Website Report on Content Issues
February 2005

 

The following information is intended as background orientation for further discussion about the Fellowship website and related IT services.  It is more of an outline and a listing of some relevant thoughts than a detailed description.  It may be helpful in the creation of an agenda for our upcoming meeting

 

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It has been suggested that the website be viewed in three divisions: Aesthetics, content, and navigation (structure).  These are useful categories for dealing with website issues. I think it is important that we look at the overall IT situation for the Fellowship which includes a variety of Internet services, administrative services, and potential applications. The website and its related issues are only a part of a bigger picture which should be considered because of the amount of overlap of these various IT activities.  Without such review and subsequent administrative followup we are allowing growth and development to proceed in a haphazard and unplanned manner.  We are used to thinking in project-specific time frames.  We need to consider our IT strategy in terms of a much bigger organizational frame of reference.  This is an area in which we are investing substantial time, money, and human resources.  

 

For this reason I would like to divide the present review into three primary categories which are: Content, services, and technology. 

 

Content means information which we've stored and want to make available to the readership.

 

Services include email services, online registration for events, online contributions, administrative database services, etc.

 

Technology refers to the media through which our content and services are delivered to the readership and the wider public.

 

Content

 

Content which we are providing may be grouped into the following categories:

           

The Fellowship Archive

                        Print documents  (Spanish, English, Portuguese, Russian, Croatian, German, Lithuanian, Polish)

                        Video files

                        Audio files

                        Photographs

                        Newsletter archive

                        Text of The Urantia Book in English and Spanish

                        Study Aids

                        Paramony

                        Topical Index

                        Introductory materials  

                        Source books

                        Secondary books

                                    21 Steps

                                                (Spanish and English)

                                    When Things Go Wrong

                                                (Spanish and English)

                                    Study of the Master Universe (Sadler)

                                                (Spanish and English)

                                    History of The Urantia Movement (Mullins)

                                                (Spanish and English)

                                    Bible (RSV)

                                                (Spanish and English)

                                    The Story of Everything

                                    Introduction to the Theology of The Urantia Book (Sprunger)

 

Administrative Archive

                                    Meeting minutes

                                    Historical documents

                                    Accounting information            

                                    Brochures

                                    Promotional materials

                                    Uversa Press information

 

Fellowship content is presently published via:

                        Print

                        CD

                        DVD

                        Website

 

Services

 

                        Email lists

                                    General Council

                                    Socadmin

                                    Executive Committee

                                    International Fellowship Committee

                                    IC05 Planning Committee

                                    Golden Gate Circle Society

                        Chat services

                        Websites

                                    UrantiaBook.org

                                    UBFellowship.org

                                    Ellibro.org

                                    UrantiaGGC.org

                                    UversaPress.com

                                    RetreatNetwork.com

                                   

                                                Unused domains

                                                            life-of-Jesus.org

                                                            urantia-book.org

                                                            librourantia.org

 

                        Polylingual Search Engine

                        Electronic Newsletter Publishing

                        Database Management

                        Study Group Database

                        Promotion of community events -- conferences, retreats, etc.

                        Inquiry Response

                        Reader Services

                        Polling

                        Online financial transactions

 

                        Internal

                                    Logfile management

                                    Statistical analysis

                                    Server maintenance

                                    Software upgrades and maintenance

                                    Email list maintenance

                                    Security strategy

 

Technology

 

            Windows 2000 server running IIS5 -- Websites

            Windows 2000 server running Apache -- Email services

                       

At present we have two servers.  The second one was put on line this past winter.  It will eventually host all communication and administrative services.  The original server will eventually host only web services.  Both servers are protected by hardware firewalls.  By the end of the second quarter these two servers should be backing each other up.  An immediate goal is to provide uninterrupted service should one of these servers go down. 

 

            In addition to these two servers we have high-speed lines connecting John Hales and David Kantor to the Internet. 

 

            Off-the-shelf software is used.  Custom code is kept to an absolute minimum and clever hacks are avoided.  This is to make it easier for someone to take over managing some or all of these functions should this become necessary.

 

            Software on the server side:

                                    Search engine

                                    Web server

                                    Mail server

                                                Sendmail

                                                Web Crossing

                                    Database software

                                                Filemaker Pro

                                                SQL Server

                                    Newsletter publishing software

                                    Financial transaction processing

           

            Software on administrative workstations

                                    Word

                                    Excel

                                    Access

                                    Photoshop

                                    Dreamweaver

                                    Adobe Acrobat 

                                    Filemaker Pro

                                    Misc audio and video processing software

                                    Misc CD and DVD formatting and burning software

                                    Misc utilities

 

            Additional accounting software is used at the Oklahoma City location.

                                   

A number of readers help with content development and management of the website.

            Paula Thompson -- Study Group Database

            John Hales -- Reader Database

            Richard Omura -- Fellowship community pages

            Ken Glasziou -- Innerface International publication

            Larry Watkins -- Misc programming

            Martha Babatola -- Administers Golden Gate Society site

            Michelle Klimesh -- Publishes weekly Society newsletter

            Bruce Porter -- Responsible for Retreat Network site

            Christel Schmidt -- Scanning

Adrienne Greer -- Financial services
            Sage Waitts -- Coordination with publications; website design consultation

 

Outside Services

 

            Outside service providers are used in several areas.  These are:

                        Appsite Hosting -- Primary hosting service

                        Verity -- Annual maintenance fee for search engine service and upgrades

                        SQL Server -- SQL Server hosting

                        Skipjack processing -- Provides for online credit card transactions

                        Chicago and Denver high speed connections to Internet

                        Hammond Communications Group -- Programming and consulting

                        Verovar, Inc. -- Translation services

 

On the Horizon: Pending or in Process

 

Content

"Man, God, and the Supreme" -- Book by Stuart Kerr

            More historical archive materials

            Additional Sadler tapes

            Audio tracks from Boulder School tapes

            Audio from early Urantia conferences

            Fully interactive topical index

            Spiritual Psychology -- Book by Meredith Sprunger

 

Services

            Online communications -- enhanced email and chat services

            Community calendar

            Polling/voting

            Sales of books, etc.

            Services and technical data for translators

            Electronic indexing of The Urantia Book in Korean, Russian, Lithuanian, and French

            Website for Urantia school in Bogotá, Colombia

            Additional services for Societies and Affiliates

                        Mailing list management

            Ledger/accounting services for Fellowship committees

 

Technology

            Migration to SQL Server

            Improved backup and failover procedures

 

           

 

Some Administrative Issues

            John needs to use the online database as the primary database; he needs to keep it current vis-a-vis Society officers, Councilors, etc.

            We need to integrate the accounting information with the reader database.  I do not have the financial records needed to do this.  When I set up the reader database I was provided with reader records stripped of all financial information.

            PDF files are being created as part of our decentralized office setup.  I know nothing about the workflow here, archiving, file naming conventions, or anything else having to do with this part of our IT infrastructure.  Who designed this process?  Are things being archived in a way which allows easy retrieval of specific documents?  Can this archive be searched?

            Legal documents, contracts, financial documents -- should be archived online for access by EC members and officers.

            Workflow -- better mechanism needs to be established for assuring that electronic versions of all publications are published on the website simultaneously with their print media publication.

            Copies of approved meeting minutes need to be archived online in a timely manner.

            Does the organization want to have a fully integrated IT function, or does it want it to be decentralized?  Right now we have operations in New Jersey, Chicago, Oklahoma City, Oregon, Denver -- and Uversa Press marketing concerns.  The operations at these centers are not well integrated.  Is integrating them desirable or would it be better to live with this decentralization? 

            Need statistical analysis and search engine optimization on an ongoing basis.  This should form the foundation of website design.

            Need to more aggressively gather names and addresses from the website and provide a sequence of introductory materials via email to interested persons.  A program needs to be developed to guide interested persons toward becoming serious readers and perhaps contributing members of our organization.

            Need to create online help and information section

            Need to improve navigation and website architecture

            Need more comprehensive database administration

 

 

Miscellaneous

 

It is important to appreciate the difference between just keeping everything operational as contrasted with aggressively exploiting the technology for our mission of spreading the revelation.  We can do a lot to integrate the presently scattered readership by providing good customer service to those readers.  The strength of our organization (and the financing we're able to raise) will be a function of the quality of service we can provide to the readership and the effectiveness with which we engage in the task of spreading the revelation.  How can we effectively deploy technology to assist in this task?    

 

The core services and data which should have priority protection are:

                        Reader database

                        Accounting database

                        Communications services

                        Document archive

 

 

There are additional decentralized readership services with no functional technical relationship to each other but which are or will be important to the readership community.

            UBRON

            Education Committee website

            OKC accounting functions

            Chicago/New York mail services

            Coordination with Jesusonian

            Coordination with Urantia Foundation (orders and shipment of translations)

            Coordination with Uversa Press marketing

 

Backups

 

The Fellowship needs to provide for administrative continuity of its IT assets. This requires more people who are knowledgable regarding our IT operations.

 

Backup information file -- should contain all information about contracted services, passwords, software configurations, etc.  This needs to be updated regularly.  Presently updated quarterly. 

 

Database and Website backups are maintained on my workstation in Denver.  This is done by regular ftp of files from Denver to Atlanta, from Atlanta to Denver.  Additionally, backups are archived to CD.

 

I have no information about accounting system backups.  John takes care of his own backups in Chicago.  I assume that Fellowship accounting information is backed up along with Alliance data.

 

Need long-term strategy for backups and restorations.  Executive Committee needs to assume responsibility for making sure it is done and done properly.  Checking on this should be an item of business at every Executive Committee meeting.

 

Physical materials

 

            Fellowship needs to assure easy access to physical materials maintained at various sites -- Chicago, OKC, Denver.  I have original software CDs filed at Denver, along with backups.

 

Immediate needs

 

            Database administrator

            Statistical analyst knowledgable in the area of search engine optimization

            Administrative guidance; clear vision of long-term IT goals and articulation of a Fellowship IT strategy -- for internal administrative operations as well as reader and public services.  Remember that the basic commodity that we are bringing to the marketplace is information.  Our work falls into two categories -- the propagation of information and management of the attendant social repercussions.  This puts information and communications at the heart of our mission.  We have only begun to develop the tools and strategies needed to proceed with this mission.