Sharing documents

jborup-p40 · #1

Hi....

Our Stake Presidency is looking for a tool, that they and the High Counsel can use for reporting, and for sharing documents/working with documents (documents that DON'T contain sensitive information).

I have been looking at FORMs from google docs, to solve the reporting, and google docs for the document part. And they seem to solve the problem.

I have looked at google apps, but here I can choose between a Business or Education solution. I don't think this is what I want. Then there is the personal solutions, which is probably just like the one I have with my gmail account, but that is personal, and not part of the common/shared solution.

It looks like I need a domain name, but don't think that is the what we want. We are not looking for a public site.

We just want to go to a 'google' address like: www.google.com/a/ourstake where we can access our documents.
The idea is to have the SP, HC, and the rest create a google account (where they can keep their current email address), and then use these user ids for our google docs....

Is this possible, how should we do it ?

pwilson · #2

Just create a "Shared Folder" in Google Docs and then privately share it with whomever in the stake you need to.

More info can be found here: http://docs.google.com/support/bin/answ ... 8074&hl=en

jborup-p40 · #3

Thanks, for the suggestion. But I would like a solution, where the documents are not shared from some ones account. But belongs to the 'group/team'
Regards
Jørn

kd7mha · #4

jborup wrote:Thanks, for the suggestion. But I would like a solution, where the documents are not shared from some ones account. But belongs to the 'group/team'
Regards
Jørn

I have a "Maintenance account" that is used to share docs for my family

#5

jborup wrote:
It looks like I need a domain name, but don't think that is the what we want. We are not looking for a public site.

We just want to go to a 'google' address like: www.google.com/a/ourstake where we can access our documents.
The idea is to have the SP, HC, and the rest create a google account (where they can keep their current email address), and then use these user ids for our google docs....

Why not just put your documents on google docs and "invite" each person to be an editor? Or am I missing something....

#6

jborup wrote:
It looks like I need a domain name, but don't think that is the what we want. We are not looking for a public site.

We just want to go to a 'google' address like: www.google.com/a/ourstake where we can access our documents.
The idea is to have the SP, HC, and the rest create a google account (where they can keep their current email address), and then use these user ids for our google docs....

Why not just put your documents on google docs and "invite" each person to be an editor? Or am I missing something....

If you want, create a stake google account and give them all the password...

jborup-p40 · #7

Hmmmm....pwilson's suggestion, taken a step further... do like it - even though it is not what I had imagined. Will take a look.

ldsrussp · #8

Our Stake President wants the same thing but we have all concluded after reading the handbook that any storage of documents with personal details of members on anything but church owned and controlled computers is not allowed. This means things like dropbox, google docs, etc... are all out. I can see why for sure but it raises the question of what to do then?

Has anyone heard of the church looking to provide a shared document service that wards and stakes could use for their councils to have common documents? The ward mission councils could also benefit from this greatly. The 'classic lds.org" site had a primitive version of file sharing on it but I gather this is going away as I've seen nothing with the new lds.org that provides this (or did I just miss it?).

aebrown · #9

ldsrussp wrote:The 'classic lds.org" site had a primitive version of file sharing on it but I gather this is going away as I've seen nothing with the new lds.org that provides this (or did I just miss it?).

If you're referring to the News and Information section of the Classic ward and stake websites, then the answer is that it is not going away. In the Stake and Ward Websites: Overview help page, it says:

If you're looking for a link to the new stake and ward website beyond the calendar and directory -- for example, the meetinghouse times, lesson schedules, and news and information -- you won't find these resources because they haven't been built yet. These features are currently in development and will be built over the course of 2011.

Personally, I'm starting to doubt that this will all be delivered by the end of 2011, but in any case, you can depend on news and information features being part of the new lds.org. For documents that are not at all sensitive, that will probably satisfy your needs.

DBDarrough · #10

ldsrussp wrote:.... but we have all concluded after reading the handbook that any storage of documents with personal details of members on anything but church owned and controlled computers is not allowed. This means things like dropbox, google docs, etc... are all out....

I actually contacted Church HQ to ask specifically about dropbox and google docs and was told that it was fine so long as it was secure and being used only for sharing documents among leaders, not to create a web presence for our ward. We wanted to use dropbox to save our MLS backups offsite so we shared a dropbox folder for the Ward Clerks. The problem was, dropbox kept conflicting with the Church's software and computer settings and half the time it wouldn't allow us to connect. It may have been a simple firewall issue but we didn't want to change anything on the ward computer and finally gave up. We're back to USB flash drives. How early 2000's!

We do however use Google Docs to share spreadsheets where we keep track of Sacrament meeting agendas, todo lists among clerks and bishopric members, birthday lists, members without callings, etc. and it is really useful in that capacity. As different leaders have been released we have simply changed ownership to someone more permanent and taken away sharing access when no longer needed. Even though leaders such as RS, YM, YW, etc. have access to this information through MLS printouts, they don't currently have access to this information online and google docs has been a great tool to share that information with those that have the right to see it.