Solar 4R Schools is a program developed by the Bonneville Environmental Foundation that educates students, teachers and community members about the science and benefits of renewable energy technology. The program provides hands-on activity guides, science kits and demonstration solar electric systems at no cost to schools, by working with local funding partners who want to show their commitment to renewable energy education.

The Bonneville Environmental Foundation selected OpenSourcery to develop the website for the Solar 4R Schools project.

The Solar4RSchools.org website is a sophisticated Drupal-based website that:

• Collects real-time data from hundreds of solar panels
• Displays interactive real-time and historical information with
• Charted historical and real-time raw data (e.g. Power output, Irradiance, Temperature)
• Interactive charts displaying student/teacher-friendly data (CO2 offsets + real-world usage displacement – a video game system for x weeks)
• Shows live weather from Yahoo Weather
• Allows visitors to download the raw data in a user-friendly CSV format for school experiments and reports
• Provides an interactive custom map of the US for visual browsing of installed sites
• Integrates Google maps
• Allows anyone to embed a widget on their site that displays real-time solar collection data
• Incorporates a full-featured blog with an RSS feed, tagging and image, video and sound uploads
• Aggregates news from a variety of sources which automatically appear in the news section
• Lists upcoming events with an easy to use web-based system for adding new events
• Allows site administrators to easily add new sites, including pre-publishing
• Enables schools to fill out an online application form to sign up for the Solar 4R Schools program
• Includes a teachers-only area that allows teachers to download lesson plans, activities and share photos and experiences with their solar curriculum
• Approved school administrators or teachers can upload video and images as well as edit text on their school pages
• Provides an email newsletter with self-service subscribing/unsubscribing

Solar 4R Schools was developed by the Bonneville Environmental Foundation which supports the development of renewable energy and watershed restoration while empowering people to shrink their carbon footprint.

OpenSourcery is the leading developer of Drupal-based education and non-profit websites. For more information contact OpenSourcery at (503) 777-7033.

The Clean Economy Network (CEN) is the national advocacy association for the cleantech and green business community. The Network emerged from the 2008 presidential election with strong ties to the CleanTech and Green Business for Obama organizations. OpenSourcery was very excited to work with an organization whose guiding principle is that "economic growth, quality jobs, international competitiveness, environmental sustainability, and energy independence are not mutually exclusive, but rather are all vital elements of a healthy, dynamic economy."

Background

The Network is a broad, nonpartisan collection of professionals, entrepreneurs, investors, workers joined by like-minded professionals and thinkers from across the economy and across the political spectrum. We work at the intersection of politics, policy and business to develop and advocate for policies and programs which meet our Guiding Principles, catalyze clean development and create green jobs.

Having emerged from the 2008 presidential election with a growing number of supporters, the Network needed a Web application that could communicate with existing supporters, deliver a strong message, and allow site administrators to easily manage content.

Key features

• Custom JavaScript slideshow on home page. No Flash required!
• YouTube video upload module to display nationally distributed video campaign
• Simple membership signup with "required" and "volunteer" fields
• Advanced "Executive" membership option that allows individuals to purchase membership onsite
• Targeted email campaigns

Challenges

The development of the Clean Economy Network's Drupal + CiviCRM Web application presented a few technical challenges. The first challenge was to provide a platform whereby the Network could quickly welcome the 7,000 existing members of CleanTech and Green Business for Obama. The Network needed a donor management system that could capture their information in a database they could use to intelligently organize members around future actions. Since one of the Network's primary goals is to "to advance policies that will promote a rapid transition to a cleaner economy," the ability to inform and promote activities among its member base is paramount.

The CEN site had to be a platform that made communicating organizational information easy. While their mission remains the same from week to week, the content itself is always changing. Multiple staff and volunteer users need the ability to manage content, whether it be to edit page content, write a newsletter, or upload a new video.

Process and Outcomes

The Clean Economy Network project is another example of OpenSourcery's Agile development process. Our project managers worked with the CEN's stakeholders to prioritize needs, iterate, and assess the project at every milestone. When pressing needs arose, as they do with time-sensitive projects, OpenSourcery was able to shift resources and address emerging challenges.

We also worked with their designers to customize a Drupal theme to fit their branding and messaging. OpenSourcery's user experience team coordinated with the CEN's themer to enhance the existing theme to increase its functionality and attractiveness. The result is an easy-to-navigate Web application that allows users to easily find the content they're looking for.

The CEN now manages the site and has seen their membership grow significantly. OpenSourcery looks forward to partnering with the Clean Economy Network as it continues to grow and increase its offerings.

Not long after OpenSourcery and the Linux Foundation launched the new Linux Foundation Video Site, news of their "I'm Linux" video contest appeared on Slashdot.

We're excited because the site itself is elegant, clean, and easy to use. The video upload module and social networking tools are a perfect match. We think the Linux Foundation will have a lot of fun promoting user-generated content and sharing internally produced videos and interviews with their community. But for now, the contest's the thing.

Basically, the Linux Foundation has joined Apple and Microsoft in promoting their operating system through humorous videos. Instead of top-down production (Apple) or faux user-generated videos (Microsoft), the Linux Foundation is gunning for the real deal. Actual users uploading their own videos enumerating the joys of Linux. The winner gets a trip to next year's Japan Linux Symposium held in Tokyo and, according to LF itself, "some serious geek cred."

Please read more about OpenSourcery's work on the Linux Foundation Video Site here, and then write yourself a reminder to submit a video on January 26, the day "I'm Linux" begins.

Thank you for reading.

The Linux Foundation Video Site allows visitors to share, search, and respond to user-generated videos, and to search Linux Foundation-produced videos and interviews. It's an elegant, user-friendly Drupal site that employs contributed and custom modules, including:

Key Features:

Story:

Read the complete case-study here.

Imagine our excitement when the Linux Foundation approached OpenSourcery to develop a Drupal site that revamps how users upload, share, and comment on Linux-related videos. As Linux users and devotees ourselves, this project was doubly exciting: it meant working with one of our favorite organizations while employing development skills honed on previous social networking + user-generated content sites (visit 247 Townhall to see one of our favorites).

The Linux Foundation chose OpenSourcery to replace their previous video portal with a dynamic, attractive Drupal site. We proposed a set of custom and contributed modules to support user-generated videos, improve search functionality, and transform the site into a true community forum. Our experience developing Video Upload modules, our ability to leverage a large code base, and our understanding of the Linux Foundation's long- and short-term project goals made OpenSourcery the right partner. We're ecstatic about the results (and if the immediate attention is any indication, so is the community).

Please read more about the Linux Foundation's first "I'm Linux" Video Contest, which will begin January 26, 2009 and run until March 15, 2009.

Development Process:

OpenSourcery's Agile development process and tight project management were integral to a successful launch. Upon our selection as developers, we assembled a Drupal team that would work closely with the Linux Foundation stakeholders and tech lead through every stage of the project. OpenSourcery's short development iterations and frequent communication with the Linux Foundation enabled us to launch the video site within a short space of time. We're happy to report that OpenSourcery continues to work with the Linux Foundation on an even more ambitious Drupal project encompassing their main website.

Key Features:

Story:

The individuals behind STAR Autism Support do important work. They provide training and educational videos to teachers who work with autistic children, and they base their programs on solid research. They're precisely the kind of organization OpenSourcery loves working with.

So it's fortunate that their needs and our skills were a perfect match. It was clear from the outset that Drupal was the appropriate framework for STAR. Since they were upgrading from a previous site, they were looking for new functionality and a new design. OpenSourcery provided both.

One objective of our work with STAR was to develop an unbreakable theme so that multiple users could manage content without fear of interrupting the usability or design. An important feature of the site is that users can update product offerings, training sessions, events, and so on. It's meant to be dynamic and solid simultaneously.

To that end, developer Dylan Tack wrote a custom module to drive the menu, such that images can be associated with specific menu items in an attractive, consistent manner. Look for a release of this module on Drupal.org in the near future.

We thank our friends at STAR Autism Support for choosing OpenSourcery, and we wish them well.

247 Townhall is a community forum that allows visitors to post videos, stories, audio, and more. A custom Drupal site powered by a combination of contributed and custom modules.

Key Features:

Story:

247 Townhall is a community forum dedicated to change. Users sign in to share videos, stories, events, trends, and audio. We love this site because it's functional and nice to look at, and, really, how can you not love a site that boasts Mos Def as a contributor?

Users can interact with the site on several levels, from observers to participating members. Members track their favorite content and comment on shared items. We also like that the process begins with new members submitting their personal stories.

We developed 247 Townhall with Drupal, which allows users and site administrators to easily upload video, text and audio. The difficult work happens below the surface so most people don't even have to think about what's happening: upload an image and VOILA! It's cropped into form and displayed exactly where and how you imagined. And by incorporating social networking, content organizing, and user-friendly site editing tools, 247 Townhall is able to maintain a vibrant site that boasts fresh content daily.

Development Process:

The key to the successful deployment of this site was the Agile software development approach that OpenSourcery took with One Economy (the corporation behind 247 Townhall). This was a complex development project with tight internal deadlines, numerous stakeholders, and significant functional requirements. OpenSourcery has partnered with One Economy on a number of projects (including One-Economy.com) and both organizations approached this project with a strong commitment to consistent communication and a tight, organized feedback loop. Solid project management tools and processes, as well as short development iterations and frequent, automated code pushes and database migration scripts, allowed us to manage the complex scope and timeline for this launch.

The theme for Oregon State Fair 2008 is "Too Big to Miss." When you visit their site, you'll see what they mean. The fair runs for 11 days, features hundreds of events, and gathers big names from music and entertainment.

They had a potential mess on their hands: how can visitors take in all this information, decide what they want to see, and keep a record of their schedule? Jonathan Hedstrom created the Session Favorites module to allow visitors to compile a "Can't Miss" list, which is a printable page that displays everything that user tagged. So instead of having to scribble down notes they're likely to lose or forget, fairgoers can bring a single piece of paper with images, descriptions, and times of their "Can't Miss" events.

OpenSourcery created this feature for the Oregon State Fair website, and now it's freely available on Drupal.org. It's just another example of how OpenSourcery contributes valuable code to the entire community.