OneBody

New Features Coming: Translations, Reporting, and More

It's been 3 months since OneBody 1.0 was released to the public. While this blog has been quiet during that time, the project most certainly has not. As of this post, the changelog shows nearly 11 major new features, 17 bug fixes, and 29 general refinements and improvements.

Some of the new features include...

Multiple Languages: English and Portuguese

I'm excited to announce that OneBody will soon be available in a language other than English! The first job is huge: every page in the app has to be combed over and every string of text replaced. Thanks to Gustavo Bim for his amazing job, the task is nearing completion, and Portuguese will be the first language other than English.

Site administrators will be able to select the language for their site to meet the needs of their community.

Once this work is done, adding other languages will be much simpler and faster. Expect to see other translations soon after.

Reporting Engine

Built on the power of MongoDB, OneBody will soon have powerful reporting capability.

We're still working on the report output functionality and formats, but the report building interface is mostly done at this point.

iPhone Interface

Utilizing the jQTouch framework, we've created a slimmed down web version of OneBody, specifically for the iPhone, Android, and other mobile devices. There are still a few rough edges to iron out, but we're close.

And a whole lot more...

• Interface for managing relationships between people.
• Improvements to the admin dashboard, including graphs.
• Sync api and interface for viewing synchronization results (UpdateAgent).
• Add changed emails interface in admin section.
• New Admin "Templates" feature.
• Way better handling of deleted records, and an interface to manage them.

Version 1.1

All these changes are currently on GitHub and are slated for release in the next release of OneBody, version 1.1. We plan to wrap up these new features in the next few weeks, and push out a release when ready.

Stay tuned!

OneBody 1.0 Is Finally Here!

I am pleased to announce the release of OneBody version 1.0! This has been three years in the making, and I'm super excited to make it available to churches all over the world.

Changes since 0.9.1 are light, but that was the plan. No new features means no new bugs, right? ;-)

• New Debian package release.
• New virtual appliance (OVF) release.
• Ability to add/remove group memberships from profile edit page.
• Improvements to the layout of the administration section.
• New rake task for modifying settings (even hidden and global ones) from the command line.

If you've been holding off installing OneBody, now is the time! This is the first release where we've started to provide some great and easy new ways to install the software, including a Debian package and a virtual appliance (OVF) for use in VMWare or other virtualization tools.

See the wiki for more download details.

And as always, we continue to offer the most advanced and full-featured software for church social networking at beonebody.com, starting at $25/month.

 

OneBody 0.9.1

This is primarily a bug-fix release, but also has some added functionality.

Notable in this release is the preliminary support for Ruby 1.9 (1.9.1 to be exact). While I don't yet recommend running OneBody on Ruby 1.9 in production, it does seem to be stable enough for testing and development, and comes with some hefty speed improvements.

Also in this release is a new rake task that builds a Debian package for OneBody, for installation on Ubuntu 8.04 LTS (it may also work on other Ubuntu releases and Debian-based distros, but I haven't tested that). I hope to release OneBody 1.0 as a deb package in addition to the usual way I release via tagging in GitHub.

Download 0.9.1 here. Changes:

• Fix bug when normalizing bible verse reference.
• New Debian package building task. Needs more testing.
• Update install cap recipe to install latest Rubygems.
• Add group batch editing feature at /groups/batch.
• Fix bug getting/setting lines-based settings.
• Fix bug deleting stale pid in script/inbox.
• Expire cache when tour starts or stops.
• New admin interfaces for checkin module (separate, unreleased code).
• New admin interface for attendance.
• Initial support for Ruby 1.9.
• Hide repetitive stream items on stream page.
• Dramatic speed ups to stream page.
• Cache stream items.

OneBody 0.9.0 (and getting ready for 1.0)

I'm happy to announce that OneBody 0.9.0 is now available for general consumption. This release represents several months of major revamps of the interface, improvements to the internals, lots of refinements, and the psychological jump right to the edge of 1.0.

I hope to make this (0.9.x) a relatively short series, with 1.0 a few weeks away. That is, if there are no major bugs found and everyone is happy with how the interface looks and acts (which most people seem to be enjoying so far).

Enough talk, here are the details:

• Upgrade to Rails 2.3.4
• New "stream" metaphor on home, profile, and group pages.
• Feed import: Facebook, Twitter, etc.
• Improved visual cues for certain interface items.
• Improved group editing interface.
• New Site Tour feature; shown upon first login.
• Link to YouVersion and eBible on verse page.
• Allow admins to remove themselves from albums and pictures.
• Add option to albums to be public or profile-only.
• Set the first uploaded pic in an album to the cover pic.
• Add feed for stream page.
• Improved wall posting feedback.
• Improved site selection from console.
• Improved email header reading/writing.
• Safeguard to prevent script/inbox from running more than one process at the same time.
• Added Yahoo map to group page.

Make sure you run the database migrations when upgrading to this release. Also, since we rolled up the migrations yet again, you'll need to upgrade to 0.8.1 (if you haven't already) and run the migrations there before you can upgrade to 0.9.0.

As always, if you need help, shoot an email to the Google Group and we'll be happy to give you a hand.

Refreshed Site Design

The main site for OneBody (beonebody.com) has been refreshed in its design tonight. The updated design and screenshots do a better job of introducing our awesome software and showing what it does and what it looks like.

OneBody 0.8.1

Today, OneBody 0.8.1 was tagged and the "stable" tag now points there as well. The 0.8.1 release contains many bug fixes and a few new features:

• Upgrade to Rails 2.3.2
• New Calendar tab with merged church-wide and group calendar events (thanks to PowerChurch)
• Ability to comment on pictures (thanks to PowerChurch)
• New "Tabbed Profile" option
• User generated News section
• Low level support for syncing a group with a Campaign Monitor subscriber list
• Feed auto-discovery for publications, friend activity, and news
• Allow HTML content in emails
• Ability to have multiple Publications groups
• Speedups for viewing large groups
• Improved News RSS feed grabbing
• OneBody plugins are now Rails engines
• Cap recipes to install/deploy on Ruby Enterprise Edition

This release has some additional prerequisites and gem dependencies, so be sure to check out InstallOneBody on the wiki for help. In short, be sure to rerun the "aptitude install" command on Linux (Macs should already have the needed packages), then run "rake gems:install".

OneBody 0.8.0

I'm proud to announce the release of the latest and greatest version of OneBody, release 0.8.0. This represents about 4 months of steady work, including new features, theme work, performance improvements, and lots of bug fixes. As has become the standard with this project, since this is a major release, the database migrations from all previous releases have been rolled up into a single migration. That means if you're behind a few versions, you'll need to upgrade to 0.7.8 first and run all its migrations. Then you can jump to 0.8.0 (or directly to any future 0.8.x release). Also, there are new gem dependencies, so you'll need to run a good ol' rake gems:install to get them all installed. Here are the high points of the release:

• Upgrade to Rails 2.2.2
• Custom theme editing.
• Custom people fields.
• Fixed Twitter integration.
• Scheduler is gone. Crontab is our friend again.
• Improve performance of profile page by eliminating/consolidating sql queries and making use of MySQL indices.
• Simplify person gender to only use Male/Female/nil.
• Improve performance by storing settings in a global instead of class variable.
• Improve performance by denormalizing blog items into separate table.
• Remove some plugins from vendor and include as gem dependencies.
• Better report following people import, including errored records and reason(s).
• Simplify profile page look.
• Improved search.
• Groups now have pictures.
• Speed up group memberships, especially linked groups and "parents-of" groups.
• New group membership privacy controls.
• Improve update submission process and interface.
• Use popup date picker for birthday and anniversary selection.
• New option to specify updates must be approved or not.
• Catch bots signing up for account using a dummy hidden field.
• New option to groups to allow users to join without requring admin approval.
• New settings to change default sharing/privacy options for new families.
• New solucija_ib theme.
• New solucija_im theme.
• Tons of bug fixes.

For more information about various features, and upgrade instructions, head over to the wiki.

OneBody Worst Project EVAR (Almost)

I missed it a few weeks ago (new baby boy!), but OneBody made it to third on the list of Worst Project EVAR in the world of Flog. Google Alerts finally brought it to my attention today. What the heck is flog? It's a Ruby code complexity analyzing tool I think. I've never used it. I was excited about the free press, until I realized it was OneBody version 0.3.0 that was listed. What? Several points to make here:

• 0.3.0 was a bogus release I had up on RubyForge for like a couple of hours I think.
• 0.3.0, in the timeline of OneBody development, was February. That's a long time in open source development world -- especially on a non-dead project.
• This was back when we vendored Rails and several other goodies. You know, before Rails 2.1 was released.

So, current OneBody code flogs in at about 27,000, whatever that means. Update: It turns out 0.3.0 was the latest release still hanging out on Rubyforge mirrors, even though I had removed it long ago. I have sent a support request to Rubyforge to get all OneBody gems removed from the mirrors.

OneBody 0.7.8

OneBody 0.7.8 is official. This will be the last release in the 0.7.x series. Features

• Upgrade to Rails 2.1.2
• Add site time zone support. Add rake task to convert existing times to UTC.
• Add l10n phone and date formatting options.
• Add optional embedded Google Calendar to groups.
• Add setting to allow unencrypted logins (for mobile phones, etc.)
• Allow system and help page editing even when CMS feature is disabled.
• Do a "soft delete" on people and families.
• Ability to add existing person to a family.
• Add setting to enable/disable email relaying for people with their email addresses shared.
• Track sign in failures and lock out account/ip based on configuration setting.

Design & Usability

• Change generic group picture to be more consistent with site design.
• Design and usability tweaks thanks to Ben Hudson.
• Show randomly-selected, limited number of "groupies" on profile with link to show all.
• Add Yahoo Map link next to profile home address (Ben Hudson).
• Populate Directory search name field from quick search box (Ben Hudson).
• Change appearance of private group.
• Show hidden people when doing a select_person search (admins only).

Fixes

• Fix friendship mirroring bug.
• Work around WYSIWYG editor escaping special syntax for inserting setting values.
• Fix bug saving family upon new account signup.
• Use male silhouette for thumbnail as fallback when gender is not set properly.
• Fix friend reordering.
• Fix bug displaying upcoming birthday icons.
• Don't show duplicate items in the blog.
• Don't send duplicate message to group member who received an email out of band.
• Don't crash if friend has been deleted.
• Fix family member reordering.
• Fix log item view when showing a comment on a deleted item.
• Fix CSV import creating duplicate families; Add access/permission options to import.
• Fix add verse on existing verse.
• Fix bug showing Prayer Request in activity feed.

You can download the 0.7.8 release here.

Time Zone Support

The next release of OneBody (and the current development code) has support for multiple time zones per installation. Previous releases have stored times in the local time zone, but now OneBody will store times as UTC, and then display them in the current site's time zone (configurable in Settings). To convert an existing installation's times to UTC, back up your database and run the following command: rake onebody:convert_times_to_utc But first you'll need to edit the lib/tasks/convert_times_to_utc.rake file to tell it what your current time zone is (so it knows how to calculate the offset to convert the time to UTC).