Web based self-scheduling application?

December 21, 2005 4:13 PM

Do you know of a web-based self-scheduling application or volunteer management system?

I am trying to find an existing package to fill a need.

I am working with a volunteer organization to set up their website. We'd like to be able to be able to define days and times on a calendar and the number of volunteers that we need. Our users/volunteers would then come in and self register for available slots. Ideally, there would be feature-candy like auto mailing reminders and volunteer time tracking.

I have tried looking around at existing volunteer website frameworks like CivicSpace, but so far I haven't found anything with volunteer self scheduling.

posted by rudyfink to computers & internet (8 comments total)

How about eyeOS? I just installed it on my server (PHP required) and seems to be what you might be looking for. The install was a snap. Feel free to see my version here. Login and password: askme/askme
posted by KevinSkomsvold at 5:13 PM on December 21, 2005

Kevin, I might not be seeing the functionality you are talking about. I realize in reading what I wrote earlier I might have been unclear, whups. I am looking for a web-based group self-scheduling application.

eyeOs seems to be a very cool but personal web desktop suite. Maybe there is some way to share calendar appointments across sessions that I am not seeing?
posted by rudyfink at 5:37 PM on December 21, 2005

Thanks for the clarification rudyfink. It appears that a group feature (calendar, doc sharing) will be implemented in the next version per this forum post. Something to forward to, I guess.
posted by KevinSkomsvold at 5:44 PM on December 21, 2005

I've run into this many times, but have never found a decent solution. I've got a side of maintaining web apps for volunteer non-profits, so I've just wrote my own php app as the need arose. If you know php, writing what you're describing isn't that hard. Fininding a pre-written app that's flexible enough to work in multiple situations... now that's hard.

After talking up php, I should say that I've switched to Ruby on Rails and found it to be so much better I'm not going back to php. I'm writing a flexible CMS for volunteer profits that will do what you describe, but it's a long ways from public release. I'm sure it'll be on MeFiProjects when the time comes.
posted by ewagoner at 6:04 PM on December 21, 2005

I have to schedule instructors with available courses, and would like them to do a preliminary self schedule. every time I ask this question, in multiple venues, invariably it is suggested that I write it myself.
posted by craniac at 7:16 PM on December 21, 2005

Thanks all.

It just _seems_ like a widget someone would have already made in perl/php/rails etc.

I guess I may do it in RoR, but I just hate remaking a wheel some continually mantained and integrated project has already made and will be servicing.
posted by rudyfink at 1:31 AM on December 22, 2005

I'm not a techie, so I don't know how they did it, but if you're looking for examples, Hands On Bay Area lets registered volunteers sign up for their own projects. Each project lists the max number of people needed, and you can just browse through projects and register online for those that interest you.

And you can track what you've done, what you're scheduled for, etc. on your own account page.
posted by occhiblu at 8:30 AM on December 22, 2005

Occhiblu,

Thanks. I'll email them and ask what they're using. It looks exactly like the kind of thing I'm looking for.
posted by rudyfink at 3:48 PM on December 22, 2005