Josh Pyles's dashboard

Josh Pyles replied on June 26, 2008 02:15 to the discussion "Invoicing process is too complicated, here are my thoughts" in Less Everything:

Perhaps this process could be rethought... maybe the preview and data entry could be done at the same time with some sort of live preview, including what the email subject and message would be. Just an idea...

I couldn't figure out how to change the themes in that template area. Do I have to enter header and footer text in order to just change the colors? That was the area I looked in to change my theme, but I didn't understand how it worked. Part of the problem there is that I didn't see there was anywhere you could select a "Template" to use in the invoice creation process either.

Re: auto-saving bug: yeah that's a strange one. It seems like it would be fine to auto save as long as it still pops up that add new line item box.

Glad you're liking the feedback. As a web application designer it's sort of my job to be nit-picky about web-apps, but it's all for the greater good of making things even better. I'll be sure to post things here if I find more bugs or have additional feedback.

Allan replied on June 26, 2008 00:27 to the discussion "Invoicing process is too complicated, here are my thoughts" in Less Everything:

Hi Josh,

Preview is first because sometimes I need to check the invoice to make sure its the right template before I go thru the sending process.

Theme is called template its changeable from the form screen, changing it from the preview screen is a very interesting idea. We'll definitely discuss it. You can edit your templates from "Settings/Import Data" > "Templates"

I'll look into making email fields more noticeable.

This is a bug we've noticed, the auto-saving of the invoice SHOULD save the whole invoice.

We've talked about allowing the user the ability to add custom colors to the templates. Changing the layout is far down the list of things we want to tackle.

We appreciate the help/suggestions/bug catches you're giving us, please keep them coming.

Allan

Josh Pyles started a conversation in Less Everything on June 26, 2008 00:15:

Invoicing process is too complicated, here are my thoughts

Sending invoices is a little confusing. It was my first time, so I thought i'd throw some of my initial thoughts out here:

- Why do I see the preview first? It seems like this should be the last step.
- Why can't I change the theme from here? I can't figure out where to go to change my default invoice theme
- Heirarchy could use some work. I didn't notice the Email Subject and Email Heading inputs so I accidentally left them blank.
- Can we have a more basic theme? I'd love a theme that was strictly black and white. Not sure what's going on with that colored box on the right side of the line description either.
- Adding a line item saves the invoice instead of adding a line item. The second time I click Add line item it works, but this is pretty confusing.

Hope this feedback helps. Oh, feature request: custom themes or color/font schemes? That would make me really happy.

A comment on the question "How do I keep track of expenses outside the business account?" in Less Everything:

Would you say this should be something I do every month? A reimbursement "rent" package that the company pays to myself? This sounds like a great solution. Thanks for the advice! – Josh Pyles, on June 24, 2008 00:24

A comment on the idea "Full title of items in the title= attribute?" in Strands:

Ah, got it. Cool. – jherskowitz, on June 23, 2008 23:23

Josh Pyles replied on June 23, 2008 23:17 to the idea "Full title of items in the title= attribute?" in Strands:

Not the URL of the item, but the full title of the item. Currently it's just showing the truncated version of the title, but it would be nice to just hover over it to see the entire title. Sometimes I don't know if I've already seen something or not in the sidebar.

Flickr does this for example on their image thumbnails so you can see what the full title is before clicking: http://dznr.org/qegv

jherskowitz replied on June 23, 2008 22:51 to the idea "Full title of items in the title= attribute?" in Strands:

Just to make sure I follow... you want the tooltip to show the entire URL, yeah?

jherskowitz started following the idea "Full title of items in the title= attribute?" in Strands.

Josh Pyles shared an idea in Strands on June 23, 2008 22:03:

Full title of items in the title= attribute?

Can we get the title attribute filled with the full title of the item for longer items that have been truncated?

See: http://dznr.org/ln55 for example...

Johnny Branch replied on June 23, 2008 19:12 to the question "How do I keep track of expenses outside the business account?" in Less Everything:

You could write a business check made payable to you reimbursing the business portion of expenses paid personally.
This practice does not violate the required separation of corporate and personal funds. Thus you keep in tact your corporate veil protection. The trick is to make sure you have the correct allocation of business vs personal expenses. For proper allocation of office in home deductions you need to read the IRS publication 587. This publication can be downloaded from irs.gov in pdf for html format. When reading be sure to first study the qualifications for office in home deductions on page 2. Then if you do
truly qualify review page 6 on how to set up the allocation formula.

The single reimbursement check should then be categorized into the specific business deductions areas such as rent or utilities for tax filing next year.

A comment on the question "How do I keep track of expenses outside the business account?" in Less Everything:

I have heard of that but I'm speaking more about things like my rent for my apartment which happens to include my office and my personal internet that my business uses as well. Im sure I'm not the only one facing this situation. Is what I just mentioned part of the piercing? If so, how do I make it right? – Josh Pyles, on June 23, 2008 15:31

stevenbristol replied on June 23, 2008 12:47 to the question "How do I keep track of expenses outside the business account?" in Less Everything:

Hi Josh,

The way my family handles this is we have a second "Business" that is for our family expenses. We don't send any invoices through that business, but we do track our money.

Allan Branch replied on June 23, 2008 11:26 to the question "How do I keep track of expenses outside the business account?" in Less Everything:

You should NEVER pay for anything for your company through your business account. In a lawsuit, this will allow a lawyer to break "the corporate seal" and would allow them to take your personal assets. This is not good accounting practices, so we do not give functionality to accommodate for it. However you can create an expense and NOT assign it to a bank account using "How did you pay?". This bypasses the accountability of the bank accounts.

Josh Pyles asked a question in Less Everything on June 23, 2008 04:53:

How do I keep track of expenses outside the business account?

What do I do about those expenses that come out of my personal accounts? I don't really know how to track these.

For example, I pay rent each month out of my personal bank account. This is not completely tax deductible, but a small portion of it is. There are other bills that overlap as well. Electricity, Phone, Internet, etc...

Since you guys designed this for small businesses, is there a good way to track these sort of expenses without having to manage the entire personal account through LA as well?

Josh Pyles started following the idea "Center company/product logos in clickable boxes?" in Get Satisfaction.

John Barker replied on June 20, 2008 17:13 to the idea "'Home' => Stored address? 'Work' too? (Check-in Shortcuts.)" in Brightkite:

You can set your home, work, school, etc. addresses to placemarks and name them whatever you want (I do believe there are certain restrictions though, like no spaces).

So for example, if you made a placemark with your home address and called it home, you can checkin through sms by simply txt'ing @home.

Anything that starts with a ! is going to post that txt to your placestream. Hope this clears up any confusion. If you have any other questions, I recommended going to the help section (on brightkite) and then checking out the screencasts, there is one for placemarking.

Dave.therio@gmail.com replied on June 20, 2008 17:11 to the idea "'Home' => Stored address? 'Work' too? (Check-in Shortcuts.)" in Brightkite:

Oh I see. Thanks.

A comment on the idea "'Home' => Stored address? 'Work' too? (Check-in Shortcuts.)" in Brightkite:

Dave, if you placemark your home address as "Home" then via text all you would need to say is "@home" and it will check you in there. – Lesley, on June 20, 2008 17:09

Dave.therio@gmail.com replied on June 20, 2008 17:03 to the idea "'Home' => Stored address? 'Work' too? (Check-in Shortcuts.)" in Brightkite:

Can you check in via text by "!home"?

trav!s replied on June 18, 2008 23:30 to the problem "New Contacts are automatically added as "Employees"" in Less Everything:

nice, thanks guys.. i noticed this as well and it seems to be fixed