Dear Michelle and All;

 

This message, along with the attached diagram, contains a collection of thoughts regarding our present IT infrastructure and developmental directions.  Can you help me put this into a form suitable for a meeting agenda?  Some of the issues are technical, some administrative.  But I need help thinking this through to a solution.  We should be able to get good consultation from Tim Hobbs and Alan Goodman.  But before seeking their help I would like to have things in a good, coherent order for presentation to them.  Can you help me do this?

 

Regarding what I would hope we could accomplish during the course of our meeting:

 

I would like to chart a strategy for aggressively dealing with our outstanding IT issues asap.  I want to have our IT systems working well long before the next EC elections so that their benefits can easily be understood and appreciated by most of the Councilors.  I would like to see things in place prior to IC08 if possible.   

 

The attached diagram attempts to show our present or about-to-be-completed infrastructure. 

 

I see several areas that need to become as integrated as possible:

 

I have a personal preference in these matters to make one change at a time, test it, make sure it is working, and then go on to the next item.  Trying to change too many variables at the same time can too easily create serious problems.

 

Decisions that need to be made:

 

1. Who has Admin access to Skipjack account?

2. Call Quickbooks Merchant Services; we have support account: 303-467-7858; Fifth Epochal Fellowship Corporation or The Urantia Book Fellowship.  POS: How do we use the POS with Skipjack?  How do we configure this?

3. How do we get the e-commerce software to talk to Quickbooks?

4. How do we get Quickbooks to talk with Skipjack?  Website autodebit and contribution information goes to Skipjack.  Paula then needs to generate a report from Skipjack and re-enter the information into Quickbooks.

5. It seems that the most dynamic, most active database should be the core, primary database with all others relative to it.  This would make Quickbooks the core database.

6.  We have data from a number of sources.  Which ones do we want to integrate into a central database?

            a. Filemaker reader database

            b. Graphicmail e-newsletter subscriber list

            c.  Fellowship internal email subscriber lists

                        i. socadmin

                        ii. EC

                        iii. Council

            d. Registration databases from past conferences

            e. Contribution records from various accounting programs used over the past 10 years

8.  Backup and restore procedures and an overall disaster recovery plan need to be developed.  Identify which data needs to be backed up regularly, which data needs long-term archiving, etc.  Adopted procedures need to be tested regularly and more than one person should know how to implement the disaster recovery plan.          

 

Filemaker currently holds our relational database.  A relational database allows us to keep address information and personal information in separate tables.  This lets us keep records for family members using one address record for multiple members. 

 

All data sets that we currently have can be ordered in Filemaker.  Admin procedures need to be established regarding where new information is entered into the system.  Through Quickbooks? Through Filemaker?  Both? 

 

Other points in the system where data is input or changed:

            Online E-newsletter subscription list -- users can add or delete email addresses.

            Fellowship internal email subscriber lists -- users can change their email addresses

            Online transactions

                        Autodebit and contribution information from online form goes to Skipjack database.

                        Transactions from online store are partially stored in Volusion database, partially in Skipjack database.

 

Data integrity can be maintained by a combination of software and admin procedures.  The same data can exist in several different places such as in a server-based database as well as static html pages generated for web user information (i.e. list of members of the General Council, EC, etc.).  Admin procedures can control points of data entry and change.  Copies of data can exist in multiple locations as long as there is a single point of entry which updates the data in all those locations. 

 

Why Filemaker?

 

Web-based forms are important to us for data entry, editing, and reporting.  This is where Filemaker is really strong--it is extremely easy to deploy Filemaker data and forms on the web. 

 

Filemaker is a relational database; Tables which are Quickbooks-accessible have to be ascii flat files. 

           

It would be much easier for Paula to process a few ascii files using scripts we write than to manually transfer information from one data set to another. 

 

Suggested approach: 

 

1.  The Filemaker/Quickbooks relationship needs to be established.  Where are new records entered?  Where are edits to existing records made?  Which one updates the other?

            If new records are first entered into Filemaker:

                        1.  Can be created via web form

                        2.  Filemaker assigns a reader ID number to each new record.

                        3.  These records can update Quickbooks.

                        4.  Existing records in Quickbooks need to have reader ID numbers from Filemaker entered into a custom field in Quickbooks.  This would be a one-time manual task.

 

2.  Both Quickbooks, Filemaker, and subordinate software should be running on a dedicated server; we should upgrade our Filemaker product to Filemaker Advanced Server 9.0. 

 

3.  Pay Alan Goodman for consultation on refinement and further development of our relational model. 

 

4.  Find and pay a Filemaker programmer to create the scripts we need.

 

5.  Establish admin procedures, security levels, access control, etc. 

 

There may be more as we think this through, but we need to proceed. We've got to push through the obstacles that keep halting our further development.

 

Thank you!

 

David

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

--- Michelle Klimesh <mklimesh@covad.net> wrote:

 

> Hi David,

>

> By the time Robert and I leave, I would like to have

> 1. a sense of what Paula and Robert need in the

> office that Alan and/

> or Tim can accomplish this year

> 2. a budget for IT 2008

> 3. an understanding of what David sees as the next

> step for the IT 

> committee.

>

> Would also like to touch base on the international

> outreach stuff if 

> Buck is available for an hour to brainstorm, and I

> need to play gin 

> rummy with Mae Lee.

>

> What do the rest of you think we should do?  I will

> email Hay and 

> tell him he won't have a budget until after we meet.

>

> Mich

>

>

> On Aug 21, 2007, at 12:31 PM, David Kantor wrote:

>

> > Hi, Michelle;

> >

> > Can we put together an agenda for our meeting in

> > September?  I'd like to optimize our use of this

> time

> > to mobilize things that have just been simmering.

> I'd

> > like to try and get Alan Goodman and Tim Hobbs to

> drop

> > in for a chat if that is agreeable with the group.

> > But to do this I would want to really be prepared

> to

> > make good use of their time.

> >

> > How do you see this meeting shaping up?

> >

> > Daviid

> >

>

>