The Legacy Foundation
IT Intern · June 2017 - Aug 2017
This past summer I stayed in Charlottesville. Despite witnessing the astounding, and somehow still heartbreaking incidents happened in August, everything else was mild and smooth, as usual. I worked for The Legacy Foundation, LLC as an IT Intern. Near Pantops, it is a local financial consulting firm providing planning strategies and asset management services, especially for those who are employed by the university. For me It was a great experience to get exposed to some financial industry workflows, yet using technology to solve some of their problems. During the internship, some of the projects I conducted include:
Build and formulate client contacts database with python scripts and MySQL
One of the most important duties of work for consulting firms is to excavate potential clients and to persuade them to stay. Since at The Legacy Foundation, university faculty and employers are the major target, it’s helpful to always have an updated copy of these people’s contacts. By using web scraping and basic SQL statements, things were not that difficult as most of the information was directly shown online - although apparently different departments paid different people to code their HTML, and some of them were not really elegantly written in my opinion.
Expand and optimize Capital Needs Analysis program in C++/Xojo
Capital Needs Analysis program is a tool to calculate and report your asset evaluations given your current financial data. It was developed in Xojo, a VB-like, cross-platform application development tool. It also has a C++ version where a MFC style app is coded and compiled. What I need to do is to modify and optimize some mathematical formulas inside certain functions, while adding a lot more tabs and features to the software. The accuracy is of course the first priority.
Develop and improve corporate website and social media presence
Wordpress can be frustrating for programmers as we are so getting used to keep everything under control by pure coding. However it’s also fun to examine how it can be the most popular website management or blogging system in use on the Web (not because it’s good). Exploring and playing around the plugins store was also a fair part of becoming a Wordpress ninja.
Invent tools to connect with trendy APIs, providing first-hand financial data
This is more of an interesting and experimental project I did with analyst Tong. We combined the ideas of data visualization, information retrieval and a little machine learning, to produce more refreshing and intuitive financial figures to our clients. Looks like it has been welcomed by people since incorporated into our regular presentations.
There are also other works I participated in when I was there, such as setting up mail chimp, editing video ad, and other common IT maintenance. I’d like to thank Judy and everyone in the office for all the help and support. It definitely gave me much more than just a 3 month internship. I had the opportunities to meet and talk to some great people in this community and learn the insights of how it's actually running. It also provided me chances to connect to a broader picture of Charlottesville and a platform to give back. For example, thanks to my colleague Jonny, I got to become a volunteer IT consultant for Center for Nonprofit Excellence Charlottesville, in this past October. It always feels good when you believe you have the ability and you are exactly using this ability to contribute to what you love the most.
Build and formulate client contacts database with python scripts and MySQL
One of the most important duties of work for consulting firms is to excavate potential clients and to persuade them to stay. Since at The Legacy Foundation, university faculty and employers are the major target, it’s helpful to always have an updated copy of these people’s contacts. By using web scraping and basic SQL statements, things were not that difficult as most of the information was directly shown online - although apparently different departments paid different people to code their HTML, and some of them were not really elegantly written in my opinion.
Expand and optimize Capital Needs Analysis program in C++/Xojo
Capital Needs Analysis program is a tool to calculate and report your asset evaluations given your current financial data. It was developed in Xojo, a VB-like, cross-platform application development tool. It also has a C++ version where a MFC style app is coded and compiled. What I need to do is to modify and optimize some mathematical formulas inside certain functions, while adding a lot more tabs and features to the software. The accuracy is of course the first priority.
Develop and improve corporate website and social media presence
Wordpress can be frustrating for programmers as we are so getting used to keep everything under control by pure coding. However it’s also fun to examine how it can be the most popular website management or blogging system in use on the Web (not because it’s good). Exploring and playing around the plugins store was also a fair part of becoming a Wordpress ninja.
Invent tools to connect with trendy APIs, providing first-hand financial data
This is more of an interesting and experimental project I did with analyst Tong. We combined the ideas of data visualization, information retrieval and a little machine learning, to produce more refreshing and intuitive financial figures to our clients. Looks like it has been welcomed by people since incorporated into our regular presentations.
There are also other works I participated in when I was there, such as setting up mail chimp, editing video ad, and other common IT maintenance. I’d like to thank Judy and everyone in the office for all the help and support. It definitely gave me much more than just a 3 month internship. I had the opportunities to meet and talk to some great people in this community and learn the insights of how it's actually running. It also provided me chances to connect to a broader picture of Charlottesville and a platform to give back. For example, thanks to my colleague Jonny, I got to become a volunteer IT consultant for Center for Nonprofit Excellence Charlottesville, in this past October. It always feels good when you believe you have the ability and you are exactly using this ability to contribute to what you love the most.
Edward (above) is the best work buddy ever.
