Ekklesion Meal Planner
Author: Andrew24 Dec
I’m pleased to announce the public availability of the Ekklesion Meal Planner,1 a web-based application that allows volunteers to easily sign-up to deliver a meal to friends in need. Granted, it’s a strange little application that most people won’t find terribly useful. However, if you are part of a church or organization that cooks meals for members who are sick, shut-in, or have a baby, then you may find Ekklesion to be a lifesaver. At Princeton we live in seminary campus housing and our neighbors are having babies constantly (seriously, six babies in ten days during the first part of December) and it’s tradition to provide meals for the happy family during the first month. However, overwhelming email communication was needed to coordinate this. When everyone wants to deliver a meal on the same date, or when someone wants to know who else is bringing chicken, the emails really start piling up.
So two years ago I created a simple web application that allowed people to signup for an evening, list the time and meal they’ll bring, and then receive an automatic email reminder the day before the meal is due. This was a hit, but it required that I setup a page every time someone had a baby. Not good. And after two years, an upgrade was needed.
So I outsourced the project via Rentacoder to some programmers in Islamabad, Pakistan. Yes, Pakistan. And they whipped up a very fine system that allows anybody to easily create a meal plan for someone else. Everything is fully automatic. And I like that.
Ekklesion works like a charm and makes coordinating meals a snap. Take it for a whirl; it’s free to use for anyone that finds it useful. You can even login using “example” for both the username and password in order to test the backend. I’ve already heard from two churches in the Princeton area that are starting to use the system, and I have plans to refine and expand the system this spring when I’ll sell it for a nominal charge to churches and organizations that might desire an internal planner of this sort.
If you have upgrade suggestions, comments, or find Ekklesion helpful, I’d love to hear from you.
- Ekklesion is Greek for “of the churches.” It derives from Ekklesia. Those of you who are Greek nerds will want to know that its morphology is feminine plural genitive. [↩]
(Updated 11 hours, 30 minutes ago)
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7 Responses for "Ekklesion Meal Planner"
Cool. I’m forwarding on to our church’s deacons (of whom my wife is one). Our church is pretty young and baby-full (sadly a rarity in Presbyterian churches, though), so I know exactly where you’re coming from.
Looks like we have some geek interest in common, too - did you code the program (before rent-a-coder, which I’ve also used!) in PHP, Python, or Perl?
PHP. I’m not cool enough to mess with Python or Perl.
Ditto. Although I’m still only a beginner at PHP. But we got my son an XO laptop from the OLPC Foundation for Christmas, and most of its applications (activities) are built in Python, so I’m learning out of necessity. And Perl is on the list for “someday” but mostly because I admire the heck out of Larry Wall — a true open-source, Christian, geek way ahead of his time.
Ok, question about Ekklesion - are you putting it out there as more of an online community at the existing website, or as customizeable software (or both)?
If it’s the former, it would seem that some filtering for geographic location or church community would be helpful, and perhaps not too hard to implement? If it’s the latter, (and PHP is perfect for this), have you considered making a downloadable trial version so churches can make sure it integrates well with their own sites?
I definitely think this is a great tool, and something I’m pretty sure our church would be interested in.
Neal,
No, there’s no intention of creating community around the site, but simply allowing communities that exist to better organize. The ultimate plan is to:
1) Have the meal list function based upon name and location the same way that, say, Target’s gift registry works. If you have a friend getting married you go to the Target website, type in name and location, and up pops the registry. The idea for Ekklesion is that you’d click “Give a Meal” and then type in the name, a list of potentials would come up and you’d go to that person’s page;
2) I also want to create a branded version for churches and other local communities that they could either a) host on their own website and customize; or b) open an account and host and host their branded church site through Ekklesion.
I have some other ideas, too, but am trying to judge how much demand there is for something like this. My guess is, “not much.” But I could be wrong.
Well, I can only judge the demand from my own church context, where I think there would be significant demand and willingness to pay for something like this.
But, unfortunately, we’re a little bit atypical for a PCUSA church, in that most of our congregation is young and online. So you’re probably right about the demand, at least in the Presbyterian demographic. But (and I’m just guessing here) when you aggregate the sheer number of churches in the US, I think there would be enough demand to sustain development on something like this.
Actually, I think it has potential way beyond churches…think other organizations like schools — my wife was a public school elementary teacher for several years, and the teachers did the whole “meal thing” for each other, too. Same with tight-knit industries like local fire & police departments, and also military bases. All of these function like “family” communities living in close proximity to one another.
Anyhow, just some thoughts and encouragement for what seems like a great idea/product…
I am having some technical problems. I can’t get my description to save in the information box. Any suggestions?
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