Before I go any further, let me just say that we'll be working on a version for all international units. Don't expect it until at least 2008. But in the meantime, the current version works for those in the U.S. and Canada and many people don't even know.
You get features like:
- News and information from your ward and stake.
- Ward and stake calendar (integrated with a calendar from Church HQ).
- Lesson schedules.
- Membership and leadership directories.
- Addresses for missionaries serving from your ward.
It's a great tool for your ward! The key is that the ward leadership and councils need to use it.
If your ward isn't using the ward web site on lds.org then ask them to start. Teachers should be updating their lessons plans, the calendar should be kept up-to-date, and so forth. This is a wonderful and only takes a little effort to get people using it.
One known issue is that the signup process is a little arduous. A member needs to know his/her membership number (can be found on your temple recommend if you have one) and confirmation number. Both pieces of data can be obtained from your ward clerk.
In the future, we will make this process easier.
Check it out by clicking here..
Joel: I am an avid Web 2.0 user, was a bishop, and I don't use the ward website. I tried to get people to use it for a long time, and it was a huge uphill battle. Those who aren't tech savvy are one issue, the second is that those who are tech savvy already feel that they are juggling too many calendars, and because of the legal and security issues the Church must face, that the site is a "walled garden" makes it less attractive to use.
ReplyDeleteIt would be a tremendous help to have an RSS feed for the calendars.
It would be nice to be able to get iCal feeds for the Ward/Stake calendars. I hate having to go to the web site to see what's on the calendar. An iCal feed would make it possible for me to view the Calendar from Outlook or Google calendars or whatever calendar software I'm using.
ReplyDeleteAs my ward's Executive Secretary, I take my laptop to bishopric meetings, PEC, Ward Council, etc. etc. It would be nice to be able to check the on-line calendars while in those meetings. Since we don't have wi-fi Internet access at our meeting house, I can't do that.
As a web developer and frequent technology early adopter, people seem to think that I'd use the ward web site all the time.
ReplyDeleteThe truth is, I hardly use it at all. The calendar has potential, but it's not up-to-date, and the ward has a printed calendar on the back of the weekly Sunday program that is. The directory has potential, but the Relief Society's monthly printed directory is right by the phone and immediately accessible, and the web site isn't. When I was the Young Men's secretary and we were instructed to stop using our own (mailman-based) mailing list, we found the web site mailing features to be entirely unusable; consequently, the YM organization now has no mailing list at all.
The single change that I would find most useful would be to allow individual users to do more. Currently too much depends on the site administrator. Someone's already suggested allowing the secretaries of the various organizations to update their own calendar items; that would be a great start. Allow them to publish their own news items while you're at it. And I can't think of a single good reason why a member who prefers not to be listed in the directory should have to go through the administrator (who may or may not actually do anything about it) to opt out of the listing. Let them do it themselves. On that point I speak from experience -- the first ward web site administrator I asked to remove my directory listing never did. Fortunately the next administrator was my wife and was more responsive to the request, but it would still have been nice if I could have done it myself.
I'm interested to know more of the international development, particularly the British Isles! I imagine some difficulties with our data protection legislation on the member directory front.
ReplyDeleteIt seems that our membership is increasingly an online community but I can foresee resistance from some to the use of calendar etc. Sounds as though the calendar format lacks information a little like the ones hanging on the noticeboard at present! This depends on the person providing the information surely?
I use both our ward web site and the stake web site a lot. They are wonderful. However, because I'm currently serving in the stake presidency it would be more convenient to be directed to the stake web site rather than my ward web site when I log in. How about putting a check box or two option buttons in our profiles that would allow us to indicate which web site (stake or ward) we'd like to be logged into initially? That would be very convenient. Thanks.
ReplyDeleteI was trying to put the ward directory into my Outlook to sync with my PDA and I can only get the first entry to save. How can I get the rest?
ReplyDelete1 of the mods I would love to see added would be lesson schedules for all the different quorums. Not just Sunday School and Priesthood/Relief Society but a lesson schedule to include Primary, Young Men/Women. This would benefit everyone who uses the ward website. My ward has a lot of people who are not tech savvy and even to the point fear tech but making getting registered and logging in simpler will help ease transition.
ReplyDeleteAnother feature that would be neat is to add RSS feeds from the ward/stake website news.
-- My $.02 --
ReplyDeleteI. Ward Calendar
Pro:
(1) Calendar export.
Con:
(1) No live updating for calendar (RSS, iCal subscription, etc). Having to download a new calendar as the calendar changes is sub-optimal.
(2) No integration with non-web applications for changing/adding. e.g. no uploading text files for populating calendar, no integration with any other calendaring app. "Walled garden"
II. Membership Directory
Pro:
lots of export options
Con:
(1) no way to update my own information, or add a family picture.
(2) no automatic update of leadership list from ward MLS. (The Elder's Quorum presidency list from 1+ years ago is still listed as current)
(3) no automatic update of missionary list from ward MLS. (The Elder's Quorum presidency list from 1+ years ago is still listed as current)
Perhaps someone could create a script that would logon to the LDS.org site and download the most recent version of the calendar and auto update my own Google Calendar?
ReplyDeleteA step by step tutorial on how to export a ward or stake calendar to import into Thunderbird Lightning or other calendars. The help button on the Church site does not cover how to export the calendar. I'm sure it is simple, I just don't know how, yet.
ReplyDeleteThe website picture directory needs to be able to upload a picture greater than 135 x 180.
ReplyDeleteIf the church is supposed to be about families how can you see an entire family of 8-10 people and still distinguish their faces with 135 x 180 pixels?
Higher resolution, or even limiting the picture by filesize would be fine. Even 50Kb per picture would be MUCH better than this artificial size limit
Look at what e-bay does when you upload an auction picture that is too large, it auto-resizes it FOR you to the appropriate size/ width dimensions. The site simply says: "too large" or even worse, displays no message at all?
I would be happy with a synch between the ward computers and the church website. If someone adds an email address, for example, in MLS system, it doesn't get updated on the website and vice versa.
ReplyDeleteThere needs to be a way to put in more than one email address per person in MLS (like the website)
I agree with "Nate" there should be an "auto-update" from the unit MLS computer system to the ward website for Leadership information.
ReplyDeleteThe bishopric already seems to auto-update from Salt Lake (or at least the Bishop's name). There should be a similar feature in place for ward / stake leadership.
This ends up creating duplicate work between the ward clerk and a ward website admin. Or as is usually the case, it just doesn't get updated except once every 2-5 years (whenever a new bishop /stake president / clerk / admin is called).