As most of you know, PhoenixPo.com is run by one person and all operations center around those who know me.  Contact information is difficult to find on the main site because of this fact.  While I welcome other people to contact me, by no means do I have the production capacity to put forth complex systems in short amounts of time.  As most of my ventures are non-profit, based on both my quirky sense in altruism and my pursuit of doing something that matters in order to gain more self-appreciation for my abilities, help is rare.  That being said, here are my plans for the rest of this year and 2006:

ConTrak Systems:  The convention management system.  My employment at MDG has caused me to increase my web application programming expertise to the next level (still all self-taught as I am the only .Net programmer there):  I have further refined my programming theories, more than tripled my JavaScript proficiency, and gained AJAX and AJAX .Net skills (a way for web sites to act more like applications). 

Looking back, my experience with ConTrak was very beneficial and key to me reaching this stage by providing me the opportunity to work at MDG.  But I now am a better person--more knowledgeable, aware of UI.  A Canadian convention contacted me about using ConTrak at their convention next October.  I will let them do so, but I want feedback as my payment.

With these events, I feel I am ready to use what I learned from ConTrak and try my hand at creating a new system, almost from scratch.  Development will not begin until I have made my decision as to the new system's UI.  Truth be told, I have been pondering this off and on since June.  I want something that looks more professional, more refined.  The new system will employ AJAX quite liberally in an attempt to become more intuitive and less bulky to employ.  My goal is simple: design a better UI and by no means compromise it because I don't think my programming skills are enough to make it happen.  If there's one thing my employment at MDG has taught me is that great accomplishments can be made if one does not budge from the initial design.

CSC Picture Project:  A photographic photo album depicting activities at UNCG's Strong College residential program.  I do not foresee problems attending activities for the remainder of the spring semester.  The fall semester may become more difficult if I decide to work full-time at a company.  I owe my current interest in photography to this project.

Haunted Attraction Pictures:  A photographic photo album depicting three haunted attractions: Woods of Terror, Haunted Forest, and Castle of Horrors.  To date, those pages alone have received more than 2,000 page requests.  While this seems like a small amount, consider this: I have in no way advertised the albums outside of telling people where the pictures I took would be located (and I only did so when asked).  I did not advertise or hand out a web address.  Nothing.

I made some good leaps in my photographic skills here, too.  While photography is still a hobby, I may take people up on their advice and charge the attractions next year.  Now that I have a superb portfolio with undeniable proof I am very competent in this area, I can easily back my words up. 

Note for those who don't know me well: I never display full confidence unless I am absolutely certain.  My ego has always been in check--too much, if you ask most people.

Air Hockey:  While this may not be of concern to PhoenixPo.com's operations, I am a consummate air hockey player.  Unfortunately, the sport never took off and it's difficult to find serious opponents.

After two months away from the sport due to the haunted attraction pictures and working sport games for UNCG and Wake Forest, I made my way back to the table on Friday night.  I knew I was forgetting something after my first attack--my cell phone was still in my pocket.  Alas, it was no more--the second of two cell phones I have owned to suffer its end by meeting an air hockey table in my jeans pocket.

The night was very rewarding and a good warm-up session.  I played three games against different opponents.  After that, I played thirteen consecutive games against my brother.  I remember when I played him a year ago, it was difficult to maintain a constant advantage.  This time, my mean game score was 7-2 without a loss.  I'm happy.  I hope I can get back into the normal routine of spending Friday and Saturday nights behind the table once again.

Discontinued Projects:  The following projects have been discontinued at some point in time over the past year.  I will not work on these unless prompted by an outside party: the Financial Game (FinGame), ResNet Work Order Entry System (WOES), and the Codic Engine .Net.  They were good projects for their time and I can cite examples of when each of these helped me to ascend to a higher rung of proficiency and kept me going with web programming when I did not have anything else to do so.  In fact, the Codic Engine was my very first major self-imposed foray into programming; its predecessor was the first application I created, as was its current web-based incarnation was my first .Net web application.  It's difficult to close the book...