Tag Archives: applications

Life after Common Ground: Not-so-final thoughts

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6 weeks ago, I began a series of blog posts highlighting different Salesforce apps I’ve been working with at KELL Partners since leaving Blackbaud/Common Ground behind six months ago. Here’s a summary of those posts and the features I highlighted, in case you missed any:

While this brings me to the end of the series as I had planned it, I know I could have gone on and on. More features on the above apps. More apps. For example there’s Volunteers for Salesforce, which was rescued from the ashes of Groundwire by the always helpful and brilliant David Habib. Or Brickwork, iATS integration with Salesforce and its form building tool, AURA. Maybe I’ll do another series in the future. What apps are you using that I should be talking about here?

As I was writing these posts, I found myself focusing on a common theme. What excites me most about these products, almost without exception, are the companies and people behind them more than features. I focused on features, sure, but with each application the feature I focused on said as much about the mindset of the company as it did about its functionality.

Simply put: It’s not enough to just have something to sell.

The best part about Salesforce is that it isn’t just a platform to build stuff on. It’s a large, inter-connected ecosystem and developers have to expect that their customers are going use their apps in ways they never imagined and alongside other apps they never heard of. That fact has to motivate companies, not scare them.

Support and communication is everything. And I’m not talking about simply answering “How do I…” questions. Organizations want to feel that they’re in partnership with the companies they’re working with. From my experience, nonprofits can forgive technology that has its rough edges here and there. They have far less patience when their emails go unanswered once the check is cashed and promises aren’t kept.

I started this series because I didn’t want Common Ground users to feel hopeless just because one old-style company didn’t get it and pulled the rug out. There’s a reason around 18,000 nonprofits have adopted Salesforce over a short time. It’s exciting and innovative. There’s so much to offer. The platform is worth it. The community is worth it. Stick around and you’ll be glad you did.

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Life after Common Ground: Part 6 – Apsona

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This post is part 6 in a series of articles pointing out what’s cool about some of my favorite Salesforce apps for nonprofits. Previously, I highlighted favorite features in Nonprofit Starter Pack, Click & Pledge, Causeview, Soapbox Engage and Conga Composer. Now I’m going to talk about my favorite parts of Apsona for Salesforce.

Apsona isn’t a non-profit specific app, but it’s so incredibly wonderful and useful I couldn’t leave it out of this series.

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Life after Common Ground: Part 4 – Soapbox Engage

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This post is part 4 in a series of articles pointing out what’s cool about some of my favorite Salesforce apps for nonprofits. Previously, I highlighted favorite features in Nonprofit Starter Pack, Click & Pledge and Causeview, now I’m going to talk about my favorite parts of Soapbox Engage.

Truth be told, my favorite thing about Soapbox Engage isn’t a technology feature. It’s the company itself. When I was laid off from Blackbaud last summer, one of the first calls I made was to Ryan Ozimek, CEO of PicNet, the company that makes Soapbox Engage. Every time I talk to him, he reminds me why this all matters so much to me. There aren’t enough words to describe my respect for Ryan and the team he’s built and what they’re trying to do, penguins and all. If there was a dictionary definition of an application developer that’s in this market for all the right reasons, it would point to PicNet and call it a day.

But let’s talk favorite feature of the software. Soapbox Engage is way to take a stand alone front end for donation and event registration forms and easily get its data to Salesforce…a combination of a platform built on the open source CMS Joomla and Salesforce app. It’s part of the full Nonprofit Soapbox platform that PicNet offers, separated out for those who just want to sync data to Salesforce and don’t need the entire CMS platform.

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Frustrated with online project management tools

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I am tearing my hair out. Or I will, as soon as I can figure out where the task is to do that and who’s responsible.

 
We have a team of 7 staff members. Each of us works on different projects for different programs. From time to time, we work with consultants or outside vendors.
 
We are an efficient bunch, but what we lack is centralized project and task coordination. We need to be able to see how our projects are progressing over time. Where the bottlenecks are. What is falling behind. What the next year will look like for projects we know we’re going to take on but haven’t started yet.
 
Folks are comfortable in email and instant messenger. It’s where most of the conversation happens between us and we get a lot accomplished. Yet working this way, we miss that “big picture” overview.
 
It seems obvious that there should be a tool we can use to help us here. We don’t have a server so we don’t want desktop software. We want something that works in the cloud. You would think that with so many choices we’d find exactly what we need.
 
I have spent the last week or two trying more of these online project management tools than I can count. Many of them are here. 
 
So frustrated that none are singing to me the way Salesforce or Google Apps did when I first tried them out.
 
Here’s what I want:
  • Uncluttered interface – folks have to spend less time managing projects than doing them. It doesn’t have to be simple or designed for idiots – I work with very smart, technically capable people. It needs to be streamlined and without features and distractions we don’t need.
  • A task management system folks will actually use – When they finish a task, will they remember to go to this tool and check it off?
  • Centralized administration and management – Administrator can create/assign projects – only assigned managers can edit milestones and the phases of the project
  • Bird’s eye view of all projects and where they stand (“What’s the next step? Who’s responsible?”) – Dashboard shows status of active tasks – not just recent activity
  • Gantt and/or clear calendar view that includes milestones and multi-day phases – bonus if it syncs with Google Calendar
  • Integration with email (receive notification via email, bonus if you can reply to attach discussion to a task)
  • Files only as essential for project – not just to dump stuff
  • Invite outside users to projects as needed
  • Don’t want tickets/case management, don’t want wikis, don’t want blogs, don’t want “here’s what I’m eating for lunch” status updates – need to be able to to tailor interface to only what we need/want. We have other tools, I want to avoid duplication as much as possible.
  • works across platforms and modern browsers – not so much an issue these days, but still needs to be considered
  • Cost: total of under $50 per month but can make a case for spending more if it’s exceptional.
What follows is my impression of what I’ve tried so far and why it falls short.
 
The biggest problem with these tools is that they are designed for teams that work with clients. Or they are designed for teams that work on software development. Or they are designed for teams that work work with clients on software development. What about project management for teams that produce newsletters? For teams that are working on a conference or event? For teams that are tracking a year-long editorial and strategy calendar for fundraising campaigns? Not so much.
 
I’ve been whining about this in Twitter a bit. I’ve been asked to summarize my findings. 
 
These are the tools I’ve evaluated/looked at and why I like them/don’t like them. 
 

Extensions at last in Chrome for Mac!

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I've been so waiting for this. I really like Chrome. It's been my default on the Windows side of my Mac for some time. It's fast, stable and I just get more done when I'm working in it. 

I have a tendency to keep a bunch of apps open at once, and when of those applications is Firefox my entire system quickly drags to a crawl. With Chrome taking less room in RAM, everything seems to run faster.

When Chrome Mac beta first came out I tried to make it my default for a while, but the lack of extensions sent me back to Firefox. Not being able to organize/sync bookmarks was a bit of a deal breaker.

Now, finally, the dev channel of Chrome has extensions and I'm happy to be back. I know Chromium has had extensions for a while. That's a bit too on-the-edge for me. Too much updating. Frankly, the way Google does "beta" it's more like the dev version is the beta while the beta is a release version.

I spent a day or so playing with available extensions (love that you don't have to restart the browser in between) and here's some of my favorites of the 12 I've installed so far. Only thing sorely missing from my toolbar is 1Password. I'm cutting/pasting my logins and manually updating them which is a bit of a pain. Come on AWS, the water is only a tiny bit chilly now…it will warm up. Jump!

Emailchecker-2

I'm neurotic about inbox zero, and I like this so much better than any of the Google notifier add-ins I tried in Firefox. Google Apps friendly. I don't have to keep an email tab open all the time anymore! Badge shows the message, making it easy to delete/archive messages without going to full Gmail interface. Only glitch is that it appears to be using UTC time zone with no option to match the time stamp to my clock.

Xmarkssettings

Chrome Mac still doesn't allow for reorganizing bookmarks. That's okay. All my bookmarks were already in XMarks and now they're syncing with Chrome. When I want to reorganize/edit my bookmarks, I just log in to the Xmarks site and do it there. I prefer this over Google's built-in bookmark sync because this way I can easily go back to Firefox or Safari at any time. And I even have synced bookmarks in Internet Explorer on the Windows side, although I rarely use it.

Great for quick sneak peeks to the social networks. I don't seem to get as distracted if I can just peek as opposed to loading the full interface. I tried Brizzly, which looks prettier, but it was slow and had more quirks. These two very simple extensions more than do the job for quick glances. When I want to spend more time in Twitter, I'll log in to Hootsuite. I long gave up on desktop Twitter apps because they took up too much precious RAM.

Extensions

My wish at this point is for a way to arrange the icons on the toolbar.

Fellow Mac users who have moved to Chrome…what extensions do you like?

Unison 2.0 – Really?

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via panic.com

Wow. Folks are debating whether RSS is dead and there’s a new Usenet reader. Not really new…a 2.0 update of a application that frankly felt too-late when it first came out years ago.

Usenet?!? For $30, plus a monthly fee for a service if you want something usable. Seriously?!?

I was big into Usenet circa 1993-96. I have friends to this day that I first met on comp.sys.mac.* and misc.kids.* groups. There’s a fond place in my heart for community so simple, concise and text-based.

But come on, today is there more there than warez and porn? I’m not sure I want to find out.

Getting it done in 2010: Things or The Hit List or…..?

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Happy 2010 everyone!

3 years back on the Mac fulltime and I'm still trying to find task nirvana. I need more than a simple to-do list or just starring my email, less than a full blown GTD system of complex contexts and next actions. My mantra: if it takes longer to keep my tasks organized than it takes to do the tasks, then it's the wrong solution.

Last year I bounced back and forth between Remember the Milk and Google's built-in task management. RTM is great. But it's very browser-dependent. It wasn't in my face enough outside of the browser. And I was tired of how often the integration with Gmail stopped working (not RTM's fault that Google keeps their code a moving target, but still). This eliminates other cloud-based task managers in my mind, such as Toodledo. Google Tasks doesn't have recurring tasks, and with more than a handful of tasks I was losing focus on what was most important to do. Simple sorting isn't enough. Context does matter.

So for 2010 I think it's time to move back to a desktop solution. But which one? As a Mac user, I've narrowed it down to 3 main contenders: OmniFocus (which I already have a license key buried somewhere), Things and The Hit List.

My priorities:

  • Each morning, I look at all my tasks and decide which ones have to be done today, while allowing wiggle room for the fires that I know will pop up. For the most part, I try and end my day with a clear "today" task list. I want software that works that way too without my having to fight it. If I complete that list, I want to see what I need to do next without being distracted by someday or "can't do this until…" tasks.
  • I want to be sure I can get email messages in it easily. I'd say 80-90% of my tasks come from email messages.
  • I have a MacBook, an iMac and an iPhone. I want to get at my tasks no matter where I am.

I took a second look at OmniFocus and once again, dismissed it. Too complex and fussy. I typically have no more than 3 or 4 projects on my plate, the rest of my tasks are broader. I can look at OmniFocus with 40 open tasks and have absolutely no idea what I should be doing next. I do have to say I like that it does Bonjour syncing which would make keeping things aligned between computers a lot easier.

So for me it's between Things and The Hit List and I can't decide between them. They're both around the same price. Both written by single developers or very small teams who have real lives and have taken hits for not working as fast as their user base wishes. The Hit List is still in a so-called public beta/preview release, with the iPhone version coming soon.

Comparison points:

I like the quick entry box in Things. If you hold down control-option-space it will look at what you have in the active application or selected and include detail in the task notes. If I'm on a Gmail message, a link to the message is automatically included. That works for linking my task application to my email. I could also drag any file or URL to the Things dock icon to create a task.

Things

The Hit List works in a similar way, but the quick entry box doesn't read the context of where you are, requiring an extra step to get the URL. A better way of dealing with URLs is to drag the icon from the address bar to The Hit List dock icon, and then you get a task that automatically is "Look at…"

Lookat

In both applications, the inbox is the place where items are captured unfiltered. On a regular basis, you are expected to go through the inbox and decide what to do with each task. Is it something to be done immediately? Part of a project? Scheduled? Repeating? The idea is to deal with it once on collection, then not think about it until it's time to actually do it.

Things and THL handle the inbox differently. And it's this difference that is giving the edge to Things for me. In Things, as soon as you make any kind of decision about a task it's out of the inbox. You can give the task no tags, no projects, nothing special and just drag it to Today and it's out of the inbox. Or, if it's something that you know you can't deal with for at least a week, you can drag it to "Scheduled," decide when you'll be ready to look at it again and it's gone. With THL, a task is only out of the inbox when it's assigned/filed. You can set it as a "today" task, but it still sits in the inbox with a blazing "deal with me" badge until you assign it to a list of some sort. I like a very clean inbox, but don't necessarily want to categorize every single thing into a bucket. If I've decided I'm going to do the task today, it shouldn't be in the inbox.

Overall, The Hit List's interface is a little cleaner and uses simple Start/Due dates. Things can get a little confusing between scheduled and due dates. Both have repeating tasks and handle them nicely.

Both handle multi-Mac sync in the same way. Both have a library/database file that was easy enough to place in DropBox so I can get the same view of tasks on both my iMac and MacBook. Both have the same limitation in that the applications must only be open on one machine at a time. I'm going to try and remember to quit my task manager on whichever machine I'm on before I walk away, but that's not my habit and may be a challenge. I much prefer how 1Password does it…the shared keychain file is updated when it's updated, so I can have it running all the time on both machines without a problem. Things and THL only update their database when the application quits, which could mean lost work if the application crashes.

Things has an iPhone application which syncs with the desktop version over wifi, similar to 1Password's solution. I can't test that until I've committed to the desktop version as I don't want to spend $10 on an iPhone app I may not keep. THL has been promising an iPhone app for a while and the developer seems to be actively working on delivering on that promise.

Longer term, it's harder to figure out which is the safer bet. Both applications are by very tiny companies. Things seems to have a bit of a small team behind it, while THL seems to be a single-person shop. The guy goes on vacation or stays quiet for a while, and the users wonder if the app is still actively developed/supported. Things is further along, but it seems to be more about being out of the gate sooner than a fair comparison of commitment to the project.

It's going to be a bother, but I think I'm going to try and use both applications equally for the next week, then decide which one gets my $50.

ScreenSteps: Simple documentation

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Part of my job is helping my colleagues do what they need to do on their computers and online. They ask, “Judi, how do I…?” and I tell them. To make finding this info easier, I started building wiki pages for documenting how we at C3 do what we do. I took screenshots with Skitch, recorded movies with Jing. Took forever.

The problem is that things change. And when they do I’d have to redo/update the documentation. And it was cumbersome to organize and build. I had a few of the basics saved, but I’m not sure all my colleagues even know where to look.

Then this week, I found ScreenSteps. This application makes building step-by-step tutorials so incredibly easy. Rather than rehash what it does, here’s their overview movie which explains it:

http://www.viddler.com/player/881afb86/

You can export your lesson/manuals to HTML, Word or PDF and customize the template. After playing with all the options, I ultimately decided to export the files to HTML, upload online via FTP and serve in a Salesforce custom web tab aptly named “How Do I?” They have a hosted version, but at a minimum of $20/month it’s more than I want to spend now compared to a one-time software license purchase.

I can even send lessons to Posterous or other blogs, as explained in this post. I considered making a private Posterous or blog for the docs, but I think I’m going to stick to HTML where the template is easier to edit, and I can more easily organize content and embed in Salesforce.

ScreenSteps is $80 (no Nonprofit discount, I’m afraid) but here’s a link that includes a code for 25% off. There’s a Mac and PC version.

Update from comments: ScreenSteps Standard is only $40 and will let you export HTML, PDF, clipboard and upload to WordPress, TypePad, Movable Type and Joomla. You usually only need Pro if you are going to be exporting full manuals or uploading to a MindTouch or Confluence wiki.

No affiliation or kickback to me, this is just a really handy tool for those of us that have to show how techie things are done visually.