From the category archives:

CMS

Drupal Commerce

February 17, 2010

Although it’s not often used in nonprofit settings, the Drupal module (or, more correctly, a large suite of modules) called “Ubercart” is a pretty amazing tool if you need to create a shopping cart system. We’ve implemented it for organizations that want to sell fees for events, sell items, and take donations. It doesn’t have many of the strengths of CiviCRM, but it has a lot of useful features if you want to sell things, or combine selling things with taking donations, memberships and selling event tickets.

A while back, I’d heard of the Ubercore initiative – a group of developers working to bring Ubercart to Drupal 7 (there was quite a delay between the release of Drupal 6 and the availability of Ubercart for Drupal 6.)  That initiative is now called “Drupal Commerce. (other site here.)” It is basically meant to be a rewrite of Ubercart for Drupal 7. It looks to be something to watch. Gregory Heller of CivicActions wrote an interesting conceptual piece on the integration of Drupal Commerce and CiviCRM that’s worth a read. (By the way, there is a module done by DharmaTech that integrates CiviCRM and the current Ubercart.)

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Drupal and Salesforce

December 31, 2009

It’s taken me a while to write this blog post, mostly because I have been working hard at various things (like building a business and building new websites.) This is the last installment in my CRM/CMS integration series, that started almost a year ago (wow!) And I’m skipping Joomla/Salesforce Integration because there isn’t any publicly available documentation or code about the integration that PICnet did with Joomla and Salesforce, called J!Salesforce.  [update: see Ryan's comment below.]

So what is the state of Drupal/Salesforce Integration? It’s not as mature as the Plone/Salesforce integration, for sure, but it is coming along nicely. There are several contributed modules:

  • salesforce – main module, with API, node, and user integration possibilities. This module provides the basic salesforce API connection (via SOAP), and includes field mapping, and basic import/export
  • sf_webform – Makes integration with webforms in Drupal fairly easy. Web-to-lead is quite nice and flexible with this module.
  • uc_salesforce – Provides integration with ubercart orders
  • parser-salesforce – Integration with FeedAPI – pulling data from salesforce into drupal nodes via FeedAPI  (I hope to start maintaining this module)
  • sf_import – Import Salesforce objects into Drupal nodes (will be folded into the main salesforce module)

All of these modules are in alpha or beta, although I know for a fact that some of them (or versions of them) are working in production sites. There are a fair number of bugs that need to be fixed before there is a stable release. There are a bunch of outstanding issues that need a lot of work (like caching, for instance). There are two other modules that are related, but don’t use the main salesforce api module – one for ubercart, and one for web-to-lead (called salesforcewebform). That module has a stable release, but only provides the ability to integrate between Webforms and leads, not other objects.

Right now, the salesforce module allows for integration of contact, lead and campaign objects only. so that’s another big area that could use some work.

There is a good screencast done by one of the folks (Jeff Miccolis from Development Seed) who has worked a lot on this project.

I’d say that in a year, we’ll have a good solid module release, providing lots of features for integration between Drupal and Salesforce.com.

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CRM & CMS integration: Web pages and forms

April 15, 2009

Third to last in my series on CMS and CRM integration (next up, Joomla and Salesforce, followed by Drupal and Salesforce) is using web forms.

I wanted to talk about this because it is arguably the most common form of “integration” between CRM and CMS that’s out there (besides the manual kind). You’ve got a CMS, and you’ve got a CRM somewhere else, and you need some way for data from users to make it to your CRM. Of course, it’s not really integration – there is no sharing of data between the CMS and the CRM in any useful way. But webforms can really help you get things done. Here are some examples of things I’ve done and seen done:

  • A custom donation page that’s sitting on a service like Network for Good that is linked from the website, or framed within it
  • The HTML for a “Web to Lead” form from Salesforce.com pasted into a CMS page
  • The HTML for a event registration form or donation form that goes to a hosted service

In the first option, the form isn’t hosted at all on your site. In this option you have the least control over look and feel – the vendor controls the look and the behavior. An example of this I’ve run into is when an organization uses Blackbaud’s Raiser’s Edge, and wants to have online donations via NetSolutions, their older (and much cheaper) “integration” tool. They provide a page, which hooks directly into the users RE installation. But you can’t customize the page in any useful way, so if you’ve just designed a brand-spanking new site, this page is gonna look like crap. (Luckily, at least Network For Good’s donation pages look snappy and nice, but are going to look a lot different than your website.)

The other options are much better for look and feel – you can take the HTML, and, in most instances, style it to look like your site. You can even sometimes include Javascript for validation or other functionality. But this is still strictly one-way communication – the form data goes directly to the service (and does not pass go.) You don’t get any of it.

This is a great start to integration, if your budget doesn’t allow for true, deep, two-way integration between CRM and CMS. And it’s a great way to get your feet wet in thinking about what you might want to do with CRM and CMS. And, in some instances, depending on both CRM and CMS, it might be your only option.

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Drupal security, and other CMS Report comments

April 3, 2009

Now that the Idealware CMS report is out, I get to have my say about it. Here’s the first post, there might be more to come.

The thing that is prompting this post is the little storm about the security metric that we used to try and get a handle on the security of the 4 different systems we reviewed. More on that in a bit.

You might think that comparing four different open source packages that, in essence, do pretty the same thing (in a broad sense) would be a cakc walk. In fact, nothing could be farther from the truth. The developers of each project have completely different sets of assumptions about what the right way to do things is, and completely different philosophies and ethos when it comes to building interfaces and functionality. Making apples-to-apples comparisons of these systems was one of the most difficult analytical tasks I’ve taken on in a while (and, actually much of the heavy lifting of designing the analysis was done by Laura Quinn), and until you attempt such a thing, please be somewhat tempered in your complaints about it.

Now the security issue. One of the 12 different aspects we are comparing is “Scalability and security”. The report isn’t about security, it’s a very, very broad comparison of the systems, with security as a very small component. That’s just the context. Two (yes, just two) questions out of many relate to security.  First, a simple metric relating to security reports, and second, what processes are in place in the communities to deal with security. This wasn’t designed to be an in-dept, complex analysis of security. If it had been, we would have done a lot more work on how to measure security. On the Four Kitchens blog, they say, “While both reports above seem to identify Drupal (and Joomla! and WordPress, to be fair) as having notably bad [emphasis mine] security, they’re also both based on one superficial metric: self-reported vulnerabilities.” Now I can’t speak about the IBM report (I haven’t even read it yet), but our report says no such thing. Drupal gets a “Solid” on Scalability and security. Solid, which is only one step below Excellent. And you know why it got a “Solid”? Because, indeed, it does have more reported security vulnerabilities than Plone (as do Joomla and WordPress.)

David Geilhufe, who also takes issue with the security metric, has some good points. Yes, sheer numbers of vulnerabilities are not anywhere near the best metric of whether or not a system is secure or not. As a quick comparative look between a small number of open source systems, it’s hard to argue that it contributes no information. Four Kitchens seems to suggest that part of the reason for more vulnerabilities in Drupal compared to Plone is that it’s more popular. But, if you’ve been an observer to the Linux/Windows FUD wars, you’ll remember that Microsoft has that exact same argument about why there are more security vulnerabilities in Windows as compared to Linux. And the Linux folks say, in response, “It’s not popularity, it’s design.” I’m sure  that Four Kitchens, and most open source software developers agree with that perspective. In reviewing Plone, and talking with people who develop for Plone, I was convinced that the reason that Plone had fewer reported vulnerabilities was not just because it was less popular – it’s because it (and Python and Zope) was more secure by design.

I am completely happy with Drupal’s security (otherwise, it wouldn’t have gotten a “Solid.”) I think the Drupal community takes security extremely seriously, and if they didn’t, I wouldn’t have chosen it as a platform for development. I also think that the Joomla and WordPress communities take security seriously. In our estimation, they were all really good. But Plone was just that much better.

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Exciting changes afoot…

April 1, 2009

I have some exciting news. For the last few months, I have been working on a new collaboration called OpenIssue, which is a growing, diverse, self-reflective and constantly-learning team. We are focused on delivering quality web technology solutions to nonprofit organizations and social enterprises.

As you know, I have built a long-time expertise in open source software and web applications, particularly Content Management Systems (CMS) and online database systems, including CRM. Thomas Groden, my new business partner, has expertise in Software-as-a-Service Constituent Relationship Management Systems (CRM), as well as much more broad expertise in technology infrastructure.

All technology implementors have to choose their tools (unless they run a very large shop) and we have decided to focus on implementation of both Salesforce.com and CiviCRM as CRMs, and Drupal as a CMS. We are keenly interested in building on our expertise to integrate these open platforms in really rich ways, to allow organizations to create great online applications.

I’m excited to be a part of a team – I’ve been a soloist for a while, and it’s nice to build collaborations, and work together with people with shared ideals on larger projects than I’d be able to take on alone. And I’m really excited by the set of technologies we’re working on, and the kinds of applications we’ll be building with these technologies.

And you can follow us on twitter.

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CRM & CMS Integration: Plone and Salesforce.com

March 16, 2009

Today, I was reading up on what the Plone community has done with integrating their CMS with Salesforce.com. I am thinking that this might be a good model for how we can do it with Drupal, but that’s a subject for another post.

(from Plone/SF Integration group)

There’s a good overview of the integration on the developerforce wiki. There are 5 components to the integration:

  • a couple of toolkits that provide the basic back-and-forth between Plone and Salesforce.com (they talk to Python and Zope)
  • an auth plug-in that allows for Salesforce.com objects to be Plone users, credential checking, caching of user data, and syncing of data from Salesforce.com and Plone
  • an integration of PloneFormGen with Salesforce.com for web-to-lead forms, etc.
  • an event management product that connects with Salesforce.com
  • A PayPal integration product

This is a pretty robust set of channels for data to move back and forth from Salesforce.com to Plone. There is a Plone/Salesforce.com Integration group, that keeps working on this, and a number of organization, including ONE/Northwest, have invested huge amounts of time and resources to working on this integration.

This is, for sure, one of the most robust open source CMS to CRM integrations out there, and one that seems to be getting pretty close to providing very powerful integration “out-of-the-box” – instead of having to piece things together and do customized code, which is more common than not.

I haven’t gotten my hands on this to try (not being a Plone person, I doubt I will), but folks might want to talk in comments about how straightforward the integration is, given differences in data for different instances of Salesforce.com. I don’t know how much code tweaking is required to really get this going. But in any event, it’s great that it exists, and it’s a great benchmark for CMS/CRM integration.

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DrupalconDC Final Report

March 10, 2009

It’s been a few days since I got back from Drupalcon, and I’ve had time to let all of the things that happened settle in. It was a great time, and I’m really happy I went.

We had a fabulous (and quite large) nptech/progressive exchange/community organizing BoF. There was a show-and-tell session for nonprofit websites (which I didn’t make it to). I went to some interesting sessions on Ubercart, Organic Groups, and a BoF on Drupal in churches (where I wondered about the theological spectrum, and guessed was populated mostly by evangelicals.)  I met lots of great people, and saw old and new friends.

I think, also, I’ve completely drunk the Drupal koolaid. I’m psyched to be working with Drupal more intensely (I’ve got 4 Drupal projects going at the present moment.) There’s lots of new things to learn, and challenges to face, but I’m excited about digging in a lot deeper. I’m sure I’ll have more to say as time goes on. And I’m looking for good excuses to go to Paris for Drupalcon Paris!

There were lots of great talks, and the videos are up!

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DrupalconDC Report #1

March 5, 2009

At the end of day one, I figured I’d give a little report on how DrupalconDC is going for me. I’m having a good time, and learning a lot.

I went to three pretty intro talks (two of them were a bit too intro for me, but I got a few good tips) and one advanced panel.

  • Themers Toolkit- I’ve only done a few themes, and modified a few, but I guess that was enough for this panel to be too beginner for me. But I did learn a few tricks I didn’t know, so it was useful. It was a good talk.
  • Totally Rocking Your Development Environment – also covered mostly stuff I knew, but I did learn a few tips (and also learned a little from my next door neighbor. It was a great talk by an incredibly enthusiastic speaker. I can’t believe though, that she suggested using Makefiles for Drupal!
  • Organic Groups – since I haven’t personally implemented OG, I didn’t know a lot about the innards, and how it really works. It was a great introduction, and I’m totally sold on it. He gave some sweet examples of it’s use (like teamsugar.com) which is amazing, and made me totally rethink using Elgg.
  • Advanced Theming Techniques -  A nice talk given by two folks from CivicActions, once of whom I’d worked with jointly on a client project. I learned a fair bit, and now have some good techniques to think about using as I start doing more serious theming (although, truthfully, I’d like to eventually be able to hand that off to folks who have a better visual sense than I.)

Dries‘ keynote was fun, and it was great to hear a bit about the history, and also the ideas about where Drupal is going. One thing he said in particular stood out: “Start thinking of the internet as one big machine.” The idea is that as barriers to the movement of data come down, doing things that were never possible before become a lot more possible. And there is some really cool stuff coming in the future like OAuth, Job Queues, RDFa output, XMPP, and Activity logs. Really neat.

I missed a couple of talks I’d wish I could have made, like the Drupal SEO talk, and Install Profiles. I was glad to see that there are a significant number of women here, and a number of women presenters, too.

I hung out with Drupalchix for lunch, and met new folks, saw some colleagues, and generally have been having a good time. I’m very much looking forward to tomorrow.

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CRM&CMS Integration: Blackbaud Raiser’s Edge and NetCommunity

February 13, 2009

What? She’s talking about Blackbaud?

Yes, it might be surprising, but I got a friendly email from fellow NTEN Board Member Steve McLaughlin, who also happens to be head of all things internet (more formally, Director, Internet Solutions) at Blackbaud. He gave me a demo and overview of their NetCommunity tool, which has been around for a while, and I figured it deserved a blog entry. It is, in fact, a great example of integration of a CMS and a CRM. Originally, I wasn’t going to cover the one vendor solutions, like this because, I believed (and, honestly, I still do) that you’re not going to get as powerful a CMS as you can as the best-in-breed CMS tools. However, it is true that Raiser’s Edge, the CRM/DMS tool that this integrates with, is inarguably one of the most important tools out there. Some call it the gold-standard. For many other CRM/DMS vendors, it’s the red spot at the center of the dartboard in their office.

The demo was pretty cool. But you know me, I fall for shiny, especially when it comes to data. The integration between the web front end and the RE back end is bi-directional and sweet. There were a lot of things you could do, including accept donations, track personal donation pages, and the like. and a lot of different ways to track what your donors and constituents did, both online and off, and have those show up in really interesting ways. It is, in many ways, the kind of CRM/CMS integration that lots of organizations want and need. Organizations can get this package in three different ways: On premises – installed inside the firewall, hosted, or SaaS. Their SaaS offering is called “NC Grow”, which provides sets of fairly simple CMS templates to start with, designed for organizations that, in their words, “are ready to reap the benefits of richer online marketing and communications, but may not have the resources or expertise in place to make such a website come to life”

The big kicker, pretty much as always with Blackbaud, is the price tag. There is a $10K license fee that you have to pay if you use the On premise or hosted versions. Expect a $35-45K price tag for development and integration. Their SaaS offering, NC Grow has a $20K/year price tag. This all is, of course, above and beyond the megabucks you’re already paying for Rasier’s Edge.

I didn’t get a very close look at the CMS (I’m wishing in retrospect that I had), but the little bit I did see of it suggested to me that it was somewhat more limited than CMS systems such as Drupal or Plone. Even if, perchance, it’s not, you still don’t get the vibrant community of developers making cool modules and add-ons to do just about anything you can imagine – you’ll have to either wait for Blackbaud to do it, or, perhaps (I’m not even sure if this is possible, but correct me if I’m wrong in comments) have someone custom develop special custom features for you. And, you’ll have an automatic $10K price tag tacked on that you won’t pay with the open source tools. I have a hard time believing that that translates to $10K worth of feature value (one could argue it’s $10K worth of integration value, though, but I’m not sure about that.)

Bottom line: If you are an organization which has Raiser’s Edge, and is committed to keeping it, and you want to do sophisticated integration between it and a web front end, then NetCommunity is probably your best solution. But before you jump in, make sure that the CMS is going to have the sophistication and power you need. And know that because RE doesn’t have open APIs, you are unlikely to be able to create the kind of sophisticated integrations with a different CMS that NetCommunity provides with RE.

But, if you are not a RE user, or are considering migrating off of RE, I don’t think that the combination of RE and NC is especially cost-effective. You can get this level of integration with Drupal/CiviCRM for sure, and likely Plone/Salesforce, and Drupal/Salesforce (with a bit more work.) More on those later.

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CiviCRM and Drupal (& Joomla)

January 26, 2009

CiviCRM was the first nonprofit-focused open source CRM (one of only two, at this moment.) It is a great tool for small to medium-sized organizations who are looking for a CRM to track members and donations, register people for events, and do mass mailings. There are also some other features, like grants management and case management that are more nascent, but promising for the future. I’ve implemented CiviCRM together with Drupal, and I’m really psyched to keep working with this great combo.

CiviCRM originally only integrated with Drupal, but recently a lot of work has been done to also integrate CiviCRM with Joomla. CiviCRM acts in Drupal like a module, and in Joomla like a component. This means that since the code sits in the same exact place,  and the databases could even be shared (or not, it’s your choice) in effect, CiviCRM is becoming part of your CMS. You install CiviCRM inside your CMS installation directory, and the CMS and CiviCRM talk to each other through PHP APIs (or “hooks”) (there are some examples of database calls across the CMS/CRM). There isn’t much work to be done by you, or by the person who implements it for you, unless you want to do customizations, and expose CRM data in new and interesting ways. Users in your CMS installation will become users in CiviCRM when you install it, and be synched going forward. You can set up web forms (for donations, event registration, etc.) and have them be menu items. It’s a very straightforward integration.

Using CiviCRM and Drupal is a great way to easily get powerful integration between your CMS and your CRM. They are both installable on pretty standard shared-hosting accounts (although shell access really helps.) It’s a really cost-effective way to get powerful features. The disadvantage of this is that you have to choose CiviCRM and Drupal (note on Joomla below).  Both have their disadvantages, and you might have a variety of reasons for not choosing one of them. Jon Stahl, in his comments on my first post in this series said: “a PHP API accessible only to other PHP apps on the same machine is simply not sufficient integration in an age of web services, where people run different apps on different machines and use languages other than PHP for building web apps.” I do agree with Jon to some extent. I do know that CiviCRM has been working on their web services APIs, but a really strong set of them would mean that people could integrate CiviCRM with more CMS, which , from my perspective, would be a Really Good Thing. That said, I do think that this combo would be a cost-effective solution for good chunks of the nonprofit community.

Note: My understanding is that there are still some snags with the CiviCRM/Joomla integration, and I’m not very familiar with it. If you already have a Joomla site (or you are about to choose Joomla) and you want to use CiviCRM, you should talk to the CiviCRM-Joomla folks, or check out the CiviCRM forums. One example: since Joomla doesn’t have granular ACLs (Access Control Lists) there must be issues with how permissions work in terms of access to specific parts of CiviCRM. If you have detailed info, please feel free to share in the comments.

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