And yet again, the conversation ensues: what would a web community look like for Ironworks? This conversation has happened on more than a couple of occasions over the past three or four years, in part, I think, because the nerd quotient at our Bible study is quite high. I mean, you put a web designer, a programmer, and a networking guy in one room and the thing is bound to turn up. There’s also a real problem with Ironworks, too, that we all know about and want to address: it’s just too hard to stay in touch. People come to our community and we build relationships with them only to watch them leave in pursuit work or school or, well, because they were only just visiting in the first place!
Web technology was built in order to close this physical divide. It’s about connecting people who would otherwise have no business knowing each other because of physical constraints of time and distance. Email, instant messaging, bulletin boards, blogs…all of these technologies help to fill that void. So the techlogist’s question is: how can these technologies be pulled together to represent the voice of a particular community as accurately as possible?
Now, I know the problem that begins when discussing an idea like this—because I’ve experienced it. When a bunch of people get together to discuss a technological solution to a problem, it’s always an intersection of what’s desirable, what’s feasible, and what’s possible. What’s possible is that we could build this gigantic, incredible, open-source community tool and quit our jobs and just consult on this new software and get famous. However, that’s not really feasible, nor is it even really desirable. I’ve sat in meetings where the guy with the vision goes on and on about the possibilities of the project until you go crosseyed, because he doesn’t get that it’s way outside the realm of feasibility.
I don’t want to do that. Instead, I want to build this site for purely selfish reasons. Among them:
- To post a community calendar where people can add their own items and get notified by email automatically when an event is coming up.
- To contact Rich Prudenti and Tom Wilkinson without worrying about phone bills or time zones.
- To post up a Bible study on Monday so people can come prepared to discuss by Friday at their option.
- To have conversations with people I don’t get to see as often as I’d like.
- To let people update their own freakin’ contact information and let others see, print, export and mass-(e)mail each other.
These all are my desires for the system (feel free to add to the list!). It’s interesting—and frustrating—that not all of these things can happen in the same package, though. BBSes or Blogs only lend to conversation and not so much to calendaring or profiling. In fact, several technologies that I’ve looked at seem to have a very limited scope in this regard…no one has effectively built the de facto, extensible online community portal tool. The most notable examples of what I’ve seen so far are as follows:
- MovableType - my beloved blogging software. It does a great job at letting people post and discuss conversation topics, but doesn’t present a very structured community model (ID/password, etc.).
- MimerDesk - the most encouraging lead I’ve had so far (scope the hot features), but it focuses mainly on the groupware aspect of a “community” and has a complicated install process that requires root access to my server—which I don’t have.
- PHP Nuke - if there is at least a runner-up for the title of de facto open-source community portal software, PHP Nuke is probably it. The lame part is, though, that every PHP Nuke site I’ve run across so far looks like total garbage. I just skip right by sites that look like garbage or their example sites look stupid. It makes me say to myself, “Okay, so this is what you expect me to build with your software?” Anyway, maybe someone can explain to me why PHP Nuke doesn’t totally bite.
- phpBB - gets honorable mention for wide use as a BBS, but that’s pretty much it.
I’ve also come across portal)ZINE, which bills as a portal about open source content management, but I’ve yet to get any really useful information out of the site.
So, from a usability standpoint, are there any other features that should be added to my list above? I’d be really interested to hear back from Ironworks members, pastors or leaders who have similar interests, or anyone who currently has experience in building or maintaining such a site. From a technical standpoint, are there some technologies that I’m missing? Any tips on Googling for this information (typing “open source community portal software” in Google only gets the portals about open source software, not sites that develop open source portals!)? Any feedback is appreciated!
21 Comments
ken, are you tired of my blogs?
to think that you could try to communicate with my husband, at 1:08 a.m., and I don’t have to worry about my living room being clean,or my children being woken up…..I support this!
(you must know I am making fun of myself in this…you are welcome in our living room anytime…)
Well, alot of that stuff is above my head. I’ll implement the flash highlights :)… (I know you programmers think that we designers are stupid, but in general - not you kenny you are a weird exeption - programmers design ugly interfaces! SO THERE!). Ironworks web… ok, lets try it and discuss it in person. I can’t seem to blog clearly today.
Jen, are you kidding? Your comments are half the reason I post on this site.
Well, maybe not half, but they’re still cool…
As far as communicating with your husband, well, I’d much rather hang out in your living room and get the “full Poley experience”—so long as you guys don’t move to another state!
I don’t think programmers think designers are stupid…the ones that do need a reality-check, anyway. Human-computer interface is a big deal: people don’t use programs (web sites, kitchen appliances) that look stupid.
Again, I think we could always set up a “website,” but I think we can do better. If we set up a community portal that will allow people to chat with each other, get meaningful information, post thoughts and so on, it would more accurately represent the voice of the community. For example, kennsarah.net has been a great outlet for talking with friends and so on, but it’s still my voice/perspective/conversation that’s canonical (for lack of a better phrase). No one else gets to start a conversation or participate outside the realm of my blogs—no matter how hard Jen tries to derail the subject.
This is a very vertical relationship: Ken speaks, everyone else listens. A community portal should be much more horizontal: everyone gets a chance to speak, and everyone gets a chance to listen. TheOoze accomplishes this to some degree, but the navigation for the site is clunky (I mean, they absolutely buried the forums link). Their system is, as far as I can tell, homegrown. I’m hoping that there’s some sort of package out there that we can install and build upon rather than having to start from scratch.
Well, I am working on a photoblog for beck, so… I can build an interactive photogallery if you use MT for anything in the ironworks conglomerrate site. Also, If you need at least temporary hosting, My CPU is set up with IIS 5.1 and has PHP 4, Perl, and something else that I can’t remember… But it’s at least useable for a launch server (plus you get basically unlimited space- not that you’d need it). This is obviously not a permanent solution, but it could be a viable temporary one.
Ken, this is actually something I have given thought to before, and here’s my conclusion: something like what you are talking about would seem to require a combination of technologies. I don’t think it’s such an unfeasible thing, too, to use different tools for different things and make them all accessible via a portal. For instance, there could be a community blog, phpBB, chat room, calendaring tool, study archive, and the like all on one domain and all accessible from the portal. That would be pretty much what you’re talking about, no?
John, I agree, this would require a number of technologies. I guess what I’m exploring is whether or not those technologies can be more or less unified into one system. The single sign-on is a big deal for me—I don’t want people to have to worry about several different login IDs if I can help it. For example, I want the following modules to be secure:
Private News/Blog
BBS
IM/Chat
Calendar
Contact Information
There could also be a public news/blog, but that depends on what people really want. Anyway, to secure each of those, you could potentially have five different IDs to track, which would suck, er, be really lame. I’d much rather have one ID that lets users access a system that will let them do all of those things.
The tricky part is finding such a system.
I think we can forget finding that system; building it, however, doesn’t seem to be out of the realm of possibility…
It doesn’t seem to be too hard to pass data among web applications, even among ones that aren’t specifically built for that purpose. XML is a good vehicle for such data-passing, but I think some research into security would be called for before doing that. Even aside from XML, there’s open source applications that pass data to other applications very easily, and I’d imagine that passing a username and password between sites from a portal app can’t be too hard (if we just take a look at the code). Even if it *is* too difficult, and becomes unfeasible, would it be too much to ask of users to use the *same* ID and password on all systems?
Just a thought.
A comment on the “Full Poley” (not to be confused with an over fed child, or the Full Monty! LOL)…it is amusing to me to find myself living a life where anyone is interested in participating. I mean, Jode and the kids to be sure, but for you and your wife to enjoy hanging out with us is something that makes me feel good.
Aside from the fact that the Full Poley can include children who have eaten Costco dogs…but we won’t go there for now….ha!
Ken, you can use an asp querystring to pass a password and just rerout the “forum” login page to be the link on the querystring, basically, one login is possible using session cookies (it wouldn’t show in the querystring, but basically works the same way). I think you could do it.
Costco Hot dogs, that’s one of the 4 food groups in the Poley kid gamut isn’t it? That and Ketchup…
(By the way, don’t eat the Wal*Mart hot dogs…)
The record for eating hotdogs in 12 minutes is 50!!! Some skinny Japanese kid did this in a contest… that’s more than eating 4 hotdogs per minute… Food network is so educational!
That skinny Japanese kid did it a lot of times in a lot of contests, he’s held the world record for like, since I was a kid.
I <3 Costco hot dogs.
3 Costco dogs? ewwww…
And, Jai, don’t forget the record for macaroni and cheese consumption in my home still belongs to you….AND the record for the ONLY guest ever to ASK to eat off of my child’s plate…..ROFL!
And to top it off, that stuff was good Mac’n'Cheese… hey Jen, what are your kids eating (or not eating) for dinner tonight… mmmm.. I’m getting hungry…
Ha! They really, truly had mac ‘n cheese….
sorry to get off topic again, guys. when I have my own blog, you can come and spew geekdom on my site, ok?
Don’t forget cheese!
In addition to Costco dogs and ketchup, the Poley family consumes approximately 452,000 lbs. of cheese a year which may include but is certainly not limited to delicious Mac-n-Chesse.
Yes, I would say, Jenn is definitely the Queen of blog derailing. If you can’t beat her you might as well laugh at her comments!
<3 = a heart.
I heart costco hot dogs.
I am not less than 3 Costco hot dogs.
Or maybe I am?
The philosophical question of the day… am I less than a hot dog? Or greater than the sum of its parts?
*Sigh* Sorry, but this is obligatory:
Jeremy Kidder: If you was a hot dog, wouldya eat yaself? I sure would! I’d just slather maself up with musta’d and I’d be real good!
The legacy lives on.
I am trying not to picture Jeremy slathered up in mustard…
Would he really say that?
And, I would have to think LONG AND HARD about what type of food I think I am. I only know I am not a costco dog.
I think the question is, does Jeremy say anything else? hehehehe….
Another lead on site software: Mark Pilgrim recently asked his readers about flexible and intelligent address book software. Link here: http://diveintomark.org/archives/2003/03/13/address_book.html
This could be useful in finding software to track people’s profiles…
Well, PostNuke makes all the right noises: http://noc.postnuke.com/docman/view.php/5/12/whatispostnuke.htm