Singlebrook Technology

Get to Know 2degrees

2010-08-31T13:46:00.001-04:00

2degrees helps organizations to solve their sustainability challenges by utilizing the expertise of an online community of 10,000 sustainable business professionals. Each member belongs to a number of managed working groups, such as “Zero Waste” and “Carbon Management”, which provide information and discussion on issues that are important to them. From there, assisted by 2degrees’ team of experts, public and private sector organizations have the opportunity to address their sustainability challenges, make contacts and share ideas, tools and best practice.

To learn more, visit 2degreesnetwork.com.

Print vs. Online Publication: ABCT Shares their Challenges and Solutions

2010-08-31T11:50:00.000-04:00

By Susan Henninger

Many organizations today find themselves evaluating whether they should take their publications online, keep them in print, or find a combination of the two venues that suits both their members or clients and their Boards of Directors.

David Teisler, CAE, Director of Communications for the Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies (ABCT) in New York City, advises businesses and organizations to, “Think about what it is that you want as your end outcome and everything else will flow from that,” adding, “Take the time to learn as much as you can before you begin to make decisions!”

In ABCT’s case, Teisler explains that they put their two journals online six years ago and added PDFs of their newsletter slightly afterwards. However, the organization members and committees had actually started to consider this move several years beforehand.

“We saw that the world was changing and at the same time we noticed that many of the things we used to consider products had morphed into services,” recalls Teisler. Using ABCT’s fact sheets as an example, he elaborates, “We used to sell the sheets but when we realized that our ultimate goal was to drive traffic to our website, our purpose shifted from creating a small revenue stream from the sale of the sheets to increasing information dissemination by making the sheets readily available at no cost to our members so they could then share them with their clients.” Teisler adds that if companies want to be relevant in today’s world, they need to be able to understand and take advantage of the online universe and all it can offer.

Teisler describes the newsletter conversion process as easy and low-cost because ABCT simply had their printer create a PDF when he printed their newsletter. Conversely, transitioning their print journals online was an immense undertaking. Since the group wasn’t even sure where to begin the process, Teisler and his associates spent a significant amount of time researching the pros and cons of going online with their written materials and trying to discern who would be best able to create the text and platform that they wanted for ABCT. Teisler asserts that this was a crucial step because, “You really need to know your options and who the players are.” Their research group was diverse, made up of stakeholders that included members from their finance and publication committees, editors, and their Board of Directors, and they took many factors into consideration including:

· The various costs of the options

· How to come up with a consistent format for their Request for Proposals so submissions would be easier for them to compare and evaluate

· What librarians favored because they’re “the ultimate buyers”

· The opinions of other societies, authors, and editors

· Whether they should give up their rights and sell their journals to a publisher or form a partnership in which they could retain their rights

ABCT ultimately decided on a combination of print and online newsletters. They put their newsletter online in static (not dynamic or searchable) PDF files while continuing to mail them to their members because both Teisler and his boss, Executive Director M.J. Eimer, believe that “It’s essential for an association to demonstrate its continued relevance and to do this it has to visit you in a personal, physical form other than a dues notice or a call to action.” Teisler feels this approach has been optimal for ABCT because they discovered that, despite numerous and diverse online reminders to their members such as email blasts, “There are still a lot of people out there who don’t realize that our publications are now online.”

For the journals, ABCT used what Teisler calls “a true online conversion”, meaning they put them online as web pages (not PDFs) through a professional publisher, for the following reasons:

· This is the direction in which the scientific publishing world is moving.

· Researchers depend upon online access to find references for their articles which will then lead to citations for your publications’ articles so; if you want your publication to be relevant then it must be easily accessible online.

“It’s the impact factor that helps drive perceived relevance in the scientific community,” he elaborates. “The impact factor is determined by the number of times that your articles are cited in a given period. The more you can get your important articles out in front of other researchers so they can choose to cite them in their own articles, the greater the impact. The greater the impact, the more other authors will want to submit to your journals and the more librarians will want to keep your publications on their subscription list.” Ultimately this “domino effect” should lead to more recognition of, and revenue for, your organization.

Teisler has two valuable tips from ABCT’s experience with online conversion to share with readers:

· You should assume that submission and management software that the publisher uses will be different than what you use which means you’ll need to retrain your editors and production people.

· Most large publishers have cookie-cutter templates so if you like the way your publication looks and favor its editorial style and guidelines then you must be sure to write in your contract that the new publisher will need to accommodate your existing templates.

Though finances needed to be an element in their final decision, organizational values turned out to be more important. According to Teisler, “We looked toward the future and realized that we wanted to be in alignment with other essential psychological journals as well as to retain the look and feel of our publications and that premise was what we based our final decisions on.”

WikiPositive Enters its Soft Launch Phase with Collaborating Partners

2010-07-26T11:19:00.003-04:00

This post contains recent news from Benchmark Asset Managers, one of our fellow B Corporations. Their WikiPositive website is a simple tool designed as a starting point for anyone seeking or sharing information about positive initiatives in both the for-profit and non-profit sectors.

The website is now emerging from its second phase of development and beginning a “soft launch” period, during which it is signing up social entrepreneurs, organizations and companies who are making a net positive impact and want to post information on their initiatives or other positive initiatives they have found. WikiPositive is designed to be the first open-source, collaborative platform providing a simple starting point for research on companies with products or services that are good for the world. Ample space for critiques and questions will provide a healthy dialogue around key questions and issues in the sustainable and positive impact space. WikiPositive will showcase companies and organizations of all shapes and sizes, including both for-profits and non-profits. The website is for everyone: volunteer researchers around the globe looking for responsible investments; philanthropists or individuals hoping to contribute to sustainable and responsible initiatives; students; journalists; or anyone else interested in learning more about endeavors that are building a more sustainable future and ways that they can get involved!

Visit www.wikipositive.org today to learn more about our history, our mission, and how you can use and contribute to our site, or register as a user using our quick and easy sign-up process at www.wikipositive.org/user/register. You can also find us on Facebook and Your Olive Branch (yourolivebranch.org). Please contact Rachael Stephens at stephens@benchmarkam.com for more information on becoming a contributor, or Steven Gervais at gervais@benchmarkam.com if you would like to learn more about doing great research!

Information provided by Jessy Nadar, Benchmark Asset Managers

Making a Difference: Glamour Gals

2010-08-10T14:34:00.000-04:00

One of our clients is making headlines by giving back! Check out this brief news clip depicting the commendable efforts of Glamour Gals.

Techniques to Increase Twitter Follower Base

2010-07-27T13:48:00.010-04:00

By Allison Goetzmann

As an intern working for Singlebrook this summer, much of my time has been spent promoting our Free iPhone App contest, especially through Twitter. A few short months ago, I would not have been able to tell you one thing about hashtags, retweets, followers, or the proper use of @ in tweeting. However, over the course of the summer I’ve found myself delving deeper and deeper into the Twitter world. I’m no expert, but I have discovered several tools that I feel might be useful to anyone trying to increase their impact and navigate the seemingly convoluted realm of Twitter.

1. Local Tweeps  – This is a zip code level directory sponsored by SMBtweet. I typed in 14850, and the site brought up other Twitter users from Ithaca, each with a “follow” button. In addition to finding local people to follow, the site also allows you to add yourself or your company to this list to gain more followers.

2. Just Tweet It – Just Tweet It boasts the ability to “find twitter users like you” by encouraging you to join up to 3 categories. Joining a category means adding your name and information to the group, and seeing/following anyone (or everyone) else in the group. Most groups have several hundred followers. Sample categories include "technology" and "web developers."

3. Twitter Groups – Twitter Groups is similar to Just Tweet It; the website has “twibes," which are simply groups of twitter people with common interests. Different twibes that Singlebrook has considered joining include web-development, non-profit, and greenbusiness.

4. Twitterfall – This site allows you to type in hashtags, which then prompts recent twitter posts with that tag to pop up one at a time and move down the screen (like a waterfall, hence the name). I think this can be effective if you come up with the right hashtags to track. There is no limit on the number of hashtags you can follow; they’re easy to add and delete.

5. Tweetchat – This site is much like Twitterfall; it allows you to choose a hashtag to follow, then directs you to a Tweetchat room, where posts with the hashtag are auto-updated. You can pause the list, and utilize the user controls to weed out spammers and feature people you like.

6. #CharityTuesday – This is a very popular hashtag that is used on Twitter every Tuesday to encourage tweeting about favorite charities, projects and causes. It seems especially helpful in reaching out to non-profits.


   Happy Tweeting!

Issuers and Investors Unite! Mission Markets has opened its doors

2010-07-27T11:05:00.000-04:00

This is a message from Mission Markets which we have reposted from their blog.

Mission Markets is in beta launch, accepting both issuers and investors in the social and environmental fields to sign up as members. We're growing fast - after less than a week, we already have 5 issuers and 5 investors on board! Call or email us for basic info, for a demo of the platform, or for help signing up. Or feel free to login yourself, at www.missionmarkets.com. We look forward to seeing you on the Mission Markets sustainable investment platform!

- The Mission Markets Team

We Are the Ones We Have (Been Waiting For)

2010-07-13T10:37:00.005-04:00

By Joe Romano,  
GreenStar Marketing Manager

(This is an article about the recent BALLE conference, written by an attendee. Romano is part of Local First Ithaca through our local cooperative grocery store, GreenStar.)

Everything is going to change. The question is whether we let the changes play out in increasingly destructive ways or embrace the deepening crisis as our time of opportunity.
—David Korten, BALLE founding Board member

As we go to press, crude oil from the Deepwater Horizon oil rig is spilling into the Gulf of Mexico at an estimated rate of more than 210,000 gallons a day. And it is about to spread to some of the most vulnerable habitats in our country. Already the foul-smelling, brown and orange blobs and slicks are coating the reeds and grasses of the delicate Mississippi Delta marshes like melted chocolate. The “accident” has put one of the nation’s largest sources of seafood, and the entire workforce of that industry, and the families and children who rely on it for food, clothing and shelter at risk. 110 species of migratory songbird depend on the wetlands directly in the path of the oil. By the time you read this, 200 million gallons are likely to have been spilled, enough to coat the entire coastline of North America and South America. That illustrates the size of the slick, which in actuality is headed straight for the Gulf Coast and is likely to hit the Florida Keys, then travel up the eastern seaboard of the US.

British Petroleum, a multibillion-dollar, multinational business, is responsible for this calamity, which has already claimed 11 lives.

Our federal government is responding in the same lackadaisical way that it responded when Wall Street took our retirements away and when Katrina took one of our greatest cities away. Essentially it is doing nothing. Sadly, the words of Sarah Palin, perhaps the unlikeliest of sages, may begin to ring true. It would be fair to ask — how is “that hopey, changey thing workin’ out for ya?”

The truth is, we need the government to come down hard on Big Businesses when they are harming average folks. But Big Government won’t do that because Big Business and Big Government depend on one another to survive. Why would either group give up the enormous privileges the other group bestows upon them? It just isn’t in either one of their self interests. So we can’t continue to “hope” for change. We must act.

So what do we do? What can we do? After all, Big Business and Big Government have an awful lot of steam in that engine of theirs, how could average people ever hope to derail it? Well, the truth is they can’t. But the story doesn’t end there. Because there is something we can all do.

Last month, several hundred people met to discuss exciting new alternatives to the sad misrule of corporate greed and corrupt and unresponsive government. The Eighth Annual Business Alliance for Local Living Economies (BALLE) Business Conference was held in Charleston, South Carolina and GreenStar was one of the few food co-ops represented there. The BALLE conference program states a simple mission: “together we can support the emergence of a new economic system, one that supports life.”

These people are not high-concept/low output types. They hail from diverse, high-powered backgrounds in sustainability, farming, economic development, environmentalism, cashless exchange, monetary theory, green industry, philanthropy, activism, food security, permaculture, local business, non-profit, renewable energy and cooperatives. Many have left top positions in government, city planning, community development, law, urban development, media, manufacturing, entrepreneurship, investment banking, finance, urban planning and telecommunications. All of the members have come together to make real things happen in their communities at the level of real people living real lives. They believe our economy should be based not at the level of multibillion-dollar corporations, but at the local level. These are people of action and with the work of their communities their ideas become realities.

BALLE attendees toured the Noisette neighborhood in North Charleston, where a large segment of a former US Navy base was purchased by an independent local group and developed into an interdependent web of businesses and neighborhoods that include a progressive recycling/green manufacturing business that takes recycled waste from the surrounding neighborhood, like glass and vegetable oil and oyster shells from restaurants. They process the glass into products that range from glossy countertops to flooring, all the way to pervious materials that can be used to make green, permeable roadways. They recycle restaurant oils into biodiesel that is used to fuel the boilers of the organic brewery that is part of the same green business district. The oyster shells are cleaned and returned to the ocean, thereby maintaining the biocycle in the local waters.

Up the road is a green roof plantation, where living, leafy roofing panels are grown and used to make living green roofs that maintain a temperature that is almost 30 degrees cooler than a conventional black roof and 20 degrees cooler than a conventional white roof. The green business district houses more than 60 cutting-edge green businesses — design companies, building arts companies, environmental agencies, art galleries, engineers, planners, a sports apparel manufacturer and a biodiesel producer. All are housed in LEED-certified modular style buildings where each tenant can take up changing amounts of space dependent upon need. A beautiful, Beaux-Arts style powerhouse is being converted into a massive civic center.

Nearby, the local retail district includes local beer pubs and natural and local foods restaurants. Clothing made from recycled fiber is sold on the same street and local services like hair cutters and massage therapists round out the offerings. This has already become a destination from other neighborhoods in town, but there is a plan for more LEED-certified green residential housing to be built in a park-style setting originally designed by the famous Olmsted brothers of Central Park fame. In addition to wildlife refuges and smaller mini-parks the city has purchased the waterfront as part of the plan, and a public waterfront walk and park has been built, affording waterfront access to all residents, not just those who can afford the price of waterfront property. There is also an amphitheatre, an “innovation center” and a prison re-entry program.

There literally isn’t room to tell all the details of this exciting revitalization at Noisette, but suffice to say that in 2008, Natural Home Magazine named it one of the nation’s “Top 10 – America’s Best Green-Built Neighborhoods.”

But how can this type of green urban model and the others like it, in cities all across America, change the face of business? That massive engine continues to barrel down the track. What BALLE hopes to achieve is to set another train rolling on another track, one that is life-affirming and beautiful, profitable and fun. Because as Annie Leonard, the author of The Story of Stuff, pointed out in her keynote speech, “We’re trashing the planet, we’re trashing each other and we’re not even having fun doing it!”
The simple plan BALLE has is that folks will just start jumping off of their train and onto ours, because we’ll be doing better stuff and ultimately having better lives.

The most moving presentation of the event was that of Lily Yeh, a tiny woman whose personal inner light allowed her to bring art to the most troubled of Philadelphia’s mean streets. Her patience and compassion allowed her to rally a community that had seen entire blocks demolished and vacant buildings abandoned to drug dealers. After five years of trying, she somehow convinced even the most hardcore drug dealers to stop their lives of crime and join her in creating African art, angels and warriors from the broken bits of glass and the broken lives around her.

Not satisfied with transforming streets filled with drugs, murder and prostitution to streets of art, public pride and community ritual, Lily moved on to Rwanda, where she helped that nation face the horror of the genocide that occurred there. She literally buried their dead, inspired the people to design and build their own incredible memorial space, to face and mourn their devastating losses with screams and tears, and then led the survivors toward their awaiting future. Her Taoist concepts of light balancing darkness allowed for two simultaneous projects there, the genocide memorial, and the mobilization of the survivor’s village.

Alone, Lily led the survivors of this genocide from stunned isolation, immobility and starvation, to become a joyous community that feeds, clothes and houses itself. She helped them develop a range of industries from textiles to clothing design, culminating in the actual manufacture of their own solar panels which they use to power their homes and light their celebrations. Alone, she had found a way to heal the soul of a savaged nation. She said she was not able to do these things because she was courageous, just that she was afraid of becoming a coward. By the end of her talk she had taken the entire auditorium through sobs and tears, ultimately elevating them to a joyous, sustained standing ovation.

Ithaca is a community that is not afraid either. We will continue to take on the oil companies when they want to do their dirty fracking in our beautiful backyard. Ithaca is a community that has always spoken back to power, and now we are an official BALLE city, too. Over 80 businesses are taking part in Local First Ithaca, our local BALLE Chapter. GreenStar is one of its founding members and is active in its operations as well.

There is so much already happening in our town, that when we begin to make the connections some of these older BALLE networks have made we will begin to stretch the boundaries of how people in cities live, too. In so doing we will perhaps be able to learn new ways to inhabit our communities that make big oil companies obsolete, we will create more business models that create capital for real people, not corporations. We will then begin to address the needs of all our citizens and raise the living standards of those who currently just don’t have enough. When our energy comes from the sun or the wind we’ll never need fear it spilling into our oceans.

Already, that’s a train that has left the station, with a whole lot of people on board.

Original Article

GreenStar Homepage

Triple Bottom Line Your Summer

2010-06-24T10:42:00.001-04:00

By Sarah Ewing, ShoreBank

(This is a guest blog from one of our fellow B Corp members.)

Raise your hand if you spent your adolescent summers doing household chores, attending camps, or volunteering? Do you still summer like that? I don’t. After years of Girl Scouts service projects, band camp attendance, and hours of daily household chores, I now do little more in the summer than pack organic picnic baskets and attend free concerts in the park. But what if I put the baskets away and actually created a to-do list similar to the one I had as a youth, only with a triple bottom line goal instead? What impact could I make with these summer 2010 triple bottom line to-dos?:

Financial:

“Green” clean my finances. I am going to sign up for as many autopilot online and paperless banking products as I can.
“Green” my budget. I need to revamp my food, housing, and entertainment budgets for the appropriate amount of organic product, air conditioning (or in my case – a lack there of), and travel expenditures.
Re-evaluate my 401(K) to participate in socially responsible investments. I did evaluate my 401(K) as promised in my 2010 resolutions; however, I want to verify that my portfolio has not modified in whom it invests and re-adjust my investments accordingly.
Go 2 weekends without drinking non-water beverage and donate the savings. According to MSN Money, Americans spend more on beer from Memorial Day through Labor Day than at any other time of the year. There is more than one nonprofit that can use my donation.

Community:

Meet My Neighbors. Not only does it improve community cohesion, but it also increases my safety, as neighbors you know are more likely to alert you if there is suspicious behavior around your neighborhood.
Support local businesses at street festivals. Street festivals can really provide an economic impact for a community.
Volunteer for at least 4 hours per month. Volunteers reduce organizational cost while helping to improve the community. And when a community is doing well as a whole, its individuals are better off, too.

Environment:

Pick up litter for at least one hour. According to Every Monday Matters, if every person picked up one piece of litter today, there would be over 300 million fewer pieces of litter.
Invest in a urban window garden. I still haven’t completed this resolution! But I think I have added another 3,000 pounds of CO2 from flying this year. It is time.
Eco-shred all of my hoarded paper. I don’t know how paper adds up, but somehow, all of a sudden, I have stacks of unsolicited credit card offers and napkins everywhere!

Think about the impact that I alone can make with this triple bottom line to-do list! Help me stay on track and join me in becoming a triple bottom line summer activist. The “What does ‘Green’ mean to me?” Facebook photo contest runners up have already gotten on board! Who else is with me?

Higher Logic Webinar Series

2010-06-14T12:51:00.002-04:00

Here is a word from one of our partners, Higher Logic, who is offering a series of great webinars on social networking best practices.

Higher Logic™, the leader in social media and collaboration solutions for associations and not-for-profits, is excited to announce the distinguished 2010 Q2 Learning Series. This inventive series is a collection of social networking best practices webinars hosted by the brightest minds in the association space. Join us for insightful webinars featuring industry experts and association executives who are empowering their organizations through providing social networking-based member websites. The theme of this innovative series, multi-dimensional membership, says it all. The 2010 Q2 Learning Series is provided complimentary to association professionals because Higher Logic not only provides a quality product, but we want to make a difference in the association community. Together, we drive the future.

You can find their Learning Series here

Remember to contact us for demos of Higher Logic's social media community service.

My First BALLE Conference

2010-07-02T15:25:00.000-04:00

By Elisa Miller-Out, Singlebrook Technology, Inc.

When I attended the recent BALLE (Business Alliance for Local Living Economies) Conference, I didn't really know what I was getting into. I knew a little about our BALLE Chapter: Local First Ithaca, co-founded by my aunt, Jan Norman, owner of Silk Oak and Leslie Ackerman at Alternatives Federal Credit Union (where we do our banking locally). I knew it was important to eat local foods and support local independent businesses and I had already integrated those things into my daily life. However, the conference gave me a really eye-opening sense of the larger vision of BALLE. Supporting local businesses is really just one part of a much bigger movement and mission.

The concept is that by creating the building blocks of a local living economy in our community, we provide a concrete, manageable way to start tackling some of the big overwhelming world problems, such as climate change, war, hunger and poverty for a start. It's not that one local living economy can solve these big problems, but if there are many worldwide thriving local living economies collaborating with each other respectfully, then these problems will become less severe, because the root causes of them will be alleviated. Furthermore, solving these problems through the BALLE method of local, grassroots efforts is not painful--it's actually fun! Thriving local communities create joy in people and putting some work and energy into building a strong community will allow everyone to reap big rewards. I was so inspired by the conference that I joined the steering committee of Local First Ithaca, so that I could get more involved in strengthening my own community.

So, what are the building blocks of a local living economy and what do we need to do to get there?

The building blocks can vary slightly from community to community, but here are a few that our group (Local First Ithaca) has identified:

Sustainable Agriculture and Natural Resources
Renewable Energy
Community Capital
Independent Media
Green Building
Arts and Culture
Health and Wellness
Independent Retail and Services
Zero Waste Manufacturing
Education
Reuse and Waste Management
Sustainable Transportation

Our community is already doing a great job in many of these areas, but there's definitely more work to do. There are some simple steps that we can all take to build our own local living economy:

The 10% Shift: Think about shifting 10% of your spending to local independent sources. That means different things for different people: Maybe you buy some of your groceries at the local farmer's market or choose some local, seasonal vegetables and fruits at your grocery store. Maybe you start banking at a local or regional bank. You could buy that birthday gift from a local, independent store rather than a big, chain store. Once you start doing it, you'll find that it's easy and fun and maybe you can even shift a bit more than 10%! Remember that money that you spend at local independent vendors stays in your community and creates jobs and a thriving local economy. And here's the slogan that BALLE folks use to remind you of the 10% Shift next time you're making a purchasing decision: Shift Happens!
Think Local First: This is a related concept to the 10% shift. If you need a product or service, try to find a local independent vendor first. If the product or service isn't available locally, try to find it somewhere nearby and try to buy it from someone who's treating their community with the same respect that you would show yours. For instance, instead of buying that shirt from someone who's manufacturing it in a sweatshop somewhere overseas, buy it from someone who's creating manufacturing jobs in your community and paying their workers a living wage. Choose the organic, fair trade coffee or chocolate, so that you know that it was grown with respect for the workers and the environment. Or buy from a certified B Corp that you know is upholding high standards of community and environmental stewardship.
Get involved: Join your local BALLE chapter or start one of your own! Volunteer for some local BALLE initiatives and start creating a more sustainable, prosperous, connected and joyful community!

How to Compare Proposals from Different Web Development Firms

2010-06-29T10:07:00.000-04:00

By Elisa Miller-Out, Singlebrook Technology, Inc.
Let's say that your company needs to build a custom web application to help them manage some of their internal processes. Your company goes through the RFP (Request for Proposal) process and collects detailed estimates and proposals from many different web development firms. It comes time to compare the different proposals. It's sometimes hard to tell the difference between the varying processes and technical skill level of the different vendors, so many people focus mainly on price when comparing web vendors. But when you look at these different proposals, how do you know that you're not comparing apples and oranges? While budget is a very important factor to consider, you need to think about whether you're going to see increased long term costs by going with what seems like the cheapest quote up front, without considering the other factors that can help you choose the right web vendor for your project.

To illustrate, let me tell you a story about a man who was building a house. He got quotes from several different contractors. He saw that the quotes were all a little different, but he was a chef, not a contractor and he wasn't sure exactly what went into the building of a house. So, he went with the contractor that gave him the lowest quote. Before long, he had a house that looked fine on the outside, but was built with the cheapest materials and the quickest, shortcut, cob job processes possible. The house seemed pretty nice at first, but it soon became clear that the house was not build to last. Things started to break and he had to hire more contractors to make repairs. Then the man got married and decided he wanted to put an addition on to the house, but he discovered that because it wasn't built well to begin with, he wouldn't be able to build the addition without shoring up the work on the original house. As the costs began to pile up, the man realized that the original low quote he got just didn't seem that low anymore! He ended up spending more on repairs than he would have if he'd just gone with a different contractor and built the house right to begin with! In the end, he had to tear down the house and start all over again.

What does this story have to do with choosing a web development vendor? Well, it's helpful to understand a little bit about a company's process and what goes into their code before you decide who you want to hire to build your custom web application. Make sure you read the proposal carefully and check client references too! The vendor with the lowest quote might end up being the right choice for your project, but you should make sure you know why their quote is low and be certain that it's not at the expense of building a quality web application that will be reliable, scalable and can be easily changed and added to as your needs change. Sometimes it's important to spend a little more time and money up front to make sure that you have a solution that will be the most cost effective over the long haul. Remember--when you have a poorly built application, it's not just the costs that can creep up on you. It's the extra time, effort and frustration that builds up when you have to deal with a problematic application for years to come!

What's special about our process and code here at Singlebrook? For one thing, we use an Agile project management process, which has several key benefits:

    * Flexibility. The ability to change course or make adjustments reduces risk and ensures that you’re getting what you need. You’ll also never have to have the common and unpleasant “that’s not in the specs” discussion. We use automated testing to ensure that the software that we write always works as intended, not just when it’s first written. Having a library of automated tests allows us to make changes freely without having to worry about breaking things elsewhere in the software. The tests will tell us if anything needs attention after a change.
    * Scalability. Because of automated testing, it's easy to add on to the software and expand functionality or build new features without compromising the original application. As your organization grows and changes, your custom software can grow and change along with it.
    * Early Value Delivery. In traditional software development, you don’t view the completed software until the very end of the process. With Agile, the most important parts of the project, which the client has selected and prioritized, are completed first and you can start using your application as early as two weeks into the process.
    * Transparency. You can view the project and give input throughout the development process, not just at the beginning and the end.

There's a lot more that goes into our development process such as the selection of the right technologies for a project, the use of source control and the use of Agile tools such as Pivotal Tracker for communicating with clients. We'll explore some other areas in future blog posts. In the meantime, as you review web development proposals, please keep in mind that there's a lot more there to consider than just the price at the end of the proposal! Sometimes the solution that appears the cheapest ends up being the most expensive in terms of costs, time, effort and frustration in the long run.

Singlebrook Rails Template

2010-06-28T13:33:00.002-04:00

You all know about Rails Templates, right? They make it easy to setup a new Rails application with common components. Here's our Rails template, in which we ditch Prototype, add Authlogic, and grab Factory Girl (among others).

Benefit Corporation Legislation

2010-06-23T20:34:00.003-04:00

Singlebrook Technology has joined forces with B Lab and the American Sustainable Business Council in conjunction with the New York State chapters of BALLE (Business Alliance for Local Living Economies) to support the Benefit Corporation legislation that’s passed the New York State Senate and is currently in the New York State Assembly (A.11498, which has been sponsored by Assemblyman Brodsky).

Tens of thousands of companies are integrating sustainability and social innovation into their business models. A New Economy is emerging that requires new market infrastructure to grow. Corporate leaders need to be able to shape business models that enable them to satisfy the demands of investors, employees and customers who increasingly demand that corporations serve both shareholders and society, considering the impact of their decisions on multiple stakeholders rather than maintaining a singular focus on short term financial maximization.

Unfortunately, this New Economy is struggling with corporate laws made to support the Old Economy, including laws that force corporate leaders to put profits before people in order to fulfill their fiduciary duties. The Benefit Corporation Bill would leave these old forms intact for those who want them, but it would create a new option without impacting the state budget that:

•    Removes legal impediments preventing businesses and investors from making their own decisions to use sustainability and social innovation as a competitive advantage, particularly in liquidity scenarios;
•    Legitimizes and accelerates development of a New Economy in New York by providing legal recognition for businesses that adopt higher standards of corporate purpose, accountability, and transparency;
•    Rebuilds public trust in business by demonstrating that businesses are willing to be held accountable to create value for both shareholders and society;
•    Serves as a platform for policymakers to provide in the future a variety of tailored tax, procurement, and investment incentives for private sector businesses addressing public benefit objectives.

Please join the growing list of business and community leaders who are supporting this effort.

1.    Sign the petition: http://org2.democracyinaction.org/o/6269/p/dia/action/public/?action_KEY=3371
2.    Please call Assemblyman Sheldon Silver's Office: 518-455-3791. You don't have to be in his district because this is for the Assembly as a whole, but it will help if you are in his district. Urge him to have another meeting of the Corporation Committee for the Benefit Corporation Legislation A11498 (same as S7855) and get it to the floor, so the Assembly can vote on it.

Handy Helper Methods Testing Domain-specific Routing for Functional Tests

2010-06-14T12:49:00.005-04:00

We've been doing some domain-specific routing lately with a Rails project, so here's a few helper methods that we use in our test environment to test these routes.

First, we have a little method to set the test host's domain value. This is in addition to just setting @request.host, since we're using some plugins for additional routing flexibility, we mock out the response from ActionController itself:

And then we can use the assert_routing method in our tests to make sure our routing is working. Since it's often nice to make sure that a particular route does NOT exist as well, here's a little method to assert_not_routing, which takes the same arguments as assert_routing:

And see it all together in a functional test:

Virgin BroadBand2Go USB Modem Connectivity -- Solved

2010-06-09T15:49:00.002-04:00

I couldn't connect to my data network through the Virgin BroadBand2Go software that came with my USB modem. It would just connect then immediately disconnect from the network. No explanation. Hardly anyone else seems to have that problem, for some reason. Checking my console, I would see the following errors:


com.novatelwireless.mobilink3[641] /Users/sweng/Perforce/NovaCore/Main/CAPI/core/build/mac/../../../connection_mac/SystemConfigurationCommon.c:717: failed assertion `(errorResult != noErr) || (servicesDict == NULL) || (*serviceOrder == NULL) || (CFDictionaryGetCount(*servicesDict) == CFArrayGetCount(*serviceOrder))'

[0x0-0x1b01b].com.novatelwireless.mobilink3[390] Failed with error 100032

Well, we know whoever programmed the software for this junk used Perforce. Does that explain a lot? I think mayhaps it does.

Regardless, I finally got the modem working again by eschewing the crappy piece of connection software that came with the modem, and instead using Apple's Networking utility in the System Preferences.

I went to System Preferences -> Network, then added a new interface. If you'd installed the drivers you'll see an options for Virgin Mobile. Select that, then set the account name and password to your account and pin number you signed up for the service with.

Next, click on the "Advanced" button, and and select "Novatel Wireless Inc." from the Vnedor list, and model of "CDMA". Click "OK", "Apply", and then, finally, "Connect". You should be able to log into the service without using the junk software that came with the modem.

Rails Bugmash Wrap Up

2010-05-17T10:52:00.010-04:00

Singlebrook had a great Bugmash on Saturday. Six developers from Ithaca's small (but committed) Ruby community showed up to help move Rails 3.0 to a release candidate.

Everyone here was a first-time contributor, so we had a range of successes, from merely getting systems up and ready to run the full Rails test suite to testing patches and helping to close active tickets. We all learned a lot about Rails, Ruby, testing, and the Rails ticket system workflow.

I'd like to thank the RailsBridge community for organizing last week's Bugmash. It was great fun.

Aaron, Viola, and Michal mashing away.

Singlebrook's wall-o-IRC, featuring the #railsbridge channel.

Singlebrook president and CTO Leon Miller-Out gets his snack on.

Dave learning to love Git.

Singlebrook Rails BugMash - May 15th

2010-05-07T12:08:00.002-04:00

It's official! Singlebrook will be sponsoring a day of Rails BugMash in Ithaca, open to any Rails developer in the upstate New York area.

Rails 3.0 is on its way to a stable release, and we want it to get there as quickly as possible. Everyone is capable of helping out, from beginners to advanced Rails developers. There's plenty of open tickets to address.

We'll provide caffeine, internet access, and a place to work and meet other Rails developers. Official hours are from 10am - 5pm-ish, Saturday, May 15th, and the location is Singlebrook's downtown Ithaca office (address below).

You may want to come prepared to work with the development branch of Rails. You can read through this very useful BugMash Guide beforehand.

You can read more about the upcoming Rails BugMash at: http://railsbridge.org/news_items/12

You can contact me, Casey Dreier, at casey@singlebrook.com, if you have any questions.

Location Information:

Singlebrook Technology, Inc.
119 S. Cayuga St.
Suite 202
Ithaca, NY 14850

View Larger Map

We're on the second floor, just to the left when you're at the top of the stairs.

See you there!

Paginating Results with the Oracle DB

2010-04-18T11:28:00.002-04:00

While the Oracle DB has some very powerful functionality, it also seems to be missing some very basic functionality. Many developers, including myself, have often struggled with paginating results from an Oracle query. Even after Googling, I find it difficult to find a straightforward solution. So here it is, taken from the implementation in the pretty amazing Oracle Enhanced ActiveRecord Adapter for Ruby on Rails.

The basic idea is to wrap your query with two outer SELECTs. Each one will limit the result's rownum property:

select 
  * 
from (
  select 
    raw_sql_.*, rownum raw_rnum_ 
  from 
    (<YOUR SQL HERE>) raw_sql_ 
  where 
    rownum <= <UPPER LIMIT>
) 
where 
  raw_rnum_ > <LOWER LIMIT>

Where <UPPER LIMIT> is the upper row number you want, and <LOWER LIMIT> is the initial row offset. So say you want to return results 11 - 20 from this query:

SELECT * FROM news_stories ORDER BY date_created DESC

Your query would look like this:

select 
  * 
from (
  select 
    raw_sql_.*, rownum raw_rnum_ 
  from 
    (SELECT * FROM news_stories ORDER BY date_created DESC) raw_sql_ 
  where 
    rownum <= 20
) 
where 
  raw_rnum_ > 10

Brute Force protection for CopSSH Server

2010-01-21T14:29:00.003-05:00

We've used the CopSSH package to provide SSH and SFTP service on various Windows servers. Until now, we have not had a solution in place to block brute force attacks on the SSH server. We use the excellent fail2ban on our Linux systems, but we had not found a similar tool for Windows.

Yesterday we came across a solution to this problem:

http://www.itefix.no/i2/node/12081

It works very well on a Windows Server 2008 system where we've deployed it. The only thing it's lacking is a way to automatically remove banned IPs after a period of time. We'll post an addition to this tool if we implement this feature.

64-bit MySQL, 32-bit Ruby

2010-01-02T14:10:00.003-05:00

Happy New Year, everyone!

As is far too often the case these days, we ran into a problem while trying to make 32-bit software play nicely with 64-bit software. One of our OS X 10.5 workstations had 64-bit MySQL installed as well as fink's 32-bit ruby. It took some time to sort out, but we ultimately solved the problem by following these instructions. Thanks to Josh there for the creative (though rather hackish) solution!

Visit us: www.singlebrook.com

Old Bukowski Poem about Technology

2009-11-19T11:07:00.003-05:00

Posted by Elisa: Of course the technology described in the poem is ancient, but it still resonates somehow.

16-bit Intel 8088 chip

with an Apple Macintosh
you can't run Radio Shack programs
in its disc drive.
nor can a Commodore 64
drive read a file
you have created on an
IBM Personal Computer.
both Kaypro and Osborne computers use
the CP/M operating system
but can't read each other's
handwriting
for they format (write
on) discs in different
ways.
the Tandy 2000 runs MS-DOS but
can't use most programs produced for
the IBM Personal Computer
unless certain
bits and bytes are
altered
but the wind still blows over
Savannah
and in the Spring
the turkey buzzard struts and
flounces before his
hens.

Charles Bukowski

Log database activity for one user (PostgreSQL)

2009-08-31T11:13:00.005-04:00

Author: Jared Beck
Date: 2009/08/31
Keywords: log PostgreSQL psql postres log_statement database activity

Problem: You need to log all statements executed by a particular user.
Solution: Luckily, you can set a configuration_parameter for a particular role (aka user)

ALTER ROLE name SET log_statement = 'all'

Don't forget to turn it off when you are done:

ALTER ROLE name SET log_statement = 'none'

Be aware that logging has an overhead cost. That's one reason we wanted to only log one user.

Finally, the log file location is your "data directory" unless you configured it to be elsewhere. By default Postgres will prepend the lines you want with "LOG:" so you can grep those lines.

References:

http://www.postgresql.org/docs/8.4/interactive/runtime-config-logging.html

IE7 Bug:

2009-03-27T12:20:00.004-04:00

Author: Jared Beck
Date: 3/27/2009

Regarding the initial value of option elements, W3C HTML Spec Section 17.6 says:

"[The value] attribute specifies the initial value of the control. If this attribute is not set, the initial value is set to the contents of the OPTION element."

Example: <option>foobar</option> should have the initial value "foobar". IE7 fails to set the initial value correctly. IE returns the empty string.

Solution: Developers should explicitly set the value attribute for all option elements.

TortoiseSVN, .exe, and TrendMicro OfficeScan

2009-02-03T09:23:00.000-05:00

While building out a staging server for a client, we encountered a strange situation in which TortoiseSVN was unable to check out a working copy of the application. It was getting an "Access is denied" message while trying to write some of the metadata files (in .svn) for an .exe file that was part of the project. The permissions on the folder looked fine. We eventually determined that the TrendMicro OfficeScan real-time virus scanner was causing the problem. After disabling it, we were able to check out the working copy. Subsequent updates with the virus scanner on have worked fine, but we haven't made any changes to .exe files, so we can't say if it's just a checkout issue or if it affects updates too.

IE bug: Image buttons do not submit value

2008-07-02T16:36:00.000-04:00

Author: Jared
Date: July 2, 2008
Keywords: IE input type="image" button submit submission post not defined undefined value

Symptom: Your form has a image button named Z (an input with type="image"). Your form handling page expects Z to be defined. Z is not defined. You are using Internet Explorer. It works fine in Firefox.

Check this: Using IE still, see if Z.x and Z.y are defined. They are, right? But Z is not defined!

Cause: Internet Explorer doesn't define Z. It just doesn't.

Does IE's behavior match the HTML spec? No. Under section 17.13 "Form submission" the spec says "Every successful control has its control name paired with its current value as part of the submitted form data set" (HTML 4.01 Specification)

Will this be fixed in IE? Maybe IE8 beta does, I haven't checked.