opportunity · EJ's Wonder Emporium

Building your own business through task automation

Sun, 07 May 2023 12:32:00 +0500

The importance of Task Automation

Task automation is the process of using software to automate simple tasks or a series of more complex tasks. This reduces the need for manual handling of such tasks, therefore improving accuracy and efficiency. Once configured, tasks are completed automatically, allowing more time for employees to focus on creativity and strategic workflows.

How to Automate Tasks

There are many different ways to automate tasks. Some common methods include:

Using software robots (bots) to perform repetitive tasks
Creating macros to automate tasks in a spreadsheet or other software program
Using workflow automation tools to automate processes that involve multiple steps

The Benefits of Task Automation

The many benefits of task automation include:

Increased productivity: Task automation can free up time for employees to focus on more creative and strategic work.
Improved accuracy: Task automation can help to improve accuracy by reducing the risk of human error.
Enhanced efficiency: Task automation can help to improve efficiency by streamlining processes and eliminating unnecessary steps.
Reduced costs: Task automation can help to reduce costs by eliminating the need for manual labor.

How to Get Started with Task Automation

If you are interested in automating tasks in your business, there are a few things you need to do to get started:

Identify the tasks that are most suitable for automation.
Choose the right automation tools.
Develop a plan for implementing automation.
Train your employees on how to use the new automation tools.
Monitor the results of your automation efforts and make adjustments as needed.

How I Automate Tasks in my Development Environment

Throughout my professional career, the companies I have founded have all stemmed from observing an existing need, and recognizing my ability to fill that need. Be it web design, application development, or software automation, my companies were also all established as partnerships. This collaboration allowed me to provide value to the client while collectively sharing responsibilities.

As time goes on, responsibilities can shift and the levels of efficiency and productivity can change. As usual, I answer the phone calls, I respond to the emails, I lead the efforts in sharing what the business is all about. In addition, for my current company I am also the primary developer which my clients are seeking to have working on their projects. The successes and experience gained through my previous companies have helped to establish myself as one of the top engineers in the field, intimately familiar with the software and hardware stacks being used.

This is where I start to let my creative juices flow a bit. The more effort spent on tasks “X”, “Y” or “Z”, the more I am able to identify the portions of those tasks which are repetitive. At this point I am able to mitigate this repetitiveness by utilizing existing automation tools or by creating new tools from scratch for these specific tasks. This results in a very lean infrastructure for a business. This form of task automation allows me to be more creative and focus on exemplary solutions for my clients and the community, instead of solutions that can bring a quick buck.

Task Automation in Development

When it comes to task automation in development, normally the mindset required does not come naturally. Meaning not everyone can easily recognise that they have performed the same steps in a process 3 times in a row. Their focus is on the task itself, not the process in which to complete it. To find this process, you must also record or note each step taken to complete the task/s.

For example, when working with Linux and AOSP development, 90% of the steps one takes are already recorded by default in a hidden file in the user’s “/home” directory. Check for a “~/.bash_history’’ file and it will contain all the commands entered into the terminal for that user’s bash sessions. Scrolling through the lines of commands recorded, we can begin to spot the repetitive commands which keep repeating. Those lines can be copied out into a separate notepad/.txt file for now, including a comment about the task it relates to.

After scrubbing through the history looking for patterns, there will be an arsenal of repeated steps, start looking at each task and establish variables from the parts that change. This allows us to start building small functions that can handle these variables (Example: do_taskname $1, $2, $3, $4, etc.). Building out functions to take specific inputs can also help take the work out of a lot of things that just take time away from creativity. Especially when we start to tie those functions together into something usable.

In AOSP, we still use a “vendorsetup.sh”. This allows us to build a “vendor profile” or use one that already exists in the project, and add the common functions there. Or if you are like me, you tie those functions together with a menu or a UI, and lock the user into the process they should follow.

An alternative route one could take when looking for ways to automate things in software and engineering, is to also look for others that thought of it first. This is where tools like the “Android-Generic Project” come into play.

Very often, when you see a need for a solution somewhere within your workflow, someone else also saw that need and already started working on a solution. My recommendation for places to look for such solutions include: Bitbucket, GitHub, and GitLab. There are of course other options though, you just have to keep your eyes peeled.

For your company, you have the unique knowledge and details of what you or your team’s workflow consists of.You have now equipped yourself with the knowledge of what to look for in order to make things easier, accurate, and efficient!. Get out there and start automating your work tasks. You can thank me later ;)

Conclusion

Task automation is a powerful tool that can help businesses to improve productivity, accuracy, efficiency, and cost-effectiveness. If you’re not already automating tasks in your business, then what better time than today to consider the benefits and get started?

Here are some important tips to help automating tasks in your business:

Start small. Don’t try to automate everything all at once. Start by automating a few simple tasks and then gradually add more complex tasks as you become more comfortable with automation.
Be patient. Automation can take some time to implement and get up and running. Don’t get discouraged if you don’t see results immediately. Just keep in mind that the efforts going in will lead to the improvements to the business in the end..
Be flexible. As your business grows and changes, you may need to adjust your automation strategies accordingly. Be prepared to make changes as needed.
Get help if you need it. There are many resources available to help you automate tasks in your business. If you get stuck, don’t hesitate to ask for help from a consultant or other expert.

If you would like to check out some of the task automation I have been using in my profession, feel free to head over to Android-Generic Project (https://android-generic.github.io). If you feel your AOSP based project could use an automation mindset to help make things easier on your engineering department, please checkout the Bliss Co-Labs (https://blisscolabs.dev), as that is kind of what we’re here for.

I hope you found this blog post helpful. If you have any questions, please feel free to leave a comment below. And if you know someone else who might find this information helpful, please share it with them.

A Return To Bliss

Fri, 24 Feb 2023 16:20:00 +0500

What Happened

It’s been a minute… but it’s been a very valuable minute to say the least. So what has been going on? Let me fill you in.

Last we checked-in, I was heading off to work for Esper, doing what I love to do. I got a chance to learn more about their projects, help them expand hardware support and fix a few issues. I even got the chance to learn how businesses have been working with Android and AOSP. Overall, before becoming part of their recent round of layoffs in January, I felt I had a solid impact on Esper’s future, and hope that some of the plans laid out together allow them a successful future in the market.

When one door closes, another one opens

I have always been the optimistic type, to a fault at times. So the week I was laid off, I was already being contacted by companies looking to get some work done for bringing Android to their x86 based devices. So I took that as a sign for what’s next, and started to plan out the business plan for Bliss Co-Labs (take 2). This time, not only as a software development company, but as a contract development and consulting company too. Since it seems the niche is Android-x86 work, might as well try and fill the need I see, right?

So I’ve filed Bliss Co-Labs as an S-Corp, so the company can take on these contracts, and divide up the work based on each team-members specialties. My goal is to still be involved in every project, but I am planning on helping everyone learn the magic of Android-x86 in the process. This will also extend to the customers too, as the company is offering a collaborative contract development service, where we will work with their engineers to help them learn how to work with Android on x86 or Android on Linux, and also license the use of our shiny new tools (shameless plug for the new version of Android-Generic Project coming out soon).

Back to my Blissful roots

Overall, I see what has happened over the last two months to be a godsend, allowing me to follow my passions, and not in a way that is geared towards making the largest possible profit, but in a more Blissful way, planning the exemplary route that would benefit the most users at the same time. So when customers need their proprietary bits to stay private, we can do that, while allowing the structure we build to support those proprietary bits, the ability to benefit the next customer behind them.

What about BlissLabs

The plan for BlissLabs is to stay running as a 501(c)3, and continue as the non-profit it has been, since that company has seen growth and reach spread further each year, we don’t want to spoil things for that momentum. This was another reason I decided to start the S-Corp as a separate entity from BlissLabs, using my own funds. So what we do through Bliss Co-Labs does not conflict with that organization at all.

Our intention is to provide the customers with a way to work with our open-source projects, while creating in-house solutions that the customers can use themselves to help automate the process further. So yes, if the plan works out in the end, we would have created the robot that replaces our jobs. But we would have also created the solution that allows us to move on to bigger and better ideas for the community, and implement those much faster.

A State Of Bliss

Tue, 19 Apr 2022 16:20:00 +0500

The Backstory

Bliss has been a part of my life since 2012/2013. I had initially started as a graphic designer with Team Bliss through kbell, a developer on XDA that was maintaining the tablet I was using (Galaxy Note 10.1 I think), and I was very much a noob trying to help the community with answers to their questions. I eventually met the rest of the team, just after they had split from Beanstalk ROM, into a new team, Bliss ROM.

This team was so much more helpful in my learning how to work with Linux and Android source than any of the famous guides their members have produced over the years ever have been. They cared about the teammates first, then the product of that teamwork second. That mentality helped to foster some great ideas as other projects started from members of the team, such as Nicholas Chum’s, Substratum, and a few other projects due to our open discussions about technology and the future potentials of Android.

The first few years of working with Team Bliss was a blast, with many successes as well as drawbacks. Noticing how a majority of the issues we were facing on the team were due to conflict of opinion or bad judgment when it came to direction, we decided to decentralize how the team operated and how our infrastructure worked. That is where I got the initial vision for starting a non-profit 501c(3) organization to take over the tasks of worrying about the “how” in keeping the team running, and let the team members focus on what they enjoy the most. This was how Bliss Family of ROMs was born, and has since been renamed to BlissLabs. This non-profit allowed our team to grow into many teams with very different projects, but they all shared Android, Linux and treating eachother as family at the core.

Accomplishments within the team

I initially started off on the team learning as much as I could, and eventually started the BlissRoms-x86 project (Bliss x86 for short). I based it off what I learned by picking through the Android-x86 projects source commits. While maintaining Bliss x86, I also joined the Android-x86 team, and we all started working together, but still keeping projects separate, while cross promoting each other’s work, and helping in each other’s community.

Over the following years, we offered the active members of Android-x86 project a space on our Slack server, access to Android build servers, and together we grew, attributing our work to Android-Generic Project to make things easier to work with for the community, and the patches refined from there, back into Android-x86 project when ready.

This move has allowed us to continue development on Android-x86 project past Android 9, and into Android 10, 11 & 12, and allowed Bliss OS 11, 12 & 14 to act as the testing ground for all the experimental changes that had the potential to wind up added to the Android-x86 project, while helping to provide all the test cases needed to automate the processes, patchsets, and customization options, and wrapping them up into Android-Generic Project.

This is where we started having an even greater impact on the community, allowing other ROMs an easier way to apply the work we’ve done onto their projects and benefit from it. This is what helped bring Project Sakura and a few others to PC’s, and provided the base for the Android 11 release of Prime OS. We also started working on a web based (Django) frontend for what Android-Generic Project was doing through terminal and Linux GUI, and automate it for users through a frontend web UI.

Then Waydroid hit the scene, I also saw a need to help on that project, so I dove right in, reworking the patching system to be more like what Android-Generic Project was using and organizing things to work better for x86 & x86_64 targets, as well as make it compatible with other ROMs, including /e/, Bliss & Project Sakura. We also ended up adding Waydroid target support to Android-Generic Project, since it fit neatly within that project’s vision for Android on all hardware. Waydroid also shared quite a few things under the hood with Android-x86, so the work there wasn’t too different. The work we did through Waydroid was an instant hit with the community, and allowed BlissLabs the ability to Level Up its ability to help the rest of the community by becoming a fiscal host on Open Collective.

What’s Ahead

Along this path I have been on with BlissLabs, a few companies have started to approach me and ask for my assistance in their projects which either work with my previous efforts, or use very similar methods to get their own work done. I have always given each one a conversation, my time and thoughts. Recently though, one of these companies, Esper has made an offer that would help not just my family and my personal life, but it would also provide more resources for running BlissLabs and supporting the future of Android on x86 development.

The only downside is that I would have to give up code contributions to Bliss OS, Android-x86, Android-Generic Projects, and others, while enabling me to continue managing the projects, but not contribute code towards them. While I was conflicted about this idea, I have to also take the time to recognise that I have reached a point where I have very few options available to me where I can turn to and learn from in the open-source community. I feel that further progress in the Android Desktop vision needs experts that just aren’t available to the FOSS community. Working with Esper could allow access to such experts, and also allow access to other learning opportunities that I do not have available currently. So, while the decision was difficult, I have decided to sign on with this company and continue my future work on Android for x86 platform from there.

What does that mean for BlissLabs and the projects? Well, you can expect the next few months (or longer), to be quite the transition phase. We are looking for new volunteers who would like to help in the development of all of these projects, and more.

With me leaving the coding side of these projects, it is making room for the great minds of @jackeagle, @hmtheboy154, @axonasif, @utzcoz, @erfanoabdi, and others to take over. I will focus on my leadership skills and hopefully fine tune a future vision of the Android on PC’s that we’ve all loved working on so far.

Don’t worry about BlissLabs, or the future here. The universe has a way of working things out for those that stay true to their dreams, and I know I haven’t given up on mine yet. :)