Simple WebApp needed for National Park

[cbgenrich]

All, I used to be involved with AtlRUG and this group. Now I live in
my camper and volunteer a good bit of my time in parks and whatnot. I
am hoping someone here will be interested in building a working app as
a project, and might pick this one up and get it started.

Parks often rely on volunteers to be able to do what they do. Ranger
led events need a "sweep" to be sure no one gets separated. Front desk
needs a second person. Special events need a lot of volunteers all at
the same time.

The volunteer coordinator at a park I work at alot asked me to look
into solutions - group calendars, non-profit software, whatever.

Coordinating the time/activity needs with volunteers who can and will
commit to the job is a problem. A whiteboard at the park is currently
used, but in general the volunteers are at home and don't see that the
slot needs someone. In other cases extra volunteers show up, and feel
they've wasted some time and expense, which isn't helpful to the
cause. It takes a lot of time to manage the board and it's a flawed
system to be sure.

They need a simple WebApp that allows admins to add events with
titles, descriptions, times and the number of volunteers needed.
Volunteers would each have an account (login/password, forgot my
password, notifications by email, etc) and could "apply" for an event
position on a certain day/time. An admin would accept the event
application notice would be sent requesting final confirmation from
the volunteer. Automatic reminder email a couple days in advance would
be sweet!

I suspect existing online group calendar apps don't really meet the
need. In particular they probably reveal the name of the person (or
some identifying information) associated with an event - which seems
out-of-bounds for a system used by a government agency. There would
probably be other problems with usability and complexity vs. a custom
app.

I feel that I could polish and maintain a Rails app of this
complexity, but not build it from the ground up, deploy, etc. It
doesn't need to be fancy. It's for a good cause and, while it has been
initially requested on behalf of one National Park, my knowledge of
parks makes me think it could be widely used by other parks as well,
and it should be designed with that in mind.

If you think you or perhaps the Emerald City group collectively would
possibly be interested in taking this on please contact me and let's
talk through the details. I really think this can enable more
volunteers to more precisely meet the needs of the parks and save
staff time in managing all those contacts.

-CB-

CB Genrich
c...@genrich.us
770-401-4899

[Alan]

I'll bring this up as a group project at the next Emerald City meeting
and let you know what happens.

Alan

[Allan Davis]

I think this will make a great group project.  Do we want to take the tracker poker time and work on this.  I am thinking yes.
I welcome opinions.

Thanks
Allan

On Apr 18, 2012 10:49 PM, "Alan" <aghe...@gmail.com> wrote:

[Jeff Costa]

I like that idea. Its something we can all sink our teeth into. Happy to help (and learn).

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[Al]

Folks,
     How about working together on the national park app during
the Random Hacks of Kindness (Weekend of June 2-3)?

Maybe CB could come down and work together with us that weekend.

Here is the Facebook page for the event: http://www.facebook.com/rhokatl

Al Snow

On Apr 20, 8:05 am, Jeff Costa <cos...@gmail.com> wrote:
> I like that idea. Its something we can all sink our teeth into. Happy to help (and learn).
>
> On Friday, April 20, 2012 at 8:04 AM, Allan Davis wrote:
> > I think this will make a great group project.  Do we want to take the tracker poker time and work on this.  I am thinking yes.
> > I welcome opinions.
> > Thanks
> > Allan

> > On Apr 18, 2012 10:49 PM, "Alan" <aghech...@gmail.com (mailto:aghech...@gmail.com)> wrote:
> > --
> > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Emerald City" group.

> > To post to this group, send email to atlrug-em...@googlegroups.com (mailto:atlrug-em...@googlegroups.com).
> > To unsubscribe from this group, send email to atlrug-emeraldc...@googlegroups.com (mailto:atlrug-emeraldc...@googlegroups.com).

[Jeff Costa]

Sounds good. Do we need to get started sooner, however? June is a ways away...

To post to this group, send email to atlrug-em...@googlegroups.com.

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[Al]

Sure - start sooner. We also mentioned 3-4 topics/sessions (Deploy,
Cucumber,
Plugins/Gem Creation) yesterday.

On Apr 29, 4:17 pm, Jeff Costa <cos...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Sounds good. Do we need to get started sooner, however? June is a ways away...
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> On Sunday, April 29, 2012 at 3:11 PM, Al wrote:
> > Folks,
> >      How about working together on the national park app during
> > the Random Hacks of Kindness (Weekend of June 2-3)?
>
> > Maybe CB could come down and work together with us that weekend.
>
> > Here is the Facebook page for the event:http://www.facebook.com/rhokatl
>
> > Al Snow
>

> > On Apr 20, 8:05 am, Jeff Costa <cos...@gmail.com (http://gmail.com)> wrote:
> > > I like that idea. Its something we can all sink our teeth into. Happy to help (and learn).
>
> > > On Friday, April 20, 2012 at 8:04 AM, Allan Davis wrote:
> > > > I think this will make a great group project.  Do we want to take the tracker poker time and work on this.  I am thinking yes.
> > > > I welcome opinions.
> > > > Thanks
> > > > Allan

[CB Genrich]

I think it's a great idea to do this during that event. I'm pretty sure I can get away from my volunteer work at the park and come to Atlanta for the weekend.

It would be a great benefit to me to see the thought processes and methodologies involved in getting the app up and running and to learn from the group. I would also appreciate the chance to be closely involved from the problem domain perspective.

I would expect to be the driver of long term implementation, at least until it has enough parks utilizing it for it's own momentum to take over, which would be good. But to have this group do the 0 -> 60 is really needed.

I will push more with the park starting immediately to ensure it's either not out-of-bounds for them to use a non-government server for this, or that they would support getting their IT people to host it. If they can't commit to one of those, then we just have to bow out.

I really appreciate the interest in this. I'm available to discuss anything about it as needed.

-CB-