OneBody: New Approach that links church web sites and church management software

I met Tim Morgan about a year ago when I asked him about 43 Verses; he recently showed me his most recent project called OneBody. OneBody enables churches to add social network features to their web site by using the data stored in their church management software.

The revolutionary thing about OneBody is that it is designed to work with ANY church management software or database.

For those of us building church web sites and those who manage church data, this is an exciting project. I was so jazzed by the project, I asked Tim some questions.

Q: To start, give us the elevator pitch for OneBody. Is OneBody unique? Why?

In a sentence, OneBody is free, open-source, volunteer-built software that connects churchgoers on the web. Basically, it's my solution to meet several different needs I saw my church having. 

For the technical types: OneBody is a web-based application that runs on your church server or a paid host and synchronizes with your existing church membership database. 

Q: So what does it do? What are the features?

Everything! Well, not quite, but it really has grown to be something quite interesting and has a little bit for everyone.

OneBody started as a clean, simple replacement for our aging online directory. With feedback, it grew to provide some basic information sharing and social networking a la Facebook-style profile pages and messaging, etc. Finally, we added groups, pictures, Bible verse sharing, and even recipe sharing! 

The 2 main features ministers salivate over: 

1. Fast Online Directory - most of our staff at Cedar Ridge now use OneBody instead of our main membership software, since it is so fast and easy to use. And they can access the online system from just about anywhere.

2. Groups - our church is very small-group driven, so it makes sense that we provide ways for the people in the groups to connect more than just once a week. Each group has its own email address, making it easy for groups to communicate. Groups can be private (like an Elders group), and group members can share private prayer requests with one another. 

Q: Okay features are great. Tell us a story of how this is used in a church setting?

OneBody was built originally for Cedar Ridge Christian Church (cedarridgecc.com) in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma. It's used every single day by ministers, clerical staff, members, group leaders, and teachers. 

But it didn't happen overnight. Our "Technology Ministry" has worked pretty consistently for the past year to educate users, improve the system with feedback, and promote its use in the church. 

Q: Explain how OneConnect works? What church management software does it  support? 

OneBody isn't yet suitable as a replacement for your church's standard membership database software. That simply wasn't the monster of a task we had in mind to accomplish. 

Rather, we started by building a separate database system to house the basic contact details and the "extra" stuff that traditional membership databases don't do at all or just don't do very well: personal favorites, groups, and email. To accomplish this, we came up with the "Connector" idea. A Connector is simply a bit of code that runs periodically and pulls information out of your existing membership database. 

We only have one Connector built at this point, and I won't even bother mentioning the system it's meant for since Cedar Ridge is likely the only church still using it. But, building a Connector isn't rocket science, and we hope to add more as our community of programmers grows. In fact, we're planning to release one for ACS early next year. 

Q: How could existing church management software vendors support this project? 

By openly publishing their database schemas and/or providing hooks to easily (and programatically) export their program's data. It seems that church management software vendors are sometimes reluctant to give church "volunteers" access to the raw data, so some coaxing may be necessary. 

But I suspect the most progress and innovation will come directly from the community of eager volunteers that start to build on this project. My gut tells me most traditional church software vendors don't want interoperability, because they want your church to buy *their* online module instead of using something free you found on the web. 

Q: I see that it is built using Ruby on Rails. If a developer is reading > this, how can they support this project? 

Just jump in. Install the software and give it a go. The code is completely open and so is the development process. We publish all tickets (bug reports and enhancement requests alike) on the website; nothing is secret.

At this stage, the biggest barrier to use by other churches is the lack of Connectors for various software packages. That's where the most work is needed right now. 

And, as you may have have heard, people say Rails is the hottest and best web application framework out there (and we tend to agree), so you can rest assured OneBody isn't built with some proprietary, unknown language and framework. The code is very well organized and easy to understand.

Q: Tell us a little about what it means that OneBody is OpenSource. How is Cedar Ridge involved in the project? 

Open source means free. "Free" as in it costs your church nothing to have and use the software. But also "free" in the sense that it is freely distributable and unencumbered by (most) licensing restrictions, except that any changes you distribute must be licensed under the same terms. Basically, it means that if you, as a programmer, make some contributions and the software is enhanced because of it, no one else can come along and make money from your work (in a nutshell). 

Cedar Ridge is our pilot church and is usually first to see new features (and new bugs). I do not "work" for Cedar Ridge in the sense that I do not get paid for my contributions, however I do volunteer as leader of the Technology Ministry. That's where the connection between Cedar Ridge and OneBody exists. 

Q: What are the requirements for OneBody? For setup, for maintenance? 

1. Full (shell) access to a Linux (or Unix-based) web server. Windows isn't yet supported. That means that a server inside your church would do, or a VPS-type hosting account outside your church. While we haven't tried it yet, shared hosting accounts probably won't give you the access you need to set up OneBody. 

2. A staff person or volunteer with decent computer skills. 

3. Unless we have a Connector already built (or you can talk us into building it for you), you'll need a programmer to look at your existing church management software and to write one for you. 

As for maintenance, there are the usual maintenance tasks of running a server. 

Q: How can a church get started with OneBody? What kind of church would OneBody work best for? 

Download. Install. 

Perhaps the best way to get started with OneBody in your church would be to get it up and running and simply promote it as an online directory. From there, see where people take it. 

I suppose any kind of church could use it. While it was written specifically for a medium independent protestant Christian church, we think it could work for just about any kind of church. And for that matter, with a bit of work, OneBody might make a decent online community type site for any group of people needing to connect online, religious or not (but we haven't tried that yet). 

Q: And if I'm a church leader, what kind of person do I need to find to implement OneBody? A programmer? A web designer? 

At this point, it will probably take a programmer-type to make OneBody work. Though, we hope to make installation much, much easier over the next few weeks and months, and once we get a decent set of Connectors built, OneBody should only need a sysadmin-type to get up and running. 

Time will tell. I suppose it all depends on the amount of support OneBody gets from the community. While I get some help from friends every now and then, and my wife is very helpful in testing and providing support, this is really a one-man project. OneBody will only grow significantly and become usable outside of Cedar Ridge if people help out. 

Q: If you were to dream, what could OneBody become?

We have many plans, as you might imagine. 

In the near future, I hope to port an old check-in system I wrote years ago to the OneBody system. While not directly related to the current features, it will fit nicely on top of the login and access facilities OneBody has. And on that note, OneBody starts to become a platform of its own, providing a basic layer of functionality common across many different church-related applications. 

Also, we have dreams of building in a general purpose CMS so the one application could run our church's main, visitor-focused website *and* the member-only site. 

Further (perhaps much further) down the line, we see OneBody becoming its own sort of church management application, though focused entirely on a different angle. It was built with the common churchgoer in mind rather than just the clerical staff. We turn the traditional model on its head by giving the most powerful tools to the people -- not just the staff. 

Those are some pretty hefty goals, I know. And like I said, it will all depend on help we get from the community. Left as a one-man project, we'll be finished sometime around 2025. :-)

By Tim Bednar, founder of Plaid
Software for people focused on ministry

Comments

[Antoine of MMM]

Nice system. I wonder what's the integration with mobile devices with aspects of this system in relation to global information lookups and staff announcement abilities. Because on top of such a system, a staff could really make the case for getting out of the office and into lives a bit more.

Great interview.

[Tim Bednar]

I forwarded your comment to Tim Morgan. I am sure he will be able to answer you much better than I...

[Tim Morgan]

There is no reason just about any web-connected device couldn't browse the app, though at this time there is no mobile-specific version. Special iPhone interfaces are popular these days -- is what you're thinking of?

[Jeffrey Thompson]

This sounds like a great project and I plan on checking it out.

If you haven't checked out http://itdiscuss.org or Church IT RoundTable http://citrt.org you might check those sites out for ways to network with other like-minded IT folks.

Also a great 24-7 Church IT RoundTable can be found at irc://irc.freenode.net/citrt with instructional link at: http://itdiscuss.org/index.php?t=msg&th=1243

I'm also talking about ways Church IT people can share Open Database Schemas and Open Program Designs at ChurchApp Wiki found at http://itdiscuss.org/wiki
--
Jeffrey Thompson
jthompsonic@gmail.com

[Christian]

Hi Tim Bednar
Your article is very good that informs the message that how important the Church management software is and how easy to plan the work of a Church using this software, and especially the interview with Tim Morgan as clarified many doubts regarding this software and finally thank you very much for sharing this post.

[Chrisitanity]

I have seen many blogs from morning on Church softwares but this is the one I'm waiting for a good article, I'm glad to say that this is the best site I have seen and thanks for sharing the interview review of Tim Morgan it really helped a lot for me, thank you.