Tech Forum

I recently returned from a mission
where we ran into the issue of getting timely reports
into the mission office and getting them sent into the
Church Headquarters, also in a timely manner.

We quickly realized that paper and phone calls were
not going to get them in because some missionaries
were out on islands.

The solution we came up with was a web site,
allowing missionaries to report via the Internet.
So I quickly built and prototyped a system that
allows news postings, orders, and of course
reporting.

This has been an incredible success, and would love
to see the church adopt a world wide system integrating
the same concept we have used.

This system would be on Church servers ( eliminating
the need for transferring the numbers weekly as done
currently ), this would also make it obviously secure.
It would also be a bonus to keep the information on Alumni
missionaries on the site, rather than using a third party
such as mission.net. It could also be used for parents,
I know that my mission president struggled contacting every
parent during a typhoon to let them know their children were
safe.

The ideas are limitless, and would be an incredible asset to
the progressing of missionary work world wide.

Having returned I have been in the process of updating our system
it to run on an AJAX engine, for speed and convenience.
I would love to show it off, but I do not know how the
Church holds the information ( sensitive? ) . . .
however if any church level employee would like to contact
me regarding this, please feel free.

Just an idea that is in the works, that has been incredibly
successful!

Zach

PM or Email me and I can help get you in touch with the missionary department. I know that they have seen demos from other missions who have done some similar things and they are always open to see the great ideas you guys have done and if/how it could be brought to the Church HQ level.

Tom

Where I'm at now we use the Microsoft Sharepoint Portals, these are secure and each user/Mission can have it's own portal where documents can be distributed as needed. The only real issue that I can see is for the areas where the internet is not readily available and phone lines are not up to our normal expectations. This is just an idea, I'm sure that there are other software programs that could accomplish the same, and it could exist at several sites with the main site located in SLC.