Barn Raising and Code Sprint for the Echo Park and Arroyo S.E.C.O. Time Banks at Droplabs on June 15 & 16, 2012

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christefano's picture
Start: 
2012-06-15 19:00 - 2012-06-16 15:00 America/Los_Angeles
Event type: 
Sprint

Join us at Droplabs on Friday & Saturday, June 15-16, 2012, for a Barn Raising and Code Sprint to benefit the Echo Park Time Bank and TimeBanks USA!

There's something for everyone at this two-day event and you're welcome to attend either or both days. If you're interested in learning more about Drupal and getting some practical hands-on experience, or if you're a Drupal power user and would like to help mentor others into using Drupal's best practices for site development, this is an excellent opportunity.

The Echo Park Time Bank is a non-profit community collective with a mission to facilitate the cooperative exchange of goods and services among its hundreds of members. Since September 2011, the Echo Park Time Bank has been using Drupal to manage their community website at http://arroyoseco.timebanks.org and its currency system.

At this barn raising, we'll be improving the online membership application and implementing a realname policy for usernames. The work we do will be shared with TimeBanks USA, which will directly benefit the 300+ time banks that have their own sites that use the same Drupal distribution.

This is our second barn raising for the time bank and directly builds upon the work we completed last time. See http://ex.tl/ZTT for more information about our last barn raising and code sprint.

Agenda

On Friday evening, a group of us will be meeting, socializing and setting up the space. On Saturday, we'll be having a recap of the last barn raising and then break into at least 2 groups that will work and learn together on specific tasks.

We will also be revising and expanding on the documentation that we created last time so that TimeBanks USA and other time banks have a guide for how to repeat our success with the Echo Park Time Bank.

For any changes to our agenda, stay tuned to this event announcement or click the Sign up button below (or both!) to be notified when the agenda has been updated.

   Friday evening, June 15, at 7-9:00pm:
   Open Meeting of the Echo Park Time Bank Tech Team
   Projector and tables / chairs setup
   Revision and expansion of documentation on the last barn raising
   Drupal After Dark (Socializing and networking)

   Saturday morning, June 16, at 10:00am:
   Introductions
   Recap of last barn raising
   Questions and answers
   Identify which groups to break off into

   Saturday afternoon, June 16, at 12pm:
   Lunch! (This is potluck-style, so bring enough for yourself and another)
   Special guests! Don't miss it!
   Break off into groups
   Hands-on code sprint

   Saturday afternoon, June 16, at 3pm
   Wrap-up, clean-up and close-up
   Drupal After Dark (Socializing and networking)

What to bring

Just bring your laptop, your business cards and whatever else you need. Lunch on Saturday is potluck-style, so please bring something for yourself and another.

Please note that our guest wireless network is limited to 1Mb per client, so bring your MiFi router or a phone you can tether with if for some reason you need a lot of bandwidth. Access to our high-speed network is included with a Droplabs membership.

About Time Banking

Time Banking is a simple concept: you work for an hour, earn an hour credit, and spend an hour with someone in your time bank community. Time banks don't get penalized in benefit reductions or pay taxes or because unlike market-based national currencies, time banks are more like charitable volunteering circles of mutual aid or relationship-based gift economies. As the recession and Occupy movement encourage people to reimagine work and how they get their needs met in the new economy, time banks are really catching on.

About the Echo Park Time Bank

The Echo Park Time Bank is a non-profit community collective with a mission to facilitate the cooperative exchange of goods and services among its hundreds of members. It's a pay-it-forward system that connects unmet needs with untapped resources. In 2011, The Echo Park Time Bank migrated its time banking software to Community Weaver, a hosted Drupal platform provided by TimeBanks USA.

In February, 2012, Autumn Rooney of the Echo Park Time Bank and Christefano Reyes from Exaltation of Larks presented on the concept and the practice of time banking and how Community Weaver is being used to fully manage the time bank's community website and currency system. See http://ex.tl/ZTq for a video of that presentation.

About TimeBanks USA

TimeBanks USA (TBUSA) was founded in 1995 with a mission to nurture and expand a movement that promotes equality and builds caring community economies through inclusive exchange of time and talent. Its central office is located in Washington D.C.

TBUSA is working with TimeBanks leaders across the US, including the Echo Park Time Bank, as well as internationally to strengthen and rebuild community, and use TimeBanks to achieve wide-ranging goals such as social justice, bridges between diverse communities, and local ecological sustainability.

Join us on Twitter, Google+ and IRC!

During the workshop, several of us will be in the regional #drupal-la channel on IRC and the LA Drupal hangout on Google+ and all are welcome to join us. The event organizers will also be monitoring Twitter for feedback and questions that mention @DowntownDrupal.

Drupal After Dark

Even if you can't make it to the meetup, you're welcome to join us for a Drupal After Dark. After we wrap up the meeting and clean up, a group of us will go to a nearby restaurant or pub. One time we had beers and a bonfire and were serenaded by Skrillex. We've also gone to a variety of other locations, including Barbara's at The Brewery (at 620 Moulton Ave., just a 5 minute walk away) and Carnitas Michoacan (on 1901 N. Broadway, just a 5 minute drive away).

Google Map

Location and directions

   Droplabs
   651 Clover St.
   Los Angeles, CA 90031

Droplabs is in the Mission Junction neighborhood of Los Angeles at Big Art Labs, just 1 mile down Main St. from Philippes (the first-ever venue for LA Drupal meetups!) and Union Station. We're one block west of The Brewery, the largest live-and-work artists' colony in the world.

Free parking in our large parking lot is first-come, first-served. After parking in the lot, follow the yellow signs that point to Droplabs. (If our lot is full, you can park for free on Clover St.)

Droplabs is a brief walk from the Main St. / Lamar St. stop on the the Metro Local 76 bus line. This is also the Lincoln Heights / Chinatown DASH stop.

To carpool or catch the Droplabs shuttle from Union Station, post below in the comments.

About Droplabs

Droplabs Los Angeles Droplabs is a collaborative Drupal event and coworking space in Downtown Los Angeles. Created in 2011 by Drupal community members for the Drupal community, we are focused on serving the greater LA Drupal community, enriching the Drupal skills and lives of its members, and bringing joy to our Drupal practice. Our founders represent several local area businesses that have deep roots in the Drupal and open source communities.

We've been open to the public since May, 2011, and the use of our equipment and facilities, including conference room, tables and chairs, is free until our official launch. See http://groups.drupal.org/node/145934 for more details about our open beta period and http://droplabs.net/prices for our list of free amenities and member perks, including our high-speed WiFi, an espresso machine, printer and scanner services, and more.

Droplabs is the host of the monthly Downtown LA Drupal meetups, LA Drupal's weekly Pro Drupal 7 Development book study group and special events including the Varnish 3 Release Party, a Leave GoDaddy Day workshop and LA Drupal's job fairs. To learn more about Droplabs, follow @Droplabs on Twitter, sign up at Meetup.com/Droplabs or like DroplabsLA on Facebook!

About Downtown Los Angeles Drupal

Downtown Los Angeles is one of the most active areas for Drupal in Los Angeles and LA County. We've been meeting regularly on the 3rd Tuesday of every month since early 2010 and now schedule up to 4 regular meetups a month and occasional trainings and social gatherings. Downtown LA Drupal members also produce special events, code sprints, and the annual Drupal Design Camp LA conference.

Attending Drupal events in and around Downtown Los Angeles is one of the best ways to meet and talk with other Drupaleros and we encourage you to attend as many meetings and special events as you'd like. Whether it's to find solutions to problems you've been having, sharing something you've learned or just meeting interesting like-minded people, the Downtown LA Drupal events are an essential resource for Drupal professionals and hobbyists alike.

If you aren't already a member of Downtown Los Angeles Drupal, it's easy to join our community. Our calendar of events is on our "Events" tab on our home page at http://groups.drupal.org/dtla

Comments

Token Authentication for CW2

jwurster's picture

Hi,

I'd really like to be out in LA, but stuck in Springfield PA. So, I'd like to ask a question about exposing the authenticated RSS feeds in CW2. My ultimate goal is to create an Android app to read the feeds and display to our members.

I installed the Token Authentication module but am a little lost. I was hoping to test with my userid and be able to just reset my token. However, I don't see that capability. I only see the ability to reset all user tokens. By the way, I am site admin.

I installed the module on a test Drupal site I have and did see a Token tab in the user area, but I don't see this in the CW2 admin area.

I hope you can help as I think this will be a good tool for all timebanks.

Thank you, jim

Hi Jim! Token Authentication

christefano's picture

Hi Jim! Token Authentication isn't on our agenda for today's barn raising but I know that this feature has been requested in the past.

After all of today's excitement, we'll come back around to your comment and will follow up about Token Authentication (tokenauth).

I recall there's a way to reset tokens with tokenauth but I don't remember if it's per-user and not site-wide…

Tabs on profiles (including

christefano's picture

Tabs on profiles (including the "Token authentication" tab) are being hidden by CW2's theme layer. Our take on this at yesterday's barn raising was that the tabs are hidden in order to simplify the user experience.

The tabs are there, but they're just hidden. To get around this, you'll need to predict the path based on the user ID and go directly to the user/$uid/tokenauth paths.

Thanks for your help but it

jwurster's picture

Thanks for your help but it seems I need more assistance. I got my token and formulated a url with it, but still could not access the rss feed. My goal is to build an Android app (which I have a little experience in) that will be able to access the timebank data and display it to the user to make it more useful to him/her. After listening to you on the timebank conference call today, I think this is really a project that needs flushing out by the team.

So, how can we make this little project go forward since I am on the east coast outside Philadelphia?

jim

This is outside what we

christefano's picture

This is outside what we worked on for the barn raising that we had here in Los Angeles. I suggest that you start a discussion in the Time Banking group at http://groups.drupal.org/time-banking and invite everyone — Droplabs members in and around Los Angeles, the worldwide Drupal community and other time banking communities that are using Community Weaver — to collaborate there on this Android project.

In the meantime, if you already have site admin access then I recommend changing the theme used for your user account so that you can get the Community Weaver default theme — and any of the weird things it may be doing to tokenauth — out of the way.

Skype conference for today's barn raising

christefano's picture

All, we're ditching Google+ Hangout in favor of Skype. Sorry for the inconvenience.

Our Skype conference is starting right now, so if you want to join then just post your Skype name here in the comments or send a contact request to neatoburrito1

For everyone to to able to join the video conference, everyone will need Skype 5. Thanks!

Some Documentation from the Code Sprint

autumnrooney's picture

The Show and Tell at the end. Not the best recording but it's something,
http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/23361875

Also some pictures,
https://picasaweb.google.com/echoparktimebank/CodeSprintJune162012?authu...

Thanks again to Droplabs for all your incredible support!

echoparktimebank.com
cafederationoftimebanks.org

My summary of the code sprint

Jim Tate's picture

The following summary was posted in the TB USA TimeBanks Network Group and shared here:

Christefano and his highly skilled team of Drupal developers worked
with Droplabs developers, TimeBank Coordinators, and TB USA staff to
do design work for a future version of CW2. This was the 2nd session
in a series of code sprints, more will be scheduled. The work was
aimed at extending and enhancing the functionality of CW2. It also
addresses some of the complaints many have with CW2 today. The two
key areas explored and worked on were:
1. New member registration and application process
2. Expanded functionality for “neighborhoods” (a bit like TimeBanks
within TimeBanks)

The Drupal Features modules, along with some needed supporting
modules, were used for the development work. This approach allows TB
USA to roll out the new functionality to all TB’s without any negative
affect on existing TB’s, It just slides in place, so to speak. Each
TB would have access to configure the additional functionality via new
Control Panel menu items. Each TB would make their own decisions to
enable the new functionality, or leave it disabled. Once enabled, the
functionality will have different settings that allow your TB
Coordinator to tailor the functionality to fit the needs of your
individual TB. Today many of these types of settings are only
available to Site Administrators. The Features module approach puts
this power into the hands of Coordinators, much like what we had in
CW1’s “manage custom and core attributes”; and no, you won’t have to
sign an intimidating agreement to be able to have this new
capability.

More details:
1) We combined the membership application form with the registration
page. This was done by adding new My Account (personal profile)
fields and extending them onto the registration page. TB’s that
require a signed application form may not wish to use this, or may
wish to use some of it ... that’s the beauty of the Features
approach! You will be able to select the fields you want and tailor
the registration page to fit your TB needs. We talked about a future
version of this functionality that could support an optional PayPal
link; enabling TB’s to collect a membership dues donation during the
registration process.

A solution was found and tested for the username problem many TB’s are
having difficulty dealing with. This is where the new member uses
some fake or made-up handle as their username (moondawgy, cutiepie,
etc.). The new version will not allow entry of a username. Prospects
will be required to input their first and last names only
(organizational members would input the first part and last part of
their organization’s name here). The system will then automatically
create their username from the first and last name fields. When the
“real name” function is enabled on a TB site, it will change the
usernames of people awaiting approval on the Control Panel, but will
not affect existing member usernames. This should go a long way
toward minimizing all the work many of us Coordinators do to cleanup
all those junk usernames.

We also discovered the source of the intermittent bug that causes
registration to fail for some people. This is due to a random error
in how the CAPTCHA works to screen out spam bots and the like. The
word puzzles generated by “pick the unrelated word” does not always
work properly and will not allow the registration to go through. SA’s
can fix this now by going into CAPTCHA, selecting the Random CAPTCHA
Type, and unchecking “pick the unrelated word”. The rest of you will
have to wait a little longer until CW2 is updated.

2) The existing neighborhood functionality in CW2 was expanded so that
neighborhoods could act like smaller TB’s within your TB. See an
example here: http://arroyoseco.timebanks.org/page/about-neighborhoods
This would allow a single TB to cover a larger community distance-
wise, but breakdown that large community into smaller neighborhoods,
where members are concentrated nearer one another. The neighborhoods
would have their own event calendars, forums/blogs, and leadership
teams. This new neighborhood functionality may not be a fit for all
TB’s and would be delivered disabled. Another new set of Control
Panel menus would allow a Coordinator to enable and configure it.

These were the main focus areas of the code sprint. The ARROYO
S.E.C.O TimeBank is acting as our guinea pig to help test and fine-
tune the new functionality ... thank you Autumn!

Please visit the Action Hub and voice your opinions for what the top
priority CW2 fixes (features, functions, bugs, etc.) should be. Your
priorities will help determine what is worked on next and what fixes
will get into the next round of CW2 updates. Things are moving
quickly, so as the saying goes: if you snooze you loose!

Thanks to Christefano everyone at Droplabs for sharing their expert knowledge with us TimeBankers and helping to enhance our Community Weaver applications. The enhanced version of CW will help propel TimeBanking to new heights and allow the movement to better serve its members and rebuild communities.

Procedures for Fixing CW2 Registration Problems

Jim Tate's picture

My TimeBank was experiencing problems with junk registrations so we decided to fix the problems for ourselves now. In the process we developed a set of procedures other TB's could use to do the same. The procedures are written for Community Weaver Site Admins, but most of the instructions would apply to any Drupal site.

The procedures can be found here: http://actionhub.timebanks.org/groups/cw-site-admin-group/fixing-registr...

The Drupal modules described in the procedures include:
RealName
RealName Registration
Botcha
Spambot
Captcha