason for us, the members of the Zoho Creator community to cheer. I say this based on the recent demo I received of the upcoming product.

Here are my top three improvements to the platform:

• It is now very easy to customize views with html code.
• There are many opportunities available  to create Mashups (with other Zoho apps and others).
• Connections to other systems (via XML) won’t require use of the API.

These platform improvements are excellent, but I am mostly excited about the new way they have devised to make it easy for developers and users to meet, test and showcase or purchase applications. We tried to start something like this at LoZC but just didn’t have the bandwidth to get it done.

I applaud how Zoho has focused  on building a solid platform and how its people are helping the user community push it forward. It may just be time for Sridhar to get in front of the large audience (at the upcoming party) and start yelling Developers, Developers, Developers. Now that would be amusing.

For those of you interested in learning how the Closings application works (previous post), here it is. This application has a   Summary View that displays all the data associated with a Real Estate transaction, but not the contact details for all the people that play a role in it (Client, Attorney, Lender). It is important for the user to have quick access to all the contact information from within this view, so the way to accomplish this is by creating a hyperlink from the Closings Summary view to a specific contact record (again, using a Summary view from Contacts). The steps are:

1.  Add hidden text fields in the Closings form to store unique IDs for each contact (i.e. ClientId, AttorneyId, Loan_OfficerId).

Name
(
displayname = "Client:"
type = picklist
values = Contacts[Category == "Client"].Full_Name
on user input
{
Client = Contacts [Full_Name == input.Name];
input.ClientId = Client.ID.toString();
}
)

2. Add a Formula field for each of the contacts (i.e. Client Details, Attorney Details, Lender Details) with the following code:

href="http://www.creator.zoho.com/gabrielcoch/view/33/record/+ ClientId +" target="_blank">Client Details

This shows up as a hyperlink on the Closings Summary view, which upon clicking  it, will open another window with contact details of the Client.

This isn’t technically a subview, but it is a workaround that enables you to link two (or more) views, which is a subject that comes about frequently in the Zoho Creator Forum.

In this post I describe how a small Real Estate Law firm improved they way they do their work considerably when the started using Zoho Creator.

This firm helps their customers with the legal work associated with purchasing or selling properties. The process (i.e. Property Closings) involves among others, keeping track of the status, key participants (i.e. Client, Loan Officer, Attorney for the other side) and whether or not the required information has been obtained in order to complete the transaction.  Preferably, all the information must be in one place. Lastly, it is important for anyone in the firm to have access to this information, regardless of their location.

They had different systems in place for managing their contacts and keeping track of the Closings and found they were spending too much time retyping contact details in their tracking systems, forgetting about sending emails automatically when a milestone had been reached and they had no way of accessing the information while away from their office.

Let’s take a closer look. The application includes two main Forms (New Closing, New Contact) and three different views (View Closings, View Contacts, Client Details, and specifically:

•  Contact Form that includes the details of the main person as well as a related contact. In the case of the Client, the related contact is always the Spouse; for the Loan Officer, the Processor is always the related contact; therefore that relationship is automatically populated. In this context, the Contact Category (i.e. Client, Attorney, Loan Officer) is required.
• Closings Form that contains all the information that must be tracked. Each Closing record actually points to three different contacts (i.e. Client, Attorney Other Side and Loan Officer). Only the names of people in each specific category are displayed as options, hence the need for having a category for each contact.
• Closing View, showing (in a Summary View) all the details of of the Closing.  It is worth noting if the user needs to find the details of any of the people listed in the Closing, he or she can do so by clicking the hyperlink (Client, Attorney or Lender details), which will open a new window with their contact information.

Aside from this, there’s a function that sends a boiler plate email automatically at different times during the process and a couple more bells and whistles, but the basics are shown here. And as you can probably tell from my previous post, the information needs of this entity with regards to contacts clearly differs from what one would expect.

If there is any interest in understanding “what’s under the hood” of this application, vote below and I’ll share the tips and tricks with you.

I am resuming my contribution to this blog by addressing a subject that is critical to me and one that continues to be a headache to manage. My Contacts are without a doubt the most valuable information I maintain and need for different purposes, including messaging, project tracking, marketing and sales and invoicing. Unfortunately, I don’t have a master contact list accessible across the different applications I use (MS Office Groove, Outlook, Skype, Zoho CRM, Gmail, MSN Messenger, Quickbooks Online and other). More than likely I am not alone here.

This unresolved issue has led me to think about using Zoho Creator as my Master Contact Manager. Here are some of my reasons:

1. Control over the Form design. I can design and modify the Contact Form to fit my current/future needs. Some systems have too much information and some others don’t have enough and modifying them isn’t that easy.
2. Integration with other ZC Apps.  The Customer Retention post is a good example. Linking ZC apps is very easy to accomplish.
3. Many filtering and export options. There are many ways of filtering the data, which is very helpful for multiple reasons, including exporting subsets of data to other apps. Ideally, I would like to automate this process, but I don’t know of a clean method yet.
4. Selective Information Sharing. I determine what contacts I want to make available to others by creating a shared view, rather than maintaining different databases.
5. Embedding Contacts in other web apps.  It is useful for me to have the list of people involved in a project (and their information) embedded in a project blog or wiki.

In my next post, I will describe an application that tracks the details of a Real Estate Closing, which involves multiple contacts (i.e. Buyer, Agent, Attorney and Lender). Stay tuned.