Show and Tell

Seeking Rails Developer (short-term)

2009-07-10T00:12:16Z

Agathon Group is in need of an experienced Ruby on Rails Developer to help us finish off a mix of internal and external projects. This is a 100% telecommuting, full-time, three month contract position.

We need someone:

~ Self-motivated, who works diligently with minimal supervision;
~ Proficient in Ruby on Rails — we’ll ask for sample sites and detailed descriptions of your role in each;
~ Capable of hand-coding XHTML + CSS, preferably with a little JQuery on top;
~ Optionally experienced in PHP;
~ Comfortable with distributed development and Linux servers;
~ Eligible for employment in the US; and
~ Available immediately or sooner.

Agathon Group is a virtual company with staff distributed across four states and six timezones. We need someone we can trust to be highly motivated to produce good work even when we can’t look over your shoulder. You also need to be very good at what you do, because our clients trust us to deliver higher quality work than they can get anywhere else.

In return, we offer great team chemistry, interesting projects/challenges and competitive pay. If this goes well and projects keep arising, the position may change to a full-time staff position at the end of the three month contract.

Please email hr@agathongroup.com to get the ball rolling.

Some More del.icio.us Links

2009-06-01T22:29:22Z

As some of you my know, we have a delicious account that we post on quite a bit. If you do follow us on there, then you can probably ignore this post, but I figured I’d highlight some of our recent links, as you may find them interesting.

Determining Browser Market Share - I found this interesting, especially since the questions about what browsers to code (and debug) for come up quite a bit with designing and implementing new sites. In other words, do we build on IE6 or Firefox 3, for example? This link is at least showing that FF3 has a greater market share in general, and is a whole lot easier to build on. Our general practice at Agathon is to start with the latest Firefox, ensure functionality in Safari (which is not difficult) then IE7 (this is more difficult), and then IE6 if needed (which is by far the most difficult).

Best UNIX commands on the web - Anyone using one of our grids could certainly find these handy.

10 Advanced PHP Tips - When are PHP tips not handy?

Donation Usability: Increasing Online Giving - Very useful research done on how donations are lost simply because ministries and charities don’t communicate what they are about and they don’t know how to use donations well. Great research and info in here for Non-Profits, Ministries, and Charities.

Modal Windows in Modern Web Design - Some nice tips on using Modal Windows in web design.

As always, if you’d like to see our other links, you can check out our full list on our delicious page.

We’re braving the depths of the internet, so you don’t have to go as deep! :-)

Memorial Day in Mexico

2009-05-26T19:12:45Z

My family and I decided that we would spend this long Memorial Day weekend volunteering at Door of Faith Orphanage south of Tijuana, Mexico. Aside from the puzzled looks that always accompany a decision like spending free time in a part of the world where 50% of the population lives on less than $5 per day, we got our share of concerned looks about threats of swine (er, “H1N1”) flu and drug-related violence in the area. We were undeterred — we had been looking forward to this long before any of the flu news broke — and we reassured the concerned parties as best we could. It was one of the more wonderful experiences my family and I have ever had in our lives. For me, just being able to hold and comfort babies, to watch my own children seamlessly integrate with their peers (rather than just trying to help “those people”), to work alongside gringos and Mexicans that have God’s own heart for the weak and helpless at the center of their ministry… this was all far more valuable than a weekend sitting on the couch and watching basketball.

The flu and violence reports turned out (as expected) to be blown way out of proportion by the US media. (To quote one of the workers, “The closest we’ve gotten to the swine flu here is San Diego.” Ha!) We never would have known that, though, without going down there and seeing things for ourselves.

There will always be people close to you that don’t have your vision or passion. Even with the best intentions, they will try to dissuade you from a decision that doesn’t make sense to them or that flies in the face of (their) logic. They will try to convince you that it’s much more comfortable or secure with them, that it’s best to just stay put. Don’t be deterred — follow your passion and reap the benefits of pushing through any discomfort once you realize that you are actually doing something you love, something you had thought about for a while, something everyone else thought was crazy.

Web Host for Web Hosts

2009-05-08T19:04:42Z

We didn’t start out targeting application and web hosting companies with our services, but they’ve come to us in surprising numbers. Web hosts, as much as anyone, understand the value of stable infrastructure (and the costs of getting that wrong).

One of our clients, Jay at Mediavangelist, recently wrote about their own experiences with handling web hosting internally and why they decided to move to Agathon Group instead. Please read it for yourself. In a nutshell, hosting is harder than you think it is, and distracts from your real passions.

Even if your passion is hosting, there’s a strong argument to be made for having someone else take responsibility for the hardware. These days, the only people who should really care about hardware are the guys who staff the data centers. For everyone else, it’s a means to a much more important end.

Some of our clients start modestly, placing a handful of their clients on one or more grid servers, others scale larger with our our LAMP clusters. For serious horsepower, we move people to dedicated grids of servers, complete with a sexy visual designer for provisioning and controlling virtual servers. The point of all this is that we provide entry points at all different levels/prices and that scratches the hosters’ itch.

We handle the hosting, freeing you to pursue your passions.

Launched: Scriptures From the Heart

2009-04-21T18:55:45Z

The task, should we choose to accept it: build a site using Drupal that allows users to sign themselves up on a daily devotional track. Users get one devotional per day (via email or web) until they’ve completed the track; administers can add and modify devotional content quickly and easily.

The challenges: We have three weeks from project initiation to launch, and we have never used Drupal.

The result: Scriptures From The Heart recently launched, coming in on time and on budget.

Why It Worked

This was a fun project for Agathon Group, in part because of the challenges we faced. We’ve heard good things about Drupal from our peers, but never had the opportunity to use it in the wild. The extremely short development cycle made for creative project management and quick build-outs.

Several things went well with this project, and contributed to its overall success.

Drupal Functionality Customization

We used Drupal’s Module API to create the custom administration options; the built-in Drupal CMS options didn’t scratch the itch we had, so we built something that did, without having to resort to modifying core files. This means that our client can upgrade Drupal without having to worry about retaining customizations that we made.

Drupal Theme Customization

Agathon Group did not create the design for this site, but we built a custom Drupal theme to integrate the client-supplied design and XHTML with the Drupal core. As with the API for functionality, we were able to apply the design to the entire site without having to customize Drupal itself.

Unobtrusive JavaScript

The site uses jQuery to provide unobtrusive JavaScript interaction. If you disable JavaScript and try to use the website, you’re still able to do everything you can with JavaScript turned on—it just might take a few more clicks. We first wrote code to function without JavaScript, then used jQuery to pull in interaction where we needed it. This technique not only provides automatic degradability for non-JS browsers, but it also let us divide and conquer programming responsibilities in our team. One of us created the standard functionality, and another came in and added the JavaScript layer.

Communication

We used Basecamp to marshall communication between us and the client. It proved crucial for tracking todos, storing design revisions, and making sure everyone was on the same page.

We used GoToMeeting for conferences with the our client, pulling in participants on both sides of the project spanning six timezones, several home offices, a couple real offices, some coffee shops, and even a train or two.

Agathon Group is an entirely virtual team, so we used our own Jabber server for internal communication. We also realize the value of face-to-face work, and a local coffee shop hosted some of our staff for a couple hours while we built critical functionality (and ate scones).

Overall, we learned that non-trivial projects can be built quickly, with the right clients, tools, and staff. We happened to have all three, and the end result is a pretty cool website.

Small Giants Illumination

2009-04-10T05:57:08Z

When I quoted yesterday from Small Giants, I had no ideas the waves I would create. Several close friends, all solid thinkers, expressed varying degrees of… angst over the quote. For reference, here’s the citation:

“I guess some people don’t feel [fabulous] about their business, but I don’t know how they manage. I think you need to feel in your gut that whatever you do is the most interesting, exciting, worthwhile thing you could be doing at that moment.” ~ Norm Brodsky, Records Storage

When Norm Brodsky talked about how he feels when working, he was juxtaposing it against the mindset of people for whom work is merely a means to an end; the motions you have to go through for a paycheck. For him, and us here at Agathon Group, the path from start to finish is often just as gratifying as crossing that finish line.

The quote resonates with me because it speaks to the heart of everything Agathon Group does. We’re not just in the business of turning a quick project buck, or reselling the same hosting packages as everyone else. We pursue things that make a difference in the world. Our unofficial motto is to Do Good, both in the value we create and the way we create it. It’s interesting, exciting, and worthwhile work.[1]

Please also note Mr. Brodsky’s essential qualifier, “at that moment.” He’s not trying to claim that today’s work is your life’s calling, everything you were made to be. Heck, he’s not even talking about six months from now. Is what you’re doing at this moment worthwhile? You’re allowed to change your mind next week, or even tomorrow. But today’s work is great, and that’s what gets me up each morning, ready to go.

[1] Not everything we do is flowers and rainbows, but a large enough percentage has that potential that I can make sweeping generalizations. Feel free to take it with a grain of salt.

Worthwhile Things

2009-04-08T21:03:03Z

I love this quote from Small Giants: Companies That Choose to Be Great Instead of Big . It captures that feeling I have when I wake up each morning.

“I guess some people don’t feel [fabulous] about their business, but I don’t know how they manage. I think you need to feel in your gut that whatever you do is the most interesting, exciting, worthwhile thing you could be doing at that moment.” ~ Norm Brodsky, Records Storage

$datacenters++

2009-02-06T02:39:21Z

Agathon Group already offers both managed hosting and grid hosting in Los Angeles, Denver, Toronto and Vancouver. Now you can add Dallas, TX to the list, where we’re recently turned up several clients in a world-class SAS-70 Type II data center.

This new location offers the same security, reliability and high speed connectivity as our other locations, but with the added bonus of being in a place that has the nine-banded armadillo as the official state animal.

What We're Doing

2009-01-08T23:58:10Z

Happy New Year!

Yes, we realize those digits flipped more than a week ago, but we’ve had plenty to keep us busy during that time. Here’s a sampling of what Agathon Group is up to right now:

Working with two different organizations to help them figure out how to move what they do from offline methods to the web. Same mission but new strategies as they reinvent themselves. Very cool stuff, because we’re able to do something that really matters.
Expanding the capabilities of a major concert ticketing agency to handle “print at home” tickets.
Rescuing a ski conditions website after their old webhost went bankrupt and refused to hand over the site code. We’ve had to reverse engineer functionality based only on the final display.
Building out the final phases of a Bible search site, helping make it everything we’ve thought sites like these should be.
Improving our grid hosting services and operations. This is a vital niche begging for someone like Agathon Group to deliver well.

All that makes for a full plate, but we like it that way—enough to keep us on our toes but not so much that we fail to deliver. Here’s hoping your 2009 is full as well!

Back from the Conference

2008-10-24T22:22:27Z

Well we are back in our respective cities, and much like everyone else who attended the Internet Ministry Conference, our hearts and heads are very full. It’s always a wonderful time to see all the ministries that we work with on a consistent basis, and even more so to see our fellow co-workers face to face (not all of us can live in Hawaii, unfortunately).

However, we knew this year would be a little different with the closing of conference organizer Gospel Communications fresh on the horizon. But I think we were all quite impressed that despite the frustrations and confusion people may have had, the attitude of the conference was not one of navel-gazing or somberness, but one of motivation and courage. There is always a sadness with the ending of a chapter, but an excitement and a hope with the beginning of the next, and that was never more true than at this conference.

As Agathon’s resident extrovert, I want to personally thank all of you who stopped by and talked with us. It was so good to see all of you, and while we’re sorry that we can’t give you all iPods, we hope that we can help you in other more practical ways in the future. :)

There are, of course, many more questions that float around out there unanswered, and if there’s any of those that we can help answer, don’t hesitate to contact us via email or phone any time. I got my fill of talking to people, and I miss it already, so feel free to just call and say hi if you must.

And if you all want autographs on your trading cards, I’m sure we could arrange something. :)

So a big thanks from us to Gospel Communications and all you incredible ministries that have made the Internet Ministry Conference what it is. Though it will probably never look the same as it has, I do hope that the community and the purpose will.

Cheers!

Next Week @ Bootcamp and IMC

2008-10-17T15:41:52Z

The Agathon Group team is all headed out next week to teach our annual Bootcamp conference, followed by several days of speaking and hanging out at the Internet Ministry Conference. If you’ll be at the Internet Ministry Conference, please stop by and say hi to us! Not only would we love to see you and chat, but we’re also raffling a free iPod touch, so make sure to stop by for your opportunity to win.

Since we all work around the country (spanning six time zones), this is our once a year opportunity to not only see a lot of our clients face to face, but to also see each other face to face. It’s a whirlwind every year, but it’s always a good time.

During both conferences, project work will be put on pause, however technical support will continue as normal.

If you’re at the IMC, we’ll see you soon! We wish you safe travels on the way!

ISP Planet profiles Agathon Group

2008-10-11T00:56:44Z

ISP Planet, a widely-read site dedicated to ISPs, web hosts and data centers, has a write-up about Agathon Group, an “open source webhost… dedicated to business excellence and moral excellence.”

Of the variety of clients we serve, Alex Goldman wanted to focus on our work for ministries and the Church, but in the second half of the profile also talks a bit about grid hosting and its tremendous benefits.

Peter has been doing quite a few interviews lately due to some of the ways we’re breaking new ground with self-service grid hosting. I’ll try to remember to post more as they publish.

Real Life Tron

2008-10-08T04:29:05Z

In a cool story of art imitating [artificial] life, programmer Daniel Wellman describes his Tron game in which “lightcycles” battle in an arena, forcing each other to crash into walls. In the 1982 movie on which the game is based, a lightcycle breaks through an arena wall to escape and run wild (hope I didn’t just ruin the movie for anyone).

In the game version, a programming bug… allows lightcycles to escape and run wild through the computer’s RAM, causing spectacular system crashes. I can only imagine their profound shock when they realized their software was flawed in exactly the same way as the movie’s villainous Master Control Program.

A geeky read, but entertaining to the core.

Cloud Cafe Podcast on 3Tera

2008-09-24T01:31:02Z

Cloud Cafe interviews 3Tera about AppLogic (the software powering Agathon Group’s grid service) in this fascinating exploration of cloud computing and Applogic’s particular take on it.. The conversation gets pretty deep when they’re discussing possibilities of open interfaces between cloud vendors, but stick with it. For me, the most interesting material started about halfway through when they talked about the tremendous cost savings clouds can provide for organizations of all sizes and shapes.

The podcast is actually a couple months old, but everything discussed is as timely as ever^*. Listen for yourself: Cloud Cafe #4: 3Tera

^*One change from the podcast is that Silkfair, mentioned in the interview, is now running on an Agathon Group “private cloud.” Moving the app from its old home to Agathon Group was really as easy as they make it sound in the podcast.

The Dip

2008-09-11T06:49:46Z

I like Seth Godin, I really do. He has a knack for restating common sense ideas in a way that teases out why they are so important. The ideas become memes and the memes shape our thinking.

The Dip is Mr. Godin’s take on being the the very best at what you do.

Confused about what that even means? The dip is the difference between being good at something and being the very best. It’s hard to get from good to best, but the rewards for pushing just a little further—through the dip—are exponentially larger.

Part of knowing when to push is knowing when to quit. Some dips are yours to grasp, but other times you’re better off letting go and walking away. Save your energy for where it will pay off.

Still confused about the dip? If I have one complaint with this book, it’s that it has a hard time bringing abstract concepts to life. The Dip is a scant 80 pages though, short enough to get through in a single sitting (yet still about 30 pages longer than it needed to be.) It’s still worth a read as a lens to evaluate which things you’re doing that are frittering your time away, and which things are worth the extra effort to do even better.