Motion application

[James Carlisle]

Anyone know if the open source software includes a motion application that allows for the resolution of motions such as approval workflow.

If not do you know of anything out there that can be downloaded and modified?

Thanks,
James Carlisle

[Sheldon Rampton]

I'm not sure if I completely understand what you're describing. The Drupal content management system has a module called "workbench" that is designed to support editorial workflows on websites. For example, you could use it to set up an online news website where there are user roles of "writer," "artist" and "editor." The writer is responsible for writing the text of a news story, the artist is responsible for adding photographs and other artwork, and the editor is responsible for review and approving the article for publication. The workbench module can be configured with different "states" for an article, and each user role has different permissions controlling who can change an article's "state." Thus, a user with the role of "writer" would have permission to create a new article but not to publish it, as well as the ability to change its state from "needs text" to "needs artwork." A user with the role of "artist" would have the ability to add images and change the article's state from "needs artwork" to "needs review." The editor would see all articles that "need review" and would have the ability to change the article's state from "needs review" to "needs revisions" (which would send it back to the writer for further work) or to "published" (if the article is ready to appear on the website).

In addition to editorial workflows, I've also used the workbench module for other types of approval workflows, such as approvals for people who submit applications for parking permits. It would be fairly straightforward to set it for with states and user roles relevant to proposals and approvals for legislative motions.

--Sheldon Rampton