Sitting on zoom this week has been a common theme throughout the workdays. Meeting with Abdullah “Josh” the head back-end developer at a Jordanian software consulting company to configure a local database on my computer for 40 minutes after a whole day of not being able to work with my terminal was just the first of many. While that may sound a little bit grueling, what made it so exciting was in between the debugging of my computer system, we talked about our Eid experiences in Amman and our families ways for celebrating Eid. Josh had no incentive to being available for our needs, but he has been so willing to jump at aiding us in our path to succeeding as web developers for this project. So while there was a lot of trial and error this week that posed a problem for even being able to get started on the actual work of the website, without these slight hiccups, Brendan, Leah, and I wouldn’t have been able to forge strong relationships with people like Josh in Amman.
Thinking about what my work for iLearn means, I reflected a lot on how creating a digital platform that will allow non-profits and CBOs to centrally report their annual work and finances will be useful. A lot of thoughts passed through my head on if this would just become another abandoned application of the millions on the internet or if this had the actual capacity of being useful to the community and audience we intended it for. However, being here in Amman has broadened my world and my understanding of how the education and skills that I have can be useful and have an impact. Part of the motivation is having been in Amman and meeting with the different Non-profits and CBOs. Being able to directly see who and what organizations will hopefully benefit from this sort of software has been the biggest motivating factor.
This project is one of the most rewarding things I have worked on. I am incredibly excited about the idea of creating a useful piece of technology that will hopefully help organizations in Jordan overcome the challenge of communicating important work and finances with donors and the government.
From facing challenges with even getting the Laravel framework (the software we are using to work on the web application) to run on my computer to trying to work around the Arabic to English barrier, there have been a lot of hours spent configuring both my computer to adjust to what I want it to do and configuring and my mind and the way I work to overcome challenges. I am motivated with this project because I feel like it is using my technical skills to propel my interests in social impact.
Since moving past all of the seemingly simple problems of getting different languages like SQL and PHP to configure with my local machine, we are moving fast. From creating a form out of the first template, to enhancing the login system, and even just getting into more of a routine and rhythm to approaching problems, our team is working hard and the developments are showing it!
I am really happy and excited about where this summer is taking me (challenges and all) and can’t wait to see the future of this software and the non-profit sector in Jordan!
