Mister Nifty » Development

Free Wordpress SMS plugin from Mister Nifty

Brian Fegter — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 23:44:06 +0000

I’m very excited to announce the latest version of my new plugin for Wordpress. EasySMS installs right into the back-end admin panel and a simple sidebar form installs by dragging and dropping the widget on your sidebar. Once people start subscribing, you can categorize them in groups and send SMS messages right from Wordpress. Another cool feature is automatic SMS messages broadcast your lastest post (optional). I’m very excited about the possibilities for churches to keep in touch with their congregations and leaders right from their websites! The best part is it is FREE for the taking. So, what are you waiting for? Go over and grab yourself some Mister Nifty goodness for your website. If you don’t have a WordPress site, we feel sorry for you. Go get yourself one for free! http://www.wordpress.org

Download EasySMS here

Features:

*   Owner Verification of cell phones with unsubscribe feature
*   AJAX sidebar widget form with custom title and terms of agreement.
*   Subscriber groups
*   Track how many SMS message have been sent to each subscriber.
*   Auto-notification of new posts to subscribers (optional)
*   Custom text messages from admins only
*   Message preview before sending SMS
*   80 default carriers
*   Delete/Add/Edit and Carriers
*   Edit/Delete Subscribers
*   WP Administration compatible interface.
*   Stats snapshot on dashboard.
*   New subscriber notification. (optional)

Screenshots

Sidebar Form

Send SMS

Carrier Table

Groups Table

Subscriber Groups

Settings

Create Awesome Flash Widgets

Brian Fegter — Thu, 23 Oct 2008 15:59:03 +0000

Sprout has just announced that it no longer is providing a free service. You can see their pricing on their website.

Sprout Builder is a great tool that helps you easily build flash banners and widgets for your site. It’s free and you can build all kinds of cool things that interact with social platforms. This is a great idea to build MySpace banners for youth events that young people can embed on their sites. I created a quick widget with my Twitter feed and my personal blog RSS to show you how it works!

Make your church site iPhone friendly

Brian Fegter — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 13:15:32 +0000

I found this great little kit to help web developers recreate their sites into iPhone format. The templates are already set up. All you have to do is copy/paste your content code and build simple menu structures. Then, set up a separate directory or subdmain on your server for the alternate site. I would use something like http://m.yourchurchsite.com or http://yourchurchsite.com/m

You can download the iWebKit here for free!

Google’s New Browser

Brian Fegter — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 17:09:08 +0000

My initial reaction to Google Chrome (Google’s new web browser) was not so good. I’m a Mac user and I always take issue with Google shunning the Mac community with their software developments in Picasa and now with Chrome. With that personal pet peeve aside, here are a few things I see that are positive. First, the new Google browser has separated processes for each tab. This means that if one of your websites ‘locks-up’ the rest of your browser doesn’t crash. You are also able to view the memory usage right from the browser for each tab and each plugin (i.e. Flash, Silverlight, etc…) that are currently running. You can also terminate the processes for each if they are “misbehaving”. Anothing thing I do like about Chrome is that it is open source, so it shows Google’s commitment to bettering the internet experience and not being proprietary.

Keep in mind, the more Google products you have, you become a greater part of their audience for marketing. One of my main concerns is how Google will use their own browser for ad sales. One of their core features is the smart URL box that gives you suggestions for sites based on keywords. I can see Google using Adwords to sell spots that will have greater relevance in the URL box. I’m not too thrilled about that. Also, Google is trying to recapture third-party searches, so they don’t have to pay people like Mozilla or Apple for sending searches their way. (That cute little search screen that says firefox and google, or the browser search bar costs Google money millions of affiliate fees every year!) The motivation behind this project is all about the benjamins.

My last concern is regarding their “incognito” browsing window. Basically, a web user can open a ’secret’ window and surf anywhere without leaving a trail in the browser. Once the window is closed, there is no local footprint of that session. Parents who download this browser need to make sure their children are not surfing “incognito”. It presents an easier way to view mature content without being tracked. Typically, a user has to clear the history, form data, cookies etc. to cover inappropriate content usage. This also leaves a distinct empty footprint. With the “incognito” feature, a user will never have to clear history, cookies, etc. They can browse whatever they wish, and then close the window without ever being detected. Google, in my opinion has broken down yet another barrier to pornography in the home with this specific feature. If you use Chrome, please make sure you have an adequate content filtering system that will keep your users safe from mature content.

I am an avid Firefox user. I have used it for years and I have it loaded with all of my favorite add-ons, userstyles, and Greasemonkey scripts to make my web experience more enjoyable. I personally am not switching to Chrome as it is a first generation product. I can see where Chrome could overtake the market in the future with it’s core processing features. Other browsers will certainly have to come on board with this new technique. (Side note: this is not new technology, it’s new programming technique built on the platform that Safari was created on). All-in-all, Chrome presents a minimalistic experience that is clean and somewhat elementary in appearance. It is made to be lightweight, very fast, dummyproof, and they are testing millions of sites on it every month to make it more stable and secure. You can download your free copy of Chrome here and see for yourself. I’m interested in your take on Chrome. Leave a comment and tell us your opinion.

Check out this video for more features and a quick tour from my friend Ray Deck over at MinistryLife.org. (If you can’t see the video here, use this link http://www.vimeo.com/1660881)

Click here to view the embedded video.

Convert Powerpoints to Flash

Brian Fegter — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 05:52:53 +0000

Have you ever wanted to post a Powerpoint presentation on the web? Now you can for free with iSpring! It’s a great little application that allows you to convert what was once a proprietary file to be used only in presentation software into a web friendly Flash file that can be embedded on a website. This nifty tool can get some of your polished slideshows on your church websites for the world to see. I love free stuff.

Create e-books for free!

Brian Fegter — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 05:12:49 +0000

Issuu is a great tool I just found to publish virtually any type of static material on the web. Issuu has a neato interface that lets you read the content like a book. Say you want to publish an article on your website, all you have to do is upload your pdf, doc, or a variety of other formats to Issuu and they do all the work. They give you an embed code you can place on your website. The result is a fabulous virtual book that people can literally flip through right from your own page. It’s totally cool and totally free! Check out this e-book I made of some photos I took of one of my old cameras. You can see it here!

Embed your docs in your website!

Brian Fegter — Mon, 08 Oct 2007 12:02:37 +0000

I stumbled across this great new service from Adobe – Adobe Share Beta. I assume Adobe is allowing this to be free while in beta stage and eventually will charge for the service once they get all the bugs worked out of it. Basically, you can upload your documents/files and share them with anyone via email or embedding them in your website. I really like seeing a preview of my document on the website before downloading. I hate having to wait for Acrobat to open up to see my PDF’s. It’s just a terrible waste of energy. I know, patience is a virtue, but not with Adobe (they charge for everything!!!). Use it to display a preview of your church bulletin, forms, and various other documents people need access to on your website. Another great feature is they can share it with others as well directly from your website. Might as well take advantage of this cool tool while it lasts!!

Click Read More to see an example of a document embedded in a website.

Free mass mailing software.

Brian Fegter — Sun, 07 Oct 2007 06:55:58 +0000

After researching dozens of list servers for emailing our entire congregation, I found Pommo. It’s a wonderfully free software that takes a bit of tech experience to get running. You can import all your contacts, add whatever information to each field, create check boxes for different lists, filter the lists down to groups, and many more cool things. Basically, I log on to pommo, click mailing, select my recipient group, fill in my subject line, who it’s from, a reply address, select a programmed template (you have to create your own via FrontPage or your own HTML editor) and then send a test email to myself to make sure it’s perfect. Once I’ve done that I hit send mail, and I reach over 700 people in one click. The difference between using this software and using your Outlook software is that this sends 700 different emails rather than one email to 700 people (this is referred to as SPAMMING). Some of the greatest features of this software is that people can unsubscribe if they don’t want your emails, and you can personalize each email you send out based on whatever information is in their data record, (i.e. First Name, ministry group, etc.). This has made a huge difference in how we communicate with the church. Read past the screenshots for tech advice on installing this.

Tech Advice:

You will need to download the zip file containing the software.

Expand it to a directory on your hard drive.

Create a directory on your web server and upload the contents to that web directory. (I used a sub-domain – mailings.mydomain.com – ask your hosting provider for more information how to do this with your domain).

Once you’ve uploaded everything, you need to go to your control panel and find where you can add a MYSQL database. Get the server address, database name, user name, and password. You will need to add these to the config file.

Open the file called config.sample.php and find where you input the database information. Then save this file as config.php and upload it to your web directory.

Next, open your browser, go to: http://www.yourdomain.com/pommodirectory/install

The software will do an automatic install from here out. Have fun. Visit pommo.org for more information and support.

Use Leafletter to create free mini websites!

Brian Fegter — Sat, 06 Oct 2007 14:02:31 +0000

This is an exciting tool that I’ve been looking at for a while. You don’t have to be a tech genius to create a mini website. I have created a simple tutorial using the Leafletter mini site to show you how it works. You can use it for advertisements on your current website, announce events, or even put together your own mini youth site your kids can post on their social networking site. The possibilities are endless with 36 cool layouts. You can upload your own image, grab from Flikr, or even take an image from your current website. They give you up to 10 pages on each mini site that you can link together. Check out the one I made. It’s neato and it’s a freebie!

Google Checkout is free for non-profits!

Brian Fegter — Wed, 03 Oct 2007 12:16:23 +0000

This is something your organization will really benefit from if you aren’t yet processing donations online. Google has been so generous to offer 501c3 status organizations free donation processing until 2009. There are no monthly fees or setup fees. It’s an entire year of free processing. I just love free stuff.